(The Eternal Garden, The Next Day, Veyr’s POV)
The next day, as the glow inside the Eternal Garden reached that soft golden hue that resembled late morning, Raymond appeared before Veyr once again, his arrival sudden enough to jolt the young dragon’s senses like a flicker of lightning through calm air.
"Bloody hell, you scared me," Veyr muttered, sitting up from the patch of grass he had been resting on.
His black eyes met Raymond’s, who stood only a few feet away, his expression unreadable, his aura perfectly still.
Raymond tilted his head slightly, a faint crease forming between his brows. "You always sense me before I even announce myself," he said, his tone casual but his curiosity evident. "How do you do that? A mortal of your level should be incapable of that ...."
He asked, as Veyr shrugged in response, pretending nonchalance.
"Dragon instincts," he said simply. "They get sharper when you’re being kept in a gilded cage."
Raymond’s lips twitched in a half-smile, though his eyes did not soften. "I see," he replied quietly, his voice carrying that polished composure of someone trying too hard to appear relaxed. But beneath that calm exterior, there was a stiffness to his posture, a nervous tension he could not entirely mask.
"So," Raymond said, folding his arms and looking down at Veyr with a tone that tried to sound commanding, "have you made up your mind about teaching me those techniques?"
Veyr studied him for a moment. The act was good, the arrogance, the poised authority, but there was something off about it.
Raymond’s eyes gave him away; they darted ever so slightly, like a man who wasn’t used to begging for knowledge.
And it was this nervousness that made Veyr even more confident that Raymond was perhaps afraid of doing this under his father’s nose, just as much as he was.
"Yes, I’ve made up my mind. But before I start teaching you, can you assure me that your father won’t find out about it and punish us both?"
Veyr asked, as Raymond’s eyes beamed at the response, his expression visibly brightening as he realized that Veyr was ready to play ball.
"Yes, don’t worry about it. Like I said, my father can’t peer into the small domain I control.
As long as you train me within my small bubble, he won’t find out anything."
Raymond assured, as Veyr finally nodded.
"Fine, I’ll teach you one today. The most basic one," he said.
"It’s called [Shapeshift]."
Raymond’s lips curved upward at once, a faint, triumphant smile breaking across his face. "Excellent," he said, stepping closer.
"You’re making the right choice, Veyr. Cooperation is always wiser than stubbornness."
Veyr gave a short, dry chuckle, though his expression remained neutral. "Let’s just get it over with."
However, before he could begin, Raymond’s expression darkened slightly. His aura pulsed—a controlled ripple of pressure that brushed against Veyr’s chest like a silent threat.
"I should make one thing clear before we begin," Raymond said softly, his voice lowering to a warning tone.
"I’m a master of aura, so if you lie to me, or try to mislead me... I’ll know. And it won’t end well for you."
He threatened, as the faint smile on his face contrasted sharply with the weight of his words
*Gulp*
Veyr swallowed hard, feeling his throat tighten as the air around him grew heavier.
He nodded silently, his voice refusing to come out for a moment, until eventually he said, "Understood."
Raymond’s pressure eased almost immediately after that, replaced once again by that calm, elegant composure he had seemed to master.
"Good," he said simply, gesturing for Veyr to begin.
And so the lesson started.
At first, Veyr took it slow, explaining the concept of [Shapeshift] and how it relied on manipulating mana to distort one’s physical form while using the body’s stored water to alter its muscle appearance.
He demonstrated simple examples, transforming his hand into a veiny bulging one before reverting it back again.
Raymond watched closely, his sharp eyes tracing every movement, every fluctuation of mana, as he grasped everything unnervingly quick.
Within minutes, he mimicked the transformation, his hand rippling and reshaping with startling accuracy.
"Not bad," Veyr admitted, trying not to sound too impressed. "But that’s just the foundation. Maintaining the shift while changing other body parts is the hard part."
Raymond nodded, his focus unbroken. He closed his eyes briefly, drawing in a deep breath before his form flickered once more.
One after another, he quickly learnt how to alter each body part, including the bone and skin, until he reached the part of altering facial features, which took him only a few more minutes to understand.
By the 25 minute mark, the only part he had not yet learnt to change was the hair color, except for which, he mastered everything else.
"Hmm," Veyr muttered, watching him work. "You’re forcing the mana too linearly. Let it flow through the entire body at once instead of doing one part at a time."
He guided, as Raymond frowned, then adjusted his technique—and within seconds, his black hair shifted into a pale gold hue.
Veyr blinked, genuinely stunned.
Half an hour. That was all it had taken. A technique that took even him and Leo several days to master had fallen before Raymond’s raw comprehension in less than one.
Naturally, he was learning it at the Demi-God tier, where his mana control and physical attributes were much superior to those of Leo and himself, but still, his comprehension was impressive nonetheless.
"Alright," Raymond said, opening his eyes with a calm satisfaction. "That’s one done. What about the next technique?"
He demanded. As Veyr raised an eyebrow, suppressing a sigh as he wagged his finger in denial.
"Uh-uh. I kept my end of the deal. Now it’s your turn."
Raymond’s grin faltered slightly.
"My turn?"
"Yes," Veyr said, his tone sharp now. "You promised me something in return. Tell me the secret of how to become a Demi-God, and then maybe, we continue with this training tomorrow, once you’ve promised me something of equal value."
For a brief moment, silence stretched between them.
Raymond’s gaze lingered on Veyr’s face, his eyes calculating, as though deciding whether he was worthy of the truth.
Then, finally, he relented.
"I suppose you’ve earned that much," he said quietly. "Very well... I’ll tell you."
His expression shifted, growing serious as the air around him thickened once more.