Today is the 5th of Taurus, my birthday. I spent the last few days thinking if I should do anything but nothing special comes to mind. I guess I will take Alfina somewhere so we can look for her doll.
The books about demons didn’t have anything else in it I wanted so it's just stored in my room now.
Alfina is trying to wake up along with me so we can train in the morning. She only succeeded once, today.
We stretch together but I make her stay a few meters away from me when I start to use my swords.
“How can you use a sword that big?” She asks me.
“Because it does not have any weight for me.”
“Why?”
“Do you remember when I told you about blessings?”
“The thing that the gods will give to people?”
“Yes, I have one that makes big swords as light as feathers for me.”
“What else you have?”
“I know how to use these big swords and I am good with fire.”
“Do I have anything?”
“Probably. We can go see it if you want.” I don’t want to enter a church but in this case I wouldn’t really care.
“Really?”
“Yeah, then we can go around and look for you doll, I will not work today.”
“Yay.” She says happy as she enters the house.
I finish my training and start to eat breakfast with everyone. Mess looks like he didn’t sleep too much.
“Are you ok Mess?” I ask.
“Yes, stone, wait, what did you ask?”
“Are you alright?”
“Sorry, I am almost finishing the first rune and its kinda driving me crazy. Who made that wall? it's too complicated.”
“By what I heard a hundred mages.” Sophia says.
“103 to be exact.” Monica adds.
“That would explain a few things.” Mess says.
“Just take it easy, it's not like I told you to do that as fast as you could, sleep if you need to.”
“I will rest a little more later.”
“On that note, Sophia, today I am taking the day off.”
“May I ask why?”
“Today is my birthday.”
Everyone at the table is somewhat shocked.
“Will there be cake?” Alfina asks.
“Don’t think it will.” I say. She looks a little sad.
“Why didn’t you tell me before?” Sophias says a little angry.
“First, because I usually had a party on the new year's celebration so it went over my head at the time with everything that happened. Second, I don’t really care that much.” I only really make a point to remember my birthday to get my age at this point.
“You could have told us anyway. We could have gotten you something.” Sophia says agitated.
“Give me Monica, she is ready and already has a ribbon on her.” I say joking. Her apron has a ribbon on it.
“I am not Lady Sophia’s property.” She says a little into the joke.
“Cake!” Alfina shouts.
“Is there any cake?” I ask.
“It’s kinda hard to find someone who makes them.”
“There is your answer Alfina. When it’s your birthday we get a cake beforehand.”
“When is my birthday, I don’t remember.” She says.
“Probably the 1th of Aries.”
“Then my birthday is only next year?” she asks, shocked.
“Yes.”
“I wanted cake.”
“If we find cake I buy you some.”
“Ok.”
“So what will you do today?” Sophia asks me.
“I will take Alfina out, see her blessings in the church, look for her doll, the cake or anything else that catches my eye.”
“I wonder how you still have money sometimes.” Sophia says.
“I don’t spend as much money as you think.” I don’t pay for food, that cuts a lot from my budget.
“Well, just make sure to return today. I had something I had to show you later.”
“Ok.”
After that we all finish eating. Me and Alfina put on some better clothes and I begin to walk with her towards the center of the city.
“Did you ever see a doll here you liked?” I ask her.
“No. They are all fluffy dolls and really old, I want a pretty doll.”
“This is going to be harder than you can ever imagine.” I hope she understands that plastic is not something here. If it is I never saw it.
We walk around for a while checking every shop. My inner collector is telling me to buy every cool weapon or armor I find to display somewhere but then I remember I don’t own a house.
Alfina looks at everything but at some point she just gets bored as there is nothing she can use or pick that isn’t too big or too heavy for her.
I then guide her to the church of the city, I only ever came here once and only to take a look. The priest here looks to be a good person so I don’t talk shit about him. He is just an old man that got dumped here and forgotten.
The scale in this place is really small but as far as I know they all work the same.
The place is mostly empty so I can just go and talk with the priest who is cleaning the place.
“Hello, I would like to request you help.”
“Hello. What can I do to help?”
“The girl over there never saw her blessings.” I say pointing to Alfina.
“This can be easily resolved. Come here girl.” He says a little more loudly.
