Ruth sat bolt upright in the clearing, startling several birds that had been hopping over him and pecking at the strange scaled cloth that covered his torso. He stared blankly ahead of him, trying to remember what had happened. There had been, of course, a number of things that he had figured out because he had exploited the weakness of the immortal and deadly text. The immortal and deadly text was no match for his intellect and was quickly overcome, spilling many secrets.

There was something about dragons not being the greatest ever but that idea was giving him a pain deep in his brain. Ruth immediately gave up thinking about it.

Speaking of the immortal and deadly text box. Now that Ruth knew that it was weak to the massive size of his brain, it was time to keep pushing the thing until it agreed to become his underling. He had never had an underling before and was actually looking forward to the prospect.

Ruth stood up and brushed himself off. He paid little mind to the dirt and grass that was still clinging tenaciously to him in places. There were important things to do and he couldn’t be bothered by this long piece of grass that was stuck in the curl of his head horn. Okay, yes, he could definitely be bothered by it. He pulled the piece of grass out of the loop and threw the offending thing to the ground.

Triumphant against grass, nature, and unnatural things alike, Ruth began to search for the immortal and deadly text.

It was gone. Was it possible it had understood that it was vulnerable to him now? Had it fled? Ruth frowned because that seemed somewhat unlikely. The poor thing didn’t seem smart enough to realize that he had it by the dewclaw. Perhaps, something had happened?

“Appear.”

Nothing.

“I have questions. Questions only…” Well, it was probably best to assert dominance now. “...a capable minion could answer! There is a place in my newly thought of clutch. Strange that I would consider a non-dragon but these are strange times. Now come out.”

Truth be told Ruth had heard of dragons having minions but had never seen it himself. It had never come up because he was a very competent dragon and had no need for lesser beings bungling things in his lair. Minions had always seemed like a huge risk to him. Things were different now. He didn’t have a hoard currently and thought that a minion might actually be useful. Ruth immediately disregarded a small voice in the back of his head that suggested he actually didn’t know much about dragons since he’d only met two or three in passing. At least, few that he hadn’t eaten. It was a dragon eat dragon world sometimes.

Back to thinking of the merits of owning minions.

He couldn’t eat the immortal and deadly text box, this was true. He would have to touch the thing in order to be able to eat it. That really wasn’t the stupid creature’s fault though. Ruth should be magnanimous enough to allow it to serve him as a decoy or distraction if nothing else. Rudimentary intelligence suggested the creature could provide companionship at the moment. Truth be told he was feeling a little lonely without Peggy to keep him company.

Moment of silence for Peggy. Why did she have to be so brave? He closed his eyes and grimaced at the memory. The wound was still fresh. Despite the immeasurable albeit momentary sadness, there was also a hint of pride. She had plummeted in such a straight line…

“Explain my mana,” something to immortalize Peggy by way of a memorial would have to wait. The immortal and deadly text would come if he inquired about his mana. It was only too pleased to tell him how much he had.

...and nothing happened.

Ruth frowned and reached up, scratching part of his inner right ear as he considered this interesting development. Perhaps the box had something important to do elsewhere? No matter. Ruth didn’t need a minion! He closed his eyes and felt the circulation of his mana. He was bursting with vigor and power! He suspected that the numbers would be high if they were shown to him as the immortal and deadly text’s childish numerical scrawlings. There also seemed to be five bursting black stars! The spell slots that were available to him were all full as well.

Despite the abruptness of his last rest, he felt pretty good. He didn’t really remember why he had decided to lie down and pass out, but no matter! He thought he might have fainted because of some sort of treachery perpetrated by the deadly and immortal text but chose to remember it differently. In fact, he chose to remember it as the time he decided to take a nap for no other reason than he’d felt like it. Ruth did not faint. Certainly not again.

Ruth stood up and made a mental checklist of things to do and resources available.

First things first. Food is needful? Yes, eventually. Obtain food from the nearby dead spider? No. It had been sitting out for some time and his belly was telling him it would not complain too arduously if he left it and sought out fresher prey.

