Someone strange

Chapter 5

Naoya wakes up from the sunlight hitting his face. He sits up on the bed and scans his surroundings, wondering where he is. The room was simple, clean, and elegant. Full of intricate designs and patterns on the curtains and walls. There were only a bed and a small table in the corner of the room and a large window where the sunlight peeked through to wake him up. He looks at his clothes, which are now a pair of comfortable pajamas, and notices the small, pink creature with an origami sakura hovering beside him on the bed.

“Oh, hi. You’re still here,” Naoya happily says.

Yes, I followed you and the other people! The creature says in his mind.

“Wait, where are we now? What happened? ” he asks, suddenly more awake.

After we defeated the vampyr, you passed out from exhaustion, and the knights brought us to the city.

“We’re in the city now?! ” Naoya exclaims, quickly taking off his blanket and running to the window to take a peek.

The curtains parted by themselves, revealing a large, colorful city. It was full of artistic and magical architecture. Their technology looked very modern but at the same time, was very clearly fantastical, like a platform that carried several boxes, slowly floating through the city and delivering goods. The inhabitants were magical as well, some human, some with animalistic features, and some were animate wooden puppets. Naoya couldn’t help but stare at every single detail he could see.

From across the room, the voice of a woman suddenly spoke.

“Welcome to the Kingdom of Valebryn, visitor.”

He turns around and sees the knights that he met yesterday entering his room. The woman who spoke floated off the floor, wearing a cast on her legs.

“Oh! Hello… ummm, good morning, and uhhh… thank you for bringing me here,” he says as he bows to the three of them.

“No problem, kid. You helped us defeat the vampyr, so it’s the least we can do,” the big man replied. “I’m Lance; these are my teammates Greta and Astrea. We’re the Cipher Unit of the Kingdom of Valebryn’s Aetheryn Knights Order, and you’re currently in our headquarters. We brought you and your fairy friend here after you passed out last night from making a miniature sun. Pretty impressive.”

“Oh, thank you, haha… it wasn’t really me; I just poured fire into it. The fairy did most of the work,” Naoya shyly replies.

“No. Fairy did little. Magic mostly you,” the girl (or the cute girl, as Naoya remembered her) named Astrea replied.

“Really? I didn’t even know how; I just learned magic from the wisps when I woke up in the forest,” Naoya replies, suddenly curious. “By the way, what are the wisps anyway, and what is a fairy?” he asks them, looking at the floating pink creature beside him.

“Wisps are the most basic forms of magical life in the world; they mostly appear in places with very high energy, like forests. Fairies, on the other hand, come from wisps that evolve when they gather together and combine themselves,” Greta explains, and Naoya reacts with a soft “ooohhhh” while looking at the fairy.

“I’m sure you have a lot of questions, but for now, we’ll be the ones asking them. We’re currently dealing with an enemy here in Valebryn, and we need to make sure you’re not someone dangerous we just brought into the city,” the lady tells him.

“Oh. Right, of course, I understand. Sooo… what do we do now? ”

“Come with us. Eat breakfast first. Then interrogation,” Astrea says.

“Breakfast? Yes, please. Lead the way.” Naoya and the fairy, hearing about breakfast, happily follow them out of the room.

…

Earlier that morning, in a briefing room somewhere in the same building…

“Alright then. I didn’t ask for a report last night since you were just in an encounter, so let’s hear it now,” a tall man with curly hair says to his teammates, sitting down on one of the chairs.

“Yes, sir. It all started at around half past 17 yesterday,” Greta starts.

She and her teammates at Cipher Unit stood in front of the briefing room, projecting several images onto the boards from yesterday’s events. They were currently reporting to their Unit’s leader, Captain Mors Bellan, who leans forward to focus on their account.

“We’ve decided to end our third patrol day of Mortesh Forest after scouring the cliff-side areas and still finding nothing out of the ordinary, besides a rare snake-goat spawn. During the walk back to the warp gate, the person who called himself Naoya approached us while speaking in an unknown language. We asked him about his identity and intentions, and he started replying to us in Common, albeit in a slow, rather childish way, like it was his first time speaking the language. He stated that he woke up in the forest and wandered there for six days before we found him, and that the wisps taught him about the forest and magic. He didn’t seem to recognize or know what Noctis is, but the interrogation was cut short when a vampyr attacked and we fought to subdue it… unfortunately I was incapacitated in the middle of the encounter, so I’ll let my teammates continue,” Greta finishes, a hint of regret in her voice.

