I stopped a day later near the Zanyr river on top of the Gavin cliffs. We could see Gavin from here but Greg suggested that we should rest as he was convinced that Raishin and I would get into trouble the moment we enter the city.

  It pains me to say this but he’s right.

  Greg had made huts with his elven magic for us to relax in.

  I was lying in my tails and thinking about the talk I had with Greg about ‘Shaped’ magic. I realized that I actually do have shaped magic! My [Illusionary Dagger]!

  Illusion layers got shattered and I grabbed my [illusionary Dagger]. Why did I never use this? I kept crafting daggers in my dimensional pocket to make sure I had enough but… I have a skill that’s a dagger.

  Can I substitute all my metallic daggers for [Illusionary Dagger]?

  I opened up the magic circle of it as I didn’t know it. Illusions is a racial affinity so I don’t need to know its magic circle to use it, same with foxfires and spatiotemporal stuff.

  Holy shit! So many exotic runes! It’s the same story with my foxfires and Nilah!

  I kept peering at the structure but there were too many mana runes I couldn’t read. I feel so stupid…

  So, all my racial magic has exotic runes, eh?

  My thoughts wandered to the fairies, the four-armed monkeys and other stuff that invaded our dimension. Their magic circles were more exotic mana runes than the ones I know. Is that because their magic is tied to their race?

  But Raishin’s [Nova Blast] seemed normal… although… I hypothesize that a 6t once stole the magic skill from a god as only a god and a 6t can brute force through those.

  I looked into my foxfires and opened my spatiotemporal magic circles. My tails had made some, they have exotic runes… my tails are using runes that I don’t understand… what is going on?

  A classic case… I start with 1 question and instead of an answer, I get more questions.

  My frost skills had normal mana runes besides… [Kryokym]…

  I’m starting to see a trend here.

  I got up and called out.

  Raishin! Greg! Show me the magic circles of skills deeply tied to your race!

  My friends came out of their huts and Raishin showed the magic circle of his [Dynamo Clouds] and [Raijin Mode], and Greg showed his [Shadow Meld] and [Edgecat].

  My [Shadow meld] was a copy of Greg’s so mine had exotic mana runes too, every skill of my friends had exotic mana runes. But I could tell, the mana runes belonged to a similar group as most also appeared in my magic circles.

  What is it Agnis? Is there something wrong with our skills?

  Yes and no… I studied magic which is based on Azu’s research. Azu spent 27 years researching this so I’m sure she didn’t half-ass it. She had documented all the mana runes she had encountered. Categorized in the occurrence rate. The lowest occurrence rate she found was 5-7% which is still relatively high. But!

  I looked at the magic circles of my friends.

  She did find a handful of ‘exotic’ mana runes that had an irregular and inconsistent occurrence. None of the exotic mana runes in our magic circles match the ones she found. None of those extra-dimensional creatures had mana runes she found. Only that scorpion Thing from Boshi town had some.

  So, what does that mean? Our races are rare so it makes sense that she doesn’t know about these right?

  Hmm well if it’s a racial skill she would never see them but I did notice that those abominations had magic circles with runes that I’ve never seen before.

  Ugh, I might be wrong but I think Chiara lied to me…

  The Sarian goddess of chaos? What exactly did she tell you?

  That she and her sister, Adea, made the tailed beasts to help them in their fuckup. Their fuckup caused 4 dimensions to merge, which created this current mess. But at some point, a 5 th one merged with it and the 6 th one merged with us during the great Calamity.

  And what did she lie about?

  I’m not sure… but the mana runes in our magic circles suggest that we might not be from this dimension… we might have come here when the 5 th dimension merged…

  I was unsure of what to be upset about, the fact that I got lied to or that we might be illegal immigrants like the races that arrived here with the Great Calamity.

  All the skills we’ve learned besides the ones our tails create or are bound to our race have normal mana runes, we only encounter exotic mana runes when we delve into magic related to our races… why is that?

