"Tales of the Skycloud: Vol 1."

  "In a land both pleasant and sweet, a dragon, once so little, lived free. Unburdened by the whims and joys of life, the dragon reigned above the laws of the real world beyond the dream."

  "With his power alone, those of the dream feared the boundary keeping their world and the one of tangible substances from bleeding together into a chaotic mess was only held strong by the whims of the nightmarish dragon choosing not to break it."

  "Despite the dream denizens' well-placed concern of him causing another calamity to befall the mortal realm by entering it himself, the dragon found no meaning in breaking out into that world again, which he'd only seen through the disjointed reconstructions created by those falling asleep in recent years."

  "But one day, the Little Lady reappeared, and with her the Skycloud Dragon."

  "The Stigmai of Nightmares desired to retu... The Nightmare Dragon is the what!!!" Lizu blurted out in nothing short of awe-struck befuddlement, almost feeling another excitement at the reveal to jump clear of her bed and reach the ceiling, had she not herself in the perfect bed position: that being with Inkaro wrapped in her tail, Enetha lying on top of her, a Morilore in each of her arms, and a jar of G.Galore-coloured honey on the nightstand. Lying comfortably on her bed in her nightwear worthy onesie, Lizu continued to scour and savour every letter bound to the book's paper, utterly enthralled to no end that Inkaro went out of his way to get her something she was invested in, even if G.Galore/Morilore acted as a middleman for it to happen. She was sure she wasn't too hung up on the small details of the whos and hows, but decided to focus on something else: "What do you think of that, Enetha? ...Enetha?"

  Wrapped up like a newborn in a loving blanket by the dragolyte's tail, Inkaro led perpendicular to how all the girls were, in exclusive part to the affectionate hold Lizu had on him, whilst he pondered over how to deliver a certain piece of important news to his entrapper.

  "Lizu, I don't believe Enetha is at the luxury of listening to the story anymore,"

  "Huh?" Lizu mumbled softly, allowing Inkaro's words to bring her back to reality, as she raised the Tales of the Skycloud hardback off her chest. To her unexpectant surprise, Lizu was greeted by the silently snoring face of Enetha, who had her cheeks smushed and squished against Lizu's chest. The sight made Enetha have an extra cherubic baby face. "She really is closer to a kid, isn't she?"

  Although it went unseen by Lizu as the girl lowered her book back in front of her face, Enetha weakly smiled, brought about by her subconscious heeding Lizu's words that allowed her ease up and relax her body somewhat. But even if the little princess's slight change in body language wasn't much compared to a normal person, it was significantly more than anything she'd allow herself to indulge in while being anywhere remotely close to a conscious mental state. Lizu found the way Enetha's cloth-like appendages flopped especially endearing.

  "Say, Inkaro, what was that idea you had for helping Anazenpha? If you don't mind spoiling the reveal for little ol' me?" Lizu said playfully, her question stoked out of her as she felt Inkaro slipping out of her taily grasp somehow, which she thought should have been impossible. For the immediate instance after he escaped, Lizu didn't think much of it, having expected Inkaro to teleport his way out.

  However, the newfound pitter-patter of smaller hands against the cool scales of her tail, distinctly different from Enetha's, was a type of touch that was hardly foreign in her mind. It made her wonder, why was it so familiar?

  Then, it hit her.

  Lizu went still, overwhelmed by an overbearing mental shackle when her brain recalled where she'd felt those hands before. She couldn't will herself to believe it, not from denial, but because she wasn't sure if she'd be able to restrain herself if it were true. Just the thought alone had her heart pumping so fast it almost resembled a singular, droning note. Sadly for her heart, which she knew wouldn't survive if her mental machinations were true, Lizu anxiously peered around the side of her book.

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  With pupils narrowing into ovals, her breath stalled at the glorious sight presented to her every sense: a kid form Inkaro.

  From the smell he emitted to the sound of his breath, even his cheeks had returned to their original and gratifyingly pinchable state of yesteryears; everything about Inkaro's current state was just how she remembered him, a perfect blast from the past, made all the more appeasing as she watched him tumble off the bed. From how the dragolyte's horns crackled with ionised lightning and the equally ionised embers peetering out of her nose, one thing was clear: she wanted to baby Inkaro.

