Sam hummed quietly to himself, sack slung over his shoulder as he retraced his steps out of the deep caves. His eyes and ears were peeled, magical senses straining for the slightest indication of a heat source or pressure variance.

Still, it was hard not to feel invincible. Muscles rippled under his new scales, his body almost overflowing with energy and potential. Even his loincloth barely fit, the strip of cured rat hide stretched tight over his expanded hips.

He wasn’t quite as big or strong as Dussok, but Sam was almost there. Already he was excited at the prospect of wrestling his littermate to test his new body as soon as he made it home. As much as he had enjoyed his sojourn into the dark, the isolation was beginning to weigh on Samazzar. There was only so long he could spend pondering the greater truths of reality while hiding from monsters so large and powerful that they could destroy him with an absent-minded flick of their tails without going at least a little mad.

Sam’s foot caught on a rock, sending him tumbling to the cavern floor. For a second, the cave floor rushed up at him, an expanse of grey overlaid with the reds and yellows of ambient heat. Only at the last second was he able to catch himself, his new claws digging grooves into the stone.

Sheepishly, he stood back up, checking his sack to ensure that his precious cargo was undamaged. Thankfully, everything was safe and in its proper place. After everything he went through to collect the alchemical reagents, the idea of being forced to delve back into the deep tunnels to replace them almost made him scream.

Nodding to himself, Samazzar resumed his former pace, keeping a fraction of his attention on his feet. For all the benefits provided by his new form, Sam hadn’t quite adapted to it yet. His arms and legs were both longer than he remembered, and if he wasn’t paying attention it was easy to forget and have clumsy episodes.

Sam smiled to himself, brushing some imaginary dust off of his scales. Yet another reason for him to get excited about his journey home. He could think of no way to better acclimate himself to his new body than to chase Takkla and Dussok through the narrow tunnels outside of the cave that they had claimed as their own.

He stopped, squinting into the darkness. An orange-red blob of heat crept toward him, skittering on all fours along the rocky floor. Distantly, Sam could hear the scratch of claws on stone as it approached furtively, darting from boulder to boulder.

As useful as his magical vision was, it did little to help Sam narrow down what was stalking him. He knew roughly how big and warm it was, where bad air streamed from its nose and mouth. Unfortunately, that didn’t help him determine its shape or capabilities.

It was roughly the same size as him, and it could clearly sense him in the dark. Beyond that, Sam was lost. He couldn’t know if it sensed his heat, disruptions in the airflow or even if it was tracking him with the hypersonic clicks of the albino cave bats. More importantly, he didn’t know what it was or what it could do.

With his new abilities, Sam suspected that he would come out on top against most monsters around his size. Still, there were a number of predators in the deep tunnels that gave him pause. Any of the major feline predators or cave foxes would give him trouble, not to mention the more esoteric creatures with proper bloodlines and magic.

It froze under his gaze. For a handful of long seconds, the figure crouched behind an outcropping of rock, unmoving, their unseen gaze burning a hole into Sam’s scales.

Cautiously, with slow and steady movements, Samazzar set his pack on the ground. He straightened up, careful to keep his movement smooth and nonthreatening. Sam feared the worst, but there was no guarantee that his pursuer was actually planning to attack.

It didn’t work.

The blob of yellow and orange exploded from cover, leaving all fours to sprint on its hind two legs toward Samazzar. His eyes went wide in surprise as he recognized his foe, barely noticing the air pressure surrounding the other kobold’s crude spear as it was thrust at Sam’s stomach.

He tried to step to the side, doing his best to guess the weapon’s location from the faint pressure waves flowing off of it. For a second, it seemed like Sam’s newly athletic body was going to do it as he jerked his body to the left.

Then his foot slipped.

The too big limb slapped into a rock, upsetting Sam’s balance and sending him spilling backward. Time seemed to slow as he fell toward the stone floor, the roiling air pressure of the spear cutting through the air as it tracked his body.

Frantically, he swung a claw at the shaft of the oncoming spear, trying to bat it aside before it impaled him. Deep down, Samazzar knew he was doomed. He had the reflexes and speed to intercept the weapon, but he was off-balance and falling. There wouldn’t be any strength behind his attempt to deflect it, and even if he succeeded, his attacker would simply finish him with a second stroke.

A fraction of a second before his claw hit, it tingled. Sam became acutely aware of the hot blood gushing through his veins as the beat of his heart thumped in his ears.

