"I'll show you what I see." I tell him.
And I run, while holding his hand.
I'll remove this fear of his by today.
"Where are you-" he says.
I don't answer to him.
We run for about two minutes until we reach the spot, heaving and panting.
"Mr. Money's Jewelry"
It shows the picture of an overweight man with a gold cap worn backwards, three gold and platinum rings per finger, a grinning face with 32 diamond teeth and sunglasses completely made out of silver, including the lenses. He probably couldn't even see through those.
I open the door and pull Junior in.
"We'll ask the shopkeeper, see if we can sell precious metals."
"Hnnngh hello boys. Get out." My Money peeks out of a table holding rings. He's panting heavily for some reason, and has a bottle of lotion on the counter.
"Hello sir. We're here to do business with you."
"Hrnnn is that so? What are you going to sell me? Don't tell me you stole your parents' wedding rings."
"Um no sir. Hypothetically if we had pure gold freshly extracted from the ore, would you be willing to buy them?"
"Hmmmrgh nyes, but that's if you have it."
"Well sir, this boy and I have Metal Magic. We should be able to easily get some."
Mr Money lifts his eyebrow. "Hmmmrrrnn nyes. I understand. I love Metal Magic, but alas I have fire magic. I also love money. Hnnnrggh oh nyes. Money..aaaaaah." He takes some lotion and strokes at something beneath his counter and his eyes roll back. "Hrnnn ambatu…kkam. Ambatukam aaaaaaaah." He shudders and moans. I see a thick white liquid shoot out from below the counter and stick to the ceiling.
I'm going to pretend like I didn't see that.
"How much are you paying?" Junior asks.
"Hrnnn 100 Mal per gram for pure gold on average." He replies. Mal is this world's currency.
Junior's jaw drops.
"That's enough to feed myself and my dad for a month!"
"Silver is about 70 Mal per gram.
Platinum is about 180 Mal per gram.
Different diamonds range from 1000-8000 Mal per gram."
Junior looks shocked.
I say, "Alright. We'll come back in a bit with some rare….stuff."
Mr Money laughs. "Hrmmm you kids are funny. You remind me of myself when I was young. Come back with the stuff and I'll pay you."
I pull Junior out of the shop and run again, while holding his hand.
"Hey- what now?"
We run for a few minutes until i reach a seemingly normal but deserted spot. It's filled with abandoned houses. A ghost town. In the mountains.
"Wait for a bit." I tell him, panting.
The mine entrance has been covered by a house. I'll need to split the Earth to do it.
I sit down, close my eyes and concentrate.
Time passes.
"What are you doing?" Junior asks.
I stay silent.
Some more time passes.
Junior, now tired of waiting asks again, "What are you doing?"
I don't reply. I have to concentrate. It's hard doing this with a 0.2% efficiency.
At the 20 minute mark, I hear a-
CRACK
The foundation of the house in front of me cracks.
I can feel Junior's body perk up.
10 more minutes.
CRRACK
The Earth under the house splits open like a door. Wood cracks, dust flies, the house implodes into itself.
I make the Earth push the debris out.
Since I'm using sub-100 power, I can use it infinitely. For some reason, whenever you use 100 Hozon or less, you won't run out of magic, but the moment you run at any number higher than 100, you can only use it for a set time continuously. Generally 15 minutes, then your magic runs out and you'll need a break to replenish your magic.
About 40 minutes after we came here, I've successfully opened a path to the caves.
Junior doesn't know what to do.
I take a few more minutes to create a metal lantern, some flint and steel, dry twigs and a bit of petrol.
With Earth Magic, I can create or pull anything that forms under the Earth. Including petrol. But for some reason rare metals are incredibly hard to create.
I manage to make the lantern work and I take Junior's hand.
"Are we going in THERE?" He's terrified.
"Hey, say something, please." He begs me.
Nope. I'll show him that there is a way out.
I'm not saying anything to him.
"There's no living things here." I assure him. Never mind, I just said something.
I created a gentle slope to get inside. The only light being my lantern.
We go very deep. I leave markings of glow stones pointing in a certain direction to know our way out. Even if we get lost, I could just dig up. But that will probably take an entire day and freak my parents out.
We come into a giant cave. It's about ten meters tall and has a mini waterfall.
I use my sonar to find out where the precious metals might be. My sonar stretches up to half a kilometer, but provides information very slowly.
There. 150 meters to the right. Gold ores.
"Come." I take his hand and look at him, the lantern being the only thing illuminating his face, and my heart skips a beat.
Why does a guy like him look so pretty?
He's going to make a lot of straight men confused about themselves when he grows up.
Whatever. I'm not into feminine shotas. My only preference is milfs.
Milf lovers rise up ✊🤝
Time to show him that he's still got some hope.
I take him to the right.
"Pull the gold out." I tell him. His radius is at about 50-70 m so it should be easy for him to get the gold out.
"What?"
"Okay, do the radar thing."
"Like this?"
"Yeah, now do you feel a weird metal?"
"Yeah."
"Keep the magic there, but try to…"
…..
After 20 minutes, he figures it out.
"Hrrrrrrnn!" He grunts and uses his magic to pull the gold out.
As usual, his magic usage and efficiency puts most 30 year olds to shame.
"Keep going." I encourage him.
After about half an hour, small pieces of gold float to his hand.
"Congratulations. You got gold. Let's go, sell it." I say, trying to hide my shock.
This would have taken me 3 hours to get. And he did it in half an hour.
This boy is scary talented.
We follow the glow stones and thankfully get out of the cave. It's almost getting dark.
Junior is silent.
"We'll split it 80-20." I say. "You take the 80%."
"That's-" he said.
