Chapter 58: Carnival island

Lightly waking. I slept wonderfully, like falling asleep in the rain and getting the exact amount of sleep you need. One of those days where you wake up 2 hours early yet feel perfectly awake; mind fog a foreign memory.

Stretching my stiff muscles and loosening my joints, I get up. The glow of sunlight seeping through the windows brightening my day. Allowing the warm glow to pass over me, enjoying the warm rays.

I head downstairs to my kitchen. I have been lazy recently, let's make something exciting. Grilled cheese for breakfast? Sounds wonderful.

Walking into my kitchen, I get to work. Finding bread, butter, cheese, onions, tomato, and sugar.

I dice the onions before cooking them off with sugar. Halfway through adding tomato to the caramelizing onions. I allow it to continue to cook off while I work on the other items. I slice thin segments of cheese to be sued. I picked up a wheel of strong-smelling cheese. Similar to a combination of cheddar and halloumi.

Placing a wedge of butter into a frying pan; lightly melting it. I place the first piece of bread into the frying pan. Taking the onions that have caramelized wonderfully, finding them very slightly crunchy. I cooked them until they are dry and sticky, resulting in a soft crunchy texture.

I place a thin layer along with the bread before laying the cheese on top of it. Placing the remaining slice of bread on top, I lightly toast both sides. Resulting in a golden-brown crust.

Removing the grilled cheese, I pull it apart with my hands. Finding a gooey texture within I audibly gulp.

A breakfast fit for a king; I ate it far too quickly. Wishing I could return back in time to eat it again. Storing the remaining onions in a jar I continue on with my day.

Today is an important day, the day I bind my familiar. In witchcraft, I imagine it’s a very important ceremony. I am doing it on my own but if I ever create a Coven or have my children bind a familiar; it will be a ‘big’ thing.

Although, I won't rush it. I have a whole day. Heading into town, I invite Jengal to play soldiers on carnival island.

He always seems to be available when I message him. I don’t know if it’s a good or bad thing. I quickly meet him at a small stall with seats. Exchanging pleasantries before flying towards the island.

He turns to me mid-flight, “So… what's this soldier's game you invited me to play.”

Replying mysteriously, “Don’t worry, you will love it. It’s the most exciting game I have ever made.”

He just laughs, “No details? You're teasing me.”

We silently fly the rest of the way. I notice his rising excitement as we come close to the island. “Wait? You haven’t seen the island yet have you?”

Seemingly confused, “Of course not, it's not open to the public yet.”

Shaking my head, “You have a flight, I wouldn’t have resisted just taking a little peek. Whatever, it’s a better surprise I suppose.”

Wait, if it's not open to the public, who are the people who are currently using it. Must be a reason?

Landing softly onto the edge of the island, I find a sparse but bustling area. People playing in different areas, but not that I think about it. The quantity of people is relatively low. I will have to ask Carl about that, he is generally running this place anyway.

I guide him to the clay soldier’s area, watching his head swivel like it was motorized. It fills me with pride in seeing people enjoy what I built. Slightly blunted by the fact I hardly recognize it anymore; new buildings and changed structures result in a slightly foreign appearance. A notable change is a metric ton of nets. Likely to stop people becoming pizza from an unlucky bounce.

We eventually arrive at the island. I spot 2 people currently playing. I tell Jengal ti to wait, so he doesn’t get spoiled. I head to the person who is supervising, a elder gentleman.

He tells me I can play in 20 minutes – perfect.

While we wait, I drag Jengal to the parkour area. Inviting him to try it out. We are both terrible but I am slightly more skillful. Still, he outpaced me, being agile and fast. He quickly started to get really good at it.

We play in the parkour area for a while, Jengal managed to get up the medium area; impressive.

I quickly guide him back to the clay soldier’s area. This time without the risk of him being spoiled. I quickly take him onto the empty field. He is enamored by all the white ‘civilian’ soldiers.

“Welcome to a miniature wargame,” I say, flourishing my arms.

His attention laser-focused on me. I explain the game and how it's played. He quickly becomes very excited to play, which is adorable. I managed to hide my excitement to actually have an opponent to play against.

Selecting our colors, me purple and him green we prepare. I go for a brawler style of combat, not neglecting healers. They are invaluable for longevity in combat.

He went for the coolest items he could find. Which happened to include 1 healer – damn. I was hoping he would make the rookie mistake and not include one.

He included magical, ranged, and normal warriors. A completely random combination. Although I found a strange cleverness with how he did it all. He placed the strongest at the front, holding the ranged and magic at back. And a healer in the middle.

I eventually won, but his soldiers put up a surprisingly effective fight. I only won because my soldiers had a great deal of endurance with those healers. I eventually was able to close in on his soldiers before he could kill mine. With his limited melee combat troops, they were quickly killed. Then it was just a slaughter killing all his squishy backline troops.

