After another long day of seemingly never ending yard work in which the little wyvern didn’t show up at all, Sophie was feeling quite grumpy by the time she set to work making more potato soup.

She was really going to have to ask for a second cooking lesson with Acacia. Or at the very least, she needed to get more pastries. She was getting low on everything – all of the ingredients to make the soup and her backup pastry stash. She was also down to her last bite of mana bread. Acacia had generously given her two loaves already, and Sophie wasn’t sure she should even ask for more, given how difficult it seemed to make. Sophie had enough left if she wanted to use some today, but then she wouldn’t have any left for the little wyvern.

Drat.

She poked at her soup, forcing herself to eat it. It’s not that it tasted bad, but after several meals in a row of eating only soup, she was getting bored with it. She sorely missed takeout and cellphones and –

Well, that wouldn’t do at all.

She did think of her old world still, especially as the night grew nearer and she had to deal with all of the inconveniences of living in this extremely old-fashioned fantasyworld shrine. But tonight, she still had her mana reserves – in fact, she could more accurately feel her mana reserves than ever before due to Mana Sense – and she was ready to try the Shrine Stone again.

Elowen was still so beside herself with happiness at the idea of finding out more about their mystery plant that she didn’t even complain tonight.

“Just be careful!” she warned cheerfully, following close behind as Sophie made her way into the entryway.

Sophie cautiously opened the shrine stone’s cabinet. This time, she came prepared with the small chunk of mana loaf that was left, still wrapped in brown paper, and she set that to the side. The shrine stone was somehow more intimidating now that she had Mana Sense, and she thought that maybe she might not have been so eager to try it had she gotten the ability sooner.

She held out her hand and rested it gently on the surface of the stone. There was still no point in trying distance channeling here – the stone itself would be difficult enough to work with without the added challenge.

Sophie almost immediately broke out into a cold sweat as soon as she made the connection. This was not the same, shaky feeling that she got with the fire, but something almost like fear, pinging along her new Mana Sense. The vast emptiness was even more overwhelming at this close distance, although she could not even begin to see the bottom.

She felt her mana trickling out of her reserves – something she had never noticed before. Even just making the connection without pushing her own mana into the stone seemed to use some small amount of the precious resource. This was new territory. She explored what she could – she felt something strange pulling at the stone, and she realized with a start that it must be Elowen. She couldn’t see the bond, but she could feel it somehow, like a hint right in the back of her mind that she could not yet access.

She poked at the strange feeling a bit more before she grew bored of it and began to channel. This time, she could feel her own mana leaving her swiftly, almost too fast for her to process. She broke the connection out of fear, embarrassed to realize that she had done it even sooner than she had the previous times and she still had quite a bit of mana left.

Okay, so perhaps knowing how much mana she was using was a little freaky. It at least made her feel more cautious, rather than waiting for the telltale signs from her body that she was overdoing it.

She hesitated, hand over the last piece of mana bread. She still had half of her mana left – it seemed like a waste to use the mana bread now, but she didn’t dare try the shrine stone again without it.

“Is everything alright?” Elowen asked.

Sophie nodded. “Yep,” she said. “But I think I’m done with the shrine stone for now, though. Is there anything else I could practice with tonight?”

“Hmmm.” Elowen pondered for a moment. “Well, there’s always water.”

“Water?” Sophie repeated, surprised. She hadn’t thought of that.

“Sure!” Elowen nodded and gestured for Sophie to follow.

Sophie picked up the still-wrapped piece of mana bread and followed Elowen back to the kitchen. Elowen floated around the bucket of leftover water from earlier in the evening.

“Just try a cup at first.”

Sophie found a teacup and used it to scoop some of the water out of the bucket. She set it on the table. “Okay, what now?”

Elowen laughed. “It’s like anything else – try channeling your mana into it.”

