ROTLE- Chapter 165- Alobam

Being an easy man to read was never a compliment. It did not matter what situation. Even among lovers, Aiden could never see the compliment in it. Shewa, his ex in his past life, had used that sentence on him once before and things hadn’t ended well.

Aiden gritted his teeth and prepared himself for what Elami’s bargain was going to be. Beside him, Ted looked disappointed, let down. Aiden couldn’t blame him. Ted had all but motivated Elami and, in truth, Ted was the reason the [Healer] wanted to join the group.

Still keeping his eyes on Elami, Aiden caught movement behind the [Healer]. Oncot made a very simple sign with one hand while his other hand held on to his cleaver.

Say the word, the large man signed.

Aiden would’ve laughed if the situation wasn’t so serious. Choosing to ignore the man, he paid attention to something else. Elami was no more than a [Healer], that was it. Yet, somehow, standing among so many people ready to strike him down, he was without worry. His poise was almost perfect.

Because he has bargaining power.

No one would kill him even though he held Valdan’s life in his hands.

But was that all there was to it?

No, Aiden answered immediately. There was no tremor in the man. His hands were as still as the mountains. His eyes were simple, effecting that calmness he’d had since they’d met him at the cave. Like an adult in the presence of children.

Elami did not fear the possibility of being wounded or killed here.

The understanding made Aiden frown. Despite all Elami had witnessed in the cave, he was either very confident in his ability to escape or very confident that he could take them.

“What do you want in exchange for Valdan’s life?” Aiden asked.

Elami shrugged. “That one’s obvious. I want to join your team.”

“Deal.”

“Not that simple,” Elami said immediately. “I hold Valdan’s life in the balance because like everyone alive, I have secrets that I would not like being pried into. So, I hold your knight’s life for a single clause. I will show you my class and level, and should you deem it acceptable, you will not disturb me on my personal matters.”

“If you cam assure us that you are of no harm,” Ted said.

“I am of no harm to Ted Lacheart and Aiden Lacheart,” Elami replied. “The others will come to harm if they go out of their way to try and harm me.”

“And why should we trust you?” Ted asked.

“Because I am trusting you,” Elami said. “There is a reason I have asked no one to use a system Oath.”

Ted looked at Aiden.

Aiden opened his mouth to explain what it was to Ted. Thinking better of it, he closed his mouth. He would explain later.

“So,” Elami smiled, “do we have a deal?”

Unwilling and not liking his situation, Aiden nodded. “Deal.”

“Good.”

Elami was all smiles as he waved his hand in a flourish in front of him. It was a completely unnecessary action, like trying to dazzle children. When he was done, his name, class, and level hovered in the air between them.

[Elami – Healer – Level 182]

Shit.

…

Tradis strolled the palace halls, quiet as the night itself. He was not under the effect of any skill, at least not anything active. The art of the Empty Steps was something he had learned from the people across the ocean a few years ago. He had mastered it as a requirement to learn a technique. Walking without making a sound was just a fun side effect.

The palace halls were as he remembered them, but the palace did not feel like home. Brandis, his younger brother, had done well to maintain the palace, keeping everything as it had always been. But years did things to a place, regardless of how well you tried to preserve the place.

The people who had walked its halls had left traces of themselves no matter how minute. The people who had bickered here, loved here, argued here. Even the maids leave a piece of themselves every time they performed their duties.

Even the children, he thought to himself as he walked.

The palace was different. Or maybe it was he that was different. After all, no place had felt like home in forever.

Tradis got to the door he was looking for and knocked on it. The sound was quiet but loud enough that the person inside would’ve heard it.

“Who is it?” a female voice called out.

“I sell trinkets and gold,” Tradis replied. “Wears that save and wears that pave. I sell vanished and furnished, tides and—”

The sound of the door’s manual locks opening hurriedly cut him off. Tradis couldn’t help but smile as the door was swung open inwardly.

“Uncle Tradis!” Elaswit exclaimed, throwing her arms around his neck.

Tradis grunted under the weight of her as he picked her up. The sound was intentional. To him, she weighed next to nothing.

“Oof,” he said, pulling her into a spin. “You get bigger every day.”

Elaswit slapped him hard on the back, forcing him to drop her. When he did, she had a mock frown on her face.

“Didn’t anyone tell you that it’s not good to comment on a lady’s weight?” she scolded, making him smile more.

“Big is good,” he grinned.

