Legacies of light

Walking back to the inn after a rather long day, Zashiki greets us. “How did today go for the both of you,” she said.

“Fine, I got solutions to some of the problems we were facing. Though I had to run all over the city to find them.”

“That sounds wonderful. You probably got some great sightseeing while you were running around.”

“You know, I am pretty sure I was so obsessed with getting what I wanted that I didn’t even bother to look at any of the sights in the city.”

“Well, that’s a pity, but for however long you stay here, I hope you manage to get some in.”

“I promise I will,” I say as we open the door to our room, but I am greeted with a strange sight. The Gyaku kitsunes have Sparrow tied up and are kicking him while he is on the ground.

“What are you guys doing to our guests,” Zashiki says.

“Oh, don’t worry. Even if they drown him, we wouldn’t care much.”

“It’s not that, I have never seen them do something this aggressive before. This isn’t a good sign. All of you are coming with me. It is time for some re-education.”

So as all the kitsunes leave, I wave the off while Cyrus unties Sparrow, and then we sit down to discuss what we did today.

Cyrus says, “It will take about a we-e-e-ek for all the medicine to be ready. But I lear-r-r-rned this isn’t going to cure p-p-p-people who had the toxins run through their systems. All it will do is prolong their life that they will eventually die,” with a dispirited expression.

Walking up to him, I say, “Don’t feel down about this, Cyrus. The fact that you were able to get us anything at all is already a god sent. Be proud, Cyrus, and I am sure there is a cure out there somewhere. All we need to do is look a little harder.”

Cheering up, Cyrus says “Yeah, we w-w-w-will.”

I hope the words I said to Cyrus are true because if they aren’t, that would be too sad. “We will leave in a week since we have cleared our main objective.”

“O-O-O-Orb, what about your search for the Gozens?”

“I found a lead, so you don’t have to worry about that. If there is something we should be thinking about, it is how we will find your sister now. I haven’t devoted that much mental energy to it, so to be honest, I have no idea where to start.”

“My sister once told me if I get lost, I should retrace my steps.”

“Cyrus, it has been over a decade since you and your sister got captured. I doubt there is any evidence of her left where you arrived.”

“Oh, s-s-s-sorry.”

“Don’t apologise. It is not like I have any ideas either?” I say while scratching my head. Looking over at Sparrow, I ask, “What are you doing.”

“I was reading the news on this omega butterfly before those little shits attacked me, so I was just getting back to that.”

Staring at Sparrow, a sudden idea hits me. I crawl up to him with great fervour, I say, “This butterfly reports information all around the world, right.”

“Yes.”

“So wouldn’t that mean that the journalist who use these butterflies would have heaps of information about what’s happening everywhere?”

“I know what you’re getting at, so please back away.”

Backing away, I say, “Dragons are rare to be found anywhere except their home continent, so I bet when Cyrus and his sister landed on this continent, it must have made some noise, and if anyone had followed up the trail on them it would have been the journalists of. What was their name?”

“The Chronicle Nimbus, or CN for short.”

“Yes, they would have such information, so all we have to do is find them.” Grabbing the butterfly out of Sparrow’s hand, I say, “There must be some kind of signature here or name.”

“You won’t find one. The journalists of CN tend to report on everything, so they aren’t well-liked, and in certain countries, they even have bounties for anyone even mildly associated with them.”

“Well, then, how am I supposed to find them?” I say, deflated.

Φ This is my chance, “I have a lead on this-.”

“We w-w-will figure it out somehow,” Cyrus says while rubbing Orb’s head.

“Hey, I was talking.”

“Your right Cyrus. I have to give it some time. Sorry about delaying our promise.”

“I have something to say.”

“D-D-Don’t worry, we will get there eventually,” Cyrus says as he gives Orb a high five.

These goddamn brats are ignoring me while having a bro moment. I can’t let this go on any longer.

Φ Hearing Sparrow’s heart rate increase behind me, I turn to see the fourth unexpected thing today. He is crying. “Oh shit we broke him.”

Whining, Sparrow says, “I have had enough of you. All the physical assault, bullying, and vomit I have put up with, even when you should’ve iced up my butt. But even after that, when I try to help, you ignore me. I hate you.”

What the hell is this? Why is this grown-ass man saying, “You’ve done a hundred times worse than what I have done to you, so what right to complain do you have? Unlike everyone else, you never even said so-.”

“Sorry, I apologise for what I have done, but you don’t know how hard it is to be me. I wasn’t born with great power or a fancy education; the only way someone like me could get stuff was through taking from others. Every young boy wants money and power with little effort. I doubt a privileged brat like you could understand that.”

