Time seem to passed in a blur as she live her new dragon life. Seeing dragons everyday, learning their powers and abilities, exploring the coves and discovering new things, never cease to amaze her.
From what she seen so far, Nine-Tailed dragons seem to be both the stealth and attack type, their weight and height posing no hassle to cleverly hide themselves amongst any terrain. They can breath black fire, use their tails as extra limbs, and even blend through the shadows and their surroundings at will.
A jack-of-all-trades. A perfect apex predator.
They have also superb night vision and extreme loathing from being wet. Unfortunately, the last seems hereditary. She only discovered this when Mother brought her out of the cave for the first time since she hatched, ushering her to the other hatchlings below. It strangely reminded her of a human mother saying 'go make friends' to their child before dumping them in the playground.
She wisely chose to stick close to other slender, small dragons like her. The bigger, bulkier ones are more stronger and reckless in their roughhousing. Though give and take few more years and she'll be the one roughhousing them.
But she soon learned that hatchlings approximately the same age as her can't seem to form a thought, let alone a proper sentence, so she was soon resigned to her lonely fate. It wasn't too bad. She took long naps under a shade of a tall tree with particular violet pear fruit, cooling off as the baby dragons run amok around her. She was slowly getting used to the loud, squawking and tittering noises they make.
She didn't know how it happened, didn't care enough to know, but she was rudely woken up with ice-cold water splashing her tails.
The feeling was hundred times unpleasant than what she remembered as a human, probably because she now hates water. And her senses are hundred times sharper.
She unintentionally hissed at the red dragon who was at fault, all her tails rising in provocation as she bared her teeth in anger. She doubt it was intimidating (her teeth are all but two inches at most), but it seem to scared the red dragon enough, who let out a few noises vibrating from their thin, scaly throat as it lowered it's head to the ground completely, showing their neck.
It was a display of complete submission.
The other dragons stopped with their movements, freezing completely as their body languages became guarded and wary as they eyed the two of them. It was unnerving. They were waiting, she realized. For what, exactly?
She didn't know what it was—instinct, maybe—but her anger soon faded, logically finding it ridiculous to be so mad over something insignificant, and instinctively let out noises in response to the poor cowering dragon.
Which, she later know was actually purring, with embarrassment.
Still, it considerably relaxed the red dragon, who finally lifted their head before jumping back to it's earlier enthusiasm, even nuzzling her neck playfully before running off. The earlier wary dragons also get back to do their own things like nothing just happened.
The tense atmosphere vanished just as fast as it came.
After a moment, she let out a tired huff before slinking back to her little isolated corner, curling onto herself as she returned from dreamland.
It was a bit tiring, being a dragon with it's hierarchy.
꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡
After observing all kinds of dragon species everyday, she have come to learn that not all dragons are gentle with parenting and some are especially lacking in logic and coherence. Some unknowingly ate their child (sometimes plural), some tossed them off the nest just seconds after they hatched, and some even accidentally stomped or suffocated them to death. She was lucky in terms of scoring an intelligent, caring mother.
All of the dragons seem to have some of their own respective quirky dislikes.
The white, long-neck hordes with red eyes in the mist—which were popularly known as Deadly Vapors—abhorred being in the direct sun, often seen lounging in the peaks of caves or large trees. The armadillos with antennae similarly hate being wet. A particular bright yellow dragons with blue spots have passionate dislike for coldness and aloe vera.
Each dragons have all kinds of abilities depending on what kind of animal they were similar to. Nine-Tailed dragons, for example, seem to be a contrasting mix of a cat, snake, chameleon and eagle. They inherited the characteristic of the predatory instinct and sharpness of an eagle, the night vision and senses of a cat and the dexterity and versatile nature of a snake. And of course, the blending to their surroundings part; chameleon.
It made them the perfect predator in the shadows.
"H-Hello! I-I am called Four-Tails!"
She stared at the stuttering dragon. It reminded her of a nervous young teenager being interviewed for the first time.
"Okay," she nodded.
"T-T-Today we are going out!" He declared loudly "...if you want to, o-of course." He added rather meekly at the end.
"Okay," she nodded again. "Where?" It was early in the morning. Mother and the others have gone out with some other dragons from neighboring caves to hunt, so only a sparse few remained. It looks like they won't be back after a while.
"M-Mother said that I have to teach you how to fly, s-so we should go to the lower slopes. Even i-if you fall, the snow will cover for your landing."
Four-Tails seem to wait for her reaction, but she only nodded again, and he seem to sigh in relief. For what, she didn't know. He seem to also call Mother 'Mother' as well, so she assume they're closely related, even if he has less tails and fewer spikes. And also shorter talons.
They traveled down to the 'lower slopes' of the mountain slowly, she was still adapting to the small body of a dragon, but she could guess she's doing a lot better compared to the other dragon hatchlings her age. They couldn't even think yet, never mind attempt to walk or fly. Maybe the Nine-Tailed dragons are just different in teaching their young ones.
She could run and jump agilely now on four legs, though her wings could use a little more work. And the blending to the surroundings part. She still couldn't managed to figure that out even when repeatedly observing all the other older dragons doing it for months now. One second they're there, then the next they're gone. Impressively silent and quick. She resolves to learn it as soon as she learned how to fly these damn uncooperative wings.
She couldn't speak for other species of dragons, but the Nine-Tailed dragons seem to have an abnormal amount of body heat that renders the biting cold of winter practically useless against them. The only exception she felt so cold is that time where she hatched, in that case she was still acclimating and developing her body properly.
As she followed Four-Tails, she noticed an unusual quantity of beautiful gleaming gemstones on their way. It sparkles so much that it almost hurts to look at, even without the sun's light shining on them. She guess nobody really cares for these stones, because they're dragons. It's just worthless stones to them. They couldn't very well mined a few and trade them off to the market now, would they?
"W-We're here," she heard Four-Tails announced.