It had been four months since I left Yuwei in Sosshi Village, and I could say for certain that I had been enjoying my time. I'd now traveled throughout most of the forsaken realm and some of the common realm, where I currently found myself. Nothing really eventful had happened besides the occasional fight with slavers and bandits, which had helped me earn some trust points from a lot of people in the forsaken realm—and one particular incident in a village.
It was about two months ago when I was strolling through a town in the common realm on the western side of the kingdom. I was doing my best to stay the hell away from the Western side where the Witches' Forest was located—I wanted nothing to do with that crazy witch with a blood fetish.
While strolling through town, I heard people talking about some kind of "sacred maiden" and how she had brought everyone such great fortune. This made me curious, so I stayed in the town for a while and saw a girl with bright turquoise hair who sang at the church every day. She even showed a rebellious side one day, singing a song she'd made herself, which I thought was quite good. Guess others didn't agree.
Anyway, I ended up saving her and her friend from some crazy church fanatic and took care of them for a little while before having to flee the city. Not knowing what to do with two kids a couple years younger than me, I did the best thing I could think of and stuck them on Yuwei. Her reaction when I appeared out of nowhere and dropped the two of them with her before saying "Take care of 'em for me, thanks, bye!" and disappeared was priceless. The call I got from her that night was hilarious.
Now that the Magic Knight exam was approaching and I'd just about had my fill of wandering around the kingdom, I'd decided to start making my way toward the capital, taking my time, of course.
Currently, I was walking on a dirt road looking at a map, trying to figure out where the hell I was. All of a sudden, I heard a loud roar coming from the direction where my destination should be, and not having anything better to do, I went that way.
Approaching the village, I began to get a little worried as I could hear people screaming and the sound of buildings collapsing. I could also see a massive, black four-legged creature rampaging and beating on what seemed to be a Magic Knight. Oh, just kidding—the knight seemed to not be moving. That wasn't good.
Without delay, I snapped my fingers and teleported directly behind the beast, taking out a cheap sword I recently bought with the money I stol.. Ahem I mean liberated from bandits I took out., I wrapped it with a large amount of mana along with my whole body, and slashed toward the beast, leaving a massive cut through its torso.
"ROAAARRRR!" The beast let out a pained scream and turned to swing its claw at me.
Okay, this is gonna take quite a bit of effort. Let's test out how far my mana enhancements have come with this guy.
Snap.
My appearance suddenly changed to that of my X form, and I jumped up high, wrapping my whole body in a thicker mana skin and began fighting the beast in front of the stunned gazes of the terrified villagers.
After a bit of dodging and trying my best to hurt the giant beast—succeeding mostly in pissing the big guy off—I cursed and thought, Just what the hell is this thing?
Abandoning the idea of using only physical force, a loud snap reverberated, pulling both myself and the giant beast inside my dimension. The surroundings turned into an animated chaotic scene of constantly changing vibrant colours, with the ground around us folding in on itself and a seemingly complete loss of gravity as trees and ground floated around us, stationary.
With this, the beast lost its footing and began to float into the air, unable to move, flailing around and letting out loud screams.
Seeing this, I smiled and said, "Congratulations, you are the first to let me try out manipulating space like this. Quite cool, don't you think?"
My only response was an even angrier roar.
I sighed. "Tch, this seems wasted on you. You can't even appreciate what's happening around you." Sighing again, I said, "Well, let's end this quickly then. No point in dragging this on."
Suddenly, I began jumping from platform to platform, rising higher above the suspended beast before getting a foothold on the bottom of what used to be the ground and launching downward toward the beast. The sword in my hand grew larger and larger as I descended.
Swinging my sword, a large, deep cut appeared on the beast's body before it was sent spiraling downward at extreme speeds.
With a snap, both myself and the beast returned to reality, with the space around returning to normal as if nothing ever happened. The beast impacted harshly, causing a loud explosion to ring out and the ground to tremble all around.
To the villagers who witnessed this scene, all they would see was a man in white suddenly appear and fight with the beast before hearing a loud snap. The next second, they saw the beast plummeting to the ground with a large gash, and the ground around them began to shake with fast winds blowing past them.
Looking down, I saw my recently acquired sword begin to fall apart, unable to handle the force of my mana, as well as the impact and sighed. Dam I just bought that to I really need to get a better sword.
The beast then began to shrink, turning into that of a small boy with orange hair. Seeing this, I muttered, "Well, that's certainly troublesome," and walked over to pick him up.
Behind me, I heard the cheers of the village shouting over my victory, and large amounts of green light came rushing toward my wrist. Ignoring this for now, I scooped the boy up into my arms.
Snap.
We then disappeared from the scene, leaving behind silence.
Scene Change: A random inn in the commoner realm
It had been a couple of days since that incident. Since then, the village had been under repair with people going about their daily lives and Magic Knights patrolling everywhere to investigate what had happened.
