"Let us start with a cursory instruction in what mana is" Hannah starts.

"Before that, what should I call you?" I interject.

"Hannah will be fine" she says. "Now mana is in essen-"

"Do all dryads look just like humans?" I knew it was rude but I was curious. I also felt slightly alive for the first time in a long time, since I could spend time with someone that wasn't my own personal torturer.

Hannah sighs. "It seems we will have to deal with some questions first. No, dryads do not necessarily look like humans. We are a special sort of tree, one with a consciousness. If we live long enough, about 500 years, we start to become proficient in magic. We then shape a new body out of our wood, but as you have seen, we can never quite close it off. This is because we can bend stretch and compress our wood, but we can't fuse it together, so somewhere on our bodies will be a hole betraying our true nature."

"Can you change how you look? Can you appear as a monster? or a dragon?" I continue my onslaught.

"I could change how I look. If I were to change shape to that of a monster, it would take me at least half a century, though. A couple of years should be plenty to change my face and hair beyond regocnition. I could change into a dragon, but I can't really control my size or mass, so I would just end up as a small one".

"How much do you weigh? What do you eat?"

"Well, I just eat any regular food, though contrary to humans, we only take in the mana and water trapped in the food, and expel the rest. As for my weight, I think there's a joke in there somewhere, but let's just get it over with. Come and lift me up" I do as instructed.

I lift her by the waist. I can't help but be slightly flustered. I didn't have much contact with any women who wasn't one of my moms or my little sister, so something inside of my reacted a little. It is overshadowed by the surprise of her weight though. I'd guess she only weighs around 50 pounds, maybe a little less. Around double the weight of my weighted training sword. I suddenly find myself imagining swinging her around as a sword and chuckle.

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"That's quite enough, young man" Hannah says with a slightly stern tone. I completely forgot I was holding her and put her down immediately.

"Any more questions?" she asks. I have a bunch, but I don't dare ask them. I wanted to ask how babies are made, since it may differ from my world, and whether she could conceive no matter what form she is in. And how it turns out, she is a tree after all. Are her babies nuts or fruit? But I let it rest so that the lesson can begin.

"Mana is produced by every little thing, be they monster or dryads or even humans without gifts." She starts. "The difference is that those who are capable of utilizing mana is because they have a mana vessel. A way to hold mana inside their body. Only dragons, dryads and a few monsters and those with gifts can hold mana"

"First lesson is, expel the mana inside of you!" She stated.

A few moments pass. "You're not gonna teach me how?" I ask to break the silence.

"You don't know?" She seems genuinely puzzled. "Children usually find it out by themselves when playing. Most have this instinct to try and manipulate the world without touching it, and during play, children often find the sensation and remember it"

Urgh, maybe because I was never really a child, I didn't try any of that. In my previous life, I do remember trying all manner of stuff like trying to light stuff on fire, move things, imitate superheroes with their beams or heat vision or whatever.

"Gimme a moment" I try to focus, convincing myself to shoot fires. Nothing happens. I try to store up the nonexistant energy and shoot it out of my hand. Nothing happens. I try to move some nearby stuff by concentrating. Nothing happens.

"Erhm, I don't know how" I say.

Hannah sighs again. "Well, keep trying different stuff and play around. Consider it your first assignment. I have heard of this before, and it shouldn't take more than a week, if my sources were to be trusted.

And so I spend the next few days playing like a kid. Imagining myself doing all manner of impossible stunts. Finally, on the third day, I feel something distincly real. When I tried to shoot down a cup, an unpleasant sensation like that of a thin rope being pulled out from the palm of my hand could be felt. It did not do anything to the cup though.