(Zack)

"What's with that disapproving glare so early in the morning?"

Nik sighs.

"Did you really feed Kylie a Spook Treat during the day?"

"She should've realized she was making Gold uncomfortable," I answer. "But she was treating Gold like an actual person, too. So I gave her something very sought-after that tastes excellent. I didn't tell her to eat it then."

"You also didn't warn her that doing so would make it taste foul, her get sick, and turn her transparent."

"She's recovered," I point out. "Stopped by this morning to say 'hey'. By the way, Nik – why did it take you a week after I gave it to her to actually come to me over that?"

"I didn't come over here for that," he lets out an aggravated sigh. "You haven't left the City at all in the last week, and I was wondering what mischief you were up to. Samantha said that Kylie commented that you were working on your Goblin guide."

"Actually," I lift it up. "This one's for Slimes."

"You know," he says. "Some people wish they could just take time off from training, and-"

"I'm not," I say, and Gold nods vigorously beside me. "I've been teaching Gold some combat moves."

A burst of excitement goes through Gold, and I look at him.

"What?" I ask, and he starts pointing at part of the book. I look down at it, tuning into his thoughts. "Really?"

He nods, and I'm granted with the impression he had of them, and his own personal experiences.

"Oh, okay," I say. "Yeah, that's interesting."

One thing about me and Slimes and Rats: I haven't had much personal experience with them, while Gold has had quite a bit. It seems the master I rescued him from enjoyed sending him to 'fight' the Slimes, and it always resulted in him getting hurt.

So he has lots of experience with them. Or at least, with running from them with his tail between his legs. Hearing his stories (well, is it really 'hearing' when it's a mixture of images, words, and impressions exchanged mentally?) about it makes me heat up, and really, really damn glad that guy left Maelnor.

Or he'd probably be about as much shorter as he'd be if he lost everything below his knees.

"I'm under the impression that Gold doesn't want to learn how to fight," Nik tells me once I finish writing down what Gold told me.

"He didn't," I look back to the Dark Knight. "But he's realized that he can't protect himself, and so wants to at least be able to do that, should he need to."

Gold nods at Nik.

"Ah," the old man says. "How's it going?"

"It's going decently," I answer. "Gold has natural instincts, which helps him a lot. Also, he apparently has Adventurer."

Nik looks stunned at that.

"Yeah," I say. "He has a lot of Skills. Both handedness are high, due to his masters over his life being assholes and sometimes breaking one arm, and he also has Jump, Dash, Howl, and a few other ones that really should've been obvious. Did you know that he can manifest claws?"

"He-what?" Nik looks stunned.

"Show him, Gold," I say, and Gold holds up his hands, claws forming at the tips of his fingers.

More doglike than the super-sharp ones of cats or the sharp ones of wolves, but they're still there. It's apparently why he despises footwear – when he uses Claws, it manifests all four sets of them. I think that he can control which set comes out at a higher Level, though I'm not entirely sure. Him describing the Skill without speaking was a bit tough for me to understand.

"That's… interesting," Nik says.

"Yep," I say. "He can also increase the power of his bites through a Skill called Bite, which I really should have seen coming."

"Same here," Nik told me as Gold undid his Claws, which simply vanished. "Does it cost Mana?"

"Ten of it," I nod. "But only to summon."

"Druids have a similar skill," he tells me, and I give him a curious look. "They're a Rank 2 Class. When in their animal form, if it's one that would normally bite, like a wolf, they can enhance the power of the bite, but it only works while in that form."

"Druids can shapeshift?" I ask, nearly asking 'here, too?' with it.

"Yes," Nik answers. "There's a group coming in tomorrow, if you want to meet them."

"Really?" I ask. "What time?"

"Fuck," he mutters. "Maybe I should tell them to come a different day, and to head straight to Praevar?"

"I wanna meet them!"

"Of course you do," he sighs. "Do not harass them, Zack."

I am totally going to convince at least half of them into taking on their animal forms. And after Nik leaves, try to figure out why Gold's been nervous ever since Nik mentioned the Druids.

"I make no promises," I grin at Nik, who's probably forgotten the actual reason he was stopping by. "So, Nik – what were you here for?"

"I can't remember," Nik sighs. "You're really annoying, you know that, right?"

"Maybe," I say. "But I'm like Kulkul – too cute and cuddly to get rid of!"

Nik lets out an aggravated groan, then leaves, and I look at Gold, who's grinning at me, his tail wagging. I look at the paper in front of him to find that he's done a quick sketch of two people, one smaller than the other, with what I think is supposed to be a sword in his hand, running it through the other.

"Did you draw a pic of me skewering Nik?" I ask, and Gold nods vigorously in response, his grin widening. "Come here!"

I tackle him, wrestling him off the bench and onto the ground, where we wrestle for awhile. Once we calm down, we dust ourselves off, then return to working on the guidebook, Gold giving occasional bits of information based on his own observations.

After awhile, I realize that he's never once asked why I got the idea to do the guidebooks on the various Monsters. Generally, people just go off what they hear or discover on their own, and no one's ever bothered putting together a book actually giving the various types of them.

Does he wonder where I got the idea from? Or does he just accept it as something that's because of me? Of me being me?

Part of it is, after all. Having something like this could greatly helps Adventurers of all types. Rather than relying on information they obtained from others, they could just read the guide and go 'okay, so this is what I'm looking for, based on the observation of someone who actually spent time to research them'.

