The Bad Offspring

Algos looked at his statistics with apprehension. He didn't really know how he was going to handle the situation, but when faced with a noble, especially angry at you for some reasons, the best thing is not to do too much.

The young man blew, his eyelids closed before he came out of the toilet, he had already stayed there far too long, if there was one more second left inside, Elizabeth would have come to believe that he was sick. He apologized to a young woman who was waiting at the entrance and headed for the lobby. There were a little more people than when he arrived and Elizabeth was talking to a young woman of her age who, like her, wore half-religious, half-modern clothes, which gave the impression that she was from the same family, but she was not. Algos could tell by the difference in their size and the traits of their faces. The young woman was redheaded with freckles and had black almond-shaped eyes that differed completely from Elizabeth.

When Algos arrived, she invited him to join her; the couple in front of him was far too big, or it was Algos who was far too small… the young man who was accompanying Elizabeth's friend was far tall than him, and he has black hair and green eyes. Algos tried to put aside his complex and introduced himself.

"Nice to meet you, Algos. I guess you're both Elizabeth's friends."

"Good thinking." replied the other young man. "I'm Samuel Koridge and next to me is Line Azel. Nice to meet you." he said as Algos looked at the young woman's neck.

"A Koridge… huh… I guess you have a nice life."

"Huh?" Samuel replied, unexpectedly.

"Usually the nobles have more facilities, and then you could afford to enslave the girl you love to stay with her...so..." Al asked again with a sharp tone after Elizabeth had put a hand on his shoulder.

"I see…" replied the nobleman, scratching his head. "Your annoyance has his reasons. I can't say I understand you, but I'm not going to blame you for that. However, if you had had my privileges, you probably would have done the same thing… In any case, I congratulate you for having managed to survive so far without having had any privileges. That truly amazing."

"No, no…" Algos continued, looking away. "I'm sorry, I didn't pay attention to the use of my words. Sorry for my... harshness, I'm a little confused at the time."

"Don't worry about it, I'm not holding it against you." Samuel said with a conciliatory smile. "If I don't say anything stupid, you're the son of the Blower Melonide, Philia Melonide, right? You must feel a lot of Bahala's will, how does that feel?"

Algos vaguely went over the subject, he didn't like talking about him too much, people always ended up apologizing or being sorry for having asked questions, so he preferred not to say too much, even though the 3 people around him seemed to be very interested in his story.

It was after ten minutes of discussion that a Cardinal took his place on the stairs of the hall, forcing everyone to go on the ground floor, including the nobles. The clergy dominated the aristocracy and the high leaders, for the example there was a king, King Sonomon but the one who held all the rights was the Salvatrix, the king could only control the armed forces and the outside parts of the city, such as the cities of the kingdom, the surrounding villages, or the hamlets where the outcasts lived.

The Cardinal expressed his gratitude to the young people for having followed the ancestral traditions that keep the world alive and healthy, thereafter he made a brief prayer to help the young a.d.u.l.ts succeed in their lives, but he also spoke about the next life, mainly the future of men, Algos did not feel particularly targeted by his words, he spoke to the nobles, the rich, the merchants, not to a member of the populace.

Be great, be strong, revive the economy, support the women and the children of this country, protect the kingdom, these were the main missions given to the men. This kind of speech sounded like dissonant music to Algos's ears, he found it almost funny; some women who dared to talk about religion said that they were like 's.e.x.u.a.l objects' in the eyes of the Gods and traditions, and also, to the eyes of men, while men had all the rights. In reality, this was not true, men were and are still 'tools': "You will learn, you will work, you will make money, you will wage war, it's for the good of this world". A noble and justified cause, it seems. Algos answered 'yes' and 'no' to this problem, depending on which side he chose to fight, but he did not really agree with the different political groups that animated this world, not everything revolves around money, territories, and religion having established a so-called cardboard peace that crumbles every time settlers discover a new land to colonize.

The Cardinal also spoke of the 96 young girls who had not found a man with whom to spend the ceremony, among them, there is also another group of women and men, those who refused to have s.e.x, they are also ejected from the city without delay and more than 80% of them become sterile, the clergy say that malediction is given by the god Paucrate, god of despair.

The Cardinal's speech ended, everyone began to leave the hall while some parents waited outside with carts to take their child home. Algos decided to go and get his cousin, she was close to the pleasant nobleman who had spat on him; he put one hand on his cousin's shoulder hoping not to have any trouble with the rich man's son who was next to him, because if Al remembered who he was, he was very well protected. Before going to talk to his cousin, he decided to go and open the statistics of the nobleman, but when he did, he suddenly felt extremely tired. He immediately understood what Tom was getting at when he told him: "you'd end up collapsing to exhaustion on the floor like a ragdoll :D". But he could see the statistics of the young nobleman:

╔════════════════════╗

╠► Current statistics:

╠═► Attack: [8 — 999]

╠═► Strength: [11 — 999]

╠═► Speed : [21 — 999]

╠═► Reflex : [12 — 999]

╠═► Stamina : [9 — 999]

╠═► Magic : [51 — ∞]

╠═► Magic Defense : [47 — ∞]

╠═► Charisma : [14 — 999]

╠═► Charm : [3 — 999]

╠═► S.e.x-appeal : [7 — 999]

"Hey, Felicia, we should go, Mag will start worrying if we don't come back soon."

"Oh? Y-Yes…" she replied as if she had just come out of a dream. "Excuse me, my head was in the clouds, we should go… Goodbye, Rayan." she said to the nobleman without looking at him.

