"Orifog!" A fat dwarf cried out, panicking for his brother as the whole cavern shook. "Watch out!"

The ceiling ruptured, dropping a large sharp rock on the young prospector’s head right before he reached the exit.

The dark shell shattered against the miner's head, pulping his skull with a sickening thump. Orifog slumped on the ground, instantly dead as his blood and brain coated the tunnel floor.

Amidst the jagged shards of the young dwarf's skull and the rocky shell, a simple talc pebble rolled out, bathing itself in a puddle of the crimson liquid as it pooled around the miner's corpse.

"Idiots! How couldn’t ye notice that there's a thin crust of andesite?! Orifog’s dead! Damn ye all!" Overseer Breadbeard yelled at his employees outside of the cave. "Morons! Cretins! Dornus dammit!" He heavily swore as if it was not his duty to secure the mine.

The dwarven swearing was the first thing the ellipsoidal white mineral ever heard. Of course, it did not care much for it. After all, its job was to merely sit in place and occasionally get crushed by the surroundings.

"…," the stone sensed. It realized something; it could feel things. It liked that.

"…," it thought. Another realization came; it can think. It liked that even more so.

"…," and again.

Thoughts flooded its proto-mind. However, those were not human-like at all; those were the thoughts of stone. Humans would call it emotions, but that was no more than a partial description.

After the quake finished, a few dwarfs returned and left again with the corpse. The awakened bloody stone was kicked out of the cavern to the wall.

It did not care.

"Hello," that was the second sound it could hear, but this time it was much sharper.

"…," the pebble ignored the strange noise.

"Hello!" The entity said, this time a little bit more loudly.

"…huh," the pebble reacted with some resemblance of sapience as the loud voice made it uneasy.

A coherent thought emerged on its miniature mind; loud!

"Hello!" The entity greeted again, even louder and with a hint of impatience.

"…," the little pebble still ignored the entity and revelled in its stony musing.

"Hey! I said hello!" The entity yelled and the panic was clearly apparent in its voice.

"…," the pebble was confused and irritated. Those were its first human-like emotions. It did not understand where they came from and got confused by them even more. It became a bigger and bigger conundrum for him.

"…," the stone vibrated as if to clear its mind and ignored the annoyingly loud sound and irritating emotions even more intensely.

"Damn. Where am I? I am supposed to be in a dwarf!" The entity exclaimed, bewildered, and with panic slowly raising. He 'looked' around after settling a bit; something was wrong. All the meaty and squishy parts were missing! "Wait a minute... Where the hell am I!?" He shouted in the minuscule mind of the small pebble with a full-blown terror.

The entity spread his awareness a bit more and figuratively paled. "I am in a fucking pebble! A piece of rock! Oh, dear gods! Help! Get me out of here!" He screamed, appalled.

"Loud," the stone complained by transferring its uneasiness. It was its first attempt to communicate with another being and as such it was very blurry. It was as if someone was talking in a foreign language through a badly tuned radio. Still, the message would be plain to anyone: it did not appreciate loudness.

"What?!" The entity metaphorically recoiled as it was with the wave of annoyance mixed with uneasiness, but promptly calmed down.

"Loud!" The pebble 'said' again, but this time it was much clearer. It learned every second it was... we could say alive.

"It's you! Look little guy, something very wrong happened. I am not supposed to be paired with you. Sooo, I will go now. Good day to you, sir!" It attempted to leave, but it bounced back.

After a few hours of erratic squirming inside the pebble's growing mind and searching for an escape, the entity quietly mumbled with a dread bubbling under his voice, "don't tell me… No, no, no, no. This can't be happening." The entity figuratively gazed at the bloody stone and asked, "are you… perhaps… sapient by any chance?"

"Sapient?" The pebble perfectly repeated the word. This was the first question the stone ever asked anyone. It got confused again. It did not like confusion.

"Don't tell me…. No! I am not doing this! A sapient rock! How! Who did this?!" The entity yelled. He forced himself to focus. He delved into his own mind.

