FA Chapter 9 Lunch Break

Bosingwa held his plate just below his stomach and inhaled more of the aroma that was catalysing an increase in the saliva within his mouth. He had eaten this meal multiple times before, yet this here had something different about it. The tantalising aroma itself already made certain that the chef was in class of his own.

This plate contained a potato and groundnut combination. If it wasn't for the loud mouth constantly yapping beside him, he would have been contented enough to enjoy his meal peacefully. Of course, this single plate wasn't even remotely enough to assuage his hunger... And that's why there was a feast spread out in the middle of the group. Miss Bora and Luna had been called away, leaving behind them, her temporary retainers.

Luna had suggested energy bars, but that had been vetoed with a majority vote.

"...she lied to me! My entire bone structure is on the verge of breaking apart! I can feel the minute cracks within each and every one of them! Couldn't that bitch..."

Bosingwa blocked out the rest of the words by taking a small bite out of his potato, dripping with the groundnut sauce, humming in satisfaction when he tasted the exquisite taste.

Drekov was a man with a disorder, one where he liked to toe the line by courting death. Bosingwa had a feeling that maybe death would answer the man's advances one of these days. And that would be the end of that.

"Shut up." 

The instant red haired spoke, the man's next words were stifled, finally bringing about the quiet he had craved so much.

Redhaired...though, her name was Flame. It was probably something made up, but that's all the woman had been called when Luna had invited her out to duel. Just like her namesake, she was ferocious. An unrelentless battle beast that would even trade injury for the chance to land an attack.

"Let me give you a tip on how to survive that woman..." 

Larssen started, attracting Drekov's full attention and the partiality of everyone's.

"...stop talking. Its simple, right? Even an idiot can follow such a simple piece of advice."

Drekov's face scrunched up and red took over the faint paleness of his face while Bosingwa and the old woman erupted into laughter.

"Lad, I do suggest you take his advice though. Because your mouth can really lead to your death." The old woman, whom Bosingwa now knew as Mrs. Namatovu advised after managing to stop the flickers of her laughter.

Silence reigned after that, with cutlery being the only source of sound within the place. An urge to release a breath of air in the form of a sigh took over Bosingwa for a moment. Except for Drekov, and maybe Mrs. Namatovu, no one else was in the mood for conversation.

Bosingwa wanted to hear more, to learn more about each of them, mostly those two, Flame and Ice. 

Ice, the white haired woman, was someone clearly of the assassin profession. All the people here had fought with either Luna or Miss Bora, allowing him to read into their techniques. Ice had even managed to give Luna quite the scare as she actually managed to almost rip out the woman's throat! Luckily, she had been in the liquid stage.

Though, Bosingwa didn't find her as scary as Flame, since she liked to keep to herself, and disliked trouble or conversation.

Flame on the other hand, was dangerous. She was unpredictable. She was like a badly arranged manuscript, where the first page wouldn't be the start of the story if you tried to read it.

But he had managed to at least glean something from her. She reveled battle. She wasn't a genius by any means, but liked the thrill of battle. She liked walking on the edge of life and death. 

Through her clash with Miss Bora, he had seen her white teeth plenty of times when she had gotten on the back foot, or faced a life ending attack.

"This is boring. Just shoving food down our throats isn't interesting. Isn't there anything our eyes can feast upon, just like our mouths?" Larssen asked. 

He was a bold one. The only one here who could just about try to engage in a conversation with everyone, even Flame.

"We could watch the feed. Maybe there are some new world famous bigshots we can feast our eyes on, right?" Drekov spoke out, with his eyes darting towards Flame.

Bosingwa though, didn't notice as he almost squealed like a pig for slaughter. He had forgotten! Musana was celebrating his 30th anniversary! Of course there were going to be world famous Forgers arriving! And every single news outlet, from the genuine to the rumor mills, were going to be circling like vultures, to try and pry out some lesser known things from these mysterious beings, or sing out their legends! And he never got tired of such.

He hurriedly searched his neural link for the news feeds, projecting the image out of his retina and into the space in the middle of the group. 

"Is that Adebayor! Wow! I never knew he was such a monster!" The moment his eyes fell onto the holographic screen, words simply gushed out of his mouth. It was like looking at a live specimen of the hulk, except that this one had dark skin and his hair was tied up in dreads that fell behind his back, reaching his waist. His muscles prominently stood out like black chains clustered together to form limbs. Those brown eyes were intense enough to make the average man piss his pants, and his breath alone caused a distortion within the image because of how hot it was. Was there a furnace within him?

