After Teerom returned from his moral expedition, they wandered through the streets, finding the Bazaar's items too expensive. At some point, they happened across a large shop on a corner. It was a general tool shop with two floors. On the first floor, Teerom found a large hammer with faint red glyphs on the head. He ran his finger down the handle, feeling empowered and getting the attention of the store clerk.
Madella apologized and attempted to usher Teerom upstairs where she saw cleaning tools from outside, but the clerk, with big, dilated eyes, asked if Teerom wanted to learn who that hammer belonged to. The clerk was lanky and over his white shirt wore a brown waistcoat with brown trousers to match.
Teerom agreed enthusiastically and spent the next ten minutes listening to the story of a great dwarf who lived in the Northern mountains of Lusitra and died protecting his people from human invaders. He'd had two months to prepare before the first attack, and with that hammer and his dwarven aptitude for transferring Strength Magic, he built the Mongri Dungeons. In a great battle, Sir Feinrild, a Lord Knight, defeated the dungeons with a party of monster hunters and bought back the hammer.
"If it's so valuable, why isn't it in a museum?" Teerom asked, which seemed to strike a nerve in the clerk and make his eyebrow twitch.
"It's a fairy tale, kid." He said, dropping his tone slightly.
Upstairs, Madella found a broomstick hovering above a raised platform. It was made of rich dark wood with bristles that seemed softer than marshmallows. She read its description: 'The Brild-Broom will find and get rid of any dust, dirt, or even stubborn sticky grime without you having to lift a finger. It even has an Air Spell attached, just pull the switch at the top and it'll begin sucking up.' She immediately looked down at the price, praying it was cheap, but it cost two gold coins, all she had.
Disappointed, she looked around at the other broomsticks, finding one that was cheap enough but still had a weaker version of the Air Spell on the previous one. She made her way downstairs and approached Teerom who held a hammer - not the great hammer - in his hand, excited.
"Mom! Can we buy this?" He asked, the clerk behind him.
"Why do you want a hammer?" She asked.
"I'm going to become a builder," He replied enthusiastically. She tried to muster the courage to refuse, but his pure eyes overwhelmed her.
"How much is it?" She asked the clerk.
"60 silver." The clerk replied.
"I-I'll only have 50 left after this broom, could you find a cheaper one?"
"I can lower it to 50. He deserves it," He ruffled Teerom's hair.
"What do you mean?"
"Your boy has talent as a builder." The clerk motioned them to a block of smooth wood resting on a table, "Look at that. No mistakes. A perfect smooth cut."
Madella felt the block of wood. Sure enough, it had zero bumps and felt as if it had been oiled.
"In fact, I'll give you a 20% discount on your future expenses. So long as you give me a 20% discount when I purchase from your service." He said to Teerom. Of course, it was a rip-off since building was more of a valuable service than the clerk's business, but Teerom didn't care.
He agreed joyfully and went with Madella to buy the hammer as well as the broom.
They left the store and continued down the streets, their stomachs rumbling frequently. It became so unbearable that Teerom couldn't stop complaining.
"Can we get something to eat?" He asked naively, slowly adding to the flame of frustration in Jurie.
"Not right now, Teerom,"
"But I'm hungry…" He held his stomach in pain. Madella saw they were approaching bushes full of berries in front of a relatively wealthy-looking house. As they passed, she quickly tried picking a handful of berries, but they were too tightly glued to their roots and she ended up cutting her fingers and palms on the thorns. Soon, she lost feeling in her legs and collapsed to her knees.
"Mother, are you alright!?" Jurie, with all her might, held Madella up. Teerom watched in horror as blood continued to flow from the open flesh. Jurie shouted at him to do something but he froze up. The crimson before him made his mind churn with images and flashes of his past horrors; a demon, devouring a woman; a knight, slaughtering children mercilessly. The purge of Rukae all came back to him. And the horrible memory of the fading warmth of Jiggan's blood.
Jurie began crying desperately. But a woman, wearing a hat that concealed her grey hair, perhaps she was about 60, sprinted down the road with much more energy than natural. She took out a massive towel and masterfully wrapped it around Madella's hand to stop the bleeding.
"You are one loud child," She smiled at Jurie, "I heard you from blocks away. Ever thought about being a singer?" She looked over at Teerom who still stood frozen, "You there, boy. Help me help your mother."
Teerom snapped out of his trance and rushed over and followed the lady's instructions to keep pressure on the bleeding. "Leia, I've never seen anyone bleed this much before."
"I have a blood disease," Madella said weakly.
"Are you travelers?" The old lady gathered from their tattered and worn down clothing they'd been outside for weeks.
"From Mackia,"
"From Mackia! Don't tell me you walked the whole time,"
"We met a kind lion along the way," Madella laughed before passing out.
She awakened in a small room with a window overlooking the streets outside. It was day time. Had she slept through the entire night?
"Teerom, Jurie!" She couldn't recall anything that had happened and rushed downstairs to find the old lady cooking something with Teerom and Jurie sat on the table behind her, an air of tension floating heavily above them.
"Are they mute?" She asked Madella.
"Sorry, um, thank you for saving me… Who are you?" Madella awkwardly stood in the doorway, panting.
