Cthulhu opened her eyes to an ocean around her. She listened to the waves surrounding her peacefully, cradling something on her chest. Something she never wanted to let go, but had to one day.
“This will be a difficult path for you to tread, my love, but I know you’ll be able to thrive,” she said to the thing on her chest. Her creation. “You’ll go through hardships, through pain, but you’ll persist. Just remember: never lose what makes you… you.”
She looked down at the ocean around her, before horror struck her. She was floating in an ocean of blood. Of sin. Of pain. She then looked at the bloody red hair still stuck to her body and the empty eyes of something she once loved more than anything. Someone.
Then the words that haunted her for longer than she could remember echoed in her ears.
“Why… why do they all hate me? Why would you do this to me… mother?”
She couldn’t stop the world-ending, despaired wail that ripped out of her throat, causing the fabric of the world itself to shatter.
***
Luna woke up with a shriek, the horrifying dream already leaving her, but the words still echoed.
“Why… Why mother?”
Bennett woke up with a start, immediately going to hold her as she covered her ears in an attempt to block the words, hyperventilating.
“Why… Why… Why…Why… Why-?”
“Hey, Luna, it’s alright. You’re okay. It’s just a dream, it doesn’t mean anything,” he muttered, louder than the words. She realized she had all her tentacles wrapped around him and she grabbed onto him, trying to use his heartbeat to drown out the words as they slowly faded away. “Everything… will be okay.”
It took a bit, but she slowed down her breathing, let her heart rate calm, but didn’t let go of him, and he didn’t let her go. She shivered in his grip, scared that if she let go, the voice would start again.
Eventually, she was able to calm down, but she refused to let go. He rubbed her messy hair, comforting her as she pressed her face against his chest.
Wh-what was that? W-why does it feel so familiar? That voice?
“Hey, are you okay?” Bennett whispered, still unwilling to let her go.
She nodded slightly, but tightened her tentacles a bit more. He let out a sigh before reaching over to turn on a bedside light.
“Man, it’s already 0540. Might as well get ready for breakfast. I’m gonna need some coffee anyways,” he mumbled. He then lifted her up and carried her out of the room into the still dark large room that served as a living room, kitchen, and dining area, along with a stand that seemed to be there for no reason in particular. He brought her to her room door and set her down.
“You can go take a bath; I’ll take a shower really quick and we’ll go down to breakfast, okay? We didn’t get to yesterday, anyways.”
After thinking about it for a few seconds, she nodded, still holding her. After yawning, he lifted her up differently, instead of having her sit on his arm, he just pulled her against him as if he were carrying a sleeping child and carried Luna to her room.
This is so… different. I feel like I’d normally be against it… but I’m okay… hopefully.
~~~
At around 0615, they were down to get breakfast in the nearly empty dining hall, where they chose their usual spots to eat and he mulled over what to eat, as he could see every dish there was to eat.
“Hm… I’d rather make something to eat instead,” he mumbled. “I wonder if there’s anywhere I can get ingredients…”
“The kitchens, dumbass,” a very familiar voice snapped. “Where else?”
Luna flinched, but, unlike what she expected, Bennett hardly reacted, instead just looking to his side with a displeased expression.
“You see, this is why I don’t want you to be my ‘teacher’,” Bennett said to Reah Justyce, who’d just quite literally appeared out of nowhere. “But thanks, I guess. Doesn’t help though.”
She glared at him. “This floor. North wing. It’s two big metal doors. Impossible to miss.”
She then swiped what looked like half a dozen strawberry tarts, leaving only four, before disappearing with a crack of lightning. Bennet frowned at this before shrugging.
“Want me to make you some food? I’ll just ask the staff there if I could have some stuff to cook with. And while I’m at it, I’ll make some for the others and sis.”
Luna, who’d only grabbed two lemon tarts, nodded and Bennett lifted her, grabbed a few more tarts, along with two cinnamon rolls, one of which he gave to Luna.
“Huh… I can make it better than this,” he muttered as they left.
They traveled through the expansive halls, eventually arriving to the north wing after passing quite a few armor stands that Luna could sense had many arrays of enchantments each, most used to animate them. They came across tall metal doors that Bennett stared at in wonder while she finished off the last tart he’d given her.
“Oh wow. They really are hard to miss,” he said, patting Luna on the head as she looked up at him.
