The next morning, Niphru began practicing sitting upright again, wanting to reach a point where falling over wasn’t an eventual certainty.  Dawn, meanwhile, went to go speak with Morris.

 

Some time into Niphru’s practice, Dawn sent a message through their bond, “It seems like we’ve finished everything here, and can leave now; please come help us load up the wagons again.”

 

Excited to finally leave this boring village, Niphru switched back to fox form.  He then picked up the few things Dawn hadn’t taken with her, and left the bedroom, finding the man who owned the house present.  After informing him that they were leaving and getting a nod in response, Niphru continued toward where they had parked their wagons when they arrived.

 

As he approached, he saw the rest of the group present and loading their own belongings up, with the two paladins resting against the side of their wagon.  Niphru found Dawn and handed over the rest of her belongings.  As he was watching her carefully set them down, he noticed the rest of the group looking at him in surprise, then remembered none of them knew he had actually changed recently.  After assuring them it was still him and he was fine, he then asked if there was anything they needed help with.

 

Apparently, the village had a significant amount of leftover meat now, and they were giving a large amount to the people who had helped them so much recently.  Due to this, there was still a fair amount to load into the wagons, and they likely wouldn’t have to stop to resupply when they reached the town of Misty Valley.

 

With everyone working together, it didn’t take long to get everything gathered and loaded, and soon, they were on their way again, the villagers waving behind them.

 

A short way into their journey, Niphru asked if anyone would mind if he were to lay down in the wagon and practice.  Apparently, neither Dawn nor Morris had said anything about his newest skill, as the others asked what he would need to be lying down to practice.

 

Quite amused at the idea of how they might react, Niphru focused for a moment and shrank in size, returning to the same form he began the journey with.  As they reacted, he remarked, “One of the things I can do now is shapeshift!  Dawn and I have been working on getting me able to use a human-ish form.  I can’t quite focus on a purely human form because it is so different, but if I leave some parts fox-like, it is much easier.”

He paused for a moment to think before continuing, “Huh, I just realized that it feels fine with a single tail, even though I have two now.  Weird.  Maybe because I had one for so long?  Anyway, I was thinking of trying to practice using my hands, they are a lot more complex than using force magic to grab things, somehow.  And maybe work on talking properly, I can at least do a little bit of that already.  I can’t stand, though, and certainly can’t walk, so I’d need to lay down in the wagon.  I also don’t have any clothes to cover up with.”

 

It didn’t take much discussion at all before everyone agreed that it was fine, especially since the wagon was powered by magic rather than needing anyone to pull it.  So, having gotten permission, Niphru took a running leap and landed in the back of the wagon, quickly crawling out of sight before slipping out of his harness and shapeshifting back into humanoid form, finding that the transformation ended in an awkward position.

 

Niphru stretched and shifted around a bit, finding a more comfortable position under the camping equipment.  Once comfortable, she then reached out with a hand and grabbed a small cup that was nearby.

 

As she began carefully manipulating the cup, Niphru called out with an illusion, “I’m safely covered now if you want to see my face.”

 

“Wait, you’re female now?!” exclaimed Miana when she got a glimpse, leading to the others muttering in surprise, as well.  She then continued, “And I can certainly tell you aren’t human with those ears and eyes.  You look almost like Dawn, though!”

Niphru nodded before remarking, “Well, I had to study someone to copy how their body works, and I’ve been around Dawn the longest.  Plus, she let me study her more in-depth with my magic.  So, my first attempt was a direct copy of her.  I am at least trying to sound a little different when I try to speak.”

 

As an example, she began saying a few of the words she’d managed during practice with Dawn, revealing that her voice wasn’t quite the same.

 

“Well, this is certainly a surprise!” Richard stated as he glanced over at her before continuing, “And you are cute; somehow, those ears make me want to pat you on the head.”

 

Hearing this, Niphru couldn’t help but feel her ears pull back.  Perhaps it would be fine if it was Dawn, but it felt wrong to think of anyone else petting her.

 

Seeing her face, especially her expressive ears, the man responded, “Don’t worry, I wouldn’t do that without permission, Niphru, just like I never did when you are in fox form.”

 

Once everyone had gotten a look at her new form, mostly agreeing that she was cute, they went back to their own activities as they traveled on.

 

Eventually, they had to stop for the night, and Niphru shifted back to his small fox form; then, hearing that he and Dawn would be on second watch, he grabbed his harness and jumped back down.  He quickly tossed it into their tent as Dawn pulled it from the wagon and began helping her set it up with his magic.

 

Once everything was set up, he joined Dawn in trying to sleep.  A while later, Thomas woke them up, and they prepared for their shift, which was, as expected, peaceful.  Later on, they woke up Viera and Lisryn for their turn before returning to bed.

 

After waking, they packed up and continued onward.  Eventually, they reached the town of Misty Valley, finding it seemingly unchanged from their earlier visit.  After a bit of questioning, they found out what had happened in their absence.

 

It turned out, surprisingly, that none of the guards from the town were willing to fight, and no one had heard directly from the lord for months, instead only hearing from his advisor.  The men from the capital found it just as suspicious as the guards, and went to see the man, who immediately tried to flee.  Apparently, it turned out that he had been poisoning the lord and took his place, living well off the lord’s money.

 

After the man was restrained, his crimes were declared to the citizens of the city, and he was put under watch for the trip back to the capital to be judged and punished.  They then found someone to be the new lord, allowing the previous to become an advisor to the new, since he did still know a great deal about the job, even if his judgement was poor and he got himself poisoned and replaced.

 

Curiosity satisfied, the group took a night to rest before continuing onward back to the capital.  For the rest of the trip, nothing of note happened, and they made good time.  Eventually, they returned to the spire, Lisryn splitting off from the group with her guards to return to the Church of Conflict.

