Stuffing his mouth with piping-hot street food, Ryan turned around and stepped up to Silvia, who had been waiting right behind him with a vegan version of the same food that he had just bought. They were sitting together on the bench at the rooftop garden, enjoying the smell of the street vendors' food permeating the air today. Being the day of Mila, the great spirit of farming, today was a celebration of farming and food, meaning that the whole city practically transformed into a single massive farmer's- and food market.

  "So... what exactly happened yesterday? You said you fell down the stairs? You still haven't told me about it, and you didn't respond to my texts either," Silvia pointed out, a little bit of dejection in her voice, and Ryan awkwardly leaned back against the railing behind him. He looked at the planter with the copper wildflowers that Gaia was currently caring for, planting new seeds that she had gathered from the recently-harvested flowers. There was really quite a lot that he should tell Silvia right now.

  "Okay... so, when I called you yesterday, I fell down the stairs in front of Kindly's room. I was pretty excited, because, well..." Ryan pointed at the wildflowers, "Those little things can cure corruption. And they did, and now Kindly is pretty healthy. Well, healthier than he was yesterday morning, at least."

  Silvia's eyes widened, "Wait, seriously? Kindly, that was the mimic, right?" she replied, before really catching up to what her friend just said, "Hold on, you fell down the stairs? Are you okay? Did you get hurt?"

  "A little. But Kula was in the area, so he came by and healed me. And yeah, Kindly is the mimic," Ryan explained, "The reason that I wanted you to come here is actually pretty simple. I want you to work with us to improve the planters for the wildflowers to increase their growth speed. I figured maybe we could go downstairs and you could use your insight skill on the Dryads or something."

  With a bit of relief that her friend was alright, Silvia took a bite of her food. She chewed for a few moments, already brainstorming a bit, before quickly nodding, "I should be able to come up with something. But healing corruption, that's a pretty big deal, isn't it? Why aren't you... well, excited about it? Or as excited as you should be, at least?"

  Ryan closed his eyes. He knew that he would have to tell Silvia and Modak about this sooner or later, but it felt a bit rough to do. But either way, it couldn't be avoided. Since Modak was busy getting his project in order for this coming Thursday, Ryan just figured he should tell Silvia for now instead of putting it off. And so, Ryan told the whole story of what happened yesterday. Of course, he did leave out the fights with Runar, because that felt a little unnecessary to add into the mix. In the end, Silvia sat there, with the food in her hand, growing colder by the second. Ryan felt almost bad that he didn't wait until they were both done eating.

  "So Richie is just evil now? Just like that?" Silvia asked, baffled, "And you can't cure him with the flowers?"

  Hesitant to reply too certain into any particular direction, Ryan just ended up shrugging, "I don't know. I think so, maybe? But his corruption is really different to the normal kind. It's more stable, I guess. I cured Maribelle right away after she was infected, but with Richie, it has to have been a while now, so I just don't know if it would work out the same way. That doesn't mean I won't try, though, obviously."

  Silvia placed down her food onto the spot next to her on the bench and placed her hands in front of her face while taking a deep breath, trying to concentrate and think properly, "Do you think I can do anything to help? Maybe... make the cure stronger somehow?"

  Ryan was about to shake his head when he stopped himself. Thinking about it, there might be a way for Silvia to do exactly that, "What do you think would happen if you turned the wildflowers into paint?"

  Sitting in the livingroom, Ryan looked down at his new phone. He had just finished setting it all up and was trying to log into all of his accounts again. Luckily, all his contacts were synced with his account, so he didn't have to worry about not being able to reach anyone. As he was sitting there, trying to figure out who to text first to let them know he had his phone back, the flat's front door opened up and someone seemingly stepped inside. To his surprise, a middle-aged, red-skinned, four-armed man walked past the living room door and toward the kitchen.

  "Chantora?" Ryan let out, surprised. Peeking his head into the room, Chantora stopped walking and waved toward Ryan with a smile.

  "Ah, yer not out tonight? I thought Mila's day is pretty big for uni kids these days," the chef laughed slightly, and Ryan shrugged.