Elaswit rolled her eyes. “I’m not big uncle. I’m properly weighted.”

“The famous words of the big.” Tradis eyes moved quietly to her arm. She had a bandage running the length of her forearm. “Are you going to host your favorite uncle in the hallway, princess?”

Elaswit looked from left to right, as if checking if there was anyone else in the hallway, before stepping to the side and granting him entrance into her room. “Please, come in.”

Tradis strolled in like he owned the place, taking the room in as he did. The stone walls of the chamber were cool and thick, rough in texture. Sunlight streamed weakly through a tall, narrow window with a wooden shutter swung open. There was no glass, only a strip of oiled linen over the space to soften the wind.

Tradis fought the urge to raise a brow at what he was looking at.

The bed was the largest piece of anything in the room. It bore frames made of sturdy oak with a linen canopy overhead currently draped in soft pink colors. The canopy was from an old time, a fashion that never truly went out of style even if its purpose had. Initially, it was a design meant to keep out drafts and falling insects from thatched ceilings above. There were nomadic tribes that still used this style for its practical purposes. Here in Brandis, it was nothing but fashion.

The room was very different from the last time he’d been here.

Without hesitation, Tradis strolled over to the well dressed mattress and plopped down on it. He saw the frown of slight exasperation that stained his niece’s expression. He guessed he was right—she had been the one to dress the bed and left it like that because she liked how it looked.

“Uncle Tradis,” she began only for him to cut her off with a wave.

“Oh, please,” he said haughtily. “We are far too close for such formal titles. Call me Cavendish the last bear walker.”

“No,” she answered without missing a beat.

“Cavendish?” he tried.

“No.”

“Vendish?”

“No.”

“What of Bob?”

Elaswit hesitated. “What’s that?”

“No idea,” Tradis shrugged. “Met someone during my travels. He said his name was bob, short for Robert.”

Elaswit paused, seeming to give it some thought. After a moment, she said, “How?”

“No idea. Anyway, anything for your favorite uncle?”

“You’re my only uncle.” Elaswit walked over to a reading table on one end of the room and leaned against it. “Unfortunately, I don’t use the read very often anymore. The place is kind of barren at this point.”

Tradis drew a finger along the length of the wooden frame of the bed and rubbed it against another finger. “I don’t see any dust.”

“They tidied it up because they knew I was coming,” she explained.

Tradis nodded sagely, as if he understood. “Coming from where?”

“Really, uncle?”

“Uncle?” Tradis repeated with an intentional frown. “Who is this uncle you speak of.”

Elaswit sighed. “Don’t talk as if you haven’t gotten the story from my father… Bob.”

Tradis smiled. “I have, in fact. Would you like my opinion on the matter?”

“Which one?” Elaswit chuckled darkly. “The quests? The items? The artifact? Or the prisoner?”

Tradis sighed. “Your brother.”

Just like that, the air went out of Elaswit. He watched her deflate. It was so bad that she forced herself into the chair at the reading table.

“I… I did not mean to hurt him.” She rested her head in her hands, kept her eyes to the ground. “It was a mistake, an unnecessary bickering between siblings. I didn’t know… I didn’t know that…”

Her words trailed off, unable to complete the sentence.

“You didn’t know that the strength difference would be that much,” he finished for her.

Elaswit nodded. The action was slow, solemn, full of remorse. “He always dodges faster than that.”

“But you were too fast this time,” he said. “Too strong. Your level is too high for him now.”

“I’m still at level forty-nine,” she told him. “All my hard work and still at level forty-nine.”

“That’s not a bad level to be at, though.”

“There are people who gained their first level two months ago and are beyond that,” she argued, but there was still sadness in her voice. “People who are at the same level as I am.”

Tradis laughed. Why? Because he couldn’t help it.

“I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, dear,” he said. “But the summoned are not your peers.”

“They are younger than I am.”

“And vastly more powerful.” Tradis sighed, then leaned forward, resting both elbows on his knees. “Do you know what the apocryphal books say about the person that is to be the [Hero]?”

Elaswit shook her head.

“It says that that person will attain the pinnacle of humanity. They will reach the highest level that there is. As far as the apocryphal books are concerned, this is a fact.”

“I guess that’s why they are apocryphal,” Elaswit said. “Because they are already questionable.”

Tradis knew why they were apocryphal. It was because one of the books had been written by a man who had ended up becoming a [Demon King]. It was a well guarded secret in church.

