"Nat, I think I might have fallen for Tess," Kim says.
What the heck? Why are you throwing such a bomb at me out of nowhere?
As if knowing what I'm thinking, the boy continues, "I can't tell it to Aaron or Dennis. They would surely tell her, and I don't know how I would survive that. But I know you will keep it to yourself."
Oh boy, should I ruin it for him? I might not tell it to Tess, but she is smart when it comes to this kind of stuff. I'm absolutely sure she has already noticed. Maybe even before Kim did, "It will pass with time," I simply say.
Kim is only 15 years old, and Tess is four years older. The boy is in puberty, so there is no surprise he is noticing girls, and Tess is... well, Tess. Tall, good-looking, and she has an aura that no surprise attracts the boys.
I glance at him, and his eyes are still on Tess, who continues to spar with Maya. Tess is moving swiftly, her figure looking nice even in the men's clothes she is wearing. She is nimble and moves with decisiveness while keeping a focused look on her face the entire time.
And Kim nearly drools.
Ew.
Anyway, I do not have the energy to deal with teenagers. Still, I continue to listen to him a bit longer before giving him a few more challenging tasks to train with. They are more difficult than usual and will likely take his mind partially off useless stuff.
Then, for the fifth time, I confirm that, no, Tess and I are not dating, and I'm not thinking of dating her. He mumbles something about good news for Lily, which almost makes me want to call Tess here and tell her about what Kim told me.
Kim probably notices that I'm at my limit, and he quickly stands up. Before leaving, he looks at me, "Nat… you can call me Min-Jae if you want," he says hesitatingly, with a look like a puppy left outside in the rain.
Oh boy, "Ok, Min-Jae, now go and practice," I shoo him away, yet he still looks happy.
"I overheard bits of your conversation," Tess says as she sits down next to me, and Maya does the same. They both grab towels and water bottles nearby, wiping sweat off their faces before taking sips.
"You didn't even have to listen; it's too obvious not to notice," Maya says and laughs, "But it's kind of cute."
Lately, Maya has become a bit more comfortable around me, probably thanks to a few pieces of advice from Tess. She's not pushing as much, but she also doesn't speak as carefully, as if I would lash out after a single wrong word.
"Well, all of them are still young, and now that we are in a slightly safer place, it's not surprising. Yet it doesn't make it less annoying," Tess adds.
As the two women talk, I just listen while practicing infusing my mana and kinetic or thermal energy. I shape them into orbs and keep trying to apply them to my skills. My goal is still to replicate alghouls' flames and infuse my flames with disruptive mana. It's surprisingly difficult, more so than I expected.
"Are they at least practicing?" Maya asks, offering me some dried fruit from a small pouch she brought as snacks.
I take it and, while chewing, I nod. "Kim... Min-Jae practices the most, but everyone else does too. It doesn't feel like they are totally slacking. They're just enjoying some free moments here and there while still being aware of our surroundings." I take another piece and inspect it before eating. Tasty; I'll have to find more of it.
"Oh, he asked you to use his first name?" Maya asks with a hint of surprise in her voice.
"Yes," I confirm.
"First name?" Tess asks as well, taking another sip from her bottle.
"Kim is South Korean, and they usually introduce themselves by their surnames. Kim is a surname, and Min-Jae is a first name. The order is switched compared to us. Usually, only family and closest friends call them by their first names."
"Oh, that's..." Tess realizes the implications of that.
Yup, it looks like little Kim considers me a close friend, something like an older brother figure.
Momthaniel, Brothaniel, Natbro, Natmom.
Hmm, how should I call myself now? And how the heck did that happen? I'm acting like an asshole most of the time, so why do so many of these kids look at me like that? They should be scared and do some fun stuff I can watch when bored, not annoying me.
Be ready to stab me in the back at any time, talk shit about me. Anything that would make it easy to deal with situations where... I stop, I shake my head. They have to be doing it on purpose after discovering my weakness. Devious little twerps.
Hell-difficulty people are all dangerous.