 

The day they arrived, Niphru didn’t bother trying to practice with the humanoid form, instead opting to simply rest after the journey.  The very next day, however, Morris visited with a request for him to visit the high mages to be studied, with an invitation for Dawn to join to relieve any worries about his treatment.

 

As expected, Dawn accepted the invitation and they traveled several floors up the tower until they reached a floor that was quite obviously designed for experimentation, the whole center a heavily enchanted containment chamber.

 

Upon seeing the rather intense design, Niphru couldn’t help but ask, “Is this going to be dangerous?  This is very concerning; I can feel the magic coming off the walls from here without even trying!”

 

Dawn nodded in agreement before Morris chuckled and replied, “No, there is no expectation of any real danger at all, for you or anyone else.  This room does have ways to amplify magical senses in addition to its role of containing dangerous effects.  That would be why we are doing this here instead of in a simple lounge.”

 

Feeling a bit relieved, Niphru let himself be led to a thick metal door that had multiple massive bolts to hold it closed.  He felt much better when it was left wide open after they entered.  Looking around, he saw several mages sitting in chairs and talking among themselves.

 

As they walked into the chamber, one of the mages looked up and called out to them, “Thank you for agreeing to come here, Niphru.  As I’m sure Morris mentioned before, we are quite curious about your ‘foxfire,’ as you’ve come to call it.  Quite simply put, it should be impossible for you to maintain such things active at all times, so we would like to study it.”

 

The woman then gestured for them to sit down on the other side of the chamber from them, with Morris sitting in a chair beside Dawn and Niphru, who was glad to see he got a chair as well.  Clearly, the high mages viewed him as being just as much a person as anyone else.

 

One of the men reached to the side, and a small column of stone rose to meet his hand as he requested, “Could you please put one of your foxfires in the center of the chamber for us?”

 

While the others watched, he moved one of his ‘blank’ illusions off of himself and shifted it back into fire form before letting it drift into the middle of the chamber.

 

The man hummed slightly before shaking his head and remarking, “Odd…  Without the spire’s amplification, I can’t tell that anything is even there.  Even then, I can only feel faint fluctuations.”

 

He then turned to the woman beside him and gestured at the stone pillar, which she grabbed.  Not long after, she agreed with the man, and the pillar sunk back into the ground.  The next man didn’t bother, simply staring intently at the flame before focusing on Niphru, frowning as he looked back and forth between them for a moment.

 

“You probably can’t sense much because this isn’t magic,” the man began, pausing for several seconds before continuing, “There is a clear connection between him and three other clouds of spiritual energy above him, as well as toward the fire.  It appears almost as if it is burning his spirit itself.  But that doesn’t explain how it is possible to keep them active at all times.  It would require an immensely powerful spirit to be able to regenerate at that speed.”

 

At this point, Dawn spoke up, “When he originally only had one flame, he exhausted himself making a second to protect me.  This crippled him to the point that he was barely alive until we visited people who helped transfer some of their spirit to him.  Maybe that is part of it?  Perhaps he needs a certain amount to maintain the regeneration?”

 

Niphru nodded before admitting, “I recently learned how to shapeshift, and after draining myself with it, my flames were very weak, and I was extremely tired, but after a night of sleep, they were back to normal.”

 

In response, the man replied, “I’ve never seen anyone able to create a spiritual flame for more than an hour, let alone four of them.  It should be impossible without more spiritual power than everyone here combined.”

 

To this, the first woman shook her head before remarking, “He is the first natural Awakened we know of.  Perhaps that makes him function differently than us humans, and the artificial Awakened we’ve ended up with.  Maybe his spirit simply heals that much faster.”

 

An idea suddenly struck Niphru, and he spoke with Dawn over their link, “Do you think I should tell them that I was blessed by two gods?”

As he asked the question, the man who had determined his flame was spiritual snapped his head up to look at them, clearly shocked at what he sensed.

 

“Is that telepathy?  I’ve known it should be possible for quite some time, but never managed it!” he exclaimed, leaning forward with interest.

 

Both Dawn and Niphru were shocked at him noticing, though Niphru recovered first and replied, “Yes, our bond lets us speak to each other, as well as even share senses.  You can feel it?”

 

Since the man hadn’t mentioned anything about gods, Niphru assumed that he couldn’t actually read the link, and told Dawn as much.

 

After a pause, Dawn responded to his question, “I don’t know; I think you should be the one to decide.  I’ll support you either way.”

 

As the man looked at Dawn, Niphru took a moment to think before finally asking, “I’m worried about revealing this…  Morris, should I trust them?”

 

Morris nodded before replying, “I trust all of them with my life, and in some cases, that has been literal while we’ve been in the wilds.  I made sure that none of those I didn’t trust would be here.”

 

Niphru nodded back before he let out a deep breath and admitted, “I became Awakened because of the blessings of two gods combined helping me.  I know this because they’ve contacted me directly recently, and even helped guide my last major mutation.  I’m sure you’ve noticed that I have two tails rather than the normal single tail.  That is part of what happened that day; shapeshifting was another part.”

He then took a moment to shapeshift back into a smaller fox, proving at least some of his words before pausing a few seconds and returning to his true form.

 

“Blessed by the gods?” several of them said in varying amounts of disbelief all at once.

 

“Not just one but two gods?” the man asked, eyes wide in shock before he shook his head and said, “That might explain it, I’ve seen someone who was blessed before, and they were incredible in their abilities compared to others.  To be blessed by two at once…”

 

A quick discussion between the high mages quickly ended with a remark that they had a lot to think over, and Niphru was free to leave, as they needed to think about what had been revealed.

 

While they returned to their residence, Dawn said, “I think that went well?”

 

Niphru shook his head as he replied, “I have no idea, but I hope giving that away was safe…”