"well, do you think there are more of them?"
Rein said.
Feeling a cool breeze settle on to him from the north. His black hair ruffled slightly, few strands of his shoulder length hair swaying gently in the wind.
Seriché turned to stare at him, a bitter expression slowly dawning on him.
It was dias who answered it question.
"Probably. I ain't gonna bet on em calming down anytime soon"
Shionelle sighed.
"We're probably going to have to increase safety measures and be on high alert for the next month or so. There's going to be more petroling, more fighting and even more reportin...ahh, I am getting a headache just thinking about it"
Her expression turned dramatically pained.
"Alright, alright. Let's get back"
Seriché said, a soft smile playing on his lips.
.
.
.
By the time the group reached monolithos, the sun had started dyeing the world in million shades of orange.
As rein appreached the deceptively medieval city, a really subtle sense of warmth had come over him.
Rein had felt it before too, a subtle sense of cold that embraced him when he left the direct vicinity of monolithos.
It was the barrier of the spirit stone.
"Okay, i'll be off then"
Shionelle said, boredom evident in her voice.
'she seemed a bit more energetic during the scouting'
Seriché also took his leave after a small wave.
It was just rein, deski and.... Dias?
"Where's dias?"
Rein turned to look around, not noticing anybody standing around him.
"H—he let the moment we entered the city, h—how did you not notice?"
'how did i not notice it?'
Rein waited for a moment before turning towards deski and saying.
"Well, I'll be going. I am hoping to get myself some better food"
"B—better?"
"Yeah, uh. The food that seriché brought as lunch was a bit..."
"Bland?"
Deski asked, a knowing smile finding it's way to her lips.
"Yeah, I don't even know how he eats something so tasteless"
Deski laughed quietly then fiddled her baggy clothes for a while before pulling out what seemed to be a... Pouch?
"W—well, I managed to extort some money from midas y—yesterday. So how about i t—treat you to something? I—i was going to wander the Market anyway"
"..." Rein stared at her with a impassive expression.
"D—dont worry, I am not into guys younger than me"
"That's not... Nevermind, let's go"
'when am I going to get paid?'
Mori was the currency used by the denizens of the continent. It was a small, square piece of silver metal ingraved with intricate ingravings and a small arcana structure.
'arcana is... Ingravable sorcery, right?'
It basically involved creating specific pathways through a special kind of spiritual energy into a object, those pathways, when filled with normal spiritual energy, create a certain effect.
'thats basically enchanting, no?'
Apparantly yes and no, there were many types of enchanting, and arcana was the most prominent one. It was a indirect type of enchanting, through some system of categorisation that rein didn't care enough to know about.
"We're h—here"
Rein's attention was brought back as he heard deski's voice.
The sun was starting to drown below the line of horizon and the calming darkness of night was returning to the sky.
Infront of him, stalls were set up on both sides of the road, all of them decorated with light and beautiful markings.
Each one was different than the other, some sold meat, some sold vegetables, some sold acessories, while some sold weapons. There were truly all sorts of things.
Rein just looked around with a calm expression, though he was fascinated.
'the city is large enough to support basic economy and commerce, but small enough to be a lovely knitted community'
"H—how much for these?"
Rein turned to the side and saw deski talking to a vendor. It was a elderly man with greyed hair. On the grill infront of him, several sticks with meat and some vegetables were being grilled.
"2 mori each one of these" the man pointed to the ones that had only meat
"and 3 mori each for these" the man then pointed to the lens tha had both meat and vegetables.
"Give me t—two of both"
"Hm, that'll be 10 mori"
The man offered the skewers to deski after wrapping the sticks with a very thin peice of cloth.
"Hm"
Deski turned to seriché and offered him two, one meat kebab and one meat and vegetables kebab.
Rein took both skewers with a grateful smile and turned to walk alongside deski.
Eventually, they ended up in a quite garden of sorts, it was pretty small but had a nice charm to it with the way the plants were placed close together and often overlapped with each other.
As both of them sat on a wooden bench, enjoying the skewers, rein was gazing at the beautiful night sky as well, there were
Countless stars that tore through the darkness like moths in a meadow.
Rein then said in a calm but curious tone, without looks away from the sky.
"Deski, i've been meaning to ask.... How exactly did you Awaken"
"Hm?.... Oh m—me?"
She pondered for a while, before she stopped eating and stared at her feet forlornly
"I h—had a natural awakening"
"Oh?"
Rein turned to look at deski, a suprised look on his face.
There were primarily three types of awakenings. Forced Awakening, the most prominent one. It was when a person let's their body get used spiritual energy for months. After a certain threshold, the person puts a immense amount of spiritual energy and let's it flow naturally through their body.
If their spiritual pathway is good enough, they'll force themselves to Awaken.
There is natural awakening, one where a person simply goes through a big enough emotional of idealogical moment that they simply push through the bounds of natural human constitution
And lastly, there is the one where a person performs the act of creating spiritual energy pathways, slays monsters and, with enough conviction, becomes a Awakener through sheer will. This path of Awakening is called 'focused Awakening'.
Rein was currently on the path of becoming an Awakener through forced Awakening.
"If... It isn't too personal, how exactly did you naturally Awaken?"
Rein was naturally interested in all sorts of awakening as forced Awakening takes months, or sometimes years to actually Awaken.
So if he could find a way to Awaken faster, he would gladly take it. If it isn't too difficult that is.
Deski turned to stare at rein for a while, a hint of nostalgia appeared on her face before being replaced by bitterness.
She turned back to look at her feet and started talking.
"Well, basically. I—it was when I killed my mother in a f—fit of fury"
Rein Opened his mouth, then closed it, realizing a comment or distraction wouldn't do this moment any good.
"Both my p—parents were Awakened actually. it was wonderful when my father was alive, or so my mother told me, because he had been dead for as long as I can remember."
Deski cracked her knuckles, her eyes becoming unfocussed as she seemed to reminisce about a time long gone.
"Well... my father was killed right after my little sister was born, by a member of the cult of rejection. I was two years old by that point, So neither me nor my little sister ever knew what he was like"
Deski then sighed.
"But my mother couldn't take it well, she... went 'mad' as people used to say. She lost an arm and her left leg during the fight, so she couldn't even walk, let alone fight"
She continued.
"But just because she couldn't fight, didn't mean she couldn't get revenge of the bastards who killed her husband. Of course not. Because there were two blades that could do the job for her"
She sighed.
"So she trained us, without warmth, without hesitation. She trained us to be something that... Only had one purpose, to kill the person who had wronged her. She considered brutality and harshness a fine took for growth, and warth a rope that ties a person to the ground"
The noise of people talking, waking, laughing around both of them seem to drown.
"This... Scar on my face was a gift she handed to me. And it was the same gift she was about to give my little sister.... And i couldn't let that happen"
Deski's pupils dilated, her cheek rising in disgust.
"I was angry, I was filled with frustration and rage. My little sister, she was the only person who I loved, cared for and the only person who cared for me.... So I killed her. Drove a knife through that weak women's neck. And killed her"
Deski took a deep breath.
"That was when I Awakened.... Perhaps it was my denience to accept the duty she has pushed onto me. Perhaps it was the conviction i had gathered to kill her or maybe it was simply the act of being free from her... But I awakened"
She took a deep breath and leaned back.
"Then, two years later, my little sister died of a lung disease"