Thief of Time

Making his way to the bakery he patronised earlier, Claud fished Crown out of his bag and placed it on his palm. The small box jiggled happily, before rolling up his arms and cuddling into his neck.

“Such a cute little fellow,” Claud muttered. “What exactly are your origins?”

The box jiggled in reply.

“Oh, that was a rhetorical question. Don’t stress yourself over worrying about it.”

[You have met the requirements to learn ‘Babysitting’. Learn it?]

“Urgh. This is the third time I’ve seen this already. Is there any way I can stop these things from showing up?” Claud muttered. “They keep obstructing my vision. Can’t I just ignore it or—”

A new textbox appeared in his vision.

[By saying ‘Ignore’, you can permanently close any prompt to learn a skill once you see it. To learn a skill whose prompt you’ve ignored, recall the skill name three times in a row. Conveniences of a mana-user discovered: 2/5]

Claud stared at the translucent blue screen. He wasn’t quite sure which one was better — the fact that he’d spent most of his life on damn screens that closed after some arbitrary time, or the fact that he now wouldn’t see the same familiar sight anymore.

“Crown.”

The little box jiggled.

Claud grinned. “Do you see it? Can you see this notification? A blessing from the gods? That I don’t need to have random screens clutter up my view every so often? This is unbelievable.”

The box jiggled once more. Maybe it wasn’t sure why Claud was so emotional, but as someone whose vision had been obstructed over and over by useless prompts, Claud wasn’t going to let that happen.

“For most of my life,” said Claud, “I’ve been living a life where blue popups would appear at the most random of times. These blue popups would vanish after minutes, hours or even days. And they can overlap with other prompts. There was one time that I was effectively blinded by so, so many screens. Couldn’t see anything.”

He clenched his fist. “And now, I’m free. Ignore.”

The screen vanished. “It’s a great feeling. Maybe you don’t get it, but…it’s great to be free of these things!”

Crown rolled over to his neck and nuzzled it. Since its exterior was made out of some soft and velvety material, Claud found the sensation soothing, even more so when he took into account the occasion, and let the little guy nuzzle him more.

Only the Moons knew that he deserved it.

“That was a rather touching story,” someone said from behind him, “but who are you talking to?”

Claud froze, and then turned to face the person behind him, stowing away Crown smoothly at the same time. “Isolde? What are you doing here?”

“I came here to grab some bread.” She sniffed twice. “So…who were you talking to?”

Claud was about to tell her to mind her own business, but it wouldn’t suit his persona. In this city, he was a smooth talker, a quick thinker. He had many flaws, that was for sure, but being unadaptable wasn’t one of them.

“I was talking to myself,” Claud replied. “Just now, I just unlocked the function to ignore skill learning prompts. It got me all emotional.”

“Emotional?”

Claud frowned. “If you don’t mind me asking, how old were you when you became a mana-user?”

“I was around six years old,” Isolde replied.

“You had over a hundred years of lifespan at six?” Claud asked. “How…”

“Oh. I began to burn my mana circuits at the age of six,” Isolde clarified. “I only reached full completion at eighteen.”

“You started to burn…?”

“How in the name of the three Moons did you become a mana-user?” Isolde asked.

“I’m new to this, okay?”

Isolde slapped her forehead. “I’ll get the manual to you as soon as the others are done with it. Okay, first off, mana-users open that Status thing once they’ve burned ten percent of their first mana circuit. You’ll see it there, labelled as ‘Mana Circuit Superimposition. Got it?”

“Oh, so it can be opened once ‘Mana Circuit Superimposition is at 0.1?”

“Exactly. I’m not sure why you don’t know that, but you get the privilege of seeing your status with that much of a mana circuit complete. This is the reason why even butlers and maids of noble families have some mana in them,” Isolde replied.

“Oh, they have some mana inside them?”

“I mean, to even learn Mana Manipulation, you need to have some amount of mana, right? That’s common knowledge…”

“Yeah, no.” Claud bobbed his head. “This is something new to me…although someone with your origins will definitely think of this as common knowledge.”

“It is common knowledge!”