  "I'm going out in a bit, yeah. But it's still a bit early right now so I'm still taking care of some stuff," Ryan responded quickly, and Chantora let out a long, jealous sigh.

  "6? Too early?" he said almost jealous of Ryan's youth, crossing his four arms in front of his chest, "That mean you'll be joining us for dinner?"

  "Are you here to cook?"

  "Aye, together with yer uncle. I heard your mum was here, so Runar suggested we have an old folk's Mila day celebration!"

  Ryan grinned lightly. He was still mad at Runar, but that didn't mean he didn't love his uncle at the end of the day. And the vibe of how Chantora was talking right now was pretty interesting to him, "Hmm, that so?"

  The chef awkwardly averted his gaze, looking away. Ryan knew better than to tease Chantora about this, but it was clear there was something going on between him and Runar. That being the case, he did wonder something else, "What about Liam?"

  "Hm? The lad'll be sleeping, won't he?" Chantora replied as if it were obvious, but Ryan just looked back with an awkward expression.

  "He's a vampire, he sleeps like 3 hours a night," Ryan pointed out, "He usually goes to bed around 2-3 in the morning."

  "Ah... well, I won't mind his company for a while either. It will be an old and young folk night, then!"

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Ryan scoffed, nodding, "Or I could take him with me. I'm headed over to my friend's place, his brothers are Liam's friends so they could hang out a bit. They're orcs, and kids, so they probably won't sleep much either."

  Of course, that was really just an excuse. Ryan wasn't really headed to Modak's place. Instead, he was going to spend the night down in the basement again, and having Liam spend the evening with them didn't sound like a bad idea. Plus, having Liam of all people sit there while Chantora, Runar and Mary were eating a meal cooked by an awakened chef, felt a little mean from Ryan's perspective. He quickly pushed himself off the couch, "So, what are you making?"

  Chantora grinned lightly, cupping his chin with one of his hands, "Just a simple crispy lesser drake."

  Ryan raised his brows, "Lesser drake? Oh man, that sounds good..." already feeling his stomach growl, he let out a slight sigh. He would have plenty to eat downstairs later, and all the food on the menu was amazing there as well, but just the idea of eating lesser drake prepared by an awakened chef seemed amazing. With a laugh, Chantora patted Ryan's back.

  "I'll make sure to put some aside for you."

  "Awesome, thank you," Ryan smiled broadly, stepping out of the living room with Chantora right behind him. Standing in the hallway, leaning against one of the walls, was Runar. Of course he was here, Ryan knew that. Runar was the one that opened the door for Chantora in the first place. But they've been avoiding each other all day, and it didn't seem as though right now was the right moment to actually talk about it, so both of them just decided to look away from each other. Runar focused on Chantora, while Ryan headed toward his bedroom. He expected his mother in here, taking a break, but instead she did something that instinctively made Ryan's stomach drop.

  Mary was cleaning Ryan's room. And it wasn't even like his room was particularly dirty. Of course, it wasn't perfectly spotless, but it was totally fine.

  "Mom, what are you doing?" he asked with a slight groan, watching as his mother was rearranging his shelves and cupboards.

  "Just organizing things a little better! It's such a mess in here," Mary pointed out, and Ryan looked at her with a blank expression, "... Mhm. I guess, whatever. Just please leave the models as they are, they're all grouped together as per their era, so-"

  "But they look so messy like that, wouldn't it be better if-"

  "Mom, please, just don't..." Ryan sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. He really didn't feel like dealing with this right now. But at least his mom was listening to some degree now.

  "Yes, yes, fine, if it's so important to you that they stay so messy, then..."

  Ryan sighed lightly. While his mom was turned around, he quickly took a picture of his wall with model figurines so that he could re-sort them again easily later should his mom mess with where they were standing right now.

  Either way, for now, Ryan quickly grabbed his backpack. He had a few things in here that he needed to bring downstairs with him. Luckily, his mom hadn't looked into his backpack at least. Ryan pushed his feet into his sneakers and walked back out into the hallway, "Yo, Liam!"

