Tsukimaru's Cave

I had slept for many years, bound by that despicable wall. Forced to be pinned on the wall, one eye in darkness while the other had to perpetually stare at a steadily growing stalagmite...or was it a stalactite? Bah! It mattered not at all. What DID matter, was that this large cone descended from the ceiling ever so slowly, and caused me great disparity over the coming years since my dark entombment. Oh how I wish to fillet that retched High Priestess and those seven harlots. If granted that the Devines or the Abyss grants me freedom, I will kill each and every one of those who placed me in this sad state. Bleh! I was at least once able to see the damn entrance to the Cave, but now these stalag-stalaci--THAT THING, has been blocking my view for gosh, I don't know how many ages! There are days that I think of enemies whom I've both conquered and let slip from my grasp, and then there were days I didn't think at all. It was a rather pious life of boredom and having to blankly stare at what would have been my exit if I was not a painting. I could not help but contain my rage, I mean... could anyone with a straight face say that they could forgive the 8 priestess's that bound me to a wall with several sutra talismans, having to stare at that antagonizing view of the cave mouth, well, now at this large cave spike hanging over my vision... I guess it's better than having to stare at the mouth... but still, being forced into this immobile, unflinching purgatory rather than being killed... this was a Hell.

It was a boring and mind numbing existence. I would have really preferred death over this any day. Like I said, I wished the painful deaths of each of those 8 venomous serpents every time I would start thinking of such dark matters.

There was a noise which echoed through the cave, and my first thoughts were of the cave wolves whom had called this place there home about eleven years after I had been entrapped, they were pleasant company, and I watched many a line of their kind grow up in these caves for about fifty years or so. Then my mind went to the negative, that of the horrible cave hermit who lived here for about 30 years before he died in one corner of the cave, and watched as he mummified and eventually become scattered bones as animals and deranged humans would come in and remove some of his limbs. Eventually, nothing was left, or I presumed. Despite all these centuries however, none had dared remove my talismans. Oh, I wished one had, but again... wishful thinking.

It was then the noise returned, and though my ears had been not too kind to me over the years of my imprisonment, it was not hard to miss the sound of human footsteps. They were light, and yet each heel had clicked against the ground as they seemed to get closer and closer. I was both distressed and pleased that I could not see the intruder, I was distressed by this sickening feeling of having to listen to the human approach, to probably look upon my face only to be frightened and run away, thus, not to mention, having that built up tension as they would approach me. Hope was a dangerous thing, for 'hoping' that the human would remove the seal would finally set me free, but I've tried my best over the years to abandon hope, especially since I've been here for Gods know how long. But I was also pleased: I had not had a proper visitor in ages.

But as soon as I thought about my latest visitor, the footsteps stop. This causes my spirits to sink, and I sigh inwardly. I have thought about the past so long, I'd lost track of the present and they had slipped out of sigh-

"What's this?" Came the curious female human's voice. It sounded young, and naive. Surely this was hope again, manifested to taunt me further, like those damn Priestess's from the past. "Woah... awesome Dragon. I wonder if this is some sort of tapestry." came her voice again, but I ignored it. I knew better, as I had not had a decent string of luck since I had conquered half of Beijio. This was a ungodly trick. "Huh...what's this? Some sort of Card?" And before I knew what had happened, I could feel things happening. Feel. What...was this what 'feeling' was like? Gods, I could feel! Wait-yes! I could blink, I could FINALLY MOVE MY EYE! I was able to look around, my surroundings looking much the same as they had when I had been imprisoned here, oh my body, my body was returning to me!

Then, an eruption of seven flames, one red, one green, one blue, one yellow, one purple, one white and one black flew up and spiraled with Beijionese script as the 8 seals were broken!

As I moved muscles I haven't moved in ages, I slipped from the wall, becoming a magically imbued embossement that waved and slowly exits the wall. Ah! How it feels to be fully removed from the wall at long last! How it feels to feel at all again! Joy is an expression which does not compare to how I feel at this moment!

As I stretch my fifty foot long frame I stretch my body and shake my black hair and scales before expelling a loud roar of freedom; letting air roll through my lungs. It took me a moment to realize I had four eyes again, and the other three wink open, blinking, turning to my savior.

The poor silver haired girl wavered and looked absolutely frightened as she looked upon me; huddled with her back against the wall, a black card held tightly in her right hand. Shaking like a frail leaf she was! I was saddened a little, but in my excitement and my years sealed to a wall I've completely forgotten how frightening I was! Oh how good it felt to be in the open air again! How good it felt to feel again!

