Chapter 34: Down by the river
Felix Sythias’ POV (continued):
Viggi and I walked back to the dorms, though we didn’t talk much after that last conversation. We finished planning our trip to his father’s restaurant on Tuesday, and then he flew off. I was left alone to walk the last kilometer by myself, his words stuck in my head. Was there any truth to them?
Alex and I were far more intimate than friends typically are, but that didn’t have to mean anything. We were both just… exceptionally comfortable with touch. And the way he smiled at me was just how he smiled. The scaly snout of a lizardkin didn’t exactly allow for much expression after all, so there wasn’t more to it—my mind and personal experience told me that there was more to lizardkin expression than just facial muscles, but I ignored that. And the reason he wanted to spend so much of his time with me was because neither of us really had other friends yet. Yes, that was it. It had to be. I didn’t know how I would handle it if it wasn’t.
Besides, what did Viggi know? He was right; he didn’t know either of us. Alex talked to him for only a few minutes, so no matter how good he was with people, he had too little to go on. And a smile didn’t say anything, anyway. He wouldn’t be able to tell so much from just an expression, no matter how long he’d worked in that restaurant. Except… he’d guessed correctly about me, and he hadn’t even talked to me then. So was he right about Alex, too? No, he just guessed about me. A freak chance, but a chance nonetheless. Though, I supposed years of working in a romantic restaurant like that would’ve left him with excellent people skills…
I sighed and shook my head. I was thinking in circles and getting nowhere. I should wait and observe. Maybe talk with Viggi again, too. He’d probably know better after spending some time with us. I wanted him to tell me then that he’d been wrong, but I hoped he’d tell me he thought he was right.
It didn’t take me long to walk the last kilometer and soon enough the large domed roof of my tower was visible over the small rise. I walked through the park and past the pool, spotting Alex and Tiki sitting on a small patch of grass in the sun. His black scales shone in the sun, sparking yet another round of questioning thoughts that I quickly pushed away again. Tiki sat in the shade of a tree next to him. They were hunched over a book and Alex was pointing something out, gesturing while he talked.
When I got closer, they both looked up. Alex flashed me a heartwarming smile and Tiki gave me a small wave.
“How was class?” I asked once I’d laid down in the sun next to Alex.
Alex faked a yawn. “As dull as last time, really. I’m sure that professor Fluffingtons—she’s my sword magic professor—must have a Skill for putting enemies to sleep or something.”
I chuckled. “She has a reputation for that, yeah. And she has Skills for gardening, not sleep magic—if that’s even a thing.”
“Gardening?” Tiki asked. “Then why is she teaching a class on sword magic?”
Alex responded before I could. “She just really likes swords,” he said with a shrug. “She does use a lot of gardening metaphors, though. It’s actually a little difficult to understand what she means sometimes.”
We talked about professor Flufingtons for a while until the conversation died down on its own.
“What are you guys doing?” I asked, trying to keep the conversation going.
Alex blinked. “Oh, I’m helping Tiki with math. She… has some trouble understanding it.”
“I fucking suck,” Tiki clarified.
Alex shot Tiki a frown. “I’ve told you already, you’re not nearly as bad as you think you are.”
Tiki just shrugged, clearly not believing him, then turned to me. “How was Aerial Combat?” she asked.
I leaned back to catch a little more sun and told her about the class and how frustrating it was to sit on the sidelines, even though I’d already expected it. They chuckled at my passive pettiness at the end.
“The trip back was way more exciting, though. I might have made a new friend. I think so, anyway. I’m honestly not entirely sure.. Alex, you remember Viggi?” I asked.
His eyes grew wide, but his expression looked more hesitant than excited. “I do,” he said. “He spoke with you, then?”
“Yeah. He came to me after class to introduce himself. We walked back together. He seems really nice.”
“I’m sorry, but who’s this Viggi?” Tiki asked.
“Oh, right, you probably missed that,” I said and let Alex explain what happened on Tuesday. Then I explained in more detail what happened earlier after class and how his father owned the restaurant.
