Lord Jaya sat with his council, 9 heads looked back at him.
"We have to be stricter with the processing of people into the city. If those cultists had been aiming to commit a terrorist attack, they could have slaughtered hundreds before we could stop them."
"What do you propose we do? Register papers?"
He rubbed his eyes, "Perhaps, I will speak to Queen Nasuada on the subject." He looked back at his council. "I know some of you have been voicing concerns over the exploits of the First Year Pearl students."
"I find that they are gathering too much attention and have caught the ire of the majority of the student body unfairly." Lord Jaya turned to his friend.
"Farooq, you never spoke up before on this topic…"
The Surdan grinned. "Come now, you all know I don't care too much about these things, the students fighting out their problems is alright, and I find the penalty a worthy deterrent. But these children have amassed enough power to turn into a sort of gambling prize. Eventually they will tire and lose."
"Well…" Mortimer began, "That's the nature of it, once they lose it should be over."
Farooq shook his head, "I fear it incites a cowardice from the rest of the Pearl students."
"You realize though that we can't make any moves to stop this, that would be preferential treatment, and given the relationships many of them have with us, Nasuada and Trianna would likely not listen to any excuses."
Farooq shook his head, "Something should be done, now though, why are three of our council members missing?"
Lord Jaya laughed. "They are checking on the students in question…."
"You know Katya, you and your friends need to stop overexerting yourselves so often, magic can heal your bodies, but your mind needs time to recuperate."
"Yes mom…" Katya turned away embarrassed as her mother patted her on the bed. The hospital room was much larger than the one Morgan and Faris had been in before.
"Why does everything hurt…" Venka moaned.
"Because you used up too much magic, and because if it didn't, I'd make it hurt." Seya laughed.
"You know you're here with us too." Nya added. She winced as her older sister, Celica, flicked her on the forehead.
"You all are stupid beyond compare, taking on Lord Jaya's daughter? Are you insane?! And worse of all you didn't hang in till the end Nya! What do you think dad will say!?"
"Oh, all of you calm down!" Rakus began. "The most important thing is you are all alive."
"Grandpa…" Morgan began.
"Yes, my sweet grandchild?"
"Please, I am strong enough to eat my own soup."
"Nonsense!" Rakus began indignantly, cooling the soup on the spoon. "Now open the cave for the bat!"
Stifled chuckles could be heard.
"I think though we should address the elephant in the room." Morgan swallowed the last bit of his spoonful, failing to hold his grandpa back from stuffing the next spoonful in.
"Yeah…" Bartholomew, who was enjoying the entire spectacle turned to Faris. "Why did you agree to the mage's duel? You know the vast majority of your team is unable to fight, and I may be a member, but I believe I already stated I don't fight."
The rest of his team turned to look at Faris, who was eating a sandwich while reading on of the books Lord Jaya had procured for him, he looked up at his team. "If I didn't agree to do so, we would have had to forfeit half our gathered energy. It's a really stupid rule if you ask me."
"Unfortunately, it's required to keep teams from banking on their winnings. But why did you agree to do the match in two days? Your team won't have recovered." Sona looked at him, eyebrow raised.
Faris shook his head his hair shaking in front of him. "I've got to cut this a little."
"I like it!" Seya chimed.
"Then I'm definitely cutting it." He sighed, "Anyways, I agreed because they challenged us because they thought you guys would be too weak to fight, which you are. So, either we give them a huge plethora of energy for nothing or we give them an even larger amount of energy and end our winning streak, which would ruin our reputation and destroy our momentum."
"I see, but…"
"But why did I take the worse option? Because if we had instead opted to wait, we would have been seen as weak and cowardly, and they would have bothered us incessantly until we finally slip or give up."
"So, we get it over with now?" Venka asked.
"No, this is because I didn't stop you from fighting. So, I told them I would be the only one they faced." He stopped their uproar with his open palms. "Calm down, if I lose, they only take my magic."
"What if they break you in retaliation? Each of those students have nasty rumors associated with them." Seya replied. "I'd rather not risk that."
