When I awaken, I find myself surrounded by towering trees, each one so tall that I cannot see the top, or even the sky, just a canopy of leaves above me.

“Hello?” I look around to see if anyone is there. After I get no reply I stand up, wiping the dirt from my clothing. “Well I better get moving, my familiar has to be in this area.” I start walking between the trees, the roots taller than me at times, forcing me to go around them. After about an hour of mindless wandering I start to hear noises from behind some bushes. “Hello?” I say as I approach the noises. I then hear a scream coming from the bushes. I grab a nearby stick and quickly rush into it. On the other side of the bush is a small clearing, in it is two creatures, one is a beautiful dryad, a monster that looks like an elf but is covered in vines coming from her body and they have legs and feet made from roots. In her hands are what looks like two wooden swords. And she is currently fighting what looks like a tree ent, but it looked strange from what father described, it’s body seems to be… slithering like snakes. Then suddenly several snakes seem to fling out of the tree ent’s arms attempting to bite the dryad but the dryad skillfully cut them down. She then looks over at me seeing me she starts to smile.

“You! Elf! I need your assistance post haste!”

I look at her dumbfounded for a moment. “But… but how?”

“This is a bundle of vine snakes! They are plant elemental snakes that take on different forms, but these seem to be working together in a group which is dangerous.” She dodges back as another snake launches itself where she was standing a moment ago. “It is a highly intelligent creature and usually won’t fight if it is facing more than one target, so come and swing the stick around at it to distract it at least, and if it doesn’t run it will give me enough time to kill or at least wound it so it runs!”

I nod nervously and charge at the bundle of snakes mimicking a tree ent, hitting one in the head with my stick. The entire body stops for a moment and shifts their attention to me then back at the dryad then back at me again like it was confused. One of the snakes then launches itself towards me, thankfully stopping mere inches from my face, I am too scared to move. After what seems like minutes in my scared mind the snake suddenly recoils and the tree ent dissolves into a mass of snakes that quickly escape into the trees. I fall onto my knees, dropping the stick, still in shock. I look as the dryad puts away her swords and walks towards me.

“Good job little elf, you saved my life there.” The dryad says as she walks over slowly, her body swaying in a near sexual motion. “My name is Ivy, and you?”

“A…Astrid….” I barely get out the words, still in shock.

“Well Astrid… you need to get up, we need to hurry and get back to my house before anything else shows up, there are things more dangerous than that no fun bundle of snakes that just ran away.”

I nod and get up, Ivy starts to walk down a nearby path and I follow her, keeping an eye on my surroundings, now scared that I will get jumped by something.

“So Astrid, why are you here?” Ivy asks as we walk.

“I’m here to find my familiar… I have been astral projected here to find it.”

Ivy turns around and rushes to me, her face stopping an inch from mine, I recoil back as she sniffs me.

“Ahhhhh, no wonder you smelled so sweet, you are here in an astral body, you have to be careful with making a body out of part of your soul like that, some creatures can do unsavory stuff to it.”

I look at her. “I will remember that.”

Ivy smiles at me and steps back. “It would also explain why I felt a connection to you.”

My eyes widen. “You… you do?”

Ivy smiles at me lovingly. “Yep, but first we got to get back to my home if we want to do anything like a familiar contract.”

I nod as I continue following her, eventually we reach a tree with stairs going up the side. After we walk up the stairs we reach a giant hole inside the side of the tree.

“Welcome to my home.” Ivy says as she turns around smiling. “Now question, about how long have you been astral projected?”

“I think… about four hours by now?”

“That is not good, not good at all, astral projection spells only last five hours, we must hurry and do this before you disappear!”

Ivy rushes me into her house, the house is barren besides piles of leaves randomly thrown about.

“Sorry about the house being a mess. I don’t get many visitors.”

I nod, smiling as I do. “So how do I do this contract?”

