Early Afternoon - Late Spring : Kingdom of Kaelallan

"Uwahhhhh…" *rustling* "Uuugghh..." I woke up with a yawn and a stretch before slowly opening my eyes to see that everything was exactly as I left it. -Damn, for only lasting a few days, that nap was heavenly…-

Casually glancing around the room to look for Ilios, I found him nowhere to be seen, but before I started to panic, I felt something move around on my side. -Huh?! Oh… I forgot he climbed up with me to nap…-

Seeing him still asleep but about to roll out of his spot, I gently repositioned myself to make him a bit more secure.

"Mmmgh…" He let out a muffled groan as I shifted him slightly.

-My god he is so f*cking cute…- The bliss his adorable self made me feel was simply unparalleled, but eventually, in an attempt to pass time and let him wake up naturally, my mind started to wander.

Before long, my mind got onto the topic of my dragon sleep, where I finally remembered there were some changes I hadn’t looked much at. -Now that I think about it, I never really looked at my organs with much detail before leaving for Zan, did I…-

Idly thinking back to when I was looking at my new skeletal structure right after my dragon sleep, I finally took a moment to look more closely at the image my aura painted in my mind at the time, but I quickly started noticing several.. anomalies... -What the… Am I just remembering things wrongly? That can’t be right…-

*Vwoomm* Thinning my reserve to let out more aura, I did my best to get a more detailed look at things, but I was left more confused than anticipated.

-How did I just.. gloss over this? - Although I was well aware that my organs had been ‘repositioned’ a little bit after my body was reconstructed, I had no idea it was to such an extent. -How was I so caught up in my appearance that I didn’t even question this…-

My vitals were not even remotely recognizable, with my lungs, stomach, and breath gland being the only proper organs remaining. -This.. isn’t normal for dragons, is it…-

Even my heart was simply gone, with only a web of veins that wrapped around my lungs before spreading to the rest of my body and taking its role.

But the oddest part was that it was actually consuming some of my aura. -I'm not imagining that, am I?- Looking at it closely, I could see a microscopic amount of mana being used to simulate blood flow, and split the atoms and particles collected from my lungs into the necessary chemicals.

-To think even my body itself would adapt to utilize my mana...- Thinking back to my dragon sleep, I remembered not eating anything for nearly 8 years and yet I didn't starve or even get hungry.

At first, I just thought my body was just being extremely efficient at not creating waste and making the food I did have last a long time.

This theory wasn’t unfounded either, since I never had the need to go to the bathroom after the dragon sleep that I awakened mana, but when I looked at things on a more cellular level, I found that my body was actually constantly recycling what would be considered waste particles into its base chemicals to then be reused.

Those chemicals would then meet up with the chemicals dropped off by my blood to make everything the cells needed to not only sustain themselves but grow.

In a way, I was basically sustaining myself with the particles in the air and my mana. -I really am a freak of nature, aren’t I…-

For several minutes, I sat there totally speechless and just watched as my cells utilized my exuding aura like I would use mana, with mind-blowing precision.

-How in the world is it so accurate? - I wracked my brain for a while to try and figure out how it was doing it since it was so far from possibly being natural, but the only thing I could think of that was plausible was that my subconscious was doing it.

But that idea itself was quite farfetched. -Even if I focused everything I could on it, I wouldn’t be able to keep track of even a tenth of these reactions… But I guess the information my brain processes when I read aura is a lot too…-

I continued to have the internal dilemma for another moment after that, before eventually just giving up with a deep breath and shifting my attention elsewhere. "Haah…" -In any case, this means I don’t produce waste that I can’t just exhale through the lungs, so…-

Shifting my attention down my body, I quickly found that I was simply missing everything related to waste management. -I'm not sure what I expected…-

After finding out I no longer had a heart, learning I had no bladder, pancreas, liver, kidney, or intestines was like nothing. -But now that I think about it, could it be an Ancient Fenrir thing?-

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Thinking back over everything since Ilios awakened as an Ancient Fenrir, he hadn’t used the bathroom a single time either. -That would make some sense…-

I looked over at him as he slept soundly and briefly considered using my aura to look through his body before deciding against it. -It'll probably wake him up if I do...-

Turning my attention back to my abdomen, I looked at the huge amount of muscle and cartilage that took up a lot of the otherwise empty space, followed by my reserve that sat in the middle of it all.

-It's a bit weird for it to be there, but it does feel really natural…- Usually, creatures would have their reserves in their most protected areas, with most animals having it in their heads, humans in their hearts, and dragons in their upper chests, but my current reserve simply couldn’t function properly if it was in such places.

