Taking Off

"Yes, as if space itself opened and swallowed the monster from its existence."

Hearing that, Aeliana's reaction was quite explosive, as if she was drinking something and spat it out instantly.

"What?!" 

She questioned, surprised at Brander's words.

'Hmm, she sure seems to believe them without any sort of difficulty. Don't know if that's a good thing or not for this girl.' Cole thought to himself, taking in the sight of a befuddled Aeliana.

"Anyways, what we've managed to recover is but a small claw that seems ripped off of it. We'll have to return to the entry of the town and get ahold of that appendage that we managed to cut off by ourselves." 

Brander ended his sentence as he rested his arm on the hilt of his sword, taking a look by my side.

"You know, kid, you've really got guts."

"I can't say I've heard it a lot."

Cole tried to strain a smile even though it made the whole situation rather awkward, as for his words, he said the truth.

Cole didn't have much interaction with people, and even if he did, it was surface-leveled. Cole has never had a person whom he could be comfortable with and say what's on his mind.

No, he had gotten used to being alone.

And so, being treated so casually by other people like this, he found himself in slight discomfort.

'Why are they being so normal around me? And Aeliana's behavior too…' 

Thus, his mind started to lean on the naive side.

'No, no, Cole, get a grip. Why would I want to befriend people just because they treat me normally? Such a dumb thing to do!'

Chastising himself mentally, Cole started walking alongside Aeliana at her signal, moving towards the battlegrounds so they also help with cleaning up the area.

"So, where we left off…" 

Cole voiced, feeling embarrassed at how awkward he was at giving a flow to the conversation.

"Mhm, where we left off."

Unable to stop himself from asking questions, Cole finally proceeded to question things that may quench his curiosity.

"So, when exactly was the town destroyed?" 

"Approximately three months ago. And not just your town, the kingdoms, the empire, cities across the whole world, everything has faced major destruction."

"…How?"

"We don't know anything for sure, everyone has the same story, once the sun itself grew dark, they were overtaken by fear and couldn't remember anything of it, only that monsters appeared everywhere."

"Does that include you?"

Cole asked an important question, since she seemed to have heard numerous reports, he must know her own experience too.

"Correct. It does include me."

"What were you doing when it happened?"

"I was… cleaning back at my house."

"Oh…"

Noticing the shift in her voice, Cole quickly apologized, "Sorry if I intruded too much, but it's important."

"No, it's okay. As I said before, I'll say it again, I have no clue how you didn't notice the shift of the world during your travels, even you should've noticed that eclipse."

"Oh, so you call that an eclipse?"

"Yeah, it was named the Celestial Eclipse just recently after an assembly by the higher-ups of the Kingdom, the Empire, and some other different Kingdoms and Countries."

"I see…"

Taking in that information, Cole stopped to think for a second, to process it, to see if he missed any important pieces of information.

Then, it rang in his mind.

"Wait, A-Aemilia," Trying to say her name properly and stuttering pathetically once, Cole asked, "If supposedly, you were a… cleaner before the eclipse, then how are you such a capable Mage right now? Based on your powers, I thought you were an early awakener."

"Oh, that… Yes, we also missed this important point."

"Important point?"

"Yes. After the eclipse occurred and everyone came back to their senses, the rate of the awakened skyrocketed."

"Huh?"

Pushing some rubble of destroyed houses out of the way and recovering the body of a knight, Cole raised his brows in surprise at her words and was rather undisturbed by the dead body missing the bottom half of his legs. 

He seemed to have grown indifferent to such things after witnessing his own mother's body decaying.

"What do you mean the rate skyrocketed?"

"Exactly as you heard. People started awakening right and left, the crime rate increased as the people suddenly gained their power and quite some political issues were and are underway. The world is ending, Cole, or rather, it ended months ago."

"..."

"I see." 

Said Cole after a long silence, just moving rubble away.

'So people started awakening and I… ended up with a curse?'

"This world's creator must really hate me…" 

Cole couldn't help but think aloud this time, after all, he seemed to think he was entirely correct.

Ever since he was a child, he trained and trained.

He gained quite the sense of a warrior physically, but that wasn't enough to sate his desire for power.

He was desperate for the aid of mana.

He was desperate for its grace, and yet, he was abandoned by it.

No, abandoned isn't the right word, after all, mana never even gazed in his direction.

And now, everyone else but him started to receive its blessings, and Cole… was the opposite.

He received a curse that didn't make any sense to him.

A curse that shows messages when it's activated.

A curse that allows him to hear voices.

A curse that… assists him?

'No way… When that voice said you owe me one, does it mean that thing was what saved me?'

'But what exactly do I owe it?'

'I feel like I've started to grasp and understand something about it, but it's still not enough. I need more information.'

"Anyways, Cole, thank you for helping out with this, considering it's not even your job, ahaha…"

Aemilia laughed awkwardly as she bowed her head slightly.

"And before you get to introduce yourself to the others, yes, we're all awakeners after the eclipse."

"Alright."

Nearing the entry which was also an exit from the town of Elyndor, Aemilia and Cole finally gathered with the survivors who were waiting for them, for Aemilia specifically.

"We'll leave the introductions on our way there, we've got quite the road to go, after all. But for now, we shall take off towards Silvindor."