I spent hours creating a wall around the camp as instructed, but when Karo arrived she didn’t seem impressed with my creations, “Aureus, why did you just make bare walls? We’re going to need doors, or gates and ways for people to get on top of them and railings so they don’t accidentally fall over.”


    I had landed to take a break and here she was complaining about what I’d created. Annoyed, I smacked a hole into the wall with a dignified sniff. There, now the humans could leave if they wanted. Karo continued to complain about my construction, I didn’t care to listen to any more of her whining so I left to continue the task given to me by Master.


    A few minutes later Master called out to me, Aureus.


    I’m coming! I was elated, making walls was so boring, I was excited to have something else to do.


    When I landed Master was staring off towards her system, it seemed like she was discussing something with the gods or maybe another human. She seemed… tired. I felt guilty, she had been working so hard since I was born. We struggled together. She almost died multiple times and I still couldn’t help her feel comfortable. I should be the one fighting and keeping her safe, but I failed to do so. Briefly when  Reed and Karo and the shadowy idiot joined us she felt relaxed and content, but it quickly turned to anxiety. Especially after the stupid shadow one brought too many rats to us. It seemed like Master liked him more now but I still thought that he was incapable. Master doesn''t need any of these humans.


    I agreed with her deepest wants, we needed to leave. To level up as much as we could, but she couldn’t bring herself to leave those humans alone. She worried that they might die, which wasn’t wrong. Humans we met were usually weak, they needed big camps and structures to make up for their frail and useless bodies. Not master though, despite her weakness she charged in, she conquered. We laid claim to the slimes'' land, and yet we had to abandon her territory to come help them.


    Aureus? Hey?


    “Aureus!” Master shouted, she pulled me from my thoughts.


    Sorry, what did you need from me Master?


    “I need you to cooperate with Caroline more, okay? I know you’re not familiar with building, but she’ll let you know what to change and how to do it. Just follow along with her instructions.” She pleaded.


    I groaned, why should I put in so much effort? The humans knew how to build these walls already. I could provide the wall and they could add the fancy things they thought were necessary.


    You said I should build a wall, that’s what I did? How is a wall wrong? If you put holes in it the monsters would get in.


    I understand, but just listen to her please? She knows what she’s doing and it won’t be too hard. C’mon?


    I focused on looking at the floor, disrespecting Master while she was putting in so much work on this wasn’t something I wanted to do. I didn’t respond and just flew back to where Karo was. She was beaming, why was this human so happy? I rolled my eyes in an attempt to push down the warmness in my chest.


    “Now, can you help me with this?” She asked excitedly.


    I snorted and stared at her, what did she want me to do? What was she waiting for? I hadn’t learned to talk yet. How did she want me to respond? Impatient to hear her response I gave her a small low grunt, maybe that would satisfy her.


    “Great, now you did a great job with setting up the walls, but we need some ladders around and railings around the top. Also I guess maybe we can do some doors or rather gates on four sides of the walls.”


    Railings and ladders… I looked up at the wall next to us, it was majestically tall of course, no one could expect any less from yours truly. Now to make it more appropriate for the humans I focused. My right paw was pressed to the cold surface of the rock as I willed my mana to reconstruct its surface. After a few seconds I opened my eyes, a section of my wall had changed. A railing added, and a fabulous ladder was carved int-


    “No, you can’t make it that way!” Karo exclaimed. It seemed she was unhappy with my efforts. Ungrateful humans.


    I swished my tail in irritation, I added the changes that she requested. The top of the wall now had thin walls for railings and the side had a carved ladder into it. She was just being nitpicky at that point.


    “Aureus, the railings are much too tall for us to use. How are we supposed to attack the coming enemies over these if we can’t see over them?” She asked as she hopped down from the ladder and onto the wall between the railings. My head cocked to the side as her eyes popped up over the side rhythmically. She was jumping up to see me over the side of the railings.  I let out a throaty laugh, how cute. Cute? I frowned, was I starting to see Karo as Master had been seeing me?


    I shook my head and placed my paw on the wall once again, reforming the rails to be easier for her short limbs to reach. “No, stop. No Aureus this isn’t going to work either, you’ve made them too small now.” I groaned loudly and plopped down in defiance.


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    She must have noticed my annoyance because she began to demonstrate her opinion, “See look,” she said as she gestured to the amount of her body that was visible. I didn’t see the issue, she wanted it to be shorter. I made it shorter. Humans were too much work.


    She sighed, “If it’s this short, then if the monsters can attack from down there with projectiles we’ll get hit, you know?” I was confused, looking from her to the other humans, they weren’t all the same size. Wouldn’t making it tall protect all of them? But she didn’t like that so I made it short, but she said it didn’t protect well. She made no sense. She looked at me for a few seconds, her eyes flicking between me and the various humans wandering the area. Finally it looked like she’d figured out my thoughts, at least she was smart.


    Her nose scrunched in thought, “Then… Try to make it like this, tall and then short and then tall again?” A vague image of a memory seeped through my connection with Master. A large stone building, not similar to others I’d seen in my lifetime, it was large and looked annoying to build. It also had those staggering stepping walls. There weren’t any of these defensive walls on the surface world, maybe they weren’t effective against other humans I pondered. But then why were they created originally? For monsters with projectiles?