“Your brother is not your sin,” he said, instead, redirecting the conversation back to what was important. “The [Healer]s will fix him.”

“They’ve done their best,” she said. “Did father tell you what his head looked like? I caved it in. That he did not die on the spot is still a miracle.”

“Not really.”

“I’m a monster uncle!” she snapped. “How could I have done such a thing to my brother?”

Tradis remembered what Brandis had told him. She’d been heading down to the dungeon while her younger brother, Derenet, had tried to stop her. They had argued, he’d pushed her, she’d swung at him. He had dodged too slowly.

Her fist had caved his head in on one side while he’d dented the wall where his head had slammed into.

To heal him, they would need a [Healer] so powerful they would be fighting to bring him back from the dead. Rue Brandis had already sent for a skilled [Necromancer]. They were versed in the world of the dead and the dying. She hoped the assistance of a [Necromancer] would save her son.

Not knowing what to do to assure his niece without lying, Tradis took in a deep breath and let it out.

“Take off the artifact,” he said simply.

Elaswit shook her head. “I’m not wearing any artifact on me right now.”

“The one in your arm, dear,” Tradis said as calmly as possible. “I’m too old for you to think you can keep secrets from me.”

Elaswit’s hand moved to her bandaged arm, it hovered there for a long while. “You knew.”

“So do your father and mother,” he told her. “Your mother can smell magic of every kind before it’s even activated.”

Elaswit rolled her eyes. “And she tamed a dragon once.”

Her voice bled with sarcasm. She believed the hypes were nothing but stories exaggerating her mother’s already existing superiority. Tradis would’ve laughed if he wasn’t being serious. Then again, Rue had never tamed a dragon. She was just from a line of people who raised dragons.

“Take the artifact of, Elaswit,” he repeated, not addressing her sarcasm.

Elaswit suddenly looked defenseless. “And if I don’t want to?”

“I’ll take it from you,” Tradis said. “It’s really that simple. I’ll take it and won’t give it back.”

He saw her eyes sharpen.

“You’ll have to—” she began but never got to finish.

In the blink of an eye, Tradis had her up by the neck, legs dangling from the ground. With his free hand, he ripped the bandage free in one move and ripped the wooden fragment embedded in her forearm free.

Elaswit gasped in pain as he released her. She fell to the ground, flabbergasted.

“You—”

“Please shut up, dear,” he said, cutting her off. “You have no idea what I did or how I did it.” Then he strolled back to the bed. “Now, collect yourself and take a seat.”

Still riddled with confusion, Elaswit obeyed. When she was seated, Tradis spoke again.

“Here’s the thing with artifacts, especially the one you so happily tried to fuse with yourself,” he said. “Artifacts have residues of their original owners in them. The Mad king’s bar, has residues of the king’s madness in it.”

“Everyone knows that, but they don’t affect the users,” she said.

“Because they are only connected to the user’s mana, you sleeping child,” he shot back. “You, however, went ahead and connected it to both your flesh and your blood. You and the artifact quite near became one. You’ve been a walking corruption for a while and you didn’t even know it. You dedicated yourself to coming back every now and again just to torture that stupid kid in the dungeon. I heard you well beat him to within an inch of his life yesterday.”

“He’s scum that deserves nothing but death,” Elaswit spat.

Tradis shrugged. “Maybe, but that’s not for you to decide. That’s for your father to decide.”

Elaswit fixed her gaze on him. Tradis saw a touch of hate in her eyes.

Is she that far gone?

“So you’re saying I feel the way I feel because of the artifact?” she asked, voice testy.

“Yes.”

“But you’ve taken it off and I still feel the way I feel,” she pointed out.

“I know,” Tradis confirmed, “because it will take a while to work your skepticism out of your system.”

“I’m not skeptical.”

Tradis didn’t bother arguing the case. Instead, he held up the fragment of the Mad king’s Bar and said, “I’ve taken your safety away. You will not be getting it back. Not from me, your father, or your mother.”

Then he got up and walked over to the door. What he didn’t tell the child was that what she had done to her brother was not necessarily a fluke. She’d gone all out on her brother. She’d moved to kill because she’d concluded that he was in her way.

How had his brother been stupid enough or busy enough to not see it all from the very beginning? How had Rue not done anything about it?

Dragon riders have a flaw of letting people fall into their own sin.

