“Vigor!” The crystal on Lea’s staff had a yellow glowing outline as she waved her staff at Alex as his body was enveloped in a yellow glow as it disappeared. “Well? Can you move your body now?” Lea asked him with a look of worry and anticipation if her spell worked on him.
Alex felt his body became lighter and his hands twitching as he raised his hands to look at them, flexing his fingers as he smiled, he felt all the fatigue go away as if he fell asleep the whole day.
“Woah…” He looked at Lea with a wide, sharp smile. “It’s like I never even fought at all.” He stated it’s effectiveness but then he remembered his face and his chest. He placed his hand on his cheek and he winced a bit from the touch. “Hgh…! S-Scratch that… The pain’s still there.”
“Don’t worry!-—” Lea waved her staff again at Alex. “Heal!” Alex’s body was enveloped in a green glow similar to the vigor spell. “There we go, The pain is still there but it’ll help recover any bruises quicker.”
“Even healing spells are not instant, huh?” Sal rested her arms behind her head.
“Well… I recently learned this spell so it’ll take time to perfect and advance the healing spell.” She said with her cheeks red in embarrassment and humiliation because of her weak healing.
“It’s fine Lea,” Alex assured her, He rubbed his cheek again as he winced but he didn’t utter a noise like before. “S-See? It’s getting better thanks to you.” He got off of his bed, stretching his and rolling his shoulders after. “Now!” He looked at his friends, he lowered his arms on his hips “Let’s go eat dinner. I’m starving!”
The two smiled at Alex as Sal’s arms raised in excitement. “Yeah! Free food!” She cheered with Lea ignoring Sal’s excitement over a free meal.
Before the three walked out of the room, Alex saw his mom pass by the doorway. He realized something, he wanted to ask her what happened during their fight. he followed after with
“Mom?” He caught up with her, She turned to him her signature gentle smile showing hints of it being forced.
“Yes, Alex? Something wrong?” She asked her son her head slightly tilted, her sweet voice had a hint of guilt.
“It’s about our fight… I know you didn’t want to go really all out on me since… Well, I can’t reach you or dad’s level just yet. But you kinda tried to kill me.” He wanted to say it upfront because even in the perspective of others she had the intent to kill him.
“Sweetie no!—I wasn’t trying to kill you!” her smile immediately faded as her guilt showed. “It was… It was an accident on my part…” She pushed her fingers as her cheeks turned red.
“Accident?” Sal and Lea poked out of the doorframe to listen to the conversation.
“M-Mhh…” She nodded. “You see Alex, Mommy is the kind of person that hits back… Twice as hard when she gets hit.”
“Throwing a giant axe that could’ve cut me in half seemed more than twice.”
“My point!—Is that I can’t hold my strength when I fight. My body automatically goes wild and goes into a frenzy when someone hits me.” She tried to ease her reasoning that she is incapable of proper restraint.
“Wait, you mean you’re saying that you go—”
“Yes, Honey. I go Berserk.” She bluntly stated as her cheeks turned redder from the embarrassment.
“Does that mean… I can go berserk too?”
Amanda shook her head. “You will know if you go berserk. But I pray that you aren’t. Anyway, you should go downstairs and eat dinner. I’ll be in my room.”
“You’re not going to eat with us?”
Amanda shook her head. She is embarrassed to sit with her son after she tried to kill him. “I-I’m a bit tired, Honey. Fighting with restraint takes alot from me. But I hope you and your friends can enjoy the food I made…” She tried to smile at her son before she walked into her room.
“Mom…” Despite her attempt to take his life, He was still worried about his mother. He felt a hand on his shoulder as it was Sal assuring him.
“C’mon Sharky. Let’s go eat dinner!” She flashed a small smile and a hard pat on his back that forced Alex to say ouch from her hard patting.
“Ow!—S-Sure…” He forced himself to smile as the three went downstairs.
“Thanks for the free meal!” Sal already snatched and stacked her plate with food. Scarfing on sausages and downing it with soda.
Alex used his fork to catch Sal’s that already had 2 pieces of sausages stabbed through. “Oi Sal! Don’t go hogging the food already!” Alex used his fork again to steal the sausages from her.
“Ah!—Alex you shark-toothed bastard!” Sal cursed as she flicked her fork up against Alex’s, his hold was loose that it was knocked out of his hand as Sal snatched his fork immediately. “Haha!” Sal snickered as she took a huge bite out of the sausages.
“My fork!” He glared at her as he was taken by surprise from her disarming his fork
She munched and swallowed the food as she stuck her tongue out at Alex. “Should’ve had a better grip Sharky
Alex quickly summoned a fork made of light from his hand and lunged his fork on the plate of sausages and quickly took and ate a piece of a sausage
“Oi! Since when can you make forks!?”
