Crystal [#2]

"C'mon Jay, help your little boy over here."

With a huff, Jason had to rethink his life's priorities- did he want to try and feed this little guy poison again? Last time he did it by accident, he can do it by "accident" again, right? 'But...' Touching his bald head, above a lump, he felt nothing- where once stood a constant sensation of having a noose around his neck or a thread touching his skull, he felt nothing. Absolutely fucking nothing.

The thread that has been placed there by the Entity was just... gone.

And he didn't know what to think of it- maybe this guy is magic? Watching him stumble, trying to lift a bookshelf Jason had made to hold his many books and failing miserably, Jason couldn't help but feel like... No way this guy is magic. He turned and walked right to him, pushing his hand against the bookshelf, he watched as the smaller guy smiled as he picked a book that had fallen beneath the bookshelf itself. It was Mery Shelly's Frankenstein- he liked that one. What? How else do you think he passes time? After he taught himself how to survive alone in the wilds as a child, teaching himself how to read was the easiest thing in the world.

Then he taught himself how to tie a knot with human intestines, so he could hang someone by their own entrails... Do you know how slippery guts can be? Very!

'He just wanted to read Frankenstein?' He tilted his head to the side to indicate curiosity, watching this guy- His name is Kaleb- but he refuses to call him by his name. That means he can get attached, and even though he is grateful that he somehow got rid of the Entity's hold over him and his home, he still wasn't sure if he wanted to find a way to kill the guy just to see if he could do it. I mean, he did kill this weird flesh monster thing the Entity wanted him to fight- Oh, and tin can head too! But he was tougher and way harder to kill.

"Oh, uhm..." The Intruder- that's what he's calling him now -looked down at the book in his hand and blew it, dust flying out of it and making a small cloud: "So, I wanted to clean this place- not to criticize your decor, but if I can't leave because we're tied together by some sort of magic, then I might as well make this place as comfortable as I can!" He dabbed the book with his hand before flipping it open, seeing it was surprisingly clean on the inside: "Huh, neat." And he placed the book in twisted his hand, and under Jason's curious gaze, the small cracks and broken imperfections on the bookshelf started to close and... mend? It was like the wood was flesh, healing of its injuries. "And there we go..."

Jason tapped the wall beside The Intruder, pointing at the bookshelf with cofusion- This guy is magical!? This clumsy, really easily killable guy? The only few people Jason has seen use some sort of magic were that skeleton guy and the vampire guy, and them both are scary. Sure, they can't kill him- not many things can even harm him seriously -but they can do a lot of damage to his body. He has had his blood drained by the Dracula (Yeah, he was kinda surprised when he met him too) and had his bones stolen by the bitch named Vecna after they beat him up using their magic.

"Oh, that?" The Intruder hummed for a moment before he smiled: "It's just something easy- I can't do much, just mend things together, repair broken items, and even remove rust." He then opened his hand and pushed it towards the ground, the open palm fluttered with a pale silver light as ot flickered for a bit before this gust of wind pushed the dust away, making a dust cloud around them: "Fuck- *cough* *cough* -that didn't go as well as I planned- *cough*"

Jason was starting to think all Magic Users are weird and not just blood leech and bone stealer.

It took The Intruder a few moments to catch his breath while Jason watched rather amusedly- if he couldn't kill the guy, might as well have fun with what he could get! "A-anyway- That was me trying to cause a controlled gust of wind, but it didn't work." Shaking his head to get the dust off of his body, The Intruder began to look around again: "This place needs a serious amount of cleaning- I know you're an outdoorsy guy, but please don't bring the outside inside." Jason ignored him, turning to leave and go back to check on his traps around Camp Crystal Lake- until he remembered that if he left, The Intruder would appear beside him, no matter where he went. So, with nothing better to do, he turned to stare and stand still- Watching as The Intruder went around trying to use the weird wind gust to push the dust out of the cabin.

It was a bit of a surprise when this time it actually worked.

"Yes! Now I can try working on Prestidigitation- Oh, you're here... Uhm, do- Sorry, but what do you do when you're not hunting people down?" To answer the Intruder's question, Jason lifted a book. "Huh, that makes sense." He nodded and went back to his cleaning quest... And Jason watched- And watched.

And watched a bit more.

"Okay!" The Intruder suddenly snapped, turning to look at him- Jason felt a bit amused, seeing him approach like an angry little cat. Harmless and adorable, but thinking he was dangerous: "If you're here, you're gonna help me- Make me a broom or something, please! I'll take whatever, even if it is made from the hairs of the skulls you buried down the tree in the backyard, next to the shrine." Jason felt cold for a moment. It was supposed to be a secret- he would decapitate any woman he thought resembled his mother and bury their heads on her shrine. He glared so strongly at the Intruder that the man actually looked afraid for a moment, but then he looked bashful: "Sorry... It's just- okay, I'm sorry, I won't ask again."

