Mom, Aunt Ighir, Durreg, and I were flying over the waters east of Kengir towards the Isles.

“Why are we going to the Isles now of all times?” Durreg asked.

“I’ve spoken to the Life Dragon, and it seems that 2,000 eggs were incubated. Each dragon adult can take up to two eggs, while Ighir and I can only take one as we have you two to take care of as is.” Mom answered.

“But what if someone doesn’t want to take care of any kids or only wants one egg?” Durreg asked.

“Those who want more than two eggs can then get in line for them. If any eggs remain, Dimri said he will place them in stasis until another willing parent appears.” Aunt Ighir responded.

“Can I take o-”

“”No.””

Before I could even ask, both of them denied me immediately.

“Boo…” I whined.

“Kiara, you’re a child yourself. You aren’t even a year old yet, what makes you think you can raise a kid?!” Aunt Ighir asked in exasperation.

“This isn’t like taming a monster or getting a pet, Kiara. A sapient child is a tremendous responsibility, one that you aren’t ready for.”

“Yeah, yeah, fair enough.” I shrugged.

“By the way, you still haven’t answered my question. What do the new eggs have to do with us?” Durreg asked again.

“Well, isn’t it obvious? Your aunt and I are each taking custody of an egg. Congratulations, you’re getting a sibling and a cousin!” Aunt Ighir said happily.

Eh?

“We’re getting what now?!”

“I see.”

***

“Can I pick the egg we’re taking? Pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease!”

I whined mom’s ear off, while she simply refused to engage with me, leaving Durreg and auntie a little exasperated.

We were almost to the isles, as they began appearing over the horizon. Interestingly, I was able to spot a few dozen dragons flying already.

“Hmm? Shouldn’t the isles be more populated than usual?” I asked.

“Most dragons are spread throughout the known world, doing their own thing. They aren’t all going to show up at the same time, especially since it was only a short while since the eggs were ready.” Auntie said.

“Dimri was struggling with getting a hold of everyone that I never found out until you told me about losing your blessing in the first place.” Mom added.

Maybe the dragons were a more free-spirited bunch than I thought?

As we began approaching the flying arcane islands, a few dragons flew by to greet us.

One of them began speaking to mom.

“It’s been too long, Azoth! Come to get an egg of your own?!” he said.

“That’s right, Tonurth. What about you?”

The two of them began talking, while Auntie spoke with another dragon that came over to see us.

“…This here is my daughter, Kiara. She’s the latest addition to our ranks, though not for long.” Mom said, introducing me to her acquaintance.

“My greetings to you, Kiara, daughter of Azoth. I have heard that it is thanks to you that Dimri could create the new batch of eggs.”

All of us finally landed on the Life Dragon’s Island, and everyone began transforming into a bipedal form. Except for me, who simply needed to use my shapeshifting to turn into my earlier form’s base humanoid form, the others made use of the transformation spell. Aunt Ighir cast it on Durreg for his own convenience.

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“Thank you, but I didn’t do anything besides giving away some blood and getting blessed by a Tameryian god.” I answered.

The dragon – now taking the form of a middle-aged man – nodded happily to himself.

“Such a polite and humble child, as expected of Azoth’s daughter. I look forward to seeing you grow with my own little ones!” he said jovially.

We began walking towards the large tree, where Dimri stood in front of an array of hundreds of eggs, each encased in a protective wooden apparatus. Nearly a hundred or two of those were empty of their eggs.

“Welcome, welcome! It’s nice to see you again!”

***

After exchanging stuffy greetings with the adults, each of them split apart – Dimri to welcome coming dragons and the adult dragons to choose an egg. I went along with mom as we walked down the makeshift aisles of tables carrying eggs.

“Is there any particular way you have in mind of picking an egg?” I asked mom as we looked around.

“Honestly, I’ve never been put in a situation like this. I suppose I should just go with my gut feeling?” she answered.

“Then can I pick one for you if you don’t have strong feelings either way? Pleaseeee!”

Mom sighed in exasperation.

“I don’t see why not.” She conceded.

