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I jumped into the water, pulled out a preservation chamber, and handed it to Aiden. "The fog is toxic. Dip this into the water," I submerged it and pulled it out, "then wait until the fog abates. Once it’s done, throw it onto wounds. If he wakes up, get him to drink some."

"Wait. Did you just say it’s toxic?" He looked around and found Halten’s body surrounded by the fog. "He’s covered in it…"

"Yeah," I said. "Don’t make it worse."

I handed him the chamber and then scaled the dragon, moving from his jaws to his snout to his head.

"Where are you going?" Aiden asked.

"I’m going to heal his wings. Can’t get the water up that high." While Halten’s snout was stuck in the water like a ramp, the rest of his body was fifteen feet high lying down. It was possible for someone to throw a water bottle back and forth, but I didn’t peg Aiden as someone who could.

I would try my magic first.

"You can use healing magic?" Aiden asked.

"Yeah."

"What grade?"

I paused and thought about it and released something strange—I didn’t know. Elana taught me spells and I wasn’t sure what they were. But what I did know is that I didn’t want anyone to know about my legacies. So I gave a believable answer.

"Gold…"

"Huh…" Aiden said.

I waited for a response but got none, so I moved across the dragon’s back and to his right wing. It was far easier to navigate than I imagined, as the dragon was very large and lying flat.

But that changed once I reached Halten’s wings.

They were a mangled mess, and each step left footprints in drying, caked-on blood. Then, I found the first wound and winced. I’m so not qualified for this…

I put my hands onto the wound and used the connecting spell that I had enchanted the Illyndra with. To my awkward astonishment, the scales and flesh underneath mended. It was only on the surface and the wound pulled the skin together in a tight knot like it was threaded, looped, and pulled tight until it scrunched—but it stopped the bleeding.

What the hell did she teach me…?

I wasn’t sure because it wasn’t necessarily a healing spell. Instead, it connected similar elements along a blueprint, like muscle fibers to muscle fibers, and I felt like it could be used for inanimate objects. That was all but confirmed a moment later.

"Is everything okay?" Aiden asked nervously. The fog rippled around his waist as he waded through the water. His face seemed conflicted and pained—familiar. But I couldn’t place where.

"Yeah," I said, standing and walking to the next wound. "I was just surprised this technique works on dragons."

"I am, too. Dragon scales are made of alianca, which isn’t in any animal on Earth. What is it…" He paused before he could ask what it was, almost as though he had caught himself. "Never mind."

I felt uneasy about leaving it there, so I clarified. "I’m not sure what it is, but… for what it’s worth, it’s technically not a healing spell."

"Then what is it?"

"It activates the elixir. It’s the thing doing the healing."

"Oh…"

"Yeah…"

We carried on. Aiden methodically healed Halten from underneath while I worked on the wounds up top. It moved smoothly, and within a half hour, I had healed another ten wounds and moved on.

"Aren’t you tired?" Aiden asked once I went to the second wing.

"Huh?"

"Tired. I can only use my spell a few times before tapping out."

I looked down and found him shivering. I was going to tell him to get out of the water, but the Diktyo River put people into a miraculous state of homeostasis where the body never overheated or cooled. That’s why it was perfect for building a core. It was constantly healing.

No, what Aiden’s shivering and pale skin indicated was something all too familiar.

"Here…" I unclipped my backpack, opened it, and pulled out a mana elixir. "Drink this. It’ll heal your mana channels. This river’s pretty special, but it doesn’t heal everything."

I threw him a squeeze bottle of mana syrup the size of an alcohol shooter. It hit his hands and he fumbled for it, but it popped out of his hands and into the water.

"Oh, sorry!" Aiden looked between me and the bottle three times before he awkwardly dove underwater.

Oh no… I sighed. I really hoped that I wouldn’t need to baby the guy or talk down his insecurities. I was excited to see another person—but that could quickly change depending on the type of person they were.

Two minutes later Aiden found the syrup in the water, made some awkward excuses, and drank it. Then I got back to work.

To my surprise, he joined me ten minutes later, cheeks flushed with vitality, walking up to me as if it weren’t awkward at all.

"I think I can get the bulk," Aiden said confidently, changing my interpretation of him again. He put his hands on the dragon’s wings.

"Wait," I said. "You need to heal."

"I… feel completely normal. At least give me a shot."

I did. A blue light washed over the scales like the barrier on my first day in Areswood Forest, and the wound I was working on closed as quickly as with my spell—but it spread the entire length of the wing. I was stunned when it stitched ten wounds in one go.

Aiden shuddered and smiled wryly as he knelt down. "Sorry. Bit weak compared to you."

"You rode a dragon past the Bramble. I don’t think you’re weak."

"That’s all him."

