In a dimly lit cave, three figures stood facing each other. Two of them faced the third—a young man wearing a hood, only his mouth visible. He exuded a powerful presence. One of the other two creatures, more vocal than the other, answered the man's questions.
"The preparations are complete?" the man asked.
"Yes," a gruff voice replied.
"No mistakes," the man warned.
"This is not our first mission. It is merely nothing," the creature scoffed.
"Don't get too cocky."
"Ughh!" Pressure mounted on them, forcing them to their knees. The second creature, standing behind the first, was the first to bare its fangs.
"Grrrr!" But it was quickly held down by the first creature. Seeing this, the man smiled.
"Not as stupid as you look, huh?" he said. "I guess surviving this long in human territory without being slaughtered means you've got something upstairs."
It was evident their relationship wasn't great.
"We made a deal, human."
"Sure. And I believe it would be in both our interests if you and your kin do your job well."
"You can trust us."
Deep inside the cave, countless red eyes shone in the darkness.
Job well done… Ren chuckled. He couldn't get Mr. Brown to stop calling him that horrible name, but at least Lyra was in the same boat now. She teased him the most about the name and even encouraged Mr. Brown.
"Hehe, serves her right."
Ren searched the whole orphanage for Liam but couldn't find him. He started looking in the neighborhood. There was no telling where he might be. The boy was a free bird.
"Oh, that's him. Hey, Liam!" Ren waved at the running Liam. Liam was a few months younger than Ren, a bit too tall for his age, with almost golden hair, brown eyes, and a handsome face to match. Overall, his appearance was more than decent. Just like everyone else, he wasn't perfect. The boy was a rascal.
"REN, RUN!!"
Huh?
Ren didn't wait for a second when he saw six bigger boys chasing Liam. He made a run for it too. They would catch him once they couldn't catch Liam because they knew they were friends.
They knew the area like the back of their hands, and it wasn't the first time Liam got in trouble. They ran for five more minutes at top speed.
"Ha – Ha!"
"Did we lose them?"
"I think so. What prank did you pull this time?"
"Nothing. I did nothing," Liam vehemently denied.
"I don't believe that," Ren was adamant.
"Well, the guy at the front said some unsavory things about Oasis… and I kinda told him some hard truths. Nothing much."
Sigh!
Ren had an inkling of what those truths were.
"It wasn't my fault, really. You know what they say, the truth hurts."
Remembering the kid's bald head—the one at the forefront of the chase—his anger might be a little justified. The baldness was one of a kind, straight from a very young age, as his parents never allowed his hair to grow. There was something poetic about the baldness, always oily, reflecting the setting sun.
"Anyways, let's go."
"Where?"
Ren immediately grabbed his shoulder.
"…!" Liam was shocked. "No, no, no."
"Yes, yes, yes. We are going."
Despite his protests, Liam was dragged along. They reached the front of a building—a bookshop. As they were about to ring the bell, Ren felt his consciousness blur. An eerie feeling. He looked back.
A carriage was passing by; the windows were slightly open. From there, he saw a man sitting inside. The man turned to him with a creepy smile. Ren was frozen, and the carriage passed.
"Hey, what's wrong?"
Ren turned to see Liam's worried expression.
"N-nothing." He hid his trembling hands.
"Okay, if you say so…" Liam looked around but saw nothing. "Let's enter."
Inside the bookstore, a man wearing monocles sat. He glanced at the customers, acknowledging their presence for only a moment before burying himself in his books.
"…" Their meetings were always kind of awkward. The man was too eccentric. "Uhm, mister?"
The man ignored them. After a moment, he stood up grumbling—something along the lines of disturbing his work, and him only opening his shop to make a living and fund his research. He approached the two boys.
"What?"
"We are here to borrow some books," Ren answered.
"Yeah, yeah, what kind of books?"
"Books about culture, history of the three empires, and uhm… well, here is the list." Ren gave him a list while scratching his head.
[Unification of the Empire, Heroes of the Empire, Awakening…]
The man walked along the array of shelves, picking the books; clearly, he had memorized them. He brought them. Ren handed over the money—a few pieces of copper coin—right there without waiting for him to ask.
"Uhm, can we stay here to read them?"
The man grunted in response, which actually meant a 'yes.' This was Ren's little trick to get free lessons, as the man would get excited about anything related to magic or research and explain more than necessary.
Ren and Liam found a comfortable place to stay, just beside the window. Ren looked around the bookstore; it was warm, quiet, and cozy.
'Definitely, the best place to read,' Ren thought to himself. He opened one of the books, and both kids buried themselves in reading. Of course, the first one they opened was the book about Awakening. At their age, it was a few years until they reached the age of awakening—12 years. It was the age one's standing in society was established. Yet, only a few got awakened, and even fewer had outstanding talent.
Ten and eleven-year-olds often fantasized about awakening and learning magic, participating in superstitious acts believed to increase one's chances of successfully awakening. Like eating some weird combination of food like pickles dipped in chocolate or garlic-flavored ice cream. There was even one about wearing mismatched socks on weekends, finding very round pebbles (which was believed to be filled with mana) placing them inside pillows, stuffs like that was widely believed.
Even some of them were written in the books.
Ren and Liam were engrossed reading – yeah, well, mostly Ren. Liam had picked a random book, spending half of the time reading and the other half dozing off. Ren was powerless against his ultra-lazy friend.
That was until someone slapped the back of his head.
"Ouch!" Liam who was waltzing between the real world and the dream-spirit world was startled awake.
"Who dares! Are you... ?!" Liam was furious, as he turned to look. His open mouth became shut.
"Find a bed if you wish to take a nap, will you?" Evan a young boy around ten or eleven year old with slight dark sunken circles around his eyes, scolded Liam.
Evan the son of the bookkeeper and a bookworm also like his father… no, he was more of a bookworm than his father.