The group arrives at their next destination. Kyrion looked up at the sign. Instead of the standard picture-based format, it was a flat board adorned with odd symbols that clearly weren’t letters. Kyrion said nothing about it as Alexander lead them in.

Inside hang various swords, axes, hammers, knives, and other weapons carved from wood and look exceptionally sharp, despite previous statements of being blunted weapons.

“Ah yes, welcome to Ace Carver’s, jr practice armory! Here I sell weapons usable in this kingdom’s Bean Sprout academy.” He laughed at something that only he seemed to get.

“Feel free to browse the shop and if you have any questions, feel free to ask if you want to try something out, I have a dummy room downstairs .” The speaker was an older man, with strong almost, carved facial features, a beard that had a blunt, flat edge where it ends, as though it was freshly trimmed.

After the introduction, Kyrion found himself standing there with a blank expression. Finally, after a good minute of silence paired with some poking and prodding, Kyrion made his way to the owner. He found himself too short for his head to reach over the counter, so he took a few steps back and looked up.

“Mr. Carver sir, I want a weapon that goes whoosh through the air.” Kyrion begins to describe the flying weapons in great detail using his meager vocabulary. “I want the sword to fly like this, and hit my opponent’s like that. Did you get that?” Kyrion ask

Alexander stifled a laugh before clearing his throat. “Eh em! We just came from the arena, and the last match involved a certain mystic, using the Hydra style. His enthusiasm is normal.” He pointed towards a shelf of small weapons. “I’m not worried about the lack of strength to wield heavier weapons, but he seems to have access to the wind element, so weapons he can throw would probably suit him for now.”

Kyrion was hit with a sour expression before whispering something to Charles, “Uh.. are there any bushes where I can. You know… I’m not a barbarian.”

Charles. in turn, looked over to Alexander, who was chatting up the owner. “Follow me,” Charles said, grabbing Kyrion’s hand and dragging him towards a room with an odd bald guy on the door. “Just go in here kiddo. It’s not that hard.”

Doing what Charles said, Kryion went into the room. Some stuff happened, and Kyrion carefully made his way back to the main room, shellshocked.

“Hey grandpa, can I try these out downstairs!?” He said in a rush, sweat rolling down his forehead. “I’ll take

these.” Kyrion grabbed a pair of wooden circular discs with lots of room on the inside.

“The eager one, aren’t you. Asela do you know what you want?” He replied, turning his head over his shoulder.

“Uh...a sickle maybe? It’s something I’ve seen back home.” Asela held her hand to her chin. “I don’t have to fight, right?”

“You don’t have to, but it’s best if you at least know how to protect yourself. You’re learning so that you never have to. Now downstairs we go.”

Kyrion threw knives, bows, shortswords, arrows, and even axes at the dummy 10 feet away. Sadly only the knives and small hammers made it. He then realized he was digging in the wrong pile.

With a reddened face, he picked up an actual throwing knife and threw it as hard as he could. Unfortunately, it flew right past the dummy, and it hit the wall 40 feet away, digging deep into the wall.

“Well I knew you had an arm, your accuracy needs work though. Keep trying various weapons out. I’ll check on the little one.” Alexander walked over to Asela, who was swinging her sickle like the farming tool it was, but it didn’t have enough strength.

“Little one, try putting your body behind the swing, you’ll hit it much harder than you did before. Have you seen Charles?” He asked while looking around for the well-mannered butler.

“I saw him near the stairs. He’s making the face you make when you find out someone switched your orange with a grapefruit.” She starts swinging harder at the wooden dummy, getting a feel for it.

Alexander finally makes it to Charles, who was sitting on the staircase looking off into the distance. He acknowledges Alex’s presence and looks away for a few long moments. “Looks like a certain young man isn’t city broken. I cleaned it up of course but you know how it goes. How is the weapon testing going?”