“Listen here, you are a walking pile of crap; out of the countless options in life, you choose the one that hurts others, and now you complain when you get hurt, that sounds a bit hypocritical to me, so why don’t you wipe your tears, shut up, and behave, you parasite!”

After I said this, he curled his body into a ball on the ground. “I am done helping you. No more information, no more nothing. Kill me if you like.”

Seeing a grown man on the floor behaving less mature than the kids in Aplos(The village), is so sad that I actually started to pity him. Now that I think about all I have done to punish him without any reward, I want to reform him, so I should be kinder.

Moving over to Sparrow, I say, “Even though it was your fault, sorry I was so mean; I will be nicer and listen to you more often.” This tends to work on the kids.

Turning his head slightly towards me, he asks “You promise?”

This is disgusting. You’re not a child, stop before I puke. Calm down, Orb and follow through, “I promise. So please share whatever information you have.”

Φ That worked wonderfully. I needed to change Orb’s attitude towards me, and I knew this would be the most surefire way. I may have embarrassed myself, but who cares? No more awful punishments.

Recomposing myself, I say to him, “There might be one surefire way to meet a member of CN, and that would be to go to Elpída. I have heard constant rumours of CN staying there.”

“Are you lying to me?”

“Why would you ask that?”

“Because aren’t these people great at staying anonymous? Why would they let info like one of their location get out.”

“Elpída is a rather expensive country to travel to for even a week. Most of the scum who would want to mess with them there couldn’t even pay the entry fee to get into the city. But that won’t be an issue since we are loaded.”

“Well, then, I guess we have our next destination. Where getting closer, Cyrus.”

Cyrus subtility smiles in response.

“Now that we have everything out of the way, Cyrus. It is time to teach you the value of money. You ready to learn?”

“Y-Y-Yeah”

-Break-

Walking through the forest early in the day with a basket full of food in my hand, I hear entirely serene sounds while Cyrus says, “O-O-O-Orb, what do you want to show me out here?”

“I have a friend here I want you to meet. She is in desperate need of more friends so I thought you would do.”

“What is she l-l-l-like?”

“Are very mean young girl with a potty mouth. She is also quite aggressive. She kept attacking me both physically and verbally yesterday.”

“Is she really y-y-your friend?”

“Yes, she is. Oh, and I forgot to mention this she has three tails and a star marker on her eye let us.”

Cyrus, who starts to shutter, falls to the ground and says, “No more numbers,” while holding his hands against his eyes, frightened.

I may have gone overboard with teaching him yesterday. “Don’t worry, the numbers can’t hurt you anymore; ok, let’s go?” I say as I pick him up by the hand and start leading him to the tiny house.

When we arrive, I see miss Gozen sitting on her knees right in front of the house with her mask on. I say to Cyrus, “Don’t be surprised if she is mean to you”.

“How have you been, little miss Gozen.”

“It is nice to see you again. I am happy about your return. I hope you got a good night’s sleep yesterday.”

After she says this, I run over to her and say, “Are you ok? Did you hit your head anywhere? Take off your mask. Let me check your temperature.”

She says, “I am fine.” Getting up, she walks up to Cyrus, bows and says, “It is nice to meet you. I hope we can get along.”

With a big smile, Cyrus says, “I hope we can as well.”

“What the hell is going on? You attacked me the first time we met, and you’re being nice to Cyrus. Is this some game, are you’re trying to make me a liar?”

“I have no such intentions. You look parched. I should get you some tea.” Running inside the house while Cyrus and I sit outside it, she grabs both of us tea and says, “I also got some food so you can enjoy it.” Then she brings out baskets of food so beautiful looking it is shining.

This stuff looks like the food kings and queens eat, and she has all of this in a basket. Seeing this, I handed her the basket of food I had brought.

“Orb, what is this?”

“I felt bad for yesterday’s food, so I bought you something to replace it. Though it pales in comparison to all this food.”

Holding the basket with food close, she says, “It’s perfect.” She gets up and puts it back in the house as we sit there and eat the food surrounding us.

While eating all the delicious food with Cyrus, I notice that miss Gozen is staring directly at us, so I say to her, “Are you hungry?”

“No, I am not. I was wondering if you are enjoying the food.”

“Yes I am, but aren’t you going to eat anything here? It is a lot.”

“I am fine; enjoy.” Looking over at Cyrus, she says, “Are you dissatisfied? You don’t look like you’re eating your fill.”

“I can eat a whole lot more than n-n-n-normal people. If I ate my fill, I would probably eat all the food in this c-c-c-city.”

“Cyrus, I didn’t know you were holding yourself back.”

“I have gotten used to eating small a-a-a-amounts since Basileia. So, I am fine.”

