Hidden Gem

"Mm... Okay, I agree! What do I need to do?" Ciemnosc responded with such words right away, quickening his steps forward and looking at the book with his right index finger pointing directly down at it suggestively and his right arm almost fully extended out. Old man Apegos's left corner of his mouth twitched thrice in just a moment, a record-like thingie, before pointing at the book but not finding words. He suddenly picked it up and slammed it against the worktable on his left which his wheelchair's back was against.

Bam, flip flip flip flip flap~!

“Here!” - “Here?” The old man shouted, almost a scream and a rough one, opening the book, and selecting a very long paragraph, and pointing at it with his left index finger becoming crooked from the force put on it. Ciemnosc looked at the whole 2 pages from the book and finally at the long paragraph on the second page of the fully opened book, pointing at it as well a few inches beside the old man Apegos’s finger and bedding his back a little, his face turned towards the old man’s and innocently asking.

“Yes!!” Old man Apegos screamed this time, nodding forcefully as his face seemed relaxed after doing so, but just for a moment before becoming grumpy once more. On the other hand, Ciemnosc’s eyes darted between the page and the old man’s Apegos’s face once before asking once more, “Really here?”

“Read it,” the old man’s Apegos’s voice became calm, scaringly calm alright. Ciemnosc nodded a few times, slowly, before warning him. “I’m gonna read it then.”

“Yes, go ahead, read it. Go on, kiddy.” Old man Apegos said again, appearing not affected by the scene unfolding with them as its actors right now. Ciemnosc topped off once more though, his tone really, really cautioning in a good nature. “I’m really gonna read it, eh.”

“Then read; carefully.” Old man Apegos was unhinged as well, though. Ciemnosc grabbed the right corner of the first page with his left hand and the left corner of the second page, “I am really am gonna am read am it.”

“Oh, what. You don’t know how to read? Can’t be. You have an Identification Token, then…you dare not read something you won’t even understand a single couple of words from? Ignorant?” Old man Apegos almost lashed back at Ciemnosc, who then looked side-eyed towards the left at the old man and said with a slightly warm, humble tone. “Ah, that can’t be~. I do have both eyes to read, don’t worry.”

Old man Apegos: ᕕ(╯°□° )ᕗ ヽ(ﾟДﾟ)ﾉ ( ⁰д⁰) ⊂（゜Д゜ ⊂… (｢ ⊙Д⊙)｢ (ﾟдﾟ；)

“JUST FUCKING READ IIIIIII~~T!!!” Old man Apegos fumed out, making Ciemnosc’s ears actually hurt, feeling like he could go dizzy any time soon, even possibly passing out. But while all that was going on, Ciemnosc smiled with victory and glory, honor and bitches on his side as he took the whole book in his hands and hopped on to sit on top of the worktable. His knees were the support of the book as Ciemnosc leaned it backwards appropriately to read it with the light hitting on it, expertly as if he had done like that for ages. He didn’t need the light to see even his tiniest fingerprints’ smallest features in absolute darkness, but he gained such habits after spending so much time dating his girls back then.

“...?” Old man Apegos, his kinda pale white skin losing its sudden reddening, looked on at Ciemnosc’s face as he moved his head left and right; he then looked at the whole book before returning his eye at Ciemnosc. The book itself was ⅔’s of Ciemnosc’s height, while each page was half a Ciemnosc, and that was the longest and most complicated paragraph in the whole book known as the most archaic, ancient, but advanced of all.

The brown hide, wasted by the time, remained old man Apegos of possibly his past self, that time when he once was a little kid as well, but… He was sure that not even he had such enthusiasm, and even more sure that despite being the second most renowned Craftsman in the entire history of the Self-Mutilating Honores Sect, he wasn’t easily reading through it as Ciemnosc currently was with his eyes not becoming any tiny bit troubled.

“...Done!” After what was not even 60 seconds, Ciemnosc lowered the book on his lap and looked to his right, below, towards old man Apegos’s face, which was still dully lost with his left eye unfocused.

“Eh- arh? Done already? Eh, already?!” Old man Apegos put his palms against his wheelchair’s armrests as if intending to stand up, naturally not being able to. Ciemnosc looked at such but ignored such and flatly nodded, “Mn, I have. Any questions? Anything to test me with, eh?”

Old man Apegos remained silent before facing Ciemnosc, who was on top of the worktable; then, a short serious questionnaire began. It was supposed to be long and arduous, but the old man himself wasn’t even able of comprehending the long paragraph, let alone make a full test about it.

When old man Apegos asked about the sophisticated paragraph in about the 34th line and the kind of exotic ideology it described, Ciemnosc described about there not being anything such as an ideology anywhere in the text and that it was only written in that way because the author was surely attempting to relax his mind after having written tedious and dull but necessary processes and experiences about something really important.

It took the old man a few minutes of pondering, which was not for realizing that Ciemnosc read the rest of the other page but from Ciemnosc’s answer, for the old man Apegos to finally realize that Ciemnosc did read through both pages.

