“Wait, that’s...” Noah suddenly stopped walking as he squinted his eyes, staring into the distance, “That’s a wall! And a tower! That’s definitely the fucking town we’re looking for! Fuck. Yes!”

“What? How can you even see that from here?” Ayden asked, surprised, trying to see what Noah was seeing, “Are you sure you aren’t just imagining it?”

“Dude, you trust your mind, I trust my body. Those are like... laws of the universe.” Noah pointed out, “Now come on, let’s get going. It’s gonna be night soon.”

“Laws of the universe, sure.” Following his friend, Ayden chuckled to himself as the two young men continued speeding up toward the town. Sooner or later, Ayden was also able to see the walls, but only much later than Noah.

“Your eyesight is really insane, you know that?” Ayden said with a wry smile, and Noah couldn’t help himself but smirk as he looked back at his friend, “I told you. It’s a law of the universe.”

At some point, they even reached a dirt road that they could approach the town through a bit more easily. And as the two came close enough to make out details, Ayden was really surprised at the scale of this place, especially compared to the village they were at before.

The walls were far taller and thicker, and while there were still some parts supported by wood, it was mostly made up of sturdy rocks instead. Not only that, but the gate seemed a lot more protective as well, and a guard was even stationed out there.

Noah and Ayden quickly approached the guard. He seemed to be rather bored. Most likely, there simply wasn’t all too much happening to keep him busy. But when he saw these two young men, the guard propped himself up and tried to appear as professional as possible.

“Welcome to Wellerton.” The Guard smiled, greeting the two clearly exhausted travelers, “For what reason are you here?”

Noah, happy to finally see another person, began to speak before Ayden even had the time to think, “Ah, we’re trying to find a mage that can help us. There’s this weird sickness goin’ around, and it can only be healed with magic.”

The moment that Noah mentioned mages, the Guard’s expression turned sour instead, as if he immediately became suspicious of the two, “And why are you here to find a mage?”

Noah raised his brows, surprised, and turned toward Ayden, “It seems like we’re right here. And that the fact that mages are here isn’t really widely known.”

The guard was immediately taken aback by this young man’s words while Ayden rubbed the bridge of his nose, annoyed by his friend’s bluntness. And then, the guard pushed his hand into his pocket. It was weird for him to do that, so Noah immediately paid attention. Noah was always able to read people incredibly easily, so an obvious action like that was, of course, picked up by him as well.

And then, to his surprise, Noah’s eyes sparked up in an emerald light, like they always did when he was faced with an unexpectedly strong personality. Both Ayden and the guard saw this and were freaking out. Ayden because he was nervous about why they suddenly activated, and the guard because this random kid’s eyes started to glow.

But Noah himself didn’t really care. He never did. He was used to people thinking it was just something they imagined, and he didn’t get used to the fact that such ‘magic’ like his glowing eyes were actually a thing here in this world yet.

Rather than that, Noah was concentrating on the thing in front of him. It was a fist-sized orb of glowing gold. And it wasn’t any sort of gold. It was rugged as if this was some sort of old piece of metal dug up by an archeologist.

A moment later, Noah realized that this wasn’t just some random orb. It was an eye—an eye made of gold.

It floated up to Noah and stared him into his left eye, and he somehow couldn’t stop himself but extend his hand. He grabbed the rugged golden orb and wrapped his hand around it. As his fingers touched this floating metal, the gold fell off as if it was just dry paint put onto it. Instead, the metal turned into a green gem. And emerald. Noah immediately realized what was going on and pulled his hand back rapidly, and the now emerald eye disappeared.

And although it was just out there for a moment, he felt quite dizzy. At the same time, Ayden noticed that the color of his eyes faded quite a bit again. Not as much as the other day, but still enough to be noticeable.

At the same time, a green window appeared floating in front of Noah.

---

[You have stolen the ]

---

The guard stared in front of himself in confusion, as if he saw something that he simply didn’t believe. He pulled his hand out of his pocket and placed it on the hilt of the sword by his hip instead. However, since Noah seemed to be in some sort of daze, Ayden had to step in.

“Please! We’re not here to fight! My friend is just an idiot that acts without thinking! We are not a threat! Look, his eye-color faded, he lost most of his mana just now.” Ayden said, “We’re really just here to find someone that can heal that disease.”

