"Hey, you kidnapped me."
"All I did was forcibly ask for your help, Arend."
Shocked, I say, "How do you know my name?"
"I know a lot about you. You struggle to wake up in the mornings and are the 82nd loudest snorer in the mansion. You spend quite a bit of time in the toilet each day and always have a crude smile despite your body being very dejected.
You work the fields most of the time, and you mainly talk with Neil. You seem to think Nora is pretty, as you stare at her quite often. I have also noted that you seem to be aroused by women's armpits, and over the last 5 days, you have coughed 75 times."
With green hair and a smile on his face, the king happily goes on and describes me, and in response to this, I have a scared face, and say, "Creepy. I need to run away right now."
Shocked by this, he grabs me and says, "Please don't leave, I need help."
Pointing at the nightmare, I say, "Ask him to help you."
"I refuse," The nightmare says as he just sits there looking annoyed.
The king then says, "Iancu is trying to protect his cool guy, I don't care about anything else persona. So he is only trying to help me in very minor ways that don't hurt his ego, so in all, he is barely being of any help at all."
Iancu throws something at us and says, "Don't go around spreading lies about me."
"Despite how he acts, he is actually really nice, so don't mind him."
"I AM NOT NICE!"
Iancu then starts to try and attack the king, but he just dodges and continues to mess with him. Seeing them start to fight, I say, "I want to go to sleep," With a tired expression.
Looking at the king, I say, "What would someone like you even need me for? You're already talented, smart, well-liked, strong, lucky with the ladies." As I speak, my jealousy starts to leak out, and I make an annoyed face.
With a proud, child-like face, the king says, "I need to design a building so people can move out of the crowded mansion, and unfortunately, all of my tests so far have ended in failure."
"Then wouldn't you ask someone from Skydust to help you with this?"
"I tried, but unlucky among all the different craftsmen among them, none are skilled in architectural design.
Apparently, the craftsman who was the best architect in Skydust was annoying and always going on about Benelium; he even tried to hire Cyrus with a horrible contract.
So all of the kids, including his own, made a promise to stay far away from architecture so they wouldn't be associated with him."
Sighing, I say, "Then if you can't find people who are skilled, you shouldn't bother doing this. The mansion can still fit us all."
Looking down with black hair, the king says, "I know it is stupid, but I feel like if everyone is working this hard, then they at least deserve some space to sleep."
He really just looks like a kid trying to help his parent, and it's all too familiar a sight to me. "Ok then, I will help."
Picking up a sheet, the king says, "Here are my first few designs."
Looking at the sheet, I say, "How did you even make this? You have integrated the parts of wonderbeasts so effortlessly into the building."
"I wanted to use readily available materials, so that's why, but is it so impressive?"
Iancu then says, "Wonderbeasts' bodies make amazing materials, but they are still not really well understood. So it takes many people multiple years to truly understand their inner workings.
That's why people who can craft or cook with their hands are very skilled. So the fact that you were able to do this is quite impressive."
"In all honesty, I got all this information about how they work from Willow, so it isn't like I discovered them myself."
I then say, "But you made a mistake."
"Where?"
"You made a lot of the frame of the house out of atlas eater bones, but you didn't account for their special qualities."
"What do you mean?"
"While atlas eater bones look very strong, they have a property that makes them soften when they are used to support certain weights for long periods of time.
Using them to construct a building will definitely lead it to completely collapse."
Looking at the page, the king says, "I see."
Iancu then says, "Orb, why is your hair silver?"
"What do you mean?"
Creating some ice, he looks in his reflection and says, "It is silver, that has never happened before!"
Iancu then says, "The shade looks different from the silver of your legacy in your hair, so this must be due to your emotions."
Putting his hands against his hair, the king says, "I was concentrating pretty intensely, so maybe this is due to that."
"How does that explain anything? You concentrate all the time, and your hair never turns silver, and doesn't your hair usually turn green when thinking about something?"
Smiling at Iancu, Orb says, "I never told you that yet you still figured it out, how kind of you."
With his façade hurt, Iancu says, "You're probably so insane that your hair couldn't even keep up with your emotions anymore."
The king says, "Hey, I am a completely sane human being!"
Iancu gets up and says, "Do you want me to name how crazy you are because I have a long list!"
As they shout, I say, "I don't really think either of you are right."
They both stop and face me, so I say, "As you grow, your emotions become more complex. So I don't think it is because you just got a new emotion, it is just that your emotions are becoming more distinct from each other."
Staring at them, I see that they both have faces of shock and disbelief.
Then, shaking, the king says, "I am so sorry, I thought you were a stupid slacker, but you just said something so wise."
With a big head, I say, "Well, I am an adult, so of course my life experiences would show."
Suddenly, a flash hits both Orb's and Iancu's minds, and Orb says, "Arend, who did you steal that line from?" While looking at me with eyes of pity.
"WHY DO YOU JUST ASSUME THAT I STOLE THE LINE!"
He says nothing in response and just keeps giving me the same stare as if he is asking me to not further embarrass myself.
Hanging my head low, I say, "My father."
They both let out sighs of relaxation as if the world now makes sense to them again, and I just stand there in embarrassment.
The king says, "Your father sounds like a wise adult; it is rare to see one, so why don't you tell us about him?"
"That sounded like a backhanded slap."
"Oh, it was, but not to you, so please could you tell me about him?"
"If you want to so bad, ok, but it isn't a pleasant story."
