Vol.4 Ch.66 - I Discovered Something New About Myself

“I can’t believe it.” I said aloud after a couple nights spent traveling, “Tothink I’m finally back in TN after so long!”The road to here was quite bad for my motion sickness. I could hardly keep ittogether for most of the trip, but every time I’d think of throwing up, I’d askmyself how the driver would feel about that, so I held it in mostly. Emphasison the mostly, since there were times when I simply couldn’t take it and hadto ask the driver to make an urgent stop in the middle of the road. He waschill about it, though.The first thing that surprised me upon crossing the border was that the peopleworking there as guards stayed the same since Grim and I left TrivisNumerica. After reading my name, one guy actually recognized me. In hiswords, “Seeing two pipsqueaks legally passing the border isn’t somethingI’d forget that easily. Although you’ve grown quite a lot since then.”He gave me a pat on the back and sent me on my way. The most noticeablething about this place that differentiates it from the others is the sheer volumeof wheat fields. It’s just wheat and other crops as far as the eye could see!You definitely couldn’t see scenery as beautiful as this no matter where youlooked, it’s just that unique.I spent most of the travel time chatting with the driver (to take my mind off ofthe motion sickness) and it turns out he’s also from here. We chatted andchatted about all sorts of things, apparently he’s a driver because he needsthe money to get his daughter into school. The gesture is beautiful, butschools, universities and the like are only found in Simpleton, no? Isn’tthat a bit too unrealistic to fund someone’s tuition with a single job?I didn’t want to accidentally insult him or anything (I’ve done enough of thatin The Plural Divide), so I refrained from saying anything. Even still, whycouldn’t he just send his daughter off to work somewhere to gain lifeexperience that way? I mean, Grim used to work part time at his father’s, andI landed a job at the local marketplace helping them with calculating thechange.Man, that takes me back! Grim would always brag to people about how quickhe is with his change, but he still has nothing on me! I used to learn people’shabits to the point where I knew what each person was going to buy themoment they walked into the store! The look on their faces as I immediatelyrang them up before they could even approach the register was priceless!Eh, back on track. I probably don’t have the full picture on the driver’sdaughter’s situation. Maybe they’re already well off or something, whoknows?“If you don’t mind me asking, sir,” I decided to just go for it, “How old isyour daughter?”“She should be turning 6 this summer.” He stated with a chipper tone.SIX?!? THAT YOUNG? IS SHE A GENIUS, OR MAYBE A PRODIGY?! Icouldn’t believe his words. A person usually enrolls in the schools inSimpleton when they’re around 20 or so at the youngest, and even then it’sonly when they really REALLY want to. Sending your daughter at a measly 6years old is crazy, she’d get bullied to all hell, not to mention the curriculumwould be too difficult for her! This guy’s really proud of his daughter!“Is she gonna be alright over there?” I worried, “I mean, being without herfather at such a delicate age is…”“Well, I thought so too.” He said, “But I can’t keep coddling her forever.Sooner or later she’s gonna grow into a beautiful young lady, and I want herto have the brains to back up that beauty.”Whoa, that’s actually kind of cool, what he said. If I had a daughter, I’dprobably just let her do whatever she wants, but I guess she’d grow upspoiled if I did that. This man is turning out to be more and more amazing bythe minute!“Well, this is my stop.” I said as we arrived near Leins, “Thanks so much,sir. I wish you and your daughter the best of luck!”“Thanks, young man.” He said, “I’ll be getting off here as well, so it’s kind oflucky on my part how I got a passenger’s destination be in my hometown,whahaha!”***I made it back to Leins, huh? Somehow, it feels unreal to even say. I alwaysthought that I left our adventure around the world early, but thinking back Imade it quite far out. I traveled to the edge of the continent on the East side.Heck, if I boarded a boat and continued going East, I’d have made it to theshores of Occidence all the way in Cardina! (or maybe Vallis?)Booking a room in the same inn Grim and I stayed in previously, I hadexpected to tear up when I saw the room or something, but that wasn’t reallythe case at all. What instead happened was I immediately ran to the bathroomto throw up all the motion sickness I held in the entire wagon ride here. Afterthat, I could barely skid my way to the bed, where the Sandman beat me to apulp.After waking up, my stomach started to hurt immensely. Looks like throwingup last night left me quite famished, so I ran downstairs to get some food.This was the emotional and nostalgic moment I was hoping for! That’s right,I’m of course talking about… The bread!Trivis Numerica is famous for its extravagant pastries, since we have anabundance of wheat to work with. Whoever looked at bread and went “Icould turn this into a spiral or swirl” Should be given a million gold coins,because they’ve certainly put this country on the map because of theirdiscovery!I ate and ate, be it from hunger or just pure nostalgia, until I was stuffed to thebrim. It got so bad that I actually chipped my tooth from it, but I still atethrough the pain. It was THAT good…But something didn’t feel