“Sounds like he’s full of confidence, huh,” Tiki said.
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s strange, but I like it. Anyway, he wants to meet up again next Tuesday at the restaurant; his treat. You want to come, Alex?”
He nodded hesitantly—I suppose he did come off a little strong—so I turned to Tiki. “I’m sorry I can’t invite you as well, but it would be rude to bring someone he doesn’t know.”
She waved her hand in dismissal. “It’s fine. I had something planned already, anyway. Dinner with my brother,” she said with a groan and a grimace. I couldn’t blame her.
“Remind him to wash up first,” I told her. “He’s probably nose-blind to it by now, but he reeks of squirrel dung.”
She scrunched up her nose. “I know.”
We chatted about the day a little longer. Tiki told me about her Advanced Archery class. It sounded like she got along exceptionally well with the professor. I smiled at that. Things were still a little tense between us, but I was happy to hear she was enjoying her classes.
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After that, I offered to let them into our room—I still had the only key—but they declined, saying they enjoyed the weather. I had to give it to them; the weather was really nice today. The afternoon sun had a mild but pleasant temperature, there was a slight breeze, and only the occasional cloud. Most of the students were outside, but very few were actually around the dorms themselves, preferring to wander the campus. I decided I would do the same. There was this supposedly nice artificial river close by I wanted to check out.
I went inside and put my text-books away. I’d already finished my homework for tomorrow’s classes days ago, leaving me only with having to use the shocking-cube a few times. I put it in my bag and went to grab a snack. I picked out some nice jerky, then paused, and grabbed some cookies too.
On my way to the patch of forest, which was one island over, I swung by my friends to hand them a bunch of cookies. They thanked me and went back to their math. Tiki looked like she wanted to burn the pages with her mind, but Alex trudged forward regardless. Adorable. I should do some more math with him as well; I loved seeing him being so passionate about it.
Crossing a bridge kept getting easier each time I had to cross one. It helped that there were other people on the bridge this time as well. Their casual posture while walking across put me at ease. If they didn’t think the bridge would collapse, or that they would fall off, then why should I? Just to be safe, though, I kept to the middle of the path, where I could see the least of the terrible depths below.
The forest was nice. It was mostly pines and similar trees, and the air held a pleasant smell that reminded me a bit of Alex. He smelled like the forest too—I thought it was either his soap or scale polish. I liked it, which wasn’t all that surprising, since I loved the forest. You’d think I’d get sick of trees while living in a forest world, but I never did. The monsters in the forest on the other hand… I wouldn’t mind if they just all died out, no matter the role they played for the mana-ecosystem complex. They could go hump sand, except the Sand-humpers, who could go hump grass.
The forest was quiet except for the rustle of the wind and the occasional bird. There were no large animals here. No deer, no boars, and no Asgers. There used to be, but they had long since been killed off and no one had bothered to replace them.
As I got deeper into the patch of forest, I could hear the river more and more clearly. There was no waterfall, and only some smaller rapids, so the river wasn’t very loud. Mostly I just heard the birds on the edges of the slower water, and the splashing of the water by the rapids.
I broke through the treeline into a small clearing beside the river. The river was entirely artificial in nature, but that didn’t bother me. It looked real enough, anyway. There was a couple lying in the grass a small bit upstream. It was the same couple Alex and I walked in on in the showers yesterday. This time they were fully clothed, luckily, and just gently and sweetly making out on a blanket. A small pile of firewood sat next to the blanket, and they had a basket with food. It seemed they planned on staying here a while, so I should find somewhere else to lie down. Especially since from what I experienced of those two so far, those clothes wouldn’t be staying on for long. I turned away and walked downstream.
Eventually I found myself a nice quiet spot with no one else around. I laid down in a sunny patch on the grass and turned my focus inward. I wanted to try the new mana manipulation technique I’d figured out thanks to Alex with other types of mana, too.
I took out some water mana and imagined it flowing through my veins, letting it flow like the calm river before me. Except, the river before me wasn’t calm at all. It had bits where the water slowed and bits where the water sped up. There were even a few smaller rapids. Could I get the same effect with my mana? Instead of a uniform flow, could I make it in such a way that there was a ‘rapid’ right before it left my body? I decided the other mana-types could wait, I wanted to try this first.