So why is it even my weakness? Is it because I had a kind of messed-up childhood around their age? Is it because their stupid naive faces are somewhat cute? Little jerks, all of them.
Anyway, back to Tess, who's staring at me, "What?" I ask her.
"Are you flying, Nat?"
"Not really, just floating," I answer and continue to focus on keeping myself afloat with kinetic energy generated by my heart. I move it delicately and keep releasing it gently, instead of using force like the way I did up until now.
"Seems difficult," Tess says and moves closer to the edge of the roof, sitting there with her legs hanging over the edge.
Meanwhile, I'm floating just a bit in front of her, above an empty space around three stories going down beneath me. Yes, it's difficult, but don't I look graceful? It's time to improve; I can't continue using my poor man's version of flying forever.
"Lily was asking for you. Kim too, even Hadwin," she said, tilting her head slightly. I feel her mana reach out to me, and she starts to observe what I'm doing to keep myself afloat.
I let her and respond, "There are two days remaining until we meet with the king, so I plan to train a lot and on my own. I slacked off quite a bit the first day and helped everyone."
"I see," Tess's mana continues to observe me, and I sense that even her [Psychokinesis] joins in. "I guess it's better if they don't rely on you that much and practice on their own. You can't be here forever giving them pointers."
"Something like that. Primarily, it's super annoying," when I say that, Tess lets out a short laugh, and I continue, "and they should be mastering their skills. Only getting advice from me might help in the short term, but in the future, it will hurt them." I send a bit more kinetic energy out and let myself float a bit higher while moving slightly from side to side. "Sure, I will share some good stuff if I feel like it, but there is a limit to it."
I pause as my senses catch something. "Edwal is coming," I say to Tess and then land on the roof next to her.
Then we wait as from far in the distance, golden lightning cracks, and we see Edwal flying through the air. No, it's not flying, he lands on the ground, and then, without causing any damage to the cobblestones, he jumps through the air so quickly and far that it looks like he's flying. He does it a few times, jumping from roofs, roads, and even from some common areas, and with shining armor around him, the young blonde man lands on the roof just a little bit near us.
"Hello, Miss Hansen, Nathaniel," he greets us almost as if we're friends and smiles at us.
I then feel a pulse of mana from him as he quickly detects everyone else in the house and then turns to us. "Well, I just wanted to say that I'm disappointed, quite disappointed," he takes another step toward us and then hands us a bag of silver color, a ball big enough to fit a watermelon in.
At the bottom of the bag, blood is leaking through and dripping onto the roof, "I did not expect any of you to try to escape," he is still smiling, but the aura around him is more dangerous now, and even his eyes seem saner, "To be honest, I'm quite surprised you were able to escape my detection and cross the wall without triggering an alert, but that's it," he throws the bag at me, and I catch it.
Then I also send my detection through the manor, locating everyone inside. I open the bag and pull out the head of a dead man, the last remaining member of hard difficulty, Icy guy.
I put the head back inside the bag and then burn it with a continuous dark yellow flame, "I would like to tell you that this man didn't come here with us, and we left him behind, in between the white and blue walls. At the place you called the garden for your king's pets," I inform him, and I feel Tess immediately calming down.
The handsome blonde man then stares at me for a long moment and smiles again.
I don't know why he went to that place, but I do know that he is not normal. His eyes are absent as he looks at me. He is trying too hard to not admit to himself that he screwed up. He doesn't want to admit that his mind is on the verge of breaking after thousands of years in this place and that some details he just keeps forgetting or not putting together.
Edwal is still smiling, as if the simple act of forcing his lips to twist into a smile makes him feel slightly better, "It doesn't matter that much. He was dealt with anyway."
Golden lightning starts crackling around his body, and he bows with his right hand on his chest. "Miss Hansen, Nathaniel." When he straightens up, he jumps far into the distance, lightning trailing behind.
But I do notice that this time, he is using more energy and less effectively. He is moving it more aggressively, and there are also some cracks on the roof he jumped from, unlike when he got here before.
