The Transport Service

Midas was shaken awake; his spine ached as he got up from the fallen log he had slept on; even Avalon couldn't resist falling asleep—his head drooping down as he sat next to him. The fire that flickered so greatly now was completely burned out; the faint smell of smoke must have awoken the boy—ash piled up in the middle of the tiny rocks surrounding it.

The sun wasn't visible as he looked up to the sky with a stiff neck, its light faint—numbly shining through the carpet of grey clouds spanning what seemed to be the whole forest, shining in light grey tones—possibly announcing rain, something that happens frequently in this region, as Avalon told him.

After a while of staring aimlessly at the clouds, Midas sunk his gaze to focus on his mana again—with open eyes, he let the mana inside of him circle through his limbs again; even though still slow, his pace seemed to improve every time he started paying attention to it.

After mumbling to himself in a faint tone, Avalon's head rose up, his eyes snapping open to see the boy sitting on top of the log in front of him, his sitting pose identical to the one he had found him take a day ago in their room. Avalon admitted to himself that the younglings commitment was greater than he anticipated.

Midas's blank stare eventually rose up to Avalon, only now realizing the man had awoken from his sleep. Getting up from his seat, Midas made his way towards him, able to keep up his mana circulation as he strode towards his sickle to pick it up.

„It might rain today."

Midas foresaw, pointing up to the sky as Avalon's head turned into the same direction, nodding at his remark without any reply—moving his body off the log with a flat yawn, stretching his arms as he rose to his feet. Sighing to himself as he realized the meaning of rain was possibly going to appear soon, he headed towards the path again as Midas followed.

„We'll have to walk through the rain then… We really have no other option but to do so—our time is running low… and I'm not sure if there are that many places to hide from the rain around here."

With a bitter murmur, Avalon announced to the boy, looking at the darkness that lingered in between the many trees, the sun's faint grey light unable to stretch through the pine's crowns. Mist tracked their steps, stretching out from in between the stems and atop the needle trees, formed by the cooler temperatures of the morning.

Through the soft fog, their path was stretching out in front of them; their boots stopped being muddied for a slim while as they crossed a stone bridge, broad enough to support caravans—the mossy stone bricks easily withstanding the weight of multiple people being transported. Granting them a secure passage over the wide river that flowed right under it.

The crashing sound of water falling down the nearby cliff, which elevated up in front of them, woke Midas up, the boy only able to admire the seemingly never-stopping downpour of massive water amounts for a short while as he forced himself to focus up again.

Avalon was used to the long pathways; he came by frequently—more often than he realized—which allowed his legs to not give up on him midway. Midas was used to traveling, yet—without a sledge to transport him—walking this distance started to somewhat cause him leg pain, something the boy wasn't willing to spend thinking power on—focusing on only his mana.

His numb hands were quick to retrieve into his pants pockets—his leather coat now gone, Avalon shivered under the cool climate of the morning, his eyes able to catch slim glimpses of the morning fog before it seamlessly vanished right into nothingness.

Midas curled up as well, hiding his left hand under his bandaged right hand, slotting it between his upper arm and torso. His sunken head traced muddy wheel markings to keep his focus—his pupils tracking the curves and ever-ongoing straights that were drawn into the muddy path they walked on, traced by the wheels of carriages Midas never got to see.

Thinking about rough characteristics that these foreign Water Kingdom rides might possess, his eyes eventually followed a sharp curve, the line on the ground stopping and ending without any other trace—confusing him, his eye rose upwards.

„Alma…!"

Midas tried to shout at the man that was multiple steps in the lead of him—Avalon's eyes widened eventually after hearing Midas's slightly shivering voice.

His gaze was greeted by torn-up light blue and mudded white cloth—wheels that hung motionlessly on their side, a carriage that crashed into a tree—left alone, fallen on its side, the arched roof bent and broken by the collision with the tree. Its wooden supports that spun up the cloth snapped, sticking out of the cloth's fibers.

Returning worried glances, the two of them eventually came closer, examining the flipped inside of it, revealing leftover goods—food, cloth, and books that piled up on the floor. Most likely being left behind only recently, as none of the transported fruit seemed to be rotting—no real smell emitted from it.

„This wheel is damaged…"

Midas left a finger pointed at a damaged wooden wheel, the circular-shaped wood damaged. The boy looked up to Avalon, crouching down in front of the wheel as he watched the man's impression, seeing if he found a conclusion.

„I don't think this carriage started its journey from Puertagua…"

Briefly examining the destroyed wooden wheel that lay in the soft dirt, Avalon returned to take another look at the inside of the ride—his eyes examining round orange fruit, their white spots reminding him of his childhood.

Turning back, Avalon saw Midas get up to also risk a glance into the ride. Throwing the rounded fruit up and catching it in his hand again, Avalon's fingers grasped the slightly hard fruit.

„These originate from the western coast of the water kingdom—they only grow in the most northwestern regions of their land… and they're fresh too—harvested maybe a few days ago…"

Midas's expression turned stern as he watched Avalon juggle the fruit in his hand with a tired face, fitting perfectly in his palm.

„Well… if those who offer the transportation services are salesmen, I wouldn't be surprised if they took goods from here on their way back to the border again… Without any passengers, they would have a lot of places to store things, able to take care of two businesses at once…"

Avalon's eyes widened slightly, nearly missing the chance to catch the orange-toned fruit with his hand as he listened to the boy's dimly spoken conclusion. Eyeing the lowered glance of the youngling next to him for a short moment.

„Yeah—that would make sense… We should put our guard up then; the way the wheel just broke up at one place doesn't feel right… If the wheel was poorly constructed, it would most likely just spin off the shaft that held onto it…"

Midas quietly nodded; the wheel most likely didn't suffer any damage during the collision with the tree, given it crashed into its rounded top—the carriage therefore fell to its side before colliding with the stem, something that might have been caused by someone attacking its rider—destroying the wheel.

„Perhaps someone knew of this… using that to their advantage, waiting until this salesman took the path to get a hold of whatever he transported…"

Something didn't make sense to Avalon regarding that; risking the carriage to tumble over and crash like this wouldn't be ideal if aiming to loot its contents, risking the loot to get destroyed or lose quality. Before Avalon knew it, his fingers grasped one of the transported books—its pages dampened by the juices of the destroyed fruits that lay in the same pile as it.

„No, this definitely came from the university itself… Whoever is behind this most likely was behind something else; I find it hard to believe that stealing widespread literature and fruits like these would be worth the risk of lingering at such a busy road…"

Midas flinched slightly, his head sinking instinctively as something cold touched his neck. Before his fingers could feel what it was, he saw Avalon turn his gaze up at the tree crowns above them; water droplets eventually hit his face.

„Oh well… I suppose this was going to happen soon… How about we just forget all of this and search for a place to rent until this is over…?"

Unsure, Midas simply watched Avalon leave the wrecked carriage behind him, turning to it once more—worriedly glancing at the destructed wheel for a last time before hesitantly following Avalon, who had no trouble forgetting about it for now.

The water on his skin felt cold; without really realizing it, Midas slowly raised his hands up, feeling the water drip down his arms and shoulders, tickling him somewhat. His eyes were unable to track the never-ending amount of droplets that hailed down onto him, getting to experience the things Alma had told him about all these sun cycles ago.

„Come on, Midas… I have no coat because of you… Pick up the pace a little…"

Avalon's plea eventually made his eyes focus up again; he really made it into Water Kingdom territory—his goal of eventually stopping the storm seemed much more reachable now. Once he acquired the language, getting to Ajan would be much easier, he thought, as the youth caught up to Avalon.