Chapter 327

The First Kindle (II)

He was old, he realized while looking at the collective might of the young as they fought. It was their monthly sparring exercises, and Be’dun would frequent them whenever he could since they were inspiring. Watching the youth overcome the walls and propel themselves further was majestic.

Still, watching them ached his bones--he could never propel himself into an attack just to ‘prove a point’, or bend his body unnecessarily just to dodge a strike as though he were dancing. More and more, he further realized, they were straying. Every new generation seemed to believe just a bit more that being fanciful during a fight is the peak of strength.

It wasn’t just one or two doing it either, it was almost all of them. And the few that didn’t were being mocked, despite having won every single spar. There was something tragically and troublingly beautiful in the way they perceived fighting. It was a sport, Be’dun realized, like corrikot. In corrikot, it wasn’t about the results, but entertaining the audiences. They were doing the same, it seemed.

Be’dun, after all, wasn’t alone in the spectating seats; there were tens of thousands of people, most of whom weren’t just casual spectators like him. They were there scouting for the future inheritors of their Mantras.

“What are you thinking, old Dun?” a familiar, raspy, and old voice interrupted his thoughts, causing him to look to the side where the source of his shaking seat was--Gurn. He was a man, and two men, and three men, and likely ten, if Be’dun was honest. He was as round as a star, red-cheeked, and never without several gourds of wine or beer or ale or anything like it. “Same crap like last one?” he added, taking a huge swig from the gourd.

“Who knows? There are a few promising seeds,” Be’dun replied to his old friend. Unlike Be’dun, who was well-reserved in most aspects and was treated as a sideways attraction largely because of the made-up stories by the kids that he was ‘an old ghost haunting the cosmos’, the reason why most people crossed the street when meeting Gurn was that... he had no filter to speak of.

“Promising? Hah,” the man scoffed. “What? You mean those two chopsticks who won a few in the row? I’d win ‘em too, on my back, asleep, with a fart if I had to fight those kids. What are they even doing? It ain’t even a dance no more. They’re just flailing their soft limbs about like they want to become Tu’tuhks.”

“You’re angry this swell morning. What happened?”

“Bah, I ran into one of ‘em Empori-cunts. Wants me to teach his kid? Bah. Fat chance. Fatter than me.”

“Nothing is fatter than you.”

“Damn right!” he gulped down a few extra swigs.

“Why not teach the kid?” Be’dun asked. “Maybe you can weasel your way back into the council and gain access to the Vineyard once again.”

“... you and your temptations, devil,” Gurn grumbled. “What about you? Last I heard, you were still a punching bag for ‘em weak and stupid kids. Don’t you ever get tired?”

“Better that they take it out on me than each other.”

“Look at how they take it out on each other,” Gurn pointed at the showcase in the star-glazed arena mockingly. “Bah. I treated my wife worse on our wedding night. At least she got fuckin’ red.”

“Maybe that’s why she left you.”

“She didn’t leave me,” Gurn said. “She’s just... reevaluating her life.”

“She’s with Yara, isn’t she?”

“Yeah. Bah, the both of ‘em will be the death of me.”

“Yara’s a good kid,” Be’dun scoffed. “You should be lucky she slapped your silly self around early on.”

“The only good of it is that all men avoid her like a plague,” Gurn grinned evilly. “And that she seems more interested in yapping about ancient curses and whatever instead of lookin’ to scratch that itch.”

“Is she getting any closer?”

“How could she?” Gurn sighed. “It’s a dead path, Dun. I nearly killed myself trying to peel back the layers, and certainly did half-kill my marriage with it. Too bad the damn kid got taken in by my stories and won’t hear me no more.”

“Unlike you, who was a mad, obsessed dog that just went headfirst into every wall he encountered,” Be’dun said. “She strikes me as someone who... well, isn’t a moron.”

“I’ll drink to that!”

“You’ll drink to anything.”

“Not to them kids ‘fighting’ down below. Heavens, what a disgrace this whole charade had become,” Gurn sighed deeply. “Who among those lazy fucks will ever achieve anything of note? Maybe one? Two? Remember back in the days when our fathers gave us a stick and kicked us out into the most hostile and evil worlds imaginable? By the time I was their age, I was fighting fuckin’ Dragons. They’d be lucky to be burned by one.”

“Different times, Gurn,” Be’dun said. “No more Dragons for them to fight.”

“... it’s depressing,” Gurn said, taking a full swig and emptying the head-sized gourd before miraculously pulling out a new one from nowhere. “That it’s come to this.”

“Come to what, aye?” the two merely glanced back where they saw a tiny, gnome-sized fella sit down and curiously peek at the arena. “Ah. To that. Aye, fairly pathetic.”

