Leor carried a heavy package from his bedroom in the old supply building, stepping across the hallways toward Alina's room before gently knocking on the door. They came back to clean up after their spar, and Leor decided to give Alina an item he had recently received. It would be more useful to her right now anyway.
He heard her voice answering from behind the door, allowing him to enter, so he didn't hesitate to do so. As he pushed the flowery elven door handle down and made his way into the room, he saw that Alina had already changed into a fresh pair of linens beneath her light leather armor. The armor Alina wore was worlds apart from the cheap scrap chest piece that Leor himself wore. Alina's family had the money to invest in such things, afterall.
The chest piece hugged her body like a second skin, fitting her many curves perfectly. It was almost certainly designed and created just for her. Leor had purchased his own leather chest piece second hand, making it just a bit larger than was proper for his body type. The dark leather armor was held together with dull metal studs.
It was ironic. Alina's armor was made with the skin of a powerful Beast, to protect her vulnerable human body. Now however, she herself possessed the body of a Beast. Her own skin would almost certainly grow much stronger than that leather armor, in time.
Alina's eyes locked onto the package in Leor's hands as he entered the room, her nostrils flaring as she caught the scent of the item.
"What have you brought me, Leor?" She asked, a look of intrigue on her face as she tightened the last strap on her outfit.
Leor placed the package on the ground beside her, flipping open the top to expose layer after layer of dried and seasoned meat. It appeared to be a pungent Beast jerky of some kind.
"The Beasts of this place take their meat processing very seriously. This was prepared for me from the corpse of a defiled pig. The creature had a Beastly body of the Dire tier, it was not easy to kill.", Leor explained, "Since I don't have the body of a Beast just yet, eating this does not benefit me at all. So I'm giving it to you."
A single eyebrow rose up high on Alina's face as she held a piece of the jerky in front of her nose, sniffing gently before tearing a small piece off the corner of the flattened meat with her teeth. A look of pleasant surprise filled her face as she happily chewed the food, tearing off another portion almost immediately.
"Wow! Have you tasted this, Leor?" She shook her head before he could answer,"No, I doubt you would have given it away so quickly if you had. Too late now, you can't take it back!" She teased as she continued to consume the piece of meat.
Leor smiled as he leaned against the wall near the door, watching her finish off the rest of the meat in her hand.
"It's fine, I can always kill another monstrously powerful Beast. In fact, I have to go to the Beast area soon, I'm owed a portion of bear meat that should have been processed similarly." He said with a smile, before his expression turned a bit more serious. "Mind if I ask you for some advice, Alina?"
She looked up at him as she chewed the last of her meal, waiting silently for him to continue. Leor sighed, turning his head to glance idly down the hallway beside him as he spoke.
"I'm ready to follow your lead. I want to use the world tree potion, but I'm completely indecisive about which Beast to choose from. I'm thinking about asking Drelk for a book on the subject of Beastly bodies, maybe I can learn something from there that will help me figure out which one I'm most compatible with. What do you think? If you didn't have the Sphinx essence in your family locket, which Beast would you choose from this Realm?" He asked sincerely.
Alina swallowed her last mouthful before closing the package of meat and rising to her feet. She slowly shook her head with a wide smile across her face, as if Leor was asking an obvious question.
"How can you even hesitate? Isn't it clear at a glance which Beast is the best choice in this world?" She answered, picking up a cloth napkin to clean the grease from her fingers and lips.
Leor's brow furrowed as he considered her words, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "Right, you're talking about Bone I assume. He is the strongest of the Beast's that we have met in this place, I have considered that too. The problem is I think Bone is strong because he made himself strong, rising to the rank of Highblood, I don't think his body is all that special."
Alina seemed to grow more and more frustrated as he spoke, tapping her fingers against her leg with visible annoyance as she waited for Leor to stop talking.
"Really? The ape is what you set your sights on? Leor, don't embarrass me. You've got a once in a lifetime opportunity here. The stars have aligned, and fate itself has intervened to give you a chance that only the heroes of storybooks ever receive. I won't allow you to squander it so thoughtlessly." Alina tossed the soiled rag in her hand into the pile of dirty linen before placing her hands on her hips as she continued. "You're not going to embody some lowly ape, my friend, you're going to embody the dragon!"
Leor seemed to finally understand all at once the incredible choice that he had been overlooking. He had seen the mighty dragon soar through the sky overhead, felt his own soul tremble with terror as the creature's terrible Willpower swept over him. Ignoring him like a tiger might ignore a fly.
For some reason, Leor's mind had placed that ominous creature outside the reach of man. He didn't even consider trying to embody such a Beast, because he had somehow failed to even see the dragon as a Beast in the first place. In his mind, it was more like some dreadful fallen demigod than a Beast.
His first instinct was to scoff at Alina's suggestion, but the more he considered it, the more intrigued he became. Dragons are Beast, afterall, why shouldn't he attempt to embody the dragon? There wouldn't be another Beast that even came close in terms of talent and potential. Even if Leor somehow stumbled upon the essence of a sacred Beast like the Sphinx, it would still probably be better for him to choose the dragon. Unless he found a sacred Beast that perfectly aligned to his own talents, like Alina had, he couldn't possibly find a better option.
Leor was already beginning to imagine what embodying such a noble and powerful Beast would be like, when a problem suddenly interred his mind.
"Wait… What about the Beast essence though? I can't just use any old scrap of scale or flake of skin, I would need to somehow get my hands on untainted dragon blood. How in the cursed realms am I supposed to get that?" He questioned.
Even as he asked the question, Leor knew what they needed to do first. If there was any Dragon blood anywhere in this realm outside the body of Viridrak himself, the old dark elf would probably know about it.
Drelk had been more occupied than usual lately because of Rynn, but it wasn't hard for the two companions to track him down. The old elf had created a simple swing from a hard piece of wood and some long rope, tying it off to a beam that had been run between two rooftops high above.
At the moment, Drelk was wearing a satisfied smile as he pushed the young Rynn on the swing. Rynn was wearing the same yellow dress as she always wore, there wasn't a great deal of clothing available around here for small children, after all. Leor couldn't help but stare a bit at the glowing red eyes of the little girl. Even though she was no longer defiled, her eyes still gave Leor a feeling of danger every time he saw them.
After approaching Drelk, Alina took over pushing the child as Leor stepped aside with the elder. Quickly filling him in on the problem at hand. Leor thought Drelk might have another fit when he heard what they were looking for. The old elf's entire body seemed to shake as a thousand expressions flashed across his startled face. Only the presence of Rynn seemed to help calm the storming emotion inside him, forcing him to speak with a hushed tone as he glared up at Leor.
"You know that such a thing is blasphemy of the highest level, don't you? If you did this, any dragon that ever discovered it would hunt you down and kill you the moment they found you. Do you understand that?! He hissed.
Leor looked startled, taking a moment to collect his thoughts as his expression slowly hardened.
"Well. That's not ideal, but I have to survive and escape this realm before I would ever need to worry about such a thing. Also, dragons are incredibly rare and solitary creatures. What are the odds that I would ever come across one again?" Leor shook his head firmly as he made his decision, "No. We don't have the luxury of choosing the easy path. If we can't get strong enough to break the seal on this Realm, we are all going to die. That includes Rynn. So even if this makes me a target, and all the dragons hate me for it, I'm still going to do it. Please tell me what you know, Drelk."
As the most senior member of the group, Drelk felt like he should try hard to convince the young human not to make such a hasty decision. The longer he considered it, however, the more he realized that the young man's words rang true. With a heavy breath of exasperation, Drelk threw his hands up in capitulation.
"Very well, Leor. I will tell you what I know." He said softly