He instantly knew that his affinity to dream powers was instantly raised to a considerable level without any explanation. All his life he knew that he couldn’t get the powers, even the basic elemental powers no matter how hard he tried.
But now, he got the power like it was the easiest thing in the world except that it wasn’t. For his entire experience as an Overseer, he had never once heard of a person with affinities towards dreams. Even high tiers in power levels were rare enough.
Maybe he was the first one to wield it. This and the mysterious power he was born with.
He was about to check the power he had just acquired then, he suddenly remembered. His heart skipped a beat and looked at outside the window. The sun was already setting towards the west with its orange visage spreading all over the brown city.
Merik slapped his palm onto his forehead and instantly rushed towards Albert’s house. Maybe he would still be waiting. But the nagging.
Merik frowned while running.
________________________________________________________________________
To his unfortunate surprise, Albert was already gone and in his house was a maid, cleaning all the stuffs. He was familiar with the maid since she was the one who occasionally came to Albert’s house to clean his ever-messy rooms and sad to say, even bathrooms. The man’s place was a menace despite his dazzling outward appearance. Nevertheless, she always came cleaning the stuffs despite Albert telling her not to come. She scolded him for not taking care of the house but she always came once in a while. Seemed like she was checking up on him.
“Good evening, ma’am Sofia.”
A reserved and well-mannered woman in her early forties greeted him back with a slight smile.
“Good evening, young Merik. Seem that Albert already left. You missed him in a nick of time. He waited for you until he couldn’t.”
“Did he say anything?”
Miss Sofia adjusted her white apron before slowly talking.
“He was smiling saying some unsavory things about you, as always. But I know he was feeling a bit emotional. Where were you?”
Merik couldn’t hide the expression on his face for Miss Sofia to see. He couldn’t just tell her that he was late because he was meeting the Goddess of Dreams and Despairs after all.
“Important stuffs.”
Despite slowly approaching the ending age of a woman’s beauty, her calm eyes and reserved manners made Miss Sofia a lot more profound than she already was. She wasn’t one of the most beautiful women in the area but she could well be one of the most respected and refined ones out there.
The slight smile never left her face.
“Of course. I understand. Albert himself said that you two would meet once again since fate has a lot more in store for you two. He said he knew that you two had a lot more to deal with.”
Merik genuinely smiled.
“Also, he left a letter for you. Seemed that he also predicted you wouldn’t be able to appear on time, whatever the circumstances.”
Despite saying what was necessary, Merik couldn’t shake off the feeling that the reserved woman was somewhat unsatisfied with him being late to Albert’s departure.
He was sorry, too of course. He wouldn’t be late under normal circumstances but no point in lingering in the past.
He gave Miss Sofia a slight sorry smile and asked.
“May I see the letter, please?”
“By all means. It is on the table in the living room. I’ll bring it for you.”
“No, no. Don’t worry, ma’am. I’ll go take it myself. I wouldn’t want to disturb you with your work. Also, I want to see the old man’s place while it’s clean.”
Unamused by his slight joke, she was silent once again and carried on with the work she was doing. Seemed that she was dragging a bag outside. Maybe she was about to throw the garbage.
Merik went inside checked all the rooms he once set his footsteps on. There were a lot of memories for him here as most of his childhood were mostly spent here. In these rooms, once dirty and messy now it was clean.
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It was clean to the point that it would even make Merik frowned slightly. He couldn’t help but sighed slightly checking the rooms, reliving the memories. Most of them are filled with pain because for a child with a life-threatening trauma, he could never be an innocent and happy child again but the grumpy yet responsible old man made his younger days a lot less hellish than it could be.
Still, it was not easy living with the old man. The guy made him do all kinds of chores from the cleaning of bathroom to even stepping onto his brick-like lower backs, every single night! Sure, he fed Merik enough but it was just bread and eggs every single day again.
Merik could never sleep well because Albert snored like an elephant. He wasn’t joking. He actually snored like an elephant and of course, every single night. They lived in separate rooms and yet, Merik hearing the deadly snores every night was showing the integrity of the walls or the intensity of the devil, himself.
Worst, training hours with him were torture. In this small room was his meditation room where a slight out of focus from Merik could result in a constant nagging from the old geezer to the point he couldn’t sleep. And for days!
