The Strange God

1. 7. What The F*ck? (Part 2)

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"Wait, you mean take Luka?" Higante asked, wanting to confirm. He thought he had misheard Kabun.

"Yes," Kabun replied, looking inside.

"Everything here is trash," he thought.

"What the f*ck?" Stephen exclaimed, using his potty mouth again.

Kabun gazed down at the 170 cm tall, golden-haired, sky-blue-eyed priest wearing a shabby robe. Despite being 29 years old, he still had an angelic face, and despite his stained, once-white robe, he looked handsome.

"Tell me again what Frank said about this house," Kabun asked Stephen with a serious expression.

"He—he said that you own this house and the land it stands on. You–you can do anything you want with it, including its contents."

"That's right. Now, take the kid because this is my house now."

"This is my dad's house!" the kid shouted.

Luka rushed towards Kabun and attempted to bite his legs but was immediately stopped by Higante. He scooped the kid up and held him in his arms.

"Elder Higante, Elder Stephen, this is my home and my dad's house, so I should protect it until he and Mom come back, right?" Luka looked at the two elders with watery eyes and a naive face.

"You did not tell him?" Kabun asked, lifting his right brow.

The two elders looked at each other. They knew that the village head was already benevolent for letting Luka stay in the village by himself. Preferably, he should be adopted by a childless household to have a family to support him while growing up. On the other hand, when he grows up, he will support older adults who adopted him.

Now that the village head was giving the house to a newcomer, he wanted the newcomer to deal with the stubborn kid. They even helped by telling Kabun the sad story of Luka. However, the newcomer refused to budge.

"Kid, your parents are gone," Kabun said earnestly.

"No, my parents are not gone. They are just adventuring and will return when they're tired of adventuring."

"As you can see, he refuses to believe what we say. He may look like a four-year-old, but he is less than one year old. He is more human than a demon," Stephen said.

Kabun looked at the kid. Luka had a tanned skin tone, golden eyes like Lucy's, and platinum blond hair like Lucy's. His horns had not erupted from the skin yet, and he had two horn-like bumps above his eyebrows.

"He resembles my son," Kabun thought aloud.

Stephen and Higante looked at each other with expectations.

"He might adopt the little kid. No wonder the village head seemed confident that he would take care of the kid," they both thought.

Kabun went inside the house and closed the door. "Take the kid and make sure he does not come here," he said from the other side of the door.

"Nooo!"

"Wait!"

All three shouted at the same time.

Snap!–

They heard a finger snap, and something appeared out of nowhere in front of the house.

When they turned their heads, they saw the old furniture and other contents of the house—it might have been all the contents.

"Do not forget to take this garbage with you. Anything you leave, I will burn tonight," Kabun announced.

Snap!–

They heard another finger snap, and an empty horse-drawn carriage and a horse appeared out of nowhere. The horse and carriage were the ones left in front of the village head's house earlier. The horse's lead rope tied itself around the house's exposed beam next to the front door.

"The three boar monsters were all left next to Frank's house."

They heard Kabun's voice from inside again.

"That—that's teleportation, right? Tell me I am not dreaming." Stephen pinched his thigh and shook Higante, asking him to confirm that he was not dreaming.

"Yeah, you are not dreaming. It is teleportation magic. He might be a ranked silver magician," Higante confirmed.

With a constipated look, Stephen grumbled, "But he is only 199 years old. Even a 500-year-old elf would only have one occupation. Nobody has more than one occupation, whether they have a long life span or are of a different race. The only elf we know with the highest rank on the continent was a 445-year-old water mage from the Sun Empire."

"We need to go back and report this to the village head and the others," Higante said with a stiffened face.

He took Luka and walked away toward the village. Luka, sensing the seriousness of the situation, instinctively quieted down.

"Wait. What about Darin's old stuff?" Stephen asked while following his friend.

Luka's father's old furniture and other house contents are helpful for any villager. They can even be sold for a good amount of silver in town.

"We will move it later before night to my place. Luka will also stay with me temporarily," Higante answered without looking back.

Upon arrival at the village head's house, the other three—Frank, Luta, and Bassit—were already seated and waiting for the two to return.

Higante handed the sleeping Luka to Frank's wife, and she left the room.

Frank grumbled loudly with his usually grumpy face, "Why did you use the emergency pendant to call us here?"

Each Elder, including the village head, carried a waist pendant with the carving of the void village symbol on it. These pendants transmit light to each other.

It can only glow three colors: green, which means everything is peaceful or acceptable; yellow, which cautions that there might be danger; and red, which indicates an emergency situation in which the villagers need to be evacuated to a safe bunker and the front lines need defense.

All the pendants were currently glowing yellow.

Stephen and Higante walked closer to the three seated elders and recounted what had happened. All three listeners had unbelievable expressions on their faces.

Frank started brushing his mustache to his beard, saying, "That is really a huge problem."

All four pairs of eyes looked at the short, hunched-back village head and waited for the following words to come out of his mouth.

"And I thought he would adopt the kid since Luka greatly resembles his son."

"That is not the main concern right now," Stephen said, slightly agitated, walking closer to the table.

"What is the main concern right now?" Frank asked, looking at the youngest member of the group.

"He has three occupations and might be silver rank in all of them," Stephen said, referring to Kabun.

"What is the problem with that? With someone like that in the village, no one in the three kingdoms or empires can go against us. We will be the same from the surrounding beasts and monsters." Frank reasoned.

"But—but what if?" Stephen hesitated, unable to say anything against Kabun since he had done nothing wrong.

"Frank is right. Based on what you guys said, Stephen was rude to him multiple times, and Kabun has not retaliated. If it were me, Stephen would be six feet under by now," Luta defended the newcomer, moving her finger across her neck in a killing gesture.

Bassit, quiet since the beginning, looked at Frank and asked, "What will you do with the kid?"

"Well, he needs to choose between the families who were willing to take him a few days ago; otherwise, he can leave the village," Frank said with a smile.

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