It was difficult. I couldn’t make my veins any wider, but I could constrict the mana to a thinner flow. It took a lot of focus to do, however. It was easier to just constrict the flow a bit just before it exited, creating a spout-like effect. I tried it out with a water-jet ‘spell’, and the stream hit the ground much harder than before and actually carved small groves into the dirt. I wasn’t sure how this would help with combat, but it was still really neat. Sadly, it didn’t work the other way around, and I couldn’t make the mana go even slower than my current slowest speed. That was fine; I had little use for slow magic, anyway.
Now excited, I wanted to see what I could do with my other mana. Air mana proved to be very similar to water mana. That made sense, air flowed as much as water did, just in different ways. I needed to push much more mana through my veins to notice a difference in strength, though, but I could already think of a few ways to use this to make my flight magic more efficient.
Earth mana proved to be… problematic. What the hell did moving earth look like? An earthquake? I tried the mental image, and it sort of worked. Mana built up in my veins, increasing in tension and pressure until finally something snapped and it rushed out with a rumble. I could see a few uses for this, like quickly forming defensive walls, but it was mostly useless. Damn.
Fire mana was even worse. Fire didn’t move that fast. Not unless it was burning something really flammable, like more fire mana. I could spread a thin amount of fire mana down the route I wanted it to take, then set the rest loose on it. The rest of the fire mana burned the ‘fuel’ I’d put down, causing a faux inferno to travel down my veins. It was fast but took so long to prepare it was useless for combat unless I knew I would be getting in a fight. Maybe I could finally throw fireballs, though? Definitely something to try out later once I got the hang of this.
All in all, it was both disappointing and incredibly exciting: I could do new things with my mana! It had been a very long time since I last figured out something entirely new, the last time being when I discovered how to make complex shapes. And I knew I would only learn more things as I practiced more and figured more details out, just like I figured out the ‘rapids’ today. Even if I couldn’t think of any combat application, it didn't mean the magic was completely useless. I could probably create a soft light by slowly burning off my fire mana, for example. A quick experiment later showed I’d been right in that thought.
But that was enough experimentation for now, though. I already spent an hour and a half on this and I needed to finish with the cube too. I took it out and with a deep sigh, channeled some mana into the crystal on top. This time I paid close attention while keeping the idea and concepts of how lightning behaved in mind. After a dozen or so attempts, I had a much better idea of what was happening and how I might absorb the mana back. It would still take a while to figure it out, though.
Since I wasn’t in a classroom, I could shift the cube not only between my front talons, but my hind ones as well. I hardly used my hind talons for tasks like this, and not only because it was awkward. People looked at me strangely when I used my ‘feet’ to pick objects up, so I generally didn’t. It let me finish the required attempts in a single sitting, though, so that was great even if it left all four of my legs feeling like mush.
I put the cube down and took my saddle off, then I took a dive in the river to let the cold seep through my scales and calm my agitated flesh down. The river was wide enough for me to fully stretch my wing and actually do some swimming without doggy paddling. I couldn't swim very far since I didn’t want to disturb the sweet couple further upstream, but it was still nice. I had to invite Alex here some time. Maybe Tiki and Viggi would want to come too.
I stepped out of the water and shook myself dry. After putting my saddle and bag back on, I began walking back to the dorms. When I got there, Alex was sitting alone against a tree. It seemed Tiki had already left. It was getting dark and my stomach rumbled. When I asked, Alex told me he was getting hungry too, so we decided it was time for dinner. I was about to leave our room to start cooking when Alex stopped me.
“Do you mind if I help you cook?” he asked. “I really don’t like how you’ve been doing all the work.”
“I really don’t mind it. I like cooking,” I said with a smile. “But you’re more than welcome to help. I’d love to have some company while I cook. Did you have anything in mind?”
“Whatever you were planning is fine.”
“Alright, come on then, before the kitchen is full.”