I closed up on the small village. It was the third night in dwarf territory and I had spent a good amount of time finding a place small enough to not be defended insanely well. The sun would rise in an hour or two at the latest. Enough to get a look at least.

The dwarven lands were in stark contrast with their cities and the great wall. They were wild and natural, nearly untouched. Only the immediate surroundings of towns and cities had any farmland, most of the time it was within the outer walls as well. They also had grouped up very close within their towns. Even what I had called a small village was the same size as the larger ork towns. I only saw it as a village because of all the large collections of buildings I had spotted the nights before. And because there was no inner wall surrounding a nearly wild area with a node.

I wondered, why this town had been built at all. It was the first place to not be centred on a node. A large lake was visible a little further east. It also was dug halfway into a cliff forming a sort of semicircle around the rocky walls. There I spotted, what they wanted from here. Stone. Building material, probably for their wall and a lot of buildings. The roads were the same quality here as between the big cities. This had to be one of their main quarries.

As I got near, I activated my senses to look for magic. It would do me no good to run straight into invisible defences. There was nothing. No wards, no artefacts on the soldier manning the wall, not even tools or weapons of magical energy. At least the natural magical energy of the people themselves existed, otherwise I would have turned away immediately. Though, deep into the quarry I got a sense of some powerful energy. It was pure earthen mana and slowly pushed outwards. Was there a node? Something to investigate later possibly.

For now, I wanted to get a read on dwarven culture. It was intriguing how they used technology powered by mana crystals but avoided any magical gear. I found a secluded spot in a dilapidated attic and set in for the day. It was close to the quarry right next to a large building with a lot of wagons standing to its side. I expected a lot of life out and about as soon as the sun rose. Enough to listen in and start learning this new language.

An hour later it started to get noisy. The sky was barely turning into a slightly less dark grey and the dwarves were already getting busy. To my great surprise, I understood every word they were saying. Almost. They spoke Ordugh, the same language the orks used, though a few words were pronounced slightly differently as if it was a dialect. I was still able to catch everything they spoke about. There were talks about food and the weather and the annoying coworker, as in any civilized place. More interesting were the conversations about actual dwarven things. They spoke about mining and stone and digging and hauling stone and building and cutting stone. There was a lot of talk about stone. Apparently, the building across the street was a mining companies dormitory for temporary workers. And they talked about work all the time. I could not understand why, when in-between ‘stone’ ‘rock’ and ‘boulders’ I heard the same people talk about getting to go home in a week or a month.

Curious if they kept their true feelings to themselves, I closed up on the window and tried to get a look at some expressions. That was when I saw a dwarf up close for the first time. Well, there were still over five metres between us, since I sat in the fourth story of a dwarf-house, but this was ‘close-up’ for eyes like mine. I let out a huff of surprise. He looked somewhat as expected but still very different in key places.

First of all, the expected stuff. They had short, stocky builds. A metre tall, some a bit more, some a bit less. Most of them had beards, though none of the women did. There were very few women in this place, which might be due to the nature of the town. They wore clothes from simple materials that looked exceptionally well made. Tiny decorations covered them in tasteful places, sometimes as patterns of strings, sometimes as stone or metal ornaments woven into the cloth. There was a lot of smiling and laughing all around. They really liked what they were doing, or they were just friendly folks altogether.

What took me off guard however were their ears. Different from the normal human ears, which the orks had as well, the dwarves had pointed ears sitting on the top of their heads. They were almost half as long as their head and reminded me strongly of goblin ears. If they were furred I would consider calling them kitsune or wolf-kin. Instead, they had little covers, almost like hats, just for their ears. Most of them were patterned in colourful swirls and lines. A few sets of styles existed, those with the same covers calling each other brother and sister. They looked to be symbols of families or clans. While talking, the pointy organs swivelled and waved with their emotions.

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I almost expected a tail growing from their backsides, but there was none. When I looked closer, they also had rather sharp front teeth. Not fully carnivorous but able to easily cut through skin and meat.

One by one, wagons rolled out towards the quarry. From down the street, more vehicles came by forming a picture like NYC rush hour. Only, there was no angry shouting or blaring horns, but laughter and happy voices all around. This was such a different culture from the orks, I almost thought I had travelled to another world. Only looking up my status screen reaffirmed I had just flown here.