“Don’t worry, when we get back home, I will let you eat as much as you want,” after saying this, I hear the heartbeat of miss Gozen beside me increase. What the hell is going on with her? All the kindness and food she is sharing are completely unlike her. She should be attacking me and kicking my ass. I still felt pain in my back from her violence yesterday.

Suddenly she starts to massage my back. “Ahh, what are you doing.”

“Your shoulders looked stiff, so I thought of giving you a back rub.”

“Please stop-,” I try to say, but the sudden pleasure from her massage forces me to stop. So, I let her continue until we finish eating. When the meal ended, due to Gozen becoming passive and Cyrus being quiet, I sat down there bored with nothing to do.

“Orb, come with me. I have something to show you,” grabbing me by the hand, she leads me to the back of the house with Cyrus following close behind.

When we arrived, she said, “Look at this.”

Staring at the landscape in front of me I see a massive amount of drawings, so many that the amount of snow I made yesterday seems small in comparison, and all of them are incredibly detailed.

“You liked my art yesterday, so I decided to show you more of it.”

Looking at this gallery, I am completely mesmerised by this sight. It is so pretty. But looking at all this, I have a question: How didn’t I notice this if it was just behind the house? This question causes me to come to a realisation suddenly.

Walking over to her, I take off her mask and see large bags under her eyes. She crouches down and hides her face from my line of sight.

“I knew you it. You drew all of these last night and didn’t get any sleep. What the hell is wrong with you? Why would you do that.”

“I wanted to make sure you would have a good time,” she says, trying to run away.

So that’s the reason she has been so attentive. I go up and grab her from the back, saying, “I came here to hang out with you regardless of any type of poise, so stop being you, ok you idiot,” while spinning her around in my arms.

When I stop spinning her, she says, “OK I will. Could you also please give me back my mask?”

Suplexing her into the ground, I say, “Come take it. Think of this as punishment for your despicable behaviour.”

“You bastard,” she says as her tail breaks my hold on her. While trying to get back on my feet, I see her three tails form into a hand which she uses to squash me repeatedly. She picks up her mask from my body and says, “That’s what you deserve scum.”

Getting up, I see Cyrus walk over to her, which causes her to freak out. Since Cyrus has a reasonable opinion of her so far, she is scared she has ruined it.

When Cyrus gets close, he says, “How amazing, you are so strong for how little you are.”

Even behind her mask, his words made her feel elated. “Of course, I am. I happen to be me.”

Getting up, I say, “Now that you’re back to normal, let us go.”

“Where?”

“Obviously, into the city. I was told to sightsee, and I would like a guide.”

She starts freaking out and says, “I can’t go. There is no way, not a chance, fucking impossible.”

“Why not? The first time we met was in the city. And if you are worried about your hair, we can put on a covering.”

“But I am not so sure.”

Walking up close, I say, “If we all go together, I guarantee it will be fun,” with a smile.

“Ok,” she says.

“We can cover your head easily, but your tails will be hard, given how big they are.”

“Don’t worry about that?” she says as her three tails suddenly disappear.

“What did you just do?”

“My legacy allows me to store spirit energy in the form of tails, so I usually have it always on, but I can disperse all the energy whenever.”

Wouldn’t that mean her legacy is always acting on her butt? I am intrigued, I would like to see how that works, but I value my life too much to ask her such a question. “Let’s go.”

When we arrive in the city, we go everywhere and take it all in; the people, the sights, the spirits, the food, everything. It has been so long since I could walk around with no strings attached, aimless, just enjoying what I saw. It was a great time. And with the big smiles on both Cyrus’s and miss Gozens faces, they were also enjoying themselves. This is what I had dreamed of doing. I hope I will be able to do this with everything back in the tunnels as well.

When we get to the base of the ocean, I say to miss Gozen, “Cyrus and I need to go to the toilet. We will be back in a minute.”

Φ I can’t believe I saw the sea during the day. What a miracle this is; I was able to make two friends today as well. I need to try my best to keep them happy. I would love to tell them my name, but that would increase their chances of finding out about me. I can’t let that happen, no matter what. I want them to continue being my friends for at least the duration of their stay. I like this feeling in my chest to stay a little longer.

“Oh no,” I say, holding my head. All the thoughts and feelings of people today are especially bad. It feels like my head is going to split open. I need to focus on my thoughts like always.

As I was focusing solely on myself, one of my tails accidentally regrew and knocked the covering off my face.

Then someone screams, “WHAT IS SHE DOING HERE!” Turning around I see qn old woman pointing at me. This isn’t good. I messed up.

“SOMEONE CALL THE TWINSTARS!”