Of course Aaron knew better and didn't even try to explain anything to Pio, he gestured for the man to hand him the hunting Blade before placing it on top of the red-hot mud and pointing with his hands towards the Blade while looking at the young man and thinking to himself : 'Here you go princess!' Then he went towards the metal bowl and said : "Now come help me clean these annoying wounds with this."
"But it's very hot!" Pio said.
The boy rolled his eyes at the young man and retorted : "Of course it's hot! grab two twigs and clean them then use them to scoop it from the water, Afterwards all you have to do is wave the handkerchief in the air a couple of times and it would cool down." Then he raised his wounded hands and exposed them to Pio while continuing to say : "Then you'd be able to use it to properly clean these disgusting burn wounds, now will you hurry the fuck up before my skin shrinks and dries any more than some ancient tree bark."
The young man sensed the urgency in the boy's words and quickly did what he was told.
Of course all these preparations didn't make it any less painful for Aaron, he kept enduring the urge to pull his hands away from Pio and sweat kept trickling down from his forehead.
Finally after who knows how long, the young man finished cleaning the wounds on both hands from any residue of mud or dirt after having to clean the handkerchief three times in the hot water.
"Phew. That wasn't hard, was it?" He asked once he noticed Pio toss the cotton cloth in the hot water then sigh deeply.
"Ah! No... it wasn't hard for me clean these wounds but, it... it must've been extremely hard for you to endure the pain young master Ron." The man had this look of bone-deep admiration for the boy when he answered, especially when he saw the kid calmly wipe his forehead with the back of his hand to remove the sweat that's bothering him by falling in his eyes.
Aaron shook his head and looked at the hunting Blade, "Now I need you to get the Blade, cool it down, then use it to remove the excess skin from the edges of these wounds."
This time Pio gawked and just stood there gaping his mouth while looking at the boy.
'For fuck sake this is really annoying!' He thought to himself before moving towards the young man and nudging him while saying : "Come on dude, move your ass before I lose my cool."
This time Pio did what he was told and once his back was turned towards Aaron, the boy took advantage of this opportunity to drink some water then stuff three pieces of salted meat jerky in his mouth then hide himself behind the biggest tree to activate the Magic Guard Skill.
"Young master!" The young man was taking a defensive pose with the hunting Blade in his right hand and the left hand resting on the grip of his Sword, hearing the singing voice for the third time made him really want to run from this place.
"Ron. My name is Ron, not young master... just Ron!" The boy appeared from behind the tree, "Now remember that and remember to let me piss in peace." Then he continued to chew on the tough meat jerky with an amused smile on his face at how frightened Pio looked.
Aaron ignored the silly bodyguard and kept monitoring his MP and HP bars instead.
'Losing HP doesn't only happen when I'm taking damage directly or suffering after-effects from an earlier attack, enduring extreme pain can also affect my vitals.' He thought when he noticed his HP bar gain 15 more points and rise from 12 to 27.
"I better be careful in the future and learn from this experience." The boy muttered softly to remind himself while thinking : 'The Skills of Magic Guard and Mana Armor are proving to be extremely important for my Magician Class, the same could be said for the Skill of Mana Boost because without Mana I've become practically useless!'
Pio moved towards Aaron and asked : "Are you ready?" Even the man himself didn't sound so sure.
Aaron offered both hands forwards before saying : "Do it. Make both clean and quick, let's get this over with." The boy said it through gritted teeth.
Thankfully this young man wasn't as clumsy as he was before when he cleaned the wounds, his hands moved with far more speed and dexterity.
He even managed to finish the task before the Magic Guard Skill ran out of time!
Aaron stared at his hands before looking up at the young man and saying : "Wow! Count me impressed, you did a darn pretty good job there mate." The boy felt how it became much easier to move his fingers to open and close his hands but it still hurt like bad to try and do so.
Pio tried to scratch his head but winced in pain when a blister on the tip of his finger almost popped, he felt awkward at his previous feelings of pride once the young man compared his pain to the boy's and shook his head before saying : "I used to work in the butcher's house when I was young, I really don't know why I quit back then to join the guards! I remember being good at it." Suddenly the man fell in a daze.
"Gather your stuff, we're going back." Aaron said.
Pio released a sigh before collecting his items.
The Bow and Arrows' quiver on his shoulder and waist, long spear in one hand and the other resting on his shoulder and barely holding the sack of their belongings with these burnt fingers.
"Maybe we should leave the sack behind," Once he saw the frown on the man's face the boy added : "We'll hide it. of course!"
This time the young man didn't seem to mind the idea and nodded to agree.