I looked into her eyes, and was ready to give her a horde of gold and riches I had obtained and stored away when I was overcome with a new but bitter sweet feeling. This feeling had returned when I brought my head down to the young woman, a teenager blossoming into adulthood, when the womans scent wafted through my nostrils. The scent of fear, of human fear and confusion. Not only that, but she had a scent that made my mouth well up with water, and the feeling of a pain in my lower chest made me remember another memory. The taste of human meat.

Despite being my savior, and against my initial hesitations, my hunger got the best of me. Her large blue eyes widened, she knew what I was about to do, no doubt from the saliva dripping from my maw. I raise my head, and for a moment I truly felt bad for the young woman, and then I descend. My jaws are filled with the young woman's body, her scream piercing and painful, but it was worth it. I raise my head as soon as my tongue wrapped around her slender, kicking frame, jerking and letting go of her as I snapped my head back. She tasted sweet upon my tongue, but she was so slender and had squirmed so much (as well as the fact that I couldn't hold myself, can you blame me for being hungry?), she was almost down my throat within the first jerk back! I curled my forked tongue around her left boot and with one pushing manipulation coupled with my wide open jaws pointed at the ceiling she was sent into the abyss of my gaping throat.

As I hear her screams dip into my echoing throat, I closed my mouth and my four eyes. With a feeling of pressure building in my throat, I lean my head back and let both gravity and my throat muscles take over, and I swallow the silver haired, and tasty, beauty whole. She wiggled like a fish (how I missed those too!) all the way down my long snaking body, her bulge traveling down and then settling at my core where she hung and bounced. I lick my jaws, wishing I had not swallowed the lass whole, for I had forgotten to tenderize her a little with my teeth... but either way, she was quite the snack after whatever amount of years it's been since I was gone.

As I scratch my underbelly where the woman would slowly digest and give me the nutrients I needed, I let out a small belch involuntarily brought on by the woman splashing in my stomach. I turn towards the mouth of the cave, sustained (if not for only a little while longer), and ready to finally exit this hell hole I begin to make my journey out.

My sagging belly swayed and I could barely hear the girls whimpers as I make it towards the light of day... but something causes me to stop. I grunt, feeling a tad conflicted, now that I had my freedom... I feel terrible for eating the naive teen, I could have given her a better or cleaner death. Or that reward. As I stood there, feeling a tad sorry for the girl I felt more than the pain of guilt hit my heart and gut. I felt like...like my body was churning, turning inwards as my superior vision diminishes and I let out a strangled painful roar, my body falling limp before I black out fully.

There is a moment where we both melded as one, and there was a clarity...then there was nothing.

Trickling of water stirred me. I feel a strange sensation as my vision returns, I blink, then shake my head. As I turn to roll back on my legs, I see that my claws were no longer claws... but they were hands. My eyes widen, and I feel a strange sensation in my legs as I look into the pool of water where the water had been trickling down from the ceiling and see my reflection.
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The silver haired girl felt her face, and noticed she was still alive. She had been swallowed, but she was now alive again. She gasped, feeling a pain in her stomach as she stands, weak in the knees as she hastily leaves. Outside the cave she is met with a painful experience which cripples her, causing her to fall onto her knees before the Beijionese desert. She felt her body churning and being swallowed, and then as she blacked out her body became a square shaped light, before the black card she had found dropped to the ground.

Soon after the dragon's form appeared, and shaped and formed, the card disappearing as soon as the Dragon Materialized. It took a second run by the Spirit Card to now successfully meld the two minds, body and form together as one, and after a couple hours of laying in a ball, the Dragon stirred.

As one form, both were one entity. They had, through a course of wills that are confusing for the average human mind to comprehend, sorted each other out. The Dragon Tsukimaru, now realized what powers it had obtained. It can now at will, change into the form of an appealing young woman, while at the same time retain their primal needs. The dragon believed that this was an additional curse brought on by that Old High Priestess and her band of seven harlots, with the exception that it had backfired. Now, she-it could go around and terrorize the countryside like it had once before-while at the same time can become a human if things got too tight. Tsukimaru had no clue what was to be in store transforming into a human yet, with the exception of better appeal by humans no doubt, but she-no "it" had to take flight as a dragon a while longer. After 'becoming one', the dragon had hunger return to h-"it's" stomach.

Why did it keep registering itself as a female? As a beast from the dark planes, it had no gender. Was this because of the woman within their mind? Well, it found this confusing, even for themselves. It had never acknowledged itself as a female... then again, a male for that matter either. They guess, considering the circumstances...it had become a woman when "she" became a part of her. This... new yet familiar feeling of being something "new" excited "her", and Tsukimaru, no longer wanting to confuse itself any further referred to itself as 'her' and 'she' from now on.

The dragon Tsukimaru, now finished with her mental struggles to determine her own existence, took flight to seek out food. Boy... did she need something to eat more than ever. Becoming a new creature, becoming a woman and all at once made her famished. After that... she would think of what she should do from there on.