I didn’t conveniently wake up after the dragon’s departure and realize it was all a dream, so I was forced to face the fact that the encounter had been real. I went about my morning routine on autopilot, then found myself standing by my lean-to, at a total loss.

Right, now what? What was my original plan for today; more experiments to chop trees with magic? Should I go find the mushrooms right now? I don’t want to keep the dragon waiting, no matter how much time I supposedly have, but I have no idea how long it will take to climb the mountain and then to find a cave. At minimum I need to get food, water, and torches. Definitely don’t want to leave today then; I guess I’ll experiment now and prepare over the afternoon.

As my wits slowly returned, I decided to employ a tried-and-true strategy for dealing with strange phenomena: acting like nothing had happened. Thus I moseyed over to where I was chopping trees and planning to build my outhouse.

Where was I after yesterday? Let’s see, I figured that using Fire and Space aspects together was difficult yet promising, so I should practice that, but I wanted to try changing the shape of the spell. Hmm, I’ll start with the shape, since that’ll be more interesting. Better just use plain Mana though, so I’m not wasting any and I don’t have to worry about fluctuations in the aspects contaminating the results.

I situated myself a safe distance away from a tree, then cast a regular spherical Mana Bolt at it to use as a comparison. Next, I tried stretching the bolt into a thin, horizontal cylinder roughly the width of the tree, but the result wasn’t encouraging: the new gouge in the tree was wider but shallower than the first. To make matters worse, my aim was off, so only half of the projectile had actually struck the tree.

Wait, why am I trying to send the bolts at full speed to the tree? It’s not going to run away. I’m pretty sure that faster magical projectiles don’t actually do more damage. I was standing right next to the tree, so I sent two small Mana bolts at it, one at regular speed and one slowed down. The damage looked identical to me, so I walked away again and sent another wide bolt at the tree, this time aiming carefully and letting the projectile leave slowly.

Oh, that’s why it needs to be fast. As the bolt crawled its way toward the tree, it dissipated before my eyes, just like when I tried shooting through water at a fish. It was rotating too, so the narrow end struck the tree without even leaving a mark.

So, I need a shape that will work even if it rotates, isn’t totally useless when my aim is a little off, and has more of an edge than a sphere. That just leaves a disc. But what if it rotates on the other axis, so that the flat side hits the tree? Eh, maybe it won’t be a problem; I should at least test it before worrying about that.

So test it I did. It worked even better than I hoped, leaving a gash over an inch deep in the center. I sent a couple more discs at the tree for good measure, with similar results. Huh, I guess I don’t have to worry about them flipping to the broad side after all. The only one that even wobbled that way was the one I didn’t intentionally spin, so adding spin helps stabilize it, even if it is a purely psychological effect. To be sure, I launched one final disc, spinning it as much as possible.

Mana Bolt has advanced to Level 8!

Well, there’s an objective sign that I’m making progress.

I walked over and inspected my target tree. The thin cuts from the discs were all fairly deep, but they were nowhere near each other. It’s going to be impossible to line up two of those cuts in the exact same place, so maybe these discs aren’t all that useful—unless I can cut a tree with one disc, that is. Perhaps I can chop most of the way through the trunk with an axe then finish it off with a disc, which will also help even out my Health and Mana usage. More testing is required. Later though, my Mana is running low.

Over the afternoon, I gathered supplies for my upcoming climb. For food, I stocked a full two days’ worth, since I wasn’t optimistic about finding any above the treeline and the mountains looked quite tall. It was mostly plants, but I had started drying groundhog some meat over the fire to moderate success. Torches I made by wrapping some green branches in dry vines coated in pine sap. They created a smoky, smoldering mess when lit, but would hopefully let me see in the cave.

Water was my real concern. The only watertight vessel I had was the cracked canteen from Cassie, and calling it watertight was a bit generous. Furthermore, it didn’t even hold enough water for half a day at rest, let alone two days hiking into the mountains. My only option would be to follow the stream by my lean-to up as far as I could and hope the cave was near it. It wasn’t as bad as I first assumed though: the mountains were still capped in snow, which was presumably melting and feeding into the stream, so the stream would extend above the treeline at least. Even if the cave wasn’t next to that stream, there could be others nearby.

By evening I was as prepared for the climb as I could be, so I spent the rest of my daylight hours working on casting Mana Bolt both Space and Fire aspects, starting with spheres then moving to discs. To conserve Mana, I kept the bolt size tiny and took my time with the aspecting process. By nightfall, I had earned another spell level:

Mana Bolt has advanced to Level 9!

The next morning was overcast with a slight drizzle. I almost put the trip another day, but images of giant teeth and claws drove me on, as well as the possibility of even worse weather later. The drizzle made my feet slip on the lichen-covered rocks and numbed my fingertips in the cold, making ascending the rockslide doubly treacherous, but since I’d climbed it twice recently, I still made decent time.

