Chapter 10: Ominous Clouds

It had already been six months since Zena had joined the orphanage, and Mirage was nearing his sixth birthday.

The temperature had gotten warmer, and the trees had grown their leaves again. While there were no monsters around where Mirage and the others lived, the coming of summer signaled the reappearance of wildlife.

Snakes and bugs were abundant in the forest, but there wouldn't be any danger to the people if proper precautions were taken. For example, Achlys would hang clothes soaked in pest repellent near the orphanage to keep pests and other wild animals away. This helped protect the goats and the chickens in the orphanage courtyard too.

Speaking of goats and chickens, Lain helped bring another rooster to the orphanage, as the previous one had passed away from old age. Of course, since they didn't consume any meat, the rooster was given a proper burial with the cries of Betty and Zena.

Another change that occurred was that Lain had left the village to help escort an important cargo. Apparently, it was something that Vosegus, the god who trained the guards, ordered a couple of guards in the village to take something to the elven royal capital.

Lain, with two other guards had drawn the short stick, and left the village a few days ago. He didn't want to leave the village as he was worried about the orphanage, but there were other guards who had families to take care of in the village, making him take on the job in the end. He came to the orphanage and said that he would be gone from anywhere between three months to half a year, as the road was very long and they would be traveling mostly on horses.

While the children were pretty sad that they wouldn't be able to see him for a long time, they didn't care too much as he said that it would be a safe journey.

The orphanage also continued to receive letters from Petra. They would sometimes arrive once a month and sometimes once every two to three months, depending on the conditions of the roads.

In her letters, Petra would be talking about her job and new friends she had made. The town she had moved to had mostly elves, and people from other races weren't many in number. She said that the people from other races that she sees in the town would mostly be travellers that were temporarily resting in the town during their travels.

While that town wasn't particularly a mixed race one, majority of the people there didn't disdain people of the other races. Petra mentioned in her letter that most elves who disdain other races would come from village's located deeper in the village, and those who were on the outer parts of the forest were already used to contacting people from different races.

Of course, the elves particularly gated dwarves in general, and activities such as blacksmithing were so rare that there were nearly nonexistent in the elven lands. This meant that the equipments and tools used in these lands were either made from wood or some unique magic materials that didn't require blacksmithing.

Petra had said within her letter that she had only ever seen one half-dwarf in her town, and that person had happened to be a traveller. This lack of blacksmithing in the elven lands made it hard for people here to acquire tools

In fact, even the bread and pastries in the village was made by a human family, since elves didn't like fire. Of course, some elves could use magic crafted items to set fire, but this didn't stop the elves from preferring a diet consisting of vegetables and fruits.

There wasn't much else Petra had mentioned in her letters, but she had said that she would be staying in that town for a long time since she liked her job.

Betty also didn't cry about Petra leaving anymore, since it had already been a long time. In fact, she only cried for the first few letters they received and didn't for those that followed.

After reaching the age of six, Betty had started to learn how to read and write from Achlys, and this was the same for Mirage. Unlike Betty, Mirage had already known how to read, so learning how to write wasn't hard either.

Instead of pretending to have slow understanding, Mirage chose to learn stuff as fast he could, and practiced his body in the free time. He would be doing exercises which made his body more flexible, and he started to do some stamina increasing exercises too.

His regular days would be composed of: waking up, practicing, eating, helping Achlys and other, learning, practicing, eating, practicing for a final time and going to sleep. Going to sleep and eating properly was the core of development, so he didn't ignore those to get some extra practice.

Mirage didn't forget to play with Betty and Zena, and also helping Achlys whenever she needed his help. His days seemed repetitive, but he was already used to such days from his last life.

'I can finally feel like the entirety of my body is under my control. It was really hard at first since I was more used to my old body. I didn't think it would take this long to reach this step... of course, the control I have now is better than what I had at the same age of my last life.'

'The limit of personal prowess in this world is higher than the one I was in before... I wonder just how much stronger I will get after obtaining a falna? Haha, even though there is no reason for me to get strong, I can deny the happiness I feel as I get stronger.'

While Mirage was continuing his afternoon exercises as always, his eyes notices something unusual in the sky. He could see black clouds that looked like smoke coming from where the village was located.

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