Chapter 68: Quality Time and Old Soil

For the most part Anselm behaves himself and greets Kaylin warmly. Kaylin is rather excited to see a man materialize out of thin air; you'd think being an elf trained by an S-rank Mage would render you immune to such but apparently not.

Despite Anselm's warm visage of good tidings and fair wishes, obliging the young-old elf with her questions-she's very interested in how he floats without any aeromancy- and generally being a nice not sour person for once, I can see through it all.

And I see that Anselm is just as mad as I thought he would be. 

Soon he tears himself away from Kaylin and asks if we could speak. Luckily, the tongue lashing is postponed when Kaylin hears we'll be going for a walk.

Anselm grits his teeth in annoyance but slaps on a smile anyway. This is an inconvenience for him brut a break for me.

Kaylin mentions wanting to get some surface food. She sounds like she hasn't had anything good in ages as we walk past the various stores.

Well, she might truly not have had anything in ages given where she's coming from. I support the motion to het some food, more because I'm hungry than I want to break away from Anselm's scolding.

There's a lot to choose from with the food options, a lot of smoke where Kaylin leads us though, she squeaks and squeals at every little one on display too, simply excited to have something other than watery empty filling soup I guess.

Still, her antics aren't enough to distract me from the feeling of heat coming from our right; Anselm's Glare.

I've been under the receiving end of his many disapproving faces, but this one in particular irks me. It's continues and unending, seemingly so anyway.

Usually, when I mess up or make a poorly thought-out decision like I often do, Anselm is immediately there to disagree with what I have done or have planned. There's no waiting time, not resting period, just fuck up, get yelled at and move on.

But now, with Kaylin in the way, he's holding it in.

I start to rethink my original thought of Kaylin helping me out now.

Speaking of whom, "I just thought of something." She says abruptly. Her attention isn't on any one of us but rather the sticks of meats and vegetables being fried out in the open street. 

"What? You want some?" I want some. The concept of kebabs is not lost of this civilisation it seems.

She nods her head, "Sure, let's wait in line a bit, shouldn't be too long."

There's about four people standing ahead of us, or rather, beside us. The line isn't really well structured or thought out since a true line would cut into the free roads and block mobility. 

This doesn't matter to Anselm at all as he glares even harder, I swear I feel the side of my head burning up.

"Uh, so you were saying something? You had a thought?" I clammer hurried. For now, I'd rather be distracted from his building anger at me than have it at the back of my mind constantly.

"Oh, right." She pauses there for a bit, trying to recall what exactly she'd thought to mention. "You summon this guy." She jabs a finger at Anselm, bristling him even more, "Are you a Conjurer? Is he a deamon?"

I blink at this. Looking to Anselm who only has a glare waiting for me. 

Great now I'm in an even more awkward situation.

"AH…"

"Ah?" She puzzles, "Are you a co-"

"Oh, look, it's our turn!" rather violently I push past the other guys beside us and reward them with a look that promised more trouble should they complain.

"Give me ten sticks!" 

I toss a single silver at the man at the impromptu griller, he doesn't care much about me pushing his customers in line away but drawls out a simple, "No fighting." In an accent I can barely understand.

Kaylin obliges to give him an apology before turning to me with a raised eyebrow. To which I smile like an idiot.

"Sorry, Kaylin, I'll have to borrow this idiot here for a bit." Anselm shouts out over the crowd and grabs me by the arm pulling me away from the griller and all the way back to the beginning of the line.

Immediately he swings right into it, "Do you have any idea what you have done?" he blinks rapidly at me, as though he can barely comprehend what compulsions drove me to making such poor decisions.

"Any idea whatsoever!"

"I can explain it all, Anselm, just give me a chance and you'll get it in a minute, you'll see how it all makes perfect sense!"

He scoffs and bites his lip, looking to the sky as though wondering which of the Gods created a troublemaker like me. His lips part to say something but he stops and nods. 

Right! My time to shine!

"Okay. First of all, lets acknowledge that you weren't there and I had no input from you whatsoever."

He looks like he has a particularly harsh comeback to that so I don't let him speak, "So, this is what happened. I met an S-rank Mage an-"

"She's an S-rank Mage?" his nearly screams, his eyes bulging as he grabs hold of my shoulders and begins to shake me, "Why didn't you just say so? She's willing to fight the Cultists? We can just let her do that while we travel to the March and somewhere else!"

"Somewhere else? No, I-NO Anselm, she's not an S-rank!" I yell, shoving his assailing arms away.

"Then, who is she? Why is she coming with us to Carbina?"

"If you would just let me finish, Anselm." He nods sheepishly, an S-rank Mage can get anyone excited I guess, "Now, the S-rank is her mother and for some very good reasons she can't come with us, her daughter on the other hand is an A-rank and needs to be kept safe from the Synagogue and the Kingdom."

"Since they are both after the two of us, we figured it'd be cool if we just combined our strengths and protected ourselves from them, there's also some talk about a Goddess or something but that was mild." I spill out, 

"She'll help us in battles and whatever else comes our way, which reminds me, she's going to get us the cure for Leriva."

"Meaning our fight with the Cultists will be easier." Anselm says, completing the thought. "But you haven't told her what type Mage you are, she thinks I'm a daemon." He snorts.

"Well, this isn't exactly the best place to announce that I have the power to raise the dead now is it?" I counter boldly, waving at the entire crowd to prove the point.

"Well, I've got some news as well." He mutters, shyly rubbing on the back of his head as he preps to spill the beans.

"Hey!"

And Kaylin jumps in. She's got ten sticks of speared meat in hand, waving them between us. "Who wants some meat!"

"No thanks," Anselm waves, "I don't need to eat food."

"…"

"What?"

***

Thanks to Anselm spilling the beans on my Necromancy I have to hurriedly explain to Kaylin that I am NOT evil. At least, not inherently so. I am still quite capable of good, although she finds that doubtful given my earlier display with the poor guys I threw out of line.

So, for the moment she treats me with some caution. I'm surprised she doesn't outright scream but I guess there's no one she can trust enough to scream for.

After eating our kebabs on the way to back to the carriage, we're relatively full and ready to sleep until sun rise. A little something I'm glad of is that we'd get to leave Aste in time.

Although, I am filled with dread at what we'd find when we get back to Carbina. The Bull General promised to sacrifice the entire place to Phien, I'm not sure what that means for a Cult of mind possessing freaks but I'm sure I don't want to find out.

When we get back Anselm once more draws me to the side, letting Kaylin find her way around the carriage and make her own space. The carriage is very spacious, built to carry goods so I'm not troubled about losing out on comfort just because she's here. 

Though, I'm a bit flustered at the thought of sleeping next to a woman again, and an elf at that.

"It's funny how you managed to, against all odds and reasonability, get another elf woman to follow you."

"She's not a woman. She's just a girl…barely even…sixty-years old."

Anselm guffaws, "How old do you think Elsa was?"

I give him a pointed stare as he laughs. He soon regains his composure as he's yet to tell me what he's found out.

Truthfully, I'm excited to hear it. Anselm, throughout the months of being here has been an even more puzzling enigma than the rest of the world around me truly.

"I read the book all while you were gone." He starts, "I finished the chapter on Saia, my country."

He pauses which I find irritating as it's just getting interesting, "And? What is Saia? Where is it?"

He chuckles, "Saia is here. We're standing on it!"

"Wut?"