“How are your legs now, Greta? ” the Captain asks.

“It’s fine for now, sir. Vampyr-related injuries caused some complications, but luckily it was just a flesh wound, though I’m going to have to float for a few weeks for it to fully heal,” she said a bit sheepishly.

“Haha, don’t worry. You’ll enjoy it soon enough. I got my leg cut off once, and I had to float for around a month or two while it reattached, but once it was back to normal, I just felt like floating again.”

“But, my training…”

“You can still do marksmanship training, can’t you? Don’t stress about it too much. It won’t heal properly if you try to hurry up the healing process, alright? ”

Greta simply nodded at the captain’s reassurance.

“Alright then, let’s continue with the report,” he says as he leans back on his chair.

“Allow me, sir—” Lance starts.

“No, no. Astrea, please,” but Captain Bellan stops him before he can continue.

“But…”

“Shush. I’d rather have Trey’s report than you. Hers is short, simple, and to the point. Yours sounds like you were just a drunk bystander who wasn’t even sure if he was awake when he saw what happened.”

Lance could do nothing but guiltily scratch his head and look away. “I, well… Go ahead, Trey.”

She nods at them. “Understood. Greta fell down. Me, Lance, fight. Boy and fairy. Climb tree. Heard their thoughts. Small sun. Planned to make. Good plan. Vampyr weakness. Use dark bubble. Hide boy. Protect while charging. Bait vampyr near. Reveal small sun. Boy shoots sun. Vampyr killed. Boy tired. Fell off tree. I catch him. Boy and fairy. Team brings home. Finally eat roast. Then sleep. Dream of boy. I mean—” Astrea turns pink as she realizes what she said and hides her face with her beret.

“Oooohhh, I see. Alright,” Captain Bellan says with a smile. Lance looks at her with a smirk, and Greta raises an eyebrow.

“So let me see if I got this right: while you were fighting, the boy and his fairy friend planned to create a miniature sun to defeat the vampyr, and you hid them while they prepared. You and Lance baited it towards them, and they successfully created a miniature sun that defeated the vampyr. Then you brought them back, ate butter roast for dinner, and then dreamed of the boy when you slept, correct? ”

Astrea puts her beret back on. “Forget last part. Everything correct.”

The captain looked at Lance.

“That was true, sir. It’s like it turned daytime again.”

“Hmmm… I’ve seen a whole lot more impressive magic in my life, but I am curious how he pulled it off. Can you demonstrate how he did it? ”Captain Bellan summons a pair of sunglasses and turns to Astrea.

She nods and raises an open hand to her chest. She creates a fireball, then compresses it into a smaller sphere, continuing to pour more fire until it is incredibly bright. After a while, she closes her hand and extinguishes it.

“Same procedure. Longer charge time. More intense,” she says.

The captain thinks before he continues. “You said they had a fairy companion, right? Did they help? ”

“Fairy used magic. Not on fire. On boy. Improving his performance.”

“So it was unlocking some of the boy’s potential…” he quietly says, looking at one of the images on the board. A large, circular patch of forest floor was completely scorched and blackened, even glowing a dim orange in some places.

“Hmmm… and where did he say he was from? ”

“He said it was a country called 'Japan,' and the language he used to call us out was nothing I’ve heard of before. Not even rarer ones like Umbral or Draconic,” Greta remarks.

“Well, if you’ve never heard of the language, then it really is strange,” Captain Bellan says, standing up and approaching the images on the board.

“Thanks for your report, Knights. Since this is quite a special case, we’ll be following some special procedures. Bring him to interrogation, and if he passes that, let him take a S.E.M.T.U.C.K.L.E.R. I’ll compile every result from those tests, then send it over to the big guy. I’m sure he’ll know what to do with this boy.” The captain goes over his plan and walks towards the door.

“Wait, captain. When you say ‘the big guy,’ do you actually mean…? ”Lance nervously asks, and they all waited with bated breath for his answer.

He opens the door and looks at his teammates. “Yes, that’s who I mean. I’ll be escalating this case to Sir Valiansteel.”

The captain leaves, and the Knights exchange nervous looks.