He couldn’t say he hated Dragon riders, but he couldn’t say that he liked them. Their concept of survival of the fittest above all else was not something that he could get behind.

As for Derenet, well… Elaswit was right. It would take a miracle for the boy to wake up. But he wasn’t going to be the one to give anybody the bad news. The boy was as good as dead. How he was still alive, hanging by a thread, was beyond him.

“Take your brother out of your mind, Ela,” he said, standing at her door. “You have greater problems to worry about.”

“I know,” Elaswit sighed. “I haven’t even gone to see Nella, and she’s been waiting for me for a while now.”

Fuck Nella, Tradis thought.

“That’s not the problem you have to deal with,” he corrected her. “You’ve been traveling for at least a month now. You are grounded. You will not leave your room. You will not see your brother. You will not see your prisoner.”

She leapt from her sit. “Uncle—”

“Silence!” he snapped at her, and she shut up. “You’ve done enough already. When I am leaving, you will be going with me. I will hear no arguments.” He paused, met her gaze from across the distance. “You want to go out there and risk your life without protection? I’ll give you so much of it that you’ll wish you were dead.”

With that, he walked out of her room, slipping the fragment of her artifact into his pocket. It would fetch a nice price in the right market or he could offer it as a gift to the right tribe.

As for Derenet… well… as sad as it was, people lived and people died. He’d seen someone with the [Oracle] class once upon a time and he’d been told that his family would live long, one of them would die in battle.

[Oracle]s are not omniscient, he reminded himself as he walked down the hallway. They only see what their gods allow them to see.

…

They rode along a dirt road. The forest was long behind them. Far ahead of them was a wall, tall and long. From left to right, they stretched as far as the eyes could see.

“Two days,” Ted repeated as they rode slowly along.

Aiden was half-lost in his thoughts. Valdan would wake up in two days.

At the longest, he reminded himself, fighting the urge to look back at Elami riding with Valdan still in his arms. He could wake up before two days.

A part of him could not believe how excited he was at the prospect of having Valdan back. He thought he had appreciated his friendship with the man, but perhaps he truly had not.

“At the longest,” he said, responding to Ted’s words. “That’s what he said.”

“True, but…” Ted’s voice trailed off into silence as Feira pulled up next to them on her jepat.

“Lord Lacheart,” she said, voice cautious.

Aiden and Ted looked at her. “What’s up?” Aiden asked.

“Am I the only one bothered that he has an effeminate name?” she asked.

“Maybe,” Ted said. “Oncot might, but Aiden’s the only one who speaks his language.”

Both pairs of eyes turned to Aiden. He replied with a shrug. If Oncot was bothered by it, he had never said.

“Why, though?” Aiden asked Feira.

Feira adjusted on her jepat, then looked back at Elami as if gauging how far he was from them. She inched her jepat closer.

“As you well know, I’m have the [Guide] class,” she said.

Aiden nodded. “I am aware.”

“My first skill works in a way that lets me know if someone is deceitful.”

“A lie detector?” Ted asked.

Feira paused, as if she did not understand. “Yes, something that detects lies.”

“And what was he lying about?” Aiden asked, his jepat taking a very quick pause to push a small rock from its path with its foot.

Aiden ignored it.

“Not necessarily lying,” Feira corrected.

Ted stroked his jaw. “Any idea what he was deceitful about?”

“Well…” Feira paused, sighed, then shook his head. “Not really. It’s difficult to tell with someone whose level is higher than mine by a lot.”

“Almost two hundred is definitely much,” Ted agreed. “I say we lucked out.”

Having powerful allies was not always a positive. That much Aiden knew. Knowing Elami’s level now, he was glad he had not carried him into the plateau when they had gone for the crystal.

The thought of fighting opponents with levels close to two hundred sent shivers up his spine. Even with all his skills, he wouldn’t have been able to save anyone, maybe not even himself.

They fell into a comfortable silence as a man rode a carriage, heading in the opposite direction. He was old and weathered. Freckles stained his cheeks and he looked at them from under a straw hat worn to protect him from the shine of the sun.

He nodded in greeting as he passed them. They returned his nod with an amicable one of their own. Only when he was gone did Aiden speak.

“What do you think he lied about?” he asked Feira. “Is he going to harm us?”

Feira shook her head. “Not harming you and Ted were true. Harming us if we tried to harm him were also true.”

Ted leaned towards her. “Which one was deceitful? His name?”