"Nat, I think I might have fallen for Tess," Kim says.
What the heck? Why are you throwing such a bomb at me out of nowhere?
As if knowing what I'm thinking, the boy continues, "I can't tell it to Aaron or Dennis. They would surely tell her, and I don't know how I would survive that. But I know you will keep it to yourself."
Oh boy, should I ruin it for him? I might not tell it to Tess, but she is smart when it comes to this kind of stuff. I'm absolutely sure she has already noticed. Maybe even before Kim did, "It will pass with time," I simply say.
Kim is only 15 years old, and Tess is four years older. The boy is in puberty, so there is no surprise he is noticing girls, and Tess is... well, Tess. Tall, good-looking, and she has an aura that no surprise attracts the boys.
I glance at him, and his eyes are still on Tess, who continues to spar with Maya. Tess is moving swiftly, her figure looking nice even in the men's clothes she is wearing. She is nimble and moves with decisiveness while keeping a focused look on her face the entire time.
And Kim nearly drools.
Ew.
Anyway, I do not have the energy to deal with teenagers. Still, I continue to listen to him a bit longer before giving him a few more challenging tasks to train with. They are more difficult than usual and will likely take his mind partially off useless stuff.
Then, for the fifth time, I confirm that, no, Tess and I are not dating, and I'm not thinking of dating her. He mumbles something about good news for Lily, which almost makes me want to call Tess here and tell her about what Kim told me.
Kim probably notices that I'm at my limit, and he quickly stands up. Before leaving, he looks at me, "Nat… you can call me Min-Jae if you want," he says hesitatingly, with a look like a puppy left outside in the rain.
Oh boy, "Ok, Min-Jae, now go and practice," I shoo him away, yet he still looks happy.
"I overheard bits of your conversation," Tess says as she sits down next to me, and Maya does the same. They both grab towels and water bottles nearby, wiping sweat off their faces before taking sips.
"You didn't even have to listen; it's too obvious not to notice," Maya says and laughs, "But it's kind of cute."
Lately, Maya has become a bit more comfortable around me, probably thanks to a few pieces of advice from Tess. She's not pushing as much, but she also doesn't speak as carefully, as if I would lash out after a single wrong word.
"Well, all of them are still young, and now that we are in a slightly safer place, it's not surprising. Yet it doesn't make it less annoying," Tess adds.
As the two women talk, I just listen while practicing infusing my mana and kinetic or thermal energy. I shape them into orbs and keep trying to apply them to my skills. My goal is still to replicate alghouls' flames and infuse my flames with disruptive mana. It's surprisingly difficult, more so than I expected.
"Are they at least practicing?" Maya asks, offering me some dried fruit from a small pouch she brought as snacks.
I take it and, while chewing, I nod. "Kim... Min-Jae practices the most, but everyone else does too. It doesn't feel like they are totally slacking. They're just enjoying some free moments here and there while still being aware of our surroundings." I take another piece and inspect it before eating. Tasty; I'll have to find more of it.
"Oh, he asked you to use his first name?" Maya asks with a hint of surprise in her voice.
"Yes," I confirm.
"First name?" Tess asks as well, taking another sip from her bottle.
"Kim is South Korean, and they usually introduce themselves by their surnames. Kim is a surname, and Min-Jae is a first name. The order is switched compared to us. Usually, only family and closest friends call them by their first names."
"Oh, that's..." Tess realizes the implications of that.
Yup, it looks like little Kim considers me a close friend, something like an older brother figure.
Momthaniel, Brothaniel, Natbro, Natmom.
Hmm, how should I call myself now? And how the heck did that happen? I'm acting like an asshole most of the time, so why do so many of these kids look at me like that? They should be scared and do some fun stuff I can watch when bored, not annoying me.
Be ready to stab me in the back at any time, talk shit about me. Anything that would make it easy to deal with situations where... I stop, I shake my head. They have to be doing it on purpose after discovering my weakness. Devious little twerps.
Hell-difficulty people are all dangerous.