Despite the happy atmosphere, I was sceptical. They had to have some bad eggs, right? Or maybe they were racist, like the orks? Or they had some rule about murdering all monsters that could be a threat to their peaceful life. For now, I was safe in this attic. I could get some rest and leave once night came around.

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Night had fallen and the streets were still full. Of course, dwarves were heavy drinkers. They kept partying deep into the night. At least the moon was only a tiny sickle and the night was dark enough for me to make my escape. I took off, quickly gaining in height to avoid detection. The walls of this small town were manned just like any others and the guards attentive but they had little in aerial defences.

Once I had gained some distance I thought about what to do next. I was nearly half a year old, almost an adult by owl standards. It may be time to find a territory to settle. It would also let me figure out some more magic. I still had not tried anything with my [Eldritch Shift] upgrade. In the end, I would leave again someday. I just enjoyed flying too much. The effortless travel to new places, the wonderful view from up high, all the different cultures and people, even though I kept my distance, their buildings and lifestyles were still interesting to observe. And to top it all off, the big magical secrets and environments this world had to hold. A temporary territory would be good to get some more levels but I would leave it at some point. Luckily, the dwarves had huge swathes of wilderness in between their cities and never seemed to leave their roads. I could pick a nice spot somewhere nearby and get to hunt whatever hid in the trees.

I took towards the lake. It was a likely spot for animals to converge, meaning there would be plenty of prey drawing in predators. Those should make for an interesting hunt. Maybe some herbivores had grown through mana as well. In addition, it would let me do a more detailed test. I was wondering what shifting into my metal form did. Could I still fly, or was I too heavy? How much more resilient would I become? And what about water? Would metal and glass feathers still get bogged down just like my normal ones?

I kept my senses sharp as I approached the body of water. This was how I noticed a large amount of mana flowing out from its centre. Crossing above let me see the source. A large node sat a few metres beneath the surface exuding pure water mana. The water around was moving away from it as if it was creating more. A shadow moved beneath the dark waves. I quickly moved on. Maybe the lake was a bad idea. One of the rivers feeding it should work just as well. There were two smaller rivers coming down the hills into the lake and one large river flowing off south. I picked one of the feeding flows at random and followed it upstream. It took me north, the town in sight to my right. After a few minutes, I passed over a small pond fed by a medium node. This one had a lot of water as well in addition to some entropy and trap. Was all the mana in these mountains produced by nodes?

A rivulet fed the pond which I followed even further up. Soon, I found a place to rest. An old dead tree carved out by lightning and weather formed a wonderful hiding spot. After eating the previous occupant, a squirrel, I had a new home for the time being. Since I wanted to experiment with magic, I expected to use a lot of energy and prepared myself accordingly. Storing a small collection of prey and a few random items such as stones, wood and leaves, I was finally ready to experiment.

I hid in my shelter. It would be annoying to be interrupted while shifting my form. Once again, mana flowed through my inner gate into my body. Tendrils dispersed it evenly all over my form. I was drawing on metal, crystal and order. If I used air instead of order or crystal I might have a higher chance of being able to fly but that was exactly why I did not use it. If the lowest possibility let me move as I pleased, I could be sure any shift would still allow me to take to the air. Slowly, my feathers gained a crystalline sheen and a web of metal, mostly iron and brass, framed the glass constructs. I watched with fascination. My body was by all means of natural laws made of non-living material but I could still move perfectly normal. It was as if I had not changed at all.

I took a careful step towards the edge of my hideout and slowly spread my wings. The Skill said sufficient damage would revert it. I really hoped the damage did not stick afterwards. The ‘outside’ Status at least let me know I would be fully restored on death. Hopefully, just returning normally would also undo any harm.

My wings slowly unfolded, feathers clinking like a dissonant set of chimes. I felt the ordo vis inside my body respond and shift my body. A careful flap returned a melodic ringing this time. The mana had formed my body to be more to my liking. Maybe I could do more with this Skill? First, it was time to fly. Wings of glass and metal chimed through the dark forest silencing the quiet rustle and hustle close by, then I was off. Flap after flap, I rose higher. The chiming sounds at first annoyed me. How could I hunt when I was this noisy? Then I remembered my Skills and activated [Silent Flight] first. The sounds immediately grew quiet. Only after activating [Sneak] as well did they fully disappear, though. Still, I could fly in a body made of metal and glass. This was a definite success. Now, onto further research!