Chapter III.XXIII (3.23) - Crone's Aftermath

  “That was interesting,” Ione said. “Lots of rhyming and talking in circles. Surprised you turned out so…sane.”

  They sat a table in Ione’s home. Servants poured them tea before bowing out. She didn’t bother touching her drink, instead she watched as Kizu. Taroe had departed to a different room to speak to Ione’s parents, the prison’s wardens.

  His hands shook slightly as he brought the teacup to his lips. He didn’t even understand why he felt so off. His meeting with the crone went down about how he expected it to. She had even answered some of his questions, something she rarely indulged him in. But what she’d said about his sister and Anata rattled him. He tried to break down the cryptic rhymes, but his mind just ran in circles. Then there was the image of her face, smiling at him with her mouth covered in blood and her flesh still stuck in her teeth. It haunted him in every shadow and every blink.

  His breathing was off tempo. He desperately tried to get a hold of himself.

  “Hey, want to go harass Sene?” Ione asked suddenly.

  “Isn’t she studying?” As he focused on his friend, he felt an invisible weight release. He regained control of himself.

  “She was before, but now her schedule has her practicing her speech for the Emperor’s coronation ceremony. All the major towns in Hon are sending representatives.”

  “And she was chosen?”

  “Of course. We’re the most influential family in the area. She wasn’t about to let someone else represent her home. Especially not me.”

  “What’s the speech about? Platitudes?”

  “Probably. Let’s go check.”

  Ione stood and helped him to his feet. Their home was surprisingly small. At least in comparison with Kizu’s parents’ mansion and Aoi’s palace. Ione’s family preferred a more discreetly nice home, without engaging in a ton of lavish decorations. Paintings hung on the walls and they had a couple servants, but nothing more than that. The house only stood two stories high, with both Ione and Sene’s rooms on the second floor.

  “Hold up,” Ione said, ducking into her bedroom. “Sene always locks her room. We got to go out my window and cross over.”

  “We could knock?” Kizu suggested as he followed her.

  “Eh.”

  Instead of books, Ione’s room had a bookshelf full of hermit crab shells. Kizu examined them all. They came in a hundred different sizes, some subtly different, while others had jarring defects. It was an interesting collection. One at the bottom was nearly the size of his head.

  As Ione struggled with her window’s lock, Kizu wandered over to her work desk. It was covered in paper cards, each one describing different monsters. They had stats on them, detailing their average blood cost, strengths, and speeds in a metric. Each also contained its own factoid as well.

  Kizu picked one up.

  Grotesque

  Abilities - Flight (max speeds of 20 kilometers per hour), Flame Durability (no maximum temperature known), Fire Consumption.

  -These creatures are found lurking near forest fires. Most cryptozoologists believe that the heat draws them up from hidden entrances in the World Dungeon, although nobody has actually seen them in the dungeon during a delve. However, others believe that they are teleported to the flames from some other unknown location. All attempts to draw them in with manmade fires have proven fruitless, regardless of size.

  “Is this the little creature you used back during our first trip into the World Dungeon?” Kizu asked.

  Ione turned away from her half-opened window and snatched the card from him. She set it back down among the other cards on the desk.

  “Yes. That's the one. I thought about writing a bestiary, but I like this version better for now. Got the idea from the boring flash cards Sene like to use for studying.” She tapped the cards. “Though I wish I could draw. I want to get a better image of each of the monsters on the cards.”

  “I can help,” Kizu offered.

  “I’ve seen your drawings. No thanks. I don’t think there’s another illusionist of your caliber alive who’s as bad at art as you.”

  “Illusions are completely different,” Kizu argued. “They come straight from my mind. You translate them into reality.”

  “Artists say the same thing.”

  “It’s different,” Kizu grumbled. “If you want an artist, you should ask Aoi.”

  “Not a bad idea. You’re staying at her place, right? Maybe I’ll pop by when I get dragged off to the capital for this coronation.” She sighed, as if exhausted by just the mere thought of traveling.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Desperate to fill the growing silence, Kizu blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “I spotted a bamboo monster the other day in the forest.”

  That perked her up. “Really?” She forgot about trying to pry the window open as she quickly assaulted him with questions about the little camouflaged monsters. As he spoke, she grabbed a blank card and started to scribble notes. He just repeated what Kumiho had said about them, he really didn’t know anymore and she got exasperated when he couldn’t create an illusionary copy of one.