The guard turned his head and locked eyes with Ayden, “You’re really trying to make me believe that someone powerful enough to negate an artifact’s effect isn’t a mage himself?”

“...Yes?” Ayden replied, not sure what he should be saying next. However, at this point, Noah was able to collect his dazed mind again. He knew how to talk to people, so he should be able to get out of here. At least, if the ‘appraisal’ thing was what he thought it was.

Noah slowly rummaged through his pocket. He knew that this thing was still in there. It was one of the few things he took with him from his and Ayden’s original world. It was a necklace with a cheap, pretty gem on it. The kind you could buy for a few bucks at basically any convention.

“Ah... Sorry about that... I didn’t want to reveal it so quickly, but I guess we have no choice.” Noah said with a wry smile, and Ayden looked at his friend confused, “Please don’t tell anyone, but we’re the kids of nobles, but we wanted to see the world, so we’re traveling. But so that nobody finds out who we are, I stole two of these from our treasury... One for him, one for me. It protects our status from being read so that we can’t be found out as easily. Just that it drains a lot of mana when it activates.”

The guard raised his brows, confused, not having expected this kind of answer. And Ayden was surprised at how eloquently Noah was talking, at least compared to normal, on top of the confusion that came with Noah’s statement in the first place.

Over the past few days, Ayden shared his assumptions on what kind of world this place was with Noah, so he probably used all of that to try and get past the guard. Although Ayden wasn’t particularly sure how the guard was going to react. But in the end, even Noah didn’t expect what he answered.

Rubbing the bridge of his nose, the guard let go of his sword’s hilt, seemingly dropping all suspicion. Instead, he was just annoyed, “Urgh, really? So you’re here to meet with that bothersome girl, aren’t you? At least she told me a similar story to you guys. Fine, come in. It’s not like either of you would be able to get up there in the first place.”

The guard took a step to the side to let Noah and Ayden through. His suspicions from before immediately faded away, as if he never had them in the first place, “But we’ll keep an eye on you two, so don’t you dare mess around like your friend. We don’t particularly want to deal with any more messes like that.”

Still confused about what was happening, Noah and Ayden looked at each other for a moment and then stepped through the gate. And a few seconds later, the gate closed behind them, and they were standing at the entrance to this small town.

“What just happened?” Ayden asked, confused, “How did you know that was going to work like that?”

“The fuck are you talking about dude, I obviously didn’t know that. I was prepared to keep lying my way through that until he gave up, but that was way too fuckin’ easy!” Noah replied without hesitation, “This just feels... wrong. Who was that girl that he was talking about in the first place?”

“I have no idea, but at least it seems like we really are in the right place.” Ayden pointed out, “And that’s the most important part right now, isn’t it?”

Noah let out a deep sigh, “I guess so.” Slowly, he pushed the necklace he used to try and trick the guard into his pocket, while Ayden looked at him surprised, “You carry that with you all the time?”

“I mean, yeah. You do as well, right?”

“Yes, but out of us two, I’m the only one that ever wore it. Seems like you’re a lot more sentimental than you let on, eh?” Ayden asked with a smirk on his face while Noah quickly turned away, “Shut it, I’m not in the mood for this. I feel like shit. Let’s just find our mage and ask him for help.”

Ayden laughed a bit and looked down the street. There were a couple of people walking along with it, but it was quite empty for the most part. It was just a small town, after all. However, at the other end of the street, which was slowly but surely rising up as this town was built directly at the foot of this enormous mountain, a set of stairs could be seen. They led up onto the mountain itself.

“The guard said ‘up there’, right? Does that mean that the mage is at the peak of the mountain?” Ayden asked with a wry smile. He was tired, it was already getting dark, and neither he nor Noah were in the slightest mood to get up there.

“...Should we try to find a hotel first or somethin’?” Noah suggested, “Let’s get up there tomorrow.”

“Inn.”

“Hm? Fine, let’s get ‘in’ there tomorrow, I don’t care.”

“No, it’s not called a hotel. It’s called an inn.”

Noah turned his head toward his friend with a wry smile, “Dude, please... stop.”