Something had been on my mind ever since I had started to go back; I felt as if I was followed. I sprinted, and every time I stopped, I’d feel eyes on me drilling into the back of my skull. After a full day of sprinting, this pesky sensation had not subsided.

Many, many of these stops-and-gos later, my pursuer finally slipped up. As I peeked back, I caught a human figure slipping behind a wall.

Oh, so that’s what it was?

I went back to run; I didn’t do ten steps before a manly voice said behind me.

“Perceptive aren’t you, boy?”

I jumped forward and turned around in midair to see the owner of the voice. Him.

The tall bald man with a conspicuous fake mustache was there, seeming both annoyed and relaxed.

I held my dagger in front of me, my hands trembling. Would he have trailed me like that if he was on my side?

“And brave, good.”

“Get over here. You will need at least 4 more days at this pace.”

“D-did Albert send you?”

“You think I ran all the way here of my volition? Hurry, Sir Albert hates tardiness. But first, give me the metal.”

“Ah—yes…”

“Wait… who said I had it?”

“You don’t?” he raised his bushy eyebrows. “Eh… I guess you need to be at least that quick-witted to catch Albert’s eyes; but you know that if I wanted to kill you, I would... right?”

“Why is Albert helping—”

“Boy, I don’t know. No one knows. Sir Albert does what he wants. Now give.”

As he saw I was still hesitant, he raised his right hand and sighed. “Overcautious brat… I promise on the Galvrung’s name. I shall not harm you.”

Figuring that was as much safety as I’d get, I approached him carefully, looking at his mana flow. It wasn’t like I could do anything if he attacked me. The roaring sea of dark waters in his core only putting me more on edge, not less.

Still, I approached and handed him the shiny metal. His eyes widened and lingered on the rock, scrutinizing its every edge.

Maybe it’s not the right metal?

I pushed down the fear. “Now, what?”

“Hah, sorry; Buffy, wake up.”

As he said these words, his glorious but weird mustache wiggled and detached from his face, leaving him totally bald from any hair on his face. A small creature with a thin body and large wings flew around me and back to its master.

“This is Buffy. He will carry you. — Oh, where are my manners? Call me Ogre.”

“This will carr—” before I could finish, Buffy grew larger until it had reached a size where it could travel in the cave while also easily carrying me. Its wings were not like a bird, they were featherless.

“W-what?”

“Now get on his back.”

“Uh really? Is that safe?”

“Yeah, he doesn’t bite, well not always,” He said, a devilish grin appearing on his face. At the same moment, as if sharing thoughts, the winged creature flashed its teeth in a similarly devilish grin.

“Hurry!”

“Ah yes.”

I went around Buffy and climbed on its back. Since there was no apparatus there for me to seat on, I just clanged as tight as I could to the neck of the animal. A neck that was as thick as a tree trunk.

When I was installed, he pulled a piece of paper from a pocket of his white robe and inspected it for a bit and then put it back.

“Hang tight,” Ogre said as he stretched.

“Ah y—“

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.

Before I could even finish my sentence, Buffy dashed forward. I accidentally bit my tongue, bringing tears to my eyes while the speed was forcing me to keep my eyes closed.

The trip back was like a blur. What I had expected would take a day at least was completed in about an hour. ‘Not fair, I’d be quick too if I had that,’ I told myself as tears dripped down my closed eyelids from the pain of my still numbed tongue.

“Here we are, boss! SUCCESS!” The bald man said with enthusiasm, dashing out the final cave and into the light. Even after having ran for so long, he looked spotless. This whole endeavor had been a cakewalk for him.

We arrived soon after.

My stomach, which had been tame for the ride, had just now realized what had happened and was making itself noticed. I unmounted as quickly as possible, and walked as fast as I could with my legs that were still feeling light before finally.

Puking.

The piece of art it had just created on the ground incited a reaction out of me; the stench and aftertaste almost made me encore.

I walked away from the vomit corner, my palms were sweaty, my knees weak and ... I approached Buffy and Ogre, who found this whole thing funny.

“Now that’s a more child-like reaction,” said Ogre with a guttural laugh. Buffy, who had now shrunk down, yet again imitated its master’s mannerism.

From inside the carriage, noises could be heard and soon enough, the door opened, revealing a man with long hair wearing a half mask.

“Oh, you are not dead,” He said with an amused tone.

“You wish I was?” I replied

“Oh-oh-oh, I am not too sure, after all now I really have to use this year’s harvest on you,” He said looking at me, his usual genial smile plastered on his face.

“Did I pass?” I said with a voice as strong as I could muster. I had this whole time been walking on adrenaline. With my goal completed, I felt like I could fall asleep at any moment.

No answer.

“Albert?”

"I am surprised to think that you’d survive this... with only my lab coat? Hats off, kid”

“So I passed?”

“Oh yeah, and with flying colors”

“Ah well, now I can sleep.”

I fell.

I couldn’t really tell what broke my fall, but it was soft. I could hear some muffled sounds of dialog as I fell asleep. Still, with that part of the journey finally completed, I could finally rest without a care in the world.

[…]

I woke up to a white ceiling. My neck was hurting a bit and my mind was hazy.

Uh, where am I?

Looking around, I remembered.

Ah yes, I passed.

