Susan hugged Alex for a solid three or four minutes, sobbing uncontrollably.
"Thank you, thank you, thank you," was all she could say.
"It's okay, I'm sorry," Alex replied. He did not wish for Susan to see him use magic since it would raise too many questions—and probably too many problems.
He didn't want to answer the question of how a fourteen-year-old orphan could use magic.
But that secret, or the crime tied to it, was not worth the life of the family that had rescued him, fed him, and kept him warm—the family that had opened their home and hearts to him, asking nothing in return.
He also knew, from what he heard the thugs say, that the reason for the home invasion was money. They probably saw Susan use the gold coin somewhere and thought she had more at home, thus following her.
So in a sense, this incident was related to him. He knew money was a driving factor for people, but he didn't know that a single glimpse of one golden coin could cause such a reaction—prompting someone to violence for the sake of getting it.
After ten minutes of consoling, Alex, noticing that Evelyn still had her eyes closed, said,
"You should take Evelyn for a shower, and shower yourself as well. I'll deal with this mess. Give me an hour—we'll talk later."
Alex had made up his mind about opening up to Susan; she deserved that much, at least.
"O-okay," Susan said absentmindedly. She took the blood-covered Evelyn and went to the bathroom in her room to shower with her.
Alex took a moment to loot all the men, taking everything of value from them, along with their weapons and the money they had stolen from Susan.
After that, he sat for ten minutes to recover some mana, then started dragging the bodies one by one. Once they were all outside, he simply tossed them downhill toward the river.
He then walked over and pushed them into the river, along with the severed head. By the time someone found them—if a monster didn't first—they would be unrecognizable. No one would spend time tracking the murderer of three nobodies with no clues to follow.
After getting rid of the corpses, he returned to the house and started cleaning.
He used water magic and cloths to wipe the blood away and wind magic to dry the floors. He had to stop periodically to recharge his mana, but eventually, he managed it.
It took him an hour and a half; he even had to ask Susan to stay in her room a bit longer.
When he finally told them they could come out, Susan and Evelyn walked into a completely clean house—it was as if nothing had ever happened, if not for the memory of what they'd just witnessed.
Susan, seeing Alex about to speak, interjected.
"Not now. We'll talk after I put Evelyn to sleep. Come help me in the kitchen." She once again postponed the talk.
But Alex knew it was the smart move. Evelyn should probably not know the details of his life—it might be too much for her young mind. Not that he was any better, but if he could spare her the harsh truths that had been forced onto him, he was all for it.
So instead, both Susan and Alex acted as if nothing had happened and went to the kitchen. The usual dynamic resumed—her giving orders, him following them.
After dinner, Susan took Evelyn to her bedroom and stayed with her until she fell asleep. Evelyn was terrified after what had happened and didn't let Susan leave, her little hand tightly gripping the side of her mother's shirt. Susan had no choice but to stay until her daughter drifted off.
When she came out, she found Alex already sitting on the sofa. Two cups of tea were placed neatly on the small table in front of him.
Susan simply walked over, sat down, and took a sip of the tea.
There was a brief silence between them before she finally spoke.
"You know, I always knew you were hiding something. You had that look—like someone with too much on their plate. The fact that you were so skinny while having so much money…" Susan turned to him.
"And don't think you fooled me with that excuse about buying food and all that. It was a horrible attempt to change the subject," she said with a slight smile.
"Anyway, what I can't comprehend is—why keep the fact that you know magic a secret? It's not a crime to know or train in magic, you know?"
Alex took a sip and finally spoke.
"What was a crime was how I got said magic."
"Huh?" Susan looked confused.
"I'll start from the beginning so you can understand. It all started sixteen days ago…"
Then Alex began explaining—from the day he was kicked out of the orphanage with his best friend, to reaching the homeless shelter, not knowing how to make money, and their desperate decision to rob an empty noble house.
"That's where I got the money—and the magic books I used to become a mage."
He went on, telling her about the chained woman he had found and helped escape, the betrayal by the trio of traitors, and the guards who came after him.
He described how he spent thirteen days in the forest, how he lost so much weight because he survived on a little bread and jerky two or three times a day—he didn't know how to cook or butcher animals to use their meat.
Then he spoke of the monsters he fought, the wounds he received, the abomination that froze him in fear, and finally, the bear fight.
"After that fight, you found me on the riverside. The bear, in its last struggle, sliced my abdomen open. I had my insides outside. Luckily, I had a couple of basic potions at hand, and I drank them—but not everything healed. Only the bite and the abdomen. All the other cuts and wounds couldn't be regenerated by the healing potions because their effects had already reached their limit," Alex said nonchalantly.
"If it weren't for those potions, you probably would've found a dead man floating down the river instead of a barely breathing one. Thanks to you, I'm actually here instead of rotting by the riverside," Alex finished.
He felt a huge weight lift from his shoulders. Having someone to open up to was a nice feeling. Normally, he had Marc—but they were separated. And now, after everything he had gone through, he had too much burden to carry and no one to share it with.