Omen: 6, 8

“So you didn’t forget my payment,” Adam said, confident now that he had survived the night.

“There were other matters to attend to last night,” the Elder said, raising his brows. “I apologise for taking so long.”

“It’s alright,” Adam looked at all the scrolls in front of him. “Eleven scrolls? Oho! What’s this?” Adam gasped, staring down at the last spell scroll. “A Second Gate spell scroll? You shouldn’t have.”

“These were the spells we were willing to part with.”

Spell Scrolls Obtains: Alarm, Chromatic Orb, Create or Destroy Water, Detect Magic, Detect Poison and Disease, Expeditious Retreat, Feather Fall, Goodberry, Hunter's Mark, Inflict Wounds, Find Steed

“Sweet,” Adam rubbed his hands along the scrolls. “They’re all so wonderful.”

“I will leave you to your business then,” the Elder said, leaving as quickly as he had come.

“If you are unlucky today, what are you going to do?” the woman asked.

“I don’t know,” Adam admitted. “I might just kick it for a few days. Last night almost gave me a heart attack.”

“It’s a good thing Lanarot protected you,” Sonarot said.

“She almost got me killed. I hid behind her and Elder Gold almost cut me down right there.”

“You did imply that she was your shield.”

“It was her cuteness which shielded me, why can’t anyone understand that?” Adam clicked his teeth.

Sonarot stared at him. “Adam, you joke too much.” She brushed his hair. “Even if you love her dearly, you must be careful. People may believe you to be worthless if you cannot contain yourself.”

Adam took the warning to heart, but he picked up his sister and hugged her tight. “If I don’t shower her with my affection and I end up dying again, I’ll just end up regretting it.”

“Then do not die,” Sonarot said, simply.

Adam rolled his eyes. “Right, because that’s so easy.”

“I have not yet died,” she said.

“I have died twice.”

She nodded her head slowly. “You should take good care of her, but there are also other children in the Iyr. You also do not have any other friends your age.”

“That’s because they’ve all run away to adventure. Even Amokan and Timojin have abandoned me.”

“They have gone to adventure so they may become Unrivalled Under The Heavens.”

Adam winced. “This isn’t that kind of fantasy world. I shouldn’t have introduced that into the world. Still, why did they choose such an impossible task?”

“Is it impossible for them?” Sonarot asked.

“I’ve already stated that I will become Unrivalled Under The Heavens, right?”

“Can they not take that title from you?” she asked.

Adam smirked. “I did beat them both by myself.”

Sonarot’s lips twitched into a smile.

Adam spent the end of the month playing with the children and the cubs in the morning, then going out to help Shikan chop down some wood in the afternoon, carrying them to the warehouse, and then relaxing in the evening.

Omen: 7, 11

“It is the last month of Duskval,” Sonarot said. “At the end of the month, the Duskval festival will begin. Jurot and the others should return then.”

Adam narrowed his eyes as he brushed his sister’s hair while she played with a long piece of fabric. “Once those traitors return, I’ll give them a piece of my mind.”

“During the festival, there will be a few fights. Our family already has two who are going to fight, but we need someone experienced as well. I would like it if you were to fight. Jurot would have done so, but since he was adventuring, I think you should do it.”

“Sure,” Adam replied.

“Are you going to enchant today?”

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“I don’t know. I need to enchant something at some point, but I don’t have anything to enchant. I should probably enchant a sword or a spear or something.”

“Not an axe?”

“I suppose I could enchant an axe,” Adam said. “I’d want it to be enchanted well, though, since it’s an axe.”

“Is there a need to enchant an axe well?”

“I can’t enchant an axe poorly if I’m a Nephew of the Rot family.”

Sonarot smiled. “Then let us pay a visit to the family vault.”

“The family vault?”

“There should be an axe for you to enchant in it,” she said, standing. “Come.”

“I can come too?”

“You are family, are you not?”

Adam flushed. “Oh, okay.” He stood, glancing aside as he carried Lanarot.

“I’ll enchant it with a great enchantment,” Adam said. “Now that I think about it, I need a new weapon after mine was… appropriated.”

She nodded her head. “You can ask Elder Zijin for the appropriate items. I believe you have enough money, considering how much you’ve enchanted, and how little you have spent.”

“I should have enough,” Adam said, nodding his head. “I was paid quite a hefty amount for that Giantslayer.”

“Let us leave Lanarot with another,” Sonarot said, taking her daughter before walking to another estate, handing her over to another Iyrman Adam didn’t recognise.

Lanarot stared at the woman for a moment, barely recognising her, before she was set down to play with all manner of toys with other children.

Sonarot led Adam away to one side, heading to a tunnel. They walked through a long network of caves, passing from one place to another. Adam wasn’t sure where they were headed, and he couldn’t keep track of it, mostly because he dared not to.

