BLESSINGS BY THE OBELISK

As Theo came back from the mind space created by the obelisk, he found Hamon with shining eyes by his side. “So… what did you get? What did you get?” Hamon asked excitedly. “But, wait, look!” He said as he punched the ground, leaving a crater of almost half his own height. “Cool isn’t it?” Hamon started laughing maniacally, posing with arms on his sides.

Theo congratulated him while smiling, hoping with all his strength Hamon didn’t get some stupid strength blessing multiple times. He couldn’t advise him after all. It would be too dangerous of a topic to touch on before their first encounter with the obelisk.

“It’s called Unwavering Defiance and Enhanced Strength, it makes me super strong.” Hamon posed with his muscles. “Then what did you get?”

Theo flinched but quickly answered. “Something like a ritual.”

“Hmm…” Hamon pondered with a hand on his chin. “Also cool, I guess.” He gave Theo a thumbs up with a big smile.

I didn’t expect Hamon to be such a protagonist. Not all blessings appeared to everyone, that didn’t mean there were ‘secret’ blessings stronger than others in the same rarity category. There were just different blessings. ‘Unwavering Defiance’ unlike ‘Enhanced Strength’ didn’t make you only super strong. It was a blessing that triggered every time you were pushed to your limits, suffered a setback, or were brought down. Once you rise up again, you would be stronger than before, that was why it was nicknamed the protagonist’s blessing or hero’s blessing. To imagine such a silly blessing would fall on his hands. Theo could imagine the incoming headaches.

To distract himself, Theo started observing the surroundings, no one extra had arrived yet. By their side, Suri was still touching the obelisk with shining light surrounding her. They started waiting for a while as Theo looked in the distance, pondering what to do next. There were so many things that had to be done. I should probably start by finding people to do the things I don’t want to do. However, to do that, I would need a minimum strength to speak with them on an equal level, at least. Also, some matters can’t wait. Otherwise, there will only be chaos to work on. Theo rubbed his temples as the many things piled upon his head.

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To his side, Theo caught Hamon looking at Suri’s figure, his eyes lost in the moment. Theo smirked as he got close, touching Hamon’s shoulder. Hamon was startled, but before he could try cooking up words to explain himself, Theo motioned for him to be silent and pointed towards Suri. She just finished choosing her blessings.

Suri got out of the obelisk’s mind-place and sighed. There were so many options. When she turned back, Theo and Hamon were looking at her. “Did you wait too long?” She smiled.

Theo shook his head. “Not much, what did you get?”

Suri perked up at the question, since Theo asked, it meant he still didn’t decide to dump her right away. “Something called ‘Persona Incognita,’ it lets me fake people’s faces.” She got three favor points and thought hard about which blessing to take. It had to be something useful, she had already defined Theo as someone who chose people by the value they offered him. For long, she pondered what she could offer but came up with nothing. Even the boy had more fighting ability than her, and she doubted her beauty would be useful for long.

However, this obelisk had been an opportunity. She had observed how Theo took care of Hamon like his own child. ‘What was his biggest fear?’ She thought and came to a conclusion: making enemies and not being able to protect the boy from them. That would happen when, for some reason, he could not be around the boy. Now she could be there to make them disappear, or so she expected.

“Good choice, show us,” Theo said, and Hamon soon got hyped up.

With much difficulty, she managed to change her face to that of a woman she once knew, it was like a magical illusion taking place, but the effect was very much real.

For Theo, the moment she activated her power, his ‘Mind Rites’ enabled him to see the ritual behind it, an intricate white circle in front of her. He carved the ritual in his mind as it occupied one of the two vacant slots. The blessing would grow with time, as he enhanced it with upgrades, but for now, it was good enough.

“I can’t change my voice or body. But it only drains me to change it, maintaining it is a piece of cake.” She gave Hamon a thumbs up, which he promptly responded

“It’s great, will you join us?” Theo said with a smile much to her relief. “The caravans are coming.” He pointed into the horizon as little black dots could be seen approaching.