I hit the ground in a run, sprinting away, kicking up dirt like mad. The dust materialized behind me as I stuffed the fat F%&@ing snake with as much wind mana as I could make, using pressurized beams of air to piss it off. I felt the ground shake, Bob’s distant relative hissing in rage.

I bit my tongue, using balancing act at full swing to lighten my body weight by half, instantly increasing my speed. I fluidly dodged the snake's acid spit, using its massive size against it as I danced.

I rounded a particularly large tree, spinning on my heel while I scooped up a fistful of dirt with shape of wind, getting it to hover 20 feet off the ground. Seconds later, the big guy came bumbling towards me, screaming snake profanities. I waited until the snake was perfectly in line with the bag of dirt above them, before dumping the whole thing onto its head.

It reeled back, its eyes unable to blink in its dirt-covered vision. I smiled, three thick Psychic tendrils battering its consciousness vainly, trying to split its attention on either front. I shifted the dirt so it continued to cover its face, matching the wind with its squirming body as a cacophony of ‘slam!’ and ‘crack!’ sounds echoed throughout the forest.

Unfortunately for me, the thing had a modicum of intelligence as I felt its attention shift, going from ‘Ahhhh!’, to ‘Attack the noisy human!’.

I crouched with my legs, building power before leaping into the air. Just in time too, as I let it blindly pass under me, giving me time to dampen my scent, trying to hover despite knowing I still didn’t have the control for it. It passed by me, thunking into another tree in confusion. I tried to keep my use of wind mana as silent as possible, but it appeared I didn’t completely succeed.

It whipped its head towards me while I was in midair, falling relatively slowly. It lunged, spitting acid and trying to attack me while I was vulnerable.

I didn’t give it a chance, yanking on the furs covering my back with semi-solid wind constructs in reckless abandon, getting me clear of the snake's trajectory.

My thoughts raced, the slight improvement in cognition and bodily strength from all the recent levels improving my thought speed.

It would be useless to rummage around its reptile brain, seeing as it could barely pass as a puppy if it was judged on intelligence alone. Funnily enough, the stupider a being was, the harder it was to break into their heads. I stayed low to the ground this time, moving my body like an awesomely smooth dancer, dodging out of the way at the last second, making sure it couldn’t runoff.

“Cinder? Please tell me this is enough.” I said as I leaped away from its next lunge, avoiding being skewered on its multitude of fangs.

“Yeah just… Give me… Two more minutes please!” He ground out, growling in frustration as he tinkered with his formations.

My eye caught the gleaming stone that wrapped the whole area in a circle, glowing with faint magical power. Any clever beast with an arcane eye would have avoided this place like it was diseased. Not this unlucky brute of a snake though.

The circling continued as I made sure the snake was within the confines, buying Cinder some time. My hand twitched near my waist where a certain extendible staff lived that I would love to use to bonk the brute over the head. I held back though, knowing it was far more valuable unharmed.

The circle continued to light up while I started paying attention to Cinder's emotions, feeling his desperate hope for his biggest formation yet.

The runes kept activating themselves in blazes, lighting up unevenly across the circle. I grunted at the sudden feeling of thickness that permeated the air, making my movements seem more slow and sluggish than they had before. It was kind of like wading through water.

“Almost… There…Oh you have got to be kidding me-it's sooo close… Come on... Got it!” He yelled through the link.

I instantly cranked balancing act up into super light mode, feeling the ambient mana thicken as my soul was suddenly bound to heavy shackles. My body shot forth, my hair whipping back, thick with wind mana as I managed to leave the premise just before the forcefield was put up.

Panting, I collapsed on my back, smiling despite myself.

“Hell yeah dude!” I said to him brightly. “That was freaking awesome!” I said.

He gave me his signature foxy grin across the link, his exhaustion amplifying my own. “Well, duh! We were working with my formations. They’re always awesome.”

I rolled my eyes. “Suuure. Awesome in the sense that they make for pretty decorations after they all fail. This is one of the few you actually managed to get to work. Of course, it still took you dozens of tries to get to this point.” I smugly said.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Cinder said stiffly. I chuckled despite myself, taking delight in the banter. I never realized how awesome it was to have someone you could relate to in your life. I had never been the most social of people and as a result, I never got to experience that part of life.