-Break-
20 years ago
Continent: Molstoria
Location: Island of Niabio Sokija
Like a lot of famous craftsmen and merchants around the world, my family is descendants from people who left Skydust to pursue their dreams, and due to the blood of those crazies, it is normal for people in my family to be a bit insane, but still, in comparison to that my father was a strange man.
With excitement, he says, "Look over there, it is a Zoidzel. They really are four times the size of a Zterytavis."
Taking out his hammer from his back, he says, "Time to get to work."
My father equally had a strange hobby, and that was to build houses for animals. Big or small, cursed or not, even if they were wonderbeasts, my father would go around and build houses for them.
Staring at the happy Zoidzel, my father says, "Looks like I am done here."
He was talented, a man who had spent years studying wonderbeasts, and had learnt not only how to utilise them in making houses, but also how to build houses for them.
Sitting in the middle of the forest, eating lunch, freshly bought food, I ask him, "Dad, with your skills, you could easily become an irreplaceable member of anyone's court, so why do you choose to build houses instead?"
"You don't reach my level of knowledge and expertise easily. I had to kill lots of different wonderbeasts to truly reach my level of experience. During that time, I saw countless different lifestyles.
But one thing that I did notice common among all of them is that they all looked really lonely, so I decided to build them houses that I hope could become their homes. That is what makes me happier than anything else in this world."
Rubbing the back of his head, my father said, "Though I am sorry I didn't give you that noble lifestyle, you could have even married a princess."
"Yeah, you're right, I won't ever forgive you," I say, completely cold and detached.
Shocked dad says, "Please, how can I make this up to you?"
Giving him a cheeky smile, I say, "By teaching me everything you know."
With a smile, he says, "Ok, son."
I trained and tried over the years, but still, I wasn't able to reach my dad's level of expertise. I was a failure, and all of that failure led me to run away from home.
I distanced myself from him so I wouldn't be hurt, but in the end, I ended up hurting him much more.
Continent: Terrafide
Location: Kingdom of Rasartine
As I lie tied up and beaten, I lay on the floor in front of the king in his hall, and down the steps leading up to the throne is my father being held by knights.
The king then says, "You will build me a wall to surround my great country from Gevurah."
"Don't hurt my son," My father cries.
A knight brings a sword to my neck, and the king says, "That depends on your compliance, so get to work, architect."
A few years later, I was released, and when I was, I asked the guards, "Where is my father?"
The guard says, "We couldn't let anyone know the weakness of our magnificent wall, so he was killed. Now leave." And starts to walk away.
Shook by these words, I ask, "Where is his body!?"
Still walking, he says, "He might have been burned, buried, thrown into the river, or thrown in with the garbage, how the fuck would I know, and why would I care?"
From the bottom of my heart, I was shaken so badly that I couldn't do anything with my life and was eventually kidnapped and sold as a slave.
"That is basically my story. I told you it won't be pleasant. Though I guess I talked more about me than him in the end, guess I really do suck."
Looking at the two, I see I have made the atmosphere weird, so I say, "Don't feel down about this, the reason my bad died was due to my stupidity and nothing else, I have already made peace with it.
Of course, sometimes I wonder why my father would give up his life for a vile piece of shit like me, but what can I do about it since it seems no matter how bad of a situation I end up in, someone just pulls me out!"
"Stop being an idiot," Iancu says.
"What?"
"Your father said that his work made him happier than anything else in the world, yet he gave up all that for you. The only answer is that you make him happier than that ever could."
Hearing Iancu, words I freeze, and say, "Please don't speak of nonsense."
"You're the one who needs to stop being stupid. Don't cheapen your dad's emotions towards you, because he loved you more than his dream."
Hearing this I fall silent and shake, and then the king says, "Please help me develop this building more, I know you might not want to, but all I can say is that even if you are not as good as him, all he has passed onto you won't be useless."
Sighing, I say, "Ok then, but don't expect much from me."
Throughout that night, we worked tirelessly to the point of exhaustion, and this continued for some days, but at the end of it, we got something amazing.
-Break-
6 days later
I once asked my father when I was a child, "How does this building stay up with all the weight?"
"You see, all of the numerous pieces help to distribute the weight all around the building. Each piece does its own part, and together they can carry weight; not a single one of them could carry weight alone, and still, they need a strong base.
But I am sure the base I have given you is enough, so please, one day, gather many pieces of life because if you do, I am sure you will be able to build something great with others."
In front of a large crowd, both Orb and I stand on a podium and present a giant sketch paper to all of them. Then, as he finishes talking, he says, "So Arend will be in charge of this project, so please talk to him about this."
"Wait, what?"
The crowd rushes at me, and then a group of people rush towards me and start talking.
"Did you really design this?"
"It is amazing."
"I didn't know you had such talent."
"I am really excited."
As people try to talk to me, a smile appears on my face. I guess working with others isn't all that bad.
ΦLooking at the crowd of people working together, I say, "My plan went off without a hitch."
Walking away, I say, "If I didn't notice him always staring at the mansion, I wouldn't have known what to do. Now it is time to help the remaining sad people.
If I were looking in terms of sadness, I would say Mike, Toria, Ruto, and Land are the ones who need help next. I also need to thank Iancu for helping me carry and move the house for my plan with Arend. I also have quite a few kingly duties to get to, and I need to keep up my training."
Suddenly feeling woozy, I say, "Oh yeah when was the last I ate and slept."
Φ Orb, who was walking, collapses, but before he hits the floor, he is caught by Iancu.
Putting Orb on my back, I say, "You need to rest as well, you idiot."