A Dragon Idol’s Reincarnation Tale

["That is the description, Ms. Segawa.”]

[“Interesting. So, that would make my “cheat” ability related to the five senses minus somatosensation,”] I said with a sigh. [“Hmmm, it does seem rather disappointing if we were to compare it to [Draconic Magics] or even [Primal Magics]. I am envious of not being born a dragon.”]

Ever since I decided to travel with Miss Dragon, a month had now gone by. Our “Age” had increased by one at the same time, so it seemed I was born exactly four months after her.

After evolving, I made up my mind I had to learn how to fight. I’ve inconvenienced Miss Dragon for too long now, riding what she called the “Carry Train.” Figuratively and literally.

I went into the first fight of my life, uhh I meant, lives with optimism, but the fight itself was a complete disaster. I was able to learn a few skills, but I couldn’t possibly count how many times Miss Dragon had to use [Minor Heal] or even [Modest Heal] to keep me alive. Frankly, I nearly died once or twice. Urgh, it was horrible.

That was why I was crestfallen to learn my racial skill, [Primal Senses], wasn’t helping me become a better combatant, compared to Miss Dragon’s [Draconic Magics]. Miss Dragon tried to reassure me about how the skill was a powerful scouting and detection skill. I couldn’t disagree. My senses were so strong, I sometimes felt overwhelmed by how much I could detect now. Still, I felt it was a bit redundant with skills like [Enhanced Enemy Sense] and [Detection Sensor] available.

Maybe I’m overthinking this… Haaaa, let’s change subjects. I’ll think it through later.

[“Anyways, enough about me. How is your transformation?”] I prodded Miss Dragon, causing her to stretch her humanoid body.

[“Feels good. My voice has gotten clearer, and my pitch is improving steadily. It’s still too hard for me to speak, though.”]

Miss Dragon’s appearance was now that of a 7-year-old girl when she used her [Humanize] skill.

Her body is completely wrapped by a shimmering coat of black scales, and most of her bone plates had disappeared. Ever since that skill became [Humanize Lv. 5], her features had started to resemble more like a human girl with enough make-up for a cosplay party.

She was extremely happy when her hair returned, letting it flow down to her back, although she had complained that without hair care products, they were hard to take care of. It had gotten messy, which was a shame since her black hair had such a strong luster.

Whenever it rained or when we found a lake or river, she would take that opportunity to clean herself up quite a bit. Although, recently, she had considered cutting it shorter, purely so it wouldn’t inconvenient her life in this forest. Maybe too rash of a decision, but Miss Dragon in shorter hair would fit her slightly tomboyish personality.

It would look adorable.

I smiled in my head, quite liking that idea. [“It is still surprising how cute you look as a little girl, despite all the scales. Honestly, I had you much older in my imagination.”]

["Oi, I told you already, I was 15-years-old when I died! I can't help it that my skill turned me into a seven-year-old kid! Also, without a snout, all these scales just make me look freaky."]

[“Give yourself more credit. At the end of the day, it’s about feeling good in your body, right?”] I chuckled at how flustered she was.

From what I noticed, her emotional spectrum seemed to be affected by her body type. In her original form, she could act a bit feral and aggressive towards other monsters, although maybe it was due to her solitude in this forest which caused it. Whereas when she humanized, she had a slight childish energy when she moved around or spoke. Then again, I wasn’t a psychiatrist nor had I ever taught pre-teen kids before, so how should I know?

Then again, she was aware of her own faults when she mentioned how she wanted to fully upgrade [Humanize] to level ten. She knew it would be a waste of SP, but she was considering it just to prove to me she was an adolescent. In the end, she tried to upgrade it by one level only, but apparently, [Humanize] was a skill you couldn’t upgrade with SP.

[“Please don’t treat me like a kid.”] Miss Dragon vented her frustration of being treated according to her new age. I could only smile peacefully at this display.

[“Anyways, dinner is ready.”]

Due to my bad combat results, we had decided that it would be smart to prioritize Miss Dragon’s evolution now. To not feel useless, I requested to take care of cooking duty. It was a grueling job to cook with my current new body, making me wish for my own [Humanize].

Not only did I not have tools to do proper, quality work, I also did not have any hands to even imitate the cooking process I did in my past life. My garm body couldn’t grab anything with my paws, so I had to use my mouth to hold and grab on the ingredients.

I had my pride as a home cook. I knew the importance of hygiene and safety whilst cutting and preparing everything for the cook, but who was I kidding. Living in a forest like this, I had to stop acting as if I had it all. I was cutting on the ground, on a fragile-looking wooden plate Miss Dragon made. My pride as a home cook was long gone.

Aside from that problem, there was also the fact that we didn’t have proper knives to cut the proteins and greens. Our claws were our only hope. My claws were not sharp and precise enough, so I needed Miss Dragon’s help here to slice the pieces into correct sizes. I could see she has some experience in the kitchen. Good.

I also found cooking with the System helping you quite fascinating. The skill [Cooking] showed you where to cut, how much to season, and when it was hot enough to be served. It was a bit inaccurate at first, forcing me to manually do it from experience alone, but over time as I leveled and used it, the skill became more precise, working out how I liked to cook and helped me improve on it.

[“Yay~”] Miss Dragon began clapping, showing a bright smile. [“Thank you for the food!”]

[“I hope you will like it. Without the proper equipment, I’m not sure if everything came out perfectly.”] Hearing me say that, Miss Dragon glared at me with a glint of envy.