He barely met any resistance as his claws struck the spear, slicing it cleanly in half. Time returned to normal as the front portion of the weapon still hit him, but without any weight or force behind it, it bounced harmlessly from Samazzar’s newly hardened scales.

Quickly, Sam scrambled to his feet, doing his best to look threatening despite the surprise filling him.

The other kobold lurched backward, staring at the useless length of wood in his hands in disbelief. Then his eyes snapped up. Sam couldn’t make out his opponent’s features, just a smear of blurry yellow as heat radiated from their snout.

“How,” Sam’s opponent hissed, swinging the remainder of his spear experimentally like a club. “You shouldn’t have been able to spot me and you shouldn’t have been able to break my spear.”

“Magic, he replied warily, eyes never leaving the baton in his opponent’s claws. Air pressure flowed around the club alerting Samazzar to its location as it whizzed back and forth.

Something tingled in the back of his mind. The pressure waves roiling off of the bat as it zipped through the air resembled the flow of water from the deep vents in the otter’s cave. Water or air could-

The kobold swung his club at Samazzar’s head. He ducked, marveling at how clear the high pressure zone in front of the wooden rod was.

His enemy grunted, swiping horizontally with the length of wood for a second time. Excitement bubbled inside Sam as he noticed a cavity of low pressure behind the weapon as it displaced air with an off-balance swing.

Almost absently, he side-stepped the blow, eyes fixed on the way air curled around the moving weapon, flowing away from the high pressure wave at the front of the rod and toward the lower pressure gap behind it. It was almost like a stream traveling from a higher elevation to a lower while passing around rocks and barriers.

Sam’s eyes widened as he jumped backward, dodging another attack. Something clicked. He wasn’t sure how, but he knew that there was another mystery here, just under his snout. He had the knowledge needed to learn it, now he just needed a baptism to commemorate his connection with the magic.

His foe snarled, gripping their baton with both hands and thrusting toward Samazzar’s stomach like it was still a spear.

Sam’s claw lashed downward, nabbing the rod from the air. He pulled, dragging the other kobold off balance and toward him where they tripped over an extended leg, leaving the length of wood in Sam’s claws and depositing his attacker on the hard stone floor.

“Why are you attacking me?” Samazzar asked, cocking his head slightly to the side. “I was on my way back to Center Cave and the things I am carrying on me are hardly valuable. Survival is tenuous enough for our kind without infighting. It just doesn’t make sense.”

The other kobold glared up at Sam, pushing himself backward along the ground as he tried to open up some distance between the two of them.

“Center Cave?” He snarled back rhetorically. “I’m dead down here in a matter of months, but there the corrupt guards will kill me on sight. At least in the tunnels I have a chance to survive.”

“About that,” Sam responded, pacing his opponent as the other kobold tried to crab walk his way to an escape. “You don’t have a torch. How have you survived in the deep tunnels? I would think that the cave rats should have picked you clean by now.”

“You’re not the only one with a bloodline ability,” the crawling kobold hissed back. “The guards didn’t know that I had darksight when they exiled me into the tunnels. If they did, they’d probably have killed my friends and I on at the gate to Center Cave when they threw us out”

“Wait,” Samazzar squinted at his prone opponent. “You’re Iksos right? The kobold that attacked me when I tried to hire him to drag a centipede into the caves?”

“The runt?” Iksos stopped crawling away, voice dripping with shock. “No, that’s impossible. You were fucking tiny-”

“I awakened my bloodline,” Sam replied with a shrug, looming over Iksos. “I still don’t understand how you’re alive. You must have been down here for months without support or preparation.”

“You and your friends killed Donnas and threw me into the dark,” Iksos fumed, clenching and unclenching his claws. “For the first couple of days I was lost, jumping every time I heard a noise, but eventually hunger got the best of me. Even in the deep tunnels, there are tools and meat if you become desperate enough.”

“Oh.” Sam blanched as he thought through the implications of Iksos’ words. “Oh dear, you mean-”

The former thug took advantage of his momentary distraction to lunge forward, tackling Samazzar and knocking both of them to the ground. Despite his smaller stature, Iksos’ momentum and experience won out, and after a moment of grunting struggle, Sam found himself on his back with the other kobold straddling his chest.

“You asked how I survived?” Iksos hissed, bringing his claw high in order to slash downward toward Samazzar’s throat. “I ate what I caught. No matter how much it wriggled or what shape it took. That’s what this was originally. A struggle for food and survival.”

