Book 1: Chapter 43

Book 1: Chapter 43

Alice’s party said goodbye to the two of them one last time close to the city gates. There was not much traffic right then, so they weren’t blocking anyone while they talked.The debut release of this chapter happened at Ñòv€l-B1n.

“Be safe, you guys,” Alice said as she hugged Eleniah. Eleniah awkwardly patted the younger woman on the back.

“We’ll do our best,” Kay replied as he shook Verndan’s hand.

Eleniah snorted. “Don’t worry, I’ll be training him, so he gets ambushed less.”

They all laughed as Kay looked away.

“It does seem to be a recurring problem,” Verndan noted.

“Yeah, yeah.”

Eduard grabbed Kay’s shoulder.

“What’s up?” Kay asked, “You’ve been quiet today.”

Eduard gestured at his throat. “Hurts to talk.” He wheezed quietly, “Lots of screaming.”

“There were a lot of spiders on the last job. It was supposed to be just a group of monster wolves harassing travelers, but their den was really close to a monster spider nest.” Alice glanced at Eduard. “He hates spiders.”

Eduard nodded emphatically while he shivered. “Hate spiders.” He mouthed. He gestured at Korz.

“What?”

“Talk.”

“Talk about what?”

“Thing. Ambushes and...”

“Oh right.” Korz shuffled closer to Kay. “So, Kay...”

“Yes?”

“We’ve been talking, right? While you were gone for those two days, and then she,” He gestured at Eleniah, “Attacked the Nelamian place, and then you guys got stuck in the house, we talked about you.”

“Alright...”

Korz glanced around, then hurriedly rushed out the thought. “You need to get better at keeping secrets.”

Kay frowned at him. “What?”

Korz stepped back and rubbed at his head. “You’re not really that good at not letting things slip, and since you’re leaving the city and we won’t be around to help out with that, we thought that maybe we should tell you that. And tell you to pay attention to it.”

“Like when we first met?” Alice jumped in, “You really shouldn’t have told me about the dragon on your necklace. That’s not the kind of thing you tell literal strangers who walk up to you.”

“But you asked me who I was talking to.”

“Right,” Alice drew out the word, “But, you should have lied. Or played it off. Or ignored the question. Telling people important things just because they ask about them is... bad. It’s bad, and you shouldn’t do it.”

“Also, it was pretty easy to figure out...” Verndan leaned into Kay’s shoulder and whispered, “About your Class Creator title.” He stepped back, “There were some easy clues you left out, so it wasn’t hard to piece together.”

“So basically, be better at keeping secrets. Obviously, we’ve never told anyone, but you might accidentally tell someone who isn’t trustworthy, and then you’re fucked.” Korz concluded.

The four of them glanced over at Eleniah.

She shrugged. “I’ve never actually had to keep the details about a class I’m using secret like that. I didn’t have any good advice for him.” She gave him some stink-eye. “I didn’t know about him telling you about the other thing literally the moment he met you.” She reached over and smacked him in the head. “Idiot.”

“Why would you drop things on coins?”

“What?” Kay furrowed his brow as he looked over at her. “Oh! The phrase. It means to stop something quickly. Or when I said it just now, I meant letting go of our plans quickly.”

“What does that have to do with money?”

“It comes from vehicles, I think.”

“What?”

“Dimes are the smallest coin that my home country makes, so a vehicle that could stop fast enough that its wheels were on the dime was a vehicle that could stop very quickly. Then it became an expression for stopping quickly in general.”

“Alright...” She was quiet for another moment. “What does it mean when you said I was ‘hotter than an active volcano’ that one time?”

Kay almost tripped over his own feet. He fought a blush as he looked over at her. “You heard me say that? I was talking to myself.”

“Yeah, I’m a tier five. If you talk out loud close enough to me, I’m going to hear it. What did you mean? It was a little chilly, and I put on a sweater. Why would I be hot then? I mean, I was warmer than I was before I put on the sweater, but I wasn’t warm enough to be compared to a volcano.”

“Um, uh. Well...”

“You’re blushing.” She looked over at him with a glare. “Were you being rude?”

“No!” He made a slightly guilty expression. “Or well, I don’t think it was rude, but some people might think that.”

“What did you mean then?”

“It’s, um, well...” He could feel his face warming up more as he blushed harder.

“Okay, now I’m going to make you tell me.” She insisted as she stepped closer.

“Alright!” He held up his hands in surrender. “I don’t know where the temperature thing came into it but it means you’re attractive.”

“Oh, is that it? Thanks.”

Kay glanced over at her and saw that that was her honest reaction. “Uh, yeah. No problem.”

She laughed. “Kay, I’m older than I look. There’s nothing wrong with thinking someone looks good, and there’s nothing wrong with people thinking you look good. I’m guessing you had some interactions that didn’t go that way?”

“Yeah, a couple of times.” He breathed out a laugh. “I was friends with these girls and if I ever said anything to them about them looking good or finding them hot or anything similar they’d get all weird about it.”

“They were probably not that confident in their friendship with you, or something else similar. Don’t worry about what other people think in times like that.” She gave him a serious look. “But don’t go around making people uncomfortable either that’s rude.”

“I get you.”

They walked on.

“So you have a thing for sweaters, huh?” Eleniah randomly teased.

Kay spluttered and coughed. “I, wait, what?”

Eleniah laughed uproariously, “You thought I was going to forget!”

“I thought you weren’t going to make fun of me!”

“I’m not making fun of you, its just some lighthearted teasing. About your thing for sweaters.”

Kay glared at her, then sighed in defeat. “Alright, fine, I think women in sweaters are hot. Happy now?”

”I’m ecstatic. Tell me more.”

Kay growled at her in frustration as they kept walking.