“Their kids, not good, but it’s fun to watch.” They watched over the kids for a while as they practiced. Kyrion, playing with a disc that had a giant hole in the center. He threw it, and it flew everywhere but towards the target, and by the look in his eye, you could tell he was having fun with this weapon. Asela, on the other hand, managed nothing more than superficial damage and boring cuts. She eventually went and asked the owner if he had anything like the sickle but more fun. He gave her a sickle with a wooden chain at the end. Ace called it the Kama and showed her how to use it. Eventually, the group paid for the Kama, including two throwing discs that were for Kyrion.

“Lets go finish eating, by now things should have cooled down a bit, and if it didn’t, Dorgon himself may step in.”

Alexander leads the way back to the restaurant. As they enter, the feel was noticeably different. The patrons are much quieter and better dressed. The band was replaced by a woman playing a relaxing melody on her harp. The workers are in leather armor, and their waitress still has her axes, only they were worn on the outside of her uniform. From the look of things, they weren’t putting up with another incident today.

“Is this the same place?” Kyrion asked aloud. Jala poked her head out of her sack, nodded, and went back in. Alexander and Charles looked at each other. The former shrugged as the group was taken to a big table that already had a few people there. There sat a muscular and green-skinned giant with pointed ears and two well-polished tusks protruding from his mouth. He seems to be casually wearing a breastplate, and greeves and his gauntlets are placed at his side. Next to him was a human woman with porcelain skin and platinum blond hair. She, in turn, was dressed in brigandine armor and had a faint scar over her left eye. She was similarly armored and had the look of someone important. The third person at the table was a pale green-skinned kid with a small pair of tusk and the same color hair as the woman tied up in a braid behind their head.

“General Alexander! Have a seat you old codger! Haven’t seen you in ages, and did you go and have more kids? Humans sure do sprout faster than I thought.” Says the green-skinned man.

“I retired after the war, Dorgon, and we both know they gave me that rank as a retirement gift. Also these are my grandkids, they will be starting at the academy in nine days. How’s the life of a chef treating you?” Alexander embraces his friend with a firm handshake, which was returned.

“Honey, shouldn’t you introduce us?” Says the platinum-haired woman.

“Yeah, dad, introduce us!” Said the child who seemed to be around Kyrion’s age.

“Oh right, this here is my wife, Freya, from house Carmine, I’m sure you know her from our unit, so I assume this is for the kids. Since you were at the wedding… Ah and this little one is Wura, my youngest daughter, she awakened with some sort of metal spirit, so we plan to have her train this year, and when the recruiters from the big schools arrive, I plan on letting her join one of those so that she can get stronger. I’m sure you noticed the strong winds as well. It’s the best we can do for now.” Dorgon says sagely.

“I see, this is Charles, my butler, Kyrion, my grandson. He is yet to find all his spirits. The little one is Asela, who awakened with the fire king’s emblem. Alexander replied.

Food was brought to the table, a full 7-course meal was served. The kids talked about what they have seen in the city. Jala popped out and made her presence known. They played with her and kept themselves busy. The adults at the table were deeply discussing what Kyrion would refer to as the boring stuff.

Afterward, they started talking about the good old days when Commander Red Bear led a suicide squad behind enemy lines and wreaked havoc on the enemies’ resources and morale.

“I’ve never had food that good.” Kyrion said, patting his stomach. Jala echoed the sentiment.

“This stuff is alright, dad’s still a much better chef than this.” Wura replied.

“You had better food than this?” Asela asked agape. “Our mom can’t even cook.”

“Neither can mine if we’re being honest.” Wura agreed readily. “Hey, why don’t we work on cooking together!”

Jala jumped up, and down delighted by the idea of trying delicious food. Kyrion, on the other hand, tried to fade into his chair, attempting to disappear enough into the background to be forgotten.

After dinner, the group said goodbye while Asela and Wura made plans to meet up tomorrow afternoon. The group walked a bit before stopping outside of a dusty old shack.

“Kyrion, what are your next two spirit slots? For you to progress you need strong spirits, you need to fill up the first three while in the fledgling rank, and while I’d love to hunt for strong creatures you can bond with, I believe it’s best you get what you can, here and now.” Kyrion looked worried but nodded in acceptance.