Outdoor days were less than different. If someone were to watch them train, without knowing the context or the relationship they were in, they could even report to the authorities with the case of child abuse. The Captain of the Overseers against a sleep-deprived, eggs and breads only, child. The bruises and scratches all over his body made him a lot more sleep-deprived than he already was.
Merik could choose from the indoor or outdoor activities every day and none of them played to his favor.
For the longest times, he wanted to leave the house and leave the devil and he couldn’t wait for the days he would grow up and leave this god forsaken house.
Weirdly enough, coming back to his house after all this time made him wondered, the times with Albert were never really bad.
He never was lonely. Alone, yes. But he was never lonely.
Even knowing fully well that taking in Merik could be troublesome for a man like Albert, he nevertheless adopted him and never once complained.
He never made him go hungry even for a day.
He made sure Merik was educated on a lot of matters, even forcing him to enjoy the luxury of learning advanced martial arts, which was hellish for a teen but now, Merik was one of the most proficient martial arts masters in the city despite his affinity to physical strength was close to none.
He lost his parents but gained the best father figure he could possibly ask for.
Albert took care of Merik a lot more than Merik credited him for and a lifetime worth of gratitude could never repay the kindness of Albert.
“I hope the old man knows my feelings well.”
Like Albert said, Merik knew in his heart that the two would meet once again. All Merik had to do was to become stronger, more reliable and make the old man proud. That would somehow repay Albert.
Merik grabbed the neatly folded letter from the table. The sloppy handwriting obviously pointed to the owner being Albert with a letter “To Merik.” on it.
He grabbed the chair before gently opening the letter and read it thoroughly, word by word.
“Dear Merik,
With all the sudden departure from my part, I find myself unable to fully express every knowledge I wanted to impart to you. Hence, the letter. I’ll be blunt since I cannot be writing like I’m nagging to you. What a shame. Anyway, firstly, about the case of yours. I want you to drop it and move on. Yes, I know what you’re thinking that’s why no matter how much I want you to drop it, you wouldn’t be able to. So, I have a warning for you. DO NOT go into the Head Captain’s office and go to the right corner and touch the book on the second row of the second column. I repeat, DO NOT DO IT since it will lead you to the confidential sections where it could only be accessed by the Head Captains of the division. There will be a lot of knowledge concerning all the paranormal cases happening around the continent, hidden from the public and even from you. So, I don’t want you to go in there to find the necessary information regarding your case and moreover, your powers. The task will be tedious since there are thousands of archives lying around in there and who knows with time, the documents you are looking for may well be already gone. So, I sincerely warn you not to go into the archives and find whatever his necessary for you. Since I am a righteous Head Captain who doesn’t favor anyone over anyone, it would embarrass me a lot if anyone were to find out about this. So, please don’t.
Secondly, you only know the gist of me leaving the station where I had been serving for so many years but there is a bigger picture, indeed. And a dire one at that. But it is still too soon for you to know about it or even attempt to dive in the world of “us”. Though I will give you a hint that it is concerning with “Death”. Make sure you get stronger and a lot more reliable than you already are, Merik.
After all these years, I am ashamed to admit that I was unable to help you progress with your powers but to my ignorance and the mysterious nature of our world, your power is one of a kind that I haven’t seen of in my entire life. Since it was an unknown power, I couldn’t inquire the higherups about it, scared that it would cause harm to you than good. So, I kept it to myself. Still, I want you to explore more of it yourself and I believe you are destined to do so.
Merik, even if I want the best for you and want you to find out about who did it, part of me wants you to take care of yourself more than anything else and not lose yourself like you often do. You’re finally getting better and starting to enjoy life more than ever so I just wish that you continue to do so. Call it a selfish wish of a lone old man.
Be wary of everyone and don’t make the mistake of sharing the knowledge of your powers with everyone, even the ones you have become close with. Stay safe, Merik. Write to me sometimes.
/Best regards, Alberts.
P.S - Also get rid of your tardiness, it’s getting ridiculous.
Another P.S - Be wary of crows.”
Merik frowned at the mention of crows. The letter was peculiar enough but what about the crows. He suddenly had the urge to look out the window and weirdly enough, there was a crow sitting on a branch of a nearby tree. Merik kept staring at it and he couldn’t shake off the feeling that it was staring right back at him, too.
“Be wary of crows.”