"I knew it, something changed with you." Cadriel said out of the blue, causing Heimfher and his own underlings to be surprised.
"Usually you'd be pissing your pants now, but you looked like you're ready to bite back.. Even back in the academy, heh– What are you thinking? Hmm?"
Cadriel added more force to his legs, he stepped on Heimfher's shoes harder than before, intending to crush his toe if his answer didn't satisfy him.
"Keuk..." Heimfher quietly groaned, he felt the pain multiplied after Cadriel found out about his abnormality, and from the looks of it, he won't let go of him that easily.
'Urgh!.. What the fuck is this strength.. It's like im being crushed by an anvil.. No magic my ass, this kind of strength shouldn't be possible for a teenager..' Heimfher said in his mind.
Cadriel waited for an answer from Heimfher, and when that answer didn't come after a minute, he was getting impatient as one of his vein swelled on his forehead. But instead of putting more force on his legs, he came up with an idea for Heimfher. Cadriel smile that previously disappeared when he waited for Heimfher's answer now slowly visible again.
He had something that Heimfher or his underlings didn't have, and it wasn't money, it wasn't status, but rather something more interesting.
"Hey, you're not going to answer?" He said. "O' Ignis, Heed my plea."
Whirrr!
It was an unbelievable sight, for Heimfher and for Cadriel's underlings, as soon as Cadriel said those words that sounded like a chant, a flickering flame suddenly appeared on his palm, the flame was burning brightly without anything that could possibly fuel its fury, it almost like real magic, a mage who can create something from nothing with mana.
"W- WH- WHAT!?" One of Cadriel's underlings was utterly shocked upon witnessing the magic.
"C- Cadriel! Y- YOU.. WHAT IS THAT.." His other underlings also had the same reaction.
All this time, Heimfher and Cadriel's underlings thought that magic were only possible with a weapon or an object, engulfing the weapon with elemental powers like an aura that enhanced its wielder. But Cadriel just proved them wrong in less than a second, their view changed, and the only thing that they can think of in that moment was how to learn it.
'M- MAGIC.. IT'S REAL MAGIC.. HE DOESN'T HAVE A WEAPON.. AND YET HE'S HOLDING A FIREBALL..' Heimfher screamed in his mind, his heart raced as he felt joy like never before, but he also felt his fear slowly rising up as he realized that Cadriel could easily kill him after knowing he could use magic.
'S- Shit!.. Im really fucked now!'
While Heimfher thought that Cadriel would kill him, what happened next instead made him question his own reality.
"This fucker.. Im actually thinking of killing you right now." Cadriel said as he furrowed his eyebrows, the fact that Heimfher still looked unfazed annoyed him more than he expected.
Ting..
It wasn't from the outside world, it wasn't from Cadriel, but he who was previously enraged and filled with hatred, now suddenly calmed his eyes, his eyebrows no longer furrowing, and his fireball dissipated right infront of Heimfher's eyes.
Cadriel looked dazed, like someone who had just been euthanized, then, his pupils shaked.
"H- HUH!?.." Cadriel abruptly shouted and looked around in confusion.
"Cadriel!?" One of his underlings asked, he noticed that Cadriel was acting weird.
As Cadriel turned his head left and right, he eventually met with Heimfher's gaze again, he seemingly had forgotten about him with the confused look on his face, Cadriel's mind then went on to scatter all of his memories around like a phone that's being cleaned up until he realized his original intention.
"What was i doing— Oh wait.." He said while looking at Heimfher. "Tch, what the fuck am i doing.."
Cadriel raised his foot that was stepping on Heimfher's shoes and walked out of the alleyway.
"Let's go, he's not worth our time anymore, haaah haahh.. I can't believe i stained my shoes, that fucker will be dead in a few days."
Seeing their leader leaving Heimfher just like that, Cadriel underlings soon followed and kept asking him.
"W- why did you leave him be?! You could've embarassed him and make him piss himself!" One of his underlings said, followed by the other one.
"Yeah!— But still, what was that Cadriel! Is that the so called God's Magic!?"
Then, his underlings tried to mimic Cadriel's chant that allowed him to summon a fireball.
"O' Ignis, Heed my plea!" Alas, the chant didn't work, and there was no fireball that appeared on their hand.
"What? Why isn't it working?"
Cadriel and his underlings kept walking until they were out of Heimfher's vision, their noisy praise and also attempts at concocting Cadriel magic sounded like the scream of the damned soul from hell to Heimfher.
.
.
A few seconds passed, Heimfher was still sitting within the dark alleyway, beside the garbage bin that smelled horrible. He looked at his shoes that were visibly deformed from Cadriel's force, and he also remembered the fireball that he summoned vividly.