“I wish they told me all this, but fine, it seems I have a seed and an egg slot. Not sure what that means.” He replied

“It means what you said. Your slots are those with the most potential for growth, but won’t do much from the get go. Let’s go inside.” He whispered to Kyrion.” Charles go on back with Asela we may be awhile.” Alexander said aloud.

The two entered the shop whose owner seemed to be a brown-haired man sleeping with a book over his face. “Welcome to my shop. Don’t ask about the name, you couldn’t prfonounce it. I deal in odd bits a baubles that people find and most have no use for.”

“I’d like to see your supply of old wives tales.” Alexander said bluntly, much to the confusion of Kyrion.

“Ah, I see a real customer.” The man removes the book revealing long sharp ears and eyes that seemed to spin when looked into. “Ah, yes, I can see it, a young plant and a magical beast of some sort.

Give me a vial of the kid’s blood, and I’ll directly give you some very powerful spirits for free and even throw in an item that hides your mark. Handpicked from yours truly. What do you say, kid?”

Alexander looked to Kyrion, who seemed to step back. “I don’t know you, and that’s my blood, I need it. Also, what mark?” He responded, a little freaked out.

“You don’t see it? Well, that’s fair, it is in rather a hard to reach place afterall.” The shop owner stated.

Alexander cleared his throat. “Your not the same one as last time, but it shouldn’t matter. We’re here to do the blind selection for two spirits. You know the categories, I have the money necessary.”

“Great. Well, feel free to look through these two cases. The one on the left contains eggs collected from all over, while the one on the right contains various seeds belonging to magical plants. The man placed 2 containers on the counter. Opening them to reveal eggs with multiple shapes and images floating decorating them. Some plain many were exotic. While the other contained seeds seemingly piled together randomly. Kyrion knew his corp-related seeds, but this was a new experience. All kinds of plants that Kyrion had never seen before.

“Uh sir… can you tell me what these are? “He points to the seeds and then the eggs. The shop owner

shakes his head no.

“It’s part of the challenge, you won’t know what you get until it’s already done and I do not do refunds for this. Truth be told I don’t know what half of these are either. If you can’t decide, why not let your neck partner choose them? It’s gonna be working with them anyway, so it can’t hurt to let her pick.” He leaned back in his chair and replaced his book.

Kyrion took the advice, placed Jala on the table, and let her loose into the box of seeds first. She had seemed to go much deeper than the box had space for but eventually came back with what appears to be a green walnut seed with odd blue tendrils arcing across it like veins. Jala then went to where the eggs were and started tapping on them with her paw. She went through each egg twice before she seemed satisfied with a blue egg with white clouds moving around it.

“I’d pick that one too.” Kyion patted his fox companion on her head. “Grandpa can you get me those? They seem to be Jala approved so I know they’re decent.” Kyrion gulped after saying that.

“Great, that will be 2 soul coins and 50 gold crowns, and since I like you all so much, I’ll give you an emblem

suppressor for free as well. How does that sound?” The owner said energetically.

Alexander grunts grimly, pulling out 2 translucent purple coins and 5 white metal coins with crown symbols on them. “I’m even poorer now, are you happy? You look happy?” He said to the owner of the shop.

“Very happy, bye bye!” He said, giving Kyrion a wool bracelet for his arm and his freshly acquired spirits.

“Kyrion, be sure to get some rest tonight because tomorrow will be a busy day.” They leave the shop and head back to the mansion.

“Gramps... What was that guy?” Kyrion asked.

“They are called Alir’mondri, or demons. They come from a place both close by yet far away at the same time, and come in many shapes and sizes. It’s a very confusing topic to be honest and I know this much from the last shop owner. They are a talkative race as well.”

“I thought demons were beast.” Kyrion stated.

“Some are, it’s complicated.” Alexander pinched his nose. “Let’s continue further quietly.”

They arrived home as the two moons decorate the night sky, Almira and Icaron, the red and blue watchers.

Charles brings Kyrion to his freshly prepared room with an exceptionally comfortable bed. He wasted no time going to sleep that night.