Next was the question of his plans. He needed to find a way out of this area. Ruth had followed the river out of the goblin area but that hadn’t been a real winner. There had been the furry creatures with envy evoking hats. Between the small creatures with hats and the Goblins, Ruth didn’t think there was a clear winner or loser. Both of them had pointy things and had been more than willing to attack him with no thought to their own safety. They were not ideal neighbors and this wasn’t an ideal place to settle anyway.

Sassy tail is checked off? Yes, it is still there and being sassy. It might have been his imagination but he thought it gave a derisive little swing there at the end as if it couldn’t believe he had doubted it. Nevermind. It was time to figure out what he could do with this thing.

Ruth tried to imagine having wings and thought about moving them up and down. He didn’t have wings of course but some of his muscles still remembered that they were supposed to move. His tail swayed, as if in amusement. Interesting...and useless! Alright. He thought about trying to move it directly like the old tail. It moved obediently left and right. Why hadn’t he tried that first?!

Ruth picked up a stick from the ground and held it behind him. The tail curled around it and took the weight. Ruth grunted in disgust. It wasn’t exactly like moving his old tail. The old tail had a lot more muscle and was like moving a huge rope or whip. This tail had more sensitivity and seemed capable of better grabbing motions. He raised the stick up and down with his tail. Well, this bore investigation. He would just carry the stick with his tail and get used to the situation of having something that could grab things for him.

Ruth thought about what else he had. Magic? Obviously.

His clothes? Come to think of it…

His clothes were still shiny and black and were starting to separate into individual scales like they were patterning naturally. They appeared in good shape considering the dragging and intense bouts of combat. He still only had one sleeve but the pantlegs seemed to go down further than they used to?

How was that possible?

With a sneaky suspicion, Ruth thought about the fabric retreating and it immediately showed his mid-riff and then started to snake down toward his crotch. Horror. Ruth immediately wished to cover the area.

His goblin skirt was gone. He had not taken it off.

His new clothing had eaten it.

Come to think of it. He was eating quite a bit compared to when he was a dragon(nevermind that he wasn’t eating enough now). He hadn’t felt the need to relieve himself eith-.

NOPE. NOT THINKING ABOUT THE CLOTHES.

Time to go and do something. Anything.

Time to pick a direction. Having been Ruth-napped by the cow had certainly thrown a wrench into things. A quick glance up. Ruth nodded to himself in confirmation, a slight smile parted his lips.

Ah, yes, that makes sense. He had no idea.

Ruth had no way of telling where he was and no knowledge of how to figure out the direction he had been carried. Ruth nodded to himself a second time. Ruth was even more lost than he had been. Yep. Dammit.

Ruth looked back across the clearing and then at the now burned out path of destruction through the once healthy and green foliage.

“What do I think is more of a challenge? Deadly creatures that disguise themselves as dens, or dens that are disguised as plants housing deadly creatures?”

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Neither option appealed to him. In front of him was a path through the forest that was full of charred plants and trees that extended for just about as far as he could see in that direction. Naturally, at some point, he would be endangered by spiders and who knows what else. If he returned the way he had run he might encounter spiders, who knew what else, deadly dens, and more cows.

Ruth narrowed his eyes in deep thought and finally started walking through the quite burned out forest. In the end he chose to go through the forest in this direction and see what lay beyond. Almost solely because his furious brainpower had said that either direction absolutely sucked and it didn’t matter.

Less than ten steps later Ruth smiled because he knew he’d chosen correctly. Ruth loved the smell of things that had just been on fire. The pungent stench of ash, smoke, burned web and hair was overpowering.

It offset the weird feeling that he had when he very vaguely acknowledged his clothes seemed to feed off other clothes and his digestive process.

So Ruth set forth, his tail moving up and down with the stick, occasionally swinging it like it was a weapon. Every once in awhile his butt would clench eliciting the infrequent exasperated sigh from him.

