For the next half an hour, I continued to train my flying. I had near instantly surpassed my record of 5 wing beats, and quickly managed to extend my air time. It really hadn't been difficult, now that I knew how to take off properly.

The first time I ascended more than 10 meters, I was ecstatic, but as I was about to rise even higher, the list rudely interrupted me.

Name: unknown

True Name: unknown

Age: 13 day(s) 23 hour(s) 1 minute(s) 40 second(s) (32 hours/day)

   18 day(s) 7 hour(s) 1 minute(s) 40 second(s) (24 hours/day)

   (1 Lifetime)

Species: (some sort of)Dragon

Gender: female

Life Stage: Hatchling

Titles and Given Names: K, dragon

Statistics:

  Notes to self:

    Never do autocunnilingus again

    Always pay attention to your surroundings

  Useless Stats:

    [Hidden]

  Treasure owned:

    [Hidden]

  Bodily Dimensions:

    [Hidden]

Goals:

  Learn to fly. Progress: 100% Congratulations!

  Learn the dragon language: Progress: 97%

  Make sure the Kobolds love me. Progress: 0%

Slightly frustrated, I immediately dismissed it again. It had, once more, decided to be its useless self. It merely congratulated me, before removing the entry completely. It didn't even leave a new category with 'Achievements' or a timeline of finished goals.

Of course, as I should have been used to by then, The list opened once again made my heart skip a beat when it reappeared in its glowing annoyingness. This time, it had added just the thing I had thought about: An achievements section under statistics, complete with a timestamp of when I got them.

I guess that does give allow me to look back every now and then, and remember how far I've come. … If I even live long enough for melancholy to take root. That seemed to be somewhat in the balance, with such large monsters prowling the caverns outside, which made me add another two goals to the tally: 'Learn Magic' and 'Master Magic'. I did always love shooting for the stars.

I wonder what the stars will look like, if I ever get to the surface. Should I make that another goal? I only considered for a moment, before I dismissed the idea and decided to focus on securing my own safety first. As comfortable as my little pebble pile of a bed was, this wasn't any way to live, relying on the kobolds to feed me.

It'll only be another two hours before Red- I mean Speaks-with-Everyone arrives for the next lesson. I should head back and try again to 'make the magic work' as he puts it. I wanted to continue flying, especially since I had only just found out how exhilarating it felt to soar through the air with confidence, but magic might actually be the more important avenue to pursue.

I hadn't kept track of how far I moved away from my cave, but the way back was very short indeed, by wing. I was just glad there weren't any turns between where I had ended up and home. As such, I was able to fly slightly above the entrance and glide the rest of the way in.

Now, How do I get you to work? I thought as I curled around my bed, facing the circle of runes Speaks-with-Everyone left behind. It was the same one I'd been copying down all day, the one that would let me launch, and most importantly aim, a rock missile. If I could put any mana into it.

How can this be so difficult? He said it was as easy as breathing, didn't he? So, what am I missing? … Breathing. Is that it? I hadn't noticed him breathing out, or in, in any special way when I saw him doing his magic, but I thought it worth a try at least.

I focused on the first of the four runes Speaks-with-Everyone had indicated for the activation. One to make the missile float, two for aiming and the last for actually shooting. Even if I did manage to get this to work, I didn't know how much 'mana' would be needed for decent results. So, considering he said I was very strong I decided to give as little as possible to it as possible. I didn't know what too much mana would do in this case, after all.

With my focus and some intent in place, I took a shallow breath, then expelled it in a sharp, short burst. Nothing happened. I tried again with a deeper breath, to the same results. I repeated this procedure with a few variations on depth of intake, as well as volume and force of expulsion of breath. At the end, someone might have thought I was hyperventilating, but nothing gave any results.

That's another possibility off the list. What else could it be? I did my best to remember all of what he had said about this. 'It's like breathing', of course. But that didn't work. 'It's like giving a part of you away', but I didn't know which part. I didn't notice any feeling I couldn't explain otherwise, and if I wasn't supposed to be able to feel it, I couldn't well use that to find it.

I hadn't noticed him bleeding on any of the runes, either, so it couldn't have been quite that literal. All I saw at the time was that his glow diminished, before, suddenly, the runes got brighter. There hadn't been any obvious glow in the air between him and the runes, but I didn't pay close attention to that, so I might have missed that. For all I knew, the mana was here one second, and there the next.

