Chapter 49 - No Church in the Wild

The only two people who weren't a part of Eternal Flame were both travelling together. Rukha Kashe, the life magic user, and Marē Mizouka, the strongest king, walked through a similar jungle biome to the one that Nell had spawned in.

Marē spoke to him.

“Isn’t she horrible?! How could somebody do that without feeling guilty!”

Rukha, completely uninterested, responded.

“I see, I see.”

Marē kept on going.

“I’m a king! I’m as strong as her! But she treats me like a citizen! It’s so annoying… Dammit! I’m gonna kill her!”

Rukha pulled out a book from his pocket, reading it while walking and responding to Marē.

“I see, I see.”

“Rukha! My boy! She’s trying to get us all killed for these fucking gods! I’m gonna look for Nell and team up with him.”

“I see, I see.”

“You’ll join our team! Rukha, Marē, and Nell!”

“I see, I see.”

“You will say ‘I see’ only once!”

“I see.”

Rukha kept walking as Marē continuously spoke to him. It was rare for Marē to be able to speak to somebody like this, so he enjoyed it as much as he could. Rukha seemingly did not care at all.

Rukha had been there for 3 weeks and Marē had been there for 2 and a half. They met the second Marē entered and had been traveling together since. Rukha didn’t see Marē entirely as a friend, but he didn’t hate him. Marē did not realize this, and continued to think that Rukha hated him. But that did not stop him from yapping to him. Rukha told Marē multiple times that he would rather be alone, but not once did he tell Marē to leave.

Rukha was rather worried about being in this game for too long. Beside his bed, in his castle, he kept a sweet potato. Every morning he would check on it and take care of it. He originally kept it as a symbol of the beauty of life, but over time, he became unreasonably attached to it. He also had hundreds of other plants and flowers around his house that needed his care. Staying away for too long would cause them to die.

As Marē stretched, a number peeked out of his shirt. He was #4.

Rukha had left his number out the entire time, except for when he ran into Inda. His number was 7.

Marē tapped the air in front of him as a screen materialized. He showed it to Rukha.

“I guess we did enough leveling up. We should end this game.”

Rukha nodded.

“I see.”

Marē grit his teeth and spoke to him.

“This is serious! Pay attention!”

Rukha turned his head over and looked at Marē. He looked as if he had just snapped back to reality after being in his own world.

Marē spoke to him.

“You look like a lost puppy. We’re in a warzone, stop daydreaming.”

He looked down.

“I apologize. I seem to have been lost in the beauty of my surroundings. What were you saying?”

Marē sighed.

“It's at times like these that I remember that you’re 120 and not 20. Eyes on the road, old man. Pull out your tablet~”

Rukha tapped the air and a screen popped up.

He looked over at Marē’s and then looked back at his.

Marē’s had the number 6 on it. His target was Sy. But, of course, he didn’t know who it was. He needed to see the number on them.

Rukha’s tablet had the number 1 on it. His target was Ame.

Rukha looked over to Marē with confusion in his eyes.

Marē spoke back to him.

“What are you looking at me for?! Let’s go level up and hunt down the targets!”

Rukha tilted his head.

“But you’re already level 10, aren’t you?”

Marē grinned and ruffled Rukha’s hair.

“You aren’t. Let’s go.”

Rukha smiled. Despite being about 100 years older than Marē, Rukha didn’t act like it. He was rather quiet and compliant. But, he was not as harmless as he acted. In front of people he had never met, he was rather menacing. Once he knew somebody for a bit, he got silent. But he had never gotten past that point. He had never known somebody enough to open up. They had always died too early. His children had died of old age before he had enough time to truly know them.

His grandchildren were fully grown adults and hadn’t seen him since they were born. His great-grandchildren were just recently born the same day that he left for the war. The plants surrounding him were the only beings he could feel a connection with. Either way, he wasn’t rushing to go back for his family.

Because he already knew the outcome.

Rukha looked up into the sky.

When he was 16 years old, the first tree of Baum was created. It was said to have been planted by The Original Sin. Baum was a new country and life magic hadn’t existed before the people of Baum did. That was why, when the tree was grown, they centered their country around it. People who had been pushed away by others, people who couldn’t communicate, and people who were searching for a reason to exist all came to Baum. They each took a bite out of the tree. Those first settlers were the first generation.

And Rukha was the first person out of the first generation. He was the first life magic user.

He thought to himself.

‘If I continue in this direction, I will die. I have done nothing but live my entire life. I can’t shake this feeling that I’m doing something wrong. If I feel it’s wrong, then it's for a reason. I’ll do something. Marē is the only way I can.’

He didn’t know it, but the feeling he had was not one of ‘not having a purpose’, but a feeling of unfulfilment. He saw it as an issue of purpose, though.

It was understandable why. A purpose would have given the feeling of fulfilment when completed. But, you didn’t need a purpose to be fulfilled. Ame had figured that out long ago.

Rukha looked down and whispered to himself.

“Who the hell likes living just to die?”

Marē heard this, but didn’t comment on it. He glanced towards Rukha and glanced back forward.

He continued walking. He tried to ignore Rukha’s comment as he walked.

But then he thought.

Why was he walking forward?

A reason to keep walking was not an easy one to come up with. Humans could not be without reason, for they would not exist.

So he had been given a reason to exist.

By who?

Step.

Marē turned his head, only to see the most likely reason for his existence standing behind him.

He spoke to her.

“L’eau. Aren’t you busy?”

She nodded.

“Yes. But I have time to speak with my assistant. You’re doing well in the game, I assume?”

Marē looked to the side.

“Yes. I am. Now go. I’ll keep walking.”

L’eau smiled.

“Good. Keep walking. Just like you’re made to do.”