The entity recalled what happened: he flew towards his target, a dwarf named Orifog Blackbeard that was supposed to be a dwarven hero, a new Paragon. When he passed through an unstable part of the mountain to sneak into his mind, it suddenly began to break apart. It was kind of his fault… That little charge of refined mana he held disrupted the fragile balance of the inner strengths in the deposit.

He was able to stop the complete collapse, but he used almost all the remaining refined mana. The falling rock crushed the Orifog’s skull and the entity, distraught from the sudden loss of power, mistook the pebble covered in the brain tissue and leftover soul mark with the former future Paragon.

"Nooooooo!" The entity wailed. "Damn it! Anyone! Help meeeee!" The pebble's mind was filled with bawling and wailing, which made it annoyed.

"Loud! Loud!" It repeated, but was still ignored by the source of its annoyance.

"I can't leave! gods dammit! I really can't leave!" The entity cursed for at least another ten minutes while ignoring the complaints of his host. Then he gathered some of his composure and said, pretending to be calm, "Hello again. I am truly sorry for my bad manners. I am a Partner, which is also my name, and from this moment, I will be with you for the rest of your life."

"Life?" The stone repeated the word he did not understand.

"Oh, for the love of gods…," Partner sighed in exasperation, something he knew he would be doing often, "It seems like I will have to teach you everything from the ground up. Hehe," Partner nervously giggled at his own joke while trying not to think about where he was or what was awaiting him. "We are in a mine, and that is…." The Partner began the lecture, and the just-born stone soaked up every single word like the baby he was.

For the next three month, the Partner patiently taught the pebble what he could about the world, languages and other important things. However, the stone, well, was a stone. He was not of the smartest bunch.

"Now, do you understand me?" Partner patiently asked. If the pebble would be observant, it would notice a hint of tiredness, exasperation and frustration; classical feelings found in high-school teachers.

"Yes," the presumably living pebble responded to the strange being residing inside of him.

It now understood a lot of things it didn't know before. That it was a stone. That it lived in the mountain, which was in the world which was situated in an infinite universe. It could not understand what infinite nor the universe means. Still, the strange voice tirelessly explained that nobody can truly understand the immensity of the universe. Partner said many complex sentences and the little pebble, failing to comprehend, ignored him.

It learned the language, known as celestian, which was spoken by almost everyone. Another thing the pebble learned was that there were many languages created by mortal and immortal beings all around the universe.

It learned about mana that pervaded everything everywhere. Partner said that mana was mixed energies, powers, and laws unused or left out in the creation. Of course, the stone still did not understand.

It learned about life. About different life forms that exist almost everywhere, thinking and doing stuff. That the dwarfs, which it met before, mined the mountain for resources. It felt strange. Partner explained that what it felt was an emotion and specifically, displeasure.

"Displeasure…" the pebble mulled over the word.

"Well, would you like to be hit by hard, spikey things that would break you in pieces?"

"No. Oh. Get it," after a while of passionate contemplation, the stone understood his emotion for the first time. It felt elated, which was quite a nice feeling.

"Good! Let's look at you. Hmm…" Partner pensively observed the strange pebble and asked, "oh, I forgot. Do you have a name?"

"Name?"

"Ah… Name is something that belongs only to you. It's your unique marking." The pebble did not understand, and Partner explains a little bit more, “you are from a mountain, you are made of talc, and you are sitting in the mine shaft made by dwarfs. This is not your name but your description, where you are from, and what you are doing. Every sapient being has a name as it's required by the Universum."

The white pebble finally understood and pondered over it; "Oh… Name... Naaame... My name."

After a while of musing, it exclaimed, "Know!"

"Well? Will you share?" Partner asked with a flat tone after five minutes of silence.

"Stone! Like!" Stone enthusiastically answered.

