PRU | Chapter 2.2

Alpeneon said it seriously. I know enough. At those words, Jaehwan felt ashamed. Alpeneon would know clearly what had happened to him. Jaehwan forced a calm expression. If he let go of even a little tension in his facial muscles, it felt like he would collapse miserably. Nothing. He muttered it inside.

“It was, it was something I couldn’t help. So, now I’m the one who’s embarrassed.”

“Ah, so you were troubled after all.”

After keeping silent for a moment, Alpeneon brought the topic up in a brighter tone. It was full of evasion.

“The bird I gave you is a paradise bird from the Land of the Silver Elephant. It is a bird that lives only in tropical forests, and I had a hard time getting it. The bird’s color is so beautiful, and it’s hard to catch, so it’s rare for one to have been handled by human hands since it was a chick. As far as I know, it was captured when it had barely just hatched. And it is still young.”

“Ah.”

“It doesn’t have a name yet, so please name it, Aphene.”

Jaehwan thought of the blue bird he had just seen. Thinking about it again now, the bird’s body might have been small. When he had not heard that it was still young, he had just thought it was a small bird by nature. Jaehwan lifted the corners of his mouth at Alpeneon’s kindness. It was only for a moment, but Alpeneon did not miss it.

As autumn deepened, the blue grass seemed to be gradually withering. Just like on Earth, the leaves were turning red and yellow from the tips. Some trees had already finished dressing for autumn. It was a scattered feast of green, yellow, and red.

That naturalness of things that did not match. It was ridiculous, like a duck whose feathers had been plucked in a clump, but it was clearly autumn. Autumn flowers were peeking out. The flowers of artificial beauty were blooming here and there within exact square meters. It was the endless labor of the gardeners.

“It’s a beautiful garden, isn’t it?”

“Seems so.”

“Still, the more beautiful place is the secret garden. There we brought over strange rocks and all sorts of flowers for the former queen. I went in only once when I was young, and now I visit there sometimes with Your Majesty’s permission. I’ll show Aphene there someday too.”

“It’s nice even just to hear about it.”

“Just hearing about it?”

Alpeneon laughed heartily. Then, as if something had come to him, he said,

“And Aphene, luckily, it seems I will have several uses to Aphene.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’ve been allowed swordsmanship lessons for basic stamina.”

I was worried I would become a Teacher in name only. At those words, Jaehwan also blurted out, Ah, that’s really good. It was welcome news. Hearing that made his steps feel a little lighter. Alpeneon talked to Jaehwan about future lessons and schedules. Jaehwan continued talking with Alpeneon, adjusting so that it would not overlap with the etiquette lessons.

It was a small thing, but something he wanted enough to grind his teeth over. Even though the Guardian Knight was still following them, they were about to spend time as if they were alone together when, before long, a Maid came up.

“The Priest and sorcerer have arrived. Aphene.”

“Ah, I have to go in, Sir.”

“It’s already that time.”

Jaehwan led the way, with Alpeneon and the Maid following behind. As he watched the Maid open the door to the reception room, Jaehwan felt his hands trembling. When he entered the reception room, two men who looked like a Priest and a sorcerer were seated, then suddenly stood up. One was an old man with dirty blond hair, and one was a young man with dark brown hair.

Which one was the Priest and which one the sorcerer was a short worry. The old man’s clothes looked familiar. They were the same clothes worn by the woman who had often treated him when the King raped him before. The white garment embroidered with a black jackal, symbolizing purity, was something he could not forget even if he tried.

The decorations on the sleeves, the belt, the folds of the clothes, the texture, how roomy it was, everything was vividly carved into the gray matter of his brain. There would certainly be a gold wheel embroidered on the back, symbolizing order. And the words below it would be, All things are by the arrangement of the gods, and cannot be defied.

“Greetings, Aphene. I am the foolish servant of God Kala, called Peitian. I hold the position of elder Akabal.”

“I am the sorcerer Ipan Kase.”

“Nice to meet you.”

After Jaehwan sat down and gestured, the Priest and the sorcerer took their seats. Alpeneon merely watched from behind Jaehwan. Even though the Priest and the sorcerer had kept Jaehwan waiting for a long time, they asked for something too easy, just like when they tested magical aptitude. The Priest said they needed to sprinkle God Kala’s holy water, and the sorcerer asked for Jaehwan’s hair.

“If you put the holy water on your forehead, nose, and both hands, and I infuse divine power into it and it reacts, then we may consider that you have divine power. If you do have divine power, the holy water will turn into a hard solid and fall off. But after some time, it will become liquid again.”

“It’s too easy. Did you really need to screen people so much, Sir Alpeneon?”

“It looks easy, but it is not the same as divine power brushing against it in order to heal. It penetrates the body. The divine power inside the body resists that, and the holy water hardens. To do that, you need a Priest with fairly high ability, and the temple is rather stingy with that.”

“Sir. Please do not say something that could cause a misunderstanding. The temple is not stingy. Those high-ranking priests all go out to serve in the slums, so they are not easy to contact. Even I was dispatched not long ago to purify because an epidemic had spread due to contaminated water.”