A deep hissing sound came from a few feet away from me, the forcefield around the snake pulsing with power. The formation runes were glowing brighter and brighter, its luminosity signaling the amount of power it took to contain the thing.

We had been trying to subjugate it for one of Cinder's tests, performing some type of core analysis thing I didn’t understand. Ever since he got that mana battery thing, he’s been obsessed with runes, trying to get Viralya to teach him more about them. Viralya of course, in her infinite wisdom, taught him the bare basics and sent him off to play around.

Apparently, runes were this sort of Physiological template that bound specific effects to specific symbols important to the caster. So runes were different for everybody. Cool right?

But anyway, when he had started tempering with them, Cinder came to me for help, begging me to teach him about ‘my worlds’ technologies. I guess he saw some of my memories at some point and thought technology was cool?

I had tried to help, mostly teaching him about basic physics and explanations on simple stuff. Like why fire burns, or how heat is just overexcited particles, and what atoms are.

He laughed when I tried to explain the law of conservation of energy. Jerk.

“So!” Cinder said happily as I felt his excitement for his test subject that thankfully wasn’t me. He had his paws on the outside edge of the formation, adjusting it and making sure it didn't break.

“Are you going to stay and help like you promised, or what?” He said. I groaned. I had promised him since he kept nagging me about it. I didn’t exactly understand why, but he loved to show off his work. Cinder loved talking about his runic stuff, and since I was the only real person he could talk to besides Viralya, the ‘sit there and listen to Cinder talk about magical toasters’ job defaulted to me. Plus, it was way easier to have a second set of paws/hands on-site for help.

Usually, when I’m not messing around with my Bo-Staff, or out there killing monsters, I was the guinea pig of Cinders ‘harmless experiments’ as he liked to call them. And since somebody decided not to teach them much about what runes were, Cinder resorted to putting his hand into the flame that was runecrafting and formations, having to learn the hard way that fire burnt. I knew that better than anyone.

“Yes. I’ll do it.” I said glumly. He grinned. I didn’t know what it was about runes that I just found so boring. I preferred to whack my staff on monster heads. That was far more enjoyable. Almost meditative really.

“Can we at least grab a bite to eat first? I haven’t eaten in a few days and I’m starving.” I said hopefully.

“Hell no! I don’t know what it is about your obsession with eating, but I’m not letting it get in the way of important work!” He said with a puff. “Besides, I can’t really leave this formation. It wasn’t exactly built to last and I’m not a mana generator like you are.”

“Oh? Is that jealousy I see?” I said haughtily.

“Not even a little. Your so dumb, I actually pity you, you overgrown ape.” Cinder responded.

“Hey!” Cinder snickered. I huffed, sitting up and staring at a red speckled bush that didn’t completely cover his fur. I grumbled, crawling over to the outside of the formation, staring at the snake curiously. The thing writhed, slamming its head into the forcefield. I kind of wanted snake meat now.

Sensing my emotions, Cinder looked at me with a glare. “Don’t you dare eat my subject, Ash.” Cinder said resolutely. I looked at him, pouting slightly. “If it dies and I have to rebuild my formation, I will char your skin so badly, even mother would hesitate to heal you.” I scowled at that, crossing my arms in defiance.

“Well, I’m hungry, okay?” I wasn’t actually. Neutral mana was more than enough to sustain me, sure, but food was heavenly. Once I had gotten a taste of it a couple of years ago, I had fallen in love. My unused taste buds had actually never tasted food in the first place, so each bite was an entirely new experience for me. You just can’t appreciate food until you go without it.

“I’ll just grab a bite and come back! I swear it won’t take long!” I said with anticipation in my eyes. I licked my lips at the thought of roasted devil duck.

“No! You were just in one of the neutral mana pockets a day ago! That will be more than enough for you.” He said resolutely.

“Oh, come on! I won’t take too long-”

“No.” I stared at him for a couple of seconds before I slumped, walking back over to the edge. I grumbled while I grabbed the mana scanner and pointed it at the snake, pumping it with my massive amounts of fire mana. I winced as the power left me suddenly, fueling the complex but inefficient formation-machine.