So why is it even my weakness? Is it because I had a kind of messed-up childhood around their age? Is it because their stupid naive faces are somewhat cute? Little jerks, all of them.
Anyway, back to Tess, who's staring at me, "What?" I ask her.
"Are you flying, Nat?"
"Not really, just floating," I answer and continue to focus on keeping myself afloat with kinetic energy generated by my heart. I move it delicately and keep releasing it gently, instead of using force like the way I did up until now.
"Seems difficult," Tess says and moves closer to the edge of the roof, sitting there with her legs hanging over the edge.
Meanwhile, I'm floating just a bit in front of her, above an empty space around three stories going down beneath me. Yes, it's difficult, but don't I look graceful? It's time to improve; I can't continue using my poor man's version of flying forever.
"Lily was asking for you. Kim too, even Hadwin," she said, tilting her head slightly. I feel her mana reach out to me, and she starts to observe what I'm doing to keep myself afloat.
I let her and respond, "There are two days remaining until we meet with the king, so I plan to train a lot and on my own. I slacked off quite a bit the first day and helped everyone."
"I see," Tess's mana continues to observe me, and I sense that even her [Psychokinesis] joins in. "I guess it's better if they don't rely on you that much and practice on their own. You can't be here forever giving them pointers."
"Something like that. Primarily, it's super annoying," when I say that, Tess lets out a short laugh, and I continue, "and they should be mastering their skills. Only getting advice from me might help in the short term, but in the future, it will hurt them." I send a bit more kinetic energy out and let myself float a bit higher while moving slightly from side to side. "Sure, I will share some good stuff if I feel like it, but there is a limit to it."
I pause as my senses catch something. "Edwal is coming," I say to Tess and then land on the roof next to her.
Then we wait as from far in the distance, golden lightning cracks, and we see Edwal flying through the air. No, it's not flying, he lands on the ground, and then, without causing any damage to the cobblestones, he jumps through the air so quickly and far that it looks like he's flying. He does it a few times, jumping from roofs, roads, and even from some common areas, and with shining armor around him, the young blonde man lands on the roof just a little bit near us.
"Hello, Miss Hansen, Nathaniel," he greets us almost as if we're friends and smiles at us.
I then feel a pulse of mana from him as he quickly detects everyone else in the house and then turns to us. "Well, I just wanted to say that I'm disappointed, quite disappointed," he takes another step toward us and then hands us a bag of silver color, a ball big enough to fit a watermelon in.
At the bottom of the bag, blood is leaking through and dripping onto the roof, "I did not expect any of you to try to escape," he is still smiling, but the aura around him is more dangerous now, and even his eyes seem saner, "To be honest, I'm quite surprised you were able to escape my detection and cross the wall without triggering an alert, but that's it," he throws the bag at me, and I catch it.
Then I also send my detection through the manor, locating everyone inside. I open the bag and pull out the head of a dead man, the last remaining member of hard difficulty, Icy guy.
I put the head back inside the bag and then burn it with a continuous dark yellow flame, "I would like to tell you that this man didn't come here with us, and we left him behind, in between the white and blue walls. At the place you called the garden for your king's pets," I inform him, and I feel Tess immediately calming down.
The handsome blonde man then stares at me for a long moment and smiles again.
I don't know why he went to that place, but I do know that he is not normal. His eyes are absent as he looks at me. He is trying too hard to not admit to himself that he screwed up. He doesn't want to admit that his mind is on the verge of breaking after thousands of years in this place and that some details he just keeps forgetting or not putting together.
Edwal is still smiling, as if the simple act of forcing his lips to twist into a smile makes him feel slightly better, "It doesn't matter that much. He was dealt with anyway."
Golden lightning starts crackling around his body, and he bows with his right hand on his chest. "Miss Hansen, Nathaniel." When he straightens up, he jumps far into the distance, lightning trailing behind.
But I do notice that this time, he is using more energy and less effectively. He is moving it more aggressively, and there are also some cracks on the roof he jumped from, unlike when he got here before.