  The young vampire quickly pulled open his door and peeked out his head from the room's dark interior, "Thou hast called for me?"

  "Wanna come with?" Ryan asked, glancing around to make sure nobody would see what he was about to do, which was to point downward at the ground. It seemed like Liam quickly understood what he was trying to ask, though, and hurriedly nodded his head.

  "Yes! Hold on!"

  "No need to rush. Just put on some shoes and we can head out," with a slight yawn, Ryan looked back down at his phone. It was a different, newer model that he wasn't quite used to. But this one did have mana-sensitive cameras, so mana distortions wouldn't disrupt pictures anymore. Though, that kind of saved his ass a few times so far, so maybe that wasn't the best choice. Either way, it was better than not having a phone at all.

  As Ryan stood there, waiting for Liam to get ready, Runar walked into the hallway again. Chantora was in the kitchen, and Mary was in Ryan's room. The uncle and nephew pair stared at each other for a few moments, until Runar pulled out a small metal card with some patterns drawn onto the front.

  "Just put this into the case of your new phone. It's the signal transmitter," he explained, and Ryan slowly nodded, quickly looking away from his uncle. For the most part, he just wanted to avoid making eye contact right now.

  "Thanks," he said, grabbing the small metal plate. He quickly pulled back his phone case and placed the plate inside. This would now allow him to head downstairs and actually use his phone from there by transmitting the phone's signal from downstairs to a point at the rooftop and vice versa.

  A few moments later, Liam came out of his bedroom, wearing his shoes while a backpack was strapped to his back. He already immediately rushed toward the door, and Ryan quickly followed, "See you guys later. Have a fun night," he said loud enough for everyone in the flat to hear, but he didn't wait long enough for an answer. Instead, him and Liam quickly made their way into the café and then downstairs into the hidden underground village. This time around, the celebration was already well underway. After yesterday, they had gotten into a proper 'Spirit Week' mood and decided to cook and eat together all day, like a massive feast. Ryan came down here earlier today as well to check on them and everything seemed fine so he decided to just come back around now when the 'main' part of the celebration was supposed to happen.

  Ryan and Liam walked into the cave village's main plaza, and could already see dozens of tables set up where people were sitting around and eating, at least those that ate solid biological food. The dryads lived off light, fertilizer, and water, so they didn't really 'eat', and the geodes also didn't need to eat, sleep, or even breathe. Though, the majority of people still did.

  "There's some kids your age over there, want to go say hi?" Ryan asked, looking down at Liam. He was a bit hesitant, but Ryan was sure that they were going to get along fine. He had already told the other kids living down here about Liam, and they seemed pretty excited to meet him.

  "Do I have to?"

  "No, not at all," ruffling his hand through Liam's hair, Ryan smiled down at the young boy, "You can stick to me if you want, but I've got some slightly troublesome stuff to take care of. So if possible, you'd still need to wait for me a bit, okay?"

  Grumbling slightly, Liam nodded, "I shall... greet my people, then!"

  "You do that, my liege," Ryan nodded, giving the boy a slight salute. Liam had met some of these people before, he just hadn't spent any time with them. And considering that there were some kids that were stuck down here, Ryan would really like it if they could all get along a bit better.

  That being the case, there really was something he had to take care of, and his first stop was on the other side of the cave. He quickly approached the stairway. There were actually still some splatters of his blood that weren't properly cleaned off. Ryan should get to that later.

  Either way, his destination was at the top of the steps. He quickly pushed open the door, seeing a wardrobe in the centre of the room, as always. But the wardrobe was different to before. It was much, much... prettier. Like it had been repaired or refurbished somehow. Rather, this seemed like what the wardrobe was supposed to look like back when it was first made.

  "Kindly, you in there? How are you feeling?" Ryan asked, stepping up to the wardrobe. He couldn't feel even a bit of corruption, so he felt fairly confident. But once Ryan was close enough, the doors of the wardrobe opened up and half a dozen large tentacles shot out, pulling Ryan toward the dark grey mass that was Kindly the mimic, covered in bandages and smelling of rubbing alcohol.

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