I shrugged. “Believe me or don’t. I doubt you’ll ever understand how little I care about what you believe.”

  Cami elbowed me lightly as I said that. With our connection I realized that she was pointing out when I was putting my foot in my mouth—as the humans liked to say.

  I wasn’t quite sure why such an expression meant a bad thing. How else was one to clean out the little rocks which could get stuck in your claws? Oh well, I’d chose to trust her.

  “Err… what I meant to say is that this is a spell my mother wanted me to learn and I just know she would have been proud of me.”

  Lisella and Serius stared at me for a second. The priestess said, “Even divine magic which is, in part, bestowed by a god or goddess isn’t learned that quickly. From what I’ve heard, pact magic is much the same—though there is always some sacrifice which must be made. But we can worry about that later. What’s happening with our friends, Serius?”

  While they were talking I took a look at my new spell.

  Identification - Tier 1 spell. This spell enables the caster to identify people, monsters, animals, or inanimate objects. The spell is automatically successful against any target within ten levels of your own, unless other magical protections exist. This spell may be channeled if you possess that skill.

  Mana: 5 (base).

  Cast Time: 2 seconds.

  Cool-Down: 15 seconds.

  Range: 100’ + 10’ per level.

  Indeed that seemed useful. I wasn’t sure how the spell would determine what my level was but I figured I’d find out. With that, I cast it at Lisella.

  Name: Lisella Forlay

  Race: Human

  Age: 31.2

  Class: Grand Priestess of Miseria

  Level: 20th

  Further information is not available as your level is not high enough and you do not possess the Channel Mana skill.

  Well, at least the system considered my level to be above ten. I was worried that it might use my human class and screw me over.

  Cami said, “Are you listening, Nico?”

  The three of them were staring at me. My eyebrows raised. “Did I miss something?

  Cami answered, “Magus Serius just informed us that the monsters are much higher level than they should be. The ogres are between level twelve and fifteen and the troll is level sixteen.”

  “Is that too much for the others to handle?”

  Serius shook his head. “In those numbers… yes. I’m going to have to draw some of them here. They have a caster of some sort, but he must be wearing a charm because I can’t Identify him.”

  Lisella climbed down from her horse and pulled out a two-foot-long mace. It looked like it was made of pure gold but was likely just enchanted. She started casting spells then. They felt like what Galbrecht had cast before but perhaps even stronger.

  Divine Armor

  Blessing of Miseria

  Divine Strength

  Harm’s Buffer

  I felt the magic empowering me and grinned. I liked this strength. From the expression on Cami’s face, she was enjoying it too.

  Then Serius cast a pair of spells.

  Group Flight

  Haste

  When the first spell landed on me, I realized that I started to hover a few inches off the ground. I was no stranger to flying but this was a new way for me. I grinned. The second spell made my blood rush and I felt like everything around me was moving terribly slowly.

  The wizard looked at Lisella, “Done?”

  “As much as I can, for now. I need to save mana for battle, so that I still have some for healing.”

  He nodded. “I don’t really have many buff spells prepared, so this is all I can do, but at least I do have some battle magic ready.” Then he looked at me and Cami. “You two will stay behind Lisella. You’re students, and thus our responsibility. Obey the Priestess’ orders as though she spoke for the emperor because, in a sense, she does for students of the university.”

  He turned but then suddenly looked back at us. “I guess we can’t leave you defenseless.” Then he fished his hand into a bag on his belt. It must have been a spatial bag, because he pulled out items too big for the pouch. He handed over a dagger to Cami.

  “That’s enchanted and will cut into most monsters. It also has a small fire enchantment. Only use it if you have to.”

  Then he tossed me a pair of metal bands. I caught them but when I did, I realized they were shaped to go around human hands—like a second set of knuckles.

  “You have training as a monk, right?” He didn’t wait for me to reply but instead said, “Those will allow you to hit beings which can only be damaged by magic items, and will also let you hit normal creatures harder. Again, only use them if there is no other choice. If things go badly, use flight and haste to flee.”

  Then he was gone, stepping through a magical door in space which appeared.

  Lisella said, “Get ready, we’ll have incoming soon.”

  Chapter 24 - Pull and Fight

  I wasn’t exactly sure what she meant, something the wizard was going to do was meant to bring some of the enemy here. That didn’t seem very smart if we were so precious. We could have simply flown away and left the other adventurers to cover our retreat. I wouldn’t have shed a tear.

  I knew that wasn’t how they were going to handle this. The dragon dream told me that humans were often tenacious in sticking together. It was frustrating and had caused dragons many problems over the years, yet as I watched them interact, I realized it might be one of their strengths.

  Not knowing how long I had, I took a moment and identified the objects which I had slipped over my hands.

  Empowered Brass Knuckles

  Weight: 2 lbs. each.