I can smell things being cooked. The lunch foods? Why are they making them at six in the morning? Luna thought as Bennett walked over and opened the doors slightly, poking his head in.
“What the…”
As he opened the door Luna also couldn’t help but be slightly baffled as well. There were kitchen utensils floating all over the place, prepping items, cooking them, preparing them, gathering them, and more. And in the center of all of it sat a boy that had to be barely older than Luna looked, but Luna could tell he was at least four times Bennett’s age from a glance.
The boy opened an eye before letting out a sigh. “Just take what you need. Most of it’s in the back. Just try not to get cut. Don’t need to deal with the paperwork if you die here.”
Bennett was a bit confused, but just said, “Thanks…” before passing through the mess of utensils, holding Luna closer to him so as to not let her get cut. After dodging a few dozen steak knives (Why does he even need that many? Luna questioned), they made it to the area where all kinds of food items were stored, which had to stretch nearly twenty feet back in the wall.
“Huh. Now that’s interesting. Let’s just grab what we need… eggs, flour, sugar are just the basics…”
~~~
They returned to the dorms only with minor scratches and plenty of ingredients in bags. Bennett had even managed to grab an apron from somewhere and had set everything up quicker than Luna had been able to finish the last lemon tart.
From then on, Luna simply sat on the counter, watching him as she tried to understand what the dream from last night could have possibly meant. From everything she could remember Cthulhu had never had a daughter, since she knew they’d have to live up to the expectations of other Ancient Gods and Cthulhu herself, which is a fate she’d never wish upon any child of hers. But… something about it felt so familiar. The sea of blood… the dark red hair… something about it was both right and wrong.
Why? If I’d ever had a child, there’s no way I’d have ever forgotten about it… right?
As the smell of Bennett’s food wafted through the air, Luna heard a door open and she looked over to Jennifer, who looked a bit groggy.
“Wha… what’s going on?” she asked. “Is that… hash browns? Bacon and eggs?”
Not even a moment later, Tyreese’s door flew open with an explosion of sound, eliciting a shriek from Jennifer, who backed away quickly as Tyreese went past her and looked over Bennett’s shoulder as he cooked.
“Hell yeah! I didn’t know you could cook, man- OW!” Tyreese yelped as a spearbutt rocketed from Mia’s room and nailed him in the back of the head. Luna caught it before it hit the ground and looked over to Mia, who was glaring at Tyreese.
“Shut up already. You’re unnecessarily loud,” she snapped. “It’s not even seven in the morning.”
“Ow… seriously?! Bennett’s making us food, and you’re complaining about noise.” he retorted.
“If you’re done yelling, it wouldn’t hurt to help,” Bennett said, pushing a bowl over to Luna, who grabbed it. “Can you whisk this?”
Luna nodded and grabbed the whisk with her tentacle, doing what he’d asked.
Nearly twenty minutes later, everyone was dressed and, as Bennett had said his sister would, Yelena had barged into the room estatic and terrifying Jennifer yet again.
“I swear, you and Tyreese share the same brain cell sometimes,” Bennett muttered as he lifted Luna from the counter and looked at his sister, who was already in the dining area, competing with Tyreese to see who could set up the table faster. “Whatever, the food’s done.”
After a very fulfilling and noisy breakfast, it was almost time for classes, and it was as Luna was effectively power washing her plate that still had some syrup from the pancakes Bennett had made, along with scraps of hashbrown and egg, that her next class was also separate from Bennett’s, which she made known on the way there.
“Yeah, I know you’re uncomfortable without me around, but you’ll be okay, alright? I’m sure you’ll be perfectly entertained. Plus, you can probably help teach people who don’t really understand the concept of Healing, since you’re so good at it,” he reasoned as she held him with her tentacles, unwilling to let go. “I, however, need to get to my Mage class. I’m sure it will be pretty big, since a lot of people join just to become a Mage and earn prestige… not that I’m any different, let’s be honest here.”
Luna gave him an unimpressed look before letting out a frustrated sigh. Bennett patted her had. “Hey, look on the bright side, our next class is Combat, which should be fun… though the student I saw from Combat yesterday didn’t look so good…”
Suddenly a skeptical look appeared on his face as Yelena interjected. “Look, one of my teammates are also going to the Healing class! Wait, you two haven’t met anyone on my team except for Juli… But he’s hard to miss. Big guy, looks scary, but is really just a big ol’ softie. Juli doesn’t like him much, but she doesn’t like anybody, now does she?”
