After Dawn’s surprising outburst that revealed falling could be fatal, Niphru immediately decided against trying to stand on his own again.  He didn’t want to worry Dawn, after all, nor did he want to risk death.  Instead, he decided he would only try it if she was there with him and able to help catch him.

 

As he made his choice, he told Dawn, and she sat down, wiped her tears away, and hugged him, staying there for several minutes.  Niphru thought about it further as she held him, and realized he had grown so accustomed to their bond that he couldn’t even imagine not having it there.

 

While he already thought protecting Dawn was important, this simply hammered home how deeply connected they were, even if they didn’t actively use their mutual connection very often.  With this thought, Niphru sent a comforting feeling through the link to Dawn, feeling her relax somewhat as he did so.

 

Eventually, they separated, and Niphru asked if she could help him practice.  Unlike his expectation, she instead shook her head.

 

“We’re nearly done here, and with just a little more work, we’ll be able to head back home.  The others are expecting me to help.  They’d also appreciate your help, if you are willing; we need to figure out how dangerous the lake is.  None of us can fly like you can, so we can only see the edges, standing at the shore,” she explained as she frowned.

 

She then sighed deeply before continuing, “I don’t like the idea much, because who knows what is out there in the middle—maybe something there could threaten you even in the air.  But I promised I’d ask you in the morning.”

 

Niphru paused for a moment, considering if he even could do that anymore.  He had grown in size and weight, after all.  Before he answered, he stepped up into the air, forming barriers of force magic below each paw.  As he stepped onto the third one, they shattered, and he found himself falling back to the floor with a light thump.

 

“Well, maybe I can, maybe I can’t,” he remarked with some amusement before focusing on becoming a smaller fox, feeling his form shift.

 

While he was limited in how much of his foxfire he could use, he didn’t think it would affect his normal magic, and tried his experiment again.  This time, he had no difficulty standing on the platforms he created, and he didn’t feel it would be terribly difficult to keep his focus like this.

 

“I think I can manage that, Dawn,” he finally answered, pausing a moment before he continued, “I’ll be very careful, so don’t worry too much!”

 

Dawn nodded, still somewhat nervously, and they headed outside, splitting up almost immediately as Dawn headed toward the center of the village, and Niphru moved in the direction of the lake beside it.

 

Well before he reached the lakeside wall, he smelled blood, and sped up.  As he arrived, he relaxed, seeing several of the villagers butchering a large reptilian beast against the wall, one of them keeping a wary eye on the water.

 

“Niphru, I was hoping you’d be willing to help!” exclaimed Viera from just beyond his vision, and he turned his head, seeing her wave at him as she pushed herself away from where she was leaning against the wall.

 

As he approached, she stated, “I can make an orb of light that floats below you and follows the ground, so you should be able to see most of the lake if you run above it.  Just be safe, okay?  I know you haven’t been around us much, but we’ve been worried about you.  If Dawn wasn’t telling us you were okay, we’d have asked Morris to check on you.”

 

Niphru wasn’t sure how to respond to her statement of worry, so instead, he focused on the first part of her remark, replying, “That sounds like it should work, and I’ll be careful, I don’t want to get wet, let alone get attacked.”

 

Viera frowned at the lack of response to the second half of her words, but sighed, shrugged, and produced the sphere of light that slowly bobbled its way toward him.  Niphru nodded toward her and began to jog toward the water, the light speeding up as it followed.

 

While the others had supposedly explored the edges of the lake, Niphru felt it best to do a proper job and check everything, so he set off in a circle around the lake.  Each time he made a lap, he moved inward slightly for his next trip.

 

Around the outer edge, he mostly saw groups of fairly normal fish, with the occasional outlier, typically abnormally shiny fish, though there were occasional reptilian creatures similar to the one being butchered back at the wall.

 

Further inward, there were several much larger fish, and when one looked like it was going to try to swim up toward him, with large teeth visible, he swiftly moved higher above the water.  Occasionally, there were glimpses of extremely long necks snaking out from even deeper that often succeeded in striking smaller fish and pulling them back out of sight, but none of those showed any interest in the flying fox.

 

Even deeper in the lake, he began to see the bodies of those creatures, looking like large squashed blobs with flippers on the sides.  He was surprised by a massive shape swimming by, its mouth open wide as it sucked in water and expelled it through openings on its sides, large amounts of fish being pulled inside as it traveled.  Perhaps it was the same one he had seen several days before in the distance, but it seemed much larger up close.

 

Near the deepest part of the lake, however, the light moved far enough down that he could barely make out anything, only a handful of silhouettes moving through the water.  He did, however, feel a sense of danger, and moved even further upward above the water.  Not long after, there was a rumble that set the surface of the water dancing, and a large eye opened deep underwater, light reflecting from it with enough brightness to pierce the depths of the lake with ease.

 

As he began to flee back to shore, a hissing echoed across the lake, and his hair stood on end while numerous twitching fish floated to the surface.  Looking back, he saw the eye close, and the electrical charge in the air slowly dissipated again.

