A Few Days' Worth Of Rest

Ciemnosc looked down at his hands, the ones that were now holding a book, it wasn't so thick but they did have a lot length and wide that they could very well almost be the size of Ciemnosc's torso in the future once he was a young man - if he at least managed to not die before that that is. It was given to him by Tini just after finishing the little bit of exploration, though it had to be said that her trust in him to say so many things about her life and the academy's secret that he was sure only some knew for sure... helped a lot to Ciemnosc in terms of acclimatizing.

And now, with her still on his left, she slowly led him by grabbing his left wrist once again and dragged him towards the somber green colored buildings with peaceful floral designs. They were slowly walking there, the monument no longer cloaked by a mantle as she let Ciemnosc have his own time reading through Lady Calisneia’s ‘diary’. Which, according to Tini herself, it isn’t really such a personal thing as a diary but still the large notebook in which Lady Calisneia wrote her life’s events in a certain brief but detailed way.

‘Hmmm…’ Ciemnosc was reading through a certain way too advanced part of the notebook, having ‘skimmed’ over the first few hundred pages altogether and gotten quite around the middle of the whole ‘diary’, when he came across a particular set of a few notes…

‘It says that one day before deciding to marry Esplendo, Lady Calisneia had a vision… And that’s all?’ Ciemnosc was confused as he saw the suspensive points at the end of the word ‘vision’ in Lady Calisneia’s notes. He couldn’t perceive any deteriorated paper or waste by time itself, it was as if she just…

“Tini, why does this seem incomplete but not… at the same time?” Ciemnosc directly asked the descendant of said Lady. She in return gave a single glimpse through the open notebook and then began with a voice filled with light mystery~. “Oha, so you are there already. Here’s the thing, a a a ahem!”

“Actually, Lady Calisneia wrote this when in front of the actual founders of the Rocaloi Academy. She did so way before Lady Calisneia disappeared.” As she spoke to her Ciemnosc looked at her once more and asked, “Disappeared? What happened to her? I thought she didn’t disappear, did she not… die?”

“Aaah~!” Tini exclaimed, therefore nodding with only her left index finger projected towards him, “Well… here’s the thing - once again, ahem.”

“After the academy was founded, as you know, the last eminence alive, many, years. I think the real number of years is about a few tens of thousands of years, after the eminence Esplendo died a thousand and few hundred years after getting married to Lady Calisneia who not only lived so long but also kept her youth - that she also wrote this last part in front of the founders of the academy.”

“But because of the fear of the major organizations, as I’ve told you before, despite the almost half a hundred thousand years of preparation in which Lady Calisneia gave it her all, just for the founders to end up turtling themselves in this array that doesn’t even belong to her. Let alone those founders; in the end, she just left the academy, and there’s nothing else left of her in our records nor in any history records across the world…”

Tini had a frown on her eyebrows, looking more confused than beautiful and more striking than enticing. She then muttered slightly while almost arriving before the 2 buildings, “There are 2 theories that have remained from the foundation of our academy up until today.”

“One: Lady Calisneia became so ashamed and depressed from the Rocaloi Academy that she decided to go across the world and settle down until she also reached her lifespan. It had to be said that she traveled a lot even while preparing for so long to make this academy worthwhile. Imagine, working tens of thousands of years to prepare for the - this - academy’s future, only to suddenly have little ants take over your precious hard work and say different things… laying waste to all that you’ve built and so passively at that.”

“Mmm…” Ciemnosc nodded slightly as he hummed, his feet and legs moving in the same rhythm as Tini’s, who was more at ease with him now but still treated him politely. Still, this image of their legs and feet swinging up and down and reaching the floor of the platform as well as stepping up from it was comically relaxing from an afar point of view.

“And the second one: Lady Calisneia… actually went outside of this world!”

“?” Ciemnosc looked at her, trying to see her face up front, but she was looking at the sky with crazy admiration. This one theory was definitely the one that not only she chose to believe, but everyone and anyone who could know of this story would hope for. Because if it was themselves in such a situation, it would be just like this how they would want their lives to go on.

“Hmm.” Ciemnosc nodded, this time more regularly as he hummed more concisely and his darkest eyes for pools went lower to gaze at the platform.

Step, step step, step step, step, step step- step step.

He looked down until there were suddenly a few vines going here and there over the little fence around the building that could very well be the one used for resting when going back to their actual rooms would be too troublesome or so.

“Here we are,” Tini said as she stopped walking. Ciemnosc also stopped walking forth at the same time and looked up. As he looked up at the building, Tini yelled towards it, “Older Brother~~! Our third member is here, come out already!”

“Older Brother is silent and grumpy whenever he goes around and meets the students or even the academy’s staff, hehe.” After yelling, Tini directly turned her head right to Ciemnosc and started briefly explaining her Older Brother to him. “He might be a bit like this, but he was the one to put the mantle today while you were getting ‘Geniusaed’ at the Mission Request & Acquisition building, so he is really nice inside, see?”

Crack~.

