The Flowers Are Back

"I do! Ugh! Fine," Rolas said, quick to change the topic, "like I said, hold the gem…"

Just as she began talking Page told her, "Zeeth and I are going to have a talk, why don't you teach Gror first, we can catch up later."

Rolas agreed but Gror seemed a little hurt, "You guys are going to leave me out of a secret conversation?"

"Trust me, you don't want to hear this. It's nothing but trouble."

"Try me."

Page said, "I don't want you to hear this as well," and walked off far enough to make sure they couldn't hear him and created a small bubble of mana around him to prevent any sound from leaking out. Rolas seemed to have winced at this without looking at them, clearly trying to listen in on their conversation.

"That old lady… trying to listen to us, shouldn't she know that's just more trouble?" Page stared at her menacingly as she began her lesson.

"What's up?"

"Right, so when I met the Dark magician of the Eight in my future, Carter wasn't the one in the role, Rolas was. But I hadn't met her until fifteen years from now when she did become one of the Eight. I've never heard of Carter before, he must've died before I met him in the past. Anyways, that means if history follows, he will die within these ten years and Rolas will eventually succeed him."

"Rolas becomes one of the Eight? That's why you brought her? I thought it was because your dad was friends with her."

"He is, they were team members on some secret mission a while back but that's a minor reason. In a few years, she will be known as the Obsidian Warhammer."

"That's a terrifying name."

"Yeah, and for a terrifying reason, she went around massacring her enemies using the darkest and most painful magic. But this means we have a few choices, try to figure out what it was that killed Carter to save him and acquire his favor, or suck as much as we can out of him before he dies."

"Your dad knew some powerful people."

"Yeah, being a world-class merchant helps with connections. In a few years, I'm gonna be friends with a king."

"That's so cool!"

"Yeah, his father will die and he will succeed the throne at the age of 19."

"Oh, shouldn't you warn his dad?"

"He died from old age, nothing much I can do now. They all know he's passing away soon, they've begun preparations. Including a coup d'etat from his mother and half brother which will fail within 12 hours from a slight miscalculation of his power, huhuhu. I'm friends with powerful people, too."

"That you earned from your dad."

"Anyways, enough talking. Let's go learn black magic."

"Right, god said the best way for me to learn magic is to get hit by it constantly. Or rather, have me absorb the magic that is around me when I get hit."

"Right! Then that means at least one of your slimes must've soaked up a bunch of magic residue from the fog we found at the lab, pull some out to see which ones have the highest concentration. We will work with those."

Zeeth scooped a few slime pearls out of his brown robes from underneath his slime armor, the majority of them were blue. A few had turned lighter or darker, some green and some even a tint of purple but Page said those weren't enough. They had affinity but it wasn't high, there were bound to be higher ones amongst his 100 slimes.

From his fifth handful, he noticed one amongst the many with a deep purple shade. It was like a glossy purple eggplant. As it expanded, the density got weaker and the purple shade decreased a lot as if it had been adulterated by water. It got to the size of his head before he stopped growing it, afraid it would be revealed to the others.

The bubble was opened up after it had shrunken to its proper size and popped back behind the robes. "Rolas, I have a favor to ask," Zeeth said, determination filled his stoic face, aware of the pain he might be facing.

"I'm already teaching you for free, what more do-" she had been turning around as she said that but paused when she saw how determined he looked, his fists and jaws clenched as if ready to challenge the world. "What is it?"

She had a certain soft spot for strong-willed men.

"I want you to hit me with your most powerful magic that won't kill me along with that locking thing to keep it on me. I don't mind the pain."

"A-are you a masochist?" Gror asked from behind Rolas.

"NO! Of course not, but I have a reason for this. Instead of teaching me black magic, I just have this one request. To hit me with your most mana costing black magic that won't kill me along with the locking."

"What? You're a little boy, how could I do that? It'll hurt as crazy, war-hardened criminals scream at the name of some of these black magic skills I have. Besides I don't even know why you wanna do this."

"I think I can handle it, it's for personal reasons that I wouldn't like to share. Also, try to avoid the robe and aim for my body beneath it, I don't wanna damage these."

"Listen, I don't know if I can or even should agree to that."

"Please." His stoic expression had come back, determined to make this work.

She finally sighed and said, "Fine, but don't come complaining to me if you don't like it. I won't be able to unlock the lock once it's on. It will last for however long I want it to, so for a trial run I will do 5 minutes."

"Do half an hour. If we just do 5 minutes I might get scared and back out, half an hour and I will get used to the pain."

"You don't even know how strong it is!"

"Fine, then give me a trial run," Zeeth held out his bare forearm out for her to hit.

She hesitantly complied, putting a hand on her elbow and yelling, "Dark Twist" as she quickly swiped her hand down at his arm. A small tornado of black magic spun out of her hands and hit his skin, the magic grabbing and twisting his skin like it was dozens of tiny hands trying to rip his skin off. It lasted for about three seconds but the mark was clear, there were twisted purple marks in a large circle on his arm, the skin was twisted and slightly looser.

"Geez, you want that on your body for thirty minutes? You're not gonna die but you're gonna come out a lot uglier, these scars won't heal with time. You're going to have flappy, twisted skin for the rest of your life."

"Then what if we heal it with magic?" Zeeth asked, rubbing his bumpy, twisted skin.

"Do you have someone in mind?"

Zeeth looked at Page but he, unfortunately, shook his head. "But those flowers you have could be useful."

"Flowers? Oh, these flowers?" Zeeth reached in and grabbed out a bunch of those colorful flowers he first found in that forest even before he had met Afir. he had neglected them for so long that they all climbed to the back where they stayed hidden. Since they had been compressed so tightly this entire time they had hardly changed at all. He decompressed them as he pulled them out and showed them to Rolas.

"Oh, chamomile flowers. But...why do they seem so big?"

"What do you mean?"

"The ones that I usually use are about half that size and much lighter in color, how come yours are so colorful and full of mana?"

"I dunno, but do you know how to use them? I have a bunch and I don't really know how to use them. I just know the heart-shaped ones are deadly, but when prepared properly it can temporarily boost adrenaline levels. The only issue is after that you also feel more tired mentally and physically."

"You know quite a lot, even though I wasn't familiar with the aftereffects. How many flowers do you have of each? I can create some pretty powerful potions with what you've given me."

"I think I have about 400?"

"400?? Where the hell...and they're all like this?" she said, amazed and excited.

"Yeah, I think so. I don't remember too well, it's been a while."

"Come on then, take them out of your magic knapsack, I gotta see them." She seemed to have assumed he was keeping them in a spatial bag and Zeeth was about to correct her when he remembered the warning Afir gave, that it was illegal to compress things without special permission so he kept quiet about them and followed her into the lab once again.