Meeting the Ulaspas family-1

When Adui heard the Click for the first time, he couldn't help but smile, it had been about an hour since he started solving the puzzle and as soon as he aligned the first face of the cube, he heard a clicking noise.

He did not know what it meant, but he understood that he was on the right path, after the first face was completed, he now only needed to align all the other faces, and this puzzle would be solved for good.

After working constantly on the cube for some hours, he made an observation, every face has a piece in the center that does not move. The opposite side of the fish center is always the leaf center and like that, every pattern has a partner. From this, he figured that every pattern has a designated face, and all the pieces of that pattern must gather on that designated face.

That observation was a breakthrough, now he could form a mental image in his head of a fully aligned cube. He thought that after making such a breakthrough, he would come a tad bit closer to solving the cube as well, but he was wrong. After working on it overnight, he was able to make one face of the cube very easily, but after that, he got stuck.

After completing a face, when he moved on to make the adjacent face, he started facing some problems. With one face complete he had to move the sides of the cube in such a way that it didn't disrupt the first face that he made.

And that was becoming rather difficult. Without the freedom to use every side, it became very hard for him to move any piece around, thus he got stuck.

By the time morning arrived, he had dark circles under his eye, and his head was aching, but still, he was stuck…

Adui looked terrible after working on the cube overnight and not even a warm bath was able to make him look better. When he arrived to eat breakfast, he saw Ben there, quietly sipping his soup while being lost in thought. He made his way over there and sat down beside him.

"Good morning my dear friend." he greeted him. But Ben only gave him a small smile and went back to eating his soup. He was not blind, he had sensed and felt that the old man had been avoiding him since yesterday. 

"Do you not wanna say something to me, Ben?" he said aggressively. 

The old man looked up, astonished. "What brought this on?"

"I am not blind nor am I an idiot. I have noticed since yesterday's incident you have been, awfully quiet. You are not on your usual behavior, and now the small smile that you gave me, you don't want to talk to me, do you?"

Ben looked uncomfortable with the question, he shifted his position on his chair a few times, as he didn't what to say. "Adui… I… It is not… Um… You see, I want to say… Dont, I mean… Uh"

Seeing him saying gibberish, he immediately stopped him. "Stop." He said sternly. "Look, Ben. I don't know what is your problem, but what I did yesterday… it was to save both of us. We would have been in a very difficult position if it wasn't for me… I know, I was... I went a little overboard. And I fully accept its responsibility, but your behavior on the other hand I cannot accept."

He continued. "If you have something to say to me, Ben, then say it to my face. We have been friends for more than a decade now, and you never had any problems bluntly sharing your thoughts with me in the past, so why have you taken the vow of silence now?"

Ben shifted in his seat. "Adui… I am sorry I acted this way. It is just that… I… Your behavior.. Reminded me of what you truly was and…" The old man then stopped. He didn't know how to complete his words without offending Adui.

"Ben, what the fuck are you trying to say? You think that I acted that way yesterday because I was drunk on my power. I have been corrupted by it?" The old man once again opened his mouth, but couldnt speak, he didn't know how to complete the sentence without offending him.

"Ben, I had these powers for more than a decade, but have you ever seen me acting this way before." Ben stayed silent, which was enough to answer his question. "No, I didn't. Yesterday I lost control because some things have been going on in my life, I cannot share them with you, but these things have messed my brain real good."

Ben didnt say anything, just went back to drinking his soup. Since that moment, Adui started noticing that their relationship wasn't the same as before, Ben acted as if he was not there. The old man didnt make any attempts to make things right, and this infuriated him even further.

Adui couldn't understand what the old man was afraid of, it was not like he was going to hurt him. He may have crossed the line that day, but those guys were bandits and a pretty notorious one at that, even if he killed some of them brutally, they all deserved it. So why was he acting this way?

He felt sad to see his only friend put up an act in front of him. He wanted their relationship to get fixed, somehow. But didn't how it could. Adui felt lost. Things only took a darker turn later on…

It was quite a night that day, the full moon was shining its grace on them and they were camping out in the wild. He was busy with the cube and the old man was cooking dinner. It has been two days since they set off from the inn, he was trying to solve the cube for the past two days but was not having any luck in doing so.

When the old man announced that the dinner was ready, he put the cube away and went to his water canteen to wash his hands. For the past two days, he had been careful not to spill water over his injured hand. He couldnt risk his wound getting infected out here.

Today he felt that his wound was healed, and he should probably change his bandage today. As he unwrapped the dirty bandage from before, he saw it, at the back of his wounded hand, a tattoo had appeared. The tattoo was of a Rose. He tried rubbing it and cleaning it with water, but the tattoo refused to get erased, it was embedded in his skin.