The group entered again in the city, and everything felt different since they left. In a few minutes the sun would set, but the city wasn't dark like it usually was. Right now there were multiple lights of different colors attached to the houses, everyone immediately recognized where the lights were coming from.
"They're the bubbles created by Garoo…" whispered Lily as she felt amazed once again at the beautiful sight.
"They are so beautiful," gasped Liro in amazement. Everyone kept walking in the city until they reached the main square. On the stage there wasn't anyone yet, but many people were already around it. In the street there were multiple stalls, and the moment Aki saw one of them he immediately realized something.
"RIGHT I HAVE TO HELP MY PARENTS, I'LL SEE YOU LATER GUYS!" shouted Aki. He suddenly remembered that he had to help his parents. Without giving time to the others to actually say goodbye, he just rushed towards his parents' stall.
Lily and Tatsy burst out into a big laugh. "Well, should we go around the festival, guys?" asked Lily, as she started to walk towards a nearby stall. Everyone did the same and followed her.
In this stall you could play a dart challenge. As Darian saw that, he immediately thought of when he was a child and used to play that with his parents. His dad was extremely good at it, while Darian usually watched him playing with the darts and learning.
"Everyone get nearby for a game of balls!!!" shouted the old man in the stall. Around the group, a small child passed with his mother.
"Mom, what are these darts?" asked the small child, who could barely be three years old.
"They are a game of the old world. Do you want to try that?" asked the mother to her beloved child, who shook his head. "I'd prefer to eat something, I'm a bit hungry." The mother nodded her head and brought her child to a stall that was making some food nearby.
Darian, who heard the conversation, immediately asked Lily something. "How did you discover something like this?" asked Darian to Lily as the group walked near the stall.
"Oh, you mean the game? Well, one of the villagers 200 years ago was able to find the ballboard in the ruins of a city. Thanks to that, we were able to create a game. Still, I don't know how much similar it might be to the one you used to play…"
Darian looked at Lily with confused eyes. 'Ballboard…? Well, I mean, they probably didn't find the darts so they must have created something different…' he thought. The group reached the stall, the old man looked at them with strange eyes.
Tatsy, noticing the weird look of the old man, tried to reassure him. "Don't worry, Vabu, they are nice people, I know them," said Tatsy. Vabu knew Tatsy really well, and the moment he saw her he felt a bit reassured.
"Well then, if you are a friend of Tatsy, I guess I must not have bad prejudice…" said the old man as he barely changed his look.
"By the way, I would like to play," said Darian as he took a step forward.
"Here, take these," the old man said as he gave some metallic spheres to Darian.
"You need to throw these spheres at the board. The spheres can attach easily, you just need to throw the balls." The spheres were really small, a bit bigger than a thumb.
"But don't I need to pay?" asked Darian to Lily behind him, who shook her head.
"In the festival everyone can have as much fun as they want. If the stall doesn't give you food, you don't need to pay," answered Lily. Darian, hearing that, immediately turned his face towards the board.
Darian first closed his eyes and concentrated. He grabbed one of the three balls on the counter, and as he opened his eyes, he immediately threw it at the board. The sphere was really close to the middle. Vabu was shocked to see him already this precise.
Darian grabbed another ball and threw it again. This one was extremely precise and reached the middle. As the balls entered in contact with the board, they didn't fall off.
"Hey, you aren't bad at this," said Vabu with a playful tone. Darian grabbed the last ball, which touched perfectly the ball in the middle and bounced off the ground. Vabu was so surprised that he ended up clapping.
"Do you outsiders have this type of game in your own town too?" asked the old man. Darian shook his head.
"Oh, well then I guess it must be natural talent!"
'I couldn't tell him about the fact that I played it 500 years ago with my parents…' thought Darian as he slowly walked away.
"I want to do it now!!" shouted Vane. The old man, who was now calmer and didn't have an angry look towards the outsiders anymore, grabbed the balls and gave them to Vane.
"Your friend was able to make four points, let's see if you can do lower," said Vabu. Because the numbers couldn't be seen anymore on the board, he decided that throwing a ball in the middle was one point, while throwing it nearby was two, three, four, and so on. The max point was ten, and the lower the points you got, the higher your score would be.
Throwing a ball outside was eleven points, but it was almost impossible. The board was big enough for even a child to hit it—
The moment Vane threw the first ball, he completely missed the board. Vabu let out a small laugh.
"You still have two other tries, it happens," said Vabu, trying to comfort Vane, who clearly looked annoyed.
"ARGHHH!" shouted Vane mad. Realizing he had missed the board, he decided to grab both balls in his hands and throw them together. The balls bounced against each other and completely missed the board. One of the balls was about to hit Vabu on the head, but luckily he moved his head at the last moment and dodged it.
"Tch… let's go to something else," said Vane, clearly annoyed. The whole group laughed softly and decided to head to another stall.
"Oh, if we want to see another stall we should definitely try the cube of the colors," said Tatsy.
"Oh right, I'm sure someone like Darian will finish it in under a second," said Lily. She searched around with her eyes for the stall that had the cube of colors, and the moment she spotted it, she immediately rushed towards it.
The group followed her from behind and reached this huge stall. The counter was really big, and around six people were already in front of it moving something with their hands.
"Darian, I'm sure you know it," said Lily. As Darian arrived, he immediately recognized the cube. It was a Rubik's cube, and people were trying to solve it, or at least that's what it looked like.
