An hour later, Alaric brought his movements to a stop. Steam rolled off his body as he crumbled to the ground, panting hard. He was exhausted and barely able to stand.
It felt like each muscle group was sending a whole list of complaints up to his brain and demanding to be heard. Today, he’d pushed himself extra hard… partly because he’d realised he was weak and partly because he really longed for the mental clarity that he found hard to come by these days.
On the flip side, he wasn’t using any Aether Manipulation or taking advantage of his Spirit Vessel. With those two out of the equation, exhausting himself within an hour became a possibility.
In the end, he managed to find that mental clarity he’d been seeking. His life was in mortal peril but in hindsight, that had been the case since the day he was born into this world.
Normally, such an argument would be considered far-fetched but after surviving a demon attack at the age of eleven, he was all but sure about this.
After that demon attack, he’d trained with his friends for four years. Those four years of training had gotten him past his obstacle of Darth. And so he would just continue to train and deal with his problems as they came. Just like he’d dealt with Darth, he would deal with the rest of his problems.
Perhaps his problems would become even bigger than Darth but the fact remained that he would deal with them. What kind of Demon King slayer would he be if a few soldiers playing dress-up with vermilion cloaks and oversized armour scared him out of his skin?
Taking a sigh, Alaric stood and turned to the house only to freeze. Seated at the porch was a hulking man in a loose shirt buttoned down halfway to reveal a patch of chest hair. Everything about him was familiar down to the dirty detail that made Alaric clench his fists and gently grit his teeth.
‘What is he doing here?’
“Old man Gregory wasn’t joking about these Face Masks,” the man mused, his deep voice rumbling, “You really can’t recognize me with this thing on.”
Alaric’s mind went blank… ‘Huh…’
Standing like a frozen idiot, he watched the large man put his palm over his face and yank at something.
The man’s face crumpled as though it was leather coming undone only to reveal an object similar to the one Alaric was wearing over his face. On the other side of the Face Mask, a nostalgic smile shone towards him, “Long time no see, Alaric!”
Alaric’s rage whithered like a flower made of ash in the middle of a storm. It was gone with the wind, leaving nothing but a disturbing hole of emptiness, warmth and a whole boiling pot of emotion the boy didn’t want to deal with.
He whispered, “LionHeart?”
He felt a weakness in his legs and a whole storm of emotions fast-forward right before he clenched his fists and walked up to the large man. Alaric boxed his shoulder with a bit of force.
LionHeart pulled back, massaging his throbbing shoulder, “Ow!”
“That’s for riling me up at the Guild Hall. You could have got hurt,” Alaric yelled with a cross expression, “When did you even get here… and what are you doing here? Did the Tower find a way to get me back to the Elite Guardian Academy?”
The door creaked open to reveal a tired woman’s face. Ms Sariah brushed her blonde hair out of her face and tossed a towel at Alaric’s face, “I got the communicator working. Garin’s ready for you two. Come inside.”
Alaric had noticed Sariah’s tired expression but the mention of Garin meant there was something even more at play here. How much could have happened in the time that he had chosen to go out hunting?
Alaric followed the two to the living room where an odd device had been placed on the table. Strange buttons surrounded a shining orb which shone with a myriad of colours.
Hovering above the odd device and surrounding the kaleidoscopic orb was a rune circle. Above that, the image of a man in the white armour of the Tower of Seekers was standing, towering over the other three figures in the room.
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Garin looked elegant in his full armour, beard trimmed short and hair tamed. He was back to being the regal knight who came to pick up the orphans every year in the Five Hills.
“Garin, he’s here,” Sariah spoke as she walked off to the dining area.
“Thank you, Sariah. Good evening, Alaric,” Garin spoke.
“Good evening, Garin,” Alaric responded, “Is something wrong?”
Sariah returned from the kitchen with a large goblet of water which she handed to Alaric. The boy thanked her and started drinking up, quenching the thirst he’d learnt to ignore after gruelling sessions of exercise.
Garin started, “Something might be wrong indeed. Something happened at the Tower today. It seems the matter of the one who wants you captured runs deeper than any of us could have guessed. We knew your guardian would attract attention but some kinds of attention are hard to attract and when attracted, can only mean bad things.”