“Ulp!—” He swallowed and took another bite. “Forks can also be used as weapons so this counts!” Technically in his own understanding, utensils can be considered a weapon, which is what matters the most as his abilities are limited to only weapons, armor, and shields.
The two glared at each other and growled like wolves. Alex summoned another fork and Sal held Alex and her’s together as the two started clashing forks and attempting to steal one another’s food.
“You guys!” Lea tried to stop their fight but the two were too focused on their fight for who gets the most meat. “There’s another plate over here!” Lea pointed at another plate full of stacked sausages.
Julius was with them and he is so far ignoring the rabble-rousing between the two as he ate a balanced meal of sausage, vegetables, and sauces compared to his son and his friend who were primarily only eating the meat.
“Mr. Ares! These two are fighting!” Lea resorted to the help of an Adult who can control these two brats. But what Lea got from Julius was a dismissive chuckle.
“Let them be Lea.” He said with a gentle smile. “This is meant to be a special dinner since you three are going to leave soon.”
Alex tried to take more sausages using his fork but his forks get disarmed and shatter whenever Sal stops him as she snatched the sausages he took to her own plate.
“But!—But even so! Don’t you find it annoying they always fight wherever and whenever we eat?” Whenever Alex gets disarmed, A new fork comes to replace it, taking back the food that Sal stole from him.
“It’s honestly better than having a quiet and awkward dinner actually, kinda like running the restaurant when there are brawls about.” Sal dropped her forks as she got off of her seat to tackle Alex out of his seat.
“Now they’re just fighting!” Lea exclaimed as she stood up to look at the two brawl. “Knock it off you two!” She felt ignored as the two struggled each other as Sal broke the struggle by biting on Alex’s arm
“Ow!—What the hell Sal?! Are you a dog or something?!” He pushed her off as he looked at his hand, having a red bitemark, no open wounds but it was still a bite.
“Woof woof!” She playfully taunted as she stood up and took the time of his confusion to go back to her seat and eat as much as she can.
“You!—” He didn’t get to finish as he grabbed her leg to make her lose her footing and fall off. “You’re lucky I have sharp teeth, because if I didn’t—I would’ve bit you back!”
“Heh!—More like unlucky because that means your hickeys leave a damn scar like a vampire!”
“S-Shut up!” He flustered as Sal started laughing from how she managed to catch him off guard this time.
“Hahah! Finally got your face red from my teasing!”
“I said shut up!” He turned redder as he looked at his dad who was not looking at him but his presence alone was making him red.
Lea rested her hand on her face, letting out a sigh of frustration. She pulled out her staff as she silently casted her staff to use her signature spell. She removed her hand from her face and on the staff as she ran at them. “That’s enough!” She ended their fight with a hard thwack on their thick heads.
“Ow!—” Both said in unison as they rubbed where Lea struck them with her staff.
“You two always fight over food whenever we eat together. I’m the one who has to witness it more than Mr. and Mrs. Ares combined.” She said with a huff as she rested her staff on the table, using the edge to let it help stand.
“Okay, okay Lea!” Sal quickly said with her arms now raised. “I’ll behave!” She got back to her seat.
“Ow ow ow… My head…” Alex whined as he got back on his seat too. “Well to be fair… Sal started it with her taking almost all of it.”
“You think your mother didn’t prepare enough food for the stomach of two bottomless pits?”
“Actually—” Julius joined to correct Lea for a moment. “Three actually…” He smiled as he included himself in the scolding before he returned eating.
Lea’s eyes narrowed at Julius as her glare switched to the two. “Anyway… You two shouldn’t keep wasting your energy fighting for food every time. Especially when we’re about to join the Guild! We have to make a good impression so the least you two can do is have good manners in eating if we ever want to show our faces in the guild.”
“So you hit us on the head just to tell us that?”
“I have to because the moment you two eat, your thick heads are focused on who eats the most.” Lea picked her staff to move it beside her seat as she sat down. “Now. Eat up you two!”
The two nodded and grunted as Alex stopped rubbing his head as Sal gave him back his fork as they are also taking some vegetables on their plates too.
“…Sal is right by the way—” Julius gulped down a mug of iced soda. He sighed in relief and wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “I actually needed to go to a cleric to heal the bite marks, and a doctor to get rid of the scarring.” He smiled gently to the three as he finished eating. “Remember to put your plates at the sink you three.” He walked out of the kitchen as the three looked at each other.
The three had mixed reactions from what he said. Alex was holding back the urge to vomit from the mentioning of his parents doing something like that.
Sal is holding back her laughter from this new information, covering her mouth as chuckle and forcing said chuckling to stop with a snort.