Alfina comes near us. We all walk towards the scale, it's as big as a soccer ball.
Alfina puts a hand on it. It glows a little and the priest puts a piece of paper on the other scale that reveals her blessings.
“Reader. Looks like the little girl was blessed with eyes capable of reading anything.”
That explains how she can read the books of this world.
“That's not true, I can’t read the stars like that old lady does.” She says.
“My child, I am talking about books, texts or other things that normal people can actually write, the stars were made by the gods.”
“Well, thanks for your help, here is a little money to help around here.” I toss him 5 Kir and tail out of there.
“What do we do now?” She asks me as we get outside.
“Want to fly to the next city?”
“You can fly?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s fly.”
“Ok, let me pick you.”
I grab her and put her head between my boobs with her looking away from them. I Then use my magic string to hold her in place a little more. I can only do one turn with the string but it should be enough.
I hold her with my left hand and lift off along with her.
“We are flying, we are flying.” She says excited.
I make sure to not go too fast and to create a barrier of heat that doesn’t make the air hit her as hard as it can. If I am moving I usually am faster than a horse at my lowest speed.
“Where we going?”
“Degrada, to see that guy that talks strange.”
We fly for about 30 minutes as I don’t really go in a straight line.
There are lots of farms here. This place is actually bigger than Sagrada if you take into account farmland, not just the city itself.
The city has no walls or anything, it's just a bunch of wooden buildings more or less making a circle. There are even some pockets of houses here and there that I think counts as part of this city.
Alfina is not feeling anything so I think I managed to not go too fast. As soon as we are at the ground, near the city itself, what I think are supposed to be the guards runs towards us. They are two guys in farmer clothes with spears.
“Who are you? Where you came from?” One of them asks, a little scared.
“We came from sagrada, I am here to see the daughter of the governor, her name is Jackelinne.”
They take a look at me and I believe that they process the fact that I probably can just defeat them if necessary as I am, as always, with all my weapons.
“Ok, I will guide you to the house and don't do anything funny.” He says trying to sound serious but the fear in his voice is palpable.
He begins to guide us towards the center of this city. There aren’t really any streets but there is enough space between each house of a big truck to pass. Some of these places are also warehouses, more than once I saw someone open the door of a house to see that most of it is filled with some kind of vegetable.
After 10 minutes of walking we get into the center of the city. There is a water fountain there. I think making a fountain in the center of the city is a costume or a unofficial requirement in this world. Every city I went to that had a central plaza had a fountain on it.
The guard points me to the only house visibly with two floors in the entire city and leaves.
All of the houses in this city are made using tree trunks as walls. The trunks have a really dark brown color to them and don't show signs of age as if the tree was still alive.
I knock on the door and a woman around her fifties opens the door. She has long orange hair, a little white due to her age, using a cotton dress like the ones and brown eyes.
“Hello, what can I do for you?”
“Hello, I am Lucia, I am looking for Jackelinne.” I say.
“What business do you have with her?”
“I am just a friend, I wanted to see her.”
“... Come in, I will see if she can see you.”
“Thanks.”
We are let in. The place is very modest compared to the mansion I live in. There are actual walls separating the rooms and not really that much mobilia around the place, just the bare minimum.
We are guided to the living room where there are two big sofas with a tea table between them.
After no more than a minute I hear a familiar voice.
“Lucia, hello. I wasn’t expecting you. What do I honor this visit.”
“Hello Jackelinne, I had some free time today so I am going around. I also wanted to present the girl I kidnapped your fiance to help with. Alfina, greet the lady.”
“Hello, I am Alfina. Nice to meet you. You are going to marry the boy with the strange voice?”
“Yes I will and nice to meet you.”
We all sit and begin to talk.
“So, why are you two here besides this?”
“It’s her birthday.” Alfinas says before I can do anything.
“Really?”
“Yeah, I am kind out of what to do so I am taking her out. We are also looking for a pretty doll that I promised her but I didn’t find anything.”
“I wish I could help but I made most of my dolls so I don’t think they are that pretty.”
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
“Well, since I am here I need to ask. Where is Jack? My plan was to find him first but there is more farmland than city around here. I don’t think I will find him even flying.”