Aaron led Pio towards an area nearby his hidden treasure then asked : "I almost forgot to ask you how much it's going to cost us for the things we need?"
"The roll of leather and the food wouldn't cost more than twenty-something Iron Coins," The young man paused slightly in his actions of using his barefoot to push a mixture of fallen leaves, twigs, and small creatures away to clear the ground around the tree roots, "The excellent piece of rope that you demanded would cost us I'd say a Bronze Coin or so, but the price of the Axe, Hammer, shovel, and nails may go up to a few Silver Coins." Then he continued to cram the sack of his belongings down a small crevice between the tree roots and cover it with whatever he could get his hands on until it became a big mess.
'Sigh. Thankfully he didn't say Gold Coins! I only took three Silver, Five Bronze, and thirty Iron Coins from that wooden box before burying it.' He thought to himself while calculating how much of the total amount is left in that wooden box.
The boy was ashamed to say that buying these items would cost him almost one-third of all his money!
This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.
Aaron carefully rummaged around his groin area with his hands until the piece of cloth that's covering his privates fell to the ground with a jingle of metal.
In the beginning Pio was feeling slightly suspicious when he saw the boy's actions, then he raised an eyebrow towards Aaron while feeling both shock and confusion.
"Don't look at me like that, I don't shit Iron, Bronze, or Silver... and I certainly don't shit Gold either!" He said while struggling to put the painful to look at and wear "underwear" back on.
"Oh!" The young man simply uttered that sound in reply.
Aaron pointed at the coins, "I believe these should be enough to cover what we need or at least enough for an advanced payment," Then he walked towards the village while continuing to say : "Do you know the location of old man Sid's shop?"
This time Pio was really confused because everyone in Pine-Breeze Village knows that location, it made him wonder if this kid is really a stranger since that location is very close to the south-gate!
If the young man hadn't seen this boy causing trouble many times in the past then he would've really doubted the validity of his own memory, especially when the man is aware about the ruckus this same young master caused when Rodd said that he's going to make Snow his personal maid so that she could warm his bed every night.
Afterwards Todd's grandson paid a certain gang to toss this child in the ancient-well, Pio still remembers the look on the faces of the members of that gang when he met them on his way to the local diner after duty yesterday morning.
Instead of how merry and amused they were around dusk the day before that, all six young men wore somber, grim, and serious expressions on their faces while exchanging hushed whispers.
"Hey! Stop daydreaming we still need to go to old Sid's shop to get some healing ointments for my hands," Aaron's voice stopped Pio's train of thoughts and the man quickly followed after the boy, "Lucky you, yours aren't as bad as mine." The young man blushed from shame when he heard these words from this strange, courageous, and really mysterious kid.
"So." Aaron said.
"Eh! W-what?" Pio frowned.
The boy glared back in annoyance and asked : "Do you know where it is?"
This time the young man nodded while smiling awkwardly before replying : "I Do, I do. Actually... it isn't that far from the south-gate." He stole a side glance at the boy's expression at the end but frowned when he didn't notice anything at all.
"Wait." Aaron stopped once Pio suddenly stood in front of him.
"Hahaha... I never expected for your senses to become so sharp after serving as a guard," Before he could ask what's going on the boy heard these words before more people joined the one who spoke and they too began to laugh, "Now be a good dog and get lost before we decide to give you a fate similar to the kid's." Then seven people appeared from behind the trees and moved quickly to surround them.
Aaron immediately turned around and shouted : "Run!"
The reason why he didn't even hesitate when making this decision is because he's not only wounded, but also their enemies outnumber them.
Not to mention the current state of both his HP and MP bars, the boy felt like cursing his reckless behavior when he saw the number 46 on his HP bar and 120 on his MP bar!
Pio wasn't angry at all when the kid ditched him and ran, in fact he was feeling gratified that the kid didn't foolishly decide to stand and fight or become overcome with fear and despair in this unfair situation against too many adults.
The young man tossed the long spear in his hand with all his power towards the gang member who attempted to follow the kid, thankfully his aim wasn't completely off with the heavy spear and it found its mark on the man's liver after pierced his back.
None of the gang members expected such a swift action from the boy or a fierce retaliation from the guard who unhooked the quiver of Arrows from his waist and let it drop to the ground while snatching an Arrow and removing the Bow from his shoulder.
"Watch out!" A slightly bigger man attempted to warn his men while jumping to hide behind a tree but one of his men received an arrow to the face and dropped to the ground with an expression of both shock and loss on his face.