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Hmm and the runic structure of extra-dimensional creatures is strengthening this hypothesis?

  I nodded.

  I can be wrong of course; maybe exotic runes are required for racial-bound skills… but so far, it’s not looking good for that theory… So, I need to experiment. Let's all have our tails make skills that belong to our race but with mana runes we’re familiar with. I will write them down.

  The experiment commenced after I had written the runes down and we put our tails to work.

  My 9 th tail got far but ran into issues as it needed exotic runes to make the magic circle work and accept my mana. My other tails had no success either. My head can make magic skills with normal mana runes just fine, there is no reason why my tails should struggle with this.

  The only spatiotemporal skill I possess with normal runes is the [Dimensional Sword] that I got from Azu, but I can cast it as if it’s a racial skill. My tails tried to remake it but with an ‘Agnis’ twist, which should be easy but they kept attempting to rewrite it with exotic runes.

  The fact that exotic mana runes are only present in the skills I got from gramps, suggest that gramps might have put his tails on creating them. but Pagos isn’t specific to our race, it’s just common, just as fire magic isn’t specific to being a human but it’s still common.

  Greg, can you show me the magic circles of your elven magic? The one I got from Elliana has a lot of exotic runes…

  Greg showed me and it too had exotic mana runes but…

  They use the same runes as we do…

  What does this mean? Do we instinctively know how to use them? It has to be else we wouldn’t be able to use the magic skills… But does that mean that elves have the same origin as we do? What if all the races responsible for the dimension’s wellbeing are not from this dimension…

  Ugh! This is impossible!

  Raishin gave up and laid back into the grass.

  I didn’t study mana runes but this shouldn’t be so hard…

  I got nothing…

  So, we’re aliens?

  Dunno, there’s not enough evidence but so far… it seems so.

  How did you make this discovery? Greg asked while he kept trying. I could sense that his tail was overheating.

  Nilah, help Greg out a bit!

  Nilah got freed from her sword form and cooled Greg’s tail.

  Well, I was looking at my [Illusionary Dagger], thinking that I could use these instead of real ones, and then tried to tweak it to discover that I have no clue what to do with all these exotic runes.

  Hmm, I have to admit, I never looked at the magic circles of my racial skills.

  Greg and I stared at the magic circles of the skills we could easily use but had no clue how they work.

  A form of understanding is needed to use a magic circle but this is not the case for racial skills. It was why I had difficulties tweaking my foxfires 4 years ago as I couldn’t read its runic structure.

  This is such an eye-opener… but to why that goddess lied to you. Why would she lie?

  She was quite nice so I doubt that it’s a malicious lie, although you can never be sure with gods. Maybe she went for a beautiful lie to cover an ugly truth. Although I probably wouldn’t have believed her if she said that the tailed beasts are from another dimension…

  I suppose nothing she could have said would have worked so she might have opted for that lie.

  I guess…

  So, what are we then? Does that mean that we don’t actually have to help the dimension as it’s not ours?

  Greg wanted to respond but he realized that he had no response. And Raishin’s question made me think.

  Is this the reason why she lied? It surely is going to be problematic if the tailed races realize this and stop their roles. But does that matter? If the dimension goes to shit while we’re still in it we’ll still die so might as well keep it running. But it does suck though, we’re stuck with a task that isn’t supposed to be our responsibility…

  I need time to think… I will retire for the night. Please tell us if you make another discovery Agnis and thank you for telling us…

  I might be wrong though!

  I know… good night.

  Greg went back to his hut.

  I think I’m going to sleep too; you should sleep too.

  Raishin retreated too and Nilah and I went back to our own huts. I was lying on my tails again and looking at the magic circle of [Illusionary Dagger]. Nilah was lying on my chest and also looking at my magic circle.

  Do you know anything about this Nilah? Do you think we’re aliens?

  No answer as usual.

  It went so well but now the identity crisis is back. So many questions and no answers. I really hope that I’m wrong.

  I am wrong quite often but hardly when I want to be wrong…

  Why am I so shit?