After saving the empire from severe mana deprivation, Dawn left right after Ellis to help organize the 'Goodbye' ceremony and restock her aura-related materials leaving a bored dragon alone in the bland room of the castle.
Emilia was desperately trying to find something to do as she had already checked her new yellow birthmarks that ran across her body, "There are yellow spirals on my wings.. Does this tattoo stuff have any utility? I feel like they mean something but i don't understand what. Even my tail is covered with them.. Besides this, now i know how Chronos was born and that she has a brother and sister! If that is anything useful.. But technically she doesn't have any biological parent since she was born out of time, so how does that work..?" Emilia's thoughts about her last experience were driving her mad, how could someone be born out of time? Rubbing her head with her paws she laid down on the cold ground to think more about this situation, "If they were stronger than Chronos and i used her as a scale of power, i'm screwed. A single Chrono is enough to blow up this universe instantly, what about two stronger Chronos? I'm doomed.. Well, at least it is safe to assume they are not here, right?"
While in thought eventually Emilia's eyes caught a glimpse at the corner of the room and remembered the mug filled with the mystic waters of time, just looking at the mug made Emilia enter a trance-like state and her heart flame was stimulated. Emilia could almost hear it, telling her to approach "..Now becoming the strongest isn't only an objective, it's a need for my safety.. So i should take some risks." Emilia said as she got up and walked towards the mug with bee stickers, "Besides Chrono i also have to deal with a weird looking furry i met in the time dimension." Once Emilia was right in front of the mug, she extended her paw and made it levitate up her claws, she clenched it and the mug seemed incredibly resistant.. Too resistant. The temptation was huge, Emilia lifted the mug to her mouth and drank everything in one go, the taste of this water was sweet like a soft drink though it was a little vicious.
Emilia licked the corner of her mouth, "That tasted oddly good.." Emilia started to feel a sharp pain in her chest as her heart flame was shrinking and expanding continuously, each time the flame was increasing in quality, "Hh.." The pain was continuously increasing with each passing second, Emilia frowned as she gritted her sharp teeth.
But that pain did not last longer than 20 seconds, and her heart flame quality was 7 times better than it was before, "..Just that? I expected more, like a whole transformation but- Oh." Emilia looked at her yellow markings, and they started to shine as Emilia began to feel weird, she could feel every beat her dragon heart took, the mana flowing and moving inside of her, "Oh wait- This is terrifying, i can now manually control my heart? It's just like breathing." Emilia accelerated her heart beating and deaccelerated it as she wished until she felt a sharp pain in her chest again, "Ah- Okay oof, I'm not doing that ever again." Emilia took a deep breath to calm herself.
Besides almost jokingly having a heart attack, she noticed that the yellow patterns on her paw started to absorb and refine mana Emilia also noticed that she could control the rate of absorption and if she could absorb besides which part of her markings can absorb mana and which not. "Alright, now what creeps me is that i could accidentally stop my heart from beating if i think too much about it." Emilia sighed, "Besides, the mana that i am refining is forming a sphere next to where the portal to the origin of time is, the time element also seems to be influencing mana to be in that way. Am i stock pilling mana?" Emilia began to think about the Body strengthening stage but she quickly shook her head.
"I'm getting sidetracked, i have to first get rid of that annoying thing that is watching me! This is also a good way to see my new limit!" Emilia circulated the time element throughout her body and everything began to slow down as Emilia's body began to strengthen and her perception to sublimate, then she circulated it again and again until 100 cycles were complete, Emilia looked behind her and saw the same eye as before, "There you are a stalker!" Emilia reached with her claw grabbed the eye and crushed it, weird fluids leaked from the eye onto her claws as time slowly went back to normal, Emilia didn't feel as drained as before, and although her mana capacity had not increased, her efficiency in how much she uses has.
"Now, back to doing nothing, yay!" Emilia fell back to the ground and rolled around while she tried to figure out something to do, "My body needs to stockpile mana and prepare for the next stage, so all i need to do is gather enough mana." Emilia's entire body began to glow yellow as she started to absorb a minuscule amount of mana per minute, "..Just to make sure the city doesn't run out of mana.." Emilia smiled as she walked to the window, jumped and stood there watching below, she looked at the dragonfolk flying here and there, people talking and buying stuff, some walked with armor and objects that resonated with mana, a few people with black cloaks were hiding in the alleys. "This place is so alive, trouble is brewing everywhere and the 'protagonists' are being oblivious as always. Such a lively city that i never got to interact with because of how i look like now." Emilia suddenly thought something, "Maybe if I learn how to metamorphose. Can dragons in this world even do that?"
"..I've been talking to myself a lot recently, am i feeling lonely?" Emilia looked back and brought her to-do list with telekinesis and began to write, "Find proper paper and pencil, a canvas will do too." Emilia jumped back from the window to her room and walked towards the door, and with a thought it opened, "I will explore this whole castle, maybe I can find some hidden treasures that I can borrow, and find out why this castle has the effect of 'ignoration' to outsiders, might be a good way to pass time." Emilia walked through the corridor that was illuminated with torches until she reached a spiral stair.
...
A few hours had passed once again, Dawn had walked out of the emperor's palace with a smile and was searching for the aura guild, "For an emperor, Ellis is really on command, but oh well this 'empire' is more a theocracy than anything and he is only an emperor because religions say that there must be one. Hey!" Dawn stopped a dragonfolk carrying over some crates to a store and asked, "Where is the aura guild?"
"Downstreet next to the adventure guild."
"Thanks!" Dawn walked further down that separated into two paths, "Now which downstreet-" Dawn glared further into the distance as she noticed something changing and appearing in the distance. It was a castle? Just as she was looking at the castle, a burst of white light nearly blinded her, she covered her eyes with her arms and looked at it again, a castle in perfect condition could be seen in the distance.
Dawn rubbed her eyes and frowned when she saw a very familiar castle, after all, it was the one she was staying in. "I'm already feeling a headache.."