[Chapter 5: Complications] 

Exploring a lively forest while joking around with the only person you know would sound like a lot of fun, and it is. Fiona and I have been exploring this forest for the past few days. 

We were messing around the majority of the time, but we did some work. We didn't put much emphasis on cultivating our cores and instead concentrated on our Mana Channels.

My control was terrible at first, but it has greatly improved since then. Still bad though. 

 

Fiona just ate all the random fruits we found while playing with Earth Magic. She's not particularly good at it. I am, but it could be better.

I didn't get any other affinities because I wanted to master Earth Magic before gaining anything else. I want to put in all of my attention on one affinity at a time.

We avoided all of the hostile animals because killing them would be futile. I have zero knowledge how to cook anything at the moment. Fiona said she knew how to, but I didn't even bother believing she. The girl didn't even have hands! 

Our main goal was to find people, or better yet, a town of some kind. We've been traveling near a river that I–it was actually Fiona–found. Perhaps it will lead us to civilization.

It worked, much to our surprise. Well, sort of.

Fiona and I were sitting on a tree branch near the river. I was crouched down with my elbows on my tights. A few adults were cooking fish on the riverbank. There are four of them. Their clothes were filthy, with numerous tars and holes.

One of them was a lady with a core! Surprisingly so. She didn't have any layers, but she did have an affinity with water. The three men were not mages, but they looked extremely strong physically. 

When I say buff, I really mean buff. The shortest was well over six feet tall. They had threatening expressions and wooden spears with stone tips.

'Damm! They appear... menacing?' Fiona said into our connection. I'm not sure when she learned, but she taught me how to do it yesterday.

'Yeah. Let's go speak with them.' I lifted myself up, and stood on the branch. 

Fiona sat on my shoulder, slowly turning her head to look at me. Her expression was almost indispensable.

'Are you insane?' She inquired. 'You, a little short boy with a smidgeon of muscle, want to talk to those goliaths? Even that woman looks more muscular than you.'

Aw. My pride had taken a hit there, but she wasn't wrong. I was only five feet five inches tall and had very little muscle.

My precise age was unknown, but I would guess I was in my early teens. If I do say so myself, I was quite attractive.

'Everything will be fine,' I sigh. 'I'm confident I can defeat them with my magic. That woman has barley begun to form her first layer; it appears they are more concerned with their bodies then magic.'

'Definitely. I wouldn't be surprised if she bench press you with just one arm.' Fiona laughed, while I rolled my eyes and ignored the statement, knowing it was most likely true.

'All right, let's go.' I stated that I was getting ready to jump down.

'Wait!' Fiona stopped me, almost knocking me off my feet from surprise. 'Are we going to just hop down there? Is there no plane or anything?'

'Planes are for sensible people, Fiona,' I said,a looking away from her. 

'Are we not rational people?' She was perplexed. 'I like to think I'm pretty rational.'

'It'll work out,' I assured her. 'It's not like they're going to try to kill a child.' I was aware that my maturity was not that of a child my age, but they weren't unaware of that. I was going to use this to my advantage; it should make it easier to converse with them. 

It would be much better if they mistook me for a lost child and took me back to where they came from, or at the very least pointed me in the direction of a town.

At this point, even the name of the forest would suffice. Hearing the name of this place may jog some memories; I'm sure I ended up in this forest for a reason. I doubt it was entirely random.

I jumped off the branch after sending Mana from my core into my body for good measure. I landed a few meters away from them, immediately drawing their attention. The four charged at him.

The three men were guarding the woman in the back. Most likely because she was the only mage present in their little group. When they saw me, their faces turned sour, and I even detected a hint of rage.

Is it possible that they recognize me?

"Child of Even! What is the reason you've come here?!" The woman yelled, though gritted teeth. 

My brow twitched in surprise. "Child of who? I'm sorry, do you know who I am?"

"Don't be a fool!!" The tallest and heaviest of the men spoke up. I stepped back, wiping sweat from my chin. "Those clothes say it all! And that beast, too!"

"Eh?" 

'Eh?' 

Fiona and I were both perplexed in multiple ways. Child of Even or whatever? What is it, or who is it? What about my clothes? What's the matter with my clothes?! Do I look bad or something?! 

I was dressed simply in a black short sleeve shirt, black long pants, and a pair of white leather shoes. It was a little dirty from my travels, but not too bad because I tried to avoid making unnecessary messes.

I awoke wearing these clothes and wanted to keep them clean since they were all I had. If my clothes said I was related to Even—whatever that is—then where did I come from?

No, she said, "child of Even." That means it's a person, unless they speech is a little different and they are saying I'm from a city named Even. 

"Is this 'Even' a place or a person, if you don't mind answering?" I inquired. "Of course, you are not required to do so if you do not wish to. If that's the case, I'll simply leave."

I was hoping they would at least answer this, but all I got was silence. 

Fiona and I simply stood there waiting for a response, which never came! I began to wonder if we were speaking the same language or if they were just stupid. Maybe I'm the idiot here.

"Tch. He even speaks like those mutts." I barely heard the woman say anything under her breath. I blinked several times, going over what I had said.

'Fiona, do I speak strangely?' I entered into the link. 'I don't think I speak strangely; you speak exactly or very similar to me.'

That's probably because she has all of my habits and treats mixed in with her own...weird treats, too. Her personality is similar to mine, but different at the same time. 

'I'm not sure. You have a different accent than them, so perhaps there are others out there who have one like yours. If that's the case, we should definitely go check it out.'

I hummed, not taking my gaze away from them. Her assumption made sense. Accents are not genetic; they change and develop as a result of the person's surroundings.

If we can find others with the same accent as mine, it's possible that I'm from there or spent a lot of time there. It's not guaranteed, but it's the best lead I have right now. I just need to find out where this Even is.

I hunched over and groaned after another minute of silence. This was vexing. Can't they at least answer a few of my questions? If they do this, I'll leave and they'll never see me again, because I don't want to see anything like this again.

"Listen, I'm just going to leave. Sorry for bothering you-"

'Wall!'

I wasted no time in forming a wall out of the soil in front of me. I compacted the soil to make it stronger. I didn't even hesitate.

Fiona was much better at sensing mana than I was, so it was obvious who attacked. No way in hell could any of them move that fast.

To confirm my suspicions, a stream of pressurized water collided with the wall less than a half-second later. Several fragments flew away. The attack's pressure was too much for such a frail wall.

I dragged myself to the side, moving the dirt beneath me to avoid what came next. The wall was destroyed after five seconds, and a stream of pressurized water flew forward, destroying the truck of one of the trees a few meters away.

It swayed for a moment before collapsing with a loud thud. Sweat streamed down both of our faces as we watched the display. 

We're so gonna die. 

'Agreed. We should have just left the big scary people alone,' Fiona nodded, her eyes filled with mana. 'Externally, that woman's control may be better than we thought. Granted, our guards were down, and I hadn't yet improved mana into my senses, but still. She's going to be a headache if they fight how I think they will.' 

Without a doubt. This could be problematic. I'm actually regretting not getting fire because I despise this girl. At the very least, I saved a forest from destruction, right?