↢↦

Arathan looked up from its perch at the edge of the space. Ruth’s soul space no longer had the shape of a dragon. At least, not quite as literally dragonesque as it once was. It was more of a ball now, with lumps that could have been stubby legs and spots on top that might have once been shaped like wings. In addition to the new rounder shape, it was about twice as large as it had been the first time Arathan had visited it.

Not to say that it was big. Arathan could probably still flap her wings just once and be clear through it.

The creature inside of it was still as spiteful and angry at the universe as ever, seemingly unchanged by the process of molding Ruth’s soul space and the massive influx of mana that Tamara’s soul scouring had done.

Right now the little thing was chasing a small creature made out of Arathan’s aura. A small red rabbit, smokey and ephemeral, hopping frantically around the circle. This was the second rabbit that Arathan had made. The first one had just hopped directly toward the little creature in the middle of Ruth’s soul space and jumped up and down on it until it had started the rattle-rattle thing that it did when it was pissed off.

The rattle was full force now as the creature had learned something from the earlier rabbit. It was much more motivated this time around. It didn’t seem like it wanted to leave Ruth’s space so Arathan was humoring it for the moment by letting the rabbit hop very close to the edge now and again.

SHAKE-SHAKE-SHAKE-SHAKE

The nice thing about this, other than it was a good way to train the small soul shape to be aggressive to invaders, was that Arathan got her first look at this little creature. It rushed forward low to the ground in a circle as it stayed just behind the rabbit. Four small feet ending with four clicking talons and one little dewclaw. It was pitch black. No. Arathan squinted.

It was midnight black with a hint of dark blue. Jagged lines were subtly carved into the hide in a snakelike pattern on its back. It had the same sort of reptilian eyes that Ruth sported, golden vertical slits over a black backdrop. Tiny curved horns adorned the head in the same shape Ruth had but were tighter almost like that of a nautilus shell. Two nascent wings popped out of the back, useless for now. Considering the size of the feet relative to his body, Arathan surmised that this creature would get at least five times the current size it was now. Maybe bigger.

The tail at the end of the creature was the most intriguing part. It looked like a reptile’s tail, of course. Well, maybe a bit like an amphibian’s tail, too. A salamander? A dragon? A lizard? The similarity became sketchy because it ended in a sort of small pine-cone rattle that some serpent’s had. It shook now and again simply from the movement but rattled especially aggressively when the creature was excited. Just past the rattle organ, there seemed to be a sharpened point.

The way the thing comically rushed about when it was excited had caused Arathan to name it Rush. Tamara had named Ruth, so it was only fitting to Arathan that she got to name the soul shape.

Arathan cocked her head slightly and watched closely this time. She had a slight expectation after her previous experiment.

Rush had reached out two of his short stubby feet as he pounced forward. He landed on top of the projection of the rabbit and pinned it against the nothing floor. A quick and furtive look around. A small hiss of warning as it saw Arathan perched lazily nearby. Rush wiggled his butt back and forth as he slowly worked to drag the struggling aura shape back into the relative safety of Ruth’s soul space. Like he recognized that the creature was too big for him to fit it all in his mouth and didn't care; he tilted his head and bit down enthusiastically. It took a big chunk of Arathan’s aura. Aura that belonged to Arathan and should have just dissipated...and ate it.

Big chews as the aura bubbled and tried to escape. Rush bit aggressively in the air at it, recapturing it, and chewed some more. His small eyes turned to happy little contented slits. His claws extended even further as part of the aura projection rabbit continued to try and escape below. Rush finally swallowed the bite he had and began to turn his attention to the rest of the rabbit.

Arathan had just confirmed it. This creature was capable of devouring aura. That was a pretty damn terrifying thing.

Was this what Tamara had seen when she had become intrigued?

Arathan closed her eyes a little bit and ignored the weird feeling of still being in control of an aura nearby and losing feeling to it. Rush could eat it, so, why not? It would keep the stupid thing busy for a minute while Arathan thought.

Devouring wasn’t a rare talent. There were lots of creatures that devoured other creatures and gained useful mana, abilities, or even stole aspects of their meals.