My plan is going to be put to the test when someone else shows up who is new to the Boundary. Completely. The next time Big C drops someone off here – other than my teammates – I'm giving them the condensed version of the book, which will just give information on the Valley's Goblins, not all the random types.

The research on the various Holiday ones will be put to the test after the war, after I've observed them out in the Lost Territory a bit, since there will be plenty there for me.

A poke at my side pulls me from my thoughts, and I look at Gold, who's giving me a confused look.

"Nothing," I tell him, and he tilts his head to the side. "Don't worry about it, bud."

He tilts his head to the other side, and I snort.

"I know that it's not morning," I tell him. "Though I'm not sure if Nik's even realized I said that."

Gold rolls his eyes, then we return to finishing up our work on the book for the day, before we take a bath and relax before bed.

As we're heading to our sleeping quarters, Nik shows back up.

"Zack," he says. "Did you really say 'so early in the morning' an hour before sunset?"

"Did you really just walk back here from the Dark Temple just to ask me that?"

He shakes his head in exasperation and leaves, and I burst out laughing, Gold giggling a little bit.

"Come on, bud," I ruffle his hair. "Let's head to bed."

Gold nods, and we climb into our 'beds', and I quickly drift off to sleep.

The Wolf Beastborn that I've seen before is running down an alley. He's wearing nothing but a loincloth and the slave collar. Is this from the past? The future? Could this be happening right now? He's running on all fours, using his hands and feet to move quickly. His body's covered in injuries, but that doesn't seem to slow him down.

He jumps up onto some crates, and from there, onto a roof. Not pausing in his movements for a moment, he continues his run, leaping across rooftops. Eventually, he jumps down. As he does, he slams into a sudden Barrier.

The Wolf Beastborn lets out a whine, but that's it, despite the fact that it clearly hurt. Laughter catches my attention, and I shift my focus to the one laughing. It's a man who looks to be in his forties, wearing a magician's robes, as well as a handful of others, a few of whom have slaves as well. I'm pretty sure the magician is the Wolf Beastborn's master, though.

The man suddenly cuts off his laughter and walks straight towards the Wolf Beastborn, an ugly look on his face, and kicks him in the stomach.

I wake with a start, and when my fury subsides, I realize that Gold's awake, looking at me with worry clear in his eyes.

"It's okay," I smile at him. "Just a bad dream."

He tilts his head to the side, and I snort.

"Not dream-dream," I remind him. "When I dream, I have visions of the future, present, or past, remember?"

He makes an 'o' with his mouth and nods, and I smile at him again, then wiggle my way out of my blankets and ruffle his hair. That elicits a big smile out of him, and he leans his head into my hand. I scratch behind his ears, sensing his happiness at that.

Gold really is so doglike in this moment, and I can see why people might mistake him as being less than human, but… if no one draws this side out of them, how would they ever know? Why do they just treat them so awful?

Beastborn aren't lesser, just because they dream and don't speak. Even if they couldn't speak, they still wouldn't be lesser. They understand us just fine, at our own intelligence levels, and when given a chance, are perfectly good people.

Sure, some might be evil, or dark, but that's the same with people, like the Wolf Beastborn's master. I'm pretty sure the Beastborn was on his way to his master. Just thinking about that makes my rage boil again, and the only thing that keeps me from screaming and lashing out and shit is Gold's happiness at my scratch. It's so childlike.

Like I'm supposed to be.

It's calming.

After a bit, Gold pulls away from my hand, impressions of hunger and images of food flashing through his mind, letting me know it's breakfast time.

"Alright," I say. "Got enough food?"

He nods, and I get the sense the Nik gave him a lot of food. Nik… and some of the other Dark Knights. And if I'm not mistaken, there was one image of Nathan in the mix that he quickly pushed down before realizing he'd projected them.

"It's okay, Gold," I chuckle, standing and ruffling his hair. "I know you and Nathan are friends, and I know the Dark Knights are probably more interested in you than you're used to, especially since you're able to enter the Dark Temple, now."

Gold beams at me, then gives me a hug before running off to the kitchen.

"And make enough extra for two more," I tell Gold as I leave the room and walk to the dining room table, and he gives me a curious look. I jerk a thumb in the direction of Nathan's house. "We're being stared at by a certain shy munchkin, who's more than welcome to join us for breakfast, and I've got a feeling that Kylie's going to be here."

He nods, then gets to work as I sit down.

Halfway through his preparation, Kylie does, indeed, show up, just to 'chat' and see how I'm doing. I invite her to sit down, then pull out a pack of cards. She looks at them curiously, and I teach her how to play Go Fish.

After the first game ends with my victory, I shuffle the desk and deal again, and she frowns.

"Why did you deal three spots?" She asks, and Gold snorts.

"You can't feel the intensity and desire of the gaze?" I ask.

"What?" She gives me the most confused look I've ever seen.

"You can play with us, you know."

A sudden breeze slams into the table, and I quickly catch the cards, keeping them from flying around. Kylie looks at the source of the breeze, then jumps.

"Whoa!" She exclaims. "Who is this?"

"This is Nathan," I introduce the midget healer, who had moved as quickly as he could into a seat at the table.

"Nathan?" She asks curiously. "He moved… fast. How old is he? What's his Level?"

"Both rude questions," I say. "You've probably heard of him before, most people call him by his last name, Normar."

Her jaw drops, and Gold giggles, his tail wagging.