Rest

Several minutes pass midnight.

Allen and Kate returned to the Three Heads Tavern. The former's injuries were now all gone, as if he has been cleansed off of it.

They entered through the same back door of the tavern and saw Mr. Sanchez sitting on one of the customers' seats of the tavern.

The tavern owner looked at both Allen and Kate and asked, "Have you found where is the treasure?"

Kate nodded and went to the table where the map was placed; she pointed at a particular point in the woods.

Mr. Sanchez looked at where was Kate pointing and nodded.

"Should we recover the treasure?", Kate asked.

"No, it's better that we shouldn't.", Mr. Sanchez disagreed and shook his head.

Kate then asked again, "Then... what about the necromancer?"

"He's dead.", Mr. Sanchez straightforwardly said without a hinge of hesitation.

Kate didn't seem to be surprised and kept looking at Mr. Sanchez.

Mr. Sanchez noticed her unremoving gaze and he said, "I'm not the one who killed him."

The girl kept quiet afterwards. Mr. Sanchez then looked at Allen, who was bowing his head down. Probably due to fear or something else?

"Hmm... I didn't get to ask you your name yet.", Mr. Sanchez asked.

Allen raised his head and met Mr. Sanchez's gaze, "My name's... Allen."

After a pause the tavern owner said, "Show me what you've learned." Mr. Sanchez then reverted his gaze from him then to Kate. 

The girl, as if knowing what the tavern owner was thinking, took out her dagger and attacked Allen without any warning.

"Huh?", Allen retreated as he dodged almost every attack of Kate, those he couldn't dodge were blocked by his dagger.

In a few moments, Allen reached the wall of the tavern, now nowhere to go, the boy charged at the incoming Kate.

Kate suddenly sidestepped out of Allen's way and tripped the boy with her feet which made him fall flat on the floor.

She immediately sat on top of Allen and pointed the tip of the dagger at his throat.

"That's enough.", Mr. Sanchez concluded. "Surviving Kate's barrage of attacks in several seconds is already a feat."

"I wasn't even trying.", Kate helped Allen to stand back up. After which, Mr. Sanchez handed a pouch full of bronze coins to the latter.

"There are 200 bronze coins inside the pouch as payment for helping.", Mr. Sanchez said.

Allen eyes shone and he hold of the pouch. He felt so ecstatic for not being able to hold so much weath before, but his elated countenance changed into a frown as he thought of something.

"Hmph, what is it, it's not enough?", Mr. Sanchez snorted.

The boy realized that Mr. Sanchez thought that he was disappointed with the amount, "No, no! I was frowning because my brother would suspect where did I get so much money in a short time."

"Oh, just tell him you got a job here in the tavern, and you won't technically even be lying to him too.", Mr. Sanchez stated.

After a pause, he told them, "Alright, pack up your clothes then give them back to me."

"Okay.", Allen went upstairs to change clothes.

After the boy was now upstairs, Kate asked, "So, we're really not going to get the treasure?"

"No.", Mr. Sanchez shook his and thought, 'After all, that kid took it already.'

'He better not sell anything to it... if he wants to keep his life.'

***

Some time later, Allen reached the outskirts of his family's house.

He was in deep thought as he was recalling what happened after the battle in the woods.

***

An hour or so ago...

After the array was accidentally turned on, it sent some sort of magic energy towards Allen and healed all of his injuries, even his broken bones were healed back to tip-top shape.

Afterwards, the kid sat up and looked around his surroundings, he was surprised and at the same time frightened to see that the ground around him was glowing.

He immediately stood up and tried to escape, however, there was some sort of invisible shield placed around in the middle of the array, forcing him to stay within it.

As he was trying to find other ways on how to escape, he saw an orb float up from the middle and shot out a beam of light towards his forehead.

When the beam of light entered his forehead, he felt excrutiating pain all over his head, it was as if his skull was being split apart. He grasped his head with the both of his hands and kneeled to the ground; afterwards, he started to roll on the ground while gritting his teeth.

'Painful... it's too!', Allen messingly thought. He wasn't able to think properly because of the torment he was experiencing. Afterwards, several unknown bits of information appeared within his mind.

-bzzt-

An electrical sound could then be heard and the array finally stopped glowing and the orb in the middle was gone, along with the pain that Allen felt.

"Huff... huff... it's finally gone.", Allen muttered. He thought that he was going to die! He already escaped the half-death state from a necromancer-apprentice's hands then he felt that he was going to die over the ground that he was on for several minutes.

He then remembered about the bits of information that entered his mind during the painful process.