“There’s that,” she said. “It’s his name but its almost like he’d rather be called something else. It’s as if he doesn’t like the name.”

She frowned, as if she didn’t like whatever thought process she was going through.

“I hate feeling like this,” she said in the end. “His level is too high so that explained why I couldn’t tell what exactly was happening. I don’t like accusing people of deceit willy nilly.”

“Hold up,” Aiden said. “Is this why you didn’t trust us when you met us?”

“Trust you,” Ted specified. “She’s been nice to me.”

Feira was already shaking her head. “It requires a level of deceit that is really really detrimental to me. A simple lie won’t matter.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. It’s why I don’t pay attention to the skill. It rarely comes up. But Elami is hiding something important and important on a grand scale.”

They were nearing the gates now. To Aiden’s surprise, there were no guards at the gate. It was simply a large arch that let anyone through. The walls were not even up to three feet thick.

Aiden looked back at Elami. “Do you think we have anything to worry about from him?”

Feira looked chastised as she shook her head. “But I think whatever secrets he’s hiding run deep enough to shake my skill, and it has nothing to do with me. Usually, the skill only reacts when it has something to do with me directly.”

Aiden grew thoughtful. All he’d known about her in her past life was what Zen had told him and none of it concerned the details of her class.

This was a new problem. If she had a skill that protected her from direct deceit but was now acting up around deceit in general, that was a cause for concern.

There was one major possibility as to why it was happening. Aiden’s mind worked on the possibility as they walked through the nonexistent gates. The answer remained the same. Whatever Elami was being deceitful about was so grand that if something went awry, Feira was going to be a collateral damage.

It made Aiden frown. He’d given his word.

Words you can break. You are not bound to your words.

But he was. If there was one thing that the Order had taught him, it was that a person was their word. Which was interesting since the subjects of the Order were designed to manipulate and deceive to achieve their goals.

But we were not taught to lie unless we had to.

The Master of the Order always said that deceit through lies was the way of the coward. It took a real being to deceive with the truth, even if with nothing but versions of the truth.

Valdan’s life still hangs in the balance, he reminded himself as they came out on the other side of the wall.

Ted’s jaw dropped. “What the hell?”

To their left was a large man, almost eight feet tall and as wide as a car. He wore nothing but a loin cloth and was surrounded by chests of varying sizes.

He offered them a massive gap-toothed smile.

“If you are here for the heart,” he said in a deep happy voice, “then I hold the necessary items required to keep you alive while you contest for it with your life on the line.”

He stood tall, a portly belly seeming to keep his loin cloth covering his groin. Certain that he had their attention, he held his arms out to his sides and let a deep rumble of laughter spill from him. It was loud enough to shake the air. Aiden almost placed a hand over his ear.

Feira, Zen and Fjord did.

“Welcome,” the man bellowed, “to the home of Nosrath!”

Elami strolled forward, looking at the large man as if he was looking at a child.

“You must be Alobam,” he said intrigued. “Merchant of Nosrath, descendant of the giants.”

Aiden held his tongue. The merchant of Nosrath was not someone that showed up often. Yes, he only turned up when Nosrath respawned, but he still remained a rare presence. You definitely never saw him at the entrance.

In fact, he was so rare an occurrence that nobody cared. He was almost a myth of his own. If you asked anybody what he looked like, they would not be able to tell you.

Alobam bowed at the waist. It was a clumsy thing to behold.

“I am he,” the man said in his deep baritone. “I am glad to see someone that is aware of who I am. Tell me, young one. Are you long lived?”

Elami smiled at him. “I am not.”

“Is that man in your arms alive?”

“He will be in time.”

“Then you do not need one of my famous elixirs,” Alobam said. “Since he will live. How about you?” He looked at Aiden. “What would you like?”

This is the merchant of Nosrath? Aiden asked himself, his hands tight around his reins. This is the myth?

Elami moved over to him. “You should always take a chance to purchase from the merchant of Nosrath. Why he’s appearing in front of us, I do not know. But we should take advantage of it.”

Take advantage? Aiden thought, flabbergasted.

He was lost in a different situation, staring the massive man in the face.

One of the important things that he had been preparing himself for was a trip to the frost mountain in search of giants, but right here, in front of him, was a certified giant. Not a descendant. Not a myth.

An honest to God giant.

How did he know? Because the man in front of him had a picture in the archives of the Order.

Standing before them was Nalbath of the North. A giant who was there on the day Nastild was split in two.