As we walked, none of the eggs seemed to look particularly special. The eggs’ sizes varied from the size of two fists to a children’s ball. Each of them had unique colors and patterns – no two eggs looked exactly the same. And yet, all of them emitted the same, muted mana signatures. Even with my draconic sight, I couldn’t quite tell what kind of attribute they each will have.

“Hmm…”

I narrowed my eyes, trying to find an egg with a unique mana signature, but couldn’t manage to find anything nearby.

“There’s no need to rush – there’s still hundreds of eggs for us to see.” Mom said.

***

Having walked through most of the aisles, I still didn’t manage to find any special eggs. Maybe this method wasn’t going to work.

“We’ve got one more aisle to go. If we don’t find something, then let’s just pick the first one we see.” I said, getting slightly frustrated with the lack of progress.

Mom shrugged and followed along, as we walked to take a look at last aisle.

Durreg and Aunt Ighir were standing at the end of the aisle, talking to Dimri with an egg in Auntie’s hands. The egg was a rather average sized one, with a brown surface and crimson spots.

“I wonder why they picked that one.” I said, earning a little chuckle from mom.

“At least they picked something, so we’ve no right to make fun of them.”

As we took in the last few dozen eggs, none of them seemed to call out to me. In the end, maybe there isn’t any big difference between the eggs like I’d hoped.

“Sorry, seems like I wasted our time. Maybe you should pick an egg with a shell you li-”

As I spoke, I felt a subtle tug on my soul from one of the eggs at the end of the aisle, just two eggs away from where Dimri stood.

Mom must’ve seen my widened eyes, so she nodded to me.

“Let’s see what you’ve found.”

I walked all the way to the egg in question to take a closer look.

The egg was incredibly tiny, so much so that it could fit comfortably on my palm like a chicken’s egg. It was an azure egg with dark red lines moving all around it, making it look like it was a shattered egg that was put together with magic, glue, and a healthy heaping of prayers. It didn’t seem to be unhealthy – it gave off a similar mana signature as all the rest did.

“Are you sure this is the egg that called out to you?” Mom asked with a raised eyebrow.

Focusing more on that tug on my soul, I tried to feel its source.

No matter how much I tried to locate it, however, I still failed.

“Maybe you’re looking at the wrong place? You’re currently in your rank C form, rather than your original. Maybe it’s worth it to transform back into your true form when we get home to find out.” She said, opening the mechanism and gently taking the egg as she walked towards the Life Dragon.

After I’d messed around with my new form back when I’d evolved, I found that having a fluid body as a mana elemental meant that I could shape my body any way I wanted to. I could become a quadrupedal or bipedal dragon, or I could take the shape of any race I wanted, though I’d have to actually transform into them with my shapeshift trait if I wanted to inherit their racial traits.

We’d agreed to keep my true form a secret for now even from Auntie and Durreg in order to not cause an uproar, so I was still using my rank C form since we left Kengir. As I followed mom, she was already in the middle of a conversation with Dimri.

“So, we’ve found an egg I’d like to raise…” she said to him.

***

Over the next day, a few surprising events unfolded.

Instead of moving back to Kengir, Mom and Auntie decided that we should stay on the Isles for a while now. Apparently, we’ve learned enough from the academy to begin our proper lessons, things were getting dangerous in the continent for the two of us, they wanted us to live in Dragon Society for a while to integrate in it, and to raise the younglings in a safer environment.

Durreg and I were sent back to Kengir to pack up our stuff, which I piled onto the maiden as we flew back home.

“Relax, Kiara. We’re not going to be away forever. We’re going home for a while, and we can visit anytime. It’s barely two hours of flight away.” Durreg said, trying to soothe my frustration as I dragged the maiden through the skies on our way to the Isles.

“Yeah, but I am upset that they wouldn’t even let us argue against it! I am going to miss seeing my friends. Won’t you?”

He sighed, conceding the point.

“When we get back, let’s make them agree to let us visit at least once a week. What do you think?”

“Too soft! Let me teach you about this little thing called haggling…”