Recovery

I couldn't say my plan to stay up all night was one of my best.

My entire body ached. Not just my limbs — everything. My eyes were appallingly sore, barely opening as I slouched over while walking behind Ren. My fists ached from hours of punching, the adrenaline having surged too strongly all night.

Though I was exhausted, I didn’t want to slow Ren down again, so I gave everything I had to keep up with him as we progressed to the next mission.

My feet dragged along the floor, but I was trying my best to make sure Ren wasn’t able to notice how terrible I felt.

“Taro, you look awful,” Ren said as he caught me moving sluggishly.

I sharply repositioned myself, standing upright and trying to look well and wide-awake. “What do you mean, Ren? I’m completely fine”.

“I’m not going to believe you for even one second. I’ve been turning around to look at you every now and then, waiting to see how long until you finally gave in.”

Clearly, I was too tired to notice any of that.

“I told you staying up all night was a bad idea. And what’s worse is that you were training the whole time; your body must be shattered.”

My eyes fixed on Ren with a confused look. I wasn’t exactly sure why, but my body wasn’t responding at that point. I wanted to say something, but it felt as though my body had closed itself off from my brain.

I suddenly fell forwards. However, I didn’t crash on the floor this time. I felt my dead softly bounce off of Ren’s shoulder, as his hands pressed up against my chest, stopping me from falling any further.

“Taro, you idiot. You need to listen to me sometimes. You can’t always think you’re right,” Ren gently whispered into my ear as he threw me onto his back.

“I’ll carry you to the next mission. It’s not so far away now. Once we get there, you can rest. Fortunately for us, only one of us has to do it.”

With all of the strength I had left in my body, I raised my index finger and began to lightly tap it against Ren’s hand which was holding me with uncoordinated and untimely beats. That was the most I could do to let him know I wasn’t outright ignoring what he was saying.

Ren remained in an upbeat mood despite the fact that he had to walk the rest of the journey with me on his back.

My eyes closed shut, but my brain wouldn’t turn off. As a result, Ren blabbered on about the next mission. I think he was purposefully trying to bore me and get me to fall asleep, but unfortunately it didn’t work.

The beginning of what he was saying was mostly a blur, but my hearing instincts suddenly reawakened when he began explaining the actual format of the mission.

“Now, the issue with the next mission isn’t really the foes. It’s the huge boulders that fall from above. You have to make sure to dodge them while fighting several different enemies. Luckily for me, I have memorised the rock's falling pattern, so this should be a piece of cake.”

He continued, but, after that, most of what he said flew right out of my ears.

As we approached what appeared to be a giant dome-shaped arena, an awful smell unexpectedly ambushed my nose. The smell was worse than any farm I had ever walked past. It was like rotting hay, burning oil, and something far more rancid all mashed together.

Ren did what he could to cover my nose so I wouldn’t suffer from it, but it was without saying that he needed to cover his as well. Regardless, I flopped my hands, pushing him away from my nose, ushering to him that protecting his was more important.

My body was so ruined the smell was only a minor problem, meaning I could ignore it for now.

As we stepped closer to the dome, the stench only grew thicker, clawing at my nose like smoke in a furnace. Out of the haze staggered the foes Ren was to face. They were pigs — but not ordinary pigs.

These stood upright on their back legs, tusks glinting, greasy leather jackets hanging off their wide frames. Their bellies shook as they strummed battered guitars strung with rusted chains, guttural snorts mixing with the distorted screeches of their instruments.

They had mohawks of wiry bristles which stood tall, dyed crimson and sickly green, and their eyes glowed under the dim arena lights.

I knew I should’ve been shocked — or more realistically, disgusted — but I just…couldn’t. My body was too broken, and my eyes too heavy. I couldn’t bring myself to care that rock-obsessed pigs were waiting to stop us in our tracks. Without a second thought, I let my head sink against Ren’s back and slipped into sleep, leaving him to handle it.

Or so I thought, at least. I remembered him placing me onto the ground before noises of high-pitched squeals and shattering boulders raged against my already-throbbing head.

I knew none of the squealing was Ren — I didn’t doubt for a second that he was going to make it out of there alive.

And with that comfort, I finally drifted off into a deep sleep.

The next thing I knew, I was back on Ren’s back. I could feel that his muscles and body had grown even more, as even my legs struggled somewhat to wrap themselves around his thick waist.

The stench of the pigs had clearly rubbed off slightly onto him, as the scent hadn’t fully faded from my nose.

While my body still unfathomably hurt, I had regained the strength to talk again. “Ren…where are we going now?”

“Oh, Taro. You’re awake?! I’m sorry if I woke you up.”

“No, don’t be silly.”

“Look. There’s a cabin up ahead. You can rest better here. There should be a nice bed for you to sleep in…as well as some secret level-up potions to make us both even stronger.”

This had reminded me that I hadn’t checked what level I had reached in quite some time. It almost didn’t seem to matter at times. But I was too tired to check just yet. That was something to do after I had rested properly.

Ren pushed open the door, quickly scanning the room to make sure nothing suspicious was lying around. After that, he lugged me over to the bed, and tucked me in delicately — just like our mother had done to the two of us when we were little children.

I felt bad for Ren that there was only one bed, meaning he would have to sleep on the floor. “Ren…don’t you want to sleep in the bed as well? There’s enough space for the both of us, I think.”

“No, it’s fine. I’m not going to sleep anyway — I only woke up a few hours ago. It’s you who needs it. I don’t want to bother you.”

I rolled up slightly out of the bed to look over at Ren, a piercing shock jabbing my head as I moved too quickly. “Thanks for taking such good care of me, Ren. I’m sorry I keep on burdening you.”

“Ah, Taro. Remember, we are doing this as a team. I know you would do the same if it was the other way around. Besides, think of it as repayment for all of the times you did my homework for me.”

I very lightly chuckled, taking into consideration that doing it any heavier would’ve hurt. “I guess you’re right.”

I lay back down, rolled to my side and shut my eyes.

“Goodnight, Ren.”

“Goodnight, Taro. Thank you for being so strong during these hard times.”