“Jack is working, he checks as many farms as he can everyday. Probably would do it at night too if I said that I wouldn’t marry him if he didn’t come back everyday.”
“He really loves the field, don’t he?”
“I never saw someone so passionate about farming in my life. If 10% of the people here were as enthusiastic as him we wouldn’t need him.”
“Hey lady, what do you do?” Alfina asks.
“I see if what people tell that they are doing are actually what they say they are doing.”
She looks confused at Jackelinne.
“I look at papers and make people go look to see if what is in the paper is true.”
“Oh, like Sophia.” Which in a simplified way is pretty much what she does. Most of the actual hard maths of the job is I who do.
“Changing the topic a little, aren’t you a little too big.” Jackelinne says pointing at me but glaring at my boobs.
“I can’t give a single explanation that won’t make people come after you with torches.” I say trying to weasel my way out of this.
“So you used a spell?”
“Let’s say I had nothing to do with it.” Which is true, I just grew out of nowhere.
She looks at me a little suspicious but accepts.
After that I end up spending the rest of the day there talking with her along with Alfina. We got a really bad tea that I did my best to ignore the taste, some cookies and some fruits.
We spent most of the day talking about city development of all things. She is studying as hard as she can so she can make the city better, we exchange some information about what we can.
I teach her about the accounting method we use in Sagrada, she got it very fast, probably will try to use it as soon as she can.
She explained to us how this place works and why there aren’t really any guards. The city has a deal with pretty much every organization that has access to the city. The guild, the kingdom, other cities, etc… They all have to defend the area around the city so nothing that is actually bad can reach the city and there are some elite people hidden around the city who as she described, will be very brutal if you are caught doing something worth of their attention, which boils down to anything that is considered a crime.
She also talked about how from time to time some animals or monsters reach the farms from the south and the scare crows don’t really do the job. Alfina gave the brilliant idea of making people dress as scarecrows and go after the monsters. Jackelinne is seriously considering it.
Alfina is not really a shy girl from what I saw today but she will only put in a conversation if she thinks she has something to add to it. She is actually trying to understand what we talk about.
As the sun begins to go down Jackelinne takes me to the side so Alfina can’t hear us.
“Hey, I heard that you killed some people, is that true?”
“...I can say yes but I feel like we wouldn’t be talking about the same people.”
“In the castle, during the new years.”
“No, I didn’t kill a single person there.”
She looks at me as if weighing her options.
“A guy that I am pretty sure I saw in the castle came here a few days ago and said that you killed lots of people in the castle and that we don’t associate with you. I only heard a little as I was outside the room but that is the gist of what he said to my dad.”
I close my eyes and take a deep breath. I really hope it isn’t those idiots from the Intelligence Division.
“Thanks for information, if you need anything just say.”
“Ok.”
We come back to the sofas and enjoy ourselves a little when I see Jack outside, through the window in front of me.
He enters the place and comes directly to us.
“Hello, I wasn’t expecting to see you here. Both of you.”
“Hello Jack.”
“Hello.”
Jackelinne stands up and gives him a kiss and a hug.
“Can I go out and back in so I can receive another one of those?” He says to Jackelinne.
I begin to laugh a little.
“So, what is the ocasion? Need help with a dragon today?”Jack asks.
“Nah, today is my birthday and I went around with Alfina here, I wasn’t expecting to stay here all this time but here we are.”
“Why didn’t you tell me she was so intelligent? She could teach me so much.” Jackelinne says to jack.
“As far I knew, the girl here only knows how to slash things.”
“She can also fly.” Alfina says.
“Now I know she can fly too. Also, there will be oranges in a few weeks.”
“Really?” I say excited.
“Yeah, one of the old guys had lots of seeds that he didn’t know and almost all of them are from fruits that grow in trees.”
“Cool, I guess the city will begin to sell more fruit now.”
“Not really, some really big things appeared in the empty fields and no one who can, has the balls to go there and those who can need some time to prepare.”
“How big?”
“This house big.”
“Jackelinne can you take care of Alfina for a while?”
“Why?”
“I think I found my birthday present.” I am itching for an actual fight since the fiasco in Bellagrizz.