[“Eh, what are you saying? Your [Cooking] skill is only level one and you’re already a better chef than me. Eating your food makes me feel both happiness and defeat. It feels even worse when I’m reminded that you’re doing all of this as a baby garm…”]

Despite her complaints, she scooped up some broth and meat with her wooden spoon — something she made herself. Once the food was in her mouth, her eyes fully widened in pleasure.

[“Mhmm, exquisite.”]

Adorable.

[“I am glad to hear that. I was not sure that it would work but this [Slime Gel] functions exactly like a thickener for soup. Having the same taste and texture as gelatin means it will not obstruct the other tastes. Very useful.”]

[“… I wish I could forget this was made with slime gelatin. Does every single slime look like an eldritch monster? Must the rank E and F ones also look like crawling horrors?”]

[“… You nearly burned down the forest again.”]

Her current appearance might be deceptive, but this girl was a walking inferno. If she couldn’t control herself then I was legitimately in danger of being torched! Whenever I watched her fight, it felt harder to believe she was just a teenage idol in her past life.

She fought with the ferocity of a tiger in her dragon form, but afterwards, she would transform into her dragonewt form and maintain a strict training schedule to “get back in shape” as she called it. Dancing and singing practice. I was quite impressed she would even contemplate it in her situation, making me even fonder of this girl. She had a dream, and she was iron-willed to achieve it.

Although, admittedly, I found it a bit hard to like her wanting to become an idol. Whether Korean or Japanese, I had heard how much of a toxic industry it was. Not only due to the fans but also from how they were treated by their managers. There were a couple current idols at the school I worked at, and I had overheard some nasty rumors from them.

Still, it wasn’t my place to say anything about. A teacher’s duty was to help kids walk into adulthood with their head up high. And, besides, kids should be able to dream and fulfill them with enough effort if possible. Anything but being stuck in my situation…

[“Speaking of monsters, our luck has not been that good. D rank monsters are quite rare. At this rate, I’ll reach level 25 from E ranks alone,”] Miss Dragon looked dejected as she mentioned that topic again.

Our search for foes Miss Dragon could kill for experience has been pretty much disappointing, recently. We decided it would be best if I took the kills on Rank Ds and lower while she took the ones on Rank E and above, solely since I had to level up and evolve. The less she had to worry about me, the more she could concentrate on fighting.

[“It has been like that ever since I entered the forest.”] Miss Dragon closed her eyes and opened them again, having given the issue some thought. [“Your garm mother not only evolved to a C rank but also reached level 28 within two months. I’ve been really thinking she might just have hunted down everything.”]

[“Miss Dragon.”] Realizing what she meant, I added another suggestion. [“Instead of her having killed everything, I think it’s more likely that she and her pack scared off everything, after killing certain predators or monster pack alphas.”]

[“A territorial dispute?”] She tilted her head.

[“Well, yes, it makes sense, no? Animals have certain territories they mark and want to protect from enemies. It is their home, after all. If my garm mother leveled up extremely fast, then she must have killed quite a lot of her equals.With the area’s power in the garm’s hand, a monster migration could have happened.”]

[“Ooh!”] She nodded vigorously, understanding and agreeing with me. [“However, hasn’t it been a month now after she died? There should be a power vacuum, right? Why aren’t all the monsters returning?”]

[“Maybe tomorrow? Who knows what they are thinking.”]

And with those final words we finished our meals and readied ourselves for a well-earned sleep. Another day

Me, and my loud mouth!

[“Hahaha! I can’t believe you were correct about yesterday! Hahaha, you sure you weren’t a fortune teller instead of teacher?”]

[“Why are you happy because of this?! This is a disaster!”] I cried out in response to Miss Dragon out-of-place excitement.

[“What do you mean a disaster? Finally, my chance to evolve. How could I not be happy?”]

Sometimes I really wondered if it was correct for me to put my trust in this girl. She was too reckless! Was it arrogance from all her strength, or was this her real personality, hidden behind a nice girl mask? I’ve seen a lot of girls have such an attitude.

Hearing her laugh so merrily as we were running away from the hulking monster behind us was frightening! I thought she was actually crazy at this moment. I knew I was in her debt and she probably meant well, maybe, but getting myself in these sort of situations was insane!

[“Alright, alright. I bought what you wanted me to, so can you do something, please! I cannot keep this up any longer!”] I pleaded.

Her plans needed me to buy [Dark Magic] and level it up, so I was broke again. Miss Dragon had described how she cast spells, but I’d never done it before.

[“We got this! Don’t worry!”]

I never thought what I did yesterday was a “setting a flag” moment, but after what happened just now, I had to curse myself for this. Superstition or not! It was a peaceful morning, but this giant bear suddenly appeared while we were having lunch! Miss Dragon noticed it immediately, but so did the bear.

We were being chased through the forest all while Miss Dragon shot fire spells at it, being the bear’s rock-like fur and skin was warding it off. Now, wheezing, I turned around to see Miss Dragon engaging the bear in close combat. Knowing that the monster will be preoccupied, I took my chance to catch my breath, recovering a little bit of my used stamina.

[“Ms. Segawa just remember the magic explanation I gave you and use [Dark Tendrils] to keep this thing in check. Be careful of overusing spells and accumulating too much arcane corruption!”]

“Understood!” … Is what I would like to say but this wasn’t the time to use any of my limited mana for [Telepathy]. I needed to concentrate on learning how to cast spells.

Oh right, what was the profile of this monster again?

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Name: *    Level: 0  Race: Rock-Skin Horned Grizzly

Age: 10 Years

Status:    Health: 2342/2342   Mana: 111/111

Strength: 1151    Intelligence: 129

Vitality: 1403    Wisdom: 1284

Agility: 641    Stamina: 1169/1380

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