"Y-you! W-what do you want? I-I'm warning you... my grandpa wouldn't forgive you if you kill me, I'm the only descendant he has." Rodd stuttered these words with the intention to threaten the boy but he sounded a lot like begging instead.
The young man kept stealing glances at Pio who followed the orders from this kid and pointed the tip of the spear at Rodd's neck as if it's the natural thing to do! 'Since when was this filthy butcher so formidable with the Spear, Bow, and Sword? He's nothing like the useless gate-guard who kept chasing the skirt of that whore of a widow Betty, that bitch does indeed know how to cook but she still refused to open her legs to me when I asked and left grandpa to handle the kitchen all alone with the rest of the idiots. Damn it, this is not the time or place to think about all that nonsense, I better keep my mouth shut and keep apologizing until I'm back in the village before I deal with these two. But who would've expected Lucas and his men to be so useless against these two? And what kind of sorcery was that? What did this brat Ron do to kill these two men and wound Lucas to this degree despite him wearing the Spider-Silk Vest?' Rodd's head was a mess of racing thoughts as he watched Aaron stop four meters away from Lucas and kneel on a single knee to watch the only person that survived his mysterious attacks.
Indeed Aaron was studying Lucas's body, he kept circling around the man and maintained a safe distance while assessing the degree of damage he received compared the two unarmed men.
While doing so the boy checked vitals of each of these "dead men" to confirm their death because he watched too many scary and "stupid" movies where similar situations did happen, it made him curse the ones who created and participated in making that nonsense.
Of course he gave these bodies a quick search and found a looped bundle of rope on the corpse of the man with half an Arrow sticking from his face, it was a bit difficult to turn the man on his belly to retrieve the rope without using the palms of his hands but his Strength was enough to do the job.
"Tie that fucker well or I'll but an extra hole up your ass if you don't." Aaron said while tossing the rope to Pio.
"Don't worry Young master, my knots are impossible to solve." The man immediately grabbed the rope and looked at Rodd while gesturing with the spear for him to kneel.
Rodd was about to open his mouth to say something to Pio when he saw an open palm pointed towards him from behind the man holding the spear, the young man immediately fell on both knees.
"Lie flat on the ground on your belly and hands behind your back, if you so as much twitch a muscle while he's tying your hands and feet... I'll cut one of your feet. Do it again and you'll lose a hand then the other foot after followed by the other hand and finally your head, let's see if you dare test my patience." The boy glared at the young man once he noticed Rodd trying to sneak a hand towards the hunting Blade on Pio's waist while the idiot was focused on preparing some knot!
Fear and panic surfaced on Rodd's expression when Aaron caught him attempting to steal the hunting Blade and he avoided eye-contact while doing as he was told.
Meanwhile Pio was furious when he caught up on what was about to happen, the man stepped on the back of his hostage while tying him up and gave no mind to the agony and pain each tug of tightening the knots affected the young man.
Aaron stood there watching it all happen while keeping a watchful eye on Lucas who's still unconscious.
"Poke him in the neck with your spear. If he's awake then we let him live, if he's out then let him go at peace into eternal sleep." The boy ordered his bodyguard once the man completed the task, he had a mysterious smile at the corner of his mouth.
Pio moved to do what he was told to do after delivering a ruthless kick to one of Rodd's kidneys! Clearly this young man was still beating himself over the momentarily loss of attention that almost cost him his life or led to him falling as a hostage to this coward and becoming a weakness for his young master in this situation.
"Cough! I-I'm awake. Ugh... huff, d-don't kill me! Huff... it w-was all Rodd, h-he's... huff, t-the one who paid me and... huff, m-my men to tease you about that girl Snow." Lucas coughed another load of blood when he heard what the boy said and thought to himself : 'This kid is really dangerous, very dangerous. I better not mess up with him, fuck Rodd, fuck Todd, and fuck this village. I don't even know what kind of witchcraft was I hit with earlier! That wasn't Soul power from the Sisterhood or Vital aura from the Barren Mountain.'
Seeing how the boy remained expressionless after hearing what he said, the gang-leader felt a chill creeping on his spine.
Lucas endured the chaotic pain from his innards and struggled to rise his body to sit up while saying : "I-I'm sorry... huff, I should've never listened to Rodd... huff. I regret everything I said... huff, I-I regret what I did." Lucas was gasping and struggling to breathe.
Aaron smiled and said : "And what did you do exactly?" Then willed Mana Armor and Magic guard to activate which left his MP bar with only 31 points remaining.
The three men were shocked when they saw the blue fairy sing and wave her staff towards the boy which covered his skin and layer of water before disappearing into thin air!
"Ah! I wasn't losing my mind earlier, it was all young master's doing." Pio felt the sweet release of solving this mystery.
"W-what are you?" Lucas muttered these words while feeling at a loss.