Ivy smiles. “Don’t worry that is all stuff that only the familiar can do, it’s nice due to this way the familiar only becomes the familiar if the familiar wants to.”

“And do you?” I say worriedly.

“Yes, it would be nice to have an elf such as yourself as my master.” Ivy says as she puts on a strange smile. “Now what I need you to do is lay down and close your eyes, this may hurt a little bit because we are merging a part of our souls. In a way, you can say we are sort of becoming one.

I nod and close my eyes as I lay down on a bunch of leaves. Gripping my hands into fists when I suddenly feel what feels like a hand plunge itself in my chest. “This isn’t right!” my brain says. I open my eyes to see Ivy standing over me, an evil grin on her face as it feels like I am starting to get drained.

“Wha… what are you doing?” I can barely get the words out.

“Foolish elf, trusting someone so easily, you didn’t even question me! You are truly, truly foolish, and for that you will have your mana devoured by me.” Ivy’s vines seem to shudder in ecstasy. “Mmmmm fresh young mana is the best, not like all this old stagnant mana sitting around in this place.”

“I thought…. You were supposed to be my familiar.”

At this Ivy lets out a thunderous laugh. “You are truly stupid, I tricked you! Dryads won’t be familiars; we aren’t slaves to lesser beings. But don’t worry since you made me laugh so much I will make sure to savor your mana nice and slow.”

My eyes start to slowly close as I get too weak to keep them open.

“What are you doing here…. oh, so you are the one eh?” I hear ivy laugh. “Trying to attack me while I was distracted? What is something like you going to be able to do, here soon her astral body will just be a husk… No…. how… WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME, LET ME GO! How are you able to do this? This is impossible! Stop! I will give it back just release me…. Please…. See… I am giving it back to her… please don’t kill and eat me… what are you doing? I gave it back, I saved h….”

Blackness envelops me, the last thing I hear is what sounds like me screaming.

My body jolts up in bed letting out a scream and clutching at my chest where Ivy thrusted her hand, feeling nothing and seeing no blood I look up to see Sheckith staring at me uninterested.

“That was close little elf, I almost had to save you.”

I looked down after I realized I was safe. “So did I fail?”

Sheckith narrows his eyes. “No you passed, if you failed I would have told you to get out already.”

“Then wait… I got my familiar?” I asked, looking around, then I notice a small tree ent staring at me blankly. I jump back as I notice its bark starts to slither like a multitude of snakes. “Wait, is that the mimic snakes?!”

Sheckith eyes me getting more annoyed every moment. “How can you not know your own familiar! You know what, I don’t have time for this, I am already late for dinner due to you, most of the rest of the class finished hours ago! Now get out of bed, take your stupid snake and go outside before I fail you anyways.”

At these words my eyes widen and I quickly get up and run towards the door Sheckith is pointing out. The tree ent seems to follow me as I go, I turn around once we are both outside of the room and inside the hallway.

“So…. you are my familiar?”

The tree ent nods its’ head in acknowledgement.

“Are you the snake that attacked me earlier?”

The tree ent kind of shrugs its’ shoulders.

Is there any way that you can speak?

The tree ent nods its’ head again then its’ form breaks down into a bundle of snakes before reshaping into the form of a dryad, the form of Ivy to be exact. I scream and fall, scooting away to the wall.

“Noooooo how are you here?”

“Form….taken….. talk….” Ivy says, but it didn’t sound like Ivy, it sounded like hundreds of voices talking at once.

“What do you mean?”

“Form… taken… after… devouring…”

“So you are the one who saved me from Ivy?”

“Yes… devoured her… contracted… you…”

Tears swell in my eyes. “I am so sorry for everything, thank you for saving my life.” I stand up and wipe the tears away.

“So since you are my familiar now, what is your name?”

“We… have… no name… we are just many.”

“Then how about the name Viele.” I cover my eyes as Viele starts to glow brightly.