“‘Juli’ isn’t deaf, by the way,” said Abyssal muttered. “But go on ahead.”
Bennett frowned at her. “If you did, you’d at least make an attempt to be nice,” he said. “But, anyways, I’m sure you’ll be okay, like I said. Just try to… not smack people to prove a point, okay?”
She smacked him in the head jokingly. He gave her a flat look. “Now, that’s not a good sign. But hey, I still have this for you.”
He somehow pulled out four tarts from his pouch and she snatched one, shoving half of it into her mouth as she pressed herself closer to him.
Hm… I’ve gotten more comfortable around Bennett. When did that happen? She thought, chewing slowly. Eh. It’s fine. Hopefully, this body will be fine during the class.
As she finished her tart, she pulled the second one from his hand ready to put it in her mouth when she nearly coughed it out in surprise as Bennett turned the corner.
“Like I said, impossible to miss,” Yelena said, bounding forward.
Luna looked at Bennett to gauge his reaction to see a suspicious look on his face as he watched his sister. What type of reaction is that- oh yeah, he’s a pretty tall person too, so it’s probably not too off-putting as it is for a person like me.
In front of them was a… Minotour, which, to Luna, was the most baffling thing she could’ve ever seen in this world. He was taller than Bennett, by almost a foot, and was far girthier than Bennett could ever hope to be, his muscles looking like they were trying to push themselves off his body. His entire body was covered in short fur, but it didn’t stop him from trying to wear clothes to pass as… somewhat normal. Of course, the bull head didn’t really do a good job of passing as “normal” but it was a start.
As she watched, Yelena seemed to start twirling the white streak in her hair and Bennett groaned, earning him a strange look from the Minotour. Bennett simply waved his hand dismissively.
“Sorry, just a headache,” he said with a small smile.
“Ah.” The Minotour’s voice was deep and loud, startling Luna as she put her hand to Bennett’s head and sending a small amount of healing. “Oh. I would’ve offered Healing, but she seemed to already do it before I had a chance to offer it.”
This boy does not have a headache at all. What-?
“What gave it away?” Juli suddenly muttered from behind Bennett.
He looked at her strangely for a few moments, studying her displeased expression, before shrugging. “The way she’s twirling her hair. She only does that around people she’s nervous of making a bad impression on.”
“Huh. She did do that before. Whatever, I just don’t need that happening.”
“You think?” Bennett muttered, seeming a bit confused that Juli was actually being somewhat respectful.
“Hey, look at that, Bennett and Juli are actually getting along-” Yelena started.
“No we’re not,” both Bennett and Juli interrupted, before looking at one another strangely.
“She was clearly about to say something that was either rude or completely unnecessary,” Bennett explained.
Juli’s eyelid twitched. “What the hell even gave you that idea? I was not.”
“Really? Cause you always say something that’s either of those.”
“Just because I dislike you does not mean-”
“What did I even do for you to dislike me? You’re the one who started talking to me the other day saying that-”
Already tired of the two of them, Luna smacked both of them on the head with her tentacles, nearly knocking Juli face-first into the floor and causing Bennett to teeter dangerously.
After a few moments of silence, Tyreese snorted and pat Bennett on the shoulder. “You’ll get there some day, my friend.”
“I’m not even going to start with you,” Bennett grumbled. “I would complain that you hit me too hard, but I kinda started the argument,” he then said to Luna.
I guess that’s just another way Bennett diverts conversations… being somewhat rude.
Bennett then looked up at the Minotaur. “What made you focus on healing?”
The big guy shrugged. “Family.”
Bennett seemed to understand this. “Ah. Understandable,” he responded, looking at his sister accusingly.
“What?! You get yourself hurt more than I do! Remember when you came home looking like you jumped into a hive of bees?”
“First of all, I did jump into a hive of bees. Second of all, you’re the one who used all the honey since you thought it’d be funny to try and cook something you had no experience cooking, unlike me.”
She huffed, “At least I wasn’t confined to the house for a week.”
“I was also half dead. What a way to reach Level 2… and didn’t you set the hive on fire afterwards? And was also confined to the house?”
“We don’t talk about that.”