 

Feeling he had done enough, Niphru quickly returned to the village, finding no trace of the body from earlier, aside from a bunch of blood soaked into the ground.  Since Viera wasn’t around either, he tried to remember where the elder’s house was, and headed in that direction.  After several minutes of growing irritation, he focused on his nose, not wanting to admit to anyone that he was lost.

 

It took a while, but he finally picked up the scent of Morris and Kel, quickly turning to head their direction.  As expected, he found them inside the home, helping direct the actions of those who came to see him.

 

As Morris noticed him, Niphru saw his eyes widen and realized he was still in his smaller form, not the larger one Morris had to be expecting.  Not wanting the man to think he wasn’t himself, he released his grip on his transformation, quickly expanding back to the size Morris had seen him grow to not long ago.  Morris shook his head, looked closely at him, and he felt a wave of mana wash over him before the man sighed and resumed speaking to the woman who had been next in line.

 

Several moments later, Niphru found himself having to explain, “It turns out I can shapeshift, which is what I’ve been focusing on for a while now.  I can’t hold myself in the air anymore with how much larger I am, but I can turn into a smaller version of myself and keep doing it.  I just forgot I wasn’t my new normal size because I’ve spent so long at that smaller size.”

 

After Morris sighed again and asked why he was there, he remarked, “I was asked to explore the lake, so I did, and most of it looks safe, but there is something huge and scary in the middle.  Whatever was there rumbled with enough force to make the water jump, and I think it had electrical abilities, because my fur stood on end until I got away.  Its eye was also absolutely massive!”

Once again, Morris sighed before shaking his head and muttering, “Figures, guess that means only limited fishing from very close to shore…”

 

He then raised his voice again and stated, “Thank you for your help, Niphru.  We are looking at leaving in another day or two, depending on how long it takes Miana and Thomas to reinforce the well.  If you’ve been busy practicing your new shapeshifting, I understand if you want to return to that, but please be ready to help load our gear back into the wagons when we do end up leaving.”

 

After nodding and assuring him that he would, Niphru returned to where he and Dawn were staying.  As usual, he knocked on the door before entering, and found the owner of the home sitting there carving something again.  He greeted the man before returning to the bedroom and closing the door again.

 

Since he still hadn’t mastered it, he decided to practice his balance again, this time only while seated, and more safely.  First, he contacted Dawn and informed her of his plan, asking if she was okay with it through their bond.

 

“If you promise you stay in the middle of the bed, it should be fine, then if you fall, you’ll land on the bed, and sitting down is much safer than falling from a standing position.  Just don’t try to stand!” she exclaimed in the link, only a minor amount of worry making it through compared to the massive amount earlier in the morning.

 

Quickly giving his agreement, Niphru leapt up to the bed and shifted back into humanoid form, then sat up and pushed her way to the center of the bed.  By the time dinner came around, she had finally managed to remain upright for almost a full two minutes with her arms held across her chest instead of using them for balance.

 

Eventually, the door opened, and Dawn walked in, an annoyed expression on her face.  As she saw Niphru sitting upright, she relaxed a little before remarking, “Why weren’t you answering me?  And where were you during lunch?”

Niphru looked up, wobbled, then fell over.  After a deep sigh, she used an illusion to reply, “I must have been more focused than I thought; I didn’t notice anything!”

As she pushed herself back to a seated position, she continued, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you, Dawn.”

 

Dawn simply shook her head and sighed before replying, “Come on, it is time for dinner; you don’t want to miss that, too!  I’d have been a lot more worried if I couldn’t feel your sense of accomplishment every now and then…”

 

In response, Niphru shifted into a small fox form, leapt from the bed, then returned to his true form and followed Dawn out into the village.

 

Later, after dinner, they returned to the bedroom, and Dawn informed him, “I do have some free time now, so if you want to practice standing, we should be able to do that.”

 

With an excited nod, Niphru moved toward the bed before shifting back into the humanoid form and pulling herself halfway up onto the bed, like before.

 

“From this point, I was pushing myself up and trying to stand, so what should I do now?” she asked, looking over at Dawn.

 

Dawn nodded before remarking, “At least you were intelligent about that and not trying to stand in the middle of the room or something…  Here, I’ll stand beside you, then you can try to stand.  When you lose your balance, I’ll catch you, and you can try to regain your balance.”

 

After Dawn had moved to stand just behind her, Niphru attempted to stand, quickly falling forward back onto the bed before trying again.  On the third try, she began to fall sideways and was caught by Dawn, who gently pushed her back upright.

 

After about two hours of falling in various directions and being helped back upright, Niphru’s practice was interrupted as Dawn stated, “We should stop for tonight.  I think we’ll be leaving tomorrow, and we should be well-rested.”

 

With a nod, Niphru toppled forward onto the bed, crawled the rest of the way up, and shifted back into a fox, curling up as he waited for Dawn to prepare for bed.