Partner facepalmed and sighed, “so be it. Your name is set in stone... hehe... from this day on. YOU! ARE! STONE!" Partner proclaimed ceremoniously. Nothing happened. "YOUR! NAME! IS! STONE!" Partner hastily corrected himself.

A new voice sounded inside of Stone's mind.

"Again. Loud voice. Don't like it," Stone complained.

"Finally," Partner spoke with a calm voice, but secretly elated, "you have joined. Everything will go easier now," Partner said while covertly thinking, "at least for me."

He proceeded with another explanation, "you know, very long before you were born, the first sapient beings evolved. There was no structure to the powers and mana. Mortals were the restless crowd, and each race tried to create their own ranking systems and measurements. It was too chaotic and, in the end, the God of Laws and Structure, Architect had mercy on them. Alongside the Deity of Magic, Conjurarum, they created the unified structure for every sapient being. Be it mortals, immortal gods, or Monsters. Now think of the word ‘status’."

"Status… Status… Status!" Stone did not understand much from Partner's lecture, but he patiently thought of the word "status" for hours. And days. Constantly.

The strange, deep and loud voice said nonchalantly, paused, then changed his tone to apologetic, The Universum disappeared, who knows where.

"Loud. What's this?" In the minuscule but growing Stone’s mind, a stone tablet appears with a soft 'thud'.

He concentrated on it for several minutes, not able to make heads or toes out of this unusual thing, but he liked it a lot. It made him comfortable.

"This is your personal status screen. You are the only one who can see it. Even I can see only your name and race. Now... I will teach you how to read it." He focused and used his mana reserves to give Stone the needed knowledge about reading and the celestian alphabet. He could not do it before, because Stone's minuscule mind would have collapsed. "I hate the Rules," Partner inwardly sighed. "Damn this," he cursed as he sensed that his mana did not regenerate as it should. "I am weaker than expected. This took most of my remaining mana. I will be able to do this once more…”

Inside of Stone's mind, another message appeared with a soft 'thud'.

"Think of the word 'yes'," Partner advised.

"Yes," Stone’s mind was filled with the knowledge he didn't have before. It pained him a little bit, but as it faded he felt elated. He could finally understand what the written words meant. He could read. But he did not understand their meaning...

"Loud voice. Again," if the pebble could frown he would.

"What did it say?" Partner asked.

Stone repeated what he heard as he got a little bit more comprehensive.

"That's what I'm talking about, baby," Partner celebrated, overjoyed.

"Now you understand, right? Now, think about word abilities. The Universum should explain to you their definition."

"Hmm... Understand? Understand..." This was a strange, new feeling. Understanding made him feel good, and feeling good was nice. He wanted more of a good feeling.

"I want more."

"What?"

"More."

"What more?"

"Feels strange. Good."

"So learn. There are plenty of things that feel good in the universe," Partner baited Stone. It was a critical hit!

"Abilities... Abilities..." Stone hurriedly thought of the word. This was the first time he felt something like impatience. It took a while before Stone could get it right, but after a few hours, a light 'thuds' resounded in his mind.

"The loud voice said that my intelligence rose," and after a bit of musing over it, he concluded, "oh, I understand. I learnt something," for the first time Stone truly understood what he was doing. It made them both thrilled.

"Yes. Good. Finally, we are moving. Figuratively speaking, of course."

Stone noted empty Expertise and Talents, "what are those?"

"What is what?"

"Expertise and talents."

"Why do you ask me? Ask the Universum."

"Expertise. Talent."

'Thud. Thud.' Two new tablets appear.

Stone was confused by so many words again, but Partner slowly explained them. Stone understood that there are too many things he still did not know and for the first time in his brief life he felt a desire to learn more.

So, he sat and patiently listened to the wisdom of the strange voice in his mind, Partner, without interrupting.

This time the lecture went for several days and not weeks or even months like before.

He was getting smarter and more knowledgeable with every Partner’s word. Now he was wise as a very stupid human, but the endless, monotonous speeches began to already bore him. Even with his stony patience, he wanted to do something else.