Ignoring all this, I sat on a chair in an inn looking at the unconscious orange-haired boy on the bed. The boy abruptly sat up and yelled, "DAD!" before looking around at the unfamiliar environment and meeting eyes with me.
Seeing a look of fear and confusion when our eyes met, the boy asked scared, "Wh-who are you? Where's my dad?"
I responded, "Name's Kenji, and I got no idea where your dad is."
The boy, still frightened, backed away to the backrest of the bed.
I sighed and said, "You're not in danger. Don't worry—I won't hurt you. You've been sleeping the past three days. I've been taking care of you while you were out."
The boy nodded, still frightened, and asked, "What happened?"
I responded, "What's the last thing you remember?"
The boy thought for a bit before saying, "I was out in the forest looking for my dad when I found him on the ground." He paused, tearing up, and continued, "He was bleeding, and that man was standing over him." Then he began to cry. The man being the magic knight Kenji found lifeless upon arrival.
Seeing this, I let him cry. After a while, I asked, "Do you remember anything after that?"
The boy shook his head.
I sighed more deeply and said, "Well, good news is I think that man got what was coming to him."
The boy looked at me, confused.
I continued, "Bad news is I don't think you can stay here in this town much longer."
Confused, the boy looked questioningly and said, "What do you mean?"
"Well, you went on quite the rampage. Pretty strong for someone without a grimoire, I gotta say. After you got who I'm assuming is the man who was beside your father, I had to step in to stop you from doing any more damage."
Hearing this, the boy didn't respond.
I then said, "Well, never mind. You're probably going through a lot right now. The knights might discover something tying you to what happened, so we should probably get out of here. Before that can you tell me anything you remember about how your dad knew that man?"
The boy responded depressingly, "Dad said they knew each other when he was a magic knight. And what do you mean leave? why should I go with you?"
I answered, "Look, you don't have many options right now, if the knight's investigation leads back to you at all, you will be held responsible for what happened in the village. I guess you don't know what I'm talking about so I guess you will just have to see what I mean once we exit this room. How about I take you to my friend? You can stay with her and two kids your age for a bit while you get better. What happened is a tragedy, and I can't imagine what you're going through, but let me get you to a safe place where you can heal. How's that sound?"
Silence stretched for a while before the boy muttered quietly, "Ok."
I smiled and said, "Well, now that you've agreed, how about telling me your name?"
The boy looked at me and again responded in a low voice, "J-Johnny."
I smiled at him and said, "Well, nice to meet you, Johnny. I'm Kenji. Can you wait right here while I go call my friend? I'll go get you something to eat, are you hungry?"
To that Johnny nods meekly, causing Kenji to say "ill be back in a bit." leaving the room.
Once Kenji has left the room, he thinks to himself, Why am I even helping this kid out, its not like I gain anything from this. Sigh, well whatever I recognize him to, what's with all these characters from To Be Hero showing up around me did ROB pull this stunt as some kind of joke?
Sighing again Kenji will then mutter out loud "whatever ill just drop his off with Yuwei like the other 2 and be done with it haha."
Taking out the magic orb Yuweu gave him, he will call her, and when it's connected put on a forced smile and say "Heyy how's it going been awhile haha." chuckling nervously at the end.
In response Yuwei on the other side of the orb will look at him angrily and say "oh I don't know, how do you think things are? I told you I didn't want to hear from you for a while after the stunt you pulled dropping these 2 off without a word." showing Cyan and Luo beside her who will wave at him smiling and say "hey Kenji!"
Kenji hearing this will say "hey, I did that with purely good intentions you can't stay mad about that. Besides you guys are becoming close aren't you I knew the moment I met them you would love them."
Yuwei will sigh with a smile saying "yes, they are good kids and I've been enjoying having them around but that's not the point."
Cutting her off before she can continue Kenji says "well see I told you, and now that I have you where are you guys now ill come visit."
Hearing this Yuwei gets an emotionless look and asks "why?" and Kenji will answer "why because I miss you guys of course! I want to check on how your doing and it's better in person, no other reason."
There will be a pause and she responds saying, "fine we're at a town near the border of the Heart kingdom, I plan to stay here for a while."
Hearing this Kenji will respond "Ok i'll see you guys soon!". Just after he finished and was about to end the call Johnny will come out of the door to the room, eyes red clearly just from crying and ask "who are you talking to?"
Yuwei on the other lines' faces develop black lines and will ask in a dangerous tone "KE-N-Ji who was that. You better not be thinking of leaving anoth-"
But before she could finish Kenji cut her off saying quickly "sorry got to go, see you soon bye" and end the transmission. With the call finished he will turn to Johnny and say "that was my friend, she is nice and lives with 2 kids your age, you will love them." pausing he will then continue "anyways do you remember where you live, lets go pack your things and get ready to skip town."
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Author note: magic knight exams and his journey as a magic knight will begin after the next chapter. Hope you enjoyed this chapter!