Hot liquid metal dripped from the helt of my sword, it barely missed my foot. I hopped back on the sidewalk. We were only a couple houses down from my house which stood on a winding road leading to a cliff overlooking the ocean of Mila.
"Uhh, was that supposed to happen, Heo. Heh he.." Stella gave a smile that wanted to pull into a laugh.
"I didn't think it would melt when I put fire on it. I was thinking it would look super cool and do more damage." I responded to Stella's comment and turned to her, scratching the back of my head.
Stella had horns that wrapped around her head in a crown, they connected like a four sided star. She had sandy blonde hair that matched mine. She had on a long, well overused, pirate outfit which she wore for as long as I knew my older cousin. She had even gone through high school with at least the jacket on. We also shared the same orange eye color. The only real difference between us was my hair was shorter and in the place of horns were two flames.
"Well, what are we gonna do now? You don't have a weapon anymore, how will you get one? Especially one as good as that one?"
"Try and get a refund or I beg again." I shrugged. "One of them will be fine. Hopefully." Stella held her staff with both of her hands and started to walk back home. "Ughh that was my lowest when I begged."
I just ruined the majority of my chances with that. Eighteen years of work and waiting just to put myself back so far. There are ways around not having a weapon, but I would lose other opportunities.
"Are you sure you want to ask your mom and dad again? We just said bye to them, and I don't think they are gonna want to know how you wasted all the money they gave you."
I shivered thinking of walking back in that house. "Ughh fine, how about we just continue our way to the guild and gain money to get a better sword?"
"I guess that's our only option. Let's not let this obstacle stop our path. You're just gonna have to become a boxer instead." Stella turned around and skipped past me while giggling to herself.
The guild was what you expected from a guild, jobs listings on a wall, rows of tables where people ate at, and guild clerks at the front helping people. The only thing you wouldn't expect were TVs on the wall with sports games playing.
"We gotta register first before getting a quest right, Heo?"
"Yeah." I walked towards the clerks with Stella behind me.
"How may I help you today? Registration or quest related?" The clerk asked as he started grabbing the registration papers.
"Yup, just starting today."
Stella couldn't have been as excited as me but she beamed. The clerk reached under the table and grabbed a sheet of glass and a pen.
"Just write down your name and pull up your statuses on the tablet."
I reached my hand over and touched the tablet. My government account popped up. Everything about me was basic down to my skills where I had fire and gravity manipulation pretty decently exercised. Until I was eighteen, I wasn't able to even train anything because of laws that prevent kids doing any sort of training to increase magically. I did break the laws a few times, I had gained a few magic points. Magic points are when your magic and experience form together. If you have too many at once you'll explode, that's why you start building them up into things like strength and magic capacity.
"Just fill in this paper and you guys should be fine." He side eyed me.
Stella's magic wise, wasn't too far behind mine. If I could barely practice, she would have way less time to. She'd focus on defense, magic efficiency, and magic capacity. She had a special skill that equaled out her defense into her magic strength. After we finished signing the paper the clerk gave us badges and we paid a fee. Really Stella paid the fee with the remaining amount of money.
"There's an arena competition in Fayha that the guild is paying for people to go and compete in if you guys are interested? It's set up for multiple different levels of strength."
The clerk pointed towards a poster with pumpkins, a big castle, and an arena on it that said 'fighting competition in the kingdom of festivals Fayha'. There was also a prize money and other rewards listed.
"How long till we can go!"
I slammed the table with my eyes wide open. We could get money and compete in a competition. That's a great way to start adventuring and get a new weapon. Plus it's Fayha, the best country for adventuring!
"Well we are offering to pay for the trip the day before the competition. You guys have like two weeks till it begins." The clerk leaned away from the table.
"Heo, we should try and get a new sword for you before entering that comp- etition."
"Wait, only one of you has a weapon? What happened to yours?"
I explained how I melted my sword. He raised an eyebrow and tilted back in slightly.
"What type of metal was it? If you're looking for something that can withstand a hotter temperature you might want hellstone or a fire enchanted sword. Hellstone is easier to get and cheaper in Fayha if you guys are already heading there."
"I know what we're doing now Stella! We have to get to Fayha and get a hellstone sword!" I turned and rushed out of the guild, Stella following behind me.
"Heo, how will we get there? We will have to wait a month!" Stella's voice barely reached me.
I reached into my pocket. My phone read May tenth, fourty-one twenty-six. I swiped past the date then I turned around as I ran and held up my phone.
"I'm just going to ask, you know who, to teleport us there. He won't mind, it's not gonna take but a few seconds for him." The person I was talking about teleported right in front of me and caught my body as I ran into him.
"Your dad told me you were going to register today so why are you calling me? I know you're not actually in the mouth of a monster."
The man was tall with black hair and red eyes. He wore priest clothes, traditionally a dress shirt with or without a suit, along with the most notable, a blanket worn like a cape. He had red beads connecting the two end by his collar, over a black tie. He had a burn scar on the right side of his face. Then a scar went through the burn mark. To his eye, across his forehead, and under his left eye. And ominously, thousands of tally marks that fell beneath his clothing from the bottom of his chin and jaw line.
"Mr. Rex, you wouldn't mind… helping us out really quick? Right?" I said, revisiting all the memories of times when I had called him to teleport me out of class.
"Heo, you know I can't just teleport you wherever you wanna go every time." Rex replied.
