How could I release Fear properly? Could I do it just by thinking? There seemed to be something else to it, didn't there?
“Oh dear, oh dear, you don't seem to understand, do you?”
“Huh? Aaaaaaagh!”
I was startled by the enormous eye that suddenly appeared in front of me.
Mom! Is teasing your son like that fun? But what had suddenly possessed her to return to her true form? Was she going out?
I protested Mom's sudden behavior and asked a question.
“Mom! What are you doing?! And why are you suddenly in your true form?”
But Mom smiled with her eyes as usual—again, a dragon smiling in its true form really doesn't look right—and spoke.
“Hoho, my Rainin doesn't seem to understand. Now, look straight into Mommy's eyes.”
Her eyes? Why her eyes all of a sudden?
I looked into Mom's enormous, glittering eye. It really was huge. I could see the aperture in her iris so clearly, couldn't I?
And I could clearly see my reflection in her pupil.
But what was this...... sensation?
I wondered about the unknown sensation suddenly sweeping over my entire body. At that moment, the aperture in Mom's eye narrowed. Then a hot wind engulfed me.
WHOOOOSH!
Ugh! What is this?! A scorching gust suddenly blew straight at me.
Aaaah! My eyes, my eyes!
I rubbed my eyes because of the dust that came with it. After a moment, the wind abruptly stopped. Then I felt something strange. I raised my head, looked ahead, and met Mom's enormous eye directly.
BOOM!
G...... ack!
Suddenly, it felt as though my heart had stopped. I felt my body being slashed from every direction, and I couldn't speak or move at all.
At that moment, I understood. The single power filling Mom's eyes as I looked into them, as they looked at me!
Gasp!
My heart was pounding violently, as though about to explode. Before I even realized it, sweat was streaming down my entire body. Yet my body had gone cold, and the sweat running over it was utterly icy.
I realized what this sensation was, the one that had taken over my entire body and finally penetrated my mind.
‘Terror.’
Mom's eyes were like deep, deep pits of the abyss. If I kept being drawn in, I felt I'd plunge to the bottom of a bottomless pit from which even my soul could never escape.
I felt as though countless ghosts and vengeful spirits inside would seize my body and soul and never let go, leaving me to suffer there forever until even my soul wore away! Indescribable terror! Pure nightmare! Pain that seemed ready to tear my whole body apart!
All of it swept over me, and I could only scream.
“SKREEEEEEEEE!”
Then I lost consciousness.
When I opened my eyes, Mom was looking down at me with an expression close to tears.
Seeing my eyes open, Mom spoke softly.
“Rainin...... A-are you all right? Hmm? You're all right, aren't you?”
“Heh...... Mom, what's wrong? I'm all right.”
With tears brimming in her eyes, Mom hugged me tight.
Gack...... Gack...... Can't...... breathe!
“I'm sorry...... I'm sorry...... My poor son......”
Mom kept holding me and saying she was sorry. Only then did I realize why I’d fainted. While wondering what Fear was, I’d looked into Mom’s eyes, felt uncontrollable terror, screamed, and passed out. If my guess was right, Mom had wanted to let me experience Dragon Fear directly to teach me—probably with a little teasing mixed in.—Unable to withstand her Fear, I’d fainted.
Haha, Mom, don't feel so sorry. Now I know exactly what Fear is.
I spoke to Mom, who was still holding me.
“Mom...... I'm all right. So please stop crying. Okay?”
“Sob...... I'm sorry. Mommy did something awful.”
“I'm telling you, I'm all right. So please stop crying. Okay? You don't look nice when you cry.”
“Y-yes, all right. Sob......! I'd better stop. I'm sorry.”
“Come on! I said I'm all right! Don't cry! Smile! You're prettier when you smile!”
Mom raised her head at my words and beamed. Though her eyes were full of tears, she was beautiful.
I nodded and spoke.
“Yes, smile like that. That looks much nicer.”
“Yes, yes, I'm sorry. I won't do it again.”
Mom said that and smiled.
I grinned back at her. Seeing my expression, Mom burst out laughing and spoke.
“P-Pfft, pffft! Ahahahahaha! You're so funnyyy! A dragon grinning like that, ahahahahaha! It's so funnyyy! Ahahahaha!”
“Grr.”
After that, I threw myself into practicing Fear. Having experienced it once, I thought I ought to be able to use it, too. In my head, I kept repeating only, ‘I'll kill you!’ Kill! Kill! I'll kill you! But an act without a purpose soon lost its appeal. Anyone who hadn't tried it couldn't know how flat and boring it was to think about killing a wall. I soon realized I was making no progress because, however I looked at it, I had no target for Fear.
“Mom. Don't I need to bring in something like a guinea pig to do this?”
“Hmm? A guinea pig? What would you need that for? When Mommy learned Fear, Grandma used a moderate amount of Fear on me, too. Once you perfect it, a hot wind will probably blow around you every time you release it. You've experienced it, so you know, don't you?”
Ah, so that hot wind had come from using Fear. Then it must have been the wind created when Fear, an intangible energy, manifested and encroached on the surroundings, rapidly pushing away the air already there.
The lack of a need for a guinea pig left things a little dull, but I squeezed my eyes shut and kept thinking relentlessly to practice Fear.