To his honor, he took the loss in stride. We had a few more games. He got better quickly but still couldn’t beat my knowledge of all the items and a slight talent in tactics. It’s a little useless normally but in this world… maybe not as useless.

After enjoying a good few games, we eventually gave in to the small line of people watching and waiting for a turn. Being the builder or not it's selfish to make people wait for too long.

I quickly bring us to the arena. One of my favorite areas as I love roughhousing. We try and knock each other into a pit with soft sticks, do some small play fighting, and just run and jump around. Doing a few flips on the slime blocks.

Eventually, we come to the sand circle for combat. Not real combat but play sword-fighting. I just felt like getting my energy out in a light fight.

Falling on my ass Jengal speaks. “Aeternum, you're like really bad with the sword.”

Just laughing it off. “More of an ax man myself, never really messed with a sword; good fun though.”

And with that, we continue to playfight. Being a complete noob, my gains were massive. Beginners gains and all that. I now know how to hold a sword and stand stability. A few pointers from Jengal helped of course. Eventually, I grabbed my familiar ax, fighting back with a bit more skill than the sword.

It's not like I never use the sword, it just feels more natural to use an ax. I was terrible by their standards but I think even before the pointers I could do a number on a lot of people from the earth.

We ended up finishing up after a few rounds. Both being sore and tired. I don’t regret It though; it was a very fun day.

Turning to Jengal, “So… did you have fun?”

He just facepalms, the universal emotive language.”Of course, it was great. I can't believe you built this. I can't wait to come here in the future when it's open.”

Suddenly having a thought, “That’s good, glad you enjoyed it; let's play again some other time. Now I have to sort something on this island, head off home on your own.”

He nods aggressively before flying off. Giving him that flying belt was definitely a good idea, he loves it. He is nearly as good as me at flying.

With Jengal gone, I pay Carl a visit. Walking into the administrative building, I find papers flying and an energetic atmosphere. I quickly walk towards Carls office and knock.

He tells me to come in, to which I comply.

Smiling under my helmet, in a slight hiss I speak. “Hello Carl, I have a question?”

He looks at me, a slight drop of sweat falling from his brow, “Sure, what do you need?”

Looking through him, “If the park is closed to the public… why are there so many people here?”

I can see the slight nervousness on his face, something fishy is going on. “You see, we needed to test the island of course, so we had some volunteers test it first.”

I prod further, “Did you charge the volunteers money and where did you ‘source’ them so to speak. Because it seems it wasn’t the people, I built the place for.” Recalling all the nicely dressed people.

He starts to stutter, “Well you see, we had the… no nobles test it. They seem like a go…”

I shout, “Nobles.” Taking a deep breath. “This was built for everyone, they are clearly not testing it, they are using it. Are they paying you?”

He pauses for a moment, panic in his eyes tells a thousand words. “Well, they donated a small quantity of money to the government too…”

This bastard is using this island to get money off nobles and pocket the change. The greedy asshole. I guess not everyone is nice here.

Stepping forward aggressively. “It seems it has been well tested, either source a fair amount of people from all backgrounds or…” Raising my voice slightly, “Open it! and stop cash-grabbing. This place is to enrich the town not fill your pockets, get your shit together!”

He just nods before running past me and shouting out, “Okay boys, we are opening to the general public. 5 Bronze admission fees, make it happen.”

Accepting this outcome, I leave, mood slightly soured. He is a terrible liar. Admittedly I already knew this would happen. I fished around about Carl; he is a very greedy person. This island is a cash cow I knew he would start milking, so I needed to put him in line. I after all built the whole damn thing, I have some pull here.

Heading home, I begin preparing for the rite of binding. Creating an 11x11 circle of white chalk around my smaller 7x7 chalk circle. Carefully placing the items, I will need within. The only notable item being the demonic blood.

I head into my castle, quickly finding Chic snoozing in a web. I prod them away, finding them a little groggy. I try my best to explain what I am offering, but as smart as they are; they are not sepient. I can only do it, as much as it hurts me to not be able to ask consent. Although I would hope Chic would jump at the offer.

Bring them in my arms to the circle, I gently stroke their thorax cross-legged in the middle of the circle.

I place my palm on the golden sigil, willing it; it begins. At first, I feel a tugging on the energy from the altar, funneling through me into the circle. The energy rises into the air permeating the circle. Chic perks up and notices the weird phenomena. Eventually, the energy condenses into blue ropes of energy that coil around us both. Chic seems nervous, I calmly continue to stroke them.

Soon the blue ropes begin to tightly wind around each of us, lightly pulling us up. I feel a strong binding sensation within my chest, my mind begins to get dizzy as the energy around us spins faster and faster. Suddenly I feel a crack in my mind, like an imagined noise, before everything distors. I fall to the floor, dizzy and woozy. Half-conscious I through sheer willpower resist the urge to vomit. Yet I feel a line coming from my chest, pointing towards an unconscious Chic; success.