Sophie stared at the water. What would it do? She sat down at the table, frowning into the cup. She could feel her mana reserves deep inside her, but she couldn’t get a read on the water, yet, other than some trace mana glimmering here and there. She tried grasping onto one of those glimmers, especially now that she could actually see them, but it felt like grasping at a slippery fish or quite like water slipping right through her fingers.

Well, this wasn’t fire after all. She stuck her finger into the cup, and Elowen giggled some more.

“You shouldn’t have to do that.”

Sophie’s cheeks felt warm at the teasing, but she persisted anyway. It was much easier to make the connection while touching the water. She felt it snap into place, although it felt much more tenuous than the other connections had been. Almost as if the water was repelling her.

In fact, she tried pushing some mana towards it, and it felt like wading through thick mud. The water felt actively disinterested in her mana. This is the first she had encountered that response.

Beyond that, with Mana Sense, she could tell that she was only managing to send a trickle of mana into the water, but the amount of mana she was using to do that was two, three, four times as much. Where was all the other mana going? It was like steam dissipating into the surrounding air, perhaps.

After a few moments of Sophie struggling to push mana into the water, the water finally began to ripple and then to bubble. Sophie was forced to pull her finger out of the teacup suddenly as the water began to grow hot.

“Wow, it really doesn’t seem to like you,” Elowen mused, peering down into the cup.

“It doesn’t?” Sophie asked as she dropped the connection to the water. She felt drained. She had some mana left, but it had somehow nearly taken as much out of her as the stone had.

Elowen shook her head. “No – it seems like you don’t have a water affinity either.”

Sophie felt oddly disappointed at that. What was her affinity then? Not fire… not water... She would have to try other things.

She didn’t bother eating the rest of the mana bread tonight. She had nothing she wanted to train with after that attempt. She would save the bread for the little wyvern after all. At least, if the little guy showed up tomorrow. If not, she’d have to eat the bread to prevent it from going completely stale.

“Well, I guess that’s all for tonight. We have a new book to try, though.”

“Oh?” Elowen seemed interested in the idea.

Sophie pushed herself out of her seat at the table and found the library books still in her bag from earlier in the day. She pulled them out and spread them across the table. “This one – The Wicked Ruins.”

“What’s it about?” Elowen asked, looking skeptical. “It’s not another romance, is it?”

Sophie shook her head. “I don’t think so. The librarian said it was an adventure story –” Or did she? Sophie couldn’t quite remember what the librarian had said, exactly.

Sophie dumped the cup of water back into the bucket to save for washing up later and got settled onto her little folding mattress. “Let’s read it.”

A chapter or two later, Sophie realized she had made a terrible mistake, her hands freezing on the pages of the book, her eyes refusing to scan further. Elowen was cackling with glee, and Sophie felt real fear for the first time since she had stumbled into this strange fantasyland.

“Why are you stopping?” Elowen complained. “I want to see what the ghost does next!”

“Um…” Sophie gulped, cold sweat trickling down her spine. The Wicked Ruins was not an adventure story, as she had been led to believe. Instead, it was a quite violent horror story about two adventurers who get lost in a jungle on the Southern Continent and find themselves staying in haunted ruins. Somehow she imagined that odd historian might enjoy it as well.

Elowen seemed to love the descriptions of the unfamiliar environment, but she was also quite amused at the ‘antics’ of the spirits as she put it. Sophie wasn’t sure she would call the piles of bones from former adventurers and walls splattered with blood to form creepy messages ‘antics’.

Nevertheless, Sophie cleared her throat and dutifully soldiered on, continuing to read the horrifying tale aloud for Elowen. She supposed it was the least she could do, since Elowen had suffered through the romance tales for her.

It was a very long night, indeed.

***

Sophie awoke the next morning at the crack of dawn, groggy and disoriented, to a soft whisper in her ear. She sat straight up, shrieking in fear, before she realized it was only Elowen.

Elowen blinked at her in confusion. “I don’t understand,” she said. “You said you wanted me to wake you up when the sun rose, did you not?”