Before I could speak again Stella shouted out. "Heo burned her sword instantly and now we need more money so we decided to go to fayha but we still don't have money to get there!"
"Yeah, what she said"
Rex's stoic face rose and shook slightly. It was outrageous to ask to pay for a ticket but to sneak someone in might be worse. I didn't really care though. The guild was gonna have people coming there to compete anyways. Why would it matter if I just jumped there?
"The answer is no, Heo. I'm not gonna cause the only other country where the church is allowed problems just because you screwed yourself." I caught his blanket right before he teleported away.
"I'm willing to let you have an experiment in return. I'll let you test the church's relics on me again." I said.
"What do you mean, test the church's relics, Heo?" Stella said, confused.
"That.." Rex paused. "You need to go through all we have then."
"That's a deal!" I shook his hand.
Rex teleported us inside a church. It was lined with a black and dark red polished stone. Pillars held the place up twisting with a curved pattern. Rows of chairs faced the end of the room where there was a podium. The room was lit by the giant stained glass hung to the back wall. The room smells like burned candles and a freshly clean room. It was a standard look for a church in Mila. Bells could be heard just outside the church, above it, almost sounding like it reacted when we got here. The most noticeable thing in the room was the floating black ring which had around twenty long pieces pointing up from the base of it.
"That one again?" I ask, stepping toward the crown.
Rex nodded and turned to a priest who was in the room. She made her way to me prepping a spell.
"Ma'am, could you hold still while I reveal your karma." The woman asked, holding out the spell.
"Nah, I got it" I mimicked what I saw her do and the number one appeared above my head before fading into a zero. "I think I've mastered this karma reveal thingy, not too hard." I turned to show off to Stella, but my spell failed and went away.
"Please, hold still ma'am." The woman's voice was harsher.
Unlike when I did it the number was zero immediately. For people it's strange for a number to be anything but one or negative one. With karma I had a slight special case. My karma was zero and certain spells or items changed it when around me.
"Here, Heo, just hold it above your head."
Rex handed me the crown delicately. I held it in my hands then reached above my head with it. The sounds of bells outside stopped as my karma number turned negative. When it changed a clock like sound was heard before a shockwave hit the room throwing everyone, even Rex, off balance. The chairs were tossed over each other and candles went out.
"What! Why would it turn negative? Wouldn't that mean-" Stella was cut off by Rex, not letting her say what she was thinking, not in the house of the gods.
"It's most likely the dulling of the gods' power. It's been a little more than two thousand years since we saw them. Or maybe because a human has it on." Rex's devotion was crazy.
"Whatever. You said, all of them. Let's keep this rolling." I replied.
We went church to church everywhere he wanted to check. Relic after relic of the gods only seem to further show a negative effect on my karma. The other crown of the goddess turned negative. Relics that the gods left behind showed a negative effect if they were imbued with magic by them but the scale of a shockwave wasn't nearly as close to the destruction the crowns left, besides the black bell.
We made our way to the last church which was in Fayha. It was a relic whose purpose wasn't known to anyone yet.
"The sphere one right." I said, a little exhausted.
"I'm pretty sure that's the last one." Stella said, grabbing her pirate jacket and holding in the motion sickness.
"It's a weird one I'll admit. It can be held but also pushed seamlessly into your skin. Then it pops right back out."
Rex grabbed the relic and pressed it into the palm of his hand. It sinked into and after a couple of seconds popped right back out.
"Weird." He laid it in my hands.
"My number isn't changing at all? That is quite weird." I pressed it into my hand, a small sphere of darkness could be seen in my hand. The number clicked to negative one, and then back to zero. The sphere didn't return though. The darkness faded until you couldn't even see it.
"What's the issue?" Stella asked me, she stared at my palm and a drop of sweat rolled down her face.
"Well, take it back out now! Heo!" Rex ordered.
"It's not coming back out… Uhh" my voice shook. "Am I in debt to the church now." I panicked more.
"Just push it back out, forcefully if you need to." Rex said.
I tried, condensing my magic, the two wisps on my head hardened into horns. I shot fire directly out of my hand trying to pull it out with the flames but nothing happened. I focused a little gravity on my hand and tried to change the weight of where I thought it was. Nothing. I tried pulling just that area. My hand ripped and a gash exploded out with blood.
"Shit!"
I dropped the spell and my focus fell from my horns which tried to revert back to flames but only became jagged. I held my bleeding hand, blood fell off my hand and stained the floor of the church.
Stella quickly laid a barrier over my hand containing the blood and acting like a bandage. Stella wasn't hurt but her face looked as though she was seeing her hand fall off. Then another drop of sweat rolled down her face.
"Are you alright Heo?" Stella held my hand, watching the blood be held down by her barrier.
"Obviously, not the worst pain I've ever felt."
I scratched my left shoulder where a scar raced down towards my right hip. A scar that was visible on both sides of my body. Stella's face fell slightly and she squeezed my hand.
"Do- don't… do that again okay?" She stammered.
"It's fine Stella, not your fault." I, who was hurt, was left comforting Stella, who was trembling.
"I guess it's gone then." Rex said, looking at the stain on the floor. "It only had a certain amount of charges and you used up the last one I'll assume. That's unfortunate, but there's nothing to really do about that."
Rex teleported the blood that laid atop the floor away somewhere. The blood that stained was, I guess, harder for him to teleport. Or he just couldn't.