"So this is the way to become immortal? Have someone worship you?" clarified Sirius.

  "I don't know," shrugged Wish of Nature.

  "What do you mean? That is how you live for so long, right?"

  "Is it really immortality? Or am I merely existing because others want it?" Wish of Nature turned back to Sirius, his deep blue eyes looking like bottomless pits filled with despair.

  "Are there others... like you?"

  "One is behind you right now."

  "Ugh, I thought you would let me listen a bit more," came a grumpy old voice from behind the tree Sirius was sitting on.

  "Friend?" Sirius asked in surprise after seeing the old man with a long grey beard and a black robe.

  "Oh, hello, kid. Did you stumble upon the Plain Veins? That's good."

  "What are you doing here?"

  "Your local god invited me as he was passing by. What was that, ?rdrick?"

  "Don't call me that."

  "Huh, kid, can you believe that? Wish of Nature ?rdrick doesn't want to hear his own name!" Friend of the Unkind began mockingly laughing at the Elder.

  "Shut up, John."

  "Your true name is John?" asked a baffled Sirius.

  "I... Erm... Well, yes... Ugh, that is awkward."

  "You tried to seem like a regular druid to me last time."

  "It's because that body is one!" Friend of the Unkind quickly covered his mouth with a hand.

  "You still create those puppets, John?" asked Wish of Nature.

  "Duh, maintaining a real one is too much trouble. And moreover, look at yourself," Friend waved at the height of Wish of Nature. "You look like a tree! I would rather be exiled looking like a human!"

  Sirius watched two god-like figures banter like old friends, picking at and annoying each other. In the end, he dared to ask, "Friend, are you also worshipped?"

  "Huh? Me? No, not happening. But too many people are afraid of me appearing in different places, so I am remembered. And people like telling scary stories, so that's a plus."

  "But you too are immortal?"

  "Maybe? I don't know. Does it change things?"

  "You... don't die."

  "Oh, no, I can die. I just don't want to."

  Awkward silence hung in the forest.

  "You don't want to?" asked Sirius slowly, while glancing at Wish of Nature, who had just expressed his desire to finally be dead.

  "Yeah, that stuff happens when you reach some point in your life. At first, you are, like, a bit apprehensive, but over time, you are okay with that."

  "What does 'okay' mean?" asked Sirius, making Friend of the Unkind nervously fall silent.

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  "That means 'fine,'" explained Wish of Nature. "He means that he is fine with not dying."

  "Yes, exactly."

  Sirius thought for a moment and asked, "How long have you both been living?"

  "I lost count," Wish of Nature answered with sadness.

  "Me too? Erm, let me think... Fifty... Then war... Hundred and fifty... another war... That empire fell... Erm, I don't usually do a lot of math, so bear with me..." Friend of the Unkind was frantically scratching the back of his head, ignoring Sirius' baffled gaze. "Something like six hundred? Plus or minus one, that is. My early years were quite frantic, so I am not sure about that time."

  "Six hundred years..."

  "Or seven. Before that stupid empire, no one thought about counting years, so it always throws me off."

  "Holy Empire of Man?"

  "Hah, you know that one? They had a fun ending. No, the other one, before this."

  "You are talking too much, John."

  "Duh, look who woke up! You have been alive for two hundred years, and you still grieve those people? Take it easy, man!"

  "Take it easy... For you, it may be easy, but you did not have your own blood turn against you."

  Friend of the Unkind lost his joyous attitude. "Oh, really? Say, how easy is it to be unlike others?"

  "Like me?"

  "No. There ARE others like you. I mean, in a world where no one else feels what I feel? Where no one sees what I see!?" His rage made the ground overturn and trees shudder, and Sirius sat completely still, fearing for his life. "I was ostracized! Banished! When I was a simple man! Do you think I was born like this!? Of-fucking-course not! You act so sorrowful and sad when those simpletons and fanatics decided YOU are THEIR world! PROVE! THEM! WRONG!" Friend of the Unkind stood right in front of Wish of Nature, looking up at the slender figure, yet his bearing was not equal, but more forceful. "There is no one like me. There can only be ONE first mage. And bear that in mind, I could decide for all of that to NOT happen. Yet I did. So be at least friendly to Friend."

  Friend of the Unkind turned away and faced Sirius, who was pale as snow and wet like a sponge from all the cold sweat.

  "Oh shit," Friend muttered.

  "Oh shit indeed. Do you think he will keep the secret?" Wish of Nature asked calmly.

  "I don't care. No one is going to believe him anyway. You were the first one to give him brain damage with all those crazy blinkers in your wall. Put them in order, God damn it, it pains me to look at them."

  "I did not give him brain damage. He is the Child..."

  "Child of the World, yeah, it doesn't matter. Why did you bring that bloody crystal?"

  "He asked..." whispered Sirius.

  "I thought it could help with isolating the wall," clarified Wish of Nature.

  "Leave the kid alone, dude! He just encased a spell in a stabilized reality fueled by his blood. You could do that too. I regret giving that body too much free will; it ratted out the best blood crystal mage I ever met. If only people stopped labeling scary magic 'forbidden'... Oh..."

  "He knows."

  "Okay, fine. Give me that glassy thing you have." Friend stretched his arm. "I will send you back to town while I give some reality-altering lessons to this carbonized twig. Say to the Elders that if he doesn't return, he decided to die."

  Sirius gave his crystal in a daze to Friend. He saw Friend's image contort and twist, and a second Friend of the Unkind walked out of his body, identical to the first. He clenched Sirius by the hand and pulled them out into the Astral World, while in the shadow of the material world, Friend of the Unkind began loudly rambling to Wish of Nature. Sirius felt a pull, and they began moving in that same strange multidimensional world.

  "Sorry to pull you into these matters, kid. ?rdrick lost his humanity a hundred years ago or so, and he has trouble understanding others."

  "Are you really the first mage?..."

  "Hmm? I don't really know, but almost certain. At some point, all mana of the World was inside my soul."

  "All of it?..."

  "Don't imagine the current amounts. There was not enough mana to condense organs. But over time, mana became more abundant, so everyone gets enough now. That is why more perceptive kids are being born."

  "Like me?"

  "Like you, like me, like ?rdrick. Bottomless Lake too, I believe. Her rants were heard all over the Astral Plane."

  "Why are we different?"

  "Can you travel in silence? I am trying to find your departure point... As for why you are different..." The reality gradually began replacing the Astral World. "Because you went against the rules. Like we did. Because we felt with our core that we knew better. Yet we all failed in the end."

  "Do you regret that?"

  "Regret? No, never. Any mistake gave me the chance to learn."

  "Can I ask one last question?"

  "Shoot."

  "Why did you give out my master's secret?"

  Friend of the Unkind gave Sirius a sad smile. "When my mind sleeps, the bodies I create live their own lives. That is how I remain sane. I am sorry about your master. Are you angry at me?"

  "Angry?..." Sirius listened to his emotions closely. "I don't think so... If he wasn't banished, I would not have met him."

  "That's a nice way to look at things. Now, go before the Elders feel that I am here. Farewell."

  Sirius saw Friend of the Unkind dissipate into thin air.