It just looked like a bunch of wires tangled with slabs of metallic rock, runes etched on the metal. I had taken the time to learn some of his runic language, recognizing some of the symbols. I felt the thing vibrate, the slabs of metal bending and aligning themselves into a near-perfect model of the big guy.

The snake hissed, ramming the forcefield with its head, trying to fit its mouth on the rounded surface. I grimaced as I stared into its ugly acid-ridden maw. I guess it really didn’t like the feeling of foreign mana in its body.

I stopped funneling the fire mana, sighing in relief as it went back to nurturing my soul. I checked my true fire creation skill once again, scowling at its low level.

*You have blown yourself up multiple times without dying! True Fire Creation III becomes True Fire Creation IV*

That's right. The skill had leveled once. In the eight years I had been here, training the skill constantly, it had leveled once. And I was pretty sure that was only because when I got too angry, I often blew myself up. It didn’t happen often, as my control was pretty good. But a couple of times, Junior had really and truly pissed me off. Stuff just kind of burns when that happens though. It only served to prove how horrible fire was.

On the flip side, I was now really good at controlling fire that wasn’t my own. Even if the system didn’t recognize it.

I sighed, walking over to Junior and handing him the metal model of the snake, pulsing with samples of the snake's mana.

His annoyance over my eating habits was gone, replaced by excitement over getting to mess with the creature's biology. Honestly, I knew jack [email protected]%& about robotics or coding. What I did have though, were ideas of stuff from sci-fi movies/novels and modern appliances. And tons of architectural knowledge, but I won’t dive into the specifics of that.

Cinder was all too happy to take those from me. Thus, a lot of the stuff he built was magical star wars tech.

“Snakey here only has a single corruption node here.” Cinder said with interest. “It's corrosive mana too.” He said with delight. I looked at the sickly purple mana in the tiny mini-model, turning back up to look at the enraged snake with a squint.

“Wait what? I don’t see any corruption mana on them though. They have trace amounts of earth, but that's about it.” I said.

“That's because they have a singular mana type! These guys are really rare. You're actually not meant to have just one mana type. Two or three is the ideal range for most, but because their body had such only one type of mana, it actually created a sort of imbalance! So its body compensated by taking in ambient earth mana, constantly flooding its mana channels with the invasive stuff! No wonder it doesn’t use its massive corrosive capabilities! It can’t! Its mana is stuck in its core, unable to move! Not only that, but it looks like it's got a biological acid gland! It's almost entirely derived from nutrients, and not its corrosive mana! If I can get a sample of some of its acid, I could theoretically use it in some of the throwables I've been concocting…” I listened to him ramble on as he looked at me excitedly. I smiled and nodded my head, trying to listen.

It was kind of hard. My attention span was small, being an eight-year-old and all. Cinder liked to talk for hours about this stuff.

After ranting for like thirty minutes, he beckoned me over, asking me to place his mana battery filled with a mix of his heat mana and neutral mana. I did as he asked, slotting it in and standing up, watching the runs dim for a second before light back up.

Cinder stood up, stretching his legs like a cat.

“Alright! Come on, I’m going to need someone to hold the snake down while I inject the parasitic venom.” He stopped talking for a second while he checked one of the trees that had fallen over when the snake had been flailing around with dirt in its eyes. Slightly smoking acid slowly burnt through the wood. He beckoned me over, his intent clear. I created a mold of wind for him without a word as he poured some of the water he had into it, watching as the semi-solid wind kept in its cup shape. He froze the water, forming a cup of frozen ice that was so cold, I could feel it from here.

“Can’t you just make a formation for this stuff? It would be so much easier.” I said, taking the cup from his hands, wincing at the temperature, and dipping the cup into the acid.

“I would, but honestly it's just way more fun to get you to do it.” I scowled at him, giving the cup back to the fox while I formed another wind mold for a lid on the cup, repeating the process and giving that to him too for him to freeze it on top.

“Besides.” He said with a wink. “Your human hands are remarkably flexible, able to form and shift things I couldn’t shift with my claws.” Oh great. Now He’s going to refute his own statement

I didn’t take the bait, waiting for him to add a sarcastic or demeaning remark at the end.

“They’re still totally useless in a fight though.” Called it. Luckily, I have an awesome comeback for him.