But in the next question, the old man asked about the thoughts he gained when he read the last paragraph, which the author used to express all of his heart and praise for the future generations as he was nearing his death; he was in accordance with it and even longed for this book to at least help a little to those Craftspeople in the future.

Yet, Ciemnosc said that that was the author not giving an ‘emotion speech’ but raging at how the decadence of the entire Craftspeople of back then, wherever it was, and hoping that whoever read this book would at least try to carve for their own path. Once again, old man Apegos was exhausted mentally by the answer, pondering and only being able to proceed to the next.

The next, the next, the next, and then the next… In the end, all of what old man Apegos knew of the long paragraph he and his whole, long inheritance of the Craftspeople of the Self-Mutilating Honores Sect have been worshiped for hundreds of thousands of years…became a sweet, wettest but oh so foolish dream.

“...Old man, Apegos? Old man Apegos?” Ciemnosc tilted his head to the left, questioning the old man to see if he was still lucid. He couldn’t just lose his brand new teacher like this, right? The old man felt something weird being off, so he raised his head, only to see Ciemnosc look around at the little study and observe everything around with rapt intrigue.

“Have you heard of array formations?” The old man Apegos’s question intrigued Ciemnosc, who turned his face at regular speed to meet his eye, then nodded with both his lips gone into his mouth and the tip of his tongue licking them, looking pretty much bored.

“Call me, sigh, call me Elder Apegos; just that, kid.” The old man rubbed his right temple with his index and middle finger, seemingly making an already known massage for his old head. Ciemnosc nodded once more, coming down the worktable, and moved towards another worktable with different stuff on it than the one he sat on and that the book with brown hide was left on.

“...” Observing Ciemnosc as he rummaged through tools, delicate and tough ones before carefully inspecting them, old man Apegos had his one eye gain some shine, looking at the little boy as if he was to become bigger and older and then show the world what Craftspeople could do.

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“You’ll come here every 4 days. I’ll assess your current abilities and practical knowledge. Every 4 days, I’ll give you several experiments, jobs, and even some homework for you to complete, all in due time. Understood?” Elder Apegos’s voice reached Ciemnosc’s ears right away, making them slightly fickle in case he wanted to shout badly; ah.

“Mn, will I be starting now?” Ciemnosc put the few glasses back in their place and asked Elder Apegos, his face blatantly expecting a ‘right now’ answer. Without letting down the little boy with a rather tall height; still, Elder Apegos said with a defeated, low voice. “Ah. And bring that sword as well, or whichever weapon you’ve got that is as good as that one.”

“Is it valuable?” Looking at the ordinary sword, top notch though, Ciemnosc disbelievingly pointed at it and asked Elder Apegos, who looked at him weirdly and spoke in a weirded out tone. “Of course it is!”

After exclaiming, Elder Apegos’s Spirit Sense moved to the wheels of his wheelchair, and it began moving towards Ciemnosc, “Such a fine and delicate sword is too rare to see among the battles even against another of the 3 strongest organizations.”

‘Whata…really?’ Ciemnosc looked at his sword as if he was looking at a girlfriend that a teenage boy let go of and suddenly realized she was a keeper and that has loved him still even as they spoke. Ciemnosc looked with fully opened eyes at Elder Apegos before returning his gaze to the sword, thinking of what the old man would think if he knew…heheheh.

“Now, get that thing off your back. I will be having you walk left and right through this tiny place. It doesn’t matter if it’s ‘one with your body’ or something; at least put some respect for both vocations when you work on them.” Elder Apegos said, pointing to a worktable in the distance before directly moving towards it. Ciemnosc hopped towards the large desk that began 10 meters in front of the door all the way to the wall on the other side.

The ceiling and walls were simply of rock, while the floor had a ceramic touch and appearance but looked to be made of the most ‘polished’ and ‘refined’ light brown dirt to ever exist.

Before long, both an old man and a little boy began working togetherç, but ‘working together’ as in one teaching without mercy and the other learning without consideration for the other’s pride. Whenever Ciemnosc touched a tool he wasn’t told to even look at, Ciemnosc would break a metallic ruler after being slapped with it on the back of his hands and arms for the 3rd time. Which Elder Apegos became used to and began changing them left and right before throwing them to a smelter.

He could recycle them without needing to waste them by just throwing them away after all. Slowly, Ciemnosc stopped being such a rebel against the heavens and began understanding such ‘punishment’, as he began recognizing the tools he had already memorized, this time more than just knowing their names but more like…more like feeling their very, utmost foundational properties of each.

After such an exercise was done, and as Ciemnosc was even beginning to form ideas on how to approve of all these tools and for the use they could possibly have, Elder Apegos began once again making Ciemnosc go through memorizing and understanding - but this time, with materials, minerals; resources of all kinds

Ciemnosc was patient now, somehow looking not like a child anymore and with his face becoming relaxed. When he began sorting out these whole items as they were being taught, one by one, and making Elder Apegos sweat. Hence, just as Elder Apegos was changing to another few sets and batches of different items, Ciemnosc took a rest with his right elbow on the surface of the table supporting his chin…letting a breath out with his chest feeling spacious.

