26 Tour and Practice - 1

The young girl was caught unprepared as she spread her hands to catch the ball. Out of her expectation , the ball flew and landed on her palms. " Now , hold the ball tightly and think about the water again but this times , you are looking down toward the water...What do you see?" As Ali held the ball , the world around her flipped upside down and the sun is now underneath her feet. She felt something above her head , deep within the darkness a hand appeared. The tiny hand was blurry and transparent that seemed like it could dissipate any moment by a gust of wind. "I.. See a tiny hand made out of smoke..?" As soon Ali finished her words , the ball in her hand released a bright dazzling green light and after a short delay , the light dimmed down , leaving behind a green symbol *W*. " Perfect Ali , you have a strong affinity with the wind element!" The teacher took a step forward and held on the little girl who opened her eyes and stared at the glass in shock. "I did it!" After Ali regained her composure , Kathrina handed the ball to Mimi and her result was way different than Ali. The globe glowed a bright brown light with small green vines wrapping around the magic tool. "Amazing , Mimi you have a perfect affinity with the earth element!"

Unlike Ali , Mimi was slightly unhappy since she did not know if that could be a good help for the group. Seeing the sad elf , Lati spoke out. "Earth element is like the nature of plants and trees , you can enhance the dirt to grow your herb faster." Lati knew that Mimi's sister was more into Magic craft as she excelled in brewing potions and Mimi happily jumped around with Ali as soon she heard those words. The two little girls did not know any thing much about elements so Kathrina wanted to give them a quick lesson but seen that the sun was already straight up the sky , the teacher decided to have lunch instead. "Nodus , you are not hungry?" Lati noticed that the young man and Shishi was walking toward the gate.

"I am not hungry." Said the young man while Shishi nodded on his dented hat. The cub already ate when they arrived because Sasha thoughtfully saved some breakfast for him in case he got hungry again. Kathrina quickly sat up and held the young man , leaving him with a pouch of money and telling him to come home early , Nodus nodded and left. "My..Sister , you really seem to like Nodus." The younger one teased her cousin but it only resulted to a boost of happiness to Kathrina. " Who wouldn't like a cute child like him and I let him call me big sister too hmmp" Just when Naire was about to comment on her statement , he felt a surge of pain from his arm as he looked toward his wife who pinched him. "Shh.. She always wanted a child remember." The wife quietly whispered to her husband. Swallowing his words , the husband gulped and he remembered when a young girl who beat every boys down to the ground , shouting who ever can beat her get to marry her. Sadly after 20 plus years , no one has yet to beat her other than her teacher or elders in her sect.

"Boss , I did good right? I didn't talk to the adult ones at all!" The young cub took a path and promised he wouldn't reveal his ability to communicate. That would be the only secret the children had together at the hut , hence it made the cub proud. "Mhmm keep it up..When you can beat them , you can talk as much as you want." The young man was paying more attentions to the buildings around him as he made his way toward the richer part of the city. "Hmm.. 100 gold coins , how much would that be?" Without knowing the value of the money he received , Nodus simply went into 3 story tall stone building with a wooden sign that had inn &restaurant written on it. "Welcome! Would you be here for a room ,food or both?" A middle age lady waitress came up to Nodus as she gently welcomed him. The woman wore a apron over her white long dress and was holding a thick piece of paper. "Food." The waitress nodded with a smile and led Nodus to a table in the corner.

"Here is the menu Mr magician!" The waitress put down the thick piece of paper and walked into the kitchen to pick up the plates of food and serve the other customers. Looking around , Almost all of them were warriors with many variety of weapons. The majority has swords while the others had sabers , axes , spears , bow and such. '102 customer , 2 magician excluding me and the rest are warriors.. Perhaps I should open a store that target warriors.' Before Nodus went further into his thought , the young man held up the menu as he study the prices. 'Special Lolo's inn meat and vegetable stir fried for 10 copper..how much is 10 copper.....' Doesn't matter , I will give one gold and see it's value.

Putting the menu on the table , the waitress quickly came to his side with a small piece of paper and a ink pen. " What would you like to order sir?" The young man simply ordered half of the meat dish with two different glasses of juice which made the waitress happy as she ran back to the kitchen. " A big order for the cutie! Don't mess it up alright!" The entire kitchen which had 6 cooks yelled in unison "YES BOSS!" Turns out the waitress was Lolo , the owner of the inn. As he wait for his food , Nodus could see that everyone was happily talking with their friends and partner with a huge mug of beers in their hands. "Target hearing." With a quiet command , the hat on his head began to transmit the conversations to his ear from a group of drunk warriors he was staring at.

"Yea!! We can have atleast a 2 month vacations with all of this gold!" "To the captain ! " "Cheers!! " The group of 4 middle aged men drank their beers as they swallowed their food. "The next mission a cooperative one , we have to work with another group to escort a bunch of merchandise to the Valen kingdom." "It will be long but , it's 5 gold each and hopefully we get attacked by some dumb bandits so it could increase the reward to 10 gold instead." "Cheers for Lolo! The food here is the best and super affordable!" Spying on many different group of people who were socializing , Nodus came into conclusion that most of these people made money out of missions that were issued by the guild. ' 10 gold for a risky mission that could take your life.. It seems that the teacher gave me too much.' The image of the strong willed Kathrina appeared in his head made him smile. 'It's fine , I will just repay her a hundred times more.. Especially those couple , they have been acting weirdly.' Knowing that the couple were secretly talking about something , Nodus could always see a hint of worries behind that silly husband warrior.

" Here is your food Mr magician!" The waitress laid down a dozen plate on the table that were filled with meat , vegetables and bowls of soup. "Thank you." The waitress gave him a gentle smile as she went towards another customer. Seeing the drool in the corner of his eyes , Nodus sighed as he allowed Shishi to eat what ever he wanted. " Eat up Shishi , make sure you finish everything." Nodus simply took a single bite of everything but kept the soup for himself. Although he wasn't that hungry , Nodus could at least finish the soup while secretly listening to some conversation. ' Definitely something for warriors...' After Shishi cleaned up all of the dishes , Nodus took the cub and put him on his shoulder as he went toward the waitress who was pouring some beer for the customers at the bar counter. "I am done , here." As the waitress calculate his food cost, Nodus slid a piece of gold onto the table. "..-With the two drinks , It will be 75 coppers in total! Thank you and here is your changes." The woman gave him back his gold coins as she said. "As it's your first times , the food will be on the house!" After she finished those words , most of the customers cheered loudly " Lolo the almighty goddess of kindness!" Nodus nodded and took his coin back. 'Damn it.. Why did she had to be kind.' After thanking the woman , Nodus left the restaurant. "Come again" As he heard the shout , the young man closed the door and went into another part of the city that was filled with warriors and magicians. 'This must be a market place for weapons and armors.' His goal was to determine what kind of items was most suited for the people of this world.