Mori and Tenno exchanged a glance. What dreams?
"Those who still haven't found their place will do small tests in all four categories. Afterwards, you will join the department of the test in which you performed best. Those who already have jobs can continue with their daily tasks."
Many kids glanced at Mori and Tenno, who had helped many find jobs they liked. Tenno would rather say that he had been forced to help by Mori, since his system could find what a person was good at and his dryad friend just knew that Tenno had an eye for such things.
It wasn't much trouble however, so Tenno did it.
On their way to the kitchen, Tenno played his koudi. The melody was quite high pitched, but it fit in with the song of birds so Mori didn't mind it too much. He was more impressed that the Ifrit could still play while walking. He seemed to have a lot of breath.
"Oh." said said Ifrit after he listened to the dryad. "It's good stamina training."
"Apparently."
"I think you should also train a bit, so when you get into trouble you can run away really fast..."
Mori chuckled. He knew his friend was serious, and very mature, but sometimes he really sounded like other kids his age, which was somewhat cute.
Bang Cheng heard about what Tian Se'as had said and just waved his hand.
"It's fine, it's fine~... The ones you have to be careful with are the ministers. The palace personnel is very nice, but the ministers... You don't wanna know how many pedophiles there are, haha~!"
"Please don't laugh after saying something so disturbing..." sighed Tenno.
"What are pedophiles?" asked Mori.
"You really don't need to know."
"Okay...?"
They watched how Mero and Mori left, then Ichigo came to them with a bucket of fruits he got from Mer who had just come by.
"You really know a lot of words, little one."
"Yan Biao is very educated~!"
Tenno rolled his eyes and wanted to start washing the dishes.
"Ah, ah, wait a moment!"
"What is it, chief Bang?"
"I want you to help cooking. Flame control."
"Oh?" the Ifrit raised his eyebrow, interested.
"Yup! I have my fox fires, its very similar to your ability, so I think I'll be able to teach you~."
"Thank you, master Bang!"
Bang Cheng laughed and began to teach him. By the end of spring, when the rain season as indicator of the transition into summer started, Tenno had complete control over the small flames used in the kitchen. He could tell when something had been cooked long enough, when the temperature of the flame was too high and was able to control the temperature. He was also allowed to tell this to the chefs, so they would be able to make the food better. He also was too lazy to constantly take care of these things himself.
The kitchen soon got used to Tenno, his way of teaching them about the flames and assisting Bang Cheng in checking the taste, texture and smell of the food.
Because of the heavy rain, the servants used underground tunnels for the places further away, glas ones for places near the kitchen. When Tenno had his lunch break, he took a small basket with light buns, lye bread and small sweet loafs. Then he sat down on a slim bench inside one of the glas tunnels to watch the rain.
"Ah, Yan Biao, here you are!"
"Oh, Lou..."
The girl with the bright red eyes and black hair cheerfully came over and planted herself next to Tenno. He inched a bit away from her. Girls weren't really up his alles...
"Can I have some?" she pointed at the bread.
"Sure."
"Thank you. Ah, Kei and Ming are so stupid!"
"What did they do?"
"I said that I like red bayberries, so they got into a fight over who would bring me some! They aren't even ripe at this time of the year!"
"Oh, yeah, that's really stupid..."
"Right?! But Wen helped me, gave me a few other tasty berries..."
"He seems to be a more considerate type..."
"Hehehe..."
They went quiet for a bit, silently eating their bread.
"You get along really well with chief Bang..."
"You think so?"
"Yes. He takes you seriously."
"He takes everyone seriously, he just has a different way of expressing it."
"That sounds stupid."
Tenno laughed dryly. If you boiled it down to the basics, it really was stupid. But without knowing the ins and outs of a character and their personality, Tenno didn't allow himself to openly judge.
"By the way, is there anything you need from me? Or did you just want to talk?"
Lou thought a bit, seemingly about wether she should say it or not.
"The dreamcatcher earring... It's really pretty."
"Thank you."
"Can I... also have one?"
Tenno blinked. "No."
Tears were already gathering in Lous eyes, but before she could really do anything, Tenno continued.
"I made another one, but I want to give it to a person that means very much to me. I hope you can understand." He smiled. He wouldn't apologize for this, not even out of politeness. It would be almost the same as wedding rings, he couldn't just give it to a kid that asked for one.
Thankfully, Lou wasn't dumb. She understood very well what he meant, and even found it amazing that a boy would think that way.
"Oh, but maybe Wen would be willing to make one for you. Just don't tell the others, else they'll fight again."
Lou smiled and nodded. Then they went back to eating and watching the rain.
"... I really like the nature here."
"Hm?"
"It seems very... alive. It has that kind of energy, even though there are so many people here."
"Oh."
