Chapter 287

Trial of the Alchemist (III)

As he slowly sauntered through the thick greenery of the forest, Cain realized that, for the first time in many years, he was… alone. Well, aside from the cat perched on top of his shoulder who was currently taking, as he put it, a ‘well-deserved nap’. Still, there was nobody else there with him. Though that was the case in the previous trial as well, there was still that strange woman there, all along.

Nonetheless, despite being alone, he didn’t feel strange; in fact, he felt… peaceful. At home. He’d spent an entire lifetime wandering the Tower on his own, and it was stranger for him to adjust to having a group around him than just this—being free, unrestrained, to go and do anything and everything he wanted. It felt freeing, however briefly. There was a part of him that missed being on his own, the maverick so to say—though he never was much of one, in all fairness—and some part of his psyche still occasionally dreamt of leaping past his friends and shooting for the stars.

He’d never do it, naturally—not only was this feeling fleeting, he’d undoubtedly grow bored quickly, not to mention hit a wall past which he would be unable to move. It was strange, altogether; despite being familiar and comfortable with being alone, his mind was still adjusted to being part of something greater than himself. It was as though twenty years of lone wolf wandering through the Tower had all been beaten out of him by being around others.

Reaching a small clearing, he came to a halt and took out a chair, sitting down. Te’gha woke up with the ruckus, stretching and yawning like a human, before leaping off Cain’s shoulder and curiously looking around.

“Why’d you stop here, human?” he asked. “Are we luring the Witch out? He he he~~ I’ve some ideas, if—”

“No, no,” Cain quickly interrupted, fearful of what he might hear. “We’re just… taking a break.”

“Taking… a break?” Te’gha replied as though confused by the words and the sentiment behind them.

“Yeah,” Cain nodded. “It’s good to take a break. We’re here in the woods, part of the beautiful nature, sun above shining just warmly enough to not feel cold, dirt beneath our feet crawling with life… we’ll take a break here, drink and eat and then be on our way.”

“… you are a strange, strange, strange human,” Te’gha muttered, though didn’t complain. “You mentioned eating—”

“Here,” Cain immediately tossed him a whole skinned, raw chicken. The cat yelped and leapt at the thing, gulping it down in massive bites. “Oi, oi, slow down! You’re gonna choke on it!” Te’gha, though, didn’t even seem to register Cain and the latter didn’t press. Despite looking like just an ordinary, black cat with a couple of strange features, Te’gha was, genetically at least, a Tiger. A mythical tiger, at that. If eating a chicken would be the end of him, perhaps it was best he died young so he didn’t embarrass his lineage.

Cain didn’t rest on his laurels either, creating a makeshift roastery and putting on some lamb and pork, using basic Magic to keep them rotating without his involvement. After, he cracked open a bottle of beer, leaned back in his chair, and closed his eyes, humming.

Soon after, the smell of roasted meat began permeating the air while Cain gained some extra pounds since Te’gha settled on his stomach. The two lay in silence, unmoving, as though part of a painting depicting the world around them. The trails of smoke from the roastery weaved up into the air, sometimes forming rings and sometimes disappearing.

“You’ve gotten as strong as my left paw, human,” Te’gha suddenly said, breaking the silence. “I’m proud of you!”

“Oh? You are?” Cain played along with a faint smile. “My ultimate goal is to become as strong as your left paw, tail, and right eye combined! At that point, I’ll probably rule the entire cosmos—with your permission, of course!”

“R-right!” Te’gha appeared faintly shocked that Cain played along, but quickly adjusted to the matter-of-fact tone. “I’ll allow it! Be grateful, he he, human! Te’gha is super-kind!”

“Yeah, you are,” Cain chuckled and began rubbing the cat’s belly. “And quite chubby, damn. Maybe I should put you on a diet or something?”

“What?! No! Great Te’gha doesn’t… doesn’t… wait. What does ‘diet’ mean?!” Te’gha asked angrily.

“It means no more meat.”

“… I will kill you.” That was all the great tiger said, and though Cain tried to stifle his laughter, he was unable and it soon roared out into the forest like booming thunder. “W-why are you laughing?! Great Te’gha is serious! Don’t taunt me, human!”

This only prompted Cain to laugh even more, though through Te’gha’s continued protests and whines, he eventually calmed down and finished up the roasted meat, separating some for Te’gha and promising the cat that he won’t force it on a ‘diet’. From that day on, the word ‘diet’ became equivalent to cursing out his entire lineage for the little cat, a dangerous thing to utter around him.