    I once again put my paw to the surface of the wall, the rock bending to my mighty will and arranging itself in a way that resembled the memory I’d pulled from Master. As my focus waned I heard her clap once, “Yes! Perfect! Now if you could just follow along the rest of the wall you’ve already made and add this design to it that would be great.”


    A small growl escaped. Taking orders from anyone but Master was demeaning. These humans should normally be groveling at my feet, but because Master wouldn’t approve I gave them mercy. I snapped my head away from her in defiance. Just building what she requested was already taxing, especially since I’d already almost finished a full outer wall around their abysmal camp.


    “Oh, come on, Aureus. While you’re working on that I’m going to follow along the wall and carve the shape of gates and where to put them. And once you’re able you can just follow the template I’ve set up. Easy right? Or is that too much for one day?” She asked as she gently tapped my shoulder.


    What a bold human! She was blatantly questioning my ability. Foolish. With a snort I took off, I soared high in the sky, circling overhead and assured Master’s domain was safe before landing at the start of my wall. For the next few hours I duplicated the work that she’d given me, lower wall railing and then higher wall railing. Ladders every so often to give more access.


    The days passed quickly as I worked with that cheeky human; we created magnificent walls and elegant housing for the humans. A few of the lessers that followed the healer requested a large stone, it was quite enjoyable to watch them flail about as they tried to bring it back to their master. Feeble creatures. They came running like ants as soon as Master graced them with her presence. Thousands more pouring in and giving me even more work to do. Despicable. I had to make entirely too many structures because they were popping out of the rocks some how. Really there were too many humans in the world.


    Despite that Master praised me for my hard work, “Aureus, you’ve gotten much better at controlling earth in a delicate way! Look how intricate your buildings are becoming! You’re doing such a good job!” She scratched at a spot under my chin, my pride was overflowing. Not that it lasted long, soon she was pulled away by that huge oaf that had arrived with all of the “drunkards” as Rozalin called them. From my understanding that meant they fell asleep in weird places and were violent and stinky. Probably…


    Learning things from Master’s memories often had strange gaps, when I listened to the humans talk it always felt like I was missing something. Like there was some sort of understanding about things I wasn’t quite grasping. Though the silliness of humans was of no interest to me, as long as Master and I understood each other, that was enough. I was much too noble to care about the complicated language and culture of humans.


    “Aureus? Where are you?” Karo’s voice carried from below me. I had been resting on the top of an unfinished tower that Rozalin’s henchman requested. A small prick of joy blossomed in my chest. I was beginning to understand why Master chose this human. Lifting my head and scanning the ground below the tower I found her, she was looking across the horizon in the square beneath me.


    I shifted my weight as I prepared to fly to her, but the tower began to creak. I could feel the rocks complaining as they split. My mana gathered in it, an attempt to strengthen it and hold it together, but the rocks were already disconnected in places. My mana couldn’t travel to them through the air that way, or at least I’d never tried that before. I roared at her, hoping she would understand the situation and help. The loss of that tower in particular didn''t concern me, but all of our work on the surrounding buildings would also be damaged if it fell apart.


    “What on earth are you doing?!” She yelled as she ran towards the tower, that dark emptiness of hers in hand.


    I was trying to rebuild as much of the tower as I could, but I could only build onto portions that connected and starting at the base was easier than trying to contain it from the top where I was. She darted around the tower absorbing the debris that fell, thankfully much of it was small. Of course as a mighty dragon I’d be able to keep hold of most of the tower! …Or so I thought. A huge chunk beneath me cracked and slipped away, and Karo disappeared beneath it.


    No! I shouted. I willed my mana to catch it instinctually, and… it worked. For the first time I managed to manipulate two elements at once. Wind swirled around the falling piece of the tower. I held my breath as I stabilized myself and the tower beneath me. The large debris that I’d caught was lifted up to the tower and molded back into place. Karo looked up at me, I sighed in relief. She wasn’t hurt.


    Proudly I flew down to her in the square after I knit the tower back together. Fatigue and loss of mana was fogging up my mind, but I wanted to hear the inevitable praise I knew I deserved. “What in the hell were you doing? You destroyed the tower and almost got people hurt! Why were you lazing off up there? We have so much work to do and you’re breaking things? Plus you almost damaged things we already finished!” Karo slapped at my shoulder, it barely stung, but it was extremely shocking. I’d never been struck by a human before. She looked distressed, something heavy and sad started filling my chest.


    Dejected, Master’s mind echoed. Yes, I felt dejected. I lowered my head, it wasn’t as though I meant to destroy the tower. I was just tired and wanted to take a break, and there wasn’t anywhere else in this growing camp that was comfortable. There were too many humans about who disturbed me. And if I left camp I wouldn’t be close if Master needed me.


    A warmth embraced me, Karo was hugging me as she said, “I’m sorry, that scared me. I was worried, please be careful.”


    The heaviness in my chest lifted. Yes, this human. I like this one too.