“Now?” The other kobold cackled as he leaned close to Sam, hot breath tickling across his scales. “Now it’s personal. I’m going to enjoy watching you bleed for what you’ve done runt.”

Sam’s heart thudded in his ears once more. WIthout thinking he reached up, digging his claws into either side of Iksos before his attacker could bring his own talons down.

It was like digging through loose soil or snow. Iksos’ scales and flesh put up little resistance, yielding almost immediately to Sam’s strikes. The other kobold tried to jerk free, squealing in pain as Sam’s claws rent through his body.

Iksos struggled for a moment, strength leaving his body as Samazzar’s claws tore through flesh and bone, gashing the organs underneath. The other kobold slapped downward, his claws weakly skittering off of Sam’s scales.

He dug deeper, taloned fingers questing for Iksos’ lungs and heart. The other kobold jerked as Sam found his quarry deep inside Iksos’ body. He thrashed futilely atop Sam, but within seconds, his assailant slumped over, unmoving and heavy on Sam’s heaving chest.

With a groan, Sam pushed the corpse off of him. It slid onto the rocks next to him leaving Samazzar on the stone floor, gasping for breath as he stared at the cavern’s ceiling. For almost a minute, he just lay there coming to terms with what had just happened.

Finally, Sam stood up, the blood and viscera covering him still glowing yellow-orange in his heat vision. He wrinkled his snout at the smell already permeating the cave.

Gingerly, he picked up his pack, doing his best not to paint it with Iksos remains. Sam took a couple of steps toward Center Cave before he changed course. His deviation added an extra hour or three to his journey, but it was all worth it when he arrived at the ankle deep stream that Dussok, Takkla and him had fled up to escape the cave centipede.

After some quick surveillance of his environment to ensure there weren’t predators lying in wait, Sam stripped off his loincloth and practically dove into the water, scrubbing the dried and crusted gore from his sole article of clothing. Once it was as clean as it was going to get, he set the scrap of cloth aside and turned to himself.

Sam lifted one clawful of water after another, pouring them over his scales and scrubbing to try and remove as much of the grit as possible. As the water coursed over his body, removing days worth of grime along with Iksos’ blood, an idea struck him, destroying any worry or anxiety he still held over his encounter with the other kobold.

Taking a deep breath to fill his lungs with good air, Samazzar lowered himself into the quietly burbling stream. The water washed over him as he screwed his eyes shut and shoved his face and upper torso into it.

There wasn’t enough of the stream to properly cover his back, but as he lay there, Sam focused on the sensation of the cold liquid splashing into his shoulders before curling around his body and continuing on this journey. More specifically, he narrowed his concentration until the only thoughts in his mind were the burning of his lungs and the flow of the water as the driving pressure from the book pushed it past him.

He needed to come up for air twice, diving back into the shallow water as he tried to chase the vague tingling sensation of the mystery just beyond his reach. By his third immersion, the chill from the stream had robbed enough heat from his scales that Sam found himself shaking and face down in the water as he tried to keep warm.

Finally, he wrapped his arms around himself and rolled over onto his back. The water washed over his shoulders and flanks as he stared unhappily at the ceiling, pondering whether or not he would need to gather some bat guano to start a fire to heat himself up before trying again.

Then, the world just snapped into place and his concerns about the cold were forgotten.

Water and air flowed. Traveling from places of concentration and height to others, ramming into and then moving around any obstructions in their path. The flow could be as gentle as the minor pressure differentials between the surface and the deep caves, slowly circulating good air throughout the entirety of the depths. It could also be a rushing torrent of water that crushed and destroyed anything in its path.

And that was him. An inexorable force flowing from pitiful beginnings as he slipped past obstacles. For those obstacles that couldn’t be avoided? His mind flashed to the purple otter and the elder salamander. Enough cleverness and persistence could wear them away like the channels worn by rivers into the solid rock of the deep tunnels.

A grin split Sam’s muzzle as he sprang up, the last vestiges of dirt and blood on his scales all but forgotten.

His trip into the great dark had been incredibly fruitful. Gathering the reagents for the next levels of the mysteries of Heat, Ember, and Good Air should be enough, but pushing his bloodline forward and learning the secrets of Flow and Pressure?

It was almost like destiny was whispering to Samazzar in his dreams, pushing him forward with promise of what he was always meant to be.