“Then explain to me why isn’t everyone in Licencia emitting some small amounts of mana,” Claud replied. “I’m quite sure ten years of lifespan is nothing compared to having the prospects of being a mage or something.”

It was Isolde’s turn to freeze up. She looked around the place slowly, her brows furrowed. For a moment, her eyes glowed blue, and an expression of shock surfaced on her face. “You’re…right.”

“I know I’m right,” Claud replied. “I don’t doubt your words either, though.”

“What are you getting at?”

“Can you guess?”

Claud’s field of vision was narrowed, but the half-baked bounty hunter was clearly no slouch in thinking things through either. The moment he began his rebuttal, Isolde had already shown signs of deriving the conclusion he’d arrived to a few seconds ago.

It was just her common sense getting in the way.

“Someone…someone’s preventing this from becoming common knowledge in Licencia. And from how information like Mana Manipulation can be learnt is being suppressed…” Isolde breathed out slowly. “Let me ask you one thing, Claud.”

“Go ahead.”

“What’s below a one-folder?”

Claud’s mind blanked out for a moment, and on instinct, he replied, “What do you mean?”

“That means that you, and probably most of Licencia, do not know what a mana-user exactly means,” Isolde replied. “One-folders have a mana circuit superimposition level of 1.0. Below that number is what we call sub-folders. Sub-folders enjoy the same benefits as a one-folder, but they lack the ability to shape mana.”

Her lips curled into a wan smile. “The weakest mages you see out there are just sub-folders with Mana Manipulation, as an illustration. However, the fact that you don’t know that is…worrying.”

Claud clicked his teeth. “If I am unaware of such distinctions, it would not be a stretch to say that in general, most commoners would be the same too. I don’t see why you need that question to help me come to this conclusion, though.”

“I needed it,” Isolde replied, before closing her eyes. “Say, what do you think might happen if I were to go around and let this secret out to everyone else?”

“I wouldn’t do that just yet, if I were you,” Claud replied. “You should go around to other sovereignties, and see if the situation is still the same. Umbra Sovereignty doesn’t have this knowledge on sub-folders; it isn’t just Licencia and the smaller towns.”

The rookie’s eyes flashed, and Claud nodded in satisfaction. It would seem that she was beginning to see the message behind Claud’s words. From her initial analysis, Claud could tell that this noble-born bounty hunter had a rather discerning eye, and a functioning ability to reason things from a different point of view.

It was, frankly speaking, a rather fresh change from the usual snobs he saw. If he had to guess at why she was such a breath of fresh air, the most likely reason was her upbringing.

Getting up from the table, Claud ordered two bags of meat buns.

“Here, catch!”

“Meat buns?” Isolde asked.

“The best in this city,” Claud replied. “Behold the greatness of buns with a solid chicken filling, marinated in lemon juice and pounded to softness.”

“You make it sound like a gourmet meal.”

Claud smirked, and then bit into his own bun. Relishing the meaty goodness, he tore through three buns in rapid succession, only to see Isolde poking at every bun with a silver needle.

“You know,” he said, “you should really get something that defends against poison, or at least detects it automatically. Testing for poison that overtly is just going to make the chef really sad.”

Fortunately, the bakery’s owner was engaged in other pursuits, so he didn’t quite see this heart-breaking display of distrust. Shifting his chair to block her from the baker’s view, Claud took out another bun and scoffed it down.

“You might have a point, but where do I get such artefacts?”

“What’s your budget?”

Isolde paused. “For the purposes of this conversation, let’s just say…one platinum.”

“Ten thousand gold, eh? That can get you something better than my own Ring of Poison Resistance. If you want to be even surer, go to the town centre and look for a place called—”

“Are you free now?” Isolde asked.

“What, me?” Claud, taken aback, nodded. “Nothing much for me to do but to—”

“Then go with me,” Isolde replied. “I’ll buy you whatever I get too if you do so.”

Claud eyed the bounty hunter. “If you buy yourself a Ring of Poison Resistance, does that mean that you’ll buy one for me too?”

“My words exactly. It’ll be in your interest to give me the best choice.”

“So, that’s how one uses money the right way.” Claud bobbed his head. “Fine. You have a deal. Shake on it?”

“Sure.”