"Ugh..."
A pained groan broke the silence in Othello's shack. His body was curled up on the floor, his grey hair waving about like tendrils with a life its own.
He opened his eyes, revealing two pitch black orbs that slowly faded as he regained his clarity.
Othello slowly stood up, looking at the blurry world before him in thought.
'Although I received some information from whoever the female in the void was, the process of taking me into the void is quite alarming.
'There's no warning, no signs, nothing. Just pain and hope that I'm not in a place where I can be taken advantage of.'
A soft sigh left his lips.
'I guess beggars can't be choosers.'
His vision had cleared by now, and he made his way over to the chair, leaning on its frame with a pondering expression.
'According to the woman, the Knowledge Path, which is undoubtedly my path, has two main abilities which are observation and finding flaws, but I find my senses sharpened and my strength overboard.
'There's a plausible explanation for this. My other two changes might be general to others like me and that woman.'
He nodded slightly at his deduction.
'But then again, if there's a Knowledge Path, that means there should be other Paths... which means more people with the same basis but different branches.
'People like me shouldn't be surplus in society, or such information would have been public by now.
'Then again, it might be a common thing among the nobles, considering how much slum dwellers are sidelined.'
He stared at the faint sunlight seeping in from one of the many holes in his shack and was surprised for a moment.
'How long was I even knocked out for?'
He stood up from the chair and moved a plank out of the way, wanting to confirm if the glow was from sunlight or something else.
The sky was still hazy, but there were already faint crimson rays spilling out of an aperture in the clouds.
'I remember that it was evening when the pain came...'
He fell silent.
'This lapse is worse than I thought. This is the slums... if someone entered, I'd have been at their mercy.'
A sigh escaped his lips as he placed the plank back in its position behind him.
'Since I don't feel tired, I'll wait early for that man from yesterday.'
He paused, thinking about his forceful actions the day before.
'He will, considering his reputation and the pride in his eyes.
'He might just bring some unpleasant "friends" along.'
Othello shrugged slightly, drawing the oversized coat tighter around his body. The horrible stench of sweat and uncomfortable feeling of grime didn't seem to bother him as much as the cold air did.
---
Gregory's Shoe Shack was located close to Joshua's food stall, making it quite a suitable position for spying the latter. Othello had been there once.
He was dragged to the alley next to the store, beaten and robbed of all the money he had mistakenly showed he had.
'I was... 15, and that was four red Slanks.'
A slank was the currency used in Othello's country - whose name he did not know - and was divided into four denominations - red, grey, yellow and purple.
Red was the lowest though, with one grey slank equalling 100 red slanks.
'Tough,' he snickered as he made his way past the entrance to the Shack.
As he walked, his ears picked up tidbits of a conversation.
"Boss Josh... men..."
'Hm?' Othello hummed to himself the footprints his sandals left on the muddy ground not stopping at all. A small, cynical smile split his face as his mind worked with the three words he had heard.
'He's known as Boss Josh in the slums, and rumours say he has his own small herd of goons. I never encountered them before because I was too busy avoiding the big shots here but now...'
Before long, he stepped into the slightly wide alley next to the shoe shack. He took a moment to observe the place, aware that Joshua wasn't going to come to provide him with information as he ordered.
'A lot of mud, some sticks- mostly useless and fragile. Stones... I could use those.'
His eyes roved about until they landed on a particularly muddy spot. There was mud everywhere in the alley and the slums, but that spot caught his attention due to a metallic glint that suddenly stabbed his eyes as the first rays of the sun hit it.
He walked over, intrigued and placed his hand into the mud, not minding the sticky dirtiness washing over his skin. His hand then splashed around until he felt the cool touch of metal.
Othello pulled the metallic object out of the mud immediately, revealing a metal bar with a round and smooth surface. The bar looked too short to fit in two hands but heavy enough to matter.
'A cudgel then?'
Othello smirked.
'How convenient.'
It was at that moment that he saw six figures stepping into the alley, each one with menacing glares on their faces. Five of the faces were unfamiliar, but the sixth one- which bore the darkest expression- he recognized all too well.
"Boss Josh," Othello started with a friendly smile. "I see you have brought the information I asked, but who are these unfamiliar friends? Mind conducting an introduction?"
His words were light-hearted, soft and sincere; a result of him simply manipulating his facial expressions and vocal cords- a perk relating to balance that granted him flawless control over his body.
Joshua's face turned darker at his words though, taking it as a sign of hesitation and fear.
'It's only normal,' he thought. 'No smile can be kept in front of five bladed cunts. Serves you right after everything I went through yesterday.'
Recalling what happened to him from the time Othello left his presence till he saw him again today, Joshua shuddered. The boy in front of him with a smiling face had all but disappeared from his memory, leaving only a faint outline and the encounter in his mind.
He had been extremely worried, worried that the boy had used some medicine to make him forget some things.
He had done it before, so it was plausible for the same to be done to him.
"Ugh," he shook his head, driving those thoughts to the back of his mind.
He looked at Othello with a smile on his face.
"These people? Oh don't mind them. I just brought them here to teach a wayward rat an unforgettable lesson. You wouldn't mind, right?"
As he spoke, the five men were already drawing closer to Othello while the latter moved backwards until his back was against the wall.
Joshua thought he would see a sliver of panic or pleading between the boy's black eyes, but all he saw was cold indifference.
Othello's smile vanished, the trace of emotion in his black eyes receding simultaneously. The time he had wasted to exchange words with Joshua were simply to buy time to observe and analyze.
And now that he was done, no words were needed.
Before anybody could react, Othello moved.