"Oh please." Venka grinned. "Faris has this…" She turns to him. "Right?"
Faris smiles and pats his chest confidently. "I have no fucking idea ha-ha…"
His friend's expressions made him begin to chuckle. "Are you insane?" Nya asks angrily.
"Well, if you weren't that brave, I wouldn't have fallen for you darling!" Seya added, winking.
"Anyways if you'll excuse me, I'm going to train. Don't follow me." Faris ignored Seya's quip, taking the books and heading out.
The room was left with silence before Venka cleared her throat. "Well, at least he's not too nervous."
"Shouldn't we help him?" Morgan asked, "Maybe lend our magic stones?"
"Faris made us promise not to give the magic stones to anyone, not even fellow team members to share in between." Katya replied. "We aren't held by the ancient language to do so but it's still important to him.
"He never made me keep that promise." Seya began to gingerly get up. "I'll pump so much magic into him he won't be walking straight. And who knows," She winks at Venka, "Maybe I'll get something in return."
Venka stared daggers at her, "If you want to be on our team you sit back down and recuperate, Faris did this so we could get rest, and probably to leave the attackers with a lesson. So, don't sully his awkward kindness."
Seya groaned, "Fine, but I really am worried about him, for the sake of those other students he better win."
Faris shook his head to clear it as he entered the slums. It had been over a month since the scramble to procure medicine to help Martha, and enough had been left over to help others who had begun to suffer the beginning strains of it in that area. Luckily the goons hadn't attacked, but they had begun to show up again, so he was heading over there to make his presence known, and maybe calm his nerves.
They are looking at me now.
The kids had stopped playing and looked at Faris with nervousness and awe, until one blurted out, "Did you bring those cakes!" They groaned when he shook his head, then grinned when he opened his satchel.
"I decided to make something a bit better." The kids began to crowd around him, taking large bowls he handed out, stuffing them to the brim with a very meaty stew, with even larger chunks of meat and vegetables in it. A few smiled as they sunk their teeth into sweet loaves of bread. "Like them? Cool, there's enough for your entire families to make a feast out of it."
"Thanks mister!" One girl smiles sweetly. Faris rubs her head affectionately.
"You are welcome, question, do you guys know where the 'tax collectors are?'" The kids looked at him nervously.
"Where's strong big sister? She was really strong! She can help you beat the baddies mister cook!"
Faris smiled, "I'm just as strong as 'strong big sister' imagine my cooking skills are this." He held his hands apart by about a foot. "My fighting skills are this much!" He made a big show spreading them far. The kids giggled, and after a bit more playing around, he was given directions into an even deeper part of the slums. He eventually found himself in front of a large and dilapidated garrison/ armory/ stable house. The red and blacks and muted greys of Galbatorix were faded from the disrepair, and several parts of the building looked like they had been removed, like places in the destroyed garden that would have likely had statues. Faris looked up, if he were to guess it would be maybe four pm on earth based on the sun's position, so he had a few hours till sunset. "Welp, better head in and say hi."
"Lost little boy?" He turned to see three goons staring at him menacingly. The one in the middle held out a wicked curved dagger, he was an ugly fellow, missing enough top and bottom teeth in a way to give his smile a checkered look, he had a scar going down his face over his lips, and his eyes betrayed the wicked intentions he had. Faris found to his amusement none of the men were even aware that he had connected to their minds.
I kinda understand what Elva feels when she talks about the ugliness of people. He quashed his grimace and instead took up a scared look. Taking out a bag he trembled. "I-I have 30 gold; can you help me get home? I'm lost and my parents will be looking for me soon."
The vagabond snatched the coin purse, playing with the jingle and turning towards the other two, who grinned in turn. "Sure, little boy, we can help you. We just need you to stay with us a bit so we can find out where your rich little basta- erm, I mean parents are."
