Chapter 113: System talk and brunch
Felix Sythias’ POV (continued):
Dad’s expression turned to confusion, then to suspicion. “Don’t tell me…” he said, but I spoke over him.
“We might have, very accidentally, caused that,” I said, the words almost stumbling out of my mouth. “We were trying to open the door, and there was this big glowy orb-thingy in the center, and I poured some mana into it to open it. Which it did! But then it also—”
“Whoah, calm down Felix,” dad said, gently putting his hand on my snout to shut me up. “You’re not in any trouble, just please calmly explain what happened.”
I removed his hand and took a deep breath. “We found an exit, but we needed to open the door, and Alex’s new Path gave us a hint that we needed to channel some mana into the orb—which I’m guessing is core #82 from the global message—at the center of the room. I did so, and it… kind of came alive. It’s the only way I can describe it. It was like the mana came alive. It grew on its own, gaining intensity, creating more mana and funneling it away. Which is when we got the notification.”
Dad blinked. “Could you describe how the ‘core’ looked?”
“Um, sure. It was just a dull crystal ball, maybe a bit blue, but otherwise not very remarkable,” I said, then turned to Alex. “Did I miss anything?”
Alex thought for a moment, then nodded. “The pillar it was set in was really creepy. It was like it was made of metal vines and tendrils crawling down from the ceiling.”
I nodded, that was true.
Dad leaned back in his chair, thinking. He had that look in his eyes he always had when he was thinking of the past—somewhat nostalgic with a mix of relief he wasn’t living that life anymore.
“Do you recognize the description?” I asked.
Dad didn’t answer and instead grabbed a pen and sketched out the room we’d just been talking about. It had more detail than we had described, and some things we’d outright forgotten to mention, like the height of the room. And at the same time, it was different. The room was of the same design, but not the room we’d been in.
“You’ve also been in one?” I asked him.
He nodded. “Once,” he said, but before he continued, he glanced at Alex. “It’s quite personal, do you mind it if your friends hears?”
I shook my head. “No, that’s fine. Whatever it is, Alex can know.”
“Right, so, you know how I always tell that story of how I found your egg after it was washed downstream by a storm?” he asked.
Slowly, I nodded, not sure if I liked where he was going with this. “I do.”
“That’s… not exactly how it happened,” he said. “There was a storm, and it did bring me your egg, but that’s not the whole story. I was on a mission to retrieve an artifact at the time, and it led me to a room much like the one you described. I just got the thing I was there for and got out, but on my way out, the underground river that flowed through that cave surged and your egg hit me over the head. When I came to, again, I was outside with your egg.”
I frowned. “That’s odd for sure,” I said. “Also, why didn’t you just tell me the real story? Why did you hide it?”
Dad winced a little. “It isn’t so much that I hid it from you specifically, it’s just that I didn’t want to look like an idiot to my friends at the time, and the story just… kind of stuck. I never figured it was of too much importance.”
I sighed. “I suppose it doesn’t really matter. So, do you remember where this cave was?”
He nodded. “I do, but why do you want to know?”
I shrugged. “I’d like to visit it sometime, maybe figure out where I came from. And I wonder if we can’t reactivate another part of the System,” I said, then glanced at Alex. “To be honest, I really want to see if repairing the broken parts of the System won’t fix mine. I’ve been thinking about it ever since I received that global System message.”
Alex glanced back at me with concern. “Didn’t you say you were fine?”
“I am,” I said, a little unsure, then repeated the statement with more conviction. “If I really am Systemless, I’m okay with that, as much as it sucks. But if I’m not, then what’s preventing me from using it? Having a System but not being able to use it is so much worse than just not having one at all. It's been on my mind for the last few days, and if I have a possible path to explore, to find a reason, I want to take that path.”
Dad nodded. “Alright, I’ll tell you,” he said, and I grinned, before he dashed my hopes. “But only if—and I do mean if—you gain enough strength. I can sense you’ve somehow become stronger than when I left—you have more mana, and your muscle density is just a touch higher—so continue doing whatever it is you were doing, and if I deem you strong enough, I’ll tell you where to go. But I’m not sending you out, just to get killed.”
I nodded, my excitement having faded a little. “Alright, that’s fair.”
Stolen story; please report.
Alex put a hand on my shoulder. “I’ll come with you when you go. You can count on me.”
From the corner of my eye, I saw dad smiling softly at us and I realized I’d have to have a conversation with him later when Alex was gone.
“We’ll talk about the details later,” dad said. “The food is ready now, so let’s eat.”
Alex helped dad get the food on the plates, and we sat down at the table. There wasn’t much conversation as we dug into the food, vast chunks of meat disappearing down our throats as we ate as much as we could. Dad had been right, we really hadn’t had a good meal in a long time. The cold, fresh juice was most welcome, too. I didn’t think I could ever look at water and drinks the same way again. I would never again take it for granted the way I had before.
I was also going to be buying an enchanted waterskin, so we’d never again run into the kind of trouble we did. Neither of us wanted to drink piss ever again. Though, sadly, I’d still have to drink blood if I wanted to increase the size of my mana-pool.