What else, what else? … You know what? Fuck it. My agitation at my inability to get this to work had been quickly rising, so I decided to leave it be for now and focus on runes. I had some ideas on how to possibly get around the limitation of having to draw all the runes out first, but they all had their own issues. Mostly that I didn't know if they'd actually end up being serviceable.

First, I had thought of carrying stone tablets with the runic circles already inscribed, but I didn't know how I'd carry them around with me. This killed my second idea, of having each rune pre-made, never mind the fact that I didn't know how many runes there actually were. I had already seen over 20 different runes, just between the three circles I had seen. Not counting when I had witnessed Dark doing her own magic.

I also tried to think of something to make drawing the runes easier, but came up blank. Maybe if there was some circle of runes that could make a wide array of runes, but I didn't know if such a thing was possible. I decided I'd ask tomorrow.

Sighing, I simply started scratching away at the floor. Most of the little images that Speaks-with-Everyone had made during our language lessons were still there, but he had wiped away all of my failed attempts at copying the runes earlier, giving me ample space to work. By the time I went to sleep, I had managed to copy about half the circle from memory, though I had the feeling the circle wasn't quite as round as it should have been.

The next day went by like so many others, with my teacher arriving just as I was waking up, and us going through what he wanted to teach me that day. In the time between that day's lessons, I spent another hour or two flying up and down the chasm, just for the heck of it.

Now that I knew how exhilarating flying felt, I had to remind myself multiple times of the importance of runes and magic, before I managed to convince myself to land again. Never mind the fact that the meal the kobolds had brought me had gotten slightly smaller again.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Even though I still didn't know with certainty how long I could survive without food, I felt it prudent to not waste energy needlessly, in case there would be a longer period of time with no food at all. All the while, in the back of my mind, I had the thought that I could totally help them gather food, if only I could activate runes. Consciously acknowledging that fact was what finally brought me back to my lair.

OK, nothing I've tried so far has worked. Either I'm missing something, or Speaks-with-Everyone was wrong about me having strong magic, on some level. I decided to go through everything I had tried up until that point again, in case I had overlooked something important.

I made myself comfortable on my little treasure pile and faced towards the runic circle, bay now familiar with every rune, at least to the point of being able to replicate all of them from memory. I still had no clue what any of them meant, or why they did what they did. I figured that would come with time, but I had my doubts that I could for science this with any efficiency.

I started with simply willing the runes to work, as that was by far the fastest idea to try out. I attempted to keep my mind free of preconceptions about that action's efficacy, but it still didn't work. I followed that up by the 'breathing' approach, but was again disappointed. Lastly, I attempted to isolate whatever sensation this magic might cause within me, going through and identifying everything I felt once, then twice when I didn't find anything new.

That was, until I focused on that 'pressure' all over my body the second time and almost dismissed it as inconsequential again. I paused as I realized that this was the only sensation I had difficulty tuning out, the way I could all the others. Could this... be it? Up until now, I had barely even spared this feeling a passing thought, but now that my attention rested on it alone, it 'reacted' for lack of a better word.

Before, it had felt like an even pressure all across my body, like being under water, but my attention seemed to rile it up, making it ripple like a lake in a stiff breeze. It was like I had gotten goose bumps, but I knew for a fact that this body was incapable of it.

Excited that I had finally made progress, I willed it to move around in my body. Well, I tried to, anyway. Narrowing my focus on any one spot within my body didn't seem to do much beyond disturbing only the 'pressure', or more likely 'mana', in that area. The mana I had my attention on got ever more excited as time went on, but the rest settled down, turning into a calm, almost serene pond again.

Moving my focus outside my own body caused everything to calm down, like nothing had ever happened, while trying to focus on two spots at once, hoping to somehow let the mana travel along the path, only gave me a mild headache.

I ground my teeth together in frustration, feeling like I was just a step away from a breakthrough. Obviously this stuff reacts to my thoughts in some way. The question is, how do I get it outside?

I stopped focusing on any part of my body and opened my eyes. I considered if I should talk to Speaks-with-Everyone about this again, to possibly get another piece of the puzzle, but decided to wait a bit more. It was likely just pride keeping me quiet, but I felt like the sense of accomplishment if I get it on my own would be way more gratifying than asking for more guidance.

