His time with Dana ended way too soon, without Nate being able to get another level in his skill.

  He had discovered that his Clean skill worked more or less by imparting order to a small area in a disorganized system.

  After leveling up, the area had expanded and now he could easily clean the upper half of the magnetic pea by pushing all the plunk down with a pass of his hand. He could even feel the small iron bits bunching up to optimize space. That said, unlike with Eavesdropping how exactly the skill was doing that eluded him.

  Apparently, in her religious mumbo-jumbo, Dana had been trying to explain to him that the level of one’s skill was directly correlated to your understanding of its capabilities… or something like that.

  To tell the true, the nun wasn’t thrill with Nate’s reinterpretation of her teachings, but the boy wasn’t able to understand them in any other meaningful way… so that was what he was going with.

  He knew he was close to discover the quirks of Clean and ern himself another level or two, if only she would give him a hint.

  But no. Alas time run out, and Dana escorted him back personally.

  To add salt to injury before leading him to his empty room, the nun casually cleansed the ball with a flash of her skill; That is, she dematerialized the inky clutters of iron sticking to it.

  If Olga’s little warming trick had violated one law of thermodynamics this small demonstration from Dana had straight up raped and murdered the bunch in a drunken frenzy.

  Of course, he had seen the nun’s skill sublimate stains before, but he had assumed the particles were still there, floating in the air or something.

  Yet Nate had aced his chemistry class; that much iron didn’t do that at room temperature, so eider the atmosphere in this world was really funky, or this woman Infront of him had just deleted matter with a wave of her hand.

  The worst of it was how oblivious she was at the monumental magnitude of this fit. And of course, she wouldn’t answer any skill related questions until he completed her second task; ‘rest until you get better’.

  Now Nate sat in bed, scowling at a dusty window sill.

  “Damn it! If only my stupid leg wasn’t hurting! I would take out all the furniture and scrub this whole room until it sparkled! The grind may up my skill too…” Nate sighed and picked up the folktales book, “Better to take my head off it… and maybe get a fill for Read while I’m at it.”

  Nate read on as the room’s shadows turned by the window’s light. Only when the son bleed the world red defeated against the horizon, did he put down his book and stretched.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “I needed that!” he sighed, “A lazy afternoon. No monster, no burning kitchen, no world hopping, just me, a book and a cozy…”

  The door slammed open, and a disheveled Uric dashed inside.

  “Wow! Wind down man!” Nate exclaimed, “Tragically wounded hero recouping inside, remember…? What’s wrong with you?”

  “Nate! Did you saw Zoly?!”

  “No? Last I saw her she slapped me and ran away.”

  “Who?! What?!”

  “OH! Erm… I mean; I haven’t saw the brat all day…! Why do you ask?”

  “Y-you didn’t hear the commotion?!”

  “The wha…? oh…” Now that Uric mention it, there was a fury of cries and activity coming from outside, “How did I miss that? What is going on?”

  “A monster!” Nate froze at Uric’s response, “Or that is what mother Olga believes! Something large and strong broke apart the sellers’ doors from the outside and left us without food and-and… Laura and Zoly are missing…”

  Uric sat defeated at the edge of the bed, eyes on the verge of tears.

  “That’s a...” Nate winced at the child beside him and rose a hand to comfort him, spent a few seconds wandering exactly how to do so with the least amount of physical contact, and finally settled for two awkward pats on the shoulder, “…that’s ruff buddy… but I am sure those two are alright…” he concluded.

  “How can you be so calm!” the other shouted, “They might be DEAD!”

  “Calm! Breathe… That’s it, count to three… there you go… filling better?”

  “No! Zoly and little Laura are…!”

  “Ok, look,” he interrupted before the kid could wind up again, “I admittedly am no expert but, you said the thing went for the pantry, right?”

  “Y-yes…” Uric sniffed.

  “And you said that it left us without supplies?”

  Uric nodded, now staring at Nate attentively.

  “See? If the monster that came in was anything like the one that attacked me, why would it do that?”

  “To eat!” the chubby boy said as if it was the most obvious thing in the universe.

  “To eat what? Grain or meat? Because I seriously doubt there is much besides oats in that seller.”

  “I… What?”

  “Look Uric, just listen ok; if this supposed creature was a deadly carnivore, then it would have simply feasted on some of the poor champs sleeping on the streets or plain snatched some of the kids playing in the yard. But nooo, it went out of his way to brake into the seller and steal our food. Why do you think is that?”

  “Because it likes oats…? Because it doesn’t eat meat…? But then what if it found them and attacked them and…”

  “Slow down! Don’t you think that if that was the case the whole seller would be a bloody mess? I mean, those two would hardly be missing if we had to scrape them off the walls…”

  “NATE!”

  “Sorry-sorry! My bad! What I am meaning to tell you is that they probably are alive! What’s more, I bet there wasn’t even a monster involved in this mess.”

  “W-what do you mean?”

  “Well, I think it is more likely that some hungry urchins broke in to steal food and made it look like a monster attack. You know, to take advantage of the current situation.”

  Uric blinked at him.

  “That… Actually, that makes a lot of sense.”

  “Hey! You don’t have to look that surprised! I am smart you know?” Nate huffed.

  “B-but then, what happened with Zoly and Laura?!”

  “Oh, that. They probably saw the monsters’ wannabes trying to steal from the kitchen and were kidnapped to keep up the ruse…”

  “But isn’t just as dangerous?!”

  “Well, not really, but…”

  “I must tell mother Dana!”

  “Wait! Before you go can you turn on the lamp…? And he is gone…” Nate sighed and Jimmied his way to the end of his bed, from where he snatched the lamp and matches off their trunk, muttering to himself, “Look at you Nate. Seventeen-year-old smart ass turned prepubescent detective… You are just missing the blue tux, the red bowtie and the fake glasses…”