“Oh, sure. Why don’t you tell that to my staff.” I said with an eye roll, brushing the compacted wood with my hand, feeling its weight.

“You mean your fancy stick? I don’t think waving that thing around at anyone is going to make much of a difference in a fight.” He said. I muttered under my breath about how my fancy stick would trump his mana battery any day.

Cinder, clearly hearing my curses with his foxy ears enhanced with mana, didn’t say anything about it as we both entered the forcefield, rousing the confused and bored snake. Cinder froze the air around it while I dashed forward, leaping onto its face back and hugging it.

It reared forward in confusion, trying to roll me off its head. It didn’t have enough time, the icy air distracting it enough that I quickly engaged balancing acts second ability. I threw my mana into my weight, making my body crush the scales of the snake to the ground as it was forced to stop moving. I grinned, clamping its mouth shut with my two hands, bleeding my mana into it whilst I activated balancing acts third ability.

*Balancing on the tiniest surfaces, while shifting your weight back and forth in tandem with the wind, you have gained an understanding of your own body! Balancing Act X becomes Balancing Act XX. Balancing Act can now affect things past your own body, dragging down a target of your choosing. You must touch the target for this skill to work. The skill works best with a target close to your natural weight.*

You better believe I got the skill to 22! It had been a massive pain, training the skill constantly by shifting my weight on a whim, balancing on tightropes made of reinforced tree bark, and of course, fighting things.

The end result? I could slightly weigh down this monster with my wind mana. I never said it was perfect, but it was definitely cool. The better I got at it, the more external weight I could mess with too.

“Perfect! Just keep it like that for just a couple of seconds!” He said, rushing over to the snake's body, peering at its scales.

My breath fogged as I struggled, the snake trying its best to escape, its tail behind me flailing around like an angry man that had gone without tacos for a couple of months.

I checked my mana, seeing it at 90% as it drained quickly. I had to weigh a ton to keep this guy pinned to the ground, so it was no surprise it was mana costly.

“Oh wow! Look at these scales! They contain an absurd amount of Calcium grease! This thing naturally produces the oils! No wonder its scales are so shiny! The mana laced in these has-”

“Stop rambling about the things damn scales! I can’t only hold this guy for so long!” I said while burrowing Psychic tendrils into its mind, trying to get it to stop moving so much. I was glad its scales were plated in a restricted overlapping manner, otherwise, it would have just reached over to me, grabbing my body and throwing it across the forest.

“Sorry.” He said, not an ounce of regret in his voice as he continued to mutter about some sort of fantastical property about F#^&ing lubricant.

I focussed on the beast beneath me, channeling shape of wind to get it to try and clamp down its tail. I just managed to waste mana though, the tail moving too fast for me to lock it down.

I didn't dare split my focus with battle meditation, knowing it would take me precious seconds to activate it. Its strong jaw tried to open itself, acid leaking from its mouth and onto my arms.

I grimaced, wiping the stuff off with a blast of wind. My arm was red and smoking as the acid kept trying to drip onto my arm.

Ow. I thought sourly.

“Stop fooling with its scales and inject the f%@*ing venom!” I shouted with reverence.

“Fine, fine.” He said with a mocking tone. I flushed red, a little mad at him for taking so long. The next time I have to pick up his torn-up remains in a failed formation explosion, I will take my time while I carry him to Viralya, making fun of him the whole trip. It had happened once. It will probably happen again.

I felt the snake shudder under me as Cinder injected the needle under its scales, pumping it full of a parasitic compound we made from the saliva of these giant F#&@ing beetles. I don’t even want to talk to you about the time I had to hold the beetle’s mouth open and wait for it to drool.

I swear, I have gone on more of Cinders stupid adventures than I have taken the time to train my skills. Every time I had complained about it, he had just responded with ‘It's for science!’ which he had totally quoted from my memories while rummaging for inspiration in my head. I kid you not, I had actually gained a skill from all the hell he put me through.

*You have been inflicted with so many different spells and injuries, you have become numb to it! Your harrowing adventures have garnered you the skill Pain Tolerance. This skill is a passive effect, giving you additional willpower to withstand pain! Bonus effects if you already have a willpower based skill*

*You have drawn the short end of the stick too many times for you to count! Pain Tolerance becomes Pain Tolerance III*

I was happy with the skill, but the stupidity I had to go through to get the skill just didn’t make it worth it.