After another few moments, Bennett finally shrugged. “I’ll just drop you off here, Luna,” he said, setting her down before giving her the last two tarts, the first of which she unwrapped and shoved into her mouth before patting him with a tentacle.
He then stretched his arms before simply disappearing in a flash of red lightning.
“Hey! That’s not fair!” Yelena yelled, rushing after him. “Since when could you even do that?”
Juli rolled her eyes. “At least I know where the class is,” she muttered, walking backwards into… some sort of portal and disappearing.
Eventually, the others followed, leaving only Luna and the Minotaur. Luna looked at him as she chewed and he sighed. “Is this normal?”
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Luna shrugged, looking to the door in front of them before reaching to the handle with a second tentacle and opening the door, as one of her tentacles was already holding the last lemon tart.
She then was mildly surprised when she saw that the room was far more full than she had expected, with a woman standing in front of the class of nearly twenty students, looking glad to see another two walk in, though she was a bit surprised to see the Minotaur follow the small Seaborn into the classroom, a pensive look on his furry face.
“Ah, welcome… both of you,” the woman said, clearly a bit off put by the Minotaur. “Sit wherever.”
Luna thought for a moment before simply going over to one of the pillows and sitting down in the front. The Minotaur simply sighed deeply before going to the back of the classroom and plopping himself down with a thump.
After another minute of waiting and Luna nearly finishing her last tart, the Professor cleared her throat. “Welcome to this class, which, for the first part of the year, will mostly focus on the basics of Healing, as well as, occasionally, going over to the Mage classes to practice, since they always seem to get themselves hurt in some way or another…”
Hm… this seems interesting, I guess, let’s see what they have wrong about Healing, since no matter what I say, some people always seem to get something wrong.
“I want to start with the obvious: no there is no God specifically for Healing, and many suspect that the God of Water, who still hasn’t been chosen, will be of Healing as well.”
Huh. This is already getting interesting.
***
The Yasmine twins sat next to one another, both giddy to be in the same Mage class. Because most of the students had chosen Mage class, there were four classes, and nearly a hundred students separated into those classes. Bennett found it a bit interesting that Jennifer chose to be in Mage instead of support, which she was quite good at. Their teacher, a tired looking man-
Oh hey, it’s my counselor. What was his name again…?
“Okay, since I’m assuming everybody is here-” he started. “We’ll begin with the more simple spells, Bolt. Bolt is an unaligned spell, which means anyone except idiots can use it, with the interesting property to infuse it with your Alignment, giving it different effects. For instance, infusing it with Flame allows you to simply increase the damage to about 4% on an unarmored foe. Of course, Burning does another 0.5% every other second until put out. Naturally, we’re not entirely sure what Lightning does since our dear Headmaster didn’t exactly let any of us Professors teach Miss Electric Fussy, who I’m sure is listening to this right now-”
Bennett felt a light presence of Lightning leave the room, but not before shooting a bolt of it at the Professor, who simply blocked it with his palm- no, some sort of shield spell. Bennett fought back a laugh, but it was clearly futile as another nearly nailed him in the head, but he leaned forward so it hit the wall next to him.
He shrugged as his sister gave him a flat look and he looked back at the Professor.
“Of course, you all know her as Reah Justyce, the very angry child who likes bullying people. And, as I just showed here, you’ll also be learning about Shield, another Unaligned spell that can be infused, with various effects, of course.”
There was some muttering throughout the classroom, but quickly stopped quickly afterwards as the tired professor cleared his throat.
“Continuing, the first thing you’ll be mastering is this spell… well, of course not master it, there’s no way to get it to Level 10 within the first year. The hope is to at least learn Bolt by the end of the class, then Shield by the end of next Class. Simple, no?”
Bennett frowned. “...Is there any basis we should go off of? Like a description?”
Some other students nodded at this, clearly also curious.
“Ah, great question, Yasmine One. Don’t explode. You don’t exactly have a healer to save your life if you do, now do you?” The Professor then simply disappeared on the spot and all the desks and pillows in the room disappeared simultaneously and all the students thumped onto the floor as some enchantment activated and the room expanded, revealing test dummies and targets as well as what looked like medical kits.
For a few minutes afterward, there were a few complaints as the room suddenly grew full of motion and excitement.
“Well, that was useless,” Yelena muttered. “He gave us no clues on how to even form the spell. Oh, yeah… we read about that somewhere though.