Rodd suddenly shouted : "He's a monster! It must be. The brat was always a hothead moron who would attack anyone at the slightest disagreement without considering the consequences, he changed completely ever since you threw him in the ancient-well." The more he spoke the more he felt confident in himself, "He must've been possessed by a ghost! That explains why he's able to do the things he's done."
Lucas fell silent and his face lost all color when he thought : 'What have I done?'
Pio frowned deeply until his forehead became a mess of lines while looking at Aaron who remained calm and smiling as if nothing said was related to him.
Finally Aaron opened his mouth to say : "Ghost huh! That's not the type of enemy I'd rather have in this life, nasty bunch indeed." Just when the three men thought that he's admitting that he's indeed a ghost, he continued : "But. Would a ghost possessing a little boy manage to escape the notice of a honorable Whispering Sister from the Sisterhood? Just consider it food for your thoughts."
Afterwards he glared at Lucas and said : "What... Did... You... Do... Exactly?"
This time the gang-leader understood that nothing good would come his way if he kept his mouth shut, "I accepted the payment from Rodd and told my men to provoke you, when you fell for the scheme we lured you outside the village and tossed you in the ancient-well to die."
Pio's anger flared when he heard Lucas admit what he's done and he pointed the spear at the man while feeling disgusted, he shouted : "Vile men like you don't deserve the honor of dying at young master Ron's hand, you lot don't even deserve to be buried like humans. I say let the beasts of the Dark Forest feed on their flesh and bones, let their blood nourish the trees."
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Rodd was feeling despair while regretting saying anything earlier when he saw the one he's trying to turn against the kid actually become much more loyal towards Aaron! Then Rodd's eyes met Aaron's and he felt the world swirling once he saw the boy smiling at him as if to say : "Hah, did you really think that you could turn things against me? You don't look too smart now!"
"No need to kill him, he's still useful to us." Aaron said to stop Pio from sticking the injured Lucas with his spear, seeing the man's unwilling expression Aaron continued to say : "Just disarm him of all his weapons and remove the Inner-Armor before tying him up."
"But we don't have any rope left." Pio said.
Aaron rolled his eyes at the man who quickly reverted back to his unimaginative-self, "Just strip him down first and make sure that he's unarmed before using some of these clothes to bundle him up good, I'll put a few extra holes in his body if he dares do anything funny on the way back."
Pio's pair of eyes shone brighter when he heard that excellent idea and he quickly followed the order, the man didn't care at all when he roughened the wounded Lucas while undressing him all the way down to his underwear.
Then Pio remembered how the boy managed to keep so much Coins hidden from him earlier, and he decided to leave nothing for the gang-leader to keep what's left of his dignity!
Aaron just laughed when he saw Lucas frown deeply while giving Pio a doubtful stare of wariness when he noticed the look of regret on the man when he looked at Rodd who's bundled tightly with ropes.
Pio was lamenting his decision of tying Rodd without stripping him first, he felt like he's not doing a good job in following the intentions of his young master!
"Alright, enough daydreaming." Aaron said, "Don't forget to gather everything of value from these men, and gather all of their bodies in that empty clearing over there when you're done." Afterwards Aaron looked at the two men currently help captive and continued to say : "I do have something to show to our guests here, I'm sure it'd be a wonderful surprise."
Pio smiled from excitement and began to laugh when the first man he killed had the same size of feet, immediately he took the pair of leather boots for himself since his poor feet had to undergo the previous fight while being bare.
Lucas and Rodd watched Pio whistle a happy tune while collecting weapons, coins, leather armor, pieces of clothes with above-average quality.
Afterwards Pio dragged the bodies by their feet while cursing at how heavy they're and how painful it was for his poor hands.
Soon a small pile of five dead bodies was stacked at the clearing.
"Good. Now come here and watch these two while I make my presentation." Aaron said, "Just stab them both to death if any of them moves a muscle, also stab them both to death if they close their eyes." This time Lucas and Rodd shuddered from fear when they heard what Aaron just ordered Pio to do.
'I wouldn't even blink, stop looking at me man!' Lucas thought.
'As I thought he's possessed by a ghost, he's going to call his ghost friends to possess these bodies. We're all going to die and become possessed by ghosts, Lucas you piece of shit. Look at what you've done, you've doomed us all to death!' Rodd thought while stealing a side-glance at the man next to him who's tied in a much uglier way compared to the handsome bundle which he's being wrapped in!
Next second the three men stared wide-eyed at the boy who summoned two fire balls from his hands and sent them flying towards the dead bodies of Lucas's fallen men.
*Boom*
An explosion happened and this time the scale of its influence was much wider compared to what happened in the first experiment, the bad news is what happened to the five corpses though.
'Oh crap!' Aaron thought when he saw the flaming chunks of human parts fly, everywhere! "Take cover." He shouted that advice while hiding behind a tree. 'This show was a mess, what an embarrassment! That was a complete and utter disgrace.' The boy laughed to himself when he imagined the fate of the three men if any of these fiery projectiles managed to strike true on any of their bodies, especially someone who's dressed sparely like Lucas for example.