Devouring aspects that included soul power, on the other hand, was very rare. When soul shape’s combatted each other they relied on the energy they produced to strike blows at each other. If your enemy could eat your attack, your defense, and -- well… you…

Every soul aura was different. Trying to eat or incorporate another soul aura often resulted in an explosion.

Shake-shake-shake-shake

Arathan opened her eyes. She was amused to see that Rush was about half a foot away from the soul space and staring at her with intent eyes. He shook his butt at her in a challenge.

Arathan smirked and rolled her eyes in response.

This seemed to encourage Rush who took another half-step away from the space. He lowered his body and his tail swayed behind him back and forth…

Scared food. It was such a childish series of images that Arathan almost didn't guess the meaning. Still.

Arathan’s eyes snapped open and her head tilted. Had this little thing just talked shit to her?

“Caw-caw-caw-caw.” Arathan lowered her head slightly and spread her wings. A bright red glow started at her breast and started to creep toward the soul space. The nothingness around Arathan began to shake as if it could barely stand the contact. The soul space behind Rush actually started to ripple in response to the waves.

Rush surprised her again when he lowered his head in response and a small tongue played over his lips. His butt started to wiggle in excitement.

Shake-shake-shake-shake-shake-shake-shake-shake.

Arathan felt the wind being blown out of her sails. Her aura dispersed dejectedly. This little thing wasn’t even smart enough for her to bully.

Arathan cocked her head at the wiggling little thing. That little ball of hate needed a lesson.

Arathan was just trying to decide what would be more fun: a horde of small rabbits jumping up and down on Rush’s head, or a horde of small bunnies with knives, when her attention immediately focused to a faraway spot.

Come to me. It is time to feast.

Arathan spread her wings and was gone in a long streak of red, disappearing in a fraction of a second. Crimson light flashed briefly in the far distance and then, nothing.

Rush stopped wiggling his butt and stared for a long moment. Finally, he turned around with a ‘hmmph’ and sashayed back into the soul space.

It had fought a valiant battle these last few hours. It was the king of this space. The strangely delicious dangerous crow fleeing was an affirmation of his superiority.

↢↦

It was a natural thing, really. Anyone would have expected it to happen.

Ruth stood near the edge of the scorched earth where the fire had finally died down and stared ahead into the forest that continued on. It was green, healthy, full of spider webs and the frantic call of small creatures trying to attract mates…

Ruth didn’t trust it a bit.

Ruth knew what to do now when he didn’t trust things.

Ruth raised his hand and pointed, eyes burning brightly as he gathered his mana and cast Generic Thunder Struck.

The otherwise perfectly blue sky above darkened as an insane amount of cloud coverage seemed to apparate out of nothing. The rumbling started and there was a brief moment of charged excitement as the waves of lightning came crashing down.

They weren’t quite as awe-inspiring in the overcast daylight, but the effect was much the same.

Ruth laughed madly at the sky as he watched the fire start to spread through the dry underbrush. Already the creatures low and high began to call out ‘danger’ in their native tongues. It would take a while before the fire would spread and he could proceed, but he had time.

Ruth felt incredibly superior at the moment and he wasn’t sure why.

Well, he did know why. It was because he was amazing.

↢↦

Two creatures stopped their journey on a plateau they were traveling atop of miles away. Clouds had appeared in mere seconds over a localized area and soon there was thunder sounding out, lightning crashing down, and the sounds of frantic wildlife escaping.

One of the creatures held it’s halberd and crouched down, staring intently at the area with yellow eyes. Both creatures had straight horns, the head of a goat, and a body that might have generously been called humanoid. Nimble hands held weapons aloft as both creatures looked at each other and then unanimously decided on their next course of action. Cloven hooves dug into the sides of the plateau as they skidded down the fairly steep dirt and rock sides. Two creatures, one with a halberd and one with a bow, disappeared into the trees.

The direction they had chosen to charge toward? The localized lightning phenomenon of course.

Spoiler: Spoiler

★Generic Thunder Struck 75%

Current Mana: 20/20

Spell Slots Available: 4/5