Lea had a mixture of Alex’s reaction but with less disgust and the urge to puke but with horror. But at the same time that horror is overshadowed by the fact how she is holding back her laughter from Julius joining in to intentionally mess around with his son similar to Sal.
With dinner over, the trio helped each other and cleaned the dishes. The room was lightly tinted with an orange hue as the window showed the sun setting.
“Sun’s goin’ down…” Sal noticed while she placed some plates into a hanging cabinet. She stretched her arms as she looked at Lea. “Me and Lea should be heading out now, gotta get ready to leave tomorrow after all!”
Lea nodded as she adjusted her hat along with her glasses. “Yeah. I have to go prepare some supplies for the three of us. I expect you and Alex will carry most of our baggage… Right?”
“Yeah yeah… Anyways, we’re heading out. See ya tomorrow Sharky.” Sal waved him goodbye while she walked out to the doorway
“See you later Alex.” Lea gave him a quick and short bow as she caught up with Sal.
“Yeah, see you tomorrow you two!” He said before they are finally gone. He’s now on his own for a moment until Julius poked his head out of the doorframe of the hallway to see his son by himself.
“Are the two gone, Son?” Julius asked his son as he rested his shoulder against the doorframe.
“Mhm.” Alex nodded as he looked at his dad. He is aware that he went easy on him, and his father knows it too. But he decided to not bring it up. “Can’t believe I can finally leave this place.” Alex sat on a counter as he looked up at the roof.
“Well believe it.” Julius smiled at his son. “You and your friends are ready to become adventurers.”
“And it just took five years of training.” He looked at his dad as he stood up straight.
“Come with me. I want to show you something.” Julius gestured Alex to follow him as he took him to the living room. “See that?”
Julius pointed at a large ornate greatsword mounted by the fireplace, a beautiful sword with the blade’s edges coated in an undulled yet shimmering gold color.
Both the front and back of the blade’s middle is adorned with large blood red gems cut and polished to look like red opals that are aligned vertically to the blade. The guard is as golden as the blade and the center of the guard also had the blood red gem but larger and circular.
The handle of the blade is wrapped in preserved yet unaging linen, and the pommel is flat but the ends were curved outward into jagged curves. Just from looking at it in a realistic view, it was more than a sword for decoration and not meant for battle. But in a fantastical world of mysticism, logic was bent to see anything impossible a reality.
“Grandpa’s Sword? What about it?” Alex looked at his father curiously, It’s a cool looking sword, but he sees it only as decoration due to his ability of weapon and armor creation. If he wanted to use a sword like that, he can always imagine it.
Julius looked back with a simple grin as he walked over to the fireplace and removed the mounted sword as he walked back to Alex, handing out the sword to him. “I want you to take it.”
Alex was taken aback, even with his thoughts of not needing it because of his ability. He had that feeling in him that this is more than just to be given to him as a starting weapon. “Dad…” Alex is stunned to say anything, but his face showed gratitude and joy from being given to him. He took the sword from his dad, his hands shaking not from nervousness, but from the weight of the blade. “It’s heavy…” As expected since it’s a greatsword.
“And someone as old as your grandfather can carry it with just one hand and swing it like a stick.” Julius meant it as a compliment, meaning to say that his father can swing it around without any effort. “And I want you to have it. He originally wanted to give it to your uncle… But we already know how that went, I took it instead but I didn’t even use it.”
“Why didn’t you?” It would make sense his dad should use the sword since he can only make armor and shields.
“Well.” He looked up to the ceiling, looking up to where his and Amanda’s room should be in. “That’s because I already have a sword.”
“That’s pretty corny…” It was sweet. But that made him sick in his stomach to hear more about anything lovey involving his dad and his mom.
“Hah!—Okay, okay. I’ll drop the mushy feels and the drama now.” It felt uncomfortable for him to use certain lingo that people Alex’s age would be sick of hearing in a casual conversation, and feel uncomfortable hearing it from some middle-aged dad.
“You should also drop trying to sound like you’re still sixteen…” He sighed and looked at the massive sword and back at his dad. Either way… Thanks, Dad.” Alex gave his father a beaming smile as he placed the sword aside to give his father a hug.
Julius prepared for any hugs as he quickly embraced his son back. “No problem, Son.” He gently rubbed the back of his son’s head. “And I’m still sixteen at heart. So it’s fine to talk like how you guys talk right?”
Alex didn’t find it annoying anymore. Actually chuckling that his attempts in being young were now becoming endearing. “Haha!—Fiiiiine. It’s my last day here anyway so you can be a sixteen year old dad as much as you want.”
“Even if you say it’s your last day here. You’re always welcome to come back home.”
“Thanks…” The two hugged longer than it needed to be. As the sun sets fully as dusk arrived, the sun sinking away upon the horizon as the orange skies slowly turned blue, sparkled with small, glittering stars.
