Jacq's birthday came earlier than he had expected. Maybe it was the rush from fighting earlier, but before he knew it, his birthday party had already arrived. When Jacq walked back into the dining room, he saw his small birthday party that had been prepared. Dorathi made carrot cake for his 14th birthday. There were some bags of chips, cold drinks such as Pepsi, Mountain Dew and Dr. Pepper as well.
Jacq cut the cake and enjoyed the evening with Dorathi while they spoke about Jacq's parents. He realized that even though he was learning a lot about his parents, they seemed to become even more mysterious. He also noticed that there seemed to be someone staring at him, however each time he looked in the direction he would find nothing.
The more Jacq thought about this, the more real it seemed that he was being watched. He also realized that the food on the table seemed to be a lot, but it was decreasing at a fast pace. He couldn't understand how the two of them had eaten so much.
Jacq was right, there was another person in the room.
He couldn't see them, but the person was a small girl. She looked about 145 cm tall, wearing a green dress that was a few centimeters above the floor. With her long black hair that stopped at her knees and purple eyes, she looked like a princess out of a fairy tale. There was an umbrella that was hovering over her, as if protecting the small girl from the sun.
Her skin was pure white, her use of the umbrella was clear. The smoothness of the skin was indescribable. Her weight seemed to be around 45 kg, but she would occasionally grab food from the table and down it in seconds. Her stomach was like a bottomless pit, there seemed to be no signs of slowing down the food intake.
This person had no killing intent towards Jacq. Dorathi would occasionally glance at her with a glare in her eyes, especially when the food would be downed too fast, but the loli would not stop. There seemed to be a connection between the two, as once in a while the girl would stick her tongue out towards Dorathi as if taunting her.
Just like that, the food was almost finished and the party came to an end. Jacq walked into his room after bidding good night to Dorathi and took out the small box that she had gave him before the party ended.
Inside was a small red stone, about the size of a fingernail. There was a red thread that went through it and a note. The note stated that this stone was a "Lucky Ruby Stone" and the user should wrap it around their wrist. With great difficulty Jacq was finally able to tie it on his wrist. When he looked at it, the thread had wrapped around his wrist enough times to make it seem like he was wearing a ruby bracelet.
After he had finished, Jacq went to sleep, but unknown to him there was another person in the room. The little girl from earlier stood next to him and placed her hand over the ruby stone. With very small effort used, her hand sent a wave of red light which merged into the thread and stone, making both of them harder.
"The effect of the Blood Stone should be noticeable to anyone from the Second Cosmos, but almost no one will know of its usage here. This will be a great help to him in the future, why not add some of your Spiritual Energy as well Big Sister?" The little girl spoke with a calm voice.
"En," her big sister causally waved her hand and also sent a wave of red light towards Jacq's wrist. This "Big Sister" was obviously Dorathi Williams. After looking at Jacq for a bit, the both of them left as silently as they had entered.
Unknown to Jacq, he had gained a very precious item that would make even the eyes of those at Spiritual Pillar Realm red. The usage of this item would be clear much sooner than the two ladies had thought originally.
When Jacq woke, he realized that the small stone and thread had became almost hard as steel. He didn't seem to mind this, as it would be harder for him to lose it.
***
*
Five days had passed since Jacq's birthday. After serving his OSS for two days, which were Friday and Monday, Jacq went back to school. The news of him spread like fire and most people would avoid him, even the teachers did not needlessly disturb him.
As Jacq finished the school day, he was prepared to head home but was stopped by another freshman.
"Don't take the regular route home today, the three seniors are preparing to teach you a lesson with a group of thugs. Take the back roads and figure out something else for your future trips to and from school," the fidgety boy spoke in a hurried voice. After seeing that Jacq had understood, he walked off in the opposite direction as fast as he could.
Thinking that it would be a wise choice to avoid the seniors for now, Jacq followed the boys advice and used a new route to head home. This route was a couple miles longer than the original one, but he thought it would be better to be safe than sorry.
However, after arriving to a darker portion of the route, he noticed that the alley was blocked off by the three seniors.
"Hey Jacq, if we knew you had such strength, we would have hit you harder." Spoke the giant senior.
Jacq had a bad feeling about this and turned around to run, however he was shocked by what he saw.
There were a few boys around the age of sixteen through twenty-four, wearing jackets blocking the entrance he came in from. When he looked back towards the three seniors, their face was weird. It was as if they had not expected the situation to be like this. Behind those seniors was another group of eighteen or so. The overall number of people had reached near forty including the three seniors and Jacq.
As if not noticing the four, the two groups started pulling out knifes as they charged towards each other. Jacq and the seniors' faces turned grim as they realized the situation. They had been caught up in a fight between the local gangs. As if sensing Jacq's suspicion, the chubbier senior spoke, "Originally we only brought one person from the West Haven Gang to help us, but who knew that the South Palace's Company would bring their men over too."
Everyone knew that there were spies in all gangs from other gangs. This would explain how the situation had turned from one outsider helping, to a fight between two gangs. Jacq made a deduction that the South Palace Company had heard that there would only be one person from the West Haven Gang and sent out a small number to kill him. But unbeknownst to them, the other gang had a spy and heard of this. They had also sent their members to counter the latter which ended up in the current situation.
With both gangs ready to kill each other as they charged, Jacq and company didn't hesitate to run for cover.