A cave in the Northern Mountains.

Jun chuckled. "Relax. All you gotta do is eat the plant. But that said, you might wanna just gently remove it. Your body needs to be low on mana for your first lesson to begin. If you don't eat the plant, your mana will still come back over time."

Jun is swept up in the dragon's overzealous arms. She did tense up for a second, afraid she would have to defend herself due to the dragon's mistrust. But instead, the dragon extended its gratitude for not squishing her.

Jun smiled and stretched out her arms to... just barely reach out and pat the dragon's shoulders.

"Aww... I know I'm perfect." She chuckled. Her armor prevented her from being turned into jelly by the dragon's embrace-

"... You can let go now I can feel my spine pressing against my spleen."

-mostly anyway.

Once she was free, she took a step back and rummaged through her things once again, in search of something pertinent. As she did so, she asked, "So in the hundred or so years you've been alive, have you ever stopped and wondered what makes you, you?"

---

Meanwhile, it had indeed not been lost on the bird that he could have attacked the dragon in that moment. But after working with Jun for many years, he had learned to accept that Jun was stubborn and always tried to make things go her way, whether it was in pursuit of power or, more recently, in pursuit of a more genuine form of benevolence. Her goals had changed and her character had improved (depending on your point of view), but her core had remained the same. Jun was not one to be dissuaded from her goal. If she was going to be merciful to the overgrown iguana, he would have no choice but to go along with her machinations.

Sometimes Blackbean missed the younger Jun, who probably would have tried to kill Clama on the spot. Ironically the current Jun was far more powerful, and yet disinclined to do so. Oh well.

He was still her best friend. And these adventures still provided a better lifestyle than hell ever could.

*Caw!*

"He says you're welcome, probably. He might actually be saying you owe him."

Blackbean did nothing to clarify the confusion and just started preening himself.

Jun pulled out yet another scroll. She unraveled it. This one, like the others, had a sigil drawn into it, characterized by concentric shapes around a focal point. The ink pulsed with a gentle cyan which bathed the beige parchment it was drawn on. Clama would sense a substantial amount of power radiating from it.

"So, Clama, tell me. If fire had a personality, what do you think it would be? And then, more importantly, do you think you could be friends with it?"

Jun blinks, noting that the creature seemed to deliberately dodge part of her question.

"Do you... know what friendship is?" She quirked an eyebrow curiously.

The parchment's soft glow remained steady as Jun brought it to her side, as if she was going to use it, but realized she would have to wait a bit.

Jun sighed. This is gonna be tougher than I thought.

"Ok. Let's try this. Imagine what your perfect friend would be like. Think about what their personality would be like, what kinds of interests they have... Oh! Maybe, what kind of dragon hoard they would have."

She started snapping her fingers and grinning excitedly as something came to mind.

"What kind of dragon hoard do you have? Different kinds of dragons like to collect different things. That says a lot about who and what they are. Some dragons love magical artifacts. Some like gold. Some like art work. And some like historical artifacts, like old scrolls and statues and stuff. I've heard rumors of dragons that count entire ancient temples as their hoards."

Yah, that's it. If I can figure out what kind of hoard this dragon keeps, maybe I can figure out what element to teach it.

"So yah, what would your perfect friend be like, and tell me what kind of hoard you have. It's important for you to have a better idea of what kind of person... er, dragon person, you are, if you want to learn my brand of magic."

Jun cocked her head curiously at the single gem, one of the smallest hoards she had ever seen on a dragon. The gears continued to rotate in her head. She analyzed every bit of information she had received.

With her strength, surely she could have obtained a much larger hoard if she was so inclined.
She seems to want a pet, a friend, something to nurture and protect.
She doesn't care about the size of her friend's hoard.
She can heal.
She thanked Blackbean for not attacking her.
She retrieved the scrolls.
She wants power so she can feel safe.

Jun blinked.

There is no... there's no way. You have got to be kidding me.

Her eyes shifted up to Clama. The incredulity of her hypothesis was well-hidden.

"You know, one way you could increase the size of your hoard is by helping others. Sometimes villagers need help dealing with a local monster, or flooding waters, or something like that. Sometimes a city needs criminals to be tracked down. Sometimes a powerful necromancer needs taking down. And if you're lucking you can get treasures in exchange. Basically, you could be a hero for hire. Does that sound like something that interests you?"

Jun smirked hopefully.

Jun chuckled. "Oh gee, it's too bad you can't do something about that like, you know, disguise yourself as a human or something."

She tossed the scroll up into the air.

WOOOSH!

The air split apart. Jun violently thrust her hands out to her sides. The scroll flared up over Jun's head and stood firm against some invisible wall. Sparkles. Sparkles erupted from the scroll and flooded the entire cave. Hundreds of lights dancing around, all golden and defiant, hundreds of tiny suns filled the cave with warmth and light, as if the stars of the night sky had been invited to grace the lonely mountain cave with their gallantry.

Jun gradually lowered her hands to her sides. Her eyes were now filled with a steely determination. Despite seemingly doing nothing, the little stars continued to dance around. If Clama could focus, she'd realize Jun was the epicenter of their myriad of orbits. Jun was the eye of a glittering storm.

"This is the element you're going to master. Light." She said calmly.

She raised a hand into the air, as if to reach out and touch the cave ceiling.

The golden lights stopped.

Then they started again, but this time they were drawn to an invisible spot upon which Jun transfixed her gaze. They rushed into the spot and coalesced into a long golden mass. It would be hard to decipher at first, but as the glare winded down and the light stabilized, Clama would see it was a construct of light. It looked like glowing quartz that had been carved into something.

It was a large sword.

Jun noticed that her light show had made quite an impression on the dragon. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite the impression she was going for.

"Oh, well, I mean, it's a pretty standard light construct. But you can make all kinds of things with light."

She quickly rummaged through her head for something a little less offensive. Perhaps Clama had a bad run-in with a sword user. Quick, think think think.

The light coalesced to a single blob. It was no longer a sword. The glittering, nebulous nothing then bubbled out on the tops and bottoms, forming appendages. These refined themselves into little claws, a tail, and horns.

Jun visibly strained as she struggled to concentrate. This shape was exceeding complex, even for her. Technically no human had ever managed to command more than five light constructs at once. Here she was bending the rules by instead making a single very complex construct. It took a few seconds, but with the mental dexterity of a clown forming a balloon giraffe, she finished.

It was a cute, adorable, baby dragon, about as opposite from a sword as you can get.

Jun lowered her head a bit. Her eyes shut and her brow furrowed down sadly. She could sense Clama's loneliness.

"Yes and no. A light construct is commanded by a small portion of my mind. It has a bit of me in it. But if I lose my concentration, it stops existing. The closest I can do to bringing it to life is let myself into it more, if that makes sense."

The dragon floated down to the ground, and carefully trotted over to Clama's feet, where it would give her leg a warm little hug with its short arms. Its tail would wag slightly like a dog's.

Jun smirked sympathetically as she looked up at Clama.