"My name is Yilba," She replied.
"Just Yilba?"
"Yilba Rainart, you?"
"Madella. Just Madella."
"Those two haven't spoken to each other at all since they woke up. Are they always like this?" Yilba nodded her head toward the two children, Jurie glaring at Teerom every now and then.
"What's wrong?" Madella approached them.
"Ask him," Jurie sneered at Teerom. Madella looked at him and he began explaining, "I'm sorry, mom. Because of me, you cut yourself." He started wailing helplessly.
"Hey, hey, hey," Madella embraced him, "You have nothing to be sorry for." She held his head and looked into his eyes, "Your mom is strong. Something like this can't hurt me." She grinned, "Now come on, make up with Jurie."
"She won't forgive me…" He said.
"Jurie-" Madella tried to speak to her but she stormed off upstairs. She sighed and turned back to Teerom, still sniffling with wet eyes, "Go up and apologize to her."
"I already did!"
"You must apologize hundreds of times with girls, didn't you know that?" Yilba said.
Over the course of the next week, Yilba helped them clean out the cottage South of Gouon and buy new furniture. She worked at Hillred School, one of two schools in Gouon, and on top of her earnings there, her husband, a sailor, would send her money. He planned to return to Gouon after gaining ten years of experience on the sea, a requirement before setting up a seafaring company.
It took three long arduous days to clean the cottage; during which Teerom tried desperately to achieve Jurie's forgiveness. His methods consisted of dragging behind her, holding on to her ankle, and chasing her while shouting "I'm sorry, Jurie, forgive me!" around Gouon. The day she'd finally forgive him was Thursday, a week after they'd arrived in Lusitra. Yilba and Madella watched Jurie running from him again; she was subtly holding back laughter.
"She's enjoying it," Yilba said, "little devil,"
"Maybe he's the prince she's been dreaming of-" Madella suddenly looked at Yilba with surprise.
Yilba touched her face in confusion, "What? Am I finally getting wrinkly?" She said, ironically, genuinely worried.
"The Devil. You know that fairy tale?"
"It's a fairy tale? I thought it was a figure of speech." Yilba said, "I heard it first from my grandmother."
"Oh," Madella sat back in her chair.
"Could you tell me the fairy tale?" She asked.
Madella began reciting the poem she'd heard so much from her aunt Cherie as a kid.
"When the Sun sets to escape it
When the Moons darken to hide from it
When Spirits are horrified
And Demons are terrified
The Devil has come
When a heart beats fast
And hair stands thin
When time runs last
And the whole world shrinks
The Devil has come
When the light becomes dark
And all the realms bend
When even hope seems far
And all things end
The Devil has come"
"Leia, that's horrible. Your aunt told you that every night?" Yilba said.
"Most nights." Madella smiled, "She loved it because she believed The Devil saved us when I was a baby."
Yilba reacted sarcastically, "Hahaha, I'm sure the one thing that even demons fear, the nightmare of nightmares, would go out of his way to do a good deed,"
They suddenly heard Jurie's faint distant scream from within the forest, sprung to their feet, and ran toward it.
Teerom stood before his worst nightmare. Heights. He'd run after Jurie so far they'd reached the Forest Mana Zone.
"Teerom! Help me!" Jurie said, hanging from a green rope-like plant above. She had stepped on the magic plant that when touched, like an elastic band, grabbed her and sprung her into the air. Typically, the victim would let go and be flung into the air to come crashing down and splat on the ground, but Jurie's hands, with incredible strength, held on to the plant rope until it swung her down. But it didn't bring her to the ground and instead left her hanging fifty meters in the air next to a giant branch.
Teerom was frozen. Why couldn't he move? He could jump from building to building with ease back in Rukae. No fear at all. Yet now, the very thought of Jurie's point of view up there terrified him.
She was holding on tightly to the spinach-like rope, trying not to dangle her legs, but she began to slip. Then, she did the worst thing possible. She looked down. Her stomach dropped and so did she a few inches down the plant rope.
"Teerom!" She cried and screamed.
Teerom's heart felt as though an elephant was crushing it. He couldn't move at all; until the image of Jiggan popped into his mind. He suddenly began breathing normally and felt in full control of his body. His eyes flashed a deep cyan and he lunged forward toward the gigantic tree trunk.
The trunk was coarse enough for there to be foot and hand holds for him to climb up with. And he climbed with ferocity.
"Teerom!" Jurie screamed his name again as she reached the last few centimeters of the rope. Teerom used Strength Magic, the power of which was surprising, to climb faster and faster until he looked like a monkey, cracking the trunk as he made his way up. Jurie's grip was too tight and the plant tore, hurtling her to her death. But Teerom jumped from the tree, crossing twenty meters in the air before getting to her, embracing her into his arms, and rolling on his shoulder onto the huge branch.
Madella and Yilba arrived shortly after, worried sick since they had stopped hearing Jurie's screams. They called out to the two children who sat holding each other above on the branch. Jurie cried helplessly, relief slowly building up as her terror faded, and Teerom tried his best to act cool when in fact, he was shitting himself from the thought of being so high up.