"I want to see. I want to go outside and see the world. I want to feel good," Stone restlessly expressed his desire and if he could, he would throw a puppy stare.

"Fine, fine. I see you are impatient already. Which is quite odd. For a stone. Today I will teach you how to control mana. Some basics, but it should be enough."

Partner concentrated again and used his last bits of mana he scraped from the reserves that barely regenerated over the days and sent the needed knowledge to Stone.

"Screw it! Well, boy, this is the last time I can do this," Partner said with a falsely cheerful voice and thought to himself, "what the hell?! It can't be because I missed my target, right? I am almost completely cut off..." The Partner panicked a bit, but soon he realized he could not do anything with it anyway, so he let it go.

"Yes," again, the Stone's mind was swamped with foreign knowledge. Soon, he absorbed it into his mind and for the first time he felt his own magic. How it flowed in him. How he could use it to 'see' and feel better.

He coated his surface with a very thin layer of translucent mana. For the first time, he felt cold. Pressure. Before, he could hear before, but everything was muffled. Now it was all so… sharp and clear.

He heard clinging and thudding like if something metal was impacting into a rock. Heavy breathing. Voices. Strange, rhythmic sounds. He usually ignored these sounds, but everything was amplified. He was overwhelmed for a while.

He swiftly adapted and ignored them again; it made him quite uneasy.

"Good. You are a fast learner... Way too fast. Who are you?” Partner pensively examined the pebble. “Anyway, let's see if you can do it. Do the same thing when you were coating yourself with mana. However, this time spread the mana as far as you can without losing touch with it, otherwise, it will disperse."

Stone did as said and soon created a sphere of thin, translucent mana around him. It was a mere 1 meter in diameter, but he 'saw' everything inside. Even underground. Small pebbles, crevices in walls. Strange things crawling around.

"What are those moving things?" Stone curiously asked. It was something new for him. Self-moving things...

"Those are bugs, non-sapient animals. Try to squish one with Mana Bubble. You should know how to do it."

Stone did not wait and casted a small mana bubble in his dome directly above himself. Mana amassed inside the bubble, one centimetre in diameter until it reached the critical amount. The bubble silently popped and a new tablet appeared.

"Oh, nice. Mana Bubble spell is a part of basic mana control expertise. Accumulate mana in one place and hold it. It can be used to push things around, or in your case, as a bug exterminator," Partner explains in more detail. "Now, again. But before it reaches the critical amount, stop the accumulation. You have used slightly more than one point of mana this time, so you should have plenty left."

Soon a new bubble of mana floated near him, half as powerful than before. "As you hold it, put it above that bug," Partner pointed to the bug.

Stone could not move the bubble even one millimetre. He let it explode with a silent 'plop' and generated a new one above the ant.

The bug exploded in gore.

"New voice. It says I gained 0.001% experience."

"Oh, this will be a pain in the ass…" Partner groaned. This will be an excruciating grind. He frowned a little bit, "wait. It should congratulate you for the first kill."

"Really?"

"Wait a minute. Did you have some experience from before?"

"Yes. Half a percent. Why?"

"Oh... nothing... poor dwarf," Partner felt sorry for the dead dwarf. "Hmm, you didn't gain much, even though you killed the dwarf,” Partner paused for a second, trying to figure out the reason. “Hmm... oh... It is because you were the weapon,” in the end, he found the reason and stopped caring about it. “Now… Where were we? Oh. Mana. You should have less mana, right? Now, sit down," he giggled at his own joke and gave the order, "concentrate.".

Stone concentrated. He was good at that.

"Feel the mana around you... in the atmosphere and within the ground."

Stone tried to feel the mana around. He was not very good at feelings as it was quite a new ploy for him, but after a few days, he succeeded.

"Haaah. Finally. Now, connect to the mana with your mind. And pull it towards your body."

The efforts were rewarded, and the new technique was learned.