The door to the building opened, and an old man came out of it. Going by the description and quick explanation of the academy’s 2 eminences secret, this Older Brother must be really old and nearing the end of his lifespan while Ciemnosc also felt his cultivation being high at the Obsidiafying realm stages but not at the peak still.

“...” - “...” The silent ones took the time of their lives to look at each other in the eye, or at least it was so in the eyes of Tini, who looked at her 2 ‘brothers’ finally meeting!

The little one looked up, as the old one was really old and tall to boot. Despite having his enormously different body to other… ’ordinary’ humans grow so much at such a young age, Ciemnosc kept on finding people that were ‘similar’ in that way to him also belonging to the Human Race. He couldn’t help but pout mentally for a few seconds as they looked at each other. After a few more seconds, their gaze ended with the old one speaking out loud.

“Is that you, Ciemnosc? The Genius of the academy?” Older Brother seemed not used to light, his eyebrows had already sunk, and his eyes narrowed quite. Ciemnosc shrugged his shoulders in slow motion and just looked back at the oldie without saying anything in return and maintaining their fixated eye contact still.

“The one who is supposed to bring us to great glory, not just us but the ent- agh, stop looking at me! Alright, alright…” The old one kept on talking, still with a loud and now increasingly serious voice, before suddenly yelling out loud even louder while covering his eyes with his left arm as if Ciemnosc’s eyes were suns making his eyes cry.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Hee hee hee!” Finally having a victor, Tini laughed as she remained on the side, supporting her elbow on the fence and looking at the old and new males in the workshop from hereon. Ciemnosc looked at Tini noncommittally and ‘I don’t know’ed with his hands towards her, before hearing Older Brother speak again.

“Ugh, you are tough, I see, I… just call me Older Brother like you’ve heard Lil’ Nini speak before.” The old one said Ciemnosc looked back at the old man just as ‘normally’ as always before nodding, “Mn, I am Ciemnosc, pleased to meet Older Brother. Then, I just wonder about something. Did you, in the past, mayhaps… called Tini not ‘Nini’ but ‘Titi’ instead?”

“Puchi…”

The not so clear-headed Older Brother: （´＿｀;） Σ(｀L_｀ ) ｜−・;）

“Oh, nono- hahahahaha, nono! Come hearrre~!” Tini stepped up and stopped Older Brother from hiding back into his building, dragging Older Brother with her small but hard working hands grabbing around his left elbow and out of the damn building again. Laughing like tinkling bells nonstop, the young girl alleviated both silent ones’ chests and moods.

“Ahem, once, but I realized about it… though it was too late and I ended up saying it to her.” Older Brother responded at last. The second half of his words were muttered as silently as possible, but he of course knew they could be heard by both Tini and Ciemnosc. Older Brother just wasn’t willing to admit it ‘out loud’ instead.

“Uhm, oh, okay,” Ciemnosc said, his hands clasping together a little. “Sorry, I was just curious about it so I asked.”

“Sigh…” Older Brother could only sigh, Tini smiled brilliantly, and Ciemnosc just looked at them lifelessly.

“Well Ciemnosc,” Older Brother started another conversation about his own mental health. He looked at Ciemnosc and began speaking with a more ordinary tone and volume, also with his left hand on his hip while the right one pointed towards the boy. “I wish you the best and the best luck, kid. This academy is asking for a lot from just 1 person. But this academy needs it, and I am too old and nearing my end to care about the academy’s mess anymore.”

“Oh, Tini has told me many things at last.” Ciemnosc nodded at Older Brother, still looking around and at them in the same normal way as always. But seeing Ciemnosc not fazed by the heavy weight on his shoulders right now, Older Brother bitterly smiled, though just for a mere second and a half, and without looking for what a smile should naturally look like.

“I’ve heard of the architecture problem? I can solve that, you just have to tell me if you want something in particular… It’ll also keep me busy and not bored these few days before going out to hunt.” Ciemnosc added, and Older Brother’s left eyebrow was raised. Though it looked more like a normal eyebrow now as if his eyebrows were in general that low, to begin with. “Hunt? Missions, you mean?”

“Oh, it’s the same.” With his slightly pale face, Ciemnosc made a cute circle with his slightly pale lips and casually answered, not nervous one bit.

“Mmm,” Older Brother looked deep into Ciemnosc’s eyes. And Ciemnosc could tell even without his Spirit Sense how incredible this oldie’s Spirit Sense is compared to any other Obsidiafying realm cultivator alive, as gramma Jing Zhu is now gone.

“Well yea! Sure!” Tini directly exclaimed out loud after thinking hard for a good while when hearing Ciemnosc and sensing how serious he was in helping on this matter. She looked at her Older Brother for a time as if remembering the words he just spoke, her face then becoming a bit less excited as she, in Ciemnosc’s eyes, tried to act all mature and grown-up little girl.