I traversed over to the stream, then started following it upstream without issue. In fact, it was almost entirely unremarkable. The only animals I saw were chipmunks and birds, the plants were just more of the same, and, though the mountains were undoubtedly gorgeous, I had become inured to their presence and the low clouds and flat lighting further dampened their majesty. Eventually, the rain stopped and the sky brightened, but the cloud cover lingered on.

After taking a late lunch break, I found my progress slowing considerably. My legs were starting to get tired, but the real problem was my lungs. While I wasn’t quite gasping, I had to either stop every hundred feet or walk at a crawling speed. To make matters worse, the forest had transitioned from a high canopy with a clear underbelly to a less defined canopy with lots of scrub, which I had to fight my way through. I was getting scratched all over, and even tore another hole in my shirt.

Holy fuck, this is annoying. At this rate, I might not even make it above the treeline today, though I seem to be getting close. Should I stop for the night soon, so I at least have the cover of trees for the night, or push on and try to find the cave to sleep in? If I don’t get close to the cave tonight, I might run out of food, and there isn’t exactly a buffet up here to restock from. Still, going hungry for a day might be better than sleeping exposed above the treeline.

Eh, I should probably keep going. If I make it above the treeline and don’t find the cave, I can always climb back down. Might have to even if I do find the cave; who knows what kind of critters are living in it.

I kept on for another hour, putting one foot in front of the other with my head down, trying to think about anything other than how tired I was, and before I knew it, the trees had given way to scrubland. There was still no sign of the cave, however. The sun was just slipping behind the mountains, so I turned around and found a campsite among the trees a decent distance away from the cold stream.

The night was blessedly clear, but my sleep was fitful at best. The light breeze was enough to keep me shivering, and a persistent headache and racing heart destroyed any remaining chance I had at a full night’s rest.

I was up and about before the sun even crested the horizon in a desperate attempt to warm up. The movement helped, but it was soon clear that to actually be comfortable, I would need the sunlight, so I eagerly awaited the sunrise. As the sky brightened and the nearby peaks started to light up, I realized my mistake: I was on the wrong side of the mountain.

Well, I have to traverse at the treeline to look for the cave anyway, might as well start now and head towards the sunlight. Of course, that meant I had to ford the stream I had been following the day before. The water was lower now, the cold night apparently stalling the snowmelt, but it was still over ankle-deep and barely above freezing. As I waded across, my feet grew progressively more numb and the stones beneath my feet shifted and were swept downstream, making me fear for my footing. Sure do wish I had my spear right now, or at least a decent walking stick.

I made it to the other side without falling, though. I drank as much water as I could, filled up my canteen, then started my trek around the mountain. The first half hour or so was the most miserable I’d been in my short memory between my wet, freezing feet, cold hands, and dull headache, but I made it to the sunlight and eventually warmed up.

The morning wore on. “Easy to see,” yeah right, maybe for a dragon from the air. We mortals have to walk, though. Is this even the right mountain? That dragon didn’t seem to be the most reliable or observant, after all. Maybe I should turn around soon. Hold on, what’s that?

Cresting a small ridgeline, I spotted a promise indent in the mountainside. Sure enough, it was a cave. There were furrows in the ground outside it, haphazard piles of rocks, charring around the entrance, and old claw marks in the rocks, so clearly I had the right place. I lit a torch, though it took a couple minutes to find some dry grass to use as tinder, then entered the cave with only a slight hesitation. Well, maybe a bit more than slight, and there may have been some throwing of rocks into the cave to check for wildlife, too, but I did enter.

Inside was predictably dark, dank, and unpleasant-smelling. I had to stoop down and practically crawl through a section about fifteen feet in, but thankfully it opened back up. That was where I found a clump of the mushrooms, silvery and about the size of my fist. Well, I guess that would be small for the dragon, at least. Identify.

Nornall Mushroom (Rare): A mushroom with magical properties found in alpine caves.

That’s real helpful. I couldn’t tell whether or not I was in a cave, thanks for clearing that up. And “magical properties,” that could be anything. Are they going to turn me into a chicken as soon as I touch one? I still have no clue whether or not they are poisonous, either.

The dragon wouldn’t send me to pick toxic or otherwise dangerous mushrooms, would it? … It definitely would, if only by accident. Damn. Should have thought about this before; now what do I do?

I could pick them using my bag like a glove, that way I don’t even have to touch them. That’s where my food is though. Well, T here’s not all that much left, so I could just eat most of it now and be sure to wash everything else as much as possible later. It’s a slight risk, and I’m not exactly comfortable with how often I’m taking “slight” risks, because sooner or later one of them is going to come back to bite me, but what other option do I have right now?