Jason huffed, turned around, and left.

——

It was a bit of a surprise that when he snapped the thread connecting the spider shadow thing to Jason, he got another little gift.

A book, inside his mind.

[Basic Cantrips Guide]

He didn't really know what they were, he just read the first page- boom. He knew how to use [Mending] immediately after reading the page, like it was natural for him to be able to do this. After using the spell to repair a bookshelf- Jason liked to read horror novels, who knew? -he also went ahead and read over the [Wind Gust] session to see if it could be useful to clean the house, and sure enough, it was... kinda? He wanted to read [Prestidigitation], but apparently he needed to earn it. He needed to first clean the entire house without it before he could actually learn it.

Like how he needed to make a campfire before he could learn how to cast [Cast Bonfire].

Like how he needed to actually play with mud before he could cast [Mold Earth].

Like how he needed to "feel nature" and "make a connection to nature" to cast [Druidcraft].

How he needed to mock someone so badly they feel like they got hurt to cast [Vicious Mockery].

So yeah, he needs to work for his spells- what were the conditions for [Mending] and [Wind Gust]? Oh, they were "repair something" and "create a gust of wind strong enough to rustle things" and they were easy enough to do. The one for [Prestidigitation] was "clean a whole house", so he was fucked either way.

So, with a heavy heart, Kaleb started to actually clean things by using [Wind Gust] to get the dust off. The trick was to try and keep a constant stream of wind to carry the dust out of the cabin. It wasn't a big cabin, it was about enough for a single person to live in, with a single bedroom with a bunch of things, like three bookshelves, boxes, and a bunch of random equipment- including a chainsaw that looked to be rusted over and broken. "Might as well." With that thought, Kaleb reached out to cast [Mending] when a hand grasped his- He almost flinched, but he saw whose hand it was: "Oh, hey Jay." He turned around just to see a brom being shoved in his face. "...thank you?" Jason simply huffed and turned to go to his bed- it was a crude thing, made of hay and leather, not very comfortable but it had to do.

Kaleb began to clean the house properly- he got the hand of using [Wind Gust] to push dust around, the cabin didn't have a window, it only had a door, so he began to pile the dust by the door before he shoved it all away with a final [Wind Gust]. The whole process took hours because he was a tidy cleaner- he didn't leave a single thing unclean, even going as far as to shove Jason out of his bed to clean it too.

What would he do? Kill him?

And like that, Kaleb had earned himself [Prestidigitation]! "Finally!" He smiled widely as he began to cast the spell to remove the rest of dust, dirt, dry blood, rust, and anything else that was dirty around. The area being cleaned would glow softly before anything he considered dirty faded into nothingness, leaving behind not even a hint that it was ever there to begin with. "You too." He waved his hand towards Jason, watching as his clothes glowed and all the dirt, grime, sweat, blood, and everything else vanished, leaving him cleaner than he has probably been in... year?

Jason had his hand around his neck, but he wasn't hurting him. It was kinda hot though.

"I just cleaned you- sorry, should've warned ya." With a red face of embarrassment, Kaleb wasily dislodged himself from Jason's hand and began to clean the bookshelves. Each book was carefully cleaned, each items was repaired and cleaned of rust and blood, and everything was cleaner than it had ever been in many years.

Jason just watched. 'What?' He didn't know why the guy was doing this- but then he remembered that they were pretty much sruck together. He didn't know if that was a good thing or not, but not having to clean up the blood himself was a good thing, actually. He always made a huge mess. 'Well, at least he's better than those people...'

Teenagers.

He didn't like them, clearly.

As he watched the magic happen (literally), he couldn't help but notice a few things. Now that the Entity was gone, he couldn't help but feel like he wasn't as angry as he always felt- it was like an itch had been scratched. He didn't feel it anymore! He gave the intruder a broom he has taken once from the camp after using it to kill a random guy, and now it had been used for what it was made for.

Jason could admit to himself that maybe this wasn't that bad... 'Huh, it smells like lavander?' He looked around at the clean home, cleaner than it had the right to, and now that the Entity was gone, he could actually feel like he owned his own house again! 'Oh, he's exhausted.' Turning to look at the intruder, Jason frowned benath his mask: 'Of course he'd be exhausted, magic is hard.'

Moving silently, he stood behind the man as he had a hand against one of the first machetes he got from the Entity, his hands glowing with the same soft orange light from before and watched as the almost permanent rust and blood marks faded away. The blade still looked dull, but it wasn't at the risk of breaking just by being held anymore...

This was his favorite machete.

'...okay, you can stay... for now.'