As we ate, I told dad all about that and what I found out about my new vampire-like ability. Dad understandably was a little squicked out by the idea of me drinking blood. No one liked vampires, after all. But he knew I would never go around killing people for their blood—if the blood of non-monsters even worked. It was a different story for monsters, but monsters were stupid killing machines, anyway. They were only sapient in the rarest of cases, and people used their various parts for all sorts of crafting already, too, so what did it matter if I drank the blood instead of selling it?
Speaking of selling things, dad also told a few names of people who might buy the mimic cores we’d earned, as well as people who could sell me blood to drink. Though, there were some doubts about it working for me if I wasn’t the one who killed the monster. But there was only one way to find out. If worse came to worst, I could always go hunting in the hunting grounds. Apparently they’d been reopened just a few days ago.
“They really didn’t figure out what caused the mess?” I asked.
Dad shook his head, shrugging. “They found a few parts where the walls were weaker, with holes in them, and a place or two where tunnels were dug, but we haven’t caught the person who did it. But there’s now a lot more surveillance enchantments in place, as well as some additional precautions, so something like this won’t happen again.”
I shook my head. “What kind of person would do such a thing? I hope you catch them soon,” I said. “I don’t like the idea of someone like that freely walking about.”
“We’ll catch them sooner or later.”
We finished the meal soon, leaving not a single scrap on the table. Anything Alex and dad couldn’t eat went straight down my throat. I had some reserves to refill, so to speak. It wasn’t so much that I hadn’t eaten while we were stuck underground, but I hadn’t really eaten enough for most of our stay.
After the meal, dad sadly had to leave. He had search parties to call off, and professors to inform of our safe return. I hugged him one last time and he promised he’d be here in the evening again so we could catch up some more.
Once dad was out of the door, I gave Alex a tour of the house. From the oversized pantry, to the library, to the luxurious baths, to my own room.
“We’ll have to take a bath together here sometime,” Alex said as we walked into my room. “I imagine we can have some fun in—fuck, your room is big.”
I chuckled. “Yeah, it’s not as cramped as my room in the dormitories.”
Alex nodded absentmindedly as he stared around us, up at the lofts and the wide open space to fly in. The room—well, tower—was about twenty meters wide, and thirty meters high. It was large for sure.
“Can I…?” Alex asked, pointing towards one of the lofts.
I nodded. “Sure, go ahead, feel free to explore.”
He didn’t wait for me to say more and walked over the wall to begin climbing up. It was maybe only five meters to the first loft, but Alex made it look like he was only walking up the stairs with how easily he got to the loft. He jumped, catching himself halfway up the wall already, then, with a few powerful pulls, launched himself upwards to the loft—his improved strength shining through again.
I took off and joined him on the loft. This one was where I kept my various saddles, bags, weapons, and jewelry. It was basically my equivalent of a walk-in wardrobe. A fly-in wardrobe, if you will.
Alex walked over to one of the saddles and glanced back at me grinning. “I can’t believe you were once this small. This is adorable.”
The saddle in question was made for someone maybe half my size. I chuckled. “What, did you think I came out of the egg like this?” I asked, gesturing to myself.
“No, no, but it’s one thing to know and another to see.”
I let Alex explore my room for a while more, and he especially loved the little personal library I kept on the second loft. He also really liked the large fluffy nest of a bed I had on the third and smallest loft. It was basically a larger version of the one I had back in the dorms.
“I’ll need to join you in here sometime soon,” he said with a wink. “It looks like we could get some great rest.”
I nudged him playfully. “With your winking, I’m not sure if we'd get any rest at all,” I said. “Which isn’t a problem for me, I’m sure we could sleep in.”
Alex squirmed a little, embarrassed. Smiling, he said, “Sounds like a fun night.”
“You could stay here tonight, if you want?” I offered. “After we’ve visited our friends, I mean.”
Alex’s smile turned a little sad. “Maybe some other time, but not tonight,” he said. “It’s not that I don’t want to spend time with you—I absolutely do—but after everything we’ve been through together this week, I’d really like some time just to myself. I’m sorry.”
I sighed, having already seen this coming. But I understood, and I’d be lying if I said that some time apart didn’t sound a bit appealing to me, either. Like Alex said, it wasn’t that I didn’t want to spend time with Alex, but I wanted to do it because I had chosen to spend time with him, not because we had to huddle together around the only light source we had.
“It’s alright, I understand. I’ll stay here for a little while, so you can have our room to yourself. Now that I can fly, it’s only maybe ten minutes to get to class, so it should be fine. But let’s check up on each other every day alright?”
Alex nodded and hugged me. “Thank you, I appreciate it,” he said, then when he let go, he continued. “For now, let’s go visit our friends together, I’m sure they’d want to know we’re okay.”
“Sounds like a plan, though before that, let’s go pick up some clothes for you and wash up.”
Alex smelled himself—his snout scrunching up in distaste—and picked at the tattered clothes that were barely covering his privates anymore. “Yeah, let’s do that first, but after that we’ll go visit Tiki and the rest.”