“Slept well brat?” the voice sitting next to me said.

“Color me surprised. Who would have thought you’d actually come back alive, hahaha” Franky, whose snarky voice I hadn’t heard in a while, proved that I was really back.

“Bite me,” I answered

“You won’t get to bury me just yet.”

“And you came back with spunk,” He said, laughing even harder.

The conversation with him before I got off was awkward, so I was happy that he was now acting as if nothing had happened.

A husky voice, “Impressive indeed, young chap.”

“I was sad we had sent to die the only person here who still listens to this old man’s stories,” Hagrid said with a warm and awkward smile, his gruffy beard and rough feature making him look even more amicable.

“Haha yes, after what I lived through, I want nothing more than to sit back and listen to your stories,” I said with a laugh.

Hagrid laughed too, his laugh reserved as if he didn’t like the sound of it.

Albert was also sitting there, nodding off, not caring much about my presence. We were long gone from the Abyss of End and were now traveling to the third finger. I knew little about it, except that the core material of the dragon bridges — evonite wood — was native from there. This made me really excited. And I was looking forward to seeing them up close. I was planning to ask Hagrid about the history of this place.

Hagrid asked for something first.

“Hey youngin, I am glad to see you came back in one piece.. but these marks on your hands, how can I say?”

“Have they always been there?”

“Now that you say Hagrid, these marks on his hands look weird. What exactly happened in there?” Franky interjected.

I was put on the spot. The marks on my hands weren’t exactly inconspicuous one a long black line, making my ring finger totally black, crossing a circle; while the other looked like a red snake forming a horizontal eight shape biting its own tail.

I could have told them about the humanoid snake princess who I saved, or of my encounter with the gigantic wyrm, but explaining to them what they were seemed like more trouble than it was worth. After all, I wasn’t even sure myself. If one thing I had remembered from Gregoire, the crazed man who’d even sold his son for my father’s approval, was that some things were better left unsaid.

It didn’t help that I couldn’t quite put my finger on what exactly she was. To my knowledge, there were only 3 humanoid races. So where did she come from?

So I just invented a story, making it sound as plausible as possible. Oh, deep in that cave, when I arrived at the place where the mana stone was, after taking it I encountered a cloaked man clad in black on my way back. He said some mysterious things and gave me these marks. “You’ll know what they mean when the time is right”, I fainted shortly afterwards, not too sure why. By the time I had woke up he had disappeared, but he let me keep the mana stone.

I stole the finer details from a story I had read as a kid.

I imagine this story had quite a few holes, but what could they do? At my words, Albert, who I thought was sleeping, twitched and opened its eyes.

He looked at me with an inquisitive eye as if he could peer into the depths of my soul, as if he knew I had lied.

“Well, that’s quite the interesting story you told us here,” Albert finally made himself heard.

Hagrid and Franky exchanged glances and shrugged their shoulders.

“Oh, is that so,” Hagrid said.

“Do you remember what the man looked like? What were his clothes like? Could you draw them? These marks.. they remind me of something...”

“Y-yea, sure…”

Franky added, “How tall was he? Was he taller than me? His voice was for sure not as suave as mine, hehehe.”

“What are you even talking about?” I laughed.

“Youngun, commit this person’s figure to memory if what you just said is true you met someone extremely important. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but I saw it in somewhere in Babel.”

I was feeling guilty seeing Hagrid genuinely trying to help me. Still, I didn’t expect it to be something that others would recognize.

“Wow, okay.. but… what is Babel?”

He looked at me dumbfounded, as if I had asked a stupid question, and then shook his head.

“Oh yes, I forgot you are not from the Galvrungs,” He answered with an awkward dry laugh.

“Babel is the Galvrungs’s pride and joy, and the reason scholars of all clans, will brave thousand dangers to reach us… A library with everything be it history, politics, science, religion that our ancestors left us.” He said with eyes beaming with pride and joy, “Also I am the head librarian of this place.”

“Wooah! Amazing!”

‘Oh, so that’s why the atheneum was deserted.’

“So, about these marks?” Franky asked, as if he couldn’t wait anymore.

“Oh, yeah.” Hagrid replied, a bit embarrassed.

“I have to admit that it’s been a long time since I read this book, and the tales it told seemed so outlandish I discarded it as a fairy-tale. Never would have I expected to see them in real life...”

“I will have to look for them, and I have no idea how long that will take... sorry.” He hid behind his book.

“Ah — no big deal, I don’t expect you to know everything, man!” Franky said, trying to comfort Hagrid.

I added, “Yes Franky is right,” — cough — “for once.”

Franky replied with a well deserved but playful jab to my shoulder.

Hagrid laughed shyly, and we bantered about other subjects.

As I read the mood, I smiled to myself. It was truly weird how quickly I had got close to them.

Suddenly, however, words were spoken that froze my blood.

Just as I was getting comfortable, Albert said telepathically, “Well alright, everyone can have secrets.”

My face paled for a bit. He knows.

Franky noticed the change and asked, “Hey what’s wrong?”

Albert was the one to answer. “Hah, nothing to worry about. He probably hasn’t fully recovered from that endeavor; still congratulations with that considerable amount of metal you brought, you got promise. O Child of Prophecy.”

He smiled at me; however, more than ever, I had the impression of looking at a devil.