A while ter, while Dawn and Niphru were discussing their experiences with the trio of mages, the room suddenly went silent. Turning around, Niphru spotted Lisryn and one of her guards entering the floor. To his shock, the guard looked directly at him, ign his invisibility illusion. Fortunately, it appeared the guard didn’t care, simply following Lisryn as she approached the group.

  “Hello, how has everyoreating you?” she asked towards the church mages.

  One of them replied, “Well, we aren’t trusted by basically anyone, but that is what we expected. No one is ht hostile, which is surprising. I think that may be because Frank was being so polite and friendly here. It may be different for the roups.”

  Lisryn nodded, humming under her breath before responding, “Well, I suppose I will have to speak with them ime we meet. What have you been up to?”

  “Well, these fellows here seem to focus oure of magid we’ve been having an iing discussion on the way it actually funs and why. Then there are Dawn and Niphru here, and we were talking about the experiehat brought us to this point. I suppose they are the ones you wao speak with, as we haven’t seen any other Awakened,” the mage expined, nodding to each group as he hem.

  “Ah, yes, I have been wanting to get to know more about Awakened, all the church taught was that they were monsters due to being inhuman. Clearly, this is not the case, as you have seen. A twisted creature would surely atta this sort of situation, but Niphru seems retively calm,” remarked Lisryn, nodding her head toward Niphru’s illusion.

  In response, Niphru shook his head and used his illusion to reply, “I am certainly not as calm as I look, yuard, especially, is scary. I’m not really here, just in case. Dawn and I both agreed to try to be as careful as we while not pletely hiding.”

  Hearing this, most of the mages in the group expressed surprise in various ways, from lifted eyebrows to oually jumping from their seat and frantically looking around. Meanwhile, Lisryn’s guardian simply let out a huff and shook their head.

  After rec from her surprise, Lisryn responded, “I am sorry you feel that way, but I pletely uand. I hope you don’t mind me asking some questions, however.”

  Receiving a nod of firmation from Niphru, she tinued, “What causes an animal to bee Awakened? I hadn’t heard of an Awakened outside of the city here before, and always wondered about that.”

  Niphru then expined, “Well, I am apparently unique? I just felt I could think more clearly over time, a like eatiain things, or that too much was dangerous, and, simirly, some pces were threatening, too, so I listeo those feelings. Over time, my memory improved, and I could more easily follow the feelings, leading to my thoughts being more and more clear.”

  Taking over, Dawn remarked, “Apparently it is something to do with may over time, much like in people, too mud too fast leads to mutations and lower intelligence, while just a bit over time improves the mind, which is ere told not to remove all the mana when practig upstairs; we are supposed to allow it to ge us at a slow pace to bee better adapted for trolling magic.”

  After a moment of thought, she added, “I also heard from someone I helped that they knew an Awakened wolf in their old town before they had to move, though I don’t recall any other information. Hopefully that is enough of an ao your question? If not, I’m sure the more experienced mages help once you get to them. I’m still trying to advanough for that, myself.”

  Nodding, Lisryn replied, “I see. That seems to me like it would make it pretty easy fes to end up actally Awakening animals they stay near. I suppose any that occurred in the Church of flict were killed before… At least that shouldn’t be a problem any longer. If you don’t mind me asking, what is it like having an Awakened panion?”

  Dawn frowned, deep in thought for a moment before answering, “I’m somewhat of a special case, from what I know; I have a bond with Niphru that is strohan many of the mind magic spells normally o speak with an Awakened. Additionally, Niphru speak on his own. But, overall, I’d say it is great, I have my best friend with me all the time, and we help each other with magibsp; Oh, and Niphru do magic too, but not all . And I almost fot that they have to learn like a kid does, they don’t just instantly know how to uand you. That is ahing that our bo us do much easier than normal.”

  With a nod, Lisryn stated, “That seems very iing. I think I’d like to get an Awakened panion, too,” and seeing the look she was getting, quickly expined, “I know, you don’t own people. But you try to befriend people. I ’t be friends with most people due to my new position, and it is pretty lonely.”

  As the expressions rexed, she tinued, “In fact, I have an idea… You said it is like with humans, so I wonder what happens if you fine a mutated creature and slowly feed it small amounts of mana… Could you get it tain its sanity and maybe awaken it?”

  Turning tuardian, she stated, “Please remind me of this idea wheurn,” then fog on the group again, she remarked, “I’m afraid I have to go che the others, but it leasure talking with everyone, we’ll have to meet again sometime.”

  After sharing farewells and watg her depart, Dawn said, “I’m surprised she is so nice, I thought she would be more… I don’t know, just not that.”

  One of the church’s mages replied, “Right? We felt the same whe her, though she be pretty scary too. She had her guardians sughter a bunch of people wheook over. But other thaimes she was enf her ges, she has been incredible. The prih Priest was always demanding and distant, but she seems like just another of us, just higher up.”

  Another spoke up, “That is why we agreed with her pn to send some of us here, it didn’t seem like we were being thrown away like sometimes happened in the past. And maybe we make some friends outside our church.”

  Dawn hen reached down to pick up Niphru, arms passing right through his illusion. Incredibly embarrassed, she got up and ran to the stairs, vanishing dow a frankly unsafe pace.

  Niphru immediately tried to calm her over their bond as he chased after her, catg up as she stopped to open the door to their dwelling. Dawn didn’t seem to rea, however, throwing herself onto the bed while muttering that everyone must think she is stupid now.

  Unsure of how to fort her, Niphru simply leapt up onto the bed and y against her, shifting as she turned and hugged him. Eventually she rexed and fell asleep, much to Niphru’s relief.

  Shard