"No big deal." I say. "YOU did most of the hard work. I just opened the cave and it's going to remain opened, but you'll be the one both searching and mining for gold in the future. But I still keep getting the 20% even though I will barely do any work in the future."
"Oh-okay." He seems satisfied. I knew he wouldn't accept a deal where he keeps all the money, as poor and desperate as he is.
He remains silent as we walk to the jeweler.
"We have Gold, Mr Money!" I yell.
"Hnnnnngh?" Mr Money is surprised.
"Junior, give him the gold."
Mr Money examines it. "Hnnn that IS freshly mined pure gold."
He heats his hand with magic. I can see the skin become translucent and the bones showing underneath. He smelts the gold into a tiny bar about 3 times the size of a SIM card.
He weighs it.
Junior and I wait with bated breath.
"Here." He gives me 310 Mal. "That's for about 3 grams worth of gold." He shows the gold being weighted on the scale, and it does read 3 grams.
"That's so much….oh my god." Junior starts shaking.
"Pleasure doing business with you, sir." I say.
"Hrrrrnnn you kids are crazy. Now get out if you have no gold." He replies.
We leave the store.
"It was that easy?" I'm surprised. I thought there would be more background checks, but no. I guess a world with magic is bound to have a high level of efficiency in some aspects.
I take 60 Mal and give him the rest. "Your share."
"I-I don't deserve-"
"Shut up." I tell him. "You deserve what you work for, and you worked for this.
It was a bit risky going into the mines, but I had to show you that there is a way out for you. So stop acting all depressed from tomorrow."
"I…" his lower lip quivers. He looks like he's about to cry, but he stops himself from crying. "Why are you doing this? Are you not having fun just being my friend? Why do you have to teach me all of this?
You could have had the mine for yourself. But you're sharing all these secrets with me. You're sacrificing a good life for a stranger. Why?"
"Because…" yeah, why DO I do this?
"I…I will feel happy if I help you. And I will feel like shit if I don't." I answer. That's why I get angry when he tells me lies his dad feeds him. That's why I like being his friend. Being with him makes me happy.
He looks pained for a second, but immediately hides it with a happy face.
"Thank you, Onna!"
He says thanks, but why does it sound so fake?
I don't believe him.
Junior's POV
I should be happy.
He doesn't care for me. He just uses me for joy as I use him to get out of poverty. I know I don't deserve to be cared. That should make me happy.
But I feel disappointed. Like I expected him to care.
I really am pathetic. Here's someone who's given me more than 10 times the amount of money my dad earns every week. And I can't even thank him properly.
"I- thank you so much." I tell him. I mean it. He's helping me get out of my shitty life. I feel happy. But it's subdued by my disappointment.
"Uhhh. You don't have to thank me if you don't mean it." He says.
"But I do." I say. "I'll pay you back one day." I will. I mean that too. I don't want to be the selfish girl my dad knows me as.
"You don't have to, dude. It's no biggie." He says and awkwardly scratches his ear.
"It's getting dark. I gotta go now. You better stop with the depressed act by tomorrow, or I'll keep making deez nuts jokes."
He waves goodbye and leaves.
I have to go home too. Back to my horrible life. Just for a little while longer, until I earn enough to get both myself and my dad out of poverty.
I walk to my home.
I stop at the door. I should give my dad the 250 Mal.
He'll be very happy. Maybe he might even care about me more. After all, he's the only one who does care for me.
My heart flutters. What if he promises never to beat me again?
What if he tells me how good of a daughter I am?
What if he….I blush. What if he hugs me?
I laugh. Dream on, me.
I open the door and see my dad. He looks a little bit sober.
"Um. Hey dad." I say.
"What?" My dad looks irritated.
Hehe. Wait till you see this.
"Here." I hand him 240 Mal.
He holds it in his hands in disbelief. "Who did you steal this from?"
Ouch.
"I worked for it."
"Who? You? You worked for it? Did you whore yourself?"
"No. I went mining for gold. With my Earth Magic."
"Oh. I'll keep it." My dad looks at the money hungrily. "Are you going to work for some more gold again?"
….this is not what I expected.
"No." I reply.
"Why not?" His voice becomes dangerous.
He'll force me to start immediately if I tell the truth. So I lie. There's no way he can figure out the truth anyways
"I don't do it alone. Ten other kids have to use different types of magic to get to the mine and remove all the rocks."
My dad looks at me angrily.
Shit, was my lie unbelievable?
"I want to speak to those kids. Who are they?"
Oh no.
"Umm..the Chief's daughter." I lie. "The general's son-"
"Forget it." He says. "Nothing I can do about it. When are you going next?" My dad asks.
"They told me that they do it for fun, so-"
"WHEN?" My dad asks, raising his voice a bit.
"I don't know."
"How do you not know? You should have some idea. Give me a date." My dad tells me.
Tears well in my eyes. I'm giving most of the money I earned to him, and he still treats me like crap.
"In 11 months." I lie. "Apparently there's a lot of preparation."
"Hmmm….I don't believe you." My dad tells me. He gets up from his seat. "Are you lying?"
"N-no. I'm telling the truth! I promise!" I back off, trying to create more space between me and my dad.
"Ugh." My dad sits down. "Alright. Tell me before you go mining next time."
I lay down without saying a word. I thought this might at least make my dad happy. I'm not giving him any money ever again.
Angry tears stream down my face and I sniffle.
"Kid?" My dad calls my name, surprisingly tenderly.
"Yes?" I say.
He walks over to me and pats my back. "Good job, kid. You made me happy today."
I'm shocked. My dad never did that to me, ever.
That means that he cares for me, right? Even if he beats me and treats me like crap.
Someone in this world cares for me.
"Mmhmm." Was the only word I can utter while I'm crying.
I feel a little bit of joy and pride.
Things are getting better.