“It’s just to the southwest of here, in a big empty field all the way to the limit of the city.” Jack explains to me.
I shake his hands, give a kiss on Alfina’s forehead and leave the place. I fly in the direction Jack gave me and I see a big area with nothing but dirt on it.
The sun is still up enough for me to be able to see the ground so I fly around looking for anything but I see nothing.
I get on the ground and begin to feel the ground moving a little. I stab the ground, but again, nothing is happening.
“Hey, big thing, come out.”
Then out from the earth a big cube of dirt just appears in front of me. It begins to compress into the shape of a humanoid creature the size Mess told me in less than a second.
“Well, shit.” I say as the thing tries to punch me.
I dodge to the side and he only hits the ground. No shockwaves are created from the impact and that surprises me because he is as heavy as he looks.
I charge Mira a little and with a horizontal slash in his waist I cut him in two making all the dirt that makes his body fall to the ground making a big pile.
Before I can even draw back my sword four golems just like the one I just destroyed form around me and tries to punch me.
I fly up and spin hitting all four of them at the same time with a horizontal cut. Two of them are destroyed and the other two just fill the space I made in their chests in the same velocity they formed.
I take this moment to go back as far as I can while still flying.
“HEY, IF ANY OF YOU ARE INTELLIGENT PLEASE RESPOND!” I shout as loud as I can. I want to make sure I am not killing something or someone that doesn’t know what they are doing.
Another golem forms just below me. I am, at max, 2 meter from the ground so the golem doesn't form completely, just part of its torso along with its head and a hand coming from the ground. I could probably just burn the ground but there is a chance that it will not do anything to these thing and I will just fuck the ground that is to be used by the farmers.
I swing Mira vertically while I fall down destroying the golem and reaching the ground.
As soon as I do that 8 golems start to form around me with one of them already doing a punch in my direction. I discharge electricity on myself using a small spell making my body move to hit the golem faster than it would normally. I destroy the golem and fly up just above the reach of the golems. They don’t throw anything at me but they are surrounding the area I am above.
I scout the entire area again looking for anything that might be the source of these things. Golems are not natural monsters, someone or something is creating these things, wish I know how but there isn’t really that much you can find in books about it.
As I finish looking again at the entire area from above the sun finishes going down and the night starts to show. If not from the flames of my thruster I wouldn’t be seeing anything near me.
I go back to the ground to test something.
At least 10 golems form around me but this time they don’t do anything, until I move, all of them try to punch me again and again I begin to fly up while spinning hitting what I can.
“All of you hit like a truck but can’t take a hit. Maybe I should ask for some help here, this is not worth it.” I say out loud. When I took this upon myself I was thinking that some big monsters were here, not a bunch of dirt. I want a fight not to hit things, I can do that at home.
I hear a strange loud noise, like a bunch of speaker’s static, coming from the ground.
The ground begins to shake a little and not that far from where I am a golem, 10 meters tall, made out of rocks in the shape of a human appears. There are no details, just a really smooth stone, but there is something on the head, a small green gem is shining in my direction.
“I No Weak!” I hear a very distorted, full of rage, broken and masculine voice coming from the stone golem.
“Well, the dirt ones are very weak.”
“Me Strong, ME WIN!” I hear the golem speak again as he swings his hands in my direction trying to slap me.
I dodge one of them and hit the other with Mira. I manage to not take damage but the only thing hitting him with Mira accomplishes is sending me flying backwards for a few hundred meters before I stop. My body finally processes what happened and I begin to feel a lot of pain in my arms, like I tried to lift something I couldn’t. I quickly heal myself with some fire while looking at the giant golem.
He is not moving from where he is, I hope he can’t.
I set Mira ablaze and begin to fly towards his face. He tries again to slap me but I am able to dodge it just by accelerating. I pass his head from the left side while slashing it. A really shallow scar is left on the place but it's soon filled with stone as if nothing happened.
“Nova Blast! Nova Blast! Nova Blast…” I shoot a bunch of spells at the golem to the point where the explosions send me flying back a little.
When the smoke vanishes I take a look at the damage. Really shallow craters on the head that are being filled really fast, doesn’t take even 5 seconds.