Bennett nodded. “What’d it say though?”
Juli, from nearby, huffed. “It can’t possibly be that difficult. All you need to do is form it into some sort of bolt or bullet shape with Man- er, MP and launch it-”
From the tip of her finger, which she had raised, there was an explosive sound as something smashed into a target she was pointing at, blowing a hole through it. For a moment, the entire class was quiet again. Juli stared at the air as if she’d just gotten a notification.
“Ah. It is,” she muttered before going over to the back of the classrrom and sitting down. “Idiots.”
This is exactly what I meant, Bennett thought as his sister sighed.
“Shall we try?” she then asked, looking a bit less enthused.
***
This, Luna thought, somewhat impressed. Is not the worst class I’ve seen on Healing magic. Well, technically, it’s not magic, but look, I can bear with it. It’s close enough. They actually got most of the things right. Except for the part about it speeding up body functions. It literally just replaces them temporarily. And how it decreases the lifespan of any one person you use it on consecutively. It actually increases it. And-
Luna blinked. Actually, they got more than one thing wrong, but oh well.
After a few moments of watching some try to use Minor Heal, which, in Luna’s opinion, was a very nice spell to start off with, on what looked like a specialized dummies that simply absorbed healing while also outputting various data on said healing, she decided to try one out herself.
I don’t really want to stand out too much, so I’ll just heal like 10%?
She placed her hand on the dummy and was immediately surprised when she felt all kinds of things going on with them. They weren’t dummies at all.
They were pylons.
As she delved deeper into them, she could tell that they sent healing to somewhere far into the distance to be and, possibly, stored and used elsewhere.
They’re stealing the healing from here and using it elsewhere. Why? There’s no way this alleged war could be that bad, right? But why else would they just take all the healing from here? Just how bad are they getting their asses handed to them?
Luna shook her head before inputting her 10% and looking at the small projected screen for a moment.
___
Error Calculating Healing Quality!
Requesting assistan-
___
It’s the podium’s sibling seeking revenge! No you don’t stupid thing. Moderate quality.
___
Healing Quality : Moderate
Healing Amount : 10% HP
___
Ha! Take that, dumb podium! Who’s going to stop me from breaking all of the podium family now-?!
Luna let out a small cough as she stopped the mental charade. Maybe I got a bit too carried away. I still hate the damn podium from the Exam’s entrance.
After a moment of self reflection, she looked at the Minotaur who had put his hand on the dummy next to hers.
___
Healing Quality : Low
Healing Amount : 7% HP
___
Luna gave the Minotaur a thumb in the air, something Cthulhu had seen on the Earth she’d locked up. A “thumbs up,” she remembered it was called. He gave her a very bull-like smile before looking at hers.
“Ah. You are better than I am. You must have been keeping your team alive and well during the Exams,” he said gruffly. “Your friend’s sister said I did, but Juli was a bit… huffy about it. The two of them get along better than one would expect though. You probably haven’t met our other teammate, but I’m sure you’d be fine with him.” He seemed to start after a moment of thought. “Oh, I never mentioned my name. It’s Bastion.”
Wow, I think this guy talks more than I expected, she thought, reaching to his outstretched hand before immediately regretting it as she felt multiple bones in her fingers dislodge. Ow.
He blinked before quickly letting her hand go. Luna stared at her now inert hand with a slightly annoyed expression before shaking it a few times, letting her bones turn to fluid and settle back in place, losing a bit of MP in the process.
After checking it over a few times and noticing a few imperfections, she remembered she could just turn her entire hand into water and reform it properly. Seeing Bastion’s already confused face, she decided to not do that. She shrugged in a manner that said “It was my fault” before moving to look at the someone next to her, who looked very focused on trying to get any healing above 4%.
She then poked his hand before placing her hand on the dummy herself and, instead of trying to insert all the healing at once, like the boy had been, did it slowly, getting 19% instead of the ten from earlier.
“Ohh. Slowly, huh? Thanks.” The boy copied her and easily doubled his healing. “Oh wow, that’s way better!”
Bastion had also noticed this and had done the same as well, getting 13%.
