A Fruitless Endeavor

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OWEN RYDER

What.....is this?

What exactly is even going on right now?

I’ve spent years in this backwater town slowly building trust with these people, shaping my image and portraying myself as a worthy leader. I did whatever I could to raise my standing in hopes of one day getting my hands on that rune. At first, I thought it was going to be easy, nobody here knew of the stigma that plagued me in the capital and most of the folks here weren’t even mages. Anything I did could easily be written off as magic, and if not for the fact that Vreena and Lennon were here, I could have gotten this whole thing done in a year at most.

That was what I'd thought anyway, but as time went on the situation slowly started to get more and more out of hand. I couldn’t have possibly predicted the Basilisk's initial attack, but at the time I thought it was an opportunity I could actually make use of. With a C rank monster that dangerous, there was always the chance that Lennon would be forced to use the rune to either boost his own level or lure it away, but he never did.

No – He couldn’t.

If I'd only known that at the time then I wouldn’t have needed to waste so much time here, but going back to Orna empty handed would just result in the others making a fool out of me. It was practically an established routine at that point but tolerating those demeaning taunts never got any easier no matter how hard I tried.

I was determined to make this work, even though taking over a year to obtain a single rune would still cause me problems, as long as I produced results then everything should have been fine. It should have, but then, he showed up.

That man, Oliver Rocco, a level three mage who’d been granted the title of ‘Ashbringer’ after becoming a court mage directly serving under the royal family. There was hardly ever any reason for someone like him to be this far outside the bounds of the capital but through sheer coincidence, he ended up here with his B rank party after finishing up another mission.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, his pregnant wife was also preparing to deliver their son, so he had no choice but to remain here while she recuperated. Luckily, his other friends decided to head back ahead of him but that still didn’t change much, because he was the real danger here. The first time I met him, he walked over to me and Lennon with unwavering conviction brimming from his body and extended his hand out to me, beckoning for a handshake.

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I still remember the broad grin that was on his face that day, one beaming with innocence and valor. Just from that expression alone I could already feel his morals and ethics spilling out around me, and after seeing that I knew this was only going to get harder.

I had to act fast while he was still tending to his family.

Tracking that injured basilisk down was no easy feat, but because Oliver had brought it to the brink of death, it was still recuperating, so it was rather easy for Amaris to put it under her control. Next was Lennon, I had to at least get rid of him if nothing else, having a level three and a level two team up on us was nothing short of a death sentence.

With the rest of Brunhilde and these two monsters at my back, I thought I had a chance. We couldn’t possibly beat that guy, but we could buy ourselves time, even if it was just a distraction. That was all we needed, even if the rune is technically gone now, as long as I bring that girl back, as long as I have something to prove my worth then this would all work out somehow.

I could deal with Brunhilde later, all I had to do was kill them off and pin the blame on Oliver, that would add more credibility to my story and reduce the competition, but until this job was done, we were allies; I'm sure Ulric and the others were thinking the same thing too.

Vreena was hardly a threat at this point, and I was keeping Oliver busy.

There were six of us and two monsters, a C rank Basilisk and a D rank Fenrir. Even with the ups and downs, this plan still had a high chance of success, we just had to kill Vreena and capture those Ashwell twins and Oliver’s kid.

So why?

Why is half of my team dead?

This kid, Liam Rocco, he must be some kind of monster. There’s no way a normal four-year-old should be that comfortable with killing, he just slaughtered a group of raiders more than three times his own age without even batting an eye. He wasn’t hesitating, right now I doubt he even recognized us as humans, as absurd as this may sound, he was dangerous.

Getting careless here could very well end up putting the rest of us in our graves, Gavin and the others have already paid the price for that.

Ever since his tone shifted just now, something felt off. It was almost as if I wasn’t even looking at the same person I'd grown used to - That presence, that aura, even the way he moved....everything about it just seemed off. The worst part about all of this was the oppressive look in his eyes, they were the eyes of a killer, but not just some run of the mill assassin, this was different, I couldn’t even meet the boy’s gaze. Every time our eyes met, it felt like his gaze was draining all the heat out of my body, almost like I was now standing before some unstoppable force of nature.

If looks could kill, I'd already be dead.

I don’t know what’s going on with him, but this wasn’t a child anymore, it was something else.....