Faris hid his smile as he shook enthusiastically. "O-of course, th-thank y-you sirs!" He gave a nervous smile, to which the thugs merely grinned wider, herding him towards the large building. Before he knew it, he was ferried to a room and pushed over. They began to rush to search the rest of his pack only to collapse in splitting migraines as what felt like thousands of daggers shaped for the sole purpose of inflicting torment drilled into their skulls. Faris calmly walked up, grabbing his coin purse back. "Sorry bloke, borrowed it from a friend." He grinned, you understand right?" After a bit of time he released his mental strike, two of the men collapsed in exhaustion, one man got up angrily, and fearfully.
"You're a devil child!" He turned to run.
Faris let him run as he calmly walked towards the hidden passage he discovered from tearing into their minds. Opening the door, he looked in to see 3 children, battered and bruised, and clearly starving, they looked up at him fearfully. "I'm here to help," He said gently, letting them out and handing them his emergency jerky and waterskin. As they each took swigs, he began to heal their bruises. He turned back into the room, the foul smell of rotting bodies was starting to fill the air, he closed the door and cleared the smell away with magic, hiding his rage to keep the children comfortable.
"Are you an angel?" The youngest, a girl asked him. He shook his head, chuckling.
"No, but then again it's a matter of perspective, anyways, take as much food as you want, and stay in this room for a while." He turned to the men, then cast invisible shackles on them, draining large amounts of their energy to create the shackles. "They won't be able to bother you, when I come back, I'll get you home." Faris hadn't seen them approach Martha and her son, but they targeted others, it was time to revise his deal. The children nodded, hope in their eyes as they looked at their savior. Faris took out a dagger and handed it to the oldest child, a dirty boy barely younger than him. The child blinked a few times at the weapon, then gripped it tightly. Faris nodded grimly, turning and leaving the room, closing the door and locking it magically to only open if they or he touched it, he placed a tiny quartz into the keyhole, it would last 30 minutes, too much time, but better safe than sorry.
"Stop right there!" He turned casually to see he was surrounded on both sided by 30 men, equipped with various levels of makeshift weaponry. "Ulgauw's been busy." He smiled at the alarm on their faces. "Your extorting of children to supply yourselves with this stuff, it's kind of sad. Half of you have families, aren't you worried for them?" He shook his head, when he opened his eyes, the mirth was gone, "It's disgusting!" The men all collapsed as they felt their energy leave them, like they had just run a thousand miles, try as they might none had the energy to get up.
"What… what did you do?!" One asked.
"Well, normally how things go, you guys gang up on one little kid, then squeeze him or her out of all the resources you can get, be it money, resources, labor, or sadistic pleasure." He stabbed one of the men in the hand. He didn't have the energy to scream for more than a second before gasping in exhaustion and pain. "And you hug your son with that same hand? How do you live with yourself?" He turned to the rest of them, "So, I thought, perhaps its best I come here, at first I wanted to kill you all, and it would have been really easy." The men begin to whimper in pain, a few pissed themselves. "Then I realized I derive no pleasure from that, because you're all fucked up because you had a shit life, and all I'm doing is breaking the cycle in a really stupid way, and also I'm unfortunately so much more powerful than an average person that it feels like putting down a rabid dog over killing someone, which, in my opinion, is a terrible way to go about life, and to be honest, I don't think I have the right to kill you when you pose no threat to my person and couldn't ever hurt me unless I chose to be criminally negligent." He smiled, "Then I thought, 'I know! I'll get them arrested.'" He turned to 6 of the men, "unfortunately that would ruin the lives of your children. Horma, Tania is a cute little girl, I hope you enjoyed those fried doughballs I made for her and the rest of the children, she's probably expecting you hope for the meat balls I recently brought." The man looked at him with a mix of guilt and terror, turning his head in shame. Faris kicked his side angrily. "See what I mean? The same people you terrorize are the same people you belong to, removing you will easily lead to them ending up just like you, and a person more comfortable with killing, or weaker than me would just kill them and right off everyone in these slums." He sighed, "I was troubled, so, as if in an epiphany, I decided, I'm going to kick your asses and instill just enough terror in all of you that if you so much as look at another person wrong, you'll all remember me, I know where you all live, and I'll give you a second chance to make things better. The city guards are looking to hire more people to help be on the lookout for dangerous individuals, like who you are now, maybe after cleaning yourselves up you can get respectable jobs that due to lucky circumstance opened up, it'll be harder than the money you make now probably from exploitation, and a few of your will be arrested and end up in jail. And you'll have to deal with the mistrust you created with the rest of the citizens in these slums."
