‘It’s a job quest,’ John stared at the smiling old man as his impression of him took a different turn. Having a job in a world like this would make a whole new ballgame for him. And what came with a job change was a whole set of new skills.

“Do you mean it?” he asked.

“There’s no reason to lie,” said the old man while stroking his long beard.

“But why me? Is it because I sat down?” John was skeptical of his luck. To him, nothing came without a price.

“Indeed. But it will only work if someone had mana along with knowledge pertaining to the arcane,” the old man said. “And you my boy have both of them. So in my eyes, yes, you’re more than qualified.”

The reward from the ghastly werewolf turned to be the deciding point of why he was eligible to obtain a job of his own. It seemed he had to thank that creepy little boy. But just the thought of the werewolf made him shuddered.

“Oh, you met a wraith and survived. How interesting,” said the old man.

“Wraith? You mean the werewolf?”

“A wraith can be anything. But the myth has foretold that what they become depends on what they fear. In a way, as they died in resentment they’ll rose into the exact thing that they fear,” the old man said. “So this werewolf wraith you spoke about, did it try to tear you limb to limb? Or did it try to get into your mind, torturing your soul with illusions of torment?” The old man was getting a bit too excited over John’s encounter. It was to the point that he got a little bit too close to his face.

John distanced himself a bit as he was getting a bit too uncomfortable with those eager eyes of the old man. “Sir, can we get back about the warlock thing? You said you’re offering me to be a warlock.”

“Ah, yes. Pardon me for my curiosity. It’s a thing about us mage. We’re too prone to learning new things,” said the old man. “And enough with the sir, it’s a bit too polite for my taste if you ask me.”

“Then what should I call you?” John asked.

“Alden Longbeard they called me,” Alden said with his beard combed by his old wrinkly finger. For an old man of his age, his beard was quite silky, and the pride on that face of his could never be more obvious.

“What about yours? I can read minds but I can’t know the unspoken,” Alden said.

“Oh, sorry. It’s John, John Creed.”

“John Creed, a good name,” Alden chuckled. “Now, coming back to the main deal here. How about it? Are you interested in joining the union of warlocks?” Alden handed out his hand to John. A sign of his invitation.

Contrary to his expectation, John stayed quiet. His eyes were on the ground while his hand cupping his chin. The man who was in front of a golden chance was deep in his own thought. ‘A mage type of job doesn’t sound so bad. But I…’ he remembered a time he spent training with his sensei. It was just the two of them in a dojo at the outskirt of San Francisco. Practicing the iai, a motion of unsheathing the sword from its scabbard. ‘…want to be a swordsman.’ His desire couldn’t be any more than truthful.

“A swordsman. How generic,” Alden wasn’t amused. For a man that pursued knowledge of the mysterious, he wasn’t the type that preferred swinging cold steel.

“Is there something wrong with being a swordsman?” John asked. Frowning from that remark. If Alden took pride in his beard, John took pride in his Sensei’s teaching.

“No, there’s not. It’s just them and us warlocks are a different breed,” a cold gleam hidden beneath those blue eyes of Alden.

John noticed the change. He would be a fool if he didn’t notice something so apparent. “Would l be unable to learn a sword skill if I become a warlock?”

All of a sudden, Alden appeared tired. The talk of swords bored him to death. “You can learn anything under the sun. But only a fool would do it. Mastering spells would take years and if you add up those paltry tricks you spoke off they would only impede your success in becoming a high-caliber warlock.”

Alden sighed and looked at John in the eye. “ Heed my advice, John Creed. A master of none could never beat a master of one. So what would it be? Are you in?”

John had his answer. Thrusting his chest out, he said, “I accept. I want to be a warlock.”

The apathetic face on Alden brightened up like the sun. He rushed over to John with his astral feet, smiling like an ass-kisser. “Now before I induct you as one of our own, you need to know that this process would take two steps. First, I’ll impart you the base knowledge of a warlock, and two, you need to find my pet serpent, Sylvie, and ask for her a part of her heart core.”

“Wait, do you just said serpent?” one word caught him off guard. But before he could retaliate, the zealous old man poked his finger right at the middle of John’s forehead. A plethora of valuable knowledge flowed into his mind like the river of time. Yet the amount was too much for the brain of an average human.

John fell to his knee as the white of his eyes was showing. His jaw slacked loose with no sound or scream. While back in the real world, John’s body convulsed like a floundering fish on land.

But the friendly bearded man watched without a trace of sympathy. He stood there stroking his beard as his free hand formed weird gestures. Purple flame erupted around him, circling the warlock like he was the center of the solar system. He finished his final hand gesture and the flames converged, forming a fiery rune. Then Alden grinned like a devil. As if he won luring the naive.