  Damage: + 4-8 damage added to any melee blow delivered with a fist.

  Enhancements:

  Physical Damage +2

  Magical Strike +2

  Armor Penetration +1

  Durability +1

  I thought about Identifying the dagger that Cami was holding, or even the mace in Lisella’s hands, but a moment later Serius stepped back through the doorway in the air. Two black tentacles trailed from his body and then he yanked on them.

  He shouted, “I had to get two. They were being overwhelmed.”

  An instant later, two massive ogres came through the portal. There was no logical way they could have fit as the door was too small, but they both stepped through just fine. The other end of the black tentacles was wrapped around them. One was bound at the wrist and the other around the waist.

  The ogres were each a good ten feet tall. They were broader across and thicker in the chest than a human would have been. The end result was a much more powerful creature. Their upper arms were as thick as the waist of many humans I’d seen. A quick Identify told me a great deal.

  Race: Ogre Variant: Knight

  Age: 21 (suspended)

  Height: 10’4” Weight: 1,827 lbs.

  Base Speed: 6 mph

  STR: 153 AGI: 8

  DUR: 39 MIND: 10

  HP: 369/390

  It was far more information than I had gotten about Lisella, which told me a couple of things. The Ogre had to be closer to my own level for me to get such a full status report. I knew that, although I needed to be careful, I could be confident about hitting the Ogre and having it count.

  I couldn’t afford to take this for granted. I still didn’t know what kind of damage resistance it might have, but my maximum hit—even with my new weapon—was only twenty-four damage. And it would require me to get up close and personal. They had triple the HP that I had. Normally with my scales to protect me, I wouldn’t have worried much, but these things seemed far more dangerous than I had expected.

  At the same time, I felt an almost primal desire to destroy them, to rip them apart. Without eating them, of course—I sensed they would taste horrible. They also seemed different than the ogres I’d been anticipating. Instead of their bare fists or clubs, these two wielded actual swords. They were crude, but clearly a blacksmith had forged them.

  Lisella stepped forward and shouted a word. I couldn’t understand what she said, despite hearing her clearly. The word was some type of holy power and it seemed to work. The two ogres each dropped to their knees while clutching their ears as blood ran through their fingers.

  Three Force Darts shot off of my hands at the same time as another one shot from Cami. Each missile might only do fifteen damage or so, but their penetrating power made the wounds they caused deep ones. I aimed my attacks for the throat of one of the kneeling ogres. They tore his flesh and despite not being critical hits, he was profusely bleeding.

  Not that it mattered, though, as only a second later a spinning red blade of fire whirled off of Serius’ hands. The fiery blade took one Ogre’s head off and then the other’s off, too. Both ogres’ bodies crashed to the ground.

  I felt an influx of life from the one I had damaged but notifications about gains didn’t come while I was in active combat mode. It was an established aspect of the system the gods set in place, which I just had to deal with.

  The wizard looked at me and then Cami, as though to warn us back, but then thought better of it. “I’m heading back for more.”

  The magical doorway he had created still hung in the air and he disappeared through it with just a step. A moment later he popped his head back through. “The caster has fled. Galbrecht and Modessa are cleaning up the rest. I need to help them, but Liam is badly injured and needs you.”

  He looked at me again and this time he did speak up. “You two hide in the back of the wagon. We’ll be right back. Fly away if anything comes for you.”

  I didn’t like the idea of hiding, especially not when I felt so empowered by the magic surrounding me. The haste effect still had my blood pumping. Suddenly, both the adventurers were gone.

  “Just us, I guess.”

  Cami smiled. “That isn’t so bad. I have so many questions I need to ask you, but there’s always someone around. Do you suppose we’ll get some more privacy at the university?”

  “I surely hope so, but none of my ancestors have any memories which help me to understand what to expect. This is all new ground for me and I’m pretty much going on curiosity… and whatever this connection is between us.”

  Cami got silent for a second. “I’ve heard you talk about your ancest…”

  Her words were cut off as I saw the air behind her shimmer. I detected it just a moment too late as claws ripped into her. I saw three claws puncture through her belly from the back and another opened her neck. It missed the jugular vein but only by a tiny bit.

  She probably owed her life to the Blessing she’d been granted because it seemed like at the last instant the claws shifted just a tiny bit. It wasn’t enough to save her entirely, but enough to buy her a bit of time for me to deal with her attacker.

  The combination of haste and divine strength made me even more powerful. I was able to react far more quickly than the were-tiger assassin anticipated. My fist snapped into its chest with the sound of crunching bone. I didn’t bother trying to Identify it as I knew enough to recognize its species. They were hunters, but inferior to dragons, of course.

  Everyone knew a crouching dragon would be stronger than a hidden tiger.

