I want you to keep your freedom
He was already sitting down, so he just began to meditate.
The boys just watched. They didn't understand what he was doing.
They noticed a sudden movement from him. He made symbols they had never seen before. Then, those things gently glowed and started to float in the boy's direction.
They thought of running away, but what use would that be?
The glowing letters entered their heads, and they suddenly understood that those were just assignments. So they didn't do anything to them.
They started talking and figured that they had been given the same assignment. They were all supposed to go and gather wood. However, they weren't allowed further than a kilometer away from this clearing.
They were rather scared of... well, they were scared of everything. But when they looked at the man who had brought them there… The man was just sitting in the middle of a small clearing with a few big and scary creatures. They didn't even see what he was talking to in the river. They just heard him speaking and saw bubbles on the water's surface.
They thought that something was also in the water, which scared them even more than the ones they could see. After all, something they knew existed but couldn't have a clear picture of was even scarier than the ones they could see.
They decided to go together, thinking that this would be safer.
Unknown to them, Haru was following close to them. That wasn't all. The one-kilometer of distance was safe to them anyway. No creature in the vicinity would come this close to the Poison Prickle Snake or the Iron Shell.
The kids focused on their tasks. One was always on the lookout, while the others looked for fallen branches. Then, over an hour later, they returned, with all of them carrying as much wood as they could.
They didn't see Liam in the clearing and started to panic. But when they looked around. They found that neither the huge snake nor the black one reacted when they entered the clearing. Shaking, they approached the log and dumped all the wood near it. Then, they sat down, speaking to each other in whispers. Hoping that they wouldn't disturb the black one or the spiky one.
Suddenly they heard the woods rustling. The tree in that direction shook all over. After a moment, Liam comes back out of the wood. Dragging a massive load.
The kid's eyes were wide as they could get. They saw him pulling three corpses of the Purple Runners. They had heard stories about how hard it was to fight one, but now they saw something contradicting that.
Then they saw something that made their skin itch when they understood that Liam was skinning the creatures—carelessly tossing the three skins in the river. After all, he had placed quite large stones inside them. So they wouldn't be dragged away by the river currents. He cut one juicy part of one of them, cutting it into neat pieces, and stuck them on a metal rod. He repeated the action but stopped as he found that the fire hadn't been built.
He remembered that he only asked them to gather the wood—nothing else.
"Karu, come here," the boy jumped up and went over as fast as he could. He was in the presence of monsters, and it seemed to them that the one they had come here with was a monster himself. Karu was quite scared.
"Did you see what I was doing to the meat before?"
"Um, cu-cutting it?" he stuttered, still scared.
"That too, I have already cut all the meat. So, I want you to place all the meat onto these metal sticks. Can you do that?"
"… yes," he answers hesitantly. He hasn't ever touched meat before. So how would he know what to do? But this task didn't sound very hard.
"Let me show you," he demonstrated what he wanted the boy to do and asked to show him that he understood. The boy picked up a piece and started the same action. He succeeded, and Liam patted his head gently.
"Continue. I'll start the fire," he left the boy, who finally seemed to forget the surroundings as he concentrated on a simple task.
"There are two more tasks, one is to gather rocks to make a safe fire pit, and the other is to bring clean water from the river. Which one do you want?"
It was a no-brainer for them, and both said the same. Both of them wanted to gather rocks.
Liam sighed at that and made the decision for them.
"Yong-Sun, take this and bring me some water. By the way, the creature in the water won't hurt you. He is as interested in you as I am." So Liam said when he saw the dispirited face ha was making.
"That… isn't making me feel better about my chances."
"What chances are you talking about," Liam chuckled, "Biff won't hurt you." He answered incredulously.
"You mean it," the boy seemed to brighten at that.
"Yes." Liam looked after Young-sun and watched as the child's steps started to gather courage. Then it began to lose the steam it had gathered, slowing down. Liam could hold back his chuckle as he watched the boy approach the river.
Still, Liam turned his attention away when he heard some stones being dropped near the firewood.
Jin seemed to have gathered some courage as he rushed around the clearing relatively undisturbed. Liam started to arrange the wood and soon pulled out some matches and the nest he had found before.
Soon after, the fire was burning, and the kids had gathered around the fire. They were eating meat and some kind of roots Liam had found on his way back. None of the kids recognized it, but Liam had dug them out from somewhere as they were still covered in dirt. He even made Yong-Sun wash them in the river. They had tasted unexpectedly sweet after boiling them.
Liam discovers a new thing after eating it. Things that grew underground didn't have the sleeping effects.
The kids marveled at the new tastes they were having. They were never able to eat as much as they could, and now they could stuff their faces as much as possible. And this was when they were in a big scary forest with giant terrifying creatures.
Liam had already filled himself as much as he could. So, he picked up the skinned beasts and tossed one in the river. One was given to Haru, and Liam wondered if Nio would eat one.
"Nio, you awake?" There was no answer. Liam shrugged his shoulders and left the skinned corpse near Nio's head. He could eat it if he wanted to later.
He returned to the kids.
"Remember, I checked your bodies earlier?"
"Yes," they all answered.
"I was mostly curious about Yong-Suns body and its condition, but I found some interesting things inside your bodies as well," Liam looked at the brothers.
"Yong-Sun seems to have been born with this condition, but you two are very close to growing it yourselves. That was why I needed to think for some time."
"My first idea was to do as the twins had suggested and find you a home in Pando. But after examining your bodies, I want to take you with me. Teach and train you as much as I can before I leave this place. I am going to give you time to think about it. But I must know your answer when we get to Pando."
"Si-Liam, what is that condition I seemed to be born with?"
"The condition you were born with is that you can gather energy and cultivate yourself until you become the strongest person."
"I have not been long here, and I don't know how this world is built, but I think that if the person who has a natural core and has no backing… that person seems to be in danger of being used as a tool for the rest of their lives."
"That is also why I wanted to teach and train you as much as possible, so starting tomorrow, I will try to train you."
"Just to let you know, if the powers of this world truly want to use you like that. I'll make sure that you can fight them off. I want you to keep your freedom and independence." He assured the frightened boy.
Liam then gave them tea to drink as the sun was about to rise. He also wanted to raise their tolerance to the toxins. Making them drink was just one way of doing that.