I'll kill you! I'll destroy you! I'll erase your existence! I'll tear you to pieces! I'll wipe everything out! I'm going to kill you!
Hissss......
Hmm? What's that? Startled by the strange sound reaching my ears, I looked around. The dust around me had retreated some distance in an even circle. Ohh! Did...... it work?
I hurriedly turned toward Mom, my eyes gleaming with an urgent plea for an answer. She smiled kindly and nodded.
I did it! Only a little, but I did it! Wahahaha! Hahahahaha!
Once I'd succeeded in releasing Fear for the first time, the rest was easy. The applications weren't particularly difficult: releasing a large amount all at once, or letting it spread far and faintly, focusing it on one individual, or dispersing it.
If I stored Fear inside my body rather than using it, then released it in a short burst, every living creature around me would be seized with great terror and unable to do anything. Small insects and lesser creatures would die instantly.
Fear symbolized the authority of a dragon's power. It made every creature submit beneath that dominion. Learning all its applications and refining my Fear took about 10 months.
With that, I'd learned walking, flying, and Fear, the foundations of dragon life, in one year. Yes! Another 998 years until adulthood! Keep going!
#(3) Adorable Spirits
After mastering the 3 basic skills of a dragon, the next thing I learned was spirit arts.
Hahaha! Spirit arts......
For some reason, I laughed. I never imagined the dragon study manual I'd seen in novels would become reality here. Mom explained spirits to me.
“Spirits are like your hands and feet. Think of it as getting servants who work exclusively for you. It's good to have subordinates to work in your place. Spirits will also warn you of danger and protect you from it as much as they can.”
I know all that.
But I nodded as though it were the first I'd heard of it. Otherwise, she'd wonder.
Mom continued her explanation.
“There are many kinds of spirits. First, I'll teach you about the 5 basic elemental spirits and the 5 non-elemental spirits. Dragons are beings of nature. We're the sons and daughters of Mother Nature, born with the greatest share of her power. Humans probably think of elves when they think of a race of nature. Elves are practically a group of fanatical conservationists. They're so fussy and petty they won't let anyone cut down a single tree, and they're a limp sort of race with nothing firm about them.”
She held up her index finger and swayed her hand from side to side.
“Oh, I've rambled too long. Anyway, to call spirits, you have to recite a summoning incantation in their language. Elves can do it very naturally, while only humans with some affinity for nature can manage it. The closer you are to nature, the easier calling spirits becomes. As I just said, we dragons are nature's children, beings of nature. So we don't need to recite a separate incantation. Just call the spirits' names, and they'll appear and obey your orders.”
This time, her finger pointed at me.
“Why call their names? Because a spirit's name represents its existence. I told you a dragon's name symbolizes its power. A spirit's existence is contained in its name, you see? If a dragon calls a spirit and it doesn't come, that's no different from denying its own existence.”
Mom paused there, seemed to think about something for a moment, then snapped her fingers.
Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap!
In order, there appeared an enormous water droplet, a blazing ball of fire, a mound of earth rising from the ground, a mass of wind forming in midair, and a ball of light that appeared with a FLASH! Mom pointed to each in turn, starting with the water droplet, and explained.
“Now, I’ll explain from the left. First, this water droplet. Show your true form, Undine (Undine).”
At Mom's words, the water droplet rippled and changed, and a pretty girl emerged from it. She was blue, but still quite pretty. Yet when Undine saw me, she covered her face and turned away. Huh? What's wrong?
“Haha, Undine must be shy. That's my son, making a spirit fall for him......”
Whaaat? For a moment, I stared blankly in astonishment. S-so...... Undine had been a water droplet instead of her true form because she was shy? H-haha, somehow I feel like I've entered another dimension. Hahaha...... But she wasn't saying anything? I asked Mom a question.
“Mom, can't they talk?”
“Hmm? Of course they can't. What would lesser spirits have to say? They have to be at least intermediate spirits to speak. They can't talk, but they can still communicate, so giving orders won't be a problem. Undine? Go and greet Rainin.”
The girl made of water wore clothes also made of water, rather like those of ancient Roman nobles. With her feet immersed in swirling water, Undine flew over to me and bowed. Then she hurriedly flew back to her place and turned into a water droplet.
Haha, that's really interesting, isn't it? But I'm a Red Dragon, and she's a water spirit, right? Since my attribute is fire, shouldn't we be incompatible?
Curious about that, I asked another question.
“Mom, I'm a Red Dragon. Can I be friends with a water spirit?”
“Ohh......! A question that gets straight to a blind spot. Of course, Mommy thought that, too. We can breathe mighty, hot, elegant, even beautiful flames that turn everything to ash in an instant. So why can we be friends with water spirits? That's what I wondered, but apparently a dragon's attribute has nothing to do with summoning spirits.”
“Huh? Nothing to do with it?”
“Summoning spirits depends on how much power of nature you possess. The power of nature in a dragon is separate from its attribute. So dragons can summon and command spirits as much as they like. Any dragon can make contracts with the Spirit Kings of the 5 elemental spirits without difficulty once it becomes an adult.”
Ohh, I see.
I nodded.
So the power of nature and attributes were separate matters? Anyway, I'm glad. Being able to command water spirits however I like, I mean. I really enjoy swimming and all sorts of other ways of playing in water.