"Why are you butting in?!" One of the collapsed men spoke angrily.
"Well see I didn't want to come in here guns blazing like a big bully, so I pretended to be a lost little kid, ended up being taken here and pushed into a room where they probably planned on robbing me and doing all kinds of terrible and horrible things. So, it's fair game." He stepped on the man's hand. "Also, please stop talking." Faris felt like faltering but he continued on, "I'd be a good man to break one finger and toe for every corpse I found stuffed in that godforsaken room. But there aren't enough fingers and toes to go around, so I'll head in to your main room, where your boss has a little ambush laid out for me, and where he has one of the kids you extorted at knife point, and when I see this in front of me…" He stepped hard, breaking the man's hand. "I'll probably be really angry, and when you get up, I want you to get to that room and see what I do to that sack of waste Uglauw." He turned to the big double doors.
"The big threat is a kid?" The leader tuned to his soldiers, chuckling. "So, how'd you sneak past my men? Where's the real fighter?"
Faris looked around, the floor was mostly dirt with sparse straw matting, over sixty men equipped with weapons of different sorts were aimed at him, in the center of the room sat Uglauw, who despite the name could be described as handsome, with his shoulder length brown hair and brooding brown eyes. His jaw was square and he had the defined cheekbones of a movie star. Faris could tell that he along with the best equipped men where better fed, picking out 25 of them, including Uglauw, he smiled. "Okay, so 26 of these filths I can't let live, dang and I even said I wanted to give you a second chance."
Uglauw laughed, pressing his blade to the child by his side's throat. "I like your bluffing, but even then, you should put your hands up, your companion would do to learn humility, and he should teach you to watch your tongue."
"I came alone," Faris smiled as the man looked at him bemused. The man dropped his dagger as it simultaneously grew hot and began to shock him, the dagger hovered in the air menacingly and he was lifted up as well.
"AH! Men! Get him!" He turned to see the majority of his men attempt to flee, only for the entire lot to collapse on the floor, he turned to look at Faris fearfully, whose face was a mask of hatred.
"Bianca, come here sweetie, I have food for you, and I'll help you find your mom after I take care of this bad man." After a bit of hesitation, the girl came towards him, as she ate, he took care to heal her brandings and whip marks. After she ate her fill, she collapsed exhausted. He covered her eyes as he turned back towards Uglauw, who he muted with magic. He turned towards the collapsed men, "Thank you for the energy, and the impotent anger over not doing anything about this, I could have saved 15 children had I come a month earlier, I'm angry at the school for not taking my reports seriously, and angrier that I didn't sneak out to do this earlier." Twenty-five of the men began to groan in pain, screaming out as they caught on fire. "The funny thing is it takes a while for it to kill you." He turned his attention back to Uglauw, who had soiled himself. "Uglauw, the reason I haven't killed you yet is because you avoided hurting Martha and her son." His eyes opened in recognition as he turned to the three men Faris had threatened earlier. "Unfortunately, my observer showed you that you attacked other people, that's on me for not thinking you would do this to others." He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes, "I hate you, someone like you makes me disgusted to be human. But then children like her," he turned to the girl, "they give me hope."
Uglauw's face twisted in pain as his body began to be covered in pinpricks of pain, his limbs began to rot, before they atrophied and fell off, they set on fire, despite the massive trauma his nerves felt as alive and healthy as they normally were, he began choking, unable to breath as if there was some sort of blockage. Tears began to well in his eyes as he underwent this painful torture. His eyes, before vicious and cruel, pleadingly looked toward Faris, pleading to end the torment, or to better yet kill him. Faris smiled.