“Whose attention did my guardian capture?” Alaric asked whilst keeping a neutral expression. His guardian had always warned him on keeping her presence hidden at all times, so it was no surprise to him that she’d attracted attention even without being exposed.
“Well… A man of very high social standing. Heathcliff of the Six. He’s one of the Six Apostles of the Emperor’s Pillar of the East. These people are very powerful individuals who don’t usually get involved directly and this man paid the Tower a physical visit.”
Alaric’s heart skipped a beat, “What did he want?”
“He wanted to meet you, of course. He said he’d offer the Tower a Hundred Stellar Gold Coins. Each one of those is worth a thousand gold. It’s enough for a family to live on lavishly for ten generations. Some Seekers would pounce on that amount of money without a moment’s hesitation… but Elder Gregory is not one of them.
The negotiations were bitter and the Apostle was not pleased, so he left. Elder Gregory warned us that this would not be the end and that you were to be informed immediately. Without a way of legally obtaining you, Heathcliff will seek other means… so be careful.”
“The negotiations were just for show, weren’t they?” Alaric sighed.
“Yes, they were. And now, who knows what they might pull?”
“They already sent the Emperor’s Soldiers to look for me here in Melbourne,” Alaric responded.
“Not just Melbourne, Alaric. Every last human village and town inside and around the Barren Mountains. They are searching for you with every last resource they can spare. LionHeart volunteered to protect you and has been given that sole mission. Stay hidden, Alaric and grow stronger,” the man explained.
Alaric nodded, sensing the end of their conversation, “Understood. That reminds me! I can hear a voice in my head feeding me information about things I don’t know. Do you have any idea what it is?”
“Oh, that sounds like a Keeper’s Almanac. It should be in your Storage Bracelet. Unfortunately, you’ll have to tinker with it a bit to learn how it works. Only Keepers can use them so I don’t know much about it other than it has access to the knowledge in the Tower.
I’ve also heard that they tend to have minds of their own when it comes to answering questions, sometimes answering questions even when you don’t ask them,” Garin responded formally.
“Right… Thank you for that. I thought I was running crazy,” Alaric replied with a sigh.
With that, Garin bid Alaric farewell, and the transmission ended. As soon as it was cut off, he turned to the woman in the room and said, “Sariah… There is something I wanted to talk to you about.”
The woman was shocked by the sudden change of topics but she adapted with a nod, “What is it?”
“There is a quest I would like to take on. The only problem is that it’s a gold-ranked quest. I’ve already got two Silver-ranked adventurers on my side. I just need one Gold-ranked.”
“Shouldn’t you leave Gold-ranked quests alone?” the woman furrowed her brows.
“Normally, I would. But the item we’ll be getting is one I need a lot,” Alaric reasoned.
The woman pursed her lips for a bit before she gave in with a sigh, “Okay… What’s this quest about?”
“We’ll be retrieving the Storm Orb of the Heaven-Crested Eagle. Though I’d prefer it if we managed to get more than one Storm Orb,” Alaric responded.
“Ah… that’s a tough one. Not to mention you want two,” the woman said with a thoughtful expression.
“Three, actually…” Alaric added, “One of the conditions I got from one of the Silver-ranked adventurers I got to help was that she would get a Storm Orb as well.”
Sariah nodded in thought, then looked the boy up and down. In the short time that the boy had been in Melbourne, the worry in his eyes had tripled. Wasn’t he too young for the kind of pressure that was being put on him?
She sighed, “Why don’t you go take a shower then we’ll talk about this tomorrow in the morning?”
Alaric knew this tone all too well. He’d heard it from Sister Marla before and knew now that there was little to no room for him to negotiate. He wiped his face with the towel he’d been given and sighed, “Can I use the Tempering Chamber first?”
“After supper. And if you use it for longer than two hours, I’ll drag you out of there myself,” the woman ordered.
He nodded, then left to complete this part of his evening routine. It was only his second day… and he could already feel his body begging him for rest.
The rest of the night passed in a blur… so fast, in fact, that he barely had time to talk to LionHeart. He did, however, give him a very tired hug, which resulted in him being carried up to his room that night for a much-needed slumber.
Soon, he would be embarking on a quest into the Barren Mountains.