He had just seen one of the few people he admired other than Musana. 

Adebayor (The Monster)

He was the man hailed as the one with the greatest physical body on Earth. Many who had managed to survive a bout with him had hailed him a monster, a beast.

Even in his personal book, Musana had had endless praise for the man, quoting that he could survive the very sun itself!

"We have a fan girl in our midst. Or should have been fanboy, but that sqeal was simply too cute!" 

Bosingwa felt his cheeks heat up at those words from Larssen. He had been captivated by what was being displayed, causing him to temporary forget that he wasn't alone. 

He was a closet Forger fanatic...and being outed in public caused immense embarrassment to the point that he started contemplating leaving.

"Now now Mr. Larssen. Everyone has that one thing they are embarrassed about. There is no need to taunt Mr. Bosingwa." Mrs. Namatovu came to the rescue before any other word could make it out of Larssen's mouth.

Bosingwa had already lowered his head, pretending that the food was much more interesting than whatever was being shown upon the hologram, such that he wouldn't have to see their expressions.

Bosingwa had even misled Bill into thinking that he was simply interested in news about Forgers. The man hadn't known how deep his infatuation went.

"Hehehehehe...now this is a nice piece of information don't you think so, Bosingwa?" 

A voice filled with mad glee spoke. Bosingwa could feel the man's breath next to his cheek, warming it. 

Drekov never did learn, did he? An urge to strangle the man where he was almost took over, but he stifled it and raised his head, looking at the others in turn, taking in their amused expressions. Even Ice was probably smirking behind the back of that palm of hers, covering in front of her mouth.

"Could Mr. Musana be celebrating the passage of 30 years since he ascended to become a Forger?" Mrs. Namatovu murmered.

"30 years... Why didn't he celebrate at 10 and 20? There must be something significant that he's going to announce. I can feel that this isn't going to be normal." Larssen was the next to continue this thread of thought.

"Maybe he has discovered what's above crystal. And he plans to share it." Ice jumped in.

"Nah. If he had, then he would have announced it long ago, right? Though, there is a possibility that he has surpassed the crystal stage. He has probably been holding onto the information because he wasn't certain that he would be capable of holding onto his title as the 'strongest Forger' after disseminating it."

"Now that's a far fetched hypothesis, Drekov." Bosingwa's gaze became unkind. Tarnishing the name of the person he most admired wasn't something to be let slide.

"Now now! There is no need to get worked up. We will know by the end of the month. Let's just watch the news feed." Mrs. Namatovu intervened.

When Bosingwa shifted his eyesight back onto the feed, a flash of white almost blinded him as the screen went white for an instant before the image stabilised.

On seeing who had appeared on the screen, everyone drew in a collective sound of disgust and dislike.

Bosingwa loved-no, idolised most Forgers, even those lesser known ones, but this man was someone almost everyone including himself, hated in this world.

The man had a serious disease called 'God-complex.' Even those with the same powers as those mythological beings never went as far as choosing exactly the same name as the figure, or wanting the myths to be altered into ones where he was the prime figure.

[Mortals! I guess there is some use to you and your technology. After all, my magnificence is being seen by everyone]

The man spoke, his sky blue eyes directly facing the camera. But there was a disdain and arrogance within it for all living things. He regarded every single mortal man at the same level as ants.

"ZEUS?!" 

Air actually exploded and food was blown away as the shout caused Bosingwa's eardrums to bleed out incessantly.

He had been so startled by the shout that he had literally jumped up from his seating position and scanned the surroundings vigilantly.

After judging that there was no threat nearby, his eyes travelled to the person who had caused this chaotic mess of food stains everywhere, Flame.

"It would be better if you have a very good explanation." 

A chill froze the atmosphere as Ice demanded, her entire demeanor having shifted into something murderous.

Bosingwa caught something different from the manic expression Flame had had before. This time, there was range within her expression. There was fear, terror and most of all hate. A hate so thick Bosingwa felt as if he would be drowned. Her spiritual energy was probably even being influenced by it.

Bosingwa had never seen that level of hate, where eyes cried blood and and nails dug into hands to the point that blood dripped in a stream, creating puddles. 

The self-harm even caused Ice to withdraw the chill within the air as everyone gazed upon Flame with quizzical expressions, wandering whether she had any connection with the man.