It felt different from learning alone with very limited, minimal resources to with a teacher who ‘had it all’; seemingly.

An hour later, Ciemnosc was still full of energy. He was even hopping around somewhat with his legs as he waited for Elder Apegos to finish introducing him to the steps to completing a simple and ordinary little part that is within each vehicle that is all around the sect’s territory moving at 200 km/h to 300 km/h. The latter number being the highest of course; more or less.

It was a one-part only per vehicle and it was also kinda the reason they could work well. Ciemnosc couldn’t complete it, only craft and assemble it. But the final touch was the creation of an array that was useful for granting it exactly what the vehicles needed to not be suicidal sons of bitches bringing others down with them.

Once Elder Apegos was finished explaining, his sweat and down feelings eased up lightly. He moved away with his wheelchair and watched Ciemnosc, who was waiting at his command to begin. Once Elder Apegos drove his wheelchair atop the large desk at the front of the study, Ciemnosc was looking up at him with his body facing the worktable, and his face turned to look at him.

“Begin!”

Pat ta ta ta tata, crull~rol rol…

As soon as the word was given, Ciemnosc’s hands that were against the edge on his side of the worktable shot towards a couple of tiny of black cylinders that were deep in the middle of the worktable’s storage. He took them out and let them roll a bit while he grabbed a needle that looked like a gungnir with a rounder bottom that smoothly became thinner than any needle he has ever seen.

Ciemnosc brought the needle to one of the tiny cylinders and placed it atop each the other with his left hand, the needle went through the middle of both cylinders as it penetrated down, and its rounder lower half became thinner and thinner as the needle became larger and larger until a whole arm’s length thinnest needle ever whose volume Ciemnosc had barely gotten used to before in the exercises and could hence successfully follow this very first step of hundreds.

After doing so, he retracted the needle, and it went back to its resting form with its lower half becoming rounder once again. Ciemnosc stored the needle and then lifted the cylinder below, when he did, both cylinders were lifted and even after balancing it around, it didn’t fall off at all.

‘Eah.’ Elder Apegos nodded, his mouth opening a little and showing his teeth. A bit of a vulgar-ish expression, but he appeared to have simply become satisfied with his new but actually first student’s experimentation amidst his first try; falling was just the norm.

Ciemnosc then took a huge, circular black metal plate of a whole 75 cm in radius, placed it on the worktable, and then took out a pistol-like thingie which was about the size of his hand. It looked quite futuristic, but villager-country bumpkin Ciemnosc got used to it very quickly already. He opened its upper back lid and introduced a tinier Inferior Powerful Stone in it that was stored before in a small drawer at the side of the worktable.

Then, putting on some glasses that neatly covered the light that came from all around his eyes and not just in front, he aimed it at the extremes of the black metal plate, forming the shape of a gear but leaving the center of it untouched to a mere 13 centimeters in radius.

Once he was done with it, which the small pistol shot out energy with its outer perimeter being straight out blue and the middle and clashing bouts of energy of it against the black metal of a very light blue color; it was a wonderful sight but that Ciemnosc could not care for at the moment as he was dearly focused on following with the steps and the next ones already.

Step after step, taking out several tools at once, not hesitating to do so and even failing somewhat; but from which in those mistakes and errors he committed, they were repairable and Ciemnosc directly amended. As such, those times he failed in a thing or two were basically negligible, and the watching Elder Apegos could only become more and more tense the more he saw Ciemnosc amend each of his messing ups one after another, fearing that he’d be unsuccessful at any given time.

Fortunately and unfortunately for Elder Apegos, however, Ciemnosc failed not to amend such messes he made, which granted a sigh of relief coming from the balcony-wannabe that is the large desk. And at the same time, it was Elder Apegos the only one who suffered through these times of holding his breath, heart quickly beating, and sweat rapidly rolling down.

When it came to a brutal moment where one needed their Spirit Sense to be guided so as to make the assembling ‘make sense’ after lots and lots of energy were used to fuse, merge and cut off as well as slice many materials used in this job; Ciemnosc purposely became much slower than he even knew he could, mentally putting a note in his brain to train his Spirit Sense the same way he did with his physical raw strength.

As a result, Elder Apegos had to stop himself from shouting Ciemnosc to let it go and to take a rest because even if he didn’t finish it, it would serve as the most memorable experience in his life even if he gets to surpass himself.

However, in the end, what won against Elder Apegos’s anxiousness and fear of a talent losing spirit and hope was Ciemnosc’s final result on that step, successfully completing it and mercilessly smoothly continuing all the way until he finished it.

Clank clank clank, clank clank…clank!!

… Ciemnosc was using a tiny hammer to assemble the whole piece of work altogether for the fifth time, just as a precaution. Once he was over giving it the last hammering down, he took out his protective glasses, grabbed it, and lifted it up to his face before roughly checking it. He then lifted it above his head and turned towards Elder Apegos, who was moving his head as if to look better, before looking at Ciemnosc’s eyes with his only one instead and nodding with a straight face.

…