I think I’m seeing why people would value healing so much. It’s basically like saying, “Hey? You at low HP? Here’s 30% more. Go fight good now.” The only thing I see holding it back is cooldowns, which I’m noticing that I don’t suffer from. I can literally spam healing. But, I’m assuming that as time goes on, there will be drawbacks. Maybe some type of debuff that lowers the amount of healing one can receive if healed consecutively. That would be how I’d balance it… oh wait. I did, didn’t I? It’s just not called a debuff.
Before Luna could continue, their teacher suddenly clapped. “Well, it seems like there’s already injuries in one of the Mage rooms. Typical, one would say… But, you’ve all done a great job. Some of you even reached High levels of healing with Minor Heal. However, as you know, Minor heal racks up the Unhealing Debuff fastest, so you’ll have to learn to maximize it to it’s twenty percent maximum soon, when it will become Moderate Heal, which can go up to 40%. Ah, you may not have realized what the actual Moderate, Low, High on the healing Quality means. Before we leave, let me explain:
“Those basically mean how effective they’ll be, based on the Healing you output and the type of Healing. Minor Heal already has a 25% loss rate in of itself, as you know by now. The qualities decrease it by a further 35%, 25%, and 15% respectively. The only exceptions to this is Teamwide, Major Healing, Revitalize, and Overheal, which suffer no consequences except Unhealing, which an exception to, of course, is Overheal. And we all know that Overheal is a great Skill in itself, so I advise you to tell me if you somehow develop it.”
Ah. I knew there was something I had to look out for. Now, let’s see what Bennett’s got himself into.
~~~
Luna looked disapprovingly down upon Bennett’s head as he shrugged, sitting on the floor and bleeding from multiple holes on his hand.
“I may or may not have overestimated my Rapid Reconstruction. But hey, it’s Level 4 now-”
Luna kicked his arm, the same one that his injuries were on, infusing a bit of Overheal into the kick.
He groaned in pain, but it didn’t stop him from muttering, “You don’t have your shoes on. I thought I told you-”
Kick.
“Okay, okay, I won’t be as reckless! That actually hurts y’know. And I’m not the only one who got hurt from their… attempted spells. I still haven’t gotten it, though…”
He flicked his hand clear of blood before looking at her strangely. “I’ve never mentioned it before, but your healing… it doesn’t have the same drawbacks as most other healing does,” he whispered. “I’m sure it’s something that you know yourself, but… it might be a good thing if you minimize the people you heal. If this becomes common knowledge…”
Luna sighed before sitting next to him and attempting a Mental Communication again.
___
Do you wish to Bind Skill : Blessing of the Sea to Bennett “Yasmine”? By doing this, you will have limited Mental communication towards Bennett “Yasmine" and all Skills used on Bennett “Yasmine” will have an extra 50% effectiveness, including Damaging Skill. This also applies to him. However, if any Soul Damage is applied to Bennett, it will also be applied to you.
You will never be able to retract this Blessing for the duration of Bennett “Yasmine”’s life. More benefits of this Skill will be revealed when Bound.
Bind Skill : Blessing of the Sea?
___
Hm… I’m honestly actually considering this, but I’m still not sure… This System wants me to do this though-
“I just felt that again…” Bennett muttered. “Like a strange pull on my mind, but it was somehow… told off?”
Luna looked at him in surprise and he gave her a strange look before some sense of understanding dawned on him. “Wait, that was you? I felt it the first time we met, then again the other day… are you trying to tell me something?”
Bennett frowned. “No wait, we should talk about this later, your teacher is staring at you suspiciously. Try to find a way to give your healing the Unhealing… I don’t know what they’ll do if they find out you don’t have healing drawbacks… we can talk about it during lunch.”
In the end, according to Bennett, after she’d gone back to her class later and tried to figure out how to artificially implant Unhealing into her healing… which seemed to be a bit counter-intuitive, he’d never learned the Spell, but Yelena had, and would not leave him alone about it.
“Hmph, I learned it and you didn’t, Beeeen~!” She sang, walking in circles around him while pretending to shoot it at Bennett.
“Yeah, it just means I have to practice. Then I’ll shoot you with a Bolt of Lightning and we’ll see who’s laughing… oh wait. I can already do that.”
Luna felt her hair raise up as a Lightning Strike began charging up in his other hand that wasn’t part of the arm that occupied Luna. Yelena yelped and Burst forward as Bennett snorted, dispelling it.