Just as Marē was about to leave, he turned his head and stared into L’eau’s soul.

“Just like I was made to do?”

Rukha backed up and created a wooden chair before sitting on it and pulling out his book.

L’eau responded to Marē.

“Yes. You’re paying your debts by doing what ‘he’ made you to do. You’re almost done.”

Marē furrowed his brows and yelled at L’eau.

“IS THIS TRULY WHAT I WAS MADE FOR?!”

“You were made to serve The Original Sin along with me. Your guilt-”

Marē raised his voice higher.

“I don’t give a fuck about my guilt! I was not made to serve you! I am as strong as you! I AM THE KING OF L’EAU!”

L’eau scowled at him.

“You’re getting ahead of yourself.”

Marē yelled back.

“Am I really?! WHY SHOULD I HAVE TO BELIEVE, L’EAU?!”

L’eau smiled.

“You have no choice but to believe in the purpose we gave you. You’ve been following it to a tee.”

“I know I am. But I know somebody who isn’t.”

L’eau looked confused but intrigued.

“Who?”

Marē calmed himself and grinned.

“Nell Moren.”

L’eau’s eyes widened as her expression quickly turned into one of anger.

She held out her palm and shot out a blast of an invisible essence that turned Marē into dust. Rukha looked on in shock. He was about to recognize this feeling, when Marē’s entire body grew back from nothing. His body was not tethered to anything physical. As long as his internal world existed, the King of Hell would shape Marē’s body around it.

Immediately after healing himself, he held his palm on the floor and propelled himself backwards with water magic.

After gaining a bit of distance, he held both his palms out and launched a beam of water stronger than anything Ame and Nell could produce combined. Stronger than Ra’s blast of magma. Because Marē, of course, was the strongest king.

The blast lit up the surrounding area and slammed into L’eau, launching her down into the floor. Every particle inside the blast of water that hit her was vibrating faster and faster as he tried to achieve the result he wanted. He hadn’t fully grasped the concept of the Essence of Eternity, but he was getting closer and closer.

He split the atoms inside the blast, and tiny nuclear explosions were formed, compressed and imploded into the blast by Marē’s magic. The RME, acting as the base of the water magic, acted as fissile material for the attack. The heat from this fission burnt her skin. Steam came off of her body as she got shot into the floor at unimaginable speeds. Any person besides a god would have been vaporized instantly.

L’eau held the surrounding area together with spatial magic so it wasn’t destroyed.

She looked to the side and held out her hand towards a tree. A moment later, she ripped through the space between her and the tree and teleported to it.

Marē shot towards her and launched a ball of water. The ball was about as small as the ones that Ame would throw at people. But it was not as harmless.

The ball hit L’eau in the stomach, before oscillating so fast that the energy released from its movement began to ionize the air.

It pushed L’eau farther and farther away until the ball exploded in the same way the beam had done.

She was damaged.

This was no longer a quarrel between a god and her assistant.

It was a fight between the two strongest people in the games.

But L’eau refused to accept that. She held her palm out as Marē’s wrist got pinned to the air.

She did the same with her other hand as Marē’s other wrist got pinned. He was floating on the air as if it was a crucifix.

L’eau held her hand out at him as his head fell off.

It regenerated.

It fell off again.

It regenerated.

“L’EAUU-”

It fell off.

It renegerated. It fell off. It regenerated. It fell off. It regenerated. This repeated hundreds of times as Rukha watched with wide eyes. Blood poured from Marē’s neck, only to be remade within his heart.

Rukha walked up behind Marē.

He held his hand onto his back, behind his heart.

He thought to himself. L’eau couldn’t kill him yet. But, he needed to be immobilized.

L’eau was the person who gave people purpose. She needed help.

Was this his purpose? Marē was the only person he could talk to. Rukha could never communicate well with anybody. Marē was one of the first people who he could speak with smoothly. He valued him highly.

Almost higher than his own life.

But almost was not enough. Rukha needed a purpose in his life more than he needed other people. That was the conclusion he came to. Not fulfillment, but a purpose.

He grit his teeth.

And he shot a root through Marē’s heart.

He was immortal, but the root was not meant to kill him. It would attach itself to his internal world and draw out all of the energy that allowed him to live. But it would regenerate.

Rukha was stealing buckets of water from an infinite ocean.

He could use this energy. Marē wouldn’t be able to move while the roots paralyzed his internal world.

Every cell in Rukha’s body would be repaired by Marē’s energy.

All he needed was to win this game. He remembered what L’eau said.

“Your reward will be asking The Original Sin and I one question.”

He would ask The Original Sin what his purpose is. That was the only way he could fill the hole in his heart.

Marē turned back to him, eyes wide.

“R-Rukha? What are you doing?”

Rukha avoided eye contact with him.

“You’ll live.”

L’eau smiled and began to walk away.

Rukha turned his back on the incapacitated Marē.

Marē yelled out to him desperately.

“I know I’ll live. But why?”

Rukha grit his teeth and began to walk away.

“You’ll live to die.”

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I continued walking with Inda. We were both at a higher level by this point. I was confident I could damage L’eau.

I was talking with Inda, when I saw an object shoot past me.

I ran up to it.

It was a wooden box.

I was a bit concerned, but there was also a high chance of it being a sort of supply drop from L’eau.

I opened it.

Dominic stepped out of the box.

“Dominic?!”

“H-Hey.”

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Nell’s Notebook: Page 25

Handwriting Drills

A A A

B B B

C C C

D D D

E E E

F F F

G G G

H H H

I I I

J J J

K K K

L L L

M M M

N N N

O O O

P P P

Q Q Q

R R R

S S S

T T T

U U U

V V V

W W W

X X X

Y Y Y

Z Z Z

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