“You are a sturdy bastard.” I say what I was thinking out loud.
The golem gives a really loud scream that hurts my ears, if somehow the people in the city didn’t see or hear this thing before, they are now.
Dirt begins to flow from the ground to the golem’s hand I fly towards it and begin to slash it away to no avail.
I get back a few meters and begin to look at what is forming in the golem’s hand and I have to say I am surprised.
“You son of a bitch, are you copying me now?” I ask the golem as he begins to swing a giant sword made out of dirt in my direction.
I make sure that any attacks coming my way are in the direction of the forest to the south and not the city.
The swing is not fast but just the air pressure is enough to move in the air. After the swing I see a bunch of trees almost without leaves.
As the swing stops I go full speed towards the sword.
“Flame Saw!” I cut the blade of the sword making all the dirt fall to the ground.
The golem is still going back to its normal instance so I try something. I put Mira on my back and get Yin and Yang. Then I fly to the thing’s head again and stab it with both of them.
“Short Circuit!” I shout as a pulse of electricity flows from me to the golem.
“AAHH!” he shouts as if in pain.
I remove my sabers and note that part of the stone isn’t regenerating and that there is metal below the stone.
“Short Circuit!” I shout again stabbing the golem pretty much in the same place.
“AaahhhH!” he shouts again this time his voice is less louder.
The places where electricity hit him don’t regenerate at the same speed, I guess I can…
“Shit!” I shout as his hand, faster than it should be, hits me, sending me flying in the direction of the city. A heat barrier absorbed a little of the impact but all my bones at least cracked.
I stop doing anything besides focusing on healing myself, I will fly for a few kilometers on my own before I start to fall anyway.
I fly past the city all the way to the glasslands around the city. I heal just enough to be able to land without breaking my spine or neck and as I am lying down on the ground I empty my mind and let my mana flow as I heal myself.
I have no idea how much time passed, could have been seconds or hours, I lost the ability to perceive time as I was healing myself. As soon as my body is 100% again I fly full speed towards the city again.
Clouds are beginning to form and it begins to drizzle. As I reach the area I was, I see that some people are fighting there. Most of them are fighting the dirt golems and the rock one is commanding.
“Leave this place, it’s my city.” The giant golem talks. This time with a more robotic and normal volume.
I get on his face again.
“Hey, stop this, this city is not yours.”
“It’s my city, he told me it’s my city and I am going to take it.” He says angrily.
“Who told you?”
“Ahhh” he shouts angrily as he slaps his own head trying to hit me. I managed to dodge it like a mosquito.
I fly as high as I can in that second and pick Mira again. I charge her with electricity and dive into the head of the golem stabbing it.
“Short Circuit!” I shout, now with Mira going deeper than Yin and Yang.
I feel more voltage from the spell, not for the fact that I put more mana into it but from the fact that I am also being electrocuted.
I set myself aflame again with healing flames just so I won’t lose my senses before stopping the spell. I guess using it with just Mira is a big no for now.
The damage was good enough that the golem didn’t try to slap me again for a few seconds as I fly up again.
I pick Yin and Yang and begin to fly down. The drizzle is rapidly becoming rain, a thunderstorm is coming, pretty sure someone fighting on the ground is doing something to make this happen as I am feeling mana all around me and it's not mine.
As I dive again at the golem I begin to discharge Short Circuits non stop while slashing him.
This golem got too fast. The wind he generates is enough to make trees fly, I can’t even go to his back or he will probably blow away some houses trying to hit me.
After a few minutes of hitting him without getting slapped like a mosquito I manage to expose the metal part of his body all over his body. Looks like he has some kind of skeleton made out of what seems to be silver. It's not like a human skeleton, it's just metal in the shape of a stick man, but does the job. The part that makes his face has a big glowing green crystal on it, probably the core.
“Why are you hurting me?” The golems scream. I am pretty sure I am the only one who can hear that as the sound didn’t generate any wind.
I would answer this but I am pretty sure this thing is not sentient. Even dumb things can learn, this one is doing the same thing over and over and over again.
The golem begins to swing his body around really fast making it impossible to reach it.
“Nova Blast!” I shout making a bigger one than normal. It explodes doing absolutely no damage to the metal part of his body.
