There wasn't much to do. I asked the librarian if I could borrow some books to read on the road but she flat out rejected me. Heck, she didn't even let me carry my own damn book.
So, bored, I tried fiddling with magic. No, I didn't use any bones. Just my own meager ass supply of mana.
I'd already tried some basic things like test out what kind of magic I could use. For starters, I could successfully create water, fire, and ice. But I couldn't do anything regarding thunder, and earth. I could barely handle light and dark but it wasn't really useable for me. None of these were even remotely mana friendly, so I needed a good amount of fishbones to make them work. And Void and time? Oh yeah, those… not only did those particular elements require a disgustingly large amount of mana, they also required hidden knowledge, neither of which I possessed. I'd read about Einstein's theories in high school but I doubt that was going to help me. It might though?
However, there was one particular element that didn't require a lot of mana. Just my mana alone allowed me to control parts of it. Why? Because I didn't have to create something that was already abundant around me.
Namely, air.
"What are you even doing?" Shia said.
The carriage went on. We'd be reaching a village by night, take a break there and keep going for three days till we reached the border and then another three days to Nisa's estate.
"Manipulating wind."
A spinning vortex of wind danced in my palm. It wasn't very violent but definitely visible. Can I make this bigger? If I could, maybe I could even make wind blades and stuff? But how would wind form a blade? I could probably flip a few skirts, but actually cut flesh? Didn't seem likely.
"Teach me!"
The onion and potato fields were somewhat empty. Recently harvested I suppose. It was still a little cold but lately I found myself sweating every now and then. So, winter's almost over, huh?
"I'd love to, but you won't be able to."
So, I actually tried dragging Mike with me the other day and teaching him stuff. Didn't work. Apparently, just knowing how fire or water or even wind worked, didn't really make that big of a difference even if you had mana. Mike could barely form a droplet or so of water but he couldn't do sparks like me and Shia. Meanwhile, Shia couldn't produce anything other than a spark.
"It's not like you're busy!"
She was loud. And annoying… sigh. "What do we breathe?"
"Air."
"Try moving the air."
"That's it?"
"That's it."
She tried, didn't work, she kept trying, still didn't work… she stayed silent for about ten minutes and then started complaining that I wasn't a good teacher.
I've to deal with this for a whole week?
Argh….
***
On the second day we crossed a river. Or would have but the knight accompanying us asked us to wait for the ships to pass. Our resident bald thug, Mr. Sibrian agreed.
I think I might have seen these ships from a distance with Den before. He said something about these things being ghost ships and stuff?
"How old are these?" I asked.
The actual river was about half a kilometer wide with virtually no current. There wasn't any wind either. Yet, the ships moved along just fine. These ships had sails but those looked pretty dead. Could they be moving with magical devices? And weren't said devices super expensive?
"About 500 years, I believe," Sibrian said. "I've heard a demigod used them but since he was betrayed, he cursed them to roam the Snile River forever. Scary stuff."
Uh-huh.
We had a perfectly decent bridge connecting the two sides. But we still had to wait for these large ass decaying black ships to pass. The ships were pretty empty by the looks of things. Yet, I felt something from within them watching. Well, this world has flamethrowing lizards. So, it wouldn't have been that surprising if zombies lurked around in dead ships or even ghosts going about for that matter.
As usual, Shia seemed excited over nothing. Meanwhile, I just felt bored. "I kind of want to plunder those things," I said. Not because I wanted to plunder but because I was trying to figure what kind of face she would make.
"Count me in!" She agreed right away.
I sighed, and just stared at the ships. There was about twelve of them and the very last one was passing by.
No wonder your mother was concerned.
"He's just joking young miss, calm down," one of our guards said.
Shia pouted but didn't say anything. She was acting a bit too spoiled on this journey. I suppose that was because she didn't need to act like a lady away from family. I bet she was going to drop this and take up another fake noble lady vibe once we crossed borders. At least I hoped, she would.
I didn't really care all that much about this though. "Let's go I guess?"
"No," the knight said. "It's best we leave only after they've vanished into the horizon."
"Any special reason?"
"Their curse is really potent. I once suffered a massive diarrhea for three days straight. Not pleasant on long journeys."
That wasn't pleasant no matter what situation though. So basically, you just had food poisoning.
These people probably had a good reason to be careful about curses and all that. I mean, magic was a thing and me, the guy who came from another world with no talent at all, had somehow managed to manipulate nature which I thought was impossible till now. Yeah, I'd seen magic but I still regarded it to be impossible for me. But it happened. And sure, I was excited as hell. But… but when I actually thought about it, I wasn't excited because I could use magic. I was excited because for the first time, I saw a way out of this hellhole and a way for me to someday properly return to my family, to Lin.
Sigh… but that wasn't happening any time soon, I guess.
"Something wrong?" Shia asked.
"Nothing."
Last of the ships were gone. So, we resumed our journey. We'd be on the road for a while longer and although I thought I was used to pissing outdoors… yeah, these days my shame meter was kind of going out of control. Part of it was because Shia was peeking at me every now and then. I didn't have the guts to peek at her though. I mean… I didn't want to accidentally get beaten up or anything. Also, I was an adult. I couldn't just go about watching kids piss or something. It did piss me off when she saw me though.
"Next time, I'll take a dump and sling it right at you like a monkey if you come close," I whispered. I literally cringed after saying it. Don't be embarrassed after saying it yourself, dumb ass!
"Ew…" She for once was disgusted. Good. "I'm still going to peek though," she winked. Even a pervert wasn't this horny for peeking… probably.
Sigh… Seriously, how am I going to deal with her for the rest of the week?