right. As I gazed at the broth’s reflection of myface, I couldn’t help but notice my eyes shone differently than usual. Usually,they’d shine a bright green, aligning with my Iro, but this wasn’t the case thistime. I started panicking before quickly running off to go check in the mirror.Sure enough, there they were. The two eyes I was born with, the two eyesthat let me see this beautiful world up to now. They were a dark browncolor... I was given no time to get accustomed to the change of my lifelong Irocolor, as I immediately saw mysterious words start to form on the mirrorssurface. I got closer in order to read it, but the words still stayed a fixedlength away from me.Not only that, but the moment I looked away from the mirror, the wordsfollowed my gaze. It was as if the words weren’t tethered to the mirror, butrather burned into my eyes. Like they were telling me “You have no otherchoice but to read me”. And read I did.“I wanna…visit… Springwood…?” I tried to make out as much as I could.Why is this written in first person? Is it telling me to make another detourinstead of just going straight to Whitehood?“But that’d be troublesome…” The words changed in front of me to reflectmy current mood.What?“What is happening?” They changed once more in accordance with my ownthoughts.“Wait, could it be…?” I figured, “The ability of the Brown Iro… Can I…Read my own mind?”I know it sounds stupid, but hear me out. I figured since I was looking at amirror, the Iro was peering into my own thoughts, thus I saw what I wasthinking materialize in front of my very eyes. So by that logic, could I readother people’s minds if I gazed at them?I immediately ran back downstairs to continue my meal, and moreimportantly to check out if my hypothesis is correct. I gazed at the innkeeperwho served me my food.“Oh, it’s the kid again. Where’d he run off to? His broth got cold…”“No worries, sir! I don’t mind eating it cold!” I said with an excited tone,”Thanks for the food!”“U-Erm??” He stood there surprised, “D-Did I say that aloud?”I couldn’t answer him (or rather pretended like I couldn’t) since I was eatingmy cold breakfast. It’s really true! This is incredible! Now I’ll never getscammed again! Hooray for Iros!After finishing up my meal and hastily putting all my stuff back in my bags, Iran out and decided to listen to heart.“Screw going straight home, I’m visiting Springwood!”***I now spent most of my time in the transport wagon looking out the windows,even though I was supposedly not good with it. The world somehow lookeddifferent than before, it was a lot more… informational? Like, I would focuson a passing traveler walking by foot, and I’d hear him envy me, who was ina transport wagon! Guess he couldn’t afford it, poor guy…Apart from that, did you know animals had cognitive thoughts, too? I focusedmy gaze on a bunny, and it repeated the same unintelligible phrase as it ate itsfood. I’m not sure what the phrase meant exactly, but I assume it’s somethingto do with food, since that’s what it’s eating. This is a revolutionary find,animals think in rational thoughts, but in a different language!If we try and learn some of their language, could we perhaps… talk to them?What would that lead to, establishing communication with animals is now arealistic thing to expect from the future, and it’s all thanks to me acquiringthis ability from the Brown Iro! Woot woot!Wait… Calling it ‘The Ability of the Brown Iro’ is getting really tiring.Maybe I should shorten it? Grim did the same with his Red Iro, so…“Analyze…” The word popped into existence on the glass window’sreflection of my face.“Heh, if you say so.” I chuckled upon realizing I read my own mind again.“Did you say something?” The wagon driver leaned back, thinking I wastalking to him.“Oh, nothing!” I tried to play it off, “Just me talking to myself, haha…”“I see.” He simply stated.“...Weirdo.” But his mind spelled out his true opinion of me.I felt kind of sad, since I didn’t expect him to think so lowly of me, but Iguess that’s good to know too. Now I know I don’t have to tip him much forthe fare… In fact, that gives me an idea…!“Actually sir,” I got his attention, “Did you know I’m actually an incrediblestreet performer?”“You are?” He didn’t seem to believe me.“Yup. I can guess any number you’re thinking of from zero to a hundred.”“Alright then, what number am I thinking of?”“You wanted to pick 18, but thought it too easy, so you switched to 58.”“…”He was quite shaken from that occurrence, so I thought of going for one morepush. This is gonna be so funny…!“Tell you what,” I added, “If I guess the next number correctly, I don’t haveto pay for the fare ride at all. If I guess wrong, I pay double. Up for it?”“No way!” He immediately rejected the idea outright, “It’s too easy for youto guess from zero to a hundred!”His logic didn’t really check out, but I guess he was just being wary now thathe knew I wasn’t all talk. So naturally, I made it “harder” for myself…“Alright then, think of any number, I don’t care about the range.”“…” He thought long and hard, “Okay, got it.”“Is your number the Queen of Hearts?” I suggested.“Whuh?!” He stammered, “B-But…! How did you-!? T-That isn’t even anumber!”“I know,” I agreed maliciously, “But it is what you were thinking of, am Iwrong?”“Grr…!” He was fuming internally.I only saved about 10 silvers because of this, and I don’t intend on doing thisin the future anymore. Even still, this guy annoyed me, so I wanted to get backat him somehow. It isn’t about the money, it’s about sending a message, am Iright?