I’m not sure if I’ve grown tired, or if boredom has taken over me. I’ve almost conquered the entire continent, yet my goal is far from reach.
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Kai took a deep breath and stopped in front of the wall. The boy had phased through the same dirty and broken-down wall when he followed him from the Guild Headquarters. He raised his hand and knocked a few times, but there was no reaction. Sighing, he kicked the wall as hard as he could and let out a light yelp upon impact. Taking a step back and rubbing his foot, he almost cussed out the wall, however, he opted to pull out the sword from his scabbard instead.
He imbued it with darkness magic, and rose it high above his head, getting ready to slash at the building. Before he could do that, however, the wall turned transparent, and the figure of the young boy revealed itself, yawning as he walked out. “Back so soon?” He asked, waving his hand.
Kai undid the magic on his sword and lowered it, gently placing it back within the scabbard. “Haha, Yeah…” He replied with an awkward laugh. “I couldn’t sleep well tonight.”
The boy looked him up and down, raising an eyebrow before asking in a more demanding tone. “You got what I asked you to get?”
“Yeah,” Kai nodded, but stood unmoving, clearly having no intention of handing the ingredients over. The boy sighed and rolled his eyes before inviting Kai in with a handwave. His face lit up under the mask, and happily followed him inside, the wall turning back into solid form as soon as Kai’s figure disappeared behind it.
The interior remained unchanged, not that there was much time for it to change. Kai pulled out all the ingredients and laid them out on the coffee table before following the boy inside the other room. The ebony beast was still locked inside the cage, its eyes glaring at the two, and bared its fangs as Kai tried getting closer.
“Don’t… approach it-” The boy said, however, his sentence got cut short by the sight of Kai pulling out a few animal corpses and throwing them inside the cage. The beast instantly devoured the meat, as it disappeared in the blink of an eye. Its large, stuffy tail rapidly wagged back and forth, and it licked its abyssal snout with great satisfaction.
“What the fuck?” The boy exclaimed in surprise, and he got closer to the animal. Its tail immediately stopped waggings, and it bared its fangs at the boy, who rolled his eyes in displeasure. Suddenly, a strong aura escaped his body, putting immense pressure on the beast, and Kai at the same time.
He shivered as the boy’s aura landed on him, his breathing almost freezing to a halt as his entire body got overwhelmed. What kind of magic is this…? To make me tremble from indirect pressure, this is insane!
Thankfully, the beast calmed down quickly, and the boy retracted his aura, coughing heavily as he turned back toward his desk. “You can leave now,” he said, struggling to piece together the makeshift microscope.
Kai didn’t listen, despite the knowledge that the boy before him could end his life with a single slap. Something deep inside told him to stick around. He circled the boy and glanced at his research papers. His pupils widened, however, upon discovering that the text was written in a completely foreign language.
“Don’t bother, you won’t understand it even if you studied it for ten years.” The boy said, his voice filled with arrogance.
“Well,” Kai said, feeling slightly hesitant. “I did learn Elvish in one year…”
“You-” the strange boy dropped the tools within his hand and looked at Kai with widened pupils. “You learned that hellish language in one year? Huh, then I guess you could learn this one as well. But I don’t have any time to teach you, so good luck figuring it out on your own. It seems like you have no intention of leaving anyway.”
“Haha, you caught me.” Kai chuckled awkwardly and picked up some papers that the boy threw to the side. “I’ll be in the other room then, I don’t want to bother you too much.” He said, however, he quickly turned and pointed at the glass. “Those lenses aren’t that good, by the way-” And he quickly stopped upon realizing that he almost outed himself. “Or at least… I think, haha…”
“Huh, what did you say?” The boy asked, turning toward Kai with a slightly bewildered expression.
“Nothing I-, haha, nothing.” Kai quickly retreated into the other room, closing the door tightly behind him. He let out a sigh of relief, however, and sat down on the couch, beginning to inspect the documents. The letters were ugly - twisted, incomplete, elongated, almost as if the calligraphy of the person writing them was… off. Don’t tell me, he can’t write it properly… Kai chuckled to himself, studying the letters and trying to make sense of their meaning.
Minutes passed, and Kai already felt a headache coming as the side study he wanted to do turned into an actual challenge, trying to understand the boy’s writing. However, he quickly found a pattern in the documents. At the bottom of each page, a similar string of letters that seemed to resemble a name could be found. The letters were as ugly as the rest, however, they were consistent and half-readable.
This must be his name then, noting it on each page, he must be either very aloof or proud. Trying to read the letters out loud based on the experience he had by learning three languages - Common, Elvish, and the language on his Earth. He read the name, “Bra-... Bra— hm… Barhm? No that’s not right… Bar… Barhm? Hmm, maybe.”
He kept tinkering with the name, saying every syllable out loud, each time very differently than the previous one, trying every combination of sounds he could think of.
“Ah for Goddess sake, it’s Barhum!” The boy yelled from the other room with an annoyed tone. “What’s so difficult about saying it?”
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Kai’s face flushed red as the boy's condescending words landed in his ears “Sorry, so, it’s Barhm, then?”
“No! It’s- You know what, never mind, fine, it’s Barhm.” He replied, annoyed, then returned to being quiet.
“Goddess? Didn’t you keep mocking her?”
Silence. The boy refused to even utter a grunt in reply to Kai, seemingly disappearing entirely from the building
Heh, Kai thought, then went back to reading the documents, although he couldn’t understand anything inside. Well, at least he’s good at drawing. He glanced over at the images Barhm drew to accompany his texts, which made Kai’s job of learning the language somewhat easier.
