"I can feel the daggers you're shooting my way, you know." Dimas is lying down on the grass with his eyes closed. Even so, he can tell Lille is still glaring at him.
The duo are back at their usual spot after cleaning their wounds. While both had suffered through the searing salve, Lilee got the brunt of it.
"If only they hurt as much as the ointment did." Lilee is making a new, and hopefully improved, ointment with her mortar and pestle. She throws a few berries into the mix.
"Actual daggers wouldn't hurt that much. Besides, I'm the one who should be mad. You were practically using me as a lab rat."
"No, I wasn't!" Lilee sets the mortar aside to allow the mixture to settle. "This new recipe should do its job while leaving us smelling citrusy."
"Citrusy? Cherry would've been better." Dimas sits up. "Where'd you learn all this anyway?"
"I taught myself. I bought some old herbal medicine books and learned everything I could from them." Lilee pulls out three books from her bag, one of them is the journal with her family on it, the other two were leatherbound and resembled pocket dictionaries.
She hands the two leatherbound books to Dimas while keeping her journal. The pages of the first book show its age. The pages are wrinkled with a few tears here and there. The second book however is being held together by a thin string that threatens to give out with every flip of a page. Dimas hands them back after a quick glance.
"However, some of the information in here is dated." Lilee carefully places the books back in the bag before opening her journal. She passes Dimas multiple pieces of paper that were folded and kept safe in her journal. "These are my notes. This is where I correct some of the misinformation on the books as well as writing down possible reactions from mixing certain plants." She puffs out her chest in pride.
"This is to compensate for your weak healing?" Dimas unintentionally wounds Lilee's pride.
"Yeah…" Lilee hangs her head.
"Impressive. Not many people actually work on their weaknesses. They either cover them up or pretend they don't have any." Dimas hands Lilee back her notes.
His comment perks her back up. "Thanks." Lilee returns the notes and journal to their rightful place. "Do you have any weaknesses you need to work on?"
"You should be more careful on what you say," A man they had never met before stands atop the hill. His black hair is slicked back with only a couple of hairs at the front that dared to stand freely. The man has a 5 o'clock shadow that gives him that rugged detective look from noir films. "You never know who's listening."
"Like a creep for example?" Dimas takes a few steps forward.
"More like someone Alastor is depending on." The man eyes Dimas. "How did a kid like you manage to get on Alastor's bad side?"
"Alastor is depending on you?"
"He came to me today and personally asked me to beat you in the tournament. I don't know why he wants you out but if Alastor requested it, who am I to say no?"
[Alastor that bastard. Here I was thinking he'll be waiting at the end.]
"So you're a fighter."
The man scoffs. "It's kind of insulting you didn't know that already considering that I'm the most dangerous fighter in the tournament. I'm sure you've heard the name Sebastian."
Lilee and Dimas both look at each other.
[The guy who's supposedly been winning with only a single punch?]
Dimas hadn't really been paying attention to Sebastian throughout the tournament. He felt it's better to focus on your current opponent than a possible one and even now Dimas still didn't feel any need to worry about Sebastian.
"Maybe but I doubt you're the most dangerous. Pretty conceited if you ask me."
"If you doubt that, you better make it to the last round against me." Sebastian slowly curls his hand into a fist. "And I'll burn it into your mind."
"Sure."
Sebastian takes one good long look at Dimas before leaving.
"Alastor really is convinced you're a threat." Lilee says.
"Yeah… Oh well." Dimas goes back to lying down on the grass.
"Doesn't that bother you? Alastor can easily turn everybody against us."
"So what? Even if he turns every fighter against us, we're still going to have to fight them anyway."
"What about merchants?"
"We can go without souvenirs."
"I'm talking about supplies! What if he also tells inn keepers? Where would we sleep?"
"Calm down, Lilee. We got this, okay?"
Lilee smiles assured by Dimas's confidence.
"Okay."
"Besides, I doubt he'll tell that many people. I'm thinking he'll want to avoid any panic."
"I wonder why he thinks you're trying to destroy the world."
"He said something about getting a warning from a prophet or something like that. He didn't get a name or anything, just assumed it was me."
"There has to be something more to it. Alastor wouldn't just pick anyone out, did you do anything to him?" Lilee goes back to creating her new ointment.
"Not really, I was probably at the wrong place at the wrong time. It tends to happen to me a lot." Dimas thinks back to his past interactions with Alastor. Before being, rightfully, accused by Alastor, Dimas had said nothing that could've tipped him off. Alastor figured it out by himself with one strong clue. "Actually… he knew I didn't have any Brío." Dimas sits up.
"What?! How?" Lilee almost drops her mortar.
"That's what I would like to know. What's his Brío Arts?"
"No one really knows. I mean there's a lot of theories floating around but none of them are actually known as the truth."
"Why is that?" Alastor was the current champion, it's hard to believe not a single person had figured it out his Brío Arts yet.
"Every one of his matches was won by using his opponents Brío Arts against them."
"Like he turned it around on them?"
"No… He would use their Brío Arts as in if his opponent was able to conjure fire, Alastor would conjure fire as well. No matter the Brío Arts, Alastor would be able to do it too."
"How is that possible?"
"One theory says he can use every Brío Arts in existence."