ROTLE- Chapter 233- The Horror of A Gunshot (Patreon)

The worry was filling Ted, consuming him from the inside as they waited at the end of the line. They had run and kept on running nonstop. Melvet had wondered how they could run for so long, and away from Aiden for that matter. Valdan had been more than ready to let her know that Aiden would be more than okay. However, when Aiden said run, only a fool did not run.

There was also the part about Rometo going into full blown preparation mode, so there was that.

“What do we do now?” Feira asked. She sounded worried, more worried than a girl like her would be about a simple friend or a simple benefactor. Ted had his suspicions but right now was too serious a time to be cracking jokes, so he said nothing on his suspicions.

Valdan looked at Ted as if waiting for him to make a decision, as if somehow Ted was the next in command instead of him.

Ted didn’t really mind. “Now, we wait,” he answered.

“Will Aiden be fine?”

Melvet had a worried look on her face. “They are going up against a high level [Mage]. But there are two of them, one of which is from the Order and the other was once a student of Valdan. They can hold their own.”

“High praise,” Telma said flatly. “Are you sure your love is not clouding your judgement?”

Ted gaze moved over to Telma. “Careful,” he warned. “My brother is not here to protect you.”

Everything that came out of the woman’s mouth only served to piss him off, even if it was a good thing. He had since identified the reason he hated her, but it did nothing to reduce his hate for her. After all, it was impossible for him to forgive someone who had tried to kill Aiden for no good reason.

He heard a low growl leave the woman. She was like a feral cat, angry at something that she knew she could not defeat.

The low growl made Ted sigh. “You’re awfully loud for a girl standing at the edge of a mountain in the presence of someone that can kill you without batting an eye.”

Valdan’s hand landed on his shoulder immediately. “Lord Lacheart.”

“Lord Dirtwater,” Ted replied.

“Hold it in.” Valdan met his gaze. The look in Aiden’s knight’s eyes told him that in this moment he was talking to the Ted who had once been the [Demon King]. “For specific reasons, this mountain she knows of is important to Aiden.”

Telma relaxed a little at the knight’s words.

“You and I both know that he can find it without her,” Ted replied.

Telma stiffened a lot once more.

“Yes,” Valdan agreed, “but there is not yet a reason for us to make it more difficult for him.” Then he changed the topic. “How are they doing so far?”

Ted paused, blinked. He looked at Valdan. “How am I supposed to—”

“I am not Aiden, Ted,” Valdan interrupted him. “I know for a fact that you have a familiar with advanced stealth present with your brother at all times that he is away from you, as long as you can handle it.”

Ted pursed his lips, then sighed. He pointed a cautionary finger at Valdan. “You will tell him nothing of it.” Then he turned the cautionary finger on the others. “Nothing. Got it?”

Heads nodded very quickly. Even Melvet nodded quickly but like that of someone playing along. It was akin to an adult scolding children and that one other adult around playing along. As per Elami’s advice, Ted remained wary of Melvet. The church, after all, was really nobody’s friend.

Ted scowled. “Telma.”

The woman nodded very quickly, so fast she would’ve given herself whiplash if she wasn’t careful.

“Good.”

Ted turned away from the group and activated a skill.

[You have used Class skill Second Eye.]

His vision shifted slightly immediately. It wasn’t full or overlapping. Instead, the new sight felt akin to a memory, as if he was remembering what was happening. Personally, Ted hated [Second Eye] because of something he had discovered on Nastild. The higher you rose in level the more specific the skills you gained. For example, eye gave him the ability to see what a specific summon was seeing. Why couldn’t it simply be a skill that gave him the ability to see, hear, and smell what his summon was seeing, hearing, and smelling. It felt like a shitty design to him.

Still, it was better than nothing. He could only imagine how horrible it would be if he had to control all his familiars individually and couldn’t give them any level of autonomy.

The familiar he had with Aiden had been hiding in the rocks of the mountain ever since they’d turned and run. He found Aiden and Rometo jogging through the mountain, following the path that his familiar had borrowed in the rocks. Just as he had guessed, they ignored the other paths already burrowed into the mountain that his familiar had noticed. Ted had suspected the new path was what Aiden wanted them to follow, but there was a chance it would be maze-like and people could get lost in it, so Ted had settled for the path his familiar had dug.