Alden motioned his hand at John and the fiery rune flew at the defenseless man.

“Disgusting,” a woman’s voice echoed out of nowhere.

The smile on Alden vanished as he shouted. “Who goes there?”

“Someone you shouldn’t cross,” to her dulcet voice, the vast whiteness broke into pieces like a mirror being smashed.

Alden screamed in madness before a flick of invisible force threw him off his feet. The bearded man flung far away until his astral body dispersed into specks of stardust. He was gone but John was still there.

John was oblivious to what was happening. Then from nothingness, a woman emerged with a big flower on her head. “Oh, straggler,” said the lady as her slender fingers caressed his face. “For power, man would do anything.”

The lady embraced John and both faded from the astral plane.

***

John woke up. Greeted by the green canopy of flowers and trees. The soft mattress beneath him was comfortable. A bit too comfortable that his desire to get up and walk around was slowly losing to drifting back to his sleep. Yet the incident from last night made him got up.

“Shit,” his eyes looked around and noticed the unfamiliar bedroom. Nature took over the walls with furniture similar to the thing he saw in the living quarter, decorating the small bedroom. The ray of sunlight beamed through the wide natural window on the wall, warming John up for a brand new day.

“What happened?” the last thing he remembered was Alden poking his forehead. ‘Damn it. He should have at least warn me about the blackout.’ John didn’t even remember the massive headache he felt before losing his consciousness.

“Did I do it last night?” To him, being here only meant one thing. The lady probably heard his plea of help before being sent to the astral plane and then kidnapped him while he fainted. It was the most logical explanation he could think of and knowing the tendency of that lady, the possibility of him doing it last night was probably high.

John peeked under his brief. Tilting his head, there was no sign of any fluid at the tip of his little brother. ‘Now I’m not sure, or she might be the thorough type. Cleaning everything up, leaving no evidence of me having unwilling sex.’ Then it dawned on him. ‘Shit. Did I just got rape?’

Before he could dwell further into that topic, his silent phone finally rang. He saw the caller and picked it up.

“Hi. You miss me?” he said in a cheery tone.

“Oh, thank God, you’re still alive,” said the woman.

John was annoyed. Did she really think so little of him?

“Hey, I did pretty well by my own you know,” John had a second thought. “Well, there were a few close calls. But in the end, I still live.”

A long sigh came at the other end. It seemed the unknown woman had a bit of a heart for him. “Don’t get cocky, you just got lucky,” said the woman.

“Some say luck is also a skill, you know?” John tried to be smugged about it. It had been a while since he had the upper hand against this unnamed lass.

“Tsk,” the scoff was loud and clear for him to hear. “So where you at? Are you in Borjak Town or are you still in Tidig village?”

Both of those places were foreign to his ears. It seemed her expectation of John was way off the mark.

“Um… I think there’s a misunderstanding here. I’m still in the forest,” John broke the news.

“You what!” the familiar scream came back. And he dodged it right in time before his eardrum got swollen again.

“Why the fuck are you still in the forest? And how the hell are you still alive in there?” her tone was a mix of everything. From anger to confusion and a little bit of concern.

“Well that’s a good question,” he paused, thinking his answer carefully. Another scream was not what he wanted. “And I also have a good story to go with…” John iterated to her about his little adventure with the werewolf wraith.

“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God…” if John could see her, she might be pacing around trying to compute what she just heard.

“I can’t believe it. You really survived the wraith quest,” she was in disbelief.

“Yeah. I think so too. I still can’t believe how I survived that. It just let me go after I said nothing,” thinking back on those memories gave him the shudder. The memory was so strong that he had the urge to pee. ‘Is there a toilet here?’ he wished he knew.

“You said what?” again, the confused voice rang from the woman.

“I said what, what?” He didn’t understand.

“I mean you said something to the wraith?” she asked.

“Yeah. I said nothing. Why?” John didn’t get the big deal about it.

“That can’t be. If you did so, you shouldn’t be alive right now,” the woman said.

“What do you mean?” John asked. Her words tugged his curiosity.

“The key to that quest is to say not even a single word at all after the boy transformed and asked the last question. If you say anything, you’re dead,” she explained.

“That’s a weird way to complete it,” he tried to remember. Did he really say nothing to the werewolf wraith? Or was his barely distinct tone only audible to his ears and not to the werewolf wraith?

“Could a wraith have a hearing problem?” John had to ask for clarification purposes.

“Oh my God, I can’t handle this,” her voice was distant as if she needed time to walk things off. Then she came back, greeting John with a long loud sigh.

“Let’s just forget about it. As long as you’re safe right now, that’s fine,” she said with her voice as calm as a meditating monk.