Relaxing into my hoard, I let my mind wander, thinking about this new life I was given. I had no real plans beyond surviving and learning magic. Maybe exploring, but that would surely get boring, once I had seen enough. Heck, I didn't even know how long a dragon's lifespan is, so even saying how much time I have was impossible. There's both stories where dragons have a similar life expectancy to humans, and there were those, were dragons lived for centuries, sometimes millennia. Not to mention those dragons all across various myths, legends and stories that were immortal.

All I could say was that with my own pair of wings, the sky was quite literally the limit. Hmm, with magic, maybe it's not. Would it be possible to make a space ship with this? I looked back to the runes and considered. There seems to be specific functions to the different elements, if these two examples are anything to go by. I only knew of one use case for earth magic, but shadow was different. I had seen it used for hiding, and I knew of a spell to let me see in the dark. Surely the Illusion out front was also shadow magic, since it definitely lacked substance.

So if I just extrapolate from that, water magic might be able to deal with, well, water recycling. Air for life support? Fire for energy and earth for... propulsion? Or would light be the better choice, with a solar sail of gigantic proportions? Darkness could be used for cloaking. Speaks-with-Everyone mentioned elements that were two at once, so is it possible to combine say, earth and water magic? Maybe water and light to make some sort of fusion engine? I gave a disappointed sigh, as all this speculation did was remind me, that I was still stuck on the very first step of learning magic. People do say the first step is the most difficult.

I was about to close my eyes to take a nap until the next lesson would begin, but I noticed something strange. The floor around me seemed to have a very gentle glow to it, that had not been there even a minute prior. I raised my head and sure enough, the rock floor in a circle around 1 meter in diameter around myself, the floor was glowing the same pale blue as mana, with no indication of who put it there.

The next lesson wasn't for another two hours, and Speaks-with-Everyone didn't have a habit of arriving early. I flicked my tongue out, but there were no scents around that weren't either him or me. Half a minute after I had first noticed the glow, it started fading again, until it was gone completely. Interestingly, the runes of the circle were the last to fade out.

Strange. I really wanted to know what that was about, but didn't even know where to start. Was this something that just happened on occasion? Or did this come about because of my experimentation. The latter would arguably be stranger than the former, since I couldn't even see my own mana. So how could it even- Ah. I think I see.

I was slowly coming to the realization what was going on. I can't see my own magic. Recognizing that fact was slightly embarrassing, since I remarked to myself every now and then, how I couldn't see my own mana. The stated reason for this, was that I didn't have an affinity. I. e. I didn't have an element. An element like all this rock sitting right under my stupid ass.

I suspected that something I tried, did work in moving my mana out of my body. Since I could then no longer feel it's effect on my body, and couldn't see it for obvious reasons, I assumed it didn't work. The mana then sunk to the ground and suffused the stone, where it, in turn, was suffused by the elemental affinity in the rock, letting me see it's glow. I could only guess that the glow fading might have had to do with the mana spreading out underground, until the glow was too little to register.

So, back to it then. Now with a minute or two in between each thing I try.

Five minutes later, I finally knew that focusing on different points did work. It would take further testing to determine how accurate and precise this was, as well as how to tell what amount of mana goes where, but the first step was done. At last I could activate this runic circle, which would likely be very useful for testing purposes.

I placed a nondescript pebble into the center of the formation, then focused on the rune that was supposed to make it hover, as well as my chest. The ripples and waves I felt in my mana were likely the result of parts of it leaving me, and going to the other point of my focus.

Almost immediately after I started concentrating, the pebble shot a foot into the air, and after a second, turned to dust. At least, judging by the cacophony of cracks that rang out from it. I had reflexively closed my eyes after the first crack and released my focus, and when I looked back a few moments later, instead of a pebble, there was only a solid, grey, perfectly smooth sphere of, assumedly, dust.

Ooookaaay. That was too much, I take it. I wearily looked at the rune that would shoot the whole thing, pointedly deciding not to try that one out until I was certain I wouldn't shoot myself, even indirectly by exploding a wall into a million smaller projectiles.

Half a minute in, both the rune I had activated, and the former pebble started to glow with mana. It was easily the brightest glow I had seen so far, illuminating my little cave quite well. It took almost 10 minutes until the glow had faded to barely visible levels, and the sphere revealed itself to be tiny chunks of rock surrounded by fine dust. Really, the cloud it made when it was released was quite beautiful, though I chose to vacate the area, as I didn't know how well dragons could breathe rock dust.

I get it. Only focus on that one for, like, a fraction of a second. I shuddered at the thought of putting that much power into shooting the pebble, if simply holding it will turn it to dust.