After Amilya stopped petting him, Niphru jumped back down, heading into the spare room and jumping into the chair there. As he curled up to sleep for the day, he sidered what he wao do.

  First on the list was to refine his trol over his foxfire, which might let him get into school by giving him a way to write. It would also be his attempts at hunting. Sed on the list was to try to produce two fmes at onaintain a fme and illusion at the same time. This would allow him to hide himself and attack at the same time, making hunting much safer. Beyond that he wasn’t terribly certain and fell asleep while thinking about it.

  He awoke a few times throughout the day due to new sounds, though he was able to get to sleep again rather quickly. He heard Amilya leaving the home at one point before falling back asleep, and aime he heard Dawn e in.

  Eventually he woke up near evening, getting up and heading into the main room of the house. He saw Amilya doing something with a mana stone, and Dawn watg her. Deg it was worth looking into, he sat down beside Dawn to watch as well.

  Amilya kept a stream of mana going into the mana stone, but it seemed to carry some kind of pattern in it as well. After a few moments, the stone began to glow before she ged the stream of mana, causing it to dim again.

  “That is how you form a basic light entment, feel free to practice with the smaller stones, Dawn, we afford to have some acts with them,” Amilya stated, before turning to Niphru, “I don’t think you will be ready to try enting anytime soon, however, as it requires a lot of practice with magic first, and we haven’t seen you use anything but your fme and illusion.”

  “I didn’t uand any of what I was seeing anyways. How hard is it to learn to use magiiphru responded.

  “For most humans it is fairly difficult, though trolling entments is easy. For you though, I have no idea. Morris has been trying to teach Kel magic for several years now without success,” replied Amilya.

  Dawn spoke up, “I’m sure he learn it, it might just take a while. Kel too! They just think differently ao e up with a different way of doing it.”

  “That reminds me, I haven’t seen Morris for a few days, has he been out hunting?” Niphru questioned.

  “Oh, we should have let you know shouldn’t we? Morris left to go back to the capital a few days ago when his golem-wagon was recharged. If you o talk to him we seers bad forth but it takes several days,” Amilya responded.

  “Ah, I see, o speak with him, I was just curious what happeo him,” Niphru replied, “anyways, I should get back to the forest and see if I spot any other twisted beasts.”

  “Make sure to e back safe!” excimed Dawn.

  “As she said, be sure to be safe in your travels,” Amilya stated.

  Niphru o the two, then headed to the door, biting down otom td pulling it open, then turning aing the process to close it as he left.

  As he left, he began experimenting with his fain, trying to make it as small as possible. While pressing it was exceedingly difficult, he did find that he could ge the shape fairly easily, making it into a ribbon of fme as wide as his paw and nearly as long as he was.

  While it was in this form, he found it easier to try to press the front edge of it, but it was still far too wide to attempt to write with, so he would o tio work on it. This path of experimentation seemed t him much closer to getting it to work than before, however.

  He headed to the forest, as he got closer to his former den he ran across a bging up some of the grass in the pins. Remembering how the humans tried to keep animals out of the pins, he tried to spook it with his foxfire. The boar, however, decided to charge the fme rather than flee from it, so he ged it into an illusion of a bear.

  Niphru found himself surprised when the boar charged straight into and through his illusion. As it turned around, it faced towards him and began to charge again. He flipped his illusion bato a ball of fme and hurled it into the boar’s face as he leapt high over the charging swine.

  The fme was thrown off course as he jumped, but still mao clip the boar’s ears, setting each alight as it passed under him. As he fell towards the ground behind it, he swung his foxfire back the other way, catg the boar’s tail as well. The swine squealed in agony as it burned, wheeling around and charging again. Still rec from his leap, Niphru hurled himself to the side, leaving his fme behind where he had been standing.

  The boar plowed face-first into the fme, igniting its entire head, leading to panicked squealing and thrashing. By the time it had turned around again, the fmes obscured its sight and hearing enough it couldn’t find where to charge anymore, ihrowing itself to the ground trying to extinguish the fmes.

  Naturally, Niphru wouldn’t allow it to stop the fmes, moving his foxfire back over it any time it mao extinguish a pates. He also used the foxfire to extinguish the grass as it ignited, wanting to avoid spreading more fire. Uo stand the fme, the boar soon expired, flopping to the ground o time as its flesh burned off.

  Without any other way to dispose of the body, Niphru simply kept burning it until there wasn’t anythi but bohen tinued on his way to explore the forest border. For tonight, his trip didn’t show any other animals outside the forest, nor any monsters within.

  Niphru returned back to the vilge after pleting his patrol, happy to think of it as his home now given that he could be with Dawn. Arriving back at their home, he headed inside, cheg Dawn’s room and finding her asleep in bed. With a quick jump, he nded softly on the bed beside her, and curled up to sleep.

  For the several days, he spent the time fairly simirly. He would wake up and py with Dawn and the other kids outside until they had school, then focus on increasing trol over his foxfire. Eventually he would tire, and sleep in the chair at home, then wake up in the evening and hunt for monsters in the forest, rep any he couldn’t easily deal with himself. Once doh his patrol, he would theurn home to sleep beside Dawn.

  During those evenings, he mao hunt down another snake, another monstrous fox, and even a bear, though he had to leave the bear behind a help bringing it back.