Arc 6. A seemingly endless loss
Road to a Hero:
Three Chances in Another World
Chapter 36. Freerunning'
Whilst waiting for the long days to pass until New Year, they must spend three weeks doing a lot of nothing. Before Gray decided to sit around and do nothing, Soku and Gray decided to walk home instead to let the whole fight blow over.
Gray: “You did pretty well, though you gave up in the end.”
Soku: “Hey! I didn’t want to hurt you. You went all animalistic and tried to attack me, I just thought you finally lost it, but I wouldn’t just kill ya.”
Gray: “MPH! Excuses, this is zero for your winning score.”
Soku: “This one doesn't count. And I’ll have you know that when we fought in the Knight Exams, you trained to fight for a month. I’ll admit I’m lazy, but you had to do all that to catch up, and I was a kid! Now I’m fifteen, my mana has settled, and I have a mark of providence. If I went all out you’d be dead.”
Gray: “Sure buddy, if that makes you feel better.”
Gray walks in front of Soku, smirking to annoy her. She retaliates by blasting Gray in the back of the head with wind, knocking him over. He stands back up, brushes himself off, and struts along.
Soku: “Not gonna do anything?”
Gray: “I’m finally too tired to care.”
Soku: “Oh no the sun’s gonna explode now!”
Gray chuckles, but he divides his attention to another subject, what should he do next? With the knowledge of the Sect in the city, the Montgomery company’s growth, the Holy Knight and the history of the lost two hundred years, and the Revolutionaries. All these factions as well as findings are coming together, and he can’t do much to stop it, but if he gets help something may be able to be done.
Gray: “When we got home I called Ryo. We need help, if something happens…we won’t be able to stop it.”
Soku: “What do you mean? What’s happening?”
Gray: “Don’t tell Rosemary or the others…but the Sect is here.”
Soku is shocked, frantically trying to get any information she can.
Soku: “WHAT!? WHERE! WHO! What happened!? What do you know!?”
Gray shushes Soku, due to all the people staring at them. He gives all the eavesdroppers a nasty look, getting them to walk along before he continues.
Gray: “I saw one, a higher-up. I’ve never seen him before, but he didn’t seem to have any ill will towards me, so it’s not a revenge plot. But something’s going on. I thought all this stuff was like some one-off adventure, but it’s something bigger…it’s gotta be.”
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Gray goes to speed up, but he’s stopped by Soku, who’s pulling on his shirt.
Gray: “Yeah?”
Soku: “Come with me, if you wanna get home quick why not learn from the master of free running.”
Gray stares at Soku, a bit confused, and watches in awe as she runs up the side of the wall. She uses her wind to give her a big boost while using the bricks and other hand holds to scale the three-story wall in under five seconds. Gray’s astounded, but admits he can perform a comparable feat. He bends down, focuses mana into his legs, and leaps up, using a foothold to boost himself up again, making it up to the top.
Gray: “I made it up faster than you.”
Soku: “Well I could’ve just blasted my way up, but look down there.”
Gray peers his head over the edge of the building, finding cracks in the ground from where he leaped, and the window frame he leaped off of broke.
Soku: “I’ve done this since I was seven, but ever since you abducted me into this cult of knights, I haven’t had any fun.”
Gray: “You can basically fly, why do you need to parkour”
Soku smacks her face with her hand, seemingly dumbfounded by Gray’s stupidity.
Soku: “I can barely glide, and I’ve only been able to do that for like eight months. Stealing and running go hand and hand, so “parkouring” is the way to go. You need to be more flexible, you all need to be honest I think yall are strartin’ to get fat..”
Gray: “I will NOT take this slander. And do NOT, SPEAK, OF, DEAR, ROOOSEMARY LIKE THAT! I’LL HAVE YOUR HEAD!”
Soku: “OH NO! NOT MY HEAD! WHATEVER WILL I DO!?”
Gray: “Actually…spending time training might be what we need. We’ve all been working, but not with things we can’t do. We all train our bodies by maxing out our power till we can take it, it’s almost like cheating. Rarely do we all get any practice by dueling each other.”
Soku: “Enough with the chatter, we can talk on our way home, for now, LET’S GO!”
Soku begins sprinting across the building, with Gray following close behind.
Soku: “Wanna go faster!”
Gray: “Oh I thought you were just this slow!”
Soku flows her wind all around her, and blasts away, jumping across a large gap between buildings. Gray does the same, pushing as much mana out of his body as he can, essentially going into a full mana overdrive. He then makes the same jump, barely crossing the gap, having to catch the side of the building. Soku grabs his hand, helping him up.
Soku: “Guess you can’t keep up.”
Gray: “Hey! It’s not my fault I’m not a trained thief!”
Soku: “Neither am I! I’m self-taught.”
Gray: “Whatever your whole thing is being fast. Peter’s the inventory, Rosemary is a glass canon, Edward has the durability, and I’m a -”
Soku: “A Nuisance?”
Gray: “No, I was going to say jack of all trades, but if you wanna lie to yourself you can do that all YOU want.”
Gray looks around, now standing up high he gets a better look at this small but gorgeous city. The bustling streets, the large shining river, lovely people, it’s still a great sight even after being here for a while.
Gray: “I was looking at a map of Constal and I saw some cool places. We’ve been staying in the shopping district as well as our small little area with other cottages and inns. But across the canal, near the mayor's office is a large park, stone garden, and this massive history museum.”
Soku: “UGH! I’ve had a really good time chilling out. The ride here was boring, so boring I'd kill myself if I ever had to do it again, but being here’s kinda fun. Lincoln’s not screaming in my ears for me to break my muscles, I'm not freezing my ass off, and I’m not getting motion sick from that carriage.”
Gray: “Whatever, I wanna do something. Now, let’s go back home since you like it so much.”
Soku playfully nudges Gray’s shoulder and quickly dives off the building they’re currently on to another and then another and so on. Gray struggles to keep up, but the cool wind blowing off Soku and hitting him in the face keeps where she is fixed in his tangled mind. The sounds of Gray’s steps echo throughout the compact city while Soku’s are completely silent, untraceable, and effortless, as nimble as a ballerina as well as quick as a cheetah.
Although they’ve been here for only two weeks in the Blessed City that is Constal, it’s feeling like home. Its people are more lively than the workaholics who are the citizens of Greenvale, and the temperature is almost backward. Constal is placed within the muggy land that is Valatrostice, underneath the hidden sky while Greenvale is atop a great mountain miles in the air, but with all the soldiers constantly training, it gets a bit sweaty, while Constal stands almost perfectly. The cold wind that the salty ocean water brings in cools everything off, and the hot air coming from the people's mouths matches it with a heat that causes the salt to subside. Valatrositce is barren, Walgonia is strong, and within, Greenvale is cold, and Constal is shining. Gray quickly gets the hang of this freerunning, sliding, climbing, and leaping between the buildings, drawing attention from the people below, knowing nothing of the true watcher. A bit in the distance, below the buildings, standing in the shadows in an alleyway the thief they had met at Meir. She puddles, flowing down the street and into the gutter, staring at the two friends making their way home laughing and having fun along the way. She then takes out a pen and paper from her gray robes, jotting down what she’s seen them doing, with a small doodle at the bottom, not of Gray or Soku, but an outline of a bigger man that’s missing its right eye.
End of Chapter Thirty-six