A few minutes later, the snake went limp under my hands as I slumped to the ground, panting in exhaustion for the second time today. I glared as Cinder jumped onto the thing's body, prying a few scales off by flash freezing them and rapidly heating them back up, making them crack like glass.

I shivered, remembering a few training sessions that had gone wrong. I had ended up using Gluttonous creation a few times, much to my chagrin. There had also been a few times when Chosen of flame had activated against my will, using my fire skills for me when I was half dead and couldn’t fight.

“Holy crap! Ash, come look at this! There is so much calcium and silicon laced into these scales! Like, if I turn this into powder, I could totally mess with enchanting this with some of my runic inscriptions!” I sat back up, stumbling over to look at the fine flakey powder he had sawed off from the scales. I still regretted the day I showed him the periodic table and explained what elements were and how matter worked.

“Wow, this is so amazing. The scale dust is so… Powdery.” Cinder rolled his eyes, jumping off the snake and shoving some of it in a jar to be messed with later. The pains of having your brother as an eccentric magical mad scientist.

“You know, you can at least try to be interested in this stuff. It's really interesting if you just look!” He said, eying his mana scanner. He set it on the snake's side, grabbing my hand with his claws and using me like a battery to funnel mana into it. I groaned as some of the life-giving stuff left my body, fueling the mana-hungry machine.

“Uh-huh,” I said. “I think sleep is more entertaining.” I laced my other hand through my messily cut hair. I have to say, wind blades do not make good scissors.

“Plus, if I ever have something I can’t figure out or a formation I want, I’ll just go to you. You owe me that much at least.” I said with a yawn as the mana scanner finished its more in-depth scan, the snake's mimic core coming into far finer detail. His weird contraptions often made me tired after I powered them.

“Sure bro.” Cinder said. “Come to me anytime you want! I always have more projects I would love your help with!” He said with enthusiasm. Ugh. If I wasn't so socially awkward, I would go live with the humans. Actually, no I wouldn’t. I would probably go live with some other spirit beast family. A family that does not consist of anything fox-related, in any shape or form.

“Please tell me you're almost done.” I said tiredly.

“Of course not! These are just initial tests! We have tons of other things to go over! Come on, where's your scientific spirit?”

“Please Mr/Ms snake. Roll over and crush us both. Please.” I said, my pleading gaze on the snake's dormant and dull yellow eyes.

I heard Cinder cackles while he used me like slave labor, powering his formations and taking samples of its mana and organs alike.

This was going to be a long night.

3 F#^&ing hours later, my 8-year-old body was being carried by Cinder back to the treehouse as I mumbled to myself while half-sleep. Thank god I was barely lucent, otherwise, my brother would have teased and insulted me the whole ride.

I felt him set me down next to the stairs, gently freezing my nose to wake me up. I got up, squinting at his blurry form.

“I’m not carrying you up the stairs, you lazy human.” He said before climbing up.

I followed lazily. “An elevator would be nice…” I mumbled to him.

“That’s going to be a while. I still haven’t found an anchor to install the pulley. Come talk to me when you have a metal forge that can make the specific parts to hold down a surface that is both magically conductible, and able to hold our weight.”

“You could just use-” I yawned, reaching the end of the stairs that wrapped around the tree's massive trunk. “You could just use a simple pulley you know,” I said while I flopped down onto our bed we stole from Viralya’s cave.

I felt Cinder pause behind me, his emotions suddenly flaring up.

“By kankaar! I’m such an idiot!” He yelled before I hissed my disagreement, stuffing the feather-filled pillow over my ears. Cinder paused again.

“Sorry…” He said genuinely, I cracked an eye open at him, sending him emotions of sleep and tiredness. He smiled at me, blowing warm air into my hair.

“Thank you bro for being there for me when I needed it. And I mean that. Thank you.” I gave him a thumbs-up, sending him feelings of affection and support before I fell asleep to Cinder drawing on his sketch notebook thing that had taken him forever to make.

That night, I dreamt of snake scale grease and beetle spit.