"The rain also seems very clear. The clouds are whiter, the gras is greener, the fruits riper and so on. It feels very different from the place I..."
"... Then it's good that you're here now!"
"Mhm."
Tenno gave Lou a small smile, which made his face look very peaceful and pretty in this setting, with the rhythm of the rain and the dim lighting in the glas tunnel.
While he was lost in thought, what brought him back wasn't a voice or a touch, but the deep sound of a bawu. It made him raise his head, just in time to see a quiet, yellow lightning light up the dark clouds. A few seconds of deep silence followed until he heard the distant thunder. It seemed to be accompanied my the melody of the bawu.
'So it was partially a dream, partially real...? Well, that does happen, but that was so accurate that it's strange... I wonder what connection there is.'
However, Lou didn't seem to hear the bawu. Being someone scared of lightning and thunder, she ran back to the kitchen. Tenno just shrugged. As a person with a modern mentality, he was very fascinated by the yellow lightning. Normally, it would be white and purple, maybe a bit blue, but yellow...? This was... exhilarating!
After having eaten his full, he put the leftovers into his inter spatial ring. It would keep the bread just as soft as it was when it was fresh. Inside his inter spatial ring were quite few things. He had put in a change of clothes, things for traveling and surviving, just in case something happened. There were also pretty stones and shells he had stealthily picked up when attending the workshop. Amongst other things were a sewing kit, food and his koudi.
After the short rain season, summer arrived in Gu city and the black palace. Thankfully, the palace was being cooled down by a magic barrier, but it was still nearly 35°C because of the black stone that swallowed the sunlight. Many of the palace inhabitants left for summer vacation or their summer residences in cooler regions, making the palace seem a bit... empty.
Because Tenno gave off heat, he didn't want to stay in the kitchen, his colleagues would get heatstrokes if he wasn't careful. So he delivered the food to the other places, which was actually a great help since he could prevent the food from getting warm or cold. He would also get around more, hear different things and get the layouts of other places.
He knew the layout of the western complex, but the system couldn't really scan a bigger area at the time, so he had to go to other places to complete his map. The other complexes were bigger, and it wasn't appropriate to just touch the building, so he had to come up with a different way or repair the system.
'System, can you self-scan?'
"Initializing self-scan on request of the host."
While he waited for the system to answer, he busily delivered food and chitchatted a bit with the maids, which was actually very interesting.
"You should be the same age as our fourth princess, ah!"
"Oh, he really looks like it! Ah, the fourth princess is really...!"
"She should just accept Enigma as her title. King Midnights title is Everest, after all."
"Enigma Cure...?"
"It's not horrible..."
"Well, The second princess was titled Evergreen, and prince 13 is Empyrean, so Enigma sounds quite good."
"Why would all the titles start with e, ah?"
"I think it's entertaining."
"Ai, don't let the royals hear that. They'll chop your head off!"
"I'd like to see them try."
"Ah, poor fourth princess... Only one of five girls while she has nearly 50 brothers..."
"The king is really working hard~!"
The maids laughed as they went on with their business. Tenno raised his eyebrows. 5 princesses and nearly 50 princes? Well, king Midnight was already quite old, maybe he had many wives or his beloved had a healthy body... Ah, it didn't have anything to do with him! He would just pass on the gossip, like always!
But this was one of the few times he heard something about the royals. The fourth princess was just 8 years old... But why would she be called an enigma?
"Self-scan complete."
Tenno almost jumped. He had forgotten about the task he had given the system. It took surprisingly long.
'So?'
"System is damaged. Scan-range is limited to a 2 meter radius."
'So I don't need to touch...?"
"For more precise data, touching the object is recommended."
'Ah, ok. Thank you.'
"Host is most welcome."
Tenno returned to the kitchen, chatted with a few chefs and then continued delivering.
In the first month of summer was another event. It was called the sun prayer festival and came from the south, brought to the palace 10 thousand years ago by a concubine of the king at that time.
When attending the sun prayer festival, one would wear soft, white clothes with a gauze jacket with white sleeves. It looked really elegant, and Tenno seemed to glow in those clothes, attracting many looks.
The kids learned the sun dance one week before the festival. They would dance around a fire to pray for a high sun on the event of the summer solstice. If they were successful, it apparently meant that the harvest in autumn would be very good.
Most kids didn't care though, they didn't need to work and could have fun with their friends.
Mori and Tenno were a bit more busy, still helping their masters prepare for the festival.
Mero and Ichigo were surprised that their proteges were so diligent. Most kids would only care about having fun, even the more mature ones. When they asked, they heard from Tenno that he didn't like dancing that much, and Mori wasn't good at it so they trained more in private. They also planned for a surprise, which had already been allowed by the organizers of the festival. The guards could only look forward to said surprise.
Then, it was finally time for the sun prayer festival.