"What the fuck.." He whispered quietly, his nose began to get runny as his tears piled on his eyes.
"Shit.. How long can i live in this world, i feel like death is always behind me wherever i go, now i see why the previous Heimfher decided to end it all."
Heimfher raised his hand to his chest, and his eyes gazed at his rough palm, some of his skin was peeled off, most likely from when he was thrown into the wall by Cadriel. He focused on his palm until the memories of Cadriel's magic appeared again in his head, which then led him to try it for himself.
"O' Ignis... Heed my plea..." Heimfher quietly whispered, he had already expected it to not work, and he was right.
"Of course it wont work... Damnit, i'll have to find a way soon—
"I must find it.. It didn't work for me, but it worked for him, then there must be some kind of process that i have to go through in order to use magic.. Even if its tedious, even if it'll kill me.. I'd be more than willing to try—
"Heimfher might not be talented at Swordmanship, but what if his true talent was in magic?"
Heimfher stood up and wiped his tears from his eyes, his feet might still hurt, but it wasn't something that he couldn't handle. Heimfher looked around the alleyway and didn't find anyone, that's when he decided to leave.
'Haahh, i never thought my life would be like this.. I wanna go home..'
But just as he was taking his first step, Heimfher had to stop in his exact spot and froze his body, it wasn't because Cadriel was coming back, but rather something worse. From within the alleyway, deeper than what Heimfher and Cadriel would've ever go, a footstep sound was heard echoing and bouncing to the walls around it, the footstep wasn't just unsettling, but it was also way too close for Heimfher to just run away.
He gradually turned his head around, and what Heimfher saw was a man in his 30's wearing full black coat and a smoke in his mouth walking towards him, he also carries a sword on his waist and kept both of his hands inside of his pocket.
'GIVE ME A BREAK!' Heimfher screamed to himself.
'What now?!.. DAMNIT! Who is he!? Can i run away?! I can escape if i just go into the street right? He can't recklessly cause a mess in public where hundreds of eyes are present—
'AHH!! WHATEVER! IM TIRED!'
Driven by his fatigue and also the desire to rest, Heimfher forced his body to move, he prepared to make a run for it and come out into the main street, he raised his legs and was about to take his first step before the man behind him could chase or do anything to him.
STEP!
"Doubt thy !&!$* and fall, @!%#&"
The man whispered a chant, but Heimfher couldn't hear it, as the man raised his hand and stretched it towards Heimfher, a black fog engulfed his fingers before it got launched forward, the black fog hits Heimfher right on his back and the man then put his hand back into his pocket as he watched calmly.
.
.
Heimfher ran into the main street, gasping for air with each step he took as he was covered with the lights from the sun. Heimfher arrived and was met with all of the civilians again, not even in a decade that he would've thought seeing a crowd would relief him so much.
"Huff.. Huff— I did it, oh my god.. Thankfully i managed to escape in time.." Heimfher said as he took multiple heavy breaths.
"The sun is setting.. I should really get back to my inn, this street is way too dangerous.."
Heimfher jogged his way on the street, the lively sound of conversations and the ringing noise of anvil being struck was enough to calm him down, Heimfher thought he'd reach his inn in about 5 minutes, but what he doesn't know is that, everyone around him was frozen.
"Seriously.. Who the hell is that man, he can't be a good person.. Good grief, it hasn't even been a day since i arrived in this world.. Is this what im going to experience everyday?.." Heimfher scoffed quietly.
It was normal at first, but soon Heimfher started to see something weird, he heard a kid falling to the ground aswell as the reaction from everyone around her, yet when Heimfher looked around, he didn't see anyone falling, infact, he didn't even see a kid around him.
"H- huh?.. That's weird, did i hear something wrong?.." Heimfher said, he was confused with his own hearing.
"ARE YOU OKAY!?" A woman suddenly screamed, she then mentioned that she was the mother of that kid who had just fell, and yet once again, Heimfher couldn't find the woman that just said that word.
"What the.." Weirded by the obviously abnormal surrounding, Heimfher decided to approach someone near him, he looked into the distance and saw many people moving, yet when he was close with the random man that was tidying up a flower pot, Heimfher realized that he was a statue.
The man's face was stuck, his body was stiff, and when Heimfher tried to touch him, his hand instead phased through him.
"W- WHAT THE FUCK!?.." Heimfher screamed in horror as he realized that he was in some sort of an illusion, his vision wasn't real, his eyes was deceiving him.
And when he tried to free himself from the illusion, the sky above him collapsed.