A Game Changer

——— Minho ———

"What do you exactly mean?" I inquired Mira after her cryptic talk about her illusions. 

"Heh, I intend it to be a surprise."

"Wouldn't it be better if I knew about it? So we can work on the strategies and stuff."

"No will do. Be honored that you will be the first one to experience the awakening of Minakong Ilennis-"

"Just hold it there, Mira. What's going on?"

"Fufu. Just do as I say. First of all, I need you to think about what can withstand the crunching jaws of that monster."

Well, I did give it a thought already although I wasn't sure how this could help us at this point. 

There was this book I read in my childhood - what child doesn't like dinosaurs? - that was about a bully Tyrannosaurs in a dinosaur village. The T-Rex was mean to everyone and everyone feared him. Nobody could stand up to him. But there was this one dinosaur who braved it one day, even defeating the T-Rex with one swift sweep of its tail, bringing peace to the dinosaur village. 

The foe that even the most fierce land predator avoided fighting was Ankylosaurus - a herbivore that had its body covered in bony plate armor called osteoderms, which had an additional layer of keratin on top of it. The total thickness of its armor was 5cm to 10cm but not only that, the keratin layer - which is the same material that our nails, rhino horns, and and bird beaks are made of - worked as shock absorption and deflection layer adding extra protection to the osteoderms that were already hard as hell to break.

As for the offense, it had a tail that had a massive wrecking-ball-like chunk of bone (again, also covered in keratin), effectively turning it into a 'tail club'. The size of this tail club was truly impressive, with the widest part of the club end being up to 60cm. 

Basically, the ankylosaurus was one of the few creatures that T-Rex didn't want to fight and posed a real lethal danger to it. 

"Well, Mira, I actually do have an idea… of such creature that Tyrannosaur might struggle with."

"Great. I could 'imagine' some kind of armor over you but there is no guarantee it could work. But if you already know something that 'works', it would make it possible for us to counter it."

"What good would it though if such armor is nothing but an illusion?"

"Sigh… could you just trust me once?"

Well, it's not like I had any other options. 

"Fine. The creature is called Ankylosaur. It's a dinosaur - the same type of monster as Tyrannosaur Rex but it's got armors that even a T-Rex would struggle to break, and has an offensive move that could even defeat it if the strike lands correctly."

"Brilliant!"

"So… what do you need from me to create the illusion of such a creature?"

"I need details of how it looks - and ideally, how it 'works'."

That made sense. Kinda hard to imagine something you have no mental image of. 

I picked up a small broken branch that was lying around and started to draw the shape of an Ankylosaur on the ground. 

"Oh, this looks great."

"Well, mind you. No human has actually 'seen' it. This is what we imagine they would have looked like based on the fossils and bones."

"Good enough for me. So it's got armor covering its entire back."

"Yes."

"How about the legs?"

"That is its weak spot. If T-Rex gets its bite on the legs then even Ankylo could be hurt."

"Fine. Then I will put the armor over it too."

I still wasn't sure completely that it would work, but if it could, then yes, that would make an even better Ankylosaur than the real one was. 

"That'll be nice, yes. Now listen carefully as I explain…"

I then explained the construction of Ankylosaur's armor - the bones and keratin, which was easy to explain as our nails and bird beaks were composed of keratin after all - and how it could attack using its tail. 

Mira listened very attentively, nodding her head and going mm-hm, mm-hm along the way. 

"Is this enough?"

"I think I got the gist of it. And now that I actually know exactly what the armor consists of, this is going to be one hell of a good illusion with the right physical properties."

"You keep talking about 'physical' impact when there can be none."

"Sigh… Minho. Just how dense could you be?"

"Eh? What am I missing?"

"You told me you could feel the monkey's tongue on your boobs."

"Yes."

"And I saw your boobs jiggle as they got touched."

"Embarrassingly, yes."

"Don't you see what that implies?"

"All I can think of is that having boobs is not for me, and getting them licked is not pleasant. At least when it's by a monkey."

"Look, place your hand on the ground."

"What for?"

"Just do as I say, Human."

I shrugged and placed one hand on the ground, palm facing down.

"Now, let me try to impose the illusion of that 'armor' on your hand."

With what I assumed to be a short recital of her spell in silence - that was a pretty neat trick that she could do this without needing to actually speak them out aloud like some other mage students did - an armor that looked like it could belong to a real Ankylo appeared on top of my head.

"Does this look like how it's supposed to look?"

"Yes, as good as I could possibly imagine."

"Now, take this!"

Without any further warning, Mira literally jumped on my head, which made me shriek but… 

"Did it hurt?" Mira asked with a grin on her face. 

"Actually… how… what the hell?"

"Why were you screaming?"

"I… thought it hurt - naturally. But how does it not hurt?"

"Fufufu. I don't know how it exactly works - but my illusion placed ON you seems to have physical properties."

I looked up to Mira who was brimming with confidence all over her face now. 

This… could really work now.