  "You're lucky I don't want to wake Enetha, otherwise you would've been pounced on by now...," Lizu grumbled, frustrated to no end as she swiped the tip of her tail at the boy-turned teen, which was made abundantly fruitless by Inkaro being a hair's breadth out of the dragolyte's reach. But that fruitlessness didn't perturb her from continuing to swish her tail at Inkaro, that was, until something occurred to Lizu: "Wait, why are you a kid in the first place anyway?"

  Inkaro shrugged his shoulders dismissively at his body's state. Crossing the bedroom towards his workstations, the simple movements he made caused his very loose clothing to slip even further down his body. By the time he'd reach his destination, he was ultimately cladded in only his black long-sleeved shirt, which the long arms of left to be limply dragged across the floor as Inkaro's lost clothes were left scattered across the floor in the form of a trail.

  "The curse from taking the book, I surmise, I figured it would've activated once I fell asleep," Inkaro stated indifferently, not finding his current physical constitution all that shocking, knowing it was bound to happen from the cryptic words he'd received from the librarian within the basement's ever-changing dungeon.

  From what she heard the guy say, Lizu put two-and-two together, to which she couldn't keep herself from giggling, thoroughly entertained at the prospect Inkaro thought getting a book for her was worth getting turned back into a kid. "I bet the one who cursed you realised that wouldn't happen until three days from now, so bit the bullet and prematurely applied it to you. Now I suppose I should call Hinosa so she can deal with that curse, shouldn't I?"

  After multiple failed attempts to grab his tools from the table before giving up and slumping his head, Inkaro turned to address the hidden meaning behind the last part of Lizu's remark: "If you want me to remain like this, I'll work on... hmm, would a tapestry or curio be the best choice for an age-modifying device?"

  "Yippee." Lizu happily clapped her hands; well, doing the motion of so, not wishing to startle Enetha awake by doing something as mean as causing a loud slapping noise right over her head. Lightly sighing, Inkaro peered at Lizu for a brief moment before placing a hand on his chest. He closed his eyes, focusing on the beating of his heart: it was unchanged from its resting rate.

  "Truly peculiar." Muttering under his breath, Inkaro let his hand drop back to his side as he found his heart's refusal to be stirred in the slightest unsuprising.

  At first, the guy had considered whether having his body reset, in a sense, would've given him the thing Lizu expressed on the regular. But on a logical deduction of his flawed reasoning, that being he was reversed, not reset, Inkaro figured it was rather silly of a thought to begin with. It was him, after all.

  "Is something wrong? Inkaro?" Lizu spoke with a somewhat concerned tone as her pupils' intensity softened back into circles. She was left somewhat struggling, unable to decide whether Inkaro was upset about something or not, from her having to readjust and calibrate her facial cue chart for Inkaro, made even tougher from the angle she forced herself into so Enetha's sleep wouldn't be disturbed.

  Lizu's words snapped the guy away from his mental mulling. Inkaro shook his head, swiftly dispelling whatever thoughts he might've had before addressing Lizu once again: "No, I was just thinking if I should make the de-ageing magic tool also shrink and grow clothes, or would that be too taxing on the clothes?"

  "Remember that article I showed you about that clothes shipping accident?" Lizu stated smugly, glad she recalled something from months ago that would aid her in the present, that being a good enough excuse to keep Inkaro from getting size-appropriate clothes so she could keep seeing the oversized clothes on his child form.

  "Fair enough," Inkaro stated, already knowing what Lizu was up to and deciding Anazenpha's assistance tool was a bigger priority anyway. So with that, the guy resumed his attempts to climb onto any of his workstations, only to be thwarted by every single one, ultimately leading him to call on the help of a third Morilore to lift him up enough to reach the tools he needed.

  "Wouldn't it be faster for me to get the things, Father?"

  "I'm doing this now so Lizu won't ask you to carry me in the near future."

  "Ah, how forward thinking for you, Father."