He doesn’t stop and before I could even think a piece of stone hits me in the chest and I begin to fall to the ground.
Luckily I wasn’t pierced but it hurt like hell. I manage to stop my fall using thrusters, the people fighting in the ground where securing an area for me to fall. There are a few knights, two archers and a girl that is clearly a mage as she is with runes on her hands pointing to the sky.
“Hello, how are things going?” I ask in a cheerful tone.
“Kinda bad, we can’t break through these mud golems.” One of the archers says to me. The knights seeing that I am not going to fall go back to hack and slashing the golems.
“Hey, mage. Can you make this rain a real thunderstorm?” It's raining pretty heavily and you can see lightning in the clouds but nothing is coming to the ground.
“I could, but don’t you fly? If I stop controlling this you will be hit.” She says to me.
“That’s the plan.” I had really stupid idea, one that if it works will destroy the main golem in one-hit.
She looks at me like I am crazy.
“...Ok, it’s not like anyone here has a plan.” She says as she stops her runes and begins to make new ones.
The rain begins to get stronger and I can see lightning hitting the ground on the horizon. I fly towards the bigger golem and get his attention.
“Hey you big hunk of shit, look at me!” I shout.
He looks at me and begins to try to catch me. All this time he hasn’t moved a single step so it is pretty sure he can’t. I make sure that his hands are way up in the sky trying to catch me before I fly all the way to the clouds.
Using Yin and Yang as mediums I begin to gather lightning around me. It takes a lot of concentration as I don’t want to get fried.
The more it begins to accumulate around me, the less red my hair becomes. It is turning blue but not because I don’t have mana left. Probably because Thunder is my other affinity and I remember Maxoiliodas saying something about my hair and that.
After a minute or so there is so much lightning around me that I have to close my eyes or I would probably be blinded.
I am using my mana to maintain everything just around me without making it lose energy. I then begin to move it slowly towards both Yin and Yang as if making them electric sabers the same way I can set Mira ablaze.
I am feeling some voltage leak out of them as I hold them but I have to endure. All that energy is being compressed so something has to happen. Lightning here doesn’t work the same it did in my old word, at least energy wise, I never noted it with fire as I don’t really interact with normal fire but all the lightning I gathered have the same power if not more than what I can create, it has mana in it as well, even being a natural phenomena.
After everything is in place I stop my thrusters and begin to fall head first towards the golem.
After a drop of a few kilometers I am again facing that monstrosity.
Seeing me the golem prepares a punch in my direction. I respond in kind.
“Time to shine, Thunder Gods!” I begin to use the spell I gathered all that lightning for.
Yin and Yang are coated in lightning in the form of them. It makes them the size of Mira if not bigger.
I slash his arm in half going from his fist to his shoulder. I would like to say it was like butter but I had to use thrusters to make my shoulder stay in place.
With his hand falling the golem begins the process of going back to the ground but I take this opportunity to hit him with the other blade. I cut his head in half using a horizontal slash.
For a second I see something I think is a human inside the green crystal that is inside the head of the golem but as soon as I finish the slash all the electricity that was built up hits my body and I begin to fall with my eyes closed.
I hit the ground with my back really hard landing on Mira. If I could cry in pain I would but every nerve in my body is too occupied feeling pain to help me with that.
For a second I open my eyes and see that the mage girl and one of the knights got near me but I soon close my eyes due to the pain. I also can’t hear anything.
After a few minutes of the most agonizing pain I ever felt I begin to regain control of myself.
I try to get up but my body is still spaghetti, and it also looks like I wet myself. Tears flow from my eyes only to be washed by the rain. A little late now, I am not feeling that pain anymore, just your good old muscular pain of doing too much.
“Hey are you alright?” The girl asks me.
“I will live.” I take a look around. “Where is that giant golem?”
“Didn’t you disintegrate him?” One of the archers ask.
“No, pretty sure I can’t do that.” That spell has no function to atomize a target.
“Well, he just became dust and vanished.”
I have nothing to say, I don’t even want to know who these people are. They are all dressed like adventurers so they can take care of themselves. I get up and begin to walk towards the governor’s house. I have things to ask and I need somewhere dry to do that.