“The… contract… complete… master… thank you…. for name…. Viele… shall serve…”

Viele then separates into a multitude of snakes slithering up my body, usually I would be scared but for some reason I felt a soothing warmth as the snakes envelop my body. Eventually they stop and I open my eyes back up to see my entire body except my head is covered in what looks like a thin brown and green wooden armor nestling under my clothing. “Viele?”

“Yes… master?”

“Where did you go?”

“The armor…. It… is part… of my… body….”

I blush a deep crimson red. “I’m not sure how I feel about this.”

“I will… protect… you…”

I start to move around noticing the armor feels like normal clothing. “Well… you seem to be very light.”

“Because… we… are… one…”

I nod as I get used to the armor. “Is this the only form you have?”

“No… master… any nature… creature… I devour… I can shapeshift into… also… I can take this form if it pleases you more.”

I shriek as the “armor” starts to turn back into a bundle of snakes and start to slither around my body, all going to my right hand, they then start to merge together and form into a large wooden staff covered in snake heads, a large emerald looking gem stone sat in the mouth of the snake head on the top of the staff.

“Is… this form… more pleasing… for master?”

I nod still blushing from the armor incident. “Thank you, that is better.”

“Then… shall… we… get going?”

I nod again as I walk down the hall, reaching another door I swing it open, Viele in one hand, I step out into the light to see that I just entered a large stadium, over three times larger than the one I just came out of. All the seats in the upper part of the stadium are filled with what looks like students and various creatures. In the middle is a large wood platform with several people on top. In front of the wooden platform seems to be a bunch of other kids my age. As I look around more I hear a booming voice.

“Welcome magi student! Glad to see another one pass! We need all the magi we can get. Now come on down and join your fellow freshmen.”

As I walk across the grass to the group of freshmen the eyes of all the students in the stadium seem to be glued to me. As I get closer to the group of students I see Shortclaw jumping up waving his paws in the air.

“Over here Astrid!”

I eye him and quickly run over to him. As I run by a group of finely dress women with familiars surrounding them I hear the familiar voice of Elizabeth. “The elf passed? How, I don’t see her familiar… is it the staff? Can a staff be a familiar?” I shake off their discussion and rejoin Shortclaw and give him a hug. “I DID IT!”

Shortclaw freezes when I hug him. “I…. I can see that… but you became a magi, right? Where is your familiar? And where did you get that staff?”

I jump back slightly. “Oh sorry… ummm Shortclaw, say hello to my familiar, Viele.” I then point the top head of the staff towards Shortclaw’s face.

“Staffs aren’t fami…”

Several of the snake heads on the staff seem to come alive and stare at Shortclaw.

“Hello… Shortclaw? Name… of food?”

Both Shortclaw and I pale as Viele says this. “No!” We both say in unison.

Viele sighs disappointedly before the heads all turn back to how they were.

“What in Gaia is that?!?!”

“Its’ name is Viele, he seems to be what is called a mimic snake.”

“Strange, the only thing I ever heard about a mimic snake is that they can mimic vines/etc. and that it was one snake, not a bunch of them!”

“I don’t know, I guess since it’s a familiar it’s special?”

“I… guess but make sure it knows that I am not food!”

I let out a laugh when he says this. “Don’t worry he seems scary but he is actually friendly.”

“So I see you also passed your test Shortclaw.”

Shortclaw nods, his chest puffing up. “Those tests where nothing compared to the power that I, Shortclaw, possess.”

I giggle as he takes his pose. “I can see that.”

A booming voice fills the stadium. “Well now that the rest of the newcomers are here let me introduce myself.” An elderly dwarf walks to the front of the wooden platform. “My name is Blaze Earthfist, the head of Flemmington academy, and I came to say welcome to my school, all those who passed the tests, and welcome to a new chapter in your lives!”

All I hear is an eruption from the stadium as people clap and howl, some familiars even literally howling. A smile slowly creeps upon my face. “Yes, a new chapter.” I say to myself.