38 The quarrel
"..."
Kaipo was standing completely still with his flower-like irises, clearly staring toward the upper right corner of his vision.
"...Zorey..."
"Yes?"
The greenish-blond-haired boy asked carefully, and his black-haired friend tilted his head curiously, nodding his head up at him.
"I could swear that when we last saw each other, your level was 8... was it not?"
Kapio asked, breathing in and breathing out slowly to keep his cool.
"Yeah, that's right."
Zorey nodded his head and admitted casually.
"Then am I seeing things? I can swear that it says 14 now..."
Kaipo pointed out, closing his eyes and rubbing his eyes.
"You're fine~! That's really what it says!"
"..."
Zorey laughed and waved his hand dismissively, causing the young necromancer to flinch and peek at him from behind his spread fingers.
"..."
"..."
A moment of silence passed, and...
"ZOREY, WE HAVEN'T SEEN EACH OTHER FOR A SINGLE DAY! SINGLE! ONE! 1! HOW, FOR THE LOVE OF THE SYSTEM, DID YOU MANAGE TO LEVEL UP SIX TIMES?!"
... something inside the greenish-blond-haired boy seemed to snap, and his eye twitched before he roared at the young priest of death, using three different ways to specify how much time had passed.
If they were still in the city and not at the entrance to the pitiful excuse for a forest, they would surely gather a lot of attention.
"Hmph. I guess country bumpkins like me have ways to train that the great city folks don't know about. Who would have guessed?"
The black-haired boy crossed his arms and turned away, pouting.
"You're still on about that?! I only said that because you didn't even try to understand my reason for skipping training!"
"You had a family dinner – what's the big deal!? We have family dinners back in my village, too. We are not THAT poor! We could have just gone out earlier and returned earlier!"
Kaipo gritted his teeth and declared with accusation, to which Zorey scoffed grumpily.
"You...! I never implied that you are poor! For the last time! It was an official family meeting! I had to show my level and skills to the family head and the elders! It's not something that I can just show up straight out of the woods, you know?!"
The greenish-blond-haired boy grasped his hair as if he wanted to tear it off and stomped his feet, unable to express his anger in any other way.
"But if you went with me, you could have leveled up more and shown off more! You also said that Wiggles has some sort of requirement she needs to complete in order to rank up and evolve – we could have done them all together, and then you could show up even more and amaze everyone!"
"GHAAAAAAAA! Why are you like this?!"
Zorey pointed out, making Kaipo cry out and spin around, feeling nauseous from anger.
The black-haired boy was so stubborn in his way that it was driving him mad.
The worst part was that Zorey didn't mean anything bad and actually wanted the best for Kaipo, and the greenish-blond-haired boy knew that – but he also knew that the young priest of death's way wasn't the right one to follow in that particular situation.
...but Zorey could not comprehend that...
"And see who had a better idea? I grew by six levels and got myself a cool skill. Gemstone creation. Blee."
*ting*
"..."
Zorey declared and used his new Skill, taking the lesser fire gemstone and lodging it into the steel ring at the end of his staff while showing his tongue to the stunned Kaipo.
"You...!"
"...!"
The greenish-blond-haired boy's eyes filled with tears, and he trembled, causing the black-haired boy to realize that he had gone too far...
"IF YOU DON'T WANT TO TRAIN WITH ME, THEN FINE! I WILL NOT BEG YOU TO HELP ME! LEAVE PARTY!"
[Party leader had left – the party has been dissolved]
Kaipo howled with tears streaming down his face and rushed away, back towards the city gates, while a notification popped up on Zorey's vision left side.
"K-Kaipo...! Wait, it's not like that! I didn't...! Argh...!"
The shocked priest of death gasped and groaned, reaching his hand after his sobbing friend – but not following him.
"..."
Zorey's face twisted in a bitter expression.
Back in New Herbal, if he got into a serious quarrel with one of the other kids his age, they would usually end up in a brawl and reconcile right after.