"Then we’re both weak." I turned to Kline, who was watching Aiden like a murderous hawk from a large tree. "That little guy’s been protecting me since I got here. But, I mean…" I pointed at Halten’s healed body. "I don’t devalue myself, and I don’t think you should either."

I walked off toward Halten’s tail, leaving him standing there dumbly. He followed behind. A half-hour later, Halten’s wounds were healed on the surface, and Aiden helped me unload my supplies off Halten’s back. It was a total pain in the ass because there were three crates, two of which belonged to the "Big Big o’ Tools," which, as the description warned, was actually two palates of axes and tarps and knives and wheelbarrows and countless other heavy tools.

I didn’t have any problem lifting the pallets but my arms and body couldn’t hold it. Kline could help but it was above a river that would corrupt his soul if he fell in. So he refrained and we did it bit by bit for two hours.

Aiden stacked up all the supplies in the forest beyond the river and then looked at me. "Now what?"

I pointed at the dead beasts around the river. There were hundreds. "There’s a lotta good meat over there. It seems more effective when you try a new species."

Aiden paused and scanned the bloody landscape. "Effective?"

I turned to him and blinked a few times. "Uh… these are… spirit beasts? They give you soul force. It’s what allows you to do this." I picked up a rock in my hand and clenched it. It crunched and turned to gravel that I let drop out of my hand. Aiden took two steps back and I smiled wryly. "That bother you?"

He shook his head. "That’s what I want."

"Good—’Cause you’ll need it."

Twenty minutes later, Aiden’s face paled when I handed him slabs of raw meat. An hour after that, I had a fire going with spirit beast ribs propped up like a teepee, cooking crudely over high heat. I would learn how to use the new stove I ordered once I learned the more important things—like the ward and the enchanted tent. So I told Aiden to wait and set to work on those items.

It turned out that, while the tent and ward both had customizable arrays and different "features," they both worked the same from a fundamental perspective. There was a small chamber in each for mana cores. After inserting them, I added mana and it activated the "base arrays," which were the default functions.

The ward only required me to put a flag pole in the ground, load it up with mana cores, and then activate it with mana. Once I did, it created a twenty-foot barrier around us on the sandy area beside the river, and it didn’t let anything in or out. It was simple and impossible to lock myself out of.

The tent was even easier. It was like a pop-out tent, only more amazing. I removed it from a tiny bag and unrolled it. It was a folded square made out of ultra-thin fabric I refused to think was useful. It had no poles. I was confused but when I added mana cores to the chamber inside and added mana, it popped out into a four-person tent that had cooking arrays in the center and four blow-up beds that filled up with various forms of magic. It lived up to its name—it truly was an "enchanted tent."

Once I finished, I returned to Aiden, poking the fire with a stick to roll the coals, and put precooked meat into a skillet and put it onto a fire.

"You make this all look so easy," Aiden said.

I laughed this high-pitched laugh, the type that you give when something you give is so ironic it needs a noise but lacks so much humor that a real laugh would make you look psychotic.

"Did I say the wrong thing?" he asked nervously.

I shook my head. "No… But trust me, Aiden. This isn’t ’easy.’"

He paused. "You know my name? I… don’t think that I’ve introduced myself."

"You’re famous," I said. "Everyone watched the trial."

"Oh… right..." He paused and listened to the fire crackling for a while. "So are you… famous."

I nodded slowly. "’Magine so."

We sat in quiet solitude for fifteen minutes after that. Once the meat was ready, I served him tea made from leaves from the forest that I mixed with dried barriers that I desiccated.

Eating it went as expected. He ate a piece of a second evolution creature and hit the ground, choking and wheezing. To his credit, he didn’t ask if I poisoned him or complain in the two hours it took him to adjust and eat the rest. And when it was over, he was nothing but smiles, lifting limbs and moving fingers as if fascinated by the common function of movement for the first time.

"You’ll get used to it," I said.

"Used to it…" He smiled ruefully. "I can’t believe you’ve been out here all this time."

I chuckled and shook my head. "Me either."

Aiden fell silent for a while before looking up. "Is it…" He cut himself off abruptly. "Never mind."

He won’t ask me questions… I noted, thinking about him stopping questions previously that day. No… no questions about me. That’s convenient. But…

It was convenient because I decided that I wouldn’t answer any questions after the slip-up earlier. That said, it was inconvenient because there was something I was dying to know. I just ended up asking, consequences be damned.

"Hey… earlier, you looked at me strangely," I said. "Why was that? Is it the ripped shirt?" Suddenly, I remembered that I had new clothing and wanted to change, but Aiden cut me off by answering my question.

"Huh? No… You’re just… normal, I guess. I was kinda expecting a warrior or hunter or… some type of goddess," he blushed and panicked and sped up his words. "Don’t get the wrong idea. I thought that because people don’t think you’re human ’cause it’s so dangerous out here. There’s myths about you already."

My lips curled into an amused and entranced smile. "Myths? What are people saying about me?"