He noted the letters of the Iyr alphabet, and when they finally reached the R, she slipped to another tunnel marked O, and then finally the T.

There was a plain wall ahead, with forty slots. She placed a coin into a slot, before reaching another slot, doing so for ten slots. Adam glanced away, unsure if he should be watching.

“You do not have to look away,” Sonarot said.

“I don’t want to know the code.”

“Why not?”

“In case I’m ever kidnapped and tortured, or if someone takes my memories from me,” Adam said.

She smiled, shaking her head, before the wall shuddered and fell, revealing a large treasury, full of various pouches, weapons, half of which were axes, armour, and all sorts of other treasures, all illuminated by small gems which had sparked to life once the door had opened.

Adam noted the spellbooks, wondering if he’d be able to sneak a peak, and then noted all the furs and scales of various creatures. The entire area was huge, easily a hundred steps from side to side, and another fifty deep, and there was a doorway leading to another room.

“Damn,” Adam said. “You guys are rich.”

Sonarot made her way to a particular axe. The handle was longer than typical, and made of dark wood, with a heavy blade. She handed it to Adam, who grabbed it, feeling its heft, which filled him with confidence.

“It’s a big boy,” Adam said.

“It was given to my father when he was a boy,” Sonarot said. “He never used it, but he always wanted to. Let us ask his permission for you to use it.”

Adam slowly nodded his head. ‘Is this what she really wanted? For me to meet the extended family? No, she wouldn’t have had me come here first. Maybe she wanted me to feel as though I was really a part of the family?’

He followed Sonarot out, eventually realising that there was no point in thinking deeper. Sonarot was Sonarot, and whatever she thought was good for him, probably was so.

Sonarot led him away from the Iyr he knew, around back towards the heavy walls he had spied every so often when he had worked with the others. There was an Iyrman who was lazing around on the top of the wall.

“Sona, of the Rot family,” Sonarot said.

It was the first time Adam had heard an Iyrman speak that way.

The Iyrman looked down towards them. “Whose the Elf?”

“My Nephew,” she said.

“An Elf Nephew?” the Iyrman said, almost suspiciously.

“Unrivalled Under The Heavens,” she said.

“Oh!” the Iyrman said, glancing down towards Adam. “I see.”

Adam rubbed his forehead, shaking his head. ‘Seriously. I should stop pretending to be so cringe.’

They were then allowed to enter, and Sonarot led Adam through the large area. Adam noted that the area had widened, but he couldn’t tell if it was deeper. There were the same large estates as he expected, and a large number of Iyrmen about, mostly children, who all ran around as they pleased, with a handful of adults keeping an eye on them.

The ground of the area around the estates were stamped with various symbols, each the various tattoos of the families which lived in the estates. Adam noted how the symbols were the same for a few estates in a row, and there was only ever one on each stone.

Then they came across a familiar pattern, some twenty or thirty minutes from the wall. Adam whistled, staring at the estate. It was equally as imposing as the estate he was used to, but he noticed it was far livelier. There were probably twice as many families which lived in each estate than those from the other area.

“This is the Rot family estate,” Sonarot said, motioning her hand across at least five estates.

“This entire area?” Adam asked, noting there were probably many dozens of families living in the five estates.

“Aunty Sonarot,” children exclaimed as they rushed over at her, grabbing at her legs to hug her. They were mostly human, but there were a few Orcs and Devilkins about too.

Adam noted how many older Iyrmen were about here, and he realised how few old Iyrmen he saw in the other area. There were dozens of elderly Iyrmen here, each with the Rot family tattoo. However, very few of them held a similar intimidating presence he was used to.

Most Iyrmen here wore a necklace with a small gem at the end, something he rarely saw in the other section of the Iyr.

“I’ve come to see father,” Sonarot said.

“He’s watering the plants,” a helpful child said, pointing wildly towards the courtyard.

Sonarot led Adam, who was catching the eye of all the Rot family, from the children to the elderly, through the courtyard towards an older man. He was adorned in the typical Iyrman attire, with a long cloak over his shoulders. At his side was an axe, as one might expect of a Rot family members.

Sitting nearby was a young Iyrman, a Devilkin, eating a fruit. He stared at Adam as he approached.

“father, I’ve come to speak with you about a matter,” Sonarot said.

The old man turned, revealing the fact that he had only a single arm. He threw a look over to the Half Elf, before glancing back to Sonarot.

“I had heard you adopted a Half Elf into the family,” the man said, placing down the watering can. “My son has been missing for just over a year, and yet you are already so lonely?”

Sonarot raised her brows at him. ‘I should have expected him to cause trouble.’

"Oi, you old bastard,” Adam said, letting slip the curse accidentally. “What the hell are you saying to my Aunt?”