Suddenly, he accidentally entered a half-sleep state and he felt that his consciousness was pulled somewhere else.

Everything around him was white, except for a dagger in front of him.

"This..."

***

Back at the present...

Allen was now holding the same dagger he saw in his consciousness. The bits of information that he got were dagger special techniques, but there were only a three of them.

'Sell me something... come on, if the price is enough, the power is all yours.', an enticing voice in his head said.

'This again...', Allen was already getting annoyed by the unstoppable mutterings of that voice. He read about this voice in his head on the books, it was written there that such voices with the same enticing and grim prowess was actually a devil.

He also saw read about the consequences of making a trade with a devil, such as losing your soul or becoming it's slave, however, those evil beings would still do the end part of their deal.

In addition, these creatures could grasp the right timing like when one was in despair, they would appear in that person's thoughts. But of course, they would only make a deal with powerful beings.

However, why would it appear within his consciousness? Those where the kid's thoughts as he speculated that the devil's consciousness was just connected to the dagger.

-poof-

The dagger in Allen's hands disappeared and returned back to his consciousness; the kid then felt fatigue spreading all over his body, the weapon was only summon on the outside world for more or less a second and his energy was almost depleted already.

'Come on, sell me something? Anything!?'

Allen ignored the devil's enticement, finally it stopped talking after seeing the kid can't be persuaded... yet again.

Finally, he arrived at the family house.

As he was about to go up the stairs, he saw his father holding a candle on a cup looking at him from upstairs.

"Where have you been?", Marco looked at Allen's pouch. "Give me that pouch."

"But..."

"Hmph, give me!"

Seeing his father nearly getting angry, Allen became scares and he could only give him the pouch of 200 bronze coins.

"This is a bit heavy. How much money is in this?", Marco asked.

"Two hundred bronze coins, father.", Allen answered.

Marco let out a smile when he heard the amount of money, "You're such a good son. Well then, I'm going to my friend tonight to play."

Obviously, his definition of 'play' is gamble.

"Father, can I get some bronze coins to get some food for William?", Allen asked.

"Oh?", Marco plunged his hand into the pouch. "Here, catch."

He threw something at Allen, the latter caught it and saw that it was only one bronze coin.

"Father, this... but..."

"Shut up, learn how to save up your money.", Marco passed by Allen and exited the house.

The kid looked blankly at the one bronze coin on his hand. He doesn't know what kind of reaction would he show. Happiness? Sadness? Or perhaps anger?

He just dejectedly pocketed the bronze coin and entered William's room to check on him.

Under the light coming from the moon through the window, he looked at his little brother who was still holding the same book while asleep.

Allen smiled and left the room and went towards his bedroom. His room only consisted of a bed, drawer, and a window, compared to William's bedroom, it was a grade or two below.

He placed the bronze coin on top of the drawer and lied down on his bed.

'What a horrible night.' Some thoughts entered Allen before he closed his eyes and started sleeping.

***

Next morning...

"Big brother, wake up! Let's have breakfast together!", William shook Allen's body as he tried to wake him up.

"Ehh... who? What?", Allen mindlessly asked out.

"I said... let's go eat breakfast!", William emphasized every words in the sentence to the point that his voice croaked up like a woman's.

"I don't want to mi'lady, Sir Nomnom commanded me to go get water first!", Allen blurted out without thinking; after which, he turned his back at William.

"You dare call me a lady?!", William angrily asked.

"Madam, don't be angry, your voice might crack up.", Allen sleepily blurted out again without opening his eyes.

"Hmph!", William's eyes, as if, suddenly was on fire, like an angry feudal lord who just judged a criminal to die. The nine year old kid backed off, when he reached the walls of the bedroom, he ran straight to Allen's bed. When he was about to hit the bed, he jumped up and aimed his elbow at his big brother's sides.

"Gahhh...", Allen eyes opened wide as he felt the shocking pain on his upper body. However, before he could continue shouting for more than a few moments, William already used his hands to punch Allen's face repeatedly.

...

A few minutes passed, Allen and William were now walking downstairs to go to eat in the kitchen.

"Erm... I'm sorry for calling you a lady.", Allen said as he held his stomach and face in pain. Surprisingly, he got a blackeye!

"Hmph!", William snorted out of anger like his father and ignored his big brother.

Allen couldn't help but inwardly cry, 'I was too tired that time, I returned back pass midnight, and before that, I experienced getting beaten half to death.'

However, he obviously won't tell what really happened to his little brother or else something bad would happen to him.

'Why do big brothers always take the burden of the younger siblings.', Allen inwardly cried again.