He leaned his head on the couch, reading the documents, however, his unfocused vision and open mouth told another story.
Now that I joined a guild, my next goal should be getting stronger. He thought, completely disregarding the text before him. To do that, I should fight more and train my mana core. I haven’t trained it a lot since I left Evicario and simply relied on it passively filling up. However, it will never advance at this rate.
Furthermore, I need to… Kai yawned softly as he stretched his hands. I need to develop a better technique to absorb mana. What I have right now works, but it’s not efficient at all. Maybe… maybe Barhm can help me! After that, I can travel to where that Léandro guy pointed me to the place with the sword technique… Although I think it’s quite far… hah… so many things to do. His vision turned blurry as his eyes closed, and he fell into a deep sleep.
…
Kai woke up the next evening drenched in sweat, on the floor next to the coffee table. Letting out a light snort, he jumped to his feet and anxiously looked around, only letting out a sigh of relief after realizing that he was in Barhm’s house. Wait- I fell asleep in here, fuck! He cursed and turned his head, only to be met by the boy’s annoyed glare.
“You have some nerve, kid.” His annoyed tone rang in Kai’s ears like a waterfall, and he quickly drew some distance as he choked on spit.
“Gah- Aha, sorry, sorry. I- I didn’t realize I fell asleep.”
“Clearly,” the boy rolled his eyes and walked toward the room where the ebony beast was located. “You’re lucky I have a bed, otherwise I’d have thrown you out in the streets.”
“I-I’m grateful you didn’t?” Kai said, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.
“Don’t use that tone with me, now get up and clean my sofa, you made a mess.”
Ah, right. Kai quickly got up and looked at the sweat-drenched pillows, let out a sigh, and began thinking of how he could clean them.
“By the way, do you sleep all day?” He asked, genuinely curious but also trying to divert attention.
“Hmm? Why the interest? Well, yes and no. My magic allows me to reduce the amount of energy my body uses so I need to sleep less, but I also prefer working when the big star in the sky - the sun - is not visible. It gives me… peace.” He said, sighing and lingering on his last words as if remembering something. “But enough about that, it’s about time you left, isn’t it?”
“Uhm… I still haven't read through all the documents yet…” Kai’s voice wavered as he picked up the papers from the ground. “But you’re probably right, I still have things to do.” He placed the papers on the table and dusted off his clothes, then walked to the wall.
“Here, take this.” The boy chucked a black stone at Kai, which he grabbed mid-air, and glanced closer at it. In his eyes, it looked like a simple Dark Crystal, with a few cracks covering its ebony surface. “Use it to enter and leave, I’d much rather have an intact wall next time I leave.”
Kai nodded and chuckled as he turned to leave. “Quite an… interesting way to enter a room.”
“No, this is just the norm… you’re the weird ones,” Barhm said, waving Kai away and going back to the room where the beast was located.
Shrugging his head, Kai phased through the wall and headed toward the guild at a leisurely pace. Gradually, the large building revealed itself before him, and he strutted inside. A strange quiet sounded in his ears before being inundated with the usual, loud chatter. He took a step back as he got accustomed to the atmosphere, and walked toward the task board, only for his pupils to widen. Crap, I have already taken on a lot of tasks… I hope none of them had a time limit.
He scurried through his ring and swiftly found the tasks he had, then walked out, his face flushed with embarrassment. I hope Anna didn’t see me… Sighing inwardly, he hurried toward the exit, locking eyes with the same guard from earlier.
“Not going out with your wolf today?” He asked as Kai passed him, after which the boy paused briefly before walking away, muttering under his breath. I forgot about Onyx… He’s going to be mad at me for sure… I hope Karfi has enough meat to feed him… shit.
He let out a frustrated sigh and dashed through the forest, looking over the tasks he had and moving accordingly. It didn’t take him long to complete the simple, low-paying tasks, and within a few hours, he returned to the Guild Headquarters and entered the room where clerks took care of weighing and counting the materials. It was full, as always, even fuller than the main lobby. Luckily, the number of clerks matched the amount of people, so the lines weren’t too big. However, the place where the boy - Barhm - did business was now manned by another man.
Kai walked there and waited in line - a line which was considerably shorter than the other clerks, and it only took thirty minutes for his turn to arrive.
The verification process was more or less the same as when he did it with Barhm, except this time he didn’t have to sign a contract and was given a receipt instead.
He thanked the man and left, albeit he still felt weird, especially after the last incident. After waiting in line for the clerk, he then waited in line to go to a receptionist - the same woman as always - Anna. She quickly took care of the points and gave Kai another receipt with a soft smile.
He sighed and placed the note, which read <<400 points attributed to the account.>> into his ring, then rushed toward the bar.
A warm orange light shone through the dirty windows, accompanied by the jingle of light laughter, and a few soft barks and growls. He smiled under his mask and pushed open the door, his arrival signaled by the bell’s melody. Taking a glance, he saw Karfi and Natasha standing at the bar, then Tausi and Onyx playing on the floor.
The four of them turned to him, and the Obborik dropped whatever he was tugging on and dashed toward Kai, letting out a loud bark and then jumping on top of him. Knocked to the ground, the boy felt a strong gust of wind blowing against him, and his companion’s wet snout sniffing his mask.
“Ah… boy you’re still f…. heavy!”