Hours passed swiftly in calm and quiet before Cain decided it was time to move on. Packing up, he weaved back in-between the trees, beginning the climb anew. He didn’t really know where the witch ran off to, only that the men who went chasing her went this way and, thus, Cain decided to follow. He was hoping to either run into the signs of a battle or for the Lady Luck to bless him at last and just appear the witch’s house in front of him. Chances of the latter, though, he knew were beyond abysmal.

Te’gha sat perched on top of his head as the duo weeded through the tall shrubberies and some snapping critters aiming for Cain’s legs and throat—mostly snakes and some lizards. Due to the advent of magic, he’d actually forgotten that he was fairly phobic of the woods as a young lad because of all the bugs and poisonous crap lying about everywhere.

He’d climb roughly halfway up the mountain before running into the first clue; it wasn’t so much the traces of the battle as they were traces of someone crazed running away with all their might. Shrubberies and accompanying flowers were trampled and slashed, low-hanging branches of some trees bent and broken, and though the dirt hardened, steeped leaves below screamed of someone trampling on them blindly.

Despite being as adept at tracking as he was at hacking, which is to say he wasn’t at all, even Cain could follow the clues and the beaten path forward up the mountain. Some three hundred feet further the ‘path’ curved to a harsh right, almost a ninety-degrees turn, prompting Cain to follow. The trees here grew thinner and fewer, likely due to the colder temperatures, and shrubs had decreased in size by at least there-four times.

Because of this, however, it became harder and harder—for him—to follow the clues. He was sure they were there, but, eventually, he was no longer able to pick up on any of them. It was at a point where the trees thinned out so much it was harder to find where the sun didn’t hit rather than the other way around, the way it was before.

He stood dumbly three-fourths of a way up the mountain, on the side growing increasingly naked, lost. He could venture a guess as to where the trail led, but he was afraid of another harsh turn. What’s worse, he didn’t come across anyone on his way up here—which was, for all intents and purposes, factually impossible. Did the witch really take them ALL?

He couldn’t help but ponder. There was no way anyone was that proficient with spatial magic this early on that they’d be able to move so many people so far up. In fact, this sort of a mass teleportation was never actually learned by people, though there were some high-end Tower natives that could use it. Somebody on the Ninth Floor, though, certainly doesn’t fit the bill.

As such, she must have used some Mind Spell on them and have them follow her. But if so many people were trekking through this hell, there’d certainly be evidence of it—and there was none. Even if Cain was inept at tracking, most of what he had seen pointed to a single person running away hectically, and certainly not someone confident leading a small platoon of men by the nose.

Cain paused and sighed helplessly, reaching his arms above his head and grabbing Te’gha, pulling him down. The cat already had his nose pointing at the sky and a face that said ‘you must first beg’. Cain, naturally, wasn’t going to beg.

“Please, o’ great Te’gha, if you would oh-so-kindly point me in the right direction, this lowly one would be beyond grateful!” Cain cried in the most woe-is-me voice he could muster.

“Heh, great Te’gha can’t reject someone who pleads this nicely,” the cat proudly snickered as though he’d won in life. “Follow me, stupid human! Stupid, stupid, stupid human! Kakakaka! Great Te’gha can’t believe you can’t even follow someone, kekekeke~~”

While the sound of the resonant, high-pitched laughter grated Cain’s ears, he didn’t let it show on his face. Instead, he opted to stay silent and follow the nimble cat while it leapt off of him and began running forward, skillfully dodging whatever obstacles were on the floor.

As Cain feared, some sixty-seventy feet further up the mountain, Te’gha curved back down and beelined toward an intersection, a thin point of the mountain where it bled into its sister. It was also here that Cain saw where they were headed—coral light flickered in the distance, clearly coming from a cave embedded in the side of the mountain. If the witch was trying to hide, she was doing a terrible job. If she was trying to lure in unsuspecting morons… she was also doing a terrible job. Cain immediately felt something stink up the whole story and his walls shot back up all around him. Something was fishy, and it certainly wasn’t only Te’gha’s rotten breath that the cat was showering him with since it leapt onto his shoulder and leaned panting into his nose, expression practically screaming ‘Praise me, praise me!’. Cain, certainly, wasn’t going to praise the cat.

“Good job, o’ Great Te’gha!” Cain exclaimed, taking a deep breath and preparing for a battle. “Now scurry quickly into my inventory so you don’t get hurt during the fight. Let’s go, then.”