"Wait a minute." he ordered in a calm voice. "You're not in such a hurry, are you? Algos, am I wrong? I just wanted to apologize for yesterday, but I couldn't help it, your sneering look annoyed me." he said, with cold eyes.

"My sneering look?" Al replied calmly. "It was only your impression, not my goal, you should make the difference and learn to control yourself, this kind of behavior can be destructive to those around you."

"Do you know who I am to talk to myself like that?"

"Rayan Obinski, the only son of the prestigious knight's family of this town."

"Well, so start by calling me Duke Obinski, it'll be a good start to learn politeness."

"I'm sorry, but no, your parents deserve the title of Duke and Duchess, and I respect them, but not you. Just being your parents' son doesn't make you a prestigious and remarkable person."

"Oh?" replied the noble with an annoyed tone and wrinkled eyes. "Well. You will leave and your cousin will stay with me in these cases, I will not see you and you will not see me, so the problem is solved." he explained, staring at Algos and then Felicia in the eyes.

"See you later." she replied with eyes filled with a faint gleam.

Algos went to pick up Elizabeth, but apparently, she and Line had to go to the cathedral, both being young a.d.u.l.ts, daughters of religious parents, she still had to do one last ceremony: the Link. It's a long process that lasts 8 days, where little by little, individuals bonded with 8 divinities of the Clouds, the highest ranks like Elizabeth could choose themselves which Gods and Goddesses would energetically accompany them throughout their lives, sometimes, in very rare cases, some of these people reached such a level of faith and energy that they could join the Clouds and live with the Gods, this is how the New Gods appeared as they went along.

The rest of the population, all races included, could not do this, the only way for the rabble and even for the rich to connect with the Gods was prayer or offerings… for the craziest, sacrifices.

Algos tried to reassure Elizabeth about this ceremony, but his words did not have much impact, different stories said that it was a painful and memorable part of the religious life, they don't get enough sleep during this 8 days, they fast, and see no one. The people who helped them during these eight days were the Blowers, they were the only support given to the young people during the Link.

Elizabeth just asked Algos to give her something of him, so she wouldn't feel too lonely. She seemed to be a more fragile girl than she wanted to make her look, but Algos would rather not talk about it and simply gave him the ring he had kept on his finger.

"Here." he says simply by reaching out his hand to her.

"Huh… but, um… it's your totem, right?" stammered the young woman, looking up at her interlocutor in a dazed way.

"Anyway, I trust you, just take care of it, it belonged to my grandfather. You'll just come and bring it back to me, once you've rested, I'll give you my address so we're good." he explained by writing the information on a piece of paper that Samuel had given him.

"All right… I'll see you in a week then…" she blew with a look lost in the vagueness.

Algos and Samuel finally discussed their personal interests. The young nobleman was different from what Al expected, certainly, he was interested in money, but this was a family trait, but above all, he wanted to do everything by the rules and give everyone a chance. His plans for the future were much more elaborate than those of Algos, which gave him the impression for the second time that he was smaller than Samuel was. The nobleman wanted to continue his studies in the school of alchemy — he had skipped a class —, there, we learned the value of each material that the earth could give, as well as the different possible mixtures for the different possible results; his goal, like all alchemists, was to reproduce the philosopher's stone. It was the only way to become close to the Gods without having to be religious because the philosopher's stone makes any living being immortal as long as it remains close.

After this long discussion over a glass of beer in a famous Dinois pub, Samuel invited him to his house, but Algos had to refuse, he was starting to get late, his aunt was probably going to worry, she was the one who had to take care of him for the 8 days his mother was away after all, and he had to start looking for a job to finance his studies for next year, his family could not pay everything.

The young nobleman decided to take Algos home with a cart waiting for them a little further down the street. Algos could smell the odor of wealth after entering, a feminine scent was floating in the air, and the benches inside were more comfortable than the chairs in his house.

They also discussed the fact that he left his cousin with the other nobleman, according to Samuel, it was not like him, but Algos could not explain why he had accepted such a thing and even if he had refused, it would surely have caused him problems… but there were Elizabeth and Samuel… the Salvatrix's daughter and the eldest son of the largest trading family could have helped him… he decided to stop thinking about it, he had made a mistake somewhere and it was too late.

After about ten minutes, the cart stopped in front of Algos's house; the two young men said goodbye after the nobleman had left him a card with his address, as well as a pass if he ever wanted to come to his house to talk, or for something more serious.

The fact of leaving a prestigious cart attracted many glances. Being "friends" with a nobleman was not given to everyone, so people tended to see it with an evil eye, for no real reason.

Algos blew when a hot flash came to his head. He rushed home and entered, the floor seemed clean, so he preferred not to get anything dirty and took off his shoes. Her aunt worked on the living room table by the light of a window and a candle, she drew the decorations for a large room for what seemed to be a wedding.

"Oh, hey, Al, you look great." she began with a little smile. "How about tonight?"

"Aaah… you like to ask personal questions, it's crazy…"

"Yeah, yeah…" he grunted as he took off his jacket. "It went very well, I didn't have any problems, unlike others…" he said, scratching his head.

"Yes… Felicia was unlucky, a Poisonous… I know you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but… I would have preferred it to be anyone else… but even I couldn't do anything, by the way, she's not with you." Mag explained, drinking a little before she started drawing again.

"Ah…"

"Do you know where she is?"