Instead of being a solid, hard-sphere, my reserve had become something akin to a water balloon where I could control the rigidity of the rubber.

By weakening the rigidity of my reserve’s wall, the wall would thin and my reserve would physically expand, and by strengthening it, it would shrink, letting the walls thicken once more.

It was a bit odd when I first noticed it right after my dragon sleep, but after giving it some time, I found myself getting more used to it.

-It'll still take more time to be super comfortable with it, but it's pretty handy, especially for bigger spells...- Compared to before, using a large-scale spell like the nuclear breath was incomparably faster and easier to prepare. -Previously, I was limited by the tap on my reserve, but that's no longer a problem…-

Although there was still a limit to how much I could pull out at once, it was such a high ceiling that I didn’t have to worry for the time being.

-At the end of all this though, for how many organs were either changed or wholly removed, these were some welcome changes…- It sounded a bit crazy at the time, but I could no longer die from a single hit unless it was to my head or strong enough to break my reserve, and I no longer needed to worry about most of what sustained life, like food or water.

-At least I didn’t lose my stomach, so I still have the option to eat or drink though…- I couldn't simply give up the delicious taste of juicy meat so easily.

Just thinking about the taste of a big field bison made my mouth water, but I was promptly interrupted by Ilios moving around. "Hm?"

Looking over, I found Ilios staring at me with his ears laid back while innocently wagging his tail.

It was so cute I wanted to cry. "Did you sleep alright, buddy?" Unable to resist, I moved my head over to let him lick me a bit.

"Hoooo!" He let out a short, excited howl before jumping up onto my face.

"Haha, I'll take that as a yes." I took a short moment to give him a chance to let some energy out before pulling myself away. "Are you ready to head to town?"

"Woof!" He barked without hesitation.

"Haha, alright. In that case, let's not waste any more time!" Carefully hopping up off the cushion with Ilios, I did another stretch, transformed, and made my way onto the lift. -I honestly feel like every time I take a nap, I stray further from being a dragon…-

But as if he knew what I was thinking, Ilios moved over and rubbed his head against my side.

Almost immediately, an irresistible comfort wrapped around my mind. "Huh..." Feeling that the conflicting feelings simply vanished, I looked down to see Ilios wagging his tail with a smile on his face. "You… Haah, never mind… Thank you, Ilios." Instead of questioning him, I just leaned down and petted him until we got to the top of the lift. -How did he even do that.. it wasn’t with aura or mana, so.. what could it have been?-

But the more I thought about it, the more confused I got.

It wasn’t until I walked out through the palace gates that I finally gave up though. "Haah, whatever…"

Finally pulling myself out of my thoughts, I started walking down the main street that had a cool breeze blowing up it, carrying the smells of food with it. -What a refreshing scent…-

As I walked down the street, I took my time to look around and enjoy the warm sun and cool breeze, but quickly noticed that there weren’t many knights. -I guess there really is stuff I missed while I was asleep…-

Curious as to what could have happened, I continued just a bit further down the street before turning into the guild. *creakk*

But the inside of the guild was nearly empty as well. -If it's just adventurers and knights, is there some kind of conflict going on?-

Nonchalantly walking up to the desk with a familiar receptionist who was on the verge of sleep, I lightly tapped the desk to wake her up. -Her name was Ellen, right?- *tap-tap* "Miss Ellen, did something big happen recently?"

The receptionist jolted up immediately. "Ah, y~yes s..sir!" She slurred her words a bit as she spoke.

-Does she ever have time off to sleep? Every time I’ve been here, she’s been dead tired…- "What did I miss?"

"Hm?" She looked a bit confused before remembering what I said. "Oh! Kaelallan declared war on the Kingdom of Zan. They sent out the march this morning."

"Huh?" -Isn't that a little too hasty?- "Did any Nation ranks go with them?"

"Yes sir. Sir Keen is leading the charge." She said his name with a sense of pride.

"Was he the only Nation rank that went?" -I guess they don't really need much more than that since I cleared the path already though...-

"Unfortunately, yes. The Grandmaster is still recovering in the academy."

"Ah.. right…" -I forgot about that...- "Well, besides that, were there any other big events?"

"N..nothing of note, sir." She spoke a bit awkwardly, like she purposefully left something out, but I didn’t bother digging into it.

-I'll just ask the librarian if there’s anything else…- "Sweet. In that case, I'll be on my way. Have a good day!"

"Y..you too sir!" She got flustered when I gave a hasty goodbye, but it was nothing out of the ordinary.

-It seems I’m finally getting used to how awkwardly people talk with me…- *creakk* Walking out of the guild, I glanced around before turning back up the street. -Let’s see what the upper levels of the library have to offer, shall we?-