“I know you’re frustrated and all hearing this bad news of mine. But now comes the good news,” John paused for dramatic effect. Waiting for a curious question from the other side.

“Just fucking tell me!”

John jumped a bit on the spot as he could never be prepared for those soprano-like screams. “Okay. So listen carefully, this is what happened…”

“No, no, no, no…” the endless no kept repeating. From her reaction, John’s good news was probably the opposite of it.

“Isn’t getting a job a good thing?” John told her about his warlock job quest. But hearing her reply made him nervous. His foot kept bouncing, waiting for the woman’s reply.

Then a distant scream rang from her side. It was long and full of pent-up frustration and it made John wondered. What kind of thing did he mess up this time?

“I left you for a night and here you are, siding with the dark side,” there was disappointment in her tone. Along with the unending sigh that kept getting heavier and heavier.

But John was frowning. Whoever she was, she didn’t need to go overboard with her words. He had been through a lot on his own and this sliver of achievement he got wasn’t going to be tarnished by an unknown woman.

“Hey, I don’t know why you’re being like this? But you need to take that back. Saying I turned to the dark side is a bit overboard, don’t you think?” John tried to be civilized in his words.

“Warlocks are the most heinous job under the Dark affiliation. Most of their skills and spells require the most outrageous demand, and one of them is a blood sacrifice. To make things worse all of those warlocks would always have a few screws loose. In simpler terms, those filthy evil mages are fucking sociopaths,” she said. Her tone was full of loath and hatred.

“No,” John shook his head. “You’re lying. That can’t be true. Alden is a good man. He was always smiling and he had the curiosity of a kid.”

“Oh my God, this can’t be happening. Why does it always have to be a lot worse than I thought,” she said. “Of all people, you had to be bounded by the sleaziest warlock I know.”

“What do you mean by bound?” John asked with a frown. For some reason, he had a bad feeling about this.

“I hate to break it to you. But you’re basically a slave,” she said.

That knowledge left John in a daze. He wanted to deny it, but why would a stranger like her lie to him about something like this?

“But how?” John felt the need to get to the bottom of it. Being a slave didn’t sit well for him or for anyone else in that matter. “He didn’t do anything to me except for the–” his words fell off as there were a few events that stuck in his head. From his hands being stuck to the table to Alden poking him at the forehead.

“With things pertaining to a slave seal, it would be a lot easier when the soon-to-be slave is mentally impaired. If I’m guessing this right, that bastard probably overloaded your mind with the knowledge transfer. Am I right?” she was spot on.

Her rational assumption proved to be the truth, and John was shaking in his boots. His hands couldn’t stop shaking at the thought of being someone’s slave. But in the midst of his mind breaking down, his denial fought back.

“Menu. Status,” he opened his status window, for the sake of verifying it with his own two eyes.

He scanned from top to bottom, repeating a few times as he didn’t get it. The title of being someone’s slave was not there, or the slave thing might not be eligible of being title worthy.

“Hey, how do you know if you’re a slave? Is there something I should see in my status window?” John had to ask, clinging on to that single glimmer of hope.

“It’s in the title bracket and beside your name,” her tone was flat as she had given up over John.

“I don’t see it,” the corner of John’s lips started to curve upwards. “Hey, I don’t see it! There’s nothing about me being a slave here.” John’s tone raised by a notch. Hope was finally in his heart.

“That can’t be, you must have missed something,” she wanted to deny it but she too had her hope up.

“No, I’m not. And you might be wrong about Alden,” John said.

“Don’t be naive. I know that fucker like the back of my hand. If he had the chance to enslave someone, he would do it in a heartbeat,” she said with conviction.

“You sure?” John was still not convinced.

“Of course I’m sure,” she said. “Unless during the process of putting the slave seal, someone interrupted him, is there someone around you while you went to the astral plane?”

“There is someone,” John hadn’t mention about the lady with the flower hat. His story with her was a bit too explicit to share with someone else.

“Who?” she demanded.

“I don’t know her name. But she’s a gorgeous woman who’s very fond of wearing a big flower hat,” John said.

He waited if she recognized her, but silence reigned on the other side. And he had to ask. “Hello? Are you there?”

“A-a-ar-are you sure about her?” she stammered.

“Yes, and why are you talking like this?” John could hear a hint of nervousness under her breath.

“Are you somewhere close to a field of flowers that only bloom in the night?” her specific question triggered something in him.

His heart palpitated and he answered, “yes.”

“She’s an alraune!” she shouted. “John, get out of there, now!”

“An alraune?” he said.

Out of nowhere, John heard a voice in front of him.

“Did someone call me?”