Trion was the one having the hardest time. He had lost his favourite sibling and his family's trust at the same time. Despite Rizel had cleared his name, the suspicions remain. How could he have been so close to Orpal and yet never noticing anything?
"I can't blame them. In their shoes I too would think of me as either a liar or a complete idiot." Trion didn't know if to laugh or cry.
Lith, Rena and Tista, instead were having the time of their life, even if they did their best to avoid their parents to notice.
They would get more and better food, clothes and they did not have to tolerate Orpal's mean words and petty jokes anymore. Plus, there were all the gifts that five families sent them as an apology.
Both the girls had stopped considering Orpal as a brother from the day he had proposed to get rid of Tista, calling her a cripple.
Lith was above and beyond them, he never considered him his brother. His only worry was for his parents, so he tried to lessen their burden as much as he could.
Lith's magic was now strong enough that he could till and plough the fields with earth magic.
He could also hunt for much bigger preys, his aim set to deer, boars and bear, whose pelt could be sold for a pretty penny.
The time for the spring festival was nearing, and Lith wanted some extra pocket money to buy something nice for his parents and sisters. Trion was still a stranger to him.
The spring festival was held midspring, during the equinox, to celebrate the time when the light finally overcame the darkness and cold of winter.
Lith was happily playing around the Trawn woods, looking for the best opportunity to kill a huge boar.
"Dammit, it's neck and skin are too thick to break with my current level of spirit magic. Fire and thunder could easily put it down, but that would mean damaging either the pelt or the meat. I need to get creative."
The boar movements were easy to predict, since it would always charge in a straight line By using air fusion, Lith's body was fast enough to dodge the charges with ease, as long as he managed to prevent the beast from coming too close.
"When an ox went mad, my father told me that the best way to put it down is to strike at the legs, instead of the head. Once you take away their mobility, beasts like this one are easy prey."
At the next charge, Lith conjured a thick layer of ice before dodging. When the boar stepped on it, it lost its footing, spinning on itself like a top.
The boar crashed against the huge oak Lith had aligned it with, its bones snapping on impact. Lith closed in enough to not miss his next shot, but always keeping a safe distance.
"A cornered prey is the most dangerous one. Always respect the prey, never underestimate it. It only needs one hit to kill you." Lith remembered Selia's teachings.
Lith made a finger gun, aligning it with his target before shooting an ice arrow that penetrated in the boar's right eye, puncturing its brain.
The beast collapsed on the ground, but Lith shot another arrow in the left eye too, just to be on the safe side.
"Okay, dead it's dead. Now the problem is how the heck do I carry it out of the woods? My spirit magic may not be enough to carry a several hundred kilograms dead animal all the way until Selia's house. And even if I actually manage to do it, how can I explain it?"
Lith was nervously tapping with a finger on a nearby tree, trying to find a solution before having to fight to defend his game, when the dead animal suddenly disappeared.
"What the f*ck?!? Since when do boars vanish into thin air? Who's there?"
He promptly activated Life Vision, scanning the surroundings in search of his enemy, but the only living beings he could find were small birds and rodents.
"Okay, this is getting creepy, but I need to get my boar back."
The boar appeared back, very close to Lith, making him jump away in fright.
"Why are you messing with me? Who are you?" Lith screamed while checking out the best escape route.
"And invisible enemy could easily kill me. Screw the boar, I need to get out of here fast." He thought.
"There is no need to escape." A gentle feminine voice replied in his mind. "I'm not your enemy, my host."
"Okay, if you want to scare the sh*t out of me, you're doing a great job. What do you mean with host? Where the heck are you?" Lith kept looking around, the enemy somehow was untraceable even by his magical senses.
"Stop looking around, host. I'm here were you put me. Around your neck."
Lith instinctively grabbed the pouch and threw it away. He could finally notice that both the life force and the mana flow of the stone were bigger than ever.
Lith had always kept it in a blind spot, and since it was useless, he forgot to check it with Life Vision since the day of the ambush.
"Okay, I hate riddles. Tell me who or what you are, or I'll leave. As much as it pains me losing such a game, it's not worth having a creepy, mysterious stone talking in my head 24/7."
"Please, don't!" To voice turned desperate. "I'll die without my host."
"Enough with the riddles!" Lith screamed out loud. "What the f*ck are you?"
"Our minds are linked, it's easier to show rather than tell."
Suddenly Lith's mind was filled with images and memories that were not his own. He could have thought of having been teleported away, if the images weren't full of holes, allowing to still see part of the woods through them.
"I'm sorry, but my powers are almost depleted, this is the best I can do."
Lith could see a gigantic tower, whose vault was so deep to reach the bottom of the ocean, it's top so high to touch the sky. He could perceive that the whole structure was a giant magical artifact, pulsing with mana.
At some point, the owner of the tower had died, and without his/her mana to nourish its core, the tower began to decline. Centuries passed, while the tower kept looking for its next host, using illusions to send away those it deemed not talented enough or unworthy.
Over time, the tower spent all his powers, and to avoid death it had been forced to an extreme sacrifice.
To prolong its existence, it started to consume its own walls, floors, everything within itself, even its memories.
More centuries had passed, now only the tower core was left, barely the size of a pebble. It had nothing left, except its sense of self. Preferring death rather than becoming a mindless tool, the tower core attempted a desperate gamble.
It sent a signal that any being with the bare minimum magical powers to sustain its life could perceive. The clock was ticking, every second that passed, the tower core could feel its life slip away.
When the one answering the call resulted to be a Ry, the tower core had tried to communicate with no results. The beast mind was too different from the first host, making the mind link impossible.
Hope was lost, the tower core could only wait for its end.
But then a saviour arrived, saving the tower core from the beast's maw, using his own blood to bond himself with the tower core, right before it fell into a deep slumber to recover from its wounds.
The images disappeared, leaving Lith alone with the pouch and the dead boar.
Lith's mind was overwhelmed, incapable of any thought outside stupid jokes.
"Does that make us married or what?"