"Wh-what?" Kurtis couldn't help but express his shock.
"yeah, I'm your new sister. Of course you wouldn't know because of..... You know..." Kayla said uncomfortably. She was doing all she could to not gesture, stare in disgust or cover her nose so as not to appear rude.
Kurtis suddenly felt a burst of hatred and jealousy toward her and found it hard to look at her innocently anymore. He had never considered the possibility of his new parents having another child, he assumed that since they had seemed disgusted at the idea that they had three children and not two, another child was out of the question. And yet, here she was, starring at him expectantly. She was clean, happy, well dressed, sanitary and obviously had Good living conditions.
What he should've had, she did and it infuriated him to think while he was up here isolated, she was living a happy care-free life.
And apparently his face was showing it as a few seconds later she looked at him with a confused expression and said "What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
If Kurtis didn't want to talk to her before, he certainly didn't want to even more now.
"Fu-f*ck off" he hissed in a strained voice.
For a second a look of anger flashed on her chubby face before disappearing and once again, silence fell upon them.
This time there was a tense atmosphere between them. Kayla looked like she was pondering something and when it looked like she was ready, she looked at him with a weary expression and said
"I know what you must be thinking ,but before I go can I at least talk to you for a bit? Its just I haven't had someone to really talk with much, Victor and Ruben are always busy training and studying and mother and father mostly ignore me"
At the mention of Victor and Ruben's names Kurtis' ears pricked up. What could four year Olds be training and studying for?'
Since Kurtis hadn't said anything, she once again took it as her cue to carry on.
"Basically, I was born a year after you, Victor and Ruben and our parents obviously named my Kayla. Honestly, I don't know why I was born to begin with, mother and father barely pay any attention to me and I was pretty much raised by the head maid Charlotte.
I'm not a potential heir or particularly gifted like Ruben and Victor so I was pretty much left to myself ....."
She continued to ramble on and on and on about herself and all the troubles she had been through so. The more she spoke, the more Kurtis' hate for and anger towards her grew, to the point were he felt he was going to lose it and attack her. He was here, barely hanging on, wearing dirty clothes, bathing and brushing his teeth once every week, barely getting the bare minimum of food to survive, holed up in this attic without sunlight for four years, with a makeshift bed and dirty bedding, having to live in the same room as a bucket of his own faeces amongst many other things as well as constant tormenting from his 'brothers'.
"Lately our parents have been fussing over Victor and Ruben even more because they've been showing early signs of what their abilities might be. They're still unknown though, but they're constantly speculating. My two abilities aren't known yet but I hope I start showing early signs like them, I doubt I will though, those two... They're prodigies after all...
'Huh? What did she just say? Abilities? 'these thoughts momentarily made him forget his hatred for her as he longed to know more.
"H-huh?"
"Hm? Ohhh... That's right you've been up here since you were born so you wouldn't know about that would you? Well I guess I should explain..." She paused as a mischievous look overtook her toddler face. "buuuuuuut... I thought you wanted me to leave?"
Kurtis cursed in his head, 'dammit, she's messing with me." He didn't want to give her the satisfaction so instead he remained silent.
He stayed silent and made it clear he wasn't going to entertain her.
From what he'd seen of her personality, she seemed determined to befriend him so any moment now.....
"haaaaaaah, fine I'll tell you anyway. Basically in this world there's something called mana everywhere and everyone is born with a certain amount in their body. From what I've been told so far its possible to increase that amount but to do that you need to have a certain amount of it to begin with. Anyway the mana you're born with is supposedly naturally designed since birth to allow its host to use magic of only one element.
I don't really know much but I also know that everyone regardless of how much mana they're born with is born with two innate abilities as well as their elemental magic that only fully awakens once they reach the age of 6. Though sometimes if someone has an excessive amount of mana, they'll start showing signs earlier. Like Victor and Ruben...those two are on a completely different level..." She concluded in a wish full tone.
"In case your wondering my element is wind, same as Ruben... And our Mother. Victor's is fire like our Father."
Honestly speaking Kurtis was shocked. After what he had briefly seen after being born, he suspected that this world would be slightly different to his old world, After all babies don't glow on earth, but this.... This was too different.
He was fascinated but there was something on his mind that prevented him from focussing on this new found information. He thought the way Kayla spoke was odd, he had noticed that apart from Victor and Ruben all the servants he had briefly come in contact with as well as Viera often spoke in a more formal and polite way.
At First he thought it was maybe because she wasn't educated on how to speak like everyone else, After all he was aware that he was in a Palace or Castle of some sort so everyone including the servants must be of High social status and boast some sort of High education. Maybe Kayla was a lower class citizen or something and some how found her way in, but for obvious reasons that idea was scraped besides Viera had stated that she was originally of poor background and yet she spoke the same as everyone.
The more he listened the more he realised she spoke the same way modern teenagers spoke back on earth not to mention, when speaking Kayla had started off saying 'in this world' as well as the lingering feeling that something about her seemed familiar.
She couldn't possibly have also come from earth.... But who was she? Did he even know her previous self?
Kurtis began wracking his brain for who she could possibly be but for some reason, after four years of being holed up in this place thinking about and cursing the names of three people they were the only three he could remember: Ruben (Blaise), Victor (Joden) and his mum.
She obviously couldn't be the first two so could she be...? It would certainly explain why she seemed to be familiar. However peeking around the box to look at her again he confirmed that she bore no resemblance to his mother, but that was nothing to go by since her appearance might've changed like Ruben's and Victor's and presumably his own.
After thinking it over for a while, he decided to pluck up the courage to just ask her.
"I hope I get really powerful abilities like... Oh! Super healing would be cool or maybe the ability to fly, super strength is really generic but I guess would still be really cool.....
She was still rambling on.
"D- do you know a- about a place c-c- called Earth? L-like another w- world? If so do you remember anyone called Kurtis?" He stammered
"imagine being able to punch through concre- I mean walls easily that would be gr-" hearing his question, she abruptly stopped and allowed for another brief silence to seize the room. Had Kurtis been able to see her face, he would've seen a flash of concern and recognition on her face.
"W- what!" Then, quickly composing herself "where's that? Another world? Who's Kurtis? Is this all from an old book you found up here or something?" She said desperately trying to sound convincing.
Kurtis hadn't missed the waver in her words and for him this pretty much confirmed she was from earth as well and was most likely his mum. He was elated at this conclusion and immediately his initial impression of her took a complete turn. He thought of telling her who he was but decided against it.
Telling her would just make it awkward since she wasn't technically his mum anymore and was actually younger than him despite looking healthier. Besides, after what he had just asked she probably now knew he was also from earth but chose to remain oblivious so she probably didn't want to talk about what happened.
Now that he had come to that conclusion, he suddenly felt unknowingly more comfortable around her, he came out from behind the large boxes and they continued to talk for a while longer with Kayla doing 95% of the talking.
Eventually though she said she had to go before her absence was noticed.
She made her leave and Kurtis was left with a lot to think about.