The handsome knight grinned and tilted his head a bit as if seeing Damian for the first time. Then he tossed the coin back towards him and placed the sword back in it's sheath on his waist.
"You can have it, consider it a payment for all the trouble my little squire has caused for you."
"Ahm.. Thanks."
Damian did not know whether he would even go to any academy in Faerunia but he could certainly use it for something else. Looking at the strange trio for the last time Damian turned around and walked back to his room at the inn. After bandaging himself and resting for a while Damian tried his best to remember the small runic magic circle the young price's spell had created but it was too detailed and condensed together that Damian just could not remember all it's details.
It was called a sword art though, that Damian had learned at least that. In all the books he had seen or read there was never a mention of any sword arts just some sword techniques that focused on how to fight as a swordsman rather than casting spells with a sword. Maybe the Spellsword academy might know what it really was but that won't help Damian.
It was around 3 in the afternoon, so not wasting time Damian took out all his runic circle drawing and quill and ink, studying and trying his best to understand the meaning of different runic sections and how he could manipulate them or how they worked all together. His unique runic section list was growing day by day, till now there were none two similar but after putting them all together Damian could see how it was always created in a same structure. The head part with some runes and numbers, the biggest of three body part that had a lot of numbers and few runes mixed in and in the last was the bottom part which only had runes and no numbers.
Initially it made no sense but if he could figure out how different spells that had same elements and designs worked he might get something out of it. For now the three blade spells [Air Blade], [Water Blade] & [Rock Bullet] had a little bit similarity with many things being unique to each but at least this was something to work with.
Working all evening Damian finally stopped when his room got too dark to continue, he was also hungry so he left the inn and went to a restaurant that was a bit further from his inn in the upper class of the city. Tasting the food from different restaurants to find one that he liked was kind of his little side quest in this city.
Damian ordered the 'special' dish that they had and waited, looking around him observing the strangers going on with their nightly activities. After some minutes someone sat on the opposite chair to his, at first Damian thought his food had arrived, then he thought he was just here to eat like him but the stranger in a white shirt and respectable enough pants was more interested in him than the menu. He had a bit grey in his otherwise black beard, the man must be at least in his 30s.
"Is there something on my face, mister..?"
"Ahh.. sorry you were just too young... I am Inko Aslakar, I run the apothecary called [Easy Remedies] in the lower city. I wanted to meet you, the little potion maker."
'Ahh.. He is interested in my potions. Doesn't look like a bad guy, but why was he stalking me like a creep..?'
"Why follow me then, could have met at my stall..."
"I wanted to offer you a deal and I just couldn't wait for tomorrow."
"What deal..?"
"Sell all your potions to me and I will give you 3 silver for each potion and 5 extra for your effort."
"Hmm.. tempting indeed but I would like to check if I could get better offer from others before making a deal."
"I could also provide you with the raw materials for it, just think how much profit you will make once you remove all that production cost..."
"No, I will handle the production myself. Just give me a better deal."
"You do not make this any easier kid... I'm being really generous here..."
"What can I do with your generosity..? Give me gold instead..."
"Fahh! Kids these days... Fine, 3 silver and 5 copper for each potion and 5 silver extra."
"Hmm.. okay. Tell me where to bring the products, I will be there tomorrow morning."
"My apothecary [Easy Remedies]. Make as many as you can, I will also sell raw material at discount if you want.."
"Okay.. I will see when my current supply ends.."
"I will be leaving you with your dinner now, I hope good business from you kid after all these bargain."
"Sure.. sure.."
The man left as the dinner arrived so Damian focused on his food instead of the large man's funny walk. 3 silvers and 5 coppers was not a bad deal at all, specially when Damian could just be finished with his sells with just one delivery. The time saved from all that talking and selling could be used for more reading and studying the runes. For just his one batch he would get 9 gold coins. That was way better than selling his own for just 7.
The man obviously would sell it for more to get a profit but that wasn't Damian's problem. He was not rich enough to care for others, the faster he could get away from this city the better.
Damian finished his meal which was just a little better than the food from the restaurant near the inn, not worth the extra price at all. He would have to find another place to check out.
Damian was walking admiring the carved details on the stone buildings just like usual when he heard people running and murmuring around him loudly. Damian turned to look what was going on and saw some people running towards the main street that stretched from the city gate. Curious, Damian also got behind them and reached a crowd of people gathered around the main street road looking at something passing by on the road. Damian was too short to see above all the tall men so he found a short enough one story building and climbed on the rooftop from the back.
Damian walked slowly to the edge and finally looked down and the thing or person that he saw made his eyes bulge in his eye sockets. The man with no left hand and a charred shoulder, chest and neck was holding a rope dragging a kid behind him.
The scarred and now burned knight captain and the electric kid.
The kid looked tired and dirty as hell, his bones were more clear on his body now, as if starved for weeks. His eyes were looking down and he was walking or more like being dragged like a dead zombie.
Damian knew the knight would be back or he would send men looking for him sooner or later but this was way too fast. He always assumed that the scarred knight served the lord of the border town 'Grimstone', never did he thought the royals would be involved. If the quest to bring back 'The miracle survivor' was from the king himself than that would make this a really big mess.
It would not end well for the kid, after all accident or not he had killed the whole squad of knights pledged to the royalty.
Damian felt bad for the little kid but this was not something where anyone could do anything. His fate was in the hands of the king now. It was a surprise that the angry knight captain had not killed him already and had brought him back here at all.
Shaking his head Damian was just going to walk away when suddenly he felt a gaze locked upon him, his instincts were never wrong so he stood still and looked past the crowd across the street from where this feeling was coming.
"F*ck! What is he doing here..?"
It was a face of an old man under a dark robe, trying to hide among the crowd. But he could tell that his two old eyes were staring directly at him.
The father of the electric kid had sure picked up on the age since Damian had last seen him.