“It’s a joke, Akabal.”

Alpeneon also tossed out a teasing remark, and the Priest did not seem to mind. Smiling, the Priest asked for permission to begin, and Jaehwan moved both hands onto the table as permission. He was so tense that he could not even say the words of permission.

The Priest took out a small blue glass bottle and applied it to Jaehwan’s forehead, nose, and both hands. Perhaps because he had applied a little too much, clear water ran down Jaehwan’s cheeks and the bridge of his nose. Jaehwan frowned a little. He was tense like the day before the CSAT. No, maybe even more tense than the moment the bell rang right after he pressed random on the last English answer in the CSAT.

The Priest lightly took hold of Jaehwan’s trembling fingertips. Light crawled up along the veins flowing over the back of his hand. Jaehwan lowered his eyes.

It felt like the sound of sucking in a breath. An arrow of foreboding pierced Jaehwan’s head. No, not foreboding, fact. His face was still wet.

“Ah, unfortunately.”

It seems hard to see you at the temple, Aphene. The Priest showed regret. Jaehwan wiped the holy water from his cheeks, his nose, and the places where it was running down like tears. It kept flowing. Breathe deeply. Breathe deeply. Jaehwan forcibly hid his trembling eyelids.

Beside him, the Maid brought him a towel with an “Aphene.” Jaehwan wiped the holy water from his face. A pale, drained face appeared beyond the towel. The sorcerer, Ipan, studied that sight carefully.

“Aphene, have you perhaps already made a contract with a magic beast?”

“What are you talking about?”

Jaehwan said it in a flat voice. His face was like a plaster statue. The sorcerer, his blue eyes shining, murmured a few words in a sly voice.

“The first daughter of the magic beast Akan, the flame that does not sleep, Wishiba Wingba Wisalba.”

Then a bright light rose from under Ipan’s clothes, at the nape of his neck. That light, which climbed through the gaps in his clothes, stretched like a beast and began to take shape as it dragged its body along the floor.

What had been only a mass of light gained legs and a head, and its tail lengthened like a rat’s. Burning fur settled everywhere, and the tail grew full. When it finally opened its eyes, the face was unmistakably that of a fox, except that it was wrapped in flames.

When the fox narrowed its eyes, Ipan spoke to it. It was like a play of talking to oneself.

“Wishiba. The person in front of me is Aphene. Yes. No. No. Don’t be angry. Wishiba. No, I gave the strawberry flower last time, I know, anyway…”

Alpeneon watched that sight quietly, then seemed to remember something.

“I kept begging at the sorcerers’ house, so it looks like a big shot came. A magic beast Wishiba.”

“A magic beast Wishiba?”

“Yes, the eldest daughter of the magic beast Akan, born from lava. I’m not a sorcerer, so I don’t know much, but Akan is an incredible magic beast. I heard it fought the red dragon Salirenyu and took its domain.”

-Are you talking about my story, or my mother’s story?

Suddenly, a woman’s voice cut into Jaehwan’s thought process. Startled, Jaehwan looked around, and Alpeneon stared at him in confusion. When Jaehwan suddenly looked at the fox, it was grinning with all its fangs bared. Ipan had a dazed look on his face.

-Oh my, look how timid you are.

“Wishiba. Please don’t be rude in front of Aphene…”

-Why, Kanteheim. Is it rude?

“Kanteheim… perhaps…”

“Yes, Aphene. It’s another way of calling Aphene in the Golden Fox’s Domain. Wishiba was a magic beast from the Golden Fox’s Domain, after all.”

Ipan looked at Wishiba anxiously, then smiled awkwardly at Jaehwan. The fox merely showed its teeth again with a heh-heh sound while looking at him. Wishiba tilted its head, then hopped up onto the table with a spring of its rounded body.

Its hair was not yet gray, but the somewhat old Priest almost fell off his chair in surprise at Wishiba’s sudden movement. Since Wishiba’s size was fairly comparable to a medium-sized dog rather than a fox, that action was threatening to anyone. So it was only natural that Alpeneon lifted Jaehwan from the chair at the same time and hid him behind himself.

Compared to that, Jaehwan stood behind Alpeneon blankly, having sensed no danger at all. The only friend Jaehwan had was a child whose house had a cat, and the cat’s posture when it leaped was exactly the same as this fox’s posture.

In truth, Wishiba was a little lacking even to be called a fox. Its face was fox-like, but some parts of its body resembled a cat, and its claws were more reminiscent of an eagle than of a cat or a canine. The appearance of this magic beast was strange, but to Jaehwan it also felt rather familiar. On top of that, it was only natural that he would develop baseless curiosity toward this thing that spoke.

And to be clear, Jaehwan somehow knew, through something like a mental communion, that the fox monster had affection for him. The way the magic beast Wishiba spoke was unusual, in that without moving its mouth, it burrowed into Jaehwan’s brain and conveyed its will.