Chapter 33. Where is he?

“Where is he?” Arthur complained while angrily lifting bedsheets and looking through dressers and drawers. Shelly shook her head and said, “I don’t think Pebble would fit there.”

“Well we’ve looked everywhere in the house and we can’t find him!” Arthur groaned. They’ve spent the past hour looking through every nook and cranny of the entire house apart from Roselyn’s room.

“Maybe he’s really in there?” Arthur considered Roselyn’s room as their last resort. Shelly shook her head; Roselyn’s room is off limits with the exception for a servant to help Dr. Galil.

“Wait.” Michael who was following the kids paused for a moment. “What did Pebble say exactly?” Arthur rolled his eyes at Michael’s question. “Heeeeee said! You guys will stand here and count to 10, when you open your eyes go find and tag me.”

“It was only an hour ago Michael, how did you forget?” Arthur was annoyed at this game of hide and seek, he just wanted to find Pebble and tag him already.

Michael eyes light up and asked. “What if he’s not inside the house?” His question made Shelly and Julie look at him as if a light bulb went off in their head, that was the answer!

“Tch, of course he’s inside the house, he’s just fast so he’s hiding in a room we’ve looked through already.” Arthur refuted, he didn’t notice the change in Shelly and Julie’s face to Michael’s question.

“But he never said he’ll be inside the house.” Michael replied.

“Of cour—” Arthur paused and looked at the girl beside him, she nodded her head.

“Let’s go outside!” Arthur ran to the back of the house where their training with Cobble began. There was a blue haired silhouette lazily laying on the floor plucking at the grass beside him. He immediately noticed Arthur’s appearance and waved at the kid before him.

“What took ya so long, that was about what? An hour?” Pebble’s response caused Arthur to fume in anger as he rushed straight towards the guy who was lazily laying there.

“Stop!” The man shouted causing Arthur to abruptly stop in place. The man with blue slowly got up as the other three made it out to the back. “Tag him Arthur!” Michael shouted. Arthur was confused for a short moment before he realized Pebble made a fool of him.

Arthur quickly dashed towards the man only to see him miss grasping at the man’s sleeve that disappeared in a gust of wind. The three others caught up to Arthur and saw that Pebble was standing 20 meters away from them.

“This is the second part of your test, if you can touch any part of me, you pass. You have 3 hours to do it.” Pebble stated as he stood there motionless. Arthur quickly returned to himself and look at Pebble who smiled back at him. “Come on, Arthur~ You were so close~”

Pebble’s taunt worked beautifully as the little silver haired kid instantly ran straight for him screaming out his impatience. 20 meters closed in a matter of moments as Arthur tunneled into tagging Pebble. The minute Arthur’s hand was about to touch Pebble, he disappeared in place and reappeared 20 meters away in a second.

The kid propelled by momentum continued to run forward before stopping. He twisted his head in all directions before locking onto his target and began to run again. Another encounter and another miss, Pebble was already 20 meters away from Arthur again.

“Arthur!” Michael shouted causing Arthur who was tirelessly chasing after Pebble again to stop and groan. “What Michael! Help me tag him!” The kid was already breathing a bit faster as he pointed at Pebble.

“We have to think of a plan! Come back!” Michael shouted back at the house. Arthur could only grumble under his breath and give Pebble a few angry glares as he walked back before the three of them.

“I think we should surround him and rush him at all four corners.” Michael stated his plan. Julie immediately rejected the plan “It wouldn’t work, we don’t know how fast he is, he could be faster we’d just run straight into each other.”

“We could use yours and Shelly’s powers to stall him somehow?” Michael asked. Shelly shook her head “It wouldn’t work.” Julie agreed “She’s right I’m only able to stop a person momentarily if I focus my attention on them. It’s not enough for us to tag him.”

“What about your other power?” Arthur asked. Julie sighed and replied, “My Seer ability lets me see the future, but even I don’t know how to trigger it.”

“Young master.” Shelly paused for a moment. “Can you walk up to Pebble and get as close as possible and see when he runs away?” Arthur agreed and jogged towards Pebble only slowing down as he got closer. “Did you figure something out Shelly?” Julie asked.

Shelly shook her head, “I just want to see something.” Arthur was within an arm’s reach of Pebble before he stopped. “Oh? Is this some sort of reaction test?” Pebble looked at the kid standing right before him.

Arthur didn’t say anything and continued to walk forward step by step. Pebble’s eye was glued on the boy as he got within his escaping distance. Immediately, Pebble ran and reappeared 20 meters away staring at the kid who had just continued to walk straight into him.

Arthur saw this and immediately ran back to Shelly. “So? So? Did you figure something out?”

“Pebble doesn’t seem to be running away until we get within a certain distance before he has to run away.” Shelly slowly replied. “If he’s not going to move until we get close, we can surround him and tag him.

“How do we do that?” Arthur asked. Shelly thought for a moment “Let’s try this…” The group of four huddled together and discuss her plan. Michael was nodding intensively whereas Arthur seemed please.

The four broke and began to circle around Pebble at the center. Pebble saw their tactic and immediately broke out of their near encirclement.

