When Athelei entered the tent, he saw Thallium Yan seated on what looked to be a cushion. Her desk was short, and about a foot in height. There was a new jar of small scrolls laying on her desk as well as a few documents that she had been able to save from the Exiled's raid.
"Orien," Athelei was the first person she called out. She gestured to a cushion right beside her, "Sit here."
Athelei silently did as he was asked. 'Comfy,' was what he thought when he set himself down. He felt that he could fall asleep with his head on the table with no problem.
"Lisa, right?" Captain Yan asked and said without waiting for an answer, "You can sit here."
Lisa nervously sat down on a cushion opposite Athelei. She was quite nervous, as she hadn't expected to be sitting in a room with a knight captain at all. Her hands shivered ever so slightly.
"So, Orien." Captain Yan said as she rested her chin on her hand, "I'm quite surprised, and I would like to know how this came to be."
"Well," Athelei started, "It's simple, really, Sister Yan. She wanted to come with us, so I helped her."
"Hmmm, I see." Captain Yan then looked at Lisa for a few moments. She was about to speak, but something stopped her. She then gazed back at Athelei with more questions,
"How did you make the decision? How are you two going to work together? You should know that your plans were barely feasible while you were alone. Now, with the two of you, things are going to be tricker." Captain Yan then added, "Do you need help?"
Athelei blinked, expecting a scolding. 'It seems like her belief that I am blessed truly is meaningful. For her to trust in the decision of an inexperienced child like me... it's both an amazing feeling yet a heavy one at the same time. I believe this is what mortals call... responsibility.'
Athelei felt that his conjecture was once again close to the truth. He had been operating alone in the truest sense of things so far. Lisa would be his first companion aside from the adults who bore the weight for him.
The way Captain Yan was dealing with things allowed Athelei to feel the weight of responsibility himself: He decided to help Lisa with her attempt at running away and even proclaimed that they were now partners, so, he had to deal with what has to come as one who bore an identity of The Blessed.
Resolutely, Athelei accepted the offer, "Yes. I need help."
"What're your suggestions, Sister Yan?"
And so, Thallium Yan and Athelei discussed a lot of things, from the possible problems they would have to face to the opportunities that they had to look out for. Lisa joined in every now and then, showcasing a shocking maturity on her part. She asked questions and expressed her opinions at times. It helped Thallium Yan give words of wisdom and help develop Lisa's mindset and outlook.
At one point in the discussion, Thallium Yan almost felt as if she wasn't speaking to children. It was a baffling experience for her, but one that she found interesting despite it. The innocence of the pair before her was filled with the liberty of creativity and lacked much prejudice.
It helped her as much as it helped the kids.
'When I return to the Capital, I want to give a few of my new ideas a try... Orien adored my suggestions so I should have confidence in those prospects, as well.'
.
.
.
When the talk with Thallium Yan ended, Athelei led Lisa out to rest for the night. He brought her to accept another sleeping bag and helped her settle down near the cinders.
As Athelei laid down on his spot and close his eyes, he heard Lisa's whisper,
"Thanks, Orien." She said as she bit back the rest of the phrase and kept it in her mind, 'The Gods blessed me with meeting you.'
To the sudden display of gratitude, Athelei just chuckled, "I had fun, so don't worry about it."
It took only a few seconds for Athelei to set his mind into the world of dreams and a thin, grey fog then blanketed the camp once more.
Athelei was expecting a normal night of training with a few differences: He would use Inspect on the Unknown Mystical Badge to figure out a new piece of information every twenty-four hours as well as look for treasure that Inspect could gain experience from.
Despite Inspect's [Bonus Effect], Athelei knew that the experience gain would be a crawl if he relied on his other three Analysis Skills—and he did not have the luxury to crawl.
He had to keep jogging at his own pace to be ready to sprint at the best opportunity possible.
After all, every hour that passed was a step closer to being without the protection of the adults.
Now, the night was, for the most part, normal. It was normal until a certain hour of moonlight when Athelei noticed someone approach the area he was in. A human's skin was making contact with the spread-out particles of his fog-body.
Intrigued, and driven by necessity, Athelei went to see just who it was. He quickly discovered a head of wavy, brown hair bobbing up and down as it moved through the trees and bushes.
'Lisa?' Athelei inwardly asked himself, 'What are you doing awake at this time of the night?'
Lisa was carefully walking over exposed tree roots and ducking under low-lying branches. She seemed to be wary of accidentally making any kind of loud noise. Athelei watched as she walked for a few minutes before stopping at a seemingly random location...
And getting on her knees to pray.
Athelei floated close to eavesdrop on her prayers. Lisa's young, energetic voice had adopted a solemn and holy tone to it. Her voice reverberated softly with the swaying branches of the trees above and Athelei noticed that the girl now knelt beneath a moonlit spotlight.
Unfortunately, Athelei could not understand the language that she was using. All he heard was an indiscernible murmuring that inadvertently heightened the shroud of mystery that floated around Lisa.
But there was nothing stopping Athelei from memorizing the way she spoke, from her intonation to the tricks she used for the syllables and letters. Appraisal's [Passive Effect] was an immense contributor to Athelei's everyday life. The spare and automatic information storage that seemed limitless could be used in all situations.
'I will have to analyse her words if I ever wish to understand what she says...' Athelei's curiosity was in full control now, 'I wonder where she could've learned such a tongue?'
Athelei spent the next eight minutes eavesdropping, memorising, and storing the information. When Lisa finished her prayers, the area around her once more drifted into the mundane. There was no more moonlight spotlight, nor was there any seemingly melodic breeze.
Lisa simply walked back to the camp as if nothing happened and Athelei went back to his training.
But not before a little research section.
With the Information Network hovering in midair, Athelei opened articles on the languages of all the countries in Oxhor. He searched for religious articles in particular and hoped to see a full set of prayers.
He set his display settings to view the prayers he found in the original languages used and discovered four writing systems he was unfamiliar with, and thus could hardly read.
Athelei opened a few other articles for the sake of translation, but was slightly stumped when it came to pronunciation and spelling—there was barely any information at all. In fact, Athelei's earlier demands only worked because the topic of religion, as well as the availability of anything religious, was almost always at the top of the charts.
If Athelei tried searching for stuff like complete dictionaries or compilations of words for a fully documented language, then he would have a harder time, and at worst, receive no search results at all. To this, he could only respectfully curse the habits of Oxhor's inhabitants for they did not have such information-and-language-attributed habits. Especially since the Cosmic Interface auto-translated everything written on it.
'If only I could somehow write down Lisa's words despite hearing it. Alas, I don't even know which parts of her prayers are words or sentences, nor can I guess how each word is spelt and how the characters of its relevant language are written.'
As such, Athelei ended up spending the rest of the night dissecting Lisa's prayer until he translated what looked to be the generic chants of her prayers. As for the more personal additions to her prayers, there was not a chance he would be able to figure those out.
When he completed this incredibly tedious task, Athelei's figurative eyes were absolutely bloodshot and his fog-body figured out a way in which it could have a headache.
'At least the hell period is over,' Athelei consoled himself as he excitedly pieced together his findings and translations.