He then looked at Luna, who swung her legs while paying little attention until he looked at her. She used a slight bit of Mental Communication, ignoring the prompt, as she pulled herself slightly closer to him, feeling slightly safer. He shrugged before looking back to his sister, instead nearly running into an outstretched wing.
“Bennett and Luna! I didn’t see you two, or any of your group, to be fair, at Breakfast!” Ulayla complained. I don’t even have the same Mage class as the two of you!”
“Luna’s in Healing, actually,” Bennett said, ducking under her wing. She spun around and followed him, cutting off Jennifer, who’d been walking behind him.
“Really?!” She squawked, before covering her mouth, looking a bit embarrassed. “Ahem… why though?”
Bennett coughed. “I guess she just likes Healing?”
Luna rolled her eyes at him, sending an unspoken message.
“Oh… are you just an idiot who gets himself hurt whenever she happens to not be looking?” she then asked.
“How’d you even gather that from an eyeroll, and no, I’m not,” Bennett said, giving Luna a suspicious look. “How did you even communicate that with a single eye roll anyways?”
Luna poked him with a tentacle and he shrugged. “Whatever, don’t tell me. I’ll just walk here in misery.”
“You’re just overdramatic,” Juli muttered.
“And you’re just rude,” Ulayla snapped before Bennett could say anything in response.
He stared at her for a moment as she spread her wings out, looking proud of herself. Then he shook his head and continued onto the path towards lunch. Ulayla blinked and chased after him.
“Hey! Are you not even going to say ‘Thanks for defending me, Ulayla’?! Or ‘You’re so great, Ulayla’?!”
“I think the more proper saying would be ‘Okay, I guess.’”
“Now that’s just rude!”
Luna had to keep herself from laughing. Is this how the year’s gonna be? If so, then I can bear it… as long as there’s no more nightmares.
~~~
Unlike before, Bennett and Luna instead brought their food to the dorm, Bennett using the excuse that he was going to practice the Bolt spell and Luna was going to make sure he didn’t blow his hand off… which wasn’t really an excuse since that’s what they did for 15 minutes.
During this time, he nearly blew his fingers off multiple times and she had to heal his fingertips multiple times, but she was okay with it. He did shoot off what looked like half baked Mana Bolts, but none really got anywhere.
However, after he got tired, he sat down in front of her and looked at her strangely for another minute.
Finally, he spoke.
“You… there’s no reason for you to come to this Academy, is there?” he asked, giving her an interested look. “Luna… when I met you, there was something… off. Despite how young you look, you’re so good at Healing magic that I thought you were some sort of honor student from the Academy that I hadn’t heard about. But… you… you’re just different. I don’t really get it.”
Oh, he’s just getting straight to the point, Luna thought. But… When did he have the time to think about this?
“I mean, you act just the same way one your age might normally act, though you have your weird moments.” He laughed slightly. “But… then there’s times where I think… you’re trying to hide something… but you’re not sure about the weight of what you’re trying to hide. Like, for instance, you hid your tentacles for nearly a week since, and I’m assuming, you didn’t think Seaborn existed. Then, your Magic is just so… different. It’s nothing like some things I’ve seen before. Splitting into multiple Lunas and having nobody question it was one of the breaking points where I knew something was wrong. It’s like you were somehow… push away the importance of certain things you could do, even to people so much more powerful than you originally seemed.
“Luna… you’re not just a normal Seaborn, are you?”
Luna, for some reason, couldn’t stop herself from shivering in… fear?
What… did he find out I’m a Goddess? I… don’t want to stop living this life. At first, I didn’t really think much about it, I honestly just took it for granted, but… I kinda like it now. Bennett is nice to me, I have friends, so many new things… will this all just end?
“I thought about it. Even an Apex Seaborn can’t do some of the things you do, which is what I thought you were at some point. But, it doesn’t explain the fact that sometimes, you don’t understand what’s normally common sense, like, the biggest thing, the Academy. Everyone, across the planet and even beyond, knows what the Academy is… but you didn’t. It’s like you came from so far away, that you didn’t even know about a lot of things… It’s like you were trained for specific things, because you have specific qualities…”
…Wait… I can salvage this, can’t I? If he goes in the direction I think he’s headed. I’ll feel horrible about it later, but I think it will still be salvageable, even for this school.
