TBATE Ballad of Madness

Chapter 7 Journey (2)

I've never been a traveler. Aside from the occasional school trips, travelling to see new places really felt like a chore. Maybe because of this paired with my baby physique, I just slept through most of the way. So when I found myself in the forest beside my mother, sleeping in a sitting position the moment I opened my eyes, I was quite shocked.

'Is it that time already?' I thought to myself as I took in my surroundings. Art was sitting next to me while our parents were talking about the past with their fellow ex party members. Then, as if on que, Helen approached us as she asked, "I heard both of you awakened, is it true?"I tried to say something but realized my mouth was dry and felt as if it was sealed, probably curtesy of the nice nap I took.

I reached for the water pouch while Art replied, "Yes" She then proceeded to ask stuff like how did it felt and the color of our mana core. We were still in the process of answering when Adam asked, "Hey Reynolds, do you mind if I test them a little?"

'So, we've reached this moment already huh...', I thought to myself as I tried to hide my smirk.While mother looked a bit hesitant, our father looked towards and gave slight nod before saying, "Alright, but be careful. We've only done some light body workout and mana exercise, I've yet to teach them proper fighting techniques."

Art stood up immediately, picked up his wooden sword and started walking towards the empty space before making a, what I assumed was his fighting stance. I just stood behind him doing some basic stretching as I'd only woken up a few moments ago. Adam on the other hand proceeded to pickup a stick.

"Come at me.", he said with a chuckle, "Lets see what you're made of!!"

While I not the type to seek trouble, which fan wouldn't be excited to participate in an event they've only ever read of!! Plus with our mother around, I wasn't that worried about getting hurt either.

The moment Art charged towards Adam, I ran the other way, trying to circle around them. Adam's focus was shifted towards me as he tried to half heartedly block Art. To everyone's surprise, Art changed the direction of his swing and caught Adam off guard, or at least that's what it looked like till he managed to dodge the attack while preparing his counter attack at the same time. The moment he swinged his stick at Art, I threw one of the many stones I picked up while I was acting to stretch.

"Oww" said Adam as he looked back at me with a surprised expression. A smirk came to my face as I saw Art hit Adam's ankle making him loose his balance. To both of our surprise though, he managed to perform a full split before almost landing a kick on Art. Art managed to slip past as I kept throwing stones at Adam, trying to distract him but to no avail. Instead, he immediately set his attention on me as he charged towards me while I started running away.

'This is bad', I thought to myself as I was barely able to understand my situation. 'How the hell does Art manages to remain so calm!!'

"What happened boy, outta rocks??", he said as he was about to swing at me. I jumped towards my left disregarding my balance, barely dodging his attack when Art appeared towards his right.Just as Adam was about to block his attack, I threw the last stone I'd been preserving for this very moment. 'Hopefully it works', I thought to myself as I threw the stone at him.

"It won't work twice", Adam gave a smirk as he said this and dodged but to his surprise, the stone curved just enough to land a hit on him but he used his shoulder to block. I was barely able to stand back up again when Art was thrown over me knocking me back down. I managed to sit back up after what felt like an eternity as I saw the stupefied faces of everyone glaring at us.

Our mother quickly rushed towards as she used a healing spell while asking in a rushed voice, "Are you both alright? Does it hurt??"

"I'm fine mom", Art said followed by me, "And so am I"

"Haven't taught them proper fighting techniques my arse, how the hell did you train these monsters??", Adam said as he messaged the lump Durden had given him.

"I didn't taught them that!!" Our father managed to say as he quickly reached us and asked us if we were ok. Then he lifted us up and took us to our seats before placing us down. Getting on his knees so as to reach our eye level, he looked at Art and me and asked, "Where did you both learn to coordinate and fight like that?!"

While it went worse then I expected, I wasn't gonna tell him how I already knew about this fight and had thought what I would have done.

"While reading books and watching you dad", Art said.

"And its not like we didn't used to spar till we got tired" I said with a grin.

"Sorry for smacking both of you guys, I just didn't expect you to be this skilled", said Adam while looking towards me and Art.

Next, Durden came to me before asking, "Did you intentionally did that with the stone you threw near the end of the fight?"

I realized that everyone was looking at me. "Yes, although it didn't exactly curve the way I wanted it" I answered.

"It seems that your son has an affinity for earth, Reynolds", Durden said as he looked towards father.

"Since when were you capable of doing that?", father asked in an excited voice.

"Not for long, I only recently found out one day while I tried to mimic you dad", I said while trying to give an innocent smile.

Then Durden started asking me a couple of other questions about what else I could do while Jasmin helped in shifting the attention towards Arthur as she asked him about his movement trick. I found our mother smiling as she saw us.

I couldn't help but feel a bit nostalgic.

Days passed by in an instant while travelling. While most adults were focused on trying to learn Art's footwork, I got to learn some interesting things about mana manipulation from Durden himself. Despite the fact he spoke less, he was able to give me precise answers to most of my doubts.

Soon we reached the foot of the mountain which had the teleportation gate at the top.