“They seem fine,” Ted said absently, watching Rometo and Aiden’s lips moving. They were talking, and judging by the look on Aiden’s face, it was about something important.

A little eavesdropping wouldn’t hurt… right?

His eyes moved over to Elami. The [Healer] that was not really a [Healer] would definitely advise it.

He’s such a bad influence, Ted thought before activating another skill.

[You have used Class skill Auditory Guest]

In the next moment, sound came with the sight and Ted found himself remembering the contents of the conversation.

“… A way a [Demon King] can get significantly stronger that most people do not know about,” Rometo was saying. It caused Ted to pause and do a doubletake.

They were talking about the [Demon King]? Why? He thought Aiden did not talk about it with anyone but Valdan and him. What else did Rometo know? Had Aiden told him the truth or was Rometo simply working his own angle from information he had as a member of the Order?

“Another well-guarded secret?” Aiden asked, giving Ted the answer to his question.

“Another well-guarded secret,” Rometo confirmed. “In the records my family once guarded, it taught us how the [Demon King] grew to possess such overwhelming strength.” He stopped moving now and turned bodily to face Aiden. “He had to go through portals that are not specified.”

Ted was a little confused now. Rometo had said his family, not the Order. What did his family have to do with the [Demon King]?

Rometo continued, speaking at length, proving to know a little too much to be a safe companion. He spoke of fighting demons, specific demons of specific power. He spoke of a greater world and how there was a path to follow before getting to become the [Demon King]. Ted’s interest got the best of him as he listened.

To Ted’s slight displeasure, Aiden was also interested, wanting to know what the levels were. From what Ted knew, and how Aiden behaved. He suspected that Aiden wanted to pull of what he had accused him of doing in their past life. He wanted to find a way to send them home. The only problem was that in their past life, Ted had seen the possibility through the path of becoming the [Demon King], and something told him that Aiden would follow that path if he thought it was the only way.

That was a burden he would definitely not allow Aiden to carry. Not in this life. Not in any life.

“What’s happening?” Valdan asked.

“Rometo is proving to be a potential problem,” Ted answered absently as Rometo informed Aiden of the first step which was gaining the title of [Demon King Candidate].

True to his now curious nature, Aiden asked for the second step. And Rometo was more than happy to give it, finally inscribing his name in Ted’s bad book. Apparently, he needed to gain something called [Heir to the Throne].

“You,” Rometo was saying, “will need to bring that monster back and kill it to grow. You need to—”

Rometo shut up abruptly, then moved. Ted saw nothing, felt nothing, heard nothing. In the blink of an eye his interface popped up in front of him.

[Summoned familiar Stealth Leech has been slain]

Ted frowned, slightly impressed that Rometo had sensed the creature when Aiden had never sensed it.

Also, a new thought came to his mind.

What monster?

“What happened?” Valdan asked. Ted had probably reacted to the suddenness of his interface’s appearance.

Ted dismissed the notification with a shrug of will. “Something or someone found the familiar.”

Worry settled in Valdan’s eyes. “We should go back for him. You know where he is, right?”

Ted nodded. [Familiar Sense] gave him real time awareness of where all his summoned familiars were within a specific range, and since it had been active, draining on his mana since he’d left the familiar on Aiden, he’d known exactly where they had been at all times.

“I’m not sure he would be a fan,” he argued. “Besides, we still have these guys to watch over.”

“Melvet is more than capable of ensuring their safety,” Valdan returned. “They’ll be safe with her.”

Ted took a moment to think about it. “It’s not that I don’t trust her, but Aida will be especially pissed if anything were to happen to Zen over there.”

Zen blinked, clearly confused. “Why me?”

“Just because,” Ted shrugged. Aiden and Zen were a sad story written in dramas. A tale of best friends who could no longer be best friends because one of them had changed too many things. He wondered if Aiden had considered the possibility before seeking Zen out. Meeting under different circumstances and hierarchical positions had cost Aiden the friendship he had been looking for. And Zen would never know.

Ted saw it in Aiden’s eyes sometimes, the slight hollowing of regret, the second guessing. He knew Aiden sometimes wished he had done things differently when it came to getting Zen. Alas, Aiden was a regressor, not a time looper.

In the end, Ted succumbed to Valdan’s argument and agreed to return for Aiden.