  “I didn’t actually see the things. I told you, they disguise themselves as bamboo branches. A friend pointed them out to me. It just looked like any other patch of bamboo to me.”

  “Ugh. You said you spotted one. I’ll just have to research them myself then. Any other awesome creatures you’ve seen recently that you forgot to tell me about?”

  Kizu thought back. There had been the yetis that kidnapped Anata. And the Kitsune. And then of course the dire polar bear he’d killed. Not to mention that sea serpent he’d seen what felt like forever ago in the underwater ruins off the shore of Shinzoushima. And the Awakened snake in the Hayashi Forest. And the swarm of insects that had attacked him while picnicking.

  “Nope. Nothing comes to mind.”

  She narrowed her eyes.

  “You’re lying.”

  He shrugged. “Okay, how about this then.”

  He reached into his storage ring and pulled out the dead insect queen he’d smashed with a rock. It floated in a preservative bottle he’d stolen from Aoi’s stash on Owl’s Respite.

  Ione perked up at the sight of it. She used an arm to clear a spot on her desk before gently taking the bottle and setting it down. Then she just stared at it for a long time.

  “It’s a queen. But I don’t know its species,” she said finally.

  “Professor Knoff called it a chimera. He believes it can be used in a potion to fuse souls together. It was the queen in a hive of insects that attacked me and Anata.”

  “Hm.” Ione tapped the bottle with a fingertip. The queen continued to float there, dead and undisturbed.

  “Can I have it?” Ione asked.

  “What? No. I want to do some brewing experiments with it.”

  “Just for the rest of spring break,” she begged. “I don’t have anything to do for the next few weeks. And if you use it in an experiment, you’ll destroy the poor thing before I can study it.”

  “Aren’t you attending the coronation?”

  “I don’t have anything interesting to do over the next few weeks,” she amended. “I’m just planning to nap and avoid my sister.”

  “Your sister that you were just going out of your way to annoy?”

  “That’s different. You’d be the one annoying her. I’d just get to watch. That’s entertainment.”

  “Fine,” Kizu relented. “You can keep the queen until the new semester. It’s starting to sound like I’m going to be too busy in the Hon Basin to have time for any decent brewing experiments anyway.”

  “Oh? So you’re actually going back there? I figured the Elite with you would be taking over the investigation from here.”

  “He doesn’t know the people I do. And he wouldn’t be able to get them to trust him enough to talk.”

  Ione looked down at the big, preserved insect and chewed on her lip, obviously lost in thought for a minute.

  “What are the chances you encounter more unique magical creatures?” she finally asked.

  “Um. Probably pretty high. The Hon Basin has plenty of unique species.”

  “Ugh.” Ione flopped face-down on her futon. “Fine. I’ll join.”

  “What? That wasn’t an invitation, Ione.”

  “I’ll let my parents know that the Elites want me to help with the investigation,” she said, voice muffled by her poofy comforter. “They’ll probably be happy I’m doing something ‘productive.’”

  “That’s not what I just said.”

  She flipped over on her bed to look up at him.

  “It basically is.”

  Kizu crossed his arms and waited for the explanation.

  “You said that the Elites wouldn’t be able to join you without looking suspicious. I’m not an Elite, nobody is going to be suspicious of me.”

  “That doesn’t mean you need to join.”

  “Kizu, we’re not going to go over this again. You’re not going to run off into another super dangerous place alone. I think I’ve more than proven why I’m worth having around. I’ve got your back, just stop trying to slip out of my grasp.”

  That…made sense. Ione was a prodigy in her own right. He didn’t know if Basil or Aoi planned to join, but he suspected that as far as raw power went, Ione might outdo both of them.

  “What’s your combat rank?” Kizu asked, realizing he’d never checked.

  “I’m not sure. Like ten I think.”

  “Ten?”

  “Hey, it could be like twenty or thirty now. I don’t participate very often anymore. I used the contests as stress tests for my summons during my first year at the academy, but I stopped once they started trying to pair me against my sister.” She looked back at the window. “Speaking of Sene….”

  “How about we just leave her alone?”

  “You’re no fun.”

  “Fine. You can join,” Kizu folded. “What do you know about monsters that live in the Hon Basin? Any questions about them?”

  That perked her up. She barraged him with inquiries, starting with nocturnal animals. And she kept that up for at least an hour until Taroe finally arrived to drag him back to the capital. This time, with Ione in tow.

  Ten Blood Curse Academia chapters (5 weeks) ahead of Royal Road.