"Aaah!" Before Pio could use the Bow to shoot another Arrow, he let go of the Arrow in his hand and leaned his upper body back to avoid the downward swing from the person who attempted to cut his hands.
The young man shoulder slammed the man away for space while removing his one-handed Sword from its scabbard, as it would seem during his attempt to evade the earlier swing from his enemy, Pio had the man's throat against the Bowstring while the Bow's curved wood at the gangster's back! The shoulder slam and the following strain from the Bowstring both crushed and slit the poor fellow's windpipe.
But this bodyguard wasn't aware that his following action was practically unnecessary in this situation against this vanquished enemy, he still delivered a piercing thrust with his sword before pushing him away with his foot.
Unfortunately the wasted effort gave his enemies a chance to gather closer and regroup, still... the wariness in their movement and fear within their eyes was clear when they looked at the young man who killed or mortally wounded three of them in less than ten seconds.
Pio carefully kept his eyes on his enemies while tightening his grip on the Sword in his hand while thinking to himself : 'Damn it, it really is difficult to hold a Sword with my hand in this state! I almost missed my thrust earlier.' Afterwards he looked at Rodd and said : "What's the meaning of this?" Since this spoiled young master is standing behind Lucas the leader of this Shadow-Dagger gang and the gang leader was clearly protecting Rodd.
Rodd was scared shitless when he witnessed Pio killing three gang-members and hid behind Lucas's wide back for extra protection when he heard this question, "Y-you still dare ask what's the meaning of this after killing three of my people?" The young man found his courage after seeing the guard not attacking them.
'Good. Keep talking, keep wasting time, this way young master Ron would be able to escape. Y-young master Ron!' In the beginning Pio was happy when these men focused all their attention on him instead of the boy who ran away, until he noticed the kid sneaking behind Rodd and Lucas.
This bodyguard almost felt like he's having a heart attack and his eyes widened from shock and fear.
Aaron cursed inside when the one to ruin his plans was his own ally and shouted : "Attack!" While sending an Energy Bolt towards Lucas's back and following with another Energy Bolt with the other hand and aiming it towards another member of the gang.
The boy left the closest gang member to Pio before dashing towards the man who got skewered by the spear, his eyes widened slightly at the effects both his Skills left once they struck human flesh.
The second target was thrown forward while spurting blood and torn innards from his mouth then fell to his knees while vomiting and choking on the rest, his back a mutilated mess of flesh and bones! the big man also coughed blood and fell to the ground but his back was practically fine... only his clothes were torn in that area and beneath it some sort of fine chainmail could be seen.
"Argh!" Lucas howled from pain and struggled to breathe while coughing copious amounts of blood, when the man looked back and glared at the boy he seemed like a demon!
'Fuck he's wearing some sort of inner vest to protect himself, that's cheating!' Aaron immediately felt threatened once his eyes met these bloodshot and extremely angry pair of eyes.
"Have another!" The boy quickly used his armpit to remove the spear from the dead man's body while firing another Energy Bolt at the big man's back.
This time Lucas was paying attention to everything Aaron did and tried to avoid the trajectory of that hand but the revolting thing about the attack from earlier was its lingering after-effect which paralyzed his body, by the time the big man moved a few inches to the left... he felt a burst of pain almost tearing his right-shoulder from his body and slamming his body to the ground.
Meanwhile Pio was cursing his bad luck because his opponent has pretty damn good Sword Skills! So far he was barely able to keep the Sword from flying out of his sore hands, obviously his opponent noticed this weakness and kept insisting on trading blows while smirking slyly.
"Whoa!" Finally Pio lost his footing during his retreat when his leg got caught on the body of his third victim, the one which got his windpipe crushed and thought to himself : 'This must be fate, that man must've felt indignant and cursed me after receiving such an awkward death.'
*Buff...*
When the young man closed his eyes thinking that his death is soon to arrive, a spray of hot liquid covered his face and he saw his opponent's stiff body falling towards him with an expression of pain, shock, and unwillingness all over his face.
Pio pushed the gang-member off of his body while feeling a mixture of both panic and relief before looking around searching for Aaron on this messy and unexpected battlefield.
The man gawked when he noticed Lucas kissing the ground with his head and almost drowning in his own blood, Rodd standing with his back to a tree to the side looking with both fear and panic at the boy aiming the tip of the spear at his throat and one of his hands towards Pio's fallen enemy.
"Come take your spear and watch that sissy for me would you." Aaron's voice sounded both cold and dark.
The young man facing the tip of the spear immediately soiled his pants once his eyes met with the frosty eyes looking at him from below.