That was why I was squatting over my bag, torch in one hand and the other hand cramming as much food as possible into my mouth, when something snuck up and bit my ankle. Hard. I stood up and kicked my foot out, banging my head and dropping my food, but luckily keeping the torch steady.

Shaking my foot just made it hurt more, and a quick glance told me why: there was a critter still attached there. It was a grotesque thing, about two feet long with four chitinous segments, more legs than I could count, and two large mandibles digging into my leg. I Observed it while preparing a couple Mana bolts.

Ephrid (Level 2): 22/22 Health

The first bolt struck true on the middle segments, taking off ten Health and making the creature let go of my leg and scurry away. Of course, the second bolt was already on its way, so it missed by a large margin.

Fuck. I need to be more careful. I inspected my leg, which was bleeding from two distinct holes. That’s going to need bandaging, but I should get out of here first—don’t want any more of those things sneaking up on me. I also checked my Health, which was still at a comfortable 63/72. Comfortable until I noticed it tick down to 62, that is. Was that thing venomous, or is it just the bleeding? Either way I need to hurry.

In what was probably a foolish move, I gathered all the nearby mushrooms. Almost all of them anyway, at the last clump I started hearing skittering noises coming from deeper in, and it was getting louder, so I started limping out of the cave as fast as I could.

As I passed back through the squeeze point, the skittering continued growing closer, and my torch spluttered out. Oh boy, good thing that didn’t happen a minute earlier; might not have been able to get out in time then. Luckily the light from outside was bright enough to navigate by at that point, so I pressed on, exiting the cave and hurrying a safe distance away before pausing to regroup.

Well, this is a fine mess I’ve gotten myself into. Bleeding, possibly-envenomed leg, only a bit of possibly poisoned food left, no water, and miles away from home. First thing’s first; got to deal with my leg. I spread some general-purpose salve on it, bandaged it as best I could (not particularly well), then checked my Health again. It was 60. That’s dropping far too fast. If it’s the bleeding, it should stabilize soon, but if there’s venom I’ll be out of Health in an hour and then I’ll really be in trouble. Guess now is no time to be stingy with the potions, I thought, taking out and drinking a Health regeneration potion.

After double-checking my bandage, I headed back toward the stream, though I angled down instead of traversing at the treeline. Despite my injury, I made good time, arriving at the stream by midday. There, I took some time to drink some water and redress my wound. I was pleased to note that my Health had stabilized in the high forties, the potion and whatever was draining it having both worn off. I also found a log to cross the stream on, so I didn’t even need to get my feet wet to cross back over. After that, it was just a matter of retracing my steps back to the valley.

I stumbled back into my lean-to just as the last light was fading, body battered, clothing torn, and hunger gnawing, but I still slept like the dead. Over the next few days, I slowly recuperated while working on the outhouse.

The site I chose for the outhouse was halfway between my lean-to and the closest mound that I thought would have a building within, so that if I did move into the ruin, I wouldn’t have to rebuild the outhouse. I wasn’t too confident in my ability to make a freestanding structure and images of the outhouse collapsing while I was inside kept flashing through my mind, so I used a small living tree as one of the corners. The result was a lopsided mess since I had trouble figuring out how to make the joints, but I did gain a couple new Skills in the process:

Carpentry has advanced to Level 1! Earth Manipulation has advanced to Level 1!

Earth Manipulation was from digging the pit. The ground was firm and filled with roots (as happens when building right next to a tree), and all I had to dig with was sticks and a couple flat stones, so I had started experimenting with magic again. All I really managed was loosening up the dirt, but it made a huge difference.

After finishing the outhouse, I took a break and was sitting by the lakeshore relaxing when the dragon returned, arcing down and landing gently in the water by me.

“Hello,” it said, loud enough to make me cringe.

“Hello, you here for the mushrooms? I’ll have to go get them.”

“You have some already? Mmm, yes, bring them to me.”

“Alright, be right back.”

The dragon hummed happily in response, sending ripples through the water.

I hurried off to grab my bag from the lean-to, and when I returned I found the dragon sitting in the lake blowing bubbles out of its snout. It perked up when I neared.

“You have them? Show me, show me!” It was practically jumping up and down.

I opened my bag before me, tilting its contents toward the dragon, still being careful to avoid touching the mushrooms.

“Yes! That’s them. Ha, stupid things can’t get away from me now! I’ll just be taking them, then.” The mushrooms lifted out of my bag and floated over to the dragon.

“Wait! Before you go, what’s your name? Or what should I call you, anyway?”

“My name? Did I forget to introduce myself again? Uhh… oops… it’s Zelkie. Ahem, I mean I’m Zelkadrad… the Magnificent! Because I’m magnificent, you see.”

“Uh, right. Of course.”

“Anyway, gotta go now, got mushrooms to eat, bye!” Zelkie said, repeating the odd levitating takeoff before zooming off.