“Keep them safe,” he told Melvet as he and Valdan prepared to leave. “If something were to go wrong and Telma can’t make it, I’m sure Aiden would understand. You can’t save everyone after all. Sometimes, people just get pushed off the edge… I mean fall off the edge.”

He winked at her before turning away and saw the amused smile on Melvet’s face. A part of him hoped Telma would cause a problem and end up getting pushed off. If it didn’t happen… well, he was sure there’ll be more chances.

They left them not long after, footsteps hurrying down the path. Only when they’d made two turns did Valdan speak again.

“You do not like Rometo,” he said.

Ted nodded. “I do not.”

“Why? Is it because he is from the Order?”

“That’s part of it.”

“Aiden was trained by the Order in his past life,” Valdan pointed out, letting Ted know that he and Aiden still talked about Aiden’s past life every now and again.

“And yet, his instinct is not to return to them,” Ted pointed out. “His instinct is to keep Zen from them. They had their uses, but he has deemed them to not be good enough to return to them. I’d argue it is a thing of moral dilemma.”

“Perhaps,” Valdan conceded as they walked at a quick pace. “But something tells me that you know something more that has made you like him a lot less.”

Ted didn’t need to think about it. For all of Aiden’s machismo, he actually listened to Valdan. It was something about Aiden that eleven unknown years still hadn’t changed. He could listen without obeying. There were two types of people that Aiden talked to. The first were those who talked and Aiden didn’t care. There were a lot of those in life. Then there were those who talked and Aiden listened. The thing was that it was difficult to tell sometimes because he rarely obeyed. Valdan fell into the category of the latter.

If Aiden was hell bent on killing someone and someone he listened to told him to walk away from the fight, Aiden would most likely end up in said fight because he was stubborn but would not kill the person. That was how Aiden listened. It was not the best, but it was something. Perhaps he could use it to his advantage here.

“Rometo might be advising Aiden towards becoming the [Demon King],” he said. “Or at least doing something favoring it.”

“I can’t say I see the problem,” Valdan said without inflection. “We both know of something regarding a person being a [Demon King] and not being bad.”

Ted blinked. “You do not mind?”

Valdan paused. “He did not tell you?”

“About what?”

“About me.”

“What about you?”

Valdan looked visibly confused. “He really does keep things from you.”

“Of course,” Ted said, unbothered. “Especially if he thinks it’s not really my business.”

“And it doesn’t bother you?”

“We are brothers,” Ted chuckled. “We keep more things than you can imagine from each other. We just make sure not knowing won’t harm the other person.”

“Is this a known agreement?” Valdan asked, intrigued.

Ted shrugged. “More like an unspoken rule. We just know.”

“Then how do you know if—”

Valdan shut up and reached for his sword as a loud boom shook the air and their ears. Ted froze in place, gripped by an old instinctual fear.

It can’t be, he thought. He couldn’t be sure, but it sounded so familiar.

Valdan walked forward while Ted remained in place, making no sudden movement. Still, his hand snapped out to grab Valdan by the arm before the man could go far.

Valdan turned and looked at him. He saw the look on his face and asked, “Do you know that was?”

“I can’t be sure,” Ted managed to say, regaining his composure. “But if we get there and anyone points a weapon at you from a distance, dodge. Don’t try to block it or use your skill to intercept it. Just dodge. Got it?”

Valdan nodded skeptically.

Ted hoped he was wrong and another boom rang through the air as if to dash his hopes against the wall. The last thing he needed was a version of Aiden that was dealing with the death of Valdan.

And he had no idea where a gun was placed in the power rankings of Nastild. Another gunshot rang out, and he knew that they had to hurry.

…

The creature pulled the trigger, the gun boomed, and Rometo disappeared from his advance, appearing off to the side.

“What the heck is that?” he snapped.

The chimera turned and leveled the gun at Aiden. Aiden’s mind raced at the sight of the gun. He’d never been shot or shot at before, so his brain wasn’t sure of what to do. Once upon a time, King Brandis had asked him how the weapons of his world would fare against monsters and he had speculated that anything above level thirty would survive easily. Now, staring at the gun, at level one hundred and forty-nine, he wasn’t so confident.

The creature squeezed the trigger once more.

Aiden’s grip on his sword twitched with indecision.

The world boomed once more with the horror of a gunshot.