“...” Gurn suddenly stared deathly at the little man and the latter replied in kind.

“Could you two stop it?” Be’dun sighed, recalling that it was like this any time the two met. “You’re brothers, for crying out loud.”

“I’ll never accept that this tiny cock is my brother!”

“Who are you calling tiny, you roll of flesh?! You’re like a stoic boulder with no purpose more than a man!”

“At least people can lean on the boulder and rest! The only thing you’re good at is for women to use you as a pleasure stick!”

“At least I can pleasure a woman!”

“O’, yeah? Where are these pleasured women, then?!”

“They--”

“Both of you, stop it,” though Be’dun spoke calmly, his words carried the kind of weight that immediately caused both Gurn and Danny to stop talking and lower their heads in shame. “Why are you here, Dan? I thought we said our goodbyes.”

“I gave away the fruit,” Gurn dropped his gourd, and Be’dun closed his eyes. Silence emerged between the three men, atmosphere akin to a burgeoning storm ready to swallow the world.

“When?” Be’dun asked.

“A few hours ago,” Danny replied. “He didn’t eat it. Won’t for some time, I think.”

“... what the hell were you thinking?” Gurn asked suddenly, the tone of his voice completely shifting. “We had an agreement. It was given to you specifically because nobody gave shit about you and that little garden of yours.”

“I was told to do with it what I wish ‘at my discretion’,” he said. “This was ‘at my discretion’.”

“Tell me where the fruit is,” Gurn said. “I can still retrieve it.”

“Gurn,” Be’dun said, interrupting the surging anger from appearing on the surface. “Do you trust Danny?”

“I...” Gurn lowered his head, not wanting to lie. Despite their difference, of course he trusted his little brother. The only man he trusted more was Be’dun himself. “That’s not the point. The fruit... we agreed--”

“We agreed because we didn’t have a choice,” Be’dun said. “If Danny found that choice, I trust him. As long as it’s not like one of these kids.”

“... humor doesn’t suit you, old friend,” Gurn sighed. “But you’re right. So, tell us, little man. What shit did get the tool that he likely doesn’t understand the hundredth of?”

“Someone who slows himself down so that his friends and family can keep up.”

“...”

“Someone who was beaten and broken and entirely unwanted.”

“...”

“Someone Anna’s taken interest in.”

“Haah, it’s that fuckin’ Thief, ain’t it?” Gurn grumbled.

“There’s a Thief?” Be’dun asked, glancing curiously at the two.

“There’s always a Thief,” Gurn shrugged. “But one hasn’t made any waves... well, the last time it happened, Shol and I were happily denting beds.”

“It has been quite some time,” Danny took a jab.

“Cap it.”

“Will the fruit accept him?” Be’dun asked.

“... I can’t be certain,” Danny replied honestly. “But it should. You told me that the Fruit’s selection is... queer.”

“It is,” Be’dun nodded. “But there is one constant.”

“The person can’t be hated by others, yes, yes, we know,” both Gurn and Danny said.

“He doesn’t seem like it,” Danny said. “It’d be a push to call him a natural leader, but he does have the charisma of someone who is hard to like but easy to love.”

“... hey, that’s just like you!” Gurn took a jab at Be’dun who merely sighed and cracked a faint smile.

“I suppose... we won’t have the luxury of watching the youngs go at it for much longer,” Be’dun said. “Gurn, go see Shol and have her contact the Warmaidens. Danny, find Anna and tell her to stop her shenanigans. She’s been too open about it. Even I have heard rumors. I’ll talk to some our old friends. We’ll hold a meeting in the old Pocket in six months. Don’t make any noise. It is time to go completely silent.”

“... we’re really doin’ it, huh?” Gurn mumbled, drinking the whole gourd of ale in one go. “Shit, my gut’s beginning to feel things. My gut hasn’t felt a thing in so long, man.”

“Maybe go to the bathroom and take care of it?”

“Damn you, little midget!! Why don’t I take care of you instead?!”

“Go, now,” Be’dun said. “We can’t rely on a young man to abstain himself from eating a fruit. We can’t be blindsided when he does.”

“I’ll make preparations for the alarms,” Danny said. “With Anna’s help, we can probably disallow them from figuring out the general world. They will still be alerted, however.”

“That can’t be helped,” Be’dun shrugged. “Try to expand their scope as much as possible, even to the Divine Halls. It ought to buy us more time.”

“Will do.”

“Good luck, old friends.”

“See you soon, old Dun. Hah, still a poet.”

“Poets are starved, sunken lot. You’re the fat, jolly, loud bard if anything.”

“Kah, when this is over, I’ll snap you in half!”