Stone slowly gathered the mana around and while at it he discovered something, "Why do some messages pop up, and some are heard?"

"Well, some messages are more important. Level ups, creations of skills, talents acquiring, prompts, and others are written. The less important messages like killing, gaining experience, changes in abilities, and similar are heard. Otherwise, people would go insane from constant messages long ago. Well... The voice messages are annoying too, but you will learn to live with them. You can disable both whenever you want, but the sound messages can't be heard again. So, it's better to let them on and learn to ignore them. After a time, I will teach you a special technique which will allow you to record these messages," Partner explained while silently sighing to himself. "You are way too big dummy to learn something like that,” he again sighed and inwardly lamented.

"Now. Kill those ants the same as before, so you can finally level up. It's time to learn how to live a little bit," Partner spoke and Stone commenced his first massacre.

He liked that.

"Too loud!"

The announcements were still quite loud and constantly pestered the silence-loving pebble. He truly did not appreciate being bugged. It had been a constant distraction for quite some time, but he was patient. A stone had to be with its nigh-endless life; thus he waited for it to go away by itself... Then he remembered. He could turn it off.

"Silence," he wished, and announcements went quiet. "Loud," the announcements came back. "Hehe. Fun. I can control it," he slacked off as he found a new toy. "Hehe," Stone chuckled. "Loud. Silence. Loud. Silence.”

"Hey! What do you think you are doing? Don't slack off!" Partner snapped at him.

Stone listened to his teacher and commenced killing the passing ants again. If he could, he would be pouting. Too bad he was a mere piece of rock and as such he had only a single expression; a stony one. Very good for poker.

He was persistent. Simply sitting on the side of the shaft and conjuring one after another to kill the poor ants. Constantly. No announcements, no emotion, no thoughts. Except for one; squish more ants! He did not personally have anything against them, but Partner said that levelling up would feel good.

After four days of hunting, a problem had arisen; no ants came around. Stone got distraught thanks to this. How could he kill them when there are none around? He must have thought of something. Fast. Well, stone fast.

Hours later, after mulling over it, he got an idea. It was his first one. He could use a small bubble next to himself and push away with the blast.

Partner sighed, something he got used to during the days of boredom, "Learned how to move around, huh..."

The sudden movement startled him as he got torn off his deep notions.

'Plop' He shifted as the bubble burst. He did it! He moved on his own for the first time! He felt so joyous and satisfied as never before. He created another bubble and moved again. He had more fun than when he was crushing those little, stupid ants.

'Plop' Stone shifted again. He contemplated what that meant and decided that he liked to move on his own. He understood that it was something extraordinary for a simple stone. However, the philosophical question eluded him in the end anyway and got pushed out of his mind by another bubble propelling him.

After several bursts, which had moved him about fifty centimetres forward, he saw bugs again.

Partner was… To say overjoyed would be an understatement of his emotion right now. Maybe enraptured? Ecstatic? Rapturous? Finally, after months of sitting in one place, he advanced; even if just a little.

With his sphere of sight, Stone saw ants disappearing into a crack in the wall.

"Their nest must be nearby," Partner proclaimed and another plan occurred to Stone; he will make a trap.

"Trap? That could work," Partner praised him, happy that the stupid piece of literal rock got smarter. He could have proposed it by himself long ago, but he explained to him what traps were and waited when he got the idea by himself. If he would hand him all the answers out, the unique being self-named Stone would be too dependent on him.

Stone felt great again. He didn't know that there are so many things that can make him feel good. Like praise. Or murdering innocent bugs, who were just looking out for themselves. He desired more.

"Trap. I will dig a hole. Ants fall into the hole. I create a bubble again and crush them all at once," Stone flaunted his intelligence.

"So, do it," Partner said, this time no more praise came from him. Stone wanted more praise, but another problem appeared.

After a while of contemplation Stone put a stony face and unceremoniously asked, "How do I create a hole?".

