The Fearless War

The Winter Road

The night before I had found myself facing my mother's wrath, something that even in my greatest follies I would never think of doing again. One good thing that came out of it was that I was able to realize that I could lean on my family a little more than I thought I could, otherwise it would have been a little obvious but my mentality of fully defending my grandfather had blinded me to what was important in the family.

It was morning when I left my room and went into the dining room to have breakfast and get ready to 'work' again at Uncle Miles' workshop, in this case I no longer had to worry about hiding the truth behind going to the workshop. When I got to the table, I could see that my father was cooking again, his punishment imposed by my mother seemed to still be in effect and I could discern that he had placed the remains of his beer in a corner.

At breakfast the only topic that varied from the normal conversation was that Eve would be going out on stakeout to mark temporary hunting areas to cover the deficiency of blood bear meat.

"Oz, don't forget this."

My father had finished eating earlier and from his room he pulled out a small bag brimming with coins that glittered as if freshly polished, when I looked inside, I saw that the number of coins equaled 300 crowns, being that the coins varied in value depending on the size and material they were made of.

"Thank you, but isn't this a lot? It's not like I've done much."

In the case of bronze coins, the small one was worth 1 crown and the big one 5 crowns. They were also equivalent to coins of greater value, having heard that there were even some white gold coins equivalent to 10,000 and 50,000 crowns of the kingdom. The currency existed in bronze, silver, gold, platinum, and white gold coins, and 10 small or 2 large coins of a coin respectively were equivalent to one of greater value in this case 10 small bronzes would exchange for one small silver and so on.

"You should have no problem accepting it Oz don't worry, the village chief himself took some of his budget to reward you for your actions in defeating the mutant with no casualties."

"If you don't want it, I'll gladly accept it brother."

"Eve dear, remember you have to help me with the bear skins."

While my family was still arguing I was trying to analyze what to do with the money I received, while I had a certain amount of savings from gifts from my grandfather or from helping neighbors, I had never received as such a renumeration for something I had done. It was a pleasant feeling for the mind. My eyes wandered for a moment, and I could see that the sun was already fully uncovered so I prepared to go to the workshop.

"Well, I'll be back in the evening, I don't know what I'll do today."

"Okay Oz, just remember to eat something with your uncle."

"And don't tell my brother about your tuition charge."

"Sure, bye."

Before long I had arrived back in front of the shop doors and to my surprise the door opened from the inside to reveal an Uncle Miles with a blood covered face and hair stuck in an apron that looked like he had seen better days.

"Good morning oz..."

"Uncle Miles, I have a question, did you get the rest of the bears I got from the hunt delivered yet?"

"I think you know the answer to that Oz."

Even though his face always had circles over his eyes I had never seen him with such a pronounced tiredness that would change his attitude. I guessed he got so carried away getting the materials from the blood bears that he didn't sleep a full day. I walked into the workshop the moment Uncle Miles headed back to work, just to stop him and make him rest for a while at least.

"Uncle, if you don't go to sleep, I will burn the bear skins."

"Oz, we both know the skins can't burn easily..."

"Who said anything about burning them with normal fire?"

I was trying to throw a feint at my uncle to get him to close his eyes a little. but when I mentioned something besides normal fire, his eyes immediately contracted, and he clenched his teeth.

"You wouldn't dare Oz, but if you promise me some peace of mind, I'll go get some rest. Just don't die in the room alone. I just put more weapons inside, good luck..."

As he tried to make his way to his room his balance gave way and he fell straight into a mountain of freshly cut and blood covered pelts. Without risking moving him or wake him up, I let him sleep among the mess he had made and headed for the basement, inside which I took two bottles of elixir and put them on a shoulder pack.

The basement still looked the same as before, except that it appeared that everything seemed to be covered entirely with ash and charred or burned materials around the forge. Looking for my swords to practice with, I could see that they were on a table, and had it not been for the glow of the dark metal I would not have been able to see them around all the debris. Picking them up I could tell that the hilt had been modified and was now made of processed leather that would allow me to avoid losing my grip when moving in a fight.

To start training for at least one more full day, I pulled what looked like a gear next to the darkroom door. I entered quickly and the door closed behind me, as I had turned on the mechanism before entering, I didn't have time to prepare myself to receive the attacks. This time there were no projectiles to deflect, but I received a frontal attack from what I could only discern as a giant metal bar. Crouching down I tried to regain my posture and to increase my capacity of my new senses, I stopped concentrating on controlling them and my eyes and ears burned while my hands tensed as I released the concentration that kept them at bay.

