7 - Experimentation and Discovery

When she looked around, she realized how much her skill had actually sacrificed. Thinking about it, she realized her skill was a little overboard... but she really wanted to keep testing it out. She was simply curious on how far it would go. She was truly a scholar at heart.

She thought to herself, 'What exactly are the limits of what I can sacrifice? What is the highest extent of what this skill can do?'

Looking around herself, she thought, 'It can decimate the landscape... that's for sure... hmm...'

Thinking back to when she originally used the skill, she thought about how she got nothing from it. This made her think, 'What if I can just sacrifice stuff without aiming for any results? Actually... I did that before. Hmm... what if I can store the cost for future sacrifices? Ooh, I need to try that!'

Searching for anything valuable, she peered through the pitch black cave. She really couldn't see anything apart from the faint shiny glow she gave off from her reinforced magisteel scales- which she didn't know the actual composition of.

Her parallel thought process got off track, thinking about how the skill had to have actually enabled her to replace her scales... albeit painfully. While her main mind still was brainstorming on how to go about using her sacrifice skill, then she thought to herself, 'Well... I might as well test out a few ideas.'

She knelt down on the ground, and her scales scraped against it. Her scales remained unharmed, while a fine powder of stone was scraped off the top where she had scratched it. She was intending to rip a chunk out of the ground to try and sacrifice it.

BAM

She slammed her hand into the ground, it didn't quite work as intended, though. She broke up the ground around where she hit, but she also hurt her hand. Her pain resistance stopped her from feeling most of the pain, but she could still feel it.

Ignoring the sharp burning sensation in her hand, she shook it a little to get the pain out. She shook her head, disappointed with herself in thinking she would be able to do that. Then she held up the stones, and thought, 'Sacrifice, and save the value.'

A small section of dark cave around her lit up in an eerie red hue. She could feel the flames ignite in her hand, the stones disintegrated into nothingness before her, and nothing else happened after. But she had expected this. If she was saving the value of the object, wouldn't it make sense that she wouldn't get anything physically? Now all she had to do was use the value she earned to finally test it.

Nodding in approval, she held her hand out again once more and thought, 'Sacrifice, reform that rock.'

Nothing happened. No rock appeared, no flames ignited, nothing. This made her think, 'Hmm... well that's disappointing... good thing I found that out now instead of later. That could have been bad...'

She went back to smash another chunk out of the ground, then she thought, 'Wait... it hurt last time, so maybe-'

Leaning over further, taking advantage of the small indent she already made, she bites a chunk out of the floor. It felt as if she was biting ice cream or whipped cream. It was so easy. Knowing this, she thought, 'Is my jaw a lot stronger than the rest of my body? Hmm... maybe some features of my previous form stayed, apart from my scales?'

Once again, going off on a little tangent due to distracting herself with new questions, she thought, 'I was able to teleport before... so what if I do it now? Ooh! I wonder if I can go further this time!'

Knowing her next goal... and forgetting her previous, she dropped the chunk of rock out of her mouth and thought back to when she had teleported the first time. What had she been doing... she wanted to mimic that feeling she got, to see if it would bring out the ability once more.

Once she really felt how to do it again, she tried to teleport and- ZIIIP she jumped forwards in space instantly. It was an interesting feeling, she once again felt like the skill was a core part of her. She could just instinctively know how to do it.

Then she thought about it even more, 'Can I change my body position as I teleport? Or do I have to do it before I teleport... I could get work done a lot faster if I could change my position with the teleport'

She imagined herself in a room full of different equations, going from standing while writing on a chalk board to teleporting into a sitting position on a chair typing on a keyboard. Altering her movements right as she was going between the two.

While she thought about that, her other thought process began putting it into action. She tried to teleport again, but this time to where she would be turned back towards where she teleported from and- it worked!

The instant she teleported, she was able to see how she instantly moved from one space to the other. Instantly. She was sure it was instant because she was able to see the faint glow left from herself as she vanished. This meant she was transported from one spot to another instantly.

She silently cheered to herself about her fun little teleport before thinking back again... 'What was I trying to do before this again...? Uh...'

Looking down at the stone she bit out of the ground, she scratched the back of her neck with her talon-like nails as she tried to remember. She thought, and thought, and thought.... but she came up blank. Nothing. Then, when her mind reviewed what happened with the rocks she had broken out before, she hypothesized that she should also be able to sacrifice anything she wanted, no matter the value.

Holding up the stone she bit out of the ground, she threw it on a whim, and thought, 'Sacrifice'

Instantly the rock, as intended, set ablaze and evaporated before it could hit the ground. The more she used this skill... the more she ended up fearing it. Sacrifice is both an incredible tool, and a dangerous weapon. She isn't a fighter, she knows this. Even with that fact, she can tell that sacrificing anything and everything could be wildly powerful...

In her mind, she really thought to herself that there had to be some sort of drawback. Something big? Dangerous even. So far, she doesn't know what that is... but she really wanted to know. Both for her sake, and well... her friend too.

Suddenly... as her mind crossed that thought, she realized she had left Veldora alone for who knows how long. Her heart sunk, she not only left a friend alone, but she had left a friend who had nobody to talk to alone... knowing this, her heart was beating fast as she raced back towards where he was. 

'Not good... I hope we'll still be friends after this...'

She tripped over a large rock and fell face first. Everything was very dark after all. She had sacrificed basically everything in the surroundings... and that had caused some issues with her getting back. She thought to herself, 'It's too damn dark...'

Then an idea popped into her head! She quickly carved a chunk of stone out of the ground, then she set it ablaze with her sacrifice skill to get herself a torch. Finally, she used a few more stones to get a normal flame to ignite on the torch.

Once again... and hopefully without tripping or falling, she was on her way to Veldora.