"This spell will last about 2 days, I've put enough energy to keep it that long, if your men feel charitable, they can finish you off, they'll recover from severe exhaustion in maybe a few hours, they still have the extra calories to burn, pun intended." He turned to the men, "Now, if you are smart, you'll turn your life around, and forget this ever happened, forget me, beg for forgiveness for those you hurt. Or…" His voice lowered to a whisper, but magic amplified it, causing it to feel like he was whispering directly into their minds, "I'll do worse to you than what's happened to him."
The chill night air caused Faris's breath to condensate. He puffed out, as if smoking a cigarette as he thought about what happened. He had taken the children and left the garrison. Anyone seeing it would think they had been playing around and he was carried a tired sibling back home. As he made his way back to the more populated parts of the suburbs, he went to the homes of the children he rescued. Each tearful reunion warmed his heart, but it was a double-edged sword as the parents of the not-so-lucky wailed into the night as he returned trinket or toy or locket of hair. When asked of the thugs, he replied that most were dead, some had escaped. This lie was because a majority of the thugs left hadn't been doing it completely by choice, and only the 26 he killed were ones fully deserving of his wrath. He also did not betray that Uglauw had a wife and daughter, but he had paid the misses a visit, he spoke to her calmly about what her husband does for a living. She denied any knowledge, Faris almost pitied her convincing crocodile tears as she lied to him. He merely told her for the sake of her daughter he wouldn't turn them in, but that if she ended up as twisted as her parents, they would meet a terrible end. As it was, she was doting on her child, sparing her from the evils of the world, he saw that she envisioned marrying her off to a rich and kind husband, so he against his better judgement didn't burn their coffers.
"Fuck people…" He sat on the tree, holding up Ulgauw's great sword, it was massive compared to him, maybe almost a foot longer than he was tall. It was a well-crafted weapon, fit for the commander of a Calvary army. Its hilt was adorned with a shining sapphire, and the blade gave off the feeling of nobility, it was a sword that didn't suit its previous owner, but it didn't really suit Faris either, he'd have to grow into it. He kept the memories he gained today close, he tended to be more reckless when he got angry, but he had decided to ignore and overcome the urge to beat the tar out of those men, instead using the most efficient method, draining them of stamina and using magic. He had lost it in front of Uglauw and used more energy than he needed to, a simple breaking of the neck would have sufficed, but he also wanted to leave an impression. "I really hope Alanna and Dusan don't start saying I smell of guilt and hatred or something like that." He sighed as he stared at the clear and shining stars, oblivious of the slaughter that had been completed under his eye.
Getting up he looked around, he was in the northern section of the forest he destroyed to force back the Black Hand, it was starting to regrow thankfully, he had used a lot of the energy he took to give the saplings a jumpstart, and the soil was rich with nutrients from the dead trees. He looked around, thinking about how he was supposed to win in two days.
"State your business in these forests!" He turned in surprise and alarm.
"Who's there!" He replied in the Urgal tongue, it had been years since he last needed to use it, but he had kept practice and was still as fluent as the day he mastered it under Angela.
"Your eyes and skin tone… Faris?!"
Faris widened his eyes before smiling, he sheathed the great sword, dropped it to the side, warded his head, and bared his chest and raised his chin, exposing his neck as he bellowed out.
"Gork! Is that really you!?"
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Afterword:
Welp, QA time! Thanks to Sullenwhitedevil for the questions! Your reviews are really helpful and motivating!
Q: Is Seya part elf? Was there some sort of magical experimentation on her?
A: She isn't part elf, but there is something up with her, she isn't a normal human
Q: Will Alanna develop feelings romantically for Faris?
A: Probably not, she is interested in him as a person and friend, but his demeanor is just off putting enough that someone sensitive to the emotions of others like she and her brother are would find him too wary to form any such close relationship. Sort of like they know he has a secret of some sort, but that his way of hiding it resembles the hidden thoughts of a person with terrible secrets.