"Oh, for fucks sake. He is such an idiot. Well, at least he finally got the idea of traps," Partner sighed to himself while offering the Stone advice, "use mana bubbles. You should have raised it by a few levels. You can pour more mana into it."

Stone did not wait and the bubble bloated with mana. As it bursted, it dug a small dent in the ground.

'Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng!'

Soon there was a nice hole in the soil, around twenty centimetres deep.

The ants were not that stupid and marched around, not caring for the all-powerful trap of mighty Stone... He watched at them with what could only be murderous intent and thought that his plan did not go as intended. It was a bad feeling. He was not fond of it.

"Well. Dig more of those holes and connect them to create a ditch," Partner decided to stop the foolishness and hand the answer out.

'Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng! Peng!'

"Dornus damn it! Eriv! Do ya hear it too? It drives me crazy!" One of the nearby dwarfs called his fellow miner.

Eriv, a female dwarf who looks almost the same as Dori, but with a thinner beard, answered, "What are ya blabberin about, Dori? I hear nothin except ya naet workin! Go back to work, will ya? We have the quota to meet!"

After that, both continued to fervently mine slabs of marble. Quotas had to be fulfilled!

Stone ignored them as they were annoying noises and dug the ditch around the ants' entrance.

"Good. Now, go before the ditch. Create a small wall of mana around the edges and hold it. It will continuously drain your mana. So regenerate mana by using Ambient Mana Gathering alongside with it," Partner explained and Stone did. Partner always had such lovely ideas.

It was hard, but after a few days, he got it right.

Patience paid off and soon the ditch was filled with the crawling ants.

"You should have gained the Mana Shaping technique, right?"

"Yes."

"Finally,” Partner celebrated. “Now, hold the mana wall and pump more magic into it. Get it thicker." Six points of mana got sucked directly into the wall. If Stone could perspire, he would as it drained him. Thankfully, he had become proficient with the mana gathering and almost instantly regained what he lost.

"You will have to use more mana. Put the mana wall over the full ditch, then squeeze it to the ground."

'Crunch! Crunch! Crunch!'

Stone crushed the ants in large droves until there was only left a greenish liquid mixed with chunks of bodies. The mixture of their laws, origin, energy and lifeforce transformed into an ethereal experience that flowed into Stone.

"Better. Now it will go way faster," Partner cheers.

The liquid and chunks served as bait, finishing the trap.

Stone remembered that he could turn off those notifications and willed them to go away as it was too annoying.

"Why couldn't I end up in the dwarf... Or any other being. Any! Even those ants would be better." Partner murmured as the week went by, no longer bothering to be polite.

Stone got the routine right. He waited until the ditch was almost empty. Then, when more and more ants slid into the hole, he collapsed the mana wall on them.

An hour later, he was rewarded with a new tablet. With 'thud' it materializes in his mind.

Like a magnet, Stone attracted talc scraps around and grew by one centimetre all around.

He felt strange. As if something changed in him. That was a new feeling.

It felt good, so he did not complain.

"Finally!" The Partner is euphoric after months of constant explaining, ant-hunting, and boredom.

☁☁☁☁☁☁

Encyclopaedia Stonia

Ants

Hive-mind insect. Cannibals. In the world of bugs, it is quite dangerous. Thankfully, only the Queens can use mana. Otherwise, they would already rule the universe. Gods (with big G) still don't understand how they came to be. But, well... they are mortal, and that's all they need.

Lives in a strict hierarchy and chaotic, large structures called anthills. One anthill can have tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of non-sapient drones and soldiers. They are often led by a sapient Queen accompanied by loyal Royal Guards. There are many sub-races of ants; from small black ones and big red ones to different mana-aberrations. But who cares? They are just ants.

Mana energy

One point of mana has the energetic value of 1 gram of black powder, but don't forget that black powder is explosive. Mana, thankfully, is not.

Stone

The fastest-growing pebble in the universe; from 64 mm to 74 mm in just a few months.