“In history, there used to be tribes… or collections of people, I guess, who’d have children for specific things about them, whether it was strength, prestige, or purely to effectively own the best source of… a sort of product, I guess. I know there’s an attribute that allows some people to bypass the Unhealing debuff. It’s rare, but possible. But, there’s also Overheal, which I’ve seen, can only be passed down through blood, or developed very rarely.
“This leads me to the conclusion, since I can tell that you’re not a reincarnator, you’re one of those perfectly bred children, sorry for putting it like that though. Is… that right.”
Luna, already feeling horrible inside for lying to him even though he was so close to the truth, nodded solemnly. He bit his lip. “You’ve probably trained all your life to be as good as you are at what you do, huh? Do you even come from this planet, or were you transported here by ship or token? I know that it rarely happens when certain of those… people I mentioned, don’t need certain things, or want their children to get real-life experience, they’ll send them off in some way, while they have no clue how society works gods know how far away from their homes and could just die to something they underestimated, or because they were unfortunate enough to be transported somewhere unliveable. And if that happens, the ones who sent them will just deem them as useless trash and continue to try and make some sort of prodigy… It reminds me of nobles.”
Luna looked up at Bennett, whose face was a mask of anger and despair. She reached over to him, but wasn’t sure how to comfort him. He let out a little laugh when she gave him a bit of healing.
“Thanks. You really don’t come from here, huh? Nor do you have much experience with people, or emotions in general. It’s okay,” he responded to her. He seemed to think for a few moments. “Ah! I have an idea! During the summer, I’m gonna take you wherever you want to go. I’ll let you experience all the things that make you happy, sad, angry, whatever. Even though you can’t communicate, that shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll be there the entire time. I bet you’ll have fun, interact with all kinds of people, things, and even learn more about the world, the things you don’t yet understand, right? Like the dark, yet vibrant forests around the Elves’ Kingdoms, filled with beautiful and dangerous life that I’m sure we can tough out, the heat of the western nations, filled with sand and lava, which I’ve heard isn’t all too bad, if not for the unending feeling of sand in your shoes, even the deep and dark oceans that nobody knows much about, which could just be filled with sights that you’ve never seen before, colors that I probably have never experienced before, along with dangerous wildlife that we’ll have to fight. It may even take longer than I think, and we may just spend years running around, discovering more about the world, the good and the bad. We’ll probably get into all kinds of fights with rude people, but we’ll just beat ‘em up and keep having fun, right?
“Uh… hey, Luna, why're you… crying?”
She blinked in surprise as she felt the tears running down her cheeks. Why am I crying? What he’s saying… makes me happy. But sad at the same time? Why are emotions so… complicated, dammit? He’s… right on so many fronts, yet so wrong. I don’t know what it’s like to really interact with people on a personal level, but… I guess it can’t hurt to try. But, I need to stop cryin-
Suddenly, Bennett pulled her into a hug and she froze, unsure what to do. “Hey, it’ll be fine! It’s just new experiences. Nothing even has to change between us. We’re still just Bennett and Luna, an inseparable duo, right?”
She couldn’t keep the tears from flowing as she hugged him back, her crying starting to grow audible.
Yeah… I guess we are. I don’t think… anyone’s ever cared about me this much… in forever. I’m happy. I can’t wait to travel with him. Though… it is a bit far off. Dammit, why didn’t he just save this for far later? I hardly even know him! I met him barely two weeks ago! Why am I so attached to this boy?!
She blinked after thinking for a moment. Oh yeah. There’s something else I need to do.
Finally, after probably too long of debating on it for the past day, she finally used Blessing Of the Sea on Bennett, kicking off a chain of events that she wouldn’t see unfold until far later.
***
A bloodred scythe hung on it’s mantle, waiting for someone else to attempt to claim it, ready to drain them of their blood as well. However it could sense one worthy of it’s power, if not faintly.
Of course, this was all the speculation of the Combat Professor, who stared at it hanging there, vibrating slightly.
“Should I close it this year?” the Wolf-kin man thought to himself. “Hm… no. I’ll just let whatever unfortunate student who decides to not heed my warning get themselves killed. Then I can just say that they refused to listen to instruction.”
He then looked at the scythe another time. “Hm… but maybe… that kid with the blood red lightning… hm…”
He shrugged and left the weapons room, unaware of the giddiness of the Scythe, ready to meet its new, worthy owner, and finally eat to its non-existent heart’s content… and one day get its revenge against its creator.
It’ll taste… so good.