Sophie’s heart was pounding in her chest – she had slept uneasily with visions from The Wicked Ruins traipsing through her head all night, turning into twisty nightmares. “Sorry,” she gasped. “I didn’t sleep well.”

Elowen shook her head, muttering about the strangeness of humans, and left Sophie to get ready for her day, as usual.

Mabel showed up around the time Sophie was considering a second cup of tea. Sophie had nearly chugged the first one, attempting to stabilize her nerves, but it had only seemed to make her more jittery. Oddly enough, she could also tell her mana reserves were not up to full capacity this morning either. It seemed the disturbed sleep had an effect on her mana regeneration along with her overall wellbeing.

She heard the chime of the bell in front of the shrine before she could put another pot of water on to boil.

Elowen’s eyes were wide, as she floated back to the living area from the entryway. “It’s – well, I’m not sure who it is.”

“It’s probably Mabel – the gardener.”

“But she’s – well, so reptilian.”

“Have you never seen someone who looks like her before?” Sophie asked, unsure how to approach this.

Elowen shook her head. “Not that I can recall…”

Sophie would have to deal with that later.

Mabel greeted Sophie warmly, when Sophie finally made it out to the courtyard. “Well, it’s just lovely up here, isn’t it?”

“It really is.” Sophie nodded. Acacia had said the same – and as Sophie slowly improved the space, she grew more and more to appreciate it as well. After several days of working on the courtyard, the grass was no longer overgrown and in fact looked quite neat around the perimeter. There was still the problem of the broken windows in the greenhouse, but she’d have to make a visit to the Crafter’s Guild to deal with that one.

“I admit I hurried up here, even though it was quite the walk,” Mabel said, her tongue flicking out as she spoke. “I’m eager to see this plant of yours.” She glanced around, as if it might be right there in the courtyard.

“Before that –” Sophie said. “Um, actually, I’d like to introduce you to Elowen.” She gestured to the place where Elowen floated a little too close to Mabel, peering at her curiously.

“Oh! The spirit! My apologies.” Mabel bowed deeply in the direction that Sophie indicated, and Elowen looked awfully pleased at the gesture.

“Unfortunately, she’s still recovering…” Sophie trailed off, but Mabel nodded in understanding.

“Of course, of course. I do hope you feel better soon,” she said towards the space that Elowen occupied.

“Thank you,” Elowen said, inclining her head as well. “And thank you so much for visiting!” Elowen spun around in happiness. “I’m so excited to hear more about our plant.”

“Elowen’s very happy that you’re here to help us,” Sophie translated.

“Well, show me the way then,” Mabel instructed, and Sophie led her into the shrine.

They had barely stepped into the space when Mabel’s eyes landed on their mystery plant.

“Is that –” She shuffled over to the plant, her tail occasionally dragging along the floor of the shrine. “Why, I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“What is it?” Elowen asked, eyes huge. Sophie echoed the question for Mabel’s hearing.

“It’s…” Mabel shook her head in disbelief. “Well, if I’m not mistaken, this is Magewood.”

“Magewood?” Sophie repeated. “What’s that?”

“An impossibility, that’s what. This only looks to be a few years old, at best.”

Sophie frowned. “Surely it’s much older than that… it would have been here since the former priestess –” She cut herself off and glanced at Elowen anxiously, but the spirit was only staring at Mabel in wonder.

“Magewood?” Elowen whispered the words, as if it were somehow familiar to her. “I wonder…”

“Where did you find it?” Mabel asked, touching one of the leaves reverently. “It sure looks like Magewood alright.”

“In the shed,” Sophie said. “Along with others like it. Although the others all seem dead.”

“Not dead!” Elowen insisted. “Dormant, I think.”

But Mabel couldn’t hear her and spoke over the spirit. “Others?” she echoed, and even her unfamiliar reptilian features conveyed the emotion of surprise. “Can you show me?”

Sophie nodded. “Of course. Right this way…”

As Sophie led Mabel to the greenhouse, with Elowen trailing along behind, she had to wonder…

What was so special about Magewood?