“Ciemnosc, I’d like a very long but not too widespread part in the middle, with empty spots to walk through in the middle and at the north and south at their respective center. Oh! Some trees will be very nice! There’s basically no green up here, only the places where everyone from all ages hooks up have some bushes to hide here and there, but nobody with a right mind, or without their selected partner, go there under any ‘other’ circumstances… Ahem.”

“Mn, trees, okay. What else?” Ciemnosc nodded, taking notes in his notebook and using his pen which was all made of air making Tini’s smile even grander. Tini began stepping up and down with each foot in intervals as she began adding…

“Oh right! And some iron fences around the trees, I want to see some Creatures too, and in-between Older Brother’s buildings and mine I want for there to be a large amount of green where our Creature pets can come and go, while another place for mount and the like!”

“Oh, also some little places to rest, like benches, chairs, lonely chairs but chairs around tables too! And I want another floor for my soft building. I want to have one place to rest and another to do some little thingies that are fun to do, and I can do when I need to waste time and there isn’t another method waiting for me to make magic.”

“Mmmm, I’d also like new different paving and roadways. You are for sure gonna get the platform pathways wider and changed in the future if you’re really good. I wanna let you have your own side at the east with all the empty space there for you. Use as much as you want. You are an all-around after all, go ahead Cici!”

“Decorations of some ordinary animals there, some mythical ones here… I want a ballerina shadow image at this place. My mommy was a dancer, and I, uh…” Tini went on and on, taking the remaining half the noon of the day and a bit of the afternoon.

Throughout the entire time, she spouted thing after thing of what she had wanted and, hell, she even dragged a huge map that seemed to be done by the best cartographer in the world. Whereas Ciemnosc ended up knowing her father was pretty much the one whom she got the habit of drawing anything from while she blushed and meekly spoke of those she didn’t even have time to speak with herself like a child to her parents how it was all supposed to be.

… In the end, Tini demonstrated to Ciemnosc her layout map of the platform of how she wanted to see it, with traces of erasing and re-drawing here and there nonstop, which could be the proof of her childhood self having evolved to her teenage self of today. Though one of them, which was at the center in the middle between her 2 buildings and Older Brother’s 2 buildings, seemed to be erased completely recently: recently.

As such, Tini went back to her soft building with her large drawn-out layout, leaving the 2 males on their own, speechless and even more so for Older Brother, who looked complicated while watching her departing back enter her soft building to finally rest until the next day - where more hard work would occupy her young mind and free time.

“Ah.. this… Ciemnosc, may I bother you with something else?” While Older Brother spoke of the things he wanted before Tini the Great Rambler of words could go on and on without getting tired, and when she went into her soft building to get her layout map of the entire platform. Ciemnosc stopped his backward steps and looked at Older Brother, who finally, at last was going to say the word.

“Ah… Can you… can you make a sort of ice cream machine? You know, one that operates automatically but makes it all for you? Of many flavors, ah, this is the list. And very big, as if… there was a need for there to be at least 500 portions each day?” Older Brother said these words feeling complicated, but also determined. Ciemnosc could only raise his right eyebrow in askance, but he took the little, yet long as hell, paper with the list of flavors.

“Is uh… Since young, I didn’t let Lil’ Nini have any ice cream, I was worried she would not understand that I could die any decade from her own childhood. I know she… I now know she does but, well, even though I know you are here now, we’ve just made you. And I definitely don’t want to miss her first taste of… i-ice cream…”

“...” Hearing Older Brother speak, Ciemnosc kept quiet, as ultimately cold, serene, and lifeless with his eyes as always, and his slightly pale skin color didn’t help making his appearance approachable in the slightest. But, when Older Brother finished his words, Ciemnosc spoke with a lil’ nod. “I understand. In the next few days I can get that done. Well, everything, really.”

“I see… Will you be needing any help?” Older Brother nodded several times in a row before asking. His voice, his natural voice wasn’t rough or friendly so to speak. It was just old, but he spoke simply so nicely that it sometimes didn’t seem to Ciemnosc as if he was talking to an oldie.

“No, I’ll do it all, I mostly need to nowadays; anyways…” Ciemnosc said those words while looking directly into Older Brother’s eyes, and Older Brother seemed to be allowed to look into Ciemnosc’s eyes; maybe deeper or maybe just a bit longer, but that made Older Brother feel as if he got a tiny bit of Ciemnosc in himself - and all he could feel was a raging, cold, hollowness.

Step, step, step…

“Ugh…” By the time Older Brother realized Ciemnosc was stepping back onto the landing zone for Creatures where one only needed to press a button and a specially selected Creature would come here if it or they were free, Older Brother was feeling incredibly annoyed and uncomfortable from feeling such things from the boy.

Only when he shook his body as if he was just feeling frustrated with himself did Older Brother feel those things wash away from his old body, a very utterly strange sensation tingling in the deepest of himself. And it was just not fear…

‘??’ But when Older Brother looked once more at the landing zone for Creatures of the Creature-renting services, Ciemnosc was nowhere to be seen. While one of the Creatures he could recognize, allowed to come here, was barely starting to show itself from far away and making its way here while the night descended upon the whole world at the same time.

…