Ughhh… My head…

{You ok?}

[I think so.]

What happened? We touched the stone, then…

Hrg…

Something strange is happening to me. Weird thoughts are popping into my head.

It’s… Argh! I don’t know!

{Is it happening to you too?}

[What do you mea… Oh, yeah, I think so.]

Hm.

The glowing symbols on the stone are still gone. These thoughts, could they be…

Hmmm…

I need to wait for my head to cool down a little. I’ll begin to understand in time, I’m sure.

{Maybe we should go back home now.}

[Fiiiiiine.]

I guess I'll grind soul manipulation for a bit, while she walks home.

Last time, I finally managed to get it mostly circular by spinning it.

This time, I think I'll try focusing on manipulating the temperature.

I've frozen the core before, so I'll do the opposite this time.

I'll boil it!

Actually, should I?

I shouldn't forget, this is apparently my soul, so I should probably be cautious…

Whatever, I wanna try!

You only live once!

Unless the reason I got reincarnated is because I died, then I guess this is the second time I've lived.

Either way, let's do this!

I froze the center by slowing the movement around that area to a complete stop, so if I want to boil it I should do the opposite of that.

I focus on a point on the outside of the mass of liquid, pushing and pulling the particles wildly.

After a while, the surface begins to bubble slightly.

Going well so far…

The bubbling continues intensifying slowly.

This feels kinda weird…

No, it’s probably just my imagination.

Now, let’s increase the area.

I expand my focus to a larger portion of the surface, bringing it to a boil.

Hm, no, this is definitely doing something to me.

It’s probably fine, right?

I guess not…

I’ll stop for now.

Gloria is pretty close to home anyway.

Ah, finally home!

{Gloria, eat something fast! I'm hungry! Not wolf meat, though!}

[Fiiiiine.]

The strange thoughts from that stone have finally begun to settle a little.

Now, a single word has appeared in my mind:

Stadiea.

Dunno what it means though.

I guess we’ll sleep on it.

{Gloria! Bed time!}

Another beautiful day in our little cave home!

After the stress of yesterday, having a nice long rest was so nice.

Now that we've slept, the thoughts from the stone have pretty much cleared up completely.

Those deer-like things with the flat faces. They're called Stadiea.

It seems that the stone held information about the Stadiea.

Like a Wikipedia article.

I still don't know why touching it shot the information into my brain though.

And so violently, too…

I'm very glad that happened to us though, because now I know to never mess with those things.

Seriously, they're super scary!

They look like your average monster-based-on-a-real-animal type, but they’re actually super smart, with intelligence that rivals a human!

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

And they can even use magic!

In scenarios like this, isn't a monster that can use magic supposed to be a boss? The kind of monster there's only one of?

But there are so many Stadiea just walking around outside!

There's also some more information here, but… I don't really get it?

Something about how they're extinct, but there's definitely a ton outside, which doesn't seem very extinct to me.

There's also a ton of information I just can't comprehend. It's frustrating!

Insight? Hm… I wonder what that does.

Well, I'm sure we'll figure it out.

[Hey, since Stadiea have human-level intelligence, do you think we could communicate with them?]

{Are you some kind of genius!? Let's try it!}

Before us is a field of bright green grass.

Standing idly in that field is a herd of Stadiea.

Now knowing how smart they are, I see their flat faces and sunken eyes in a different context.

They look elegant, their eyes seeming almost noble.

Their long, slender legs look delicate, but powerful.

Before, I had wondered why the wolves didn't hunt the Stadiea, despite seemingly being easy prey because they don't hide at night.

Now I know, the wolves would be utterly annihilated if they tried to even get close to the Stadiea.

Woah! This is insight?

And it already leveled up?!

[This skill is annoying!]

{No, this skill is amazing! It's exactly what I was hoping for!}

[Why?]

{With this, we can gain an advantage in fights! Probably!}

[Whatever, just make it stop. It's annoying!]

{Fine.}

It annoys Gloria so I guess I'll only use insight when we need to.

Or at least, I'll try. How am I supposed to not use such a useful skill?

Anyway, the Stadiea are all pretty high level.

Well, I assume level seven and eight are pretty high for at least this area.

The wolves couldn’t have been much higher than that, if they were we definitely would have gone way past level five.

Speaking of our level, can we use insight on ourself?

Let’s try it!

Insight, activate!

H

M

E >

Nice!

But what are those colored letters for?

H is probably health, M is mana, and E… Energy maybe?

How am I supposed to use these? There's no bars next to them...

I hoped it would show our skills too, but it’s still a pretty low level. I’m sure it will show us more in the future.

Now, back to what we came here for, communicating with the Stadiea.

How should we do this?

Will they understand a wave?

Should we write some symbols in the dirt, to try to let them know we’re intelligent?

Could we somehow get a telepathy-type skill?

No, probably not.

We’ll have to communicate like people stranded on an island trying to signal a plane.

Except, the people we’re trying to contact don’t speak any language.

Ah, whatever! Let’s just try.

We approach the herd of Stadiea slowly, trying to not alarm them so they won’t obliterate us with their magic.

Some look at us curiously, but most just keep grazing on the lush green grass.

Now, what should we try first?

Let’s start with the first idea I had, a wave!

…Doesn’t seem like it worked.

They don’t look at all interested.

If that didn’t work, how about this?

We move over to a patch of dirt, and crudely draw a few shapes. Then, we jump up and down to try to gather their attention.

This time, a few of them look over.

But nothing else.

After a few moments, they just go straight back to what they were doing before.

Hmmm…

Oh! I just had a genius idea!

When trying to gauge an animal’s intelligence, human researchers sometimes use mirrors!

If the animal recognizes it’s reflection as such, it’s considered intelligent.

I think usually they’ll put a spot on the animal in a place it can’t see, but I think that’s just to easily tell if the test succeeded or failed, so we’ll go without that part of the test.

Besides, I really don’t want to get any closer to the Stadiea than this until we establish friendly communications.

So, we’ll draw a picture of them on the ground!

[That’s dumb.]

{Why?!}

[I barely managed to draw a square, Fir. How do you expect me to draw one of them?]

{Um… practice?}

[Yeah, no. Let’s just go home for now. We can come back later when we think of a better way to communicate with them.]

{Okay…}

At least today’s expedition wasn’t a complete waste of time.

We managed to learn how to use insight, and we learned that it’s exactly the skill I was looking for.

I wouldn’t call today a success, but it definitely wasn’t an utter failure.

As we walk back home, the glowing stones in the roof of the cavern begin to dim.

I wonder how those work?

It’s gotta be magic, right?

Magic…

I really wanna use it.

I didn’t bother trying to figure out how to use magic before, since I had no idea if it was really a thing.

But now, we know it is because of that stone.

And if the Stadiea can use magic, shouldn’t we be able to too? We’re intelligent too!

In fact, we should be able to use it two times as well since we’re two times as intelligent!

Well, we’re not two times smarter than them, there are just two of us.

So, how do we use magic?

I dunno.

There are so many different unique types of magic systems, it’d be a horrible idea to just try every type I know of, we’d die of old age before we finished.

So, how do we learn how to use magic?

Hmm…

The Stadiea can use it, so they could teach us. But we’d have to learn to communicate with them first, obviously.

Other than that…

The glowing stones?

If they really do work via magic, I’m sure we could learn something from them.

Of course, we’d have to get one to study it. And they’re all on the ceiling.

Ah, what a dilemma.

I guess for now the best course of action is to just keep grinding our skills.

I’ll try to convince Gloria to learn to draw, as well.

It seems we’ve entered what could be called a training arc.