  Each punch pushed it back but the man-shaped tiger was in his hybrid form. He likely was stronger and faster than me in this form, even if I would have been much stronger as a dragon. I was going to need to use my wiles. For a brief moment, I regretted that I hadn’t found time to spend my DKP up to this point, but vowed to rectify that as soon as possible. Now, though, I felt Cami fading and there was no time for anything but killing.

  Its claws swung in a sharp arc at me and cut into my shirt and the soft human skin beneath. I growled, but fortunately had already been charging up another Force Darts. The spell went off point blank into the beast’s chest, blasting it back ten feet.

  I ran through my options. Dragon Fear wouldn’t work in this form. I couldn’t transform quickly enough to matter, even if that wouldn’t have created a whole other set of problems when the adventurers got back. No, I realized that with Force Darts on a cool down and this thing as fast as me—even while I was buffed—I would need my only other viable magic.

  Then, it did what I wasn’t expecting and hopped back. It wove its hands in a quick spell. My mind followed the details even as I raced at him to tackle him. I assumed I could survive a single spell but I wasn’t sure. I was just a single step too slow as the magic hit me.

  The were-tiger growled, its words difficult to understand through its bestial mouth, “Go to sleep.” But as I felt the spell wash over me I burst out laughing.

  I couldn’t help myself as I snapped back, “Dragons are immune to sleep magic, you fool.”

  My insult certainly didn’t shock him but the revelation must have made him question himself for just a moment because I was able to drive my shoulder into him. I came up and under his ribcage which was exaggerated in this hybrid form. The impact lifted him up off the ground and flung him backward.

  Just as I was about to pounce on him, I heard the sound of swishing air. On pure instinct I ducked low and felt the wind of a blow that just barely missed the top of my head. I rolled to the left following that same instinct, and came up standing between Cami and the second were-tiger which had just come out of stealth.

  I’d been having enough trouble with just one of them. My dragon powers weren’t going to save me from two, and I couldn’t transform fast enough. The only thing that had saved me from having my head batted around like a toy by the were-tigers was an instinct which seemed completely foreign.

  I knew what it was, but hadn’t given any time to thinking about it before.

  My conviction about the inferiority of humans had made me neglect the classes I was operating while in human form. They made a sort of sense. A monk was a warrior who trained and fought to use his body as a weapon. That was exactly what a dragon was, a living engine of destruction, while the sorcerer class was one which mirrored my magical abilities.

  As the injured were-tiger stepped up next to his kin, he said, “About time.”

  The second one said, “You didn’t even kill the human child and couldn’t handle one measly level seven monk. Shall I handle him for you?”

  The first were-tiger snorted. “Bah, there’s something off about him. He resisted my magic and moves faster than should be possible.”

  “The wizard and priestess must have buffed him. It doesn’t matter, we can kill him now.”

  “No, playing with our food is always more fun,” the first one said with a wicked grin. He bared his teeth at me.

  I could respect that gesture, not that I let them prattle on out of some misguided sense of respect. No, I would have preferred to have bitten their heads off, rather than listen to them drone on while in my dragon form. But I wasn’t in my dragon form, and I needed this time to come to the point of accepting something which my dragon memories were screaming at me about.

  Nicosandumas, a dragon somewhere between young adult and adult, had been unable to defeat these two were-tigers. The best I might hope for was to flee using the wizard’s flight spell. But that would never work, as I wouldn’t be able to scoop up Cami from right in front of them. Even if I could, my connection with her told me she was barely hanging on to life, and I doubted she’d survive being moved.

  Maybe I could stall them long enough for the adventurers to return, but being saved by those who had slain my sister and destroyed my home was even more unacceptable than what I now contemplated. Nicosandumas might be unable to defeat them, but Nico, the monk/sorcerer with magical knuckles and the buffing magic from a pair of level twenty casters should be able to.

  I simply had to embrace being human. My transformational skill made it so I truly was human in body, although enhanced by my draconic heritage. But my mind had never—not for a single instant—allowed me to slip into thinking of myself as human. Now, though, I needed to accept these human classes and all the skills that came with them.

  There was a sharp moment of bitterness within me—almost like pain, but purely emotional—and then I did the pragmatic thing. I pushed down my pride. Survivors wrote the dragon dream. Let all my ancestors be damned. They couldn’t save me and yet fought against me accepting the power at hand which could?

  I drew it in and embraced it. As the monk class took over, I found that I no longer felt awkward in this body. A series of notifications immediately popped up but I had to ignore them. I had a good idea what at least some of them were. Then I moved forward with a newfound grace.

  This was my body and I was the master of it. The were-tigers were shocked at first. My attack speed was even greater now. Thanks to the magic and my innate skills, I was moving faster than they were. I swept the leg of one dropping it backward but doing no real damage. I only wanted to disorient it.