I could see better in the dark as my eyes felt warm and a little irritated as I forced them to release, but another change I noticed was that I could focus on points as if my vision was that of a predator. So, I could realize that inside the room there were several bastard swords and several single-edged axes, both types of weapons had exaggerations in their measurements and their movement was only restricted by the mechanism that moved them around the room.

Guided by the sound generated by the mechanism of the walls I could identify that the weapons attacked in a pattern, and I would have to attack the point where the movement starts, which was in front of me. A small opening in the wall. I advanced into the room and with the blades of my swords I forced my way while breaking the blades of the weapons and generating damage to the mechanism, it seemed like an obstacle course but every now and then an axe or small spear would come out of the wall too fast and although I could see clearly even with the new smoke coming from the ceiling, I could not discern the speed with which they were attacking me.

I finally reached the wall with the opening and with my arms I pushed both swords against the hole, thus ceasing the movement around me. I dropped against the wall and leaving the swords on the floor, I took out the elixirs and drank them both at once. I felt again the sensation of my body forcing itself to heal my wounds but this time the initial pain of the process lasted less.

When I no longer felt the wounds closing, I stood up and concentrated again on calming my senses, this time making it easier to 'turn them off'. I could already feel some control over them and simply hoped that it would get easier as time went on.

 "Now you've done it Oz."

I scolded myself the moment I saw the state of my swords, during my advance I had to break several moving weapons and that wore down the metal of my own weapons even breaking one of the edges of one of my swords. and as for the second one, apparently it had lost the tip even reaching to the groove in the structure of the sword. In other words, if I were to use them again in that state, it would do more damage to me than to my aim.

I held the damaged swords and left them on the table where I found them, I also left a note to Uncle Miles saying, 'I'm sorry'. My body, despite not having any open wounds or damage in general, felt exhausted from using all the energy to heal itself. I went up to the kitchen and passing the bundle of pelts I spent a few moments to prepare something to eat, when I realized that despite having more sensitivity to the attacks, I took too long in the room, given that outside the window I could see the moonlight coming in.

Just as I finished preparing some dinner, the light had reached the bundle of pelts and managed to reach just enough light to wake Uncle Miles, it must have been one of the few times he had managed to sleep more than a few hours after a full day's work.

"Did the moonlight wake you up?"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence Oz."

"What sentence? Come quick Uncle Miles, or I'll eat this whole bear."

"I'm coming, did something happen while I was sleeping?"

"Nothing out of the ordinary, you got bear blood all over your face again, I destroyed a few swords in training including mine, you know, the usual."

I couldn't help but bring out a bit of sarcasm within my explanation of the events in the workshop around the day. I also tried to subtly include that I grotesquely destroyed the weapons I had become accustomed to using.

"Yes yes, the usual ... You broke what?!"

"Apparently you did pay attention hehe, I broke my swords a little bit."

"Ah ... Now I think I shouldn't have slept if I was going to have more work to do."

"Speaking of work, when would I have to accompany you to process the mana stones?"

"Well if we take into account that you turn 16 in a year and a half, we should go in a week, in the first week of septum."

"So, in two to three days?"

"Exactly, so I suggest you train in the forest while I prepare what I need, and you hunt whatever we are going to eat."

I didn't know exactly where in the duchy we would have to go or even if we were going to leave the territory to get to another duchy. But if Uncle Miles was asking me to hunt for two days or more, the journey ahead should be long and tedious.

"Anything specific you want to eat on the trip? Other than blood bear."

"Well if you can just get a few thunder deer tomorrow, their antlers will be useful for campfires and scaring off monsters on the trip."

"Okay, do you have another bow I can take?"

"Last night I repaired the spear bow you took last time, the blades are reinforced and compressed so they won't break so easily. You know where the arrows are."

"Thank you, well I'll go home, see you tomorrow Uncle Miles, I'll come and drop off the meat and horns in the evening."

"Thank you, here I will wait, while I try to repair your mess."

I left the workshop for the day and when I returned home, I told my sister that I would accompany her on a hunting trip the next day. It seemed she still had some punishment from my mother, so she didn't pay as much attention to my reason for following her hunting. I also talked to my parents about the next trip I would be taking.

"Dad, I have to go with Uncle Miles to refine some mana stones."

"Oh, you're going to train to use magic?"

My mother answered immediately when I mentioned the involvement of mana stones in the purpose of the trip. I was beginning to be able to see a whole other side of my mother now that I knew she could use more than just day to day magic.

"Don't worry oz, just take care of yourself, and as tiring as it sounds, keep an eye on my brother too."

"Charles! Do you really think your brother is so careless that oz will have to take care of him? You let him be Oz, tomorrow I'll look for a book I used when I learned magic, to entertain you on the journey."

"Thanks, I don't know how long I'll have to be gone but I'll still be back .... "

"We know son, your mother and I will be waiting."