"Look what I made!!" said a woman. The owner of the stall walked next to her. The woman had divided the colors into lines: there was a line of red colors, another one with only white colors, and so on.
"Woah, that's really impressive," said the owner of the stall. He was a man in his forties with a thick beard. The woman then decided to walk away, and the owner left the Rubik's cube there.
"You can move the squares as much as you like. You can create every form of colors on this cube. Do you know it, Darian?" asked Lily.
Darian walked closer to the stall. "Can I use it?" asked Darian. The man first watched him.
"Go ahead," he answered with a cold voice as he realized he was one of the outsiders that recently arrived in the town.
Lily walked next to Darian to see what he was doing.
"During my time, this was called a Rubik's cube. You'd need to move it so that every face was only one color," said Darian.
He first looked over the cube, then he started to move his hands really fast. Everyone else at the stall was surprised to see him moving his hands so fast without even breaking the cube.
"No, wait…" whispered Darian as he realized he had moved one piece in the wrong way.
Another twenty seconds passed. After that, Darian finished the cube and left it on the counter. Everyone was shocked to see him able to do something this impressive in such little time.
"Woah… you outsiders are really great, eh?" said the man, surprised. Darian looked really proud.
Vane and Liro were trying to complete one of the cubes. As they watched Darian doing that, they tried to replicate what he did.
"How was he able to do something like this?" whispered Liro as he analyzed the cube before trying to move it, while Vane was just moving the cube randomly.
"I'm sure that he was just moving everything randomly. If I do the same, I will be able to finish it too!!"
The group remained at the stall for another five minutes. In this time, Liro had finally been able to complete it, while Vane was still moving everything randomly.
"Meh, too hard," said Vane, still annoyed, as he left the cube on the counter. The cube returned to its original state. For the owner of the stall, it was more impressive to see someone putting all the colors together in five minutes like Liro did.
"Hey, he's about to arrive!!" said a child to his friend.
"Yeah, he will finally arrive to play!" said the other.
The group noticed that everyone was getting closer to the stage. It felt like something important was about to happen.
"He's here!!!" shouted multiple women. Many people moved away, and in front of them there was Garoo climbing the stairs.
"Hello, everyone!!" he shouted. All the people under the stage immediately started to clap for him.
"Is everyone ready??" shouted Garoo. Everyone shouted back. With that, Garoo immediately put the flute next to his mouth and started to play it. The moment he started to play, multiple bubbles of different colors came out of him and created a beautiful palette of colors.
All the people started to dance the moment they heard Garoo's music.
"It's amazing…" whispered Darian as he looked at Garoo and listened to how beautiful the music sounded.
He hadn't listened to any song for so long. Now that he was able to hear something this great after many years, he felt some tears going down his cheek. As Snowy heard the music, he opened his eyes and stretched himself.
As Garoo kept playing, he slowly opened one of his eyes just to see something. Archie was still inside his stall cooking fish. Garoo felt reassured as he saw him still there. After that, with his glance, he searched for Darian and the others. The moment he saw them, his eyes met Lily's eyes.
'Oh right, the fact about Archie…' Lily thought as she had completely forgotten it. Knowing that her friend had his own stall, she proposed to go there.
"Everyone, what about we eat something?" asked Lily. Now that they realized it, everyone was feeling a bit hungry.
"What type of food can we eat there?" asked Darian as he realized his stomach was growling. He felt really hungry as he realized he hadn't eaten anything for lunch.
"We can go to Archie's stall, he must be making grilled fish," said Lily as she started to lead the way. Everyone followed her until they reached Archie's stall.
"Hello, guys!!" Archie warmly waved at the sight of his friends.
"Do you want to eat the best fish in the whole town?" he asked proudly.
"Wait, didn't you say that we'd need to pay? We don't have any money…" asked Liro to Lily. Archie, hearing that, immediately spoke without giving time to Lily to answer.
"Don't worry everyone, this is on the house!" said Archie. There were some fish skewers that were already cooked.
"This is on the house, everyone," said Archie as he gave two fish skewers to each of them.
'Maybe Garoo is wrong… he isn't that bad as he described him…' thought Lily. The moment she tried the fish, she felt it was great.
"Archie, this fish is extremely good," she said in surprise. Other than the fish on the skewer, there were some potatoes too.
"Hehe, I told you, it is the best fish in the town."
The group remained close as they listened to the sound made by Garoo.
"He's really great, right?" asked Archie to Darian.
"Yeah, I can't believe it, he's doing great," said Darian.
Suddenly they heard some footsteps. It was a stick pressing on the ground. The moment they turned around, they saw Naluri.
"Hello, everyone!" she said happily.
"You want to eat something, Naluri?" asked Archie as he was already preparing a skewer for her.
"Ohoh, thank you, Archie," she said as she reached the group.
"He's really great at playing his instrument," pointed out Naluri. Everyone could only agree with her. The music was extremely beautiful.
"He's creating fewer lights than usual, am I the only one who noticed it?" pointed out Tatsy. Archie, Lily, and Naluri agreed with her.
"Maybe he's waiting for something great? Like he will give us a surprise?" said Archie.
"I think so, maybe he wants to create a special moment in which he uses all of his magic together," answered Lily, trying to find a solution.
With that, the group kept listening to Garoo while they ate together the fish made by Archie.