“Hey that’s cheating! You ran away too early!” Arthur shouted causing to give him a confused look. “I’m not going to get myself trapped for you.” Pebble replied as if he’s looking at an idiot.

However, the four already understood that Pebble would have done that and formed a square with Pebble at the center this time. They slowly closed in instead of circling around him like before. The moment Pebble saw that they got too close for his body to squeeze out he ran.

The instant Pebble vanished the four hopped to their right hoping to grab anything of Pebble. However, no dice, a gale of wind blew passed by them as Pebble’s speed increased at the last moment escaping their second attempt at surrounding him.

“Phew, almost had me there, I had to get serious for a moment.” Pebble gave the group a thumbs up. The four glanced at Pebble and began to discuss follow up strategies to their situations.

The moment Pebble saw the determination in their eyes he knew that this next strategy would decide whether or not they passed the training. The four surrounded Pebble and began to circle closer. They then paused and circled again drawing in closer.

They all instantly rushed forward with Julie using her powers to stop Pebble momentarily. Sadly, for them, Pebble already anticipated their decision and immediately broke out of her binding and vanished.

It wasn’t until Pebble was 40 meters away when they saw him again. “I knew you were going to try to stop me, I prepared for it.” Pebble replied. He continued “Is that all you’ve got?”

The group of four knew that they half-won this round by forcing Pebble past the 20-meter distance he had set for himself; unfortunately, half-winning is still just losing.

3 hours passed by before they knew it, taking turns coming up with plans and rushing at Pebble. During the last half hour, they threw everything they had formulating intricate plans using some stuff from within the house as barriers to force Pebble to go where they wanted him to.

Alas, it takes longer than just 30 minutes to make a maze for Pebble to run through resulting in their loss. “It was to be expected, did you expect to catch me that easily on your first day? Keep meditating, maybe you’ll figure it out after a month.” Everyone collapsed on the ground once the time was up, Pebble left them there and walked inside.

The two young adults and two kids sat on the ground panting heavily. The door that was recently closed open again with a brown-haired kid walking out. “Ohoho, did you all exhaust yourself again to make it more fun for me? ~” The kid had a wicked smile as he looked at the group of four.

Michael gave Boss a serious look and hmphed, he placed both hands on his knee and pushed himself to stand back up. “Ohoho, we’ve got a fighter here~” Boss then eyed the other three. They too gave Boss a look of contempt and struggled to get back up.

“Tch, and here I thought I would have my own marionette to play with again today.” Boss’ irritating words irked them even more. “Not today, Boss!” Arthur began to jump up and down “See, I can walk back to the Inn no problem!” seeing Arthur huffing and puffing his competitive attitude made Boss smirk at him. He turned around and vanished after taking a few steps.

The door opened again with Pebble carrying a tray containing cups of water and some fresh fruits for them. “You four are already standing? Impressive” He then looked around “Where’s Boss? I thought I saw him walk out here.”

“Don’t know, don’t care.” Arthur stated flatly as he reached for the cup of water to drink. While eating the fruits and drinking water they conversed with Pebble about what Gran would do.

“My father is a Prodigy Power Telekinesis, expect to see a situation where he uses both of them to his advantage.” Pebble only gave them that much of a hint. After everyone looked better recovered Pebble excused himself to check on his mother, letting them know to come back in 6 hours for meditation.

The smirk Boss gave Arthur earlier before he disappeared gave him a sense of foreboding while walking to the main gate to exit. “Do you guys think Boss will make it harder for us knowing we can walk back?”

“I think he’ll make it more difficult than yesterday. How much more difficult, I’m not sure. I think you made him a little competitive, young master Arthur.” Shelly’s reply made Arthur groan. “I didn’t want that…”

“Done with morning training today?” The gatekeepers greeted the kids and opened the gates. “Yes, we’re done Mr. gatekeeper, see you in the afternoon!” Arthur waved the gatekeeper goodbye and continued forward.

Five steps later everyone was sent directly back to the front of the gate. The gatekeepers wiped at their eyes as they looked below. Did these kids just teleport back before them?

A little brown-haired boy appeared beside the gatekeeper and looked down at the group of four before them. His presence immediately alarmed them before they recognized who it was. “You shouldn’t be up here kid.” One of the gatekeepers stated as he walked over to escort Boss down the ladder.

However, Boss ignored the gatekeeper completely and leaned over the wall to look down at the group of four who were back at the front of the gate.

“Goodluck on the way back to the Inn, since you can walk, you should walk a lot!” His loud voice boomed in their ears as they looked up at him. That damn brown-haired kid was leaning over the wall looking down at them with a mischievous smile.

“Boss!” Three people shouted in unison at his training. On the first day when they couldn’t walk, he had them push a blocked door and walk downstairs to the cafeteria. On the second day they had to walk home while getting teleported back from Gran’s estate!?!

The difficulty jumped too much!

“This is not fair!” Arthur shouted.

Boss plucked a booger from his nose and flung it away. “Life’s not fair.”

His three words silenced Arthur and anyone else who wanted to complain. They looked at the normal 15-minute walk back to the Inn, a time-consuming walk waited for them up ahead.