"Ah!" Rodd's voice made him sound in pain, "Get it off me!" Now he was panicking while feeling helpless.
Just imagining how Rodd would try to evade while bundled like that was hell of a lot fun to consider!
Maybe the sissy of a man would "roll-along" with the projectiles and somehow managed to survive this scary event.
"Aargh!" This time it was Lucas's turn to taste the wonder of this special pain.
Finally the battering sound of the falling human body-parts stopped and Aaron dared to come out from his hiding spot, warily he quickly confirmed that nothing around his spot was on fire before calling : "Pio. You good?"
"Young master Ron. Y-you really shouldn't be playing with fire at this young age." Pio appeared a few seconds later with Lucas and Rodd ahead of him looking at Aaron both with fear and anger, the two of them suffered a few burns here and there but the overall damage was nothing major in the end.
'More like never! That fire hurts like nothing I've ever felt before, the two attacks from earlier were like a tickle compared to that bone-deep pain.' Lucas thought while trying to forget how a small graze from that flame made him feel helpless, as if he's confronted with something that's beyond his comprehension.
Aaron just laughed and said : "My bad, but I believe that this little show would be a lesson learned for our guests. If you behave yourselves then good, if you think that others could save you from me in the village then you better think again." Afterwards he looked at Pio and continued to say : "Take a quick look around and tell me if there's anything burning."
Lucas and Rodd weren't enjoying the awkward silence once they were left alone with the boy, these two men would rather spend their time around the big idiot instead of this smirking crazed child.
"Thankfully there isn't anything burning but I noticed something strange," Pio arrived a few minutes later and reported to Aaron who sat there to the side looking bored while watching the men and leisurely drinking water, "The body-parts were burning on top of flammable material yet the fire never spread, I kept watching it happen until one of these burning body-parts turned to ash. Afterwards I used the flint to make fire and those leaves caught fire in the blink of an eye!" Pio sounded really confused since both him and Aaron had a headache trying to put out the first flame.
'Is it because the target was different this time? I really need to experiment more and familiarize myself with my Skills until everything is completely under my control, I'm vulnerable to my enemies until I achieve that goal.' Aaron fell into deep thought for a short while before shrugging and replying : "Let's go back, I'm curious to see how Sera would handle these two. Today I might burn the whole village to the ground if I'm not satisfied." Afterwards he looked at Lucas and Rodd with a wide smile on his face.
"You heard young master Ron, move!" Pio barked the order once he hooked his arm to the line tied to the bundle where the trophies they earned after the battle are gathered.
"Stop calling me young master." Aaron barked his own order while rolling his eyes at Pio.
The man just smiled and followed the two prisoners who struggled to walk yet didn't mind the extra effort, every step they took closer to the village filled them with hope for a better fate.
Both of them wouldn't mind having to spend time alone in the dungeons if the alternative is being left to this kid to decide their fate on one of his frightening whims.
"How much money did we earn from these bums?" Aaron asked.
"About 14 Gold Coins." Pio answered and couldn't hide the pride from shining after the sun reflected on his teeth when he smiled brilliantly.
That radiant smile almost blinded Aaron who thought to himself : 'Fuck me! I'm nothing in comparison to these bastards when it comes to economic strength, but I'll gladly inherit all their wealth since they dared aim to take my pure soul.' Afterwards he muttered : "I never thought that these weapons and equipment would earn us that much."
Pio struggled to contain his laughter when he heard what his young master said and he looked back towards Aaron before making a unique gesture with his fingers and saying : "That's where you're mistaken. We made a pure profit of 14 Gold Coins, these weapons and equipment on the other hand are worth more than 50 Gold Coins give or take a few silver. Meanwhile this Vest is a priceless treasure on its own, I reckon it's worth a few hundred Gold Coins... at least!"
Lucas's eyelid twitched when he heard this ignorant fellow's appraisal of his Spider-Silk Vest and thought to himself : 'More like ten-times as much! Just locating the Broodmother amidst a clutter of Turtle-Arachne's was terribly dangerous, not to mention actually collecting the Jade-Webs without alerting the freaking group of beasts. Then going through the trouble of finding an expert Tailor to thread this extremely valuable Silk into the fitting shape of a Vest.' Of course it hurt more when the gang-leader couldn't voice these thoughts.
Just when Lucas was thinking in a more positive way since it's possible for him to buy his Vest back for cheap if these two morons sold it for cheap of course, not to mention that this gang-leader would have to break the bank if he's ever going to achieve this aim of his! Lucas heard Aaron admonishing Pio and saying : "That vest is mine, I plan to remodel it to a fine robe that fits my size. Not for sale, no sir."
Actually Aaron first thought about remodeling the Vest into some underwear but the idea of wearing silky and transparent underwear made him decide on choosing different material later when it's time for a shopping spree.
A few minutes later the group reached the south-gate and the twenty-something guards were shocked when they saw their comrade Pio leading his prisoners into the village.