But Kaipo wasn't like the other kids that Zorey knew, and they didn't hang around each other long enough to pick up on the subtle differences between each other...
...well... at least Zorey didn't...
"I don't get it! Should I treat him more like a girl or something?! It would be so much better if he punched me instead of crying! Tears are unfair! Haaa..."
The black-haired boy tried his best to be angry, but he knew that the fault was on his side this time.
He didn't go after Kaipo, but he did enter the forest to hunt – he didn't tell Kaipo earlier because he wanted to make it a surprise, but since he was allowed to accept low-rank adventuring quests, he took on a reoccurring lesser giant rat hunting quest that paid well and offered an even higher reward in compensation for the HP+ gemstones if those end up crystalizing within the corpse.
That day, Zorey ended up hunting alone.
The next day Brigitta was still holed up in her room, reading through the papers Atwood left for her, and Zorey had another day for himself.
He wanted to find Kaipo, apologize to him, and invite him to continue training and hunting together, but the greenish-blond-haired boy was nowhere to be found, and Zorey ended up giving up and going to the forest alone to hunt lesser giant rats.
…after all, with Kazimir's approval, he would receive the full compensation for the adventuring quest he took, and he was really close to affording the price for the ATK+ gemstone that the orange-haired peddler, Belinda, managed to find and reserve in one of the back-alley shops that not many were even aware of.
The young priest of death also asked her to keep an eye out for two MP+ gemstones, intending to have one made into a ring for himself and the other...
...for the accessory for Kaipo as an apology...
...but since those were rare, even someone with the imp's luck Skill like Belinda could not manage that easily...
"Even if I will buy the ATK+ gemstone, what will I do if Belinda manages to find the MP+ one? There's no way that it would be as cheap... in the end, the best option would be to hunt down the canine-type monsters and get the ATK+ gemstone that way while saving up money to buy the MP+ one..."
*WHAM* *whooo*
"SCREE-GUEGH...!"
Zorey muttered to himself while delivering a devastating blow at the giant lesser rat's skull, breaking the lesser fire gem lodged into the metal ring at one end of his staff and causing the creature both physical and magical damage.
*WHAM*
*WHAM* *WHAM*
"Gemstone creation.*
*ting*
Zorey turned around, continuing to deliver attacks on the monster as he moved and having a long enough window of opportunity to use the Skill and place another lesser fire gem in the vacant ring at one end of his staff.
*WHAM* *whoo*
"Scuegh...!" *thump*
[You have defeated lesser giant rat]
[EXP points granted]
The next augmented attack finished the monster off which was confirmed by the notification showing up in the boy's vision.
"Prayer."
*Haaa~!*
[EXP points granted]
The lesser prayer skill was already maxed out – the young priest of death wouldn't receive its upgraded version otherwise – so now it was turned for Prayer Skill training.
Without Kaipo, it wasn't as efficient, as raised undead had a lot more malice, but even the normal monster corpse released a minuscule amount of black mist and prayer-type skills could be used on it.
Unfortunately, that situation meant that Appease undead would stay the way it was because it could not be used on anything other than undead.
"Alright. It's decided. I will go into Stone Fang dog spawning ground."
Zorey dragged the monster's corpse by its meaty tail and nodded to himself while throwing it on an old cart that Belinda got for him, already full of bodies of lesser giant rats.
"I should deliver them to the guild... no, should stop by Belinda – she was furious that I didn't give her a chance to check for and buy the HP+ gemstones first..."
He decided and pulled the cart back to the city gates.
"Ah, it's you. Come in, come in."
The guards who kept seeing Zorey together with Kaipo noticed him and waved their hands, allowing him to bypass the line that formed for identification, which raised many voices of complaint...
...but none of them made Zorey stop...
Only half an hour later, the black-haired boy was going back out – and funnily enough, some people that were still waiting recognized him and stared at him in confusion.
