"Boy, you sure do act creepy sometimes."(s.h.i.t, I got lost in thought and Benjamin spotted my stupid grin. Well whatever.)
Lowen then turned around with his back toward Benjamin and sat down as though he never heard his words. Benjamin just continued to stare at Lowen as though he were odd before he looked back at the tree, curious as to how Lowen pierced it with a single hair.
(How the h.e.l.l did he do that?)
Lowen thought about his new discovery and wondered what he should do.
(This inscription for hair hardening is incomplete. It seems I need to offer an even greater power source to the stone in order to fill in the missing parts of the hair hardening inscription, otherwise, the hair goes limp after only a second or so.)
As Lowen wondered about where he could obtain a huge source of energy the night quickly pa.s.sed.
As the morning sun was on the rise, Benjamin slowly sat up, awakening to the sound of rough breathing. At first, he thought someone was doing something perverted and when he thought of that, his head swung over in Lowen"s direction. If anyone here was perverted, it had to be that brat he thought. To his surprise though, what he saw was completely different from his imagination. Lowen, Nia, and Ben were all breathing strangely while moving there bodies in odd ways. Sometimes they would sway from left to right before there breathing would roughen and they would suddenly pivot and jump forward. The pace of their movements quickened with their breath before they all came to an abrupt stop. After a few seconds of stillness and silence, all three again began moving almost in sync.
Benjamin looked on in curiosity as the three continued these strange dance-like movements. Finally, all at once, the three stopped and simultaneously released a long breath. Looking at each other, the three couldn"t help but smile after a good work out. This was a ki breathing exercise that helped increase one"s control over their ki as well as expand it. Usually, the three would do this together every morning. At first Nia and Ben were a little hesitant not because they didn"t wish to grow stronger but because the movements were truly strange looking sometimes and were a bit embarra.s.sing but after trying it out once, the two quickly became addicted to it. Not only did it help improve their control and grow their ki but it felt incredibly comfortable and once you were done one"s body felt extremely light and powerful.
Wiping the sweat from their brow, Nia and Ben had been sweating profusely. In the end, this breathing technique was still difficult for the two, slowing your breath and then increasing it, shallow and short then a deep inhale, all the while moving your body oddly at a quick speed. This all acc.u.mulated to a hard workout for the two who were still at the first ki stage. As ki body refiners, this exercise would continue to be difficult until they either reached their body"s limits, gained perfect control over their ki or reached the next stage in ki manipulation, the aura body stage.
Benjamin walked over and just as he was about to speak to his children the two of them walked off to follow after Lowen. Benjamin just woke up and he was already annoyed at Lowen.
(What is this? As soon as I approach my babies turn and follow that t.u.r.d.)
"Hey Nia, where are you all off to?"
Nia looked back and gave a quick reply.
"Dad, we just finished our morning training so we"re going to wash up."
Nia was just about to turn back when her father yelled out.
"What, why didn"t you say. I"ll join ya."
Nia accidentally yelled out.
"No, absolutely not!"
Benjamin looked at her with confusion.
"Eh, why not?"
Nia"s face turned red as she yelled out.
"Dad, I"m older now, I"m practically a woman, how can I bathe with my father, its too weird."
"Weird, I was bathing with you all the time back in the day and as for you being a woman, aren"t women supposed to have hair in certain spots before they can claim their a woman?"
Nia"s face turned red with both embarra.s.sment and anger. Her voice suddenly grew louder and more fierce.
"Dad, you, you, you IDIOT!"
Benjamin though was even more confused. Looking for an escape route, his eyes made contact with Lowens. Pointing at him almost accusingly, Benjamin said.
"Then what about him, why does he get to bathe with you guys and I don"t?"
Nia looked at her dad as though he were stupid.
"Lowen"s a kid, so of course he can bathe with us."
Nia and Ben started walking toward the stream while Benjamin was left dumbfounded. Nia"s words made sense but Lowen just didn"t seem like a kid. Looking over at Lowen the two once more made contact. Lowen felt like teasing Benjamin a bit so Lowen Smiled fiendishly at Benjamin before he stuck out his tongue and turned and followed Nia and Ben. Benjamin grew furious and was about to chase after Lowen when Luna grabbed his hand. Turning around Luna smiled at him gently and asked.
"Are you hungry?"
Benjamin seeing this smile, somehow seemed to soothe him. As Benjamin"s anger slipped away, he noticed that he was indeed hungry and gave a small nod.
"Good, then if you would please continue stirring that pot, the food will be ready in a few minutes."
Luna then turned and followed after the others while reminding Benjamin.
"Remeber, you have to keep stirring it or else it will burn, I"ll be back after I"ve had a bath."
Disappearing behind some bushes, Luna soon joined the others. A few moments later, Benjamin could hear the playful laughs of the others causing his annoyance to grow.
---------------------------------------------
After a few days, the group came upon a stone wall. Its height reaching only 15 ft and it stretched all the way around a decent sized town, they had arrived at Jizhen. Along the path leading to the gate, there were a few carts here and there as well as a mult.i.tude of wagons filled with items and goods. The people leading these goods through seemed to be merchants as well as a few ordinary citizens just trying to make a trade. Behind them were guards of mercenaries and a few regular travelers. To Benjamin, this was a normal sight, he had traveled to many different places when he was younger and seen plenty of people. To Luna, Nia, and Ben, however, living out in the stix their whole lives, they had only ever seen 200-300 people max. Right now though, there was at least double that and that didn"t even count the trail of people leaving, together, it could easily make 1000 people.
Benjamin looked at his kids and Luna and smiled to himself, it was fun seeing their look of wonder at a new sight and he couldn"t wait to see their expression when they actually went in. Benjamin curiously looked at Lowen and wasn"t surprised to see a look of boredom upon his face.
(Yep, this kids weird.)
Lowen strode forward and everyone else followed. Although this would be his first time entering a town in this world, Lowen had been to towns more times then he could count in his previous life. To him, a town was a town, a place gathered with people and buildings nothing more. Walking to the gate, it was 4 carts wide, capable of handling a large influx of pa.s.sersby. Guarding the gate was a small group of 7 soldiers all wearing leather armor. The one in charge though was easy to spot, seeing as how his leather chest armor had the symbol of a three-horned rhinoceros etched into it. Lowen was about to pull out some money to pay the tax to enter the town when Benjamin suddenly stopped him before simply walking through. Lowen was slightly confused seeing this. Roland had told him, that in order to enter a town or city, one would have to pay a small fee, a tax, to enter but Benjamin had waltzed right in and wasn"t stopped. Lowen and the rest walked through the gate. Benjamin seeing the confused look on Lowen"s face smiled smugly before explaining.
"You want to know why we didn"t have to pay right? Well, the answer is quite simple really. The reason being is money."
The four looked at Benjamin questioningly.
"You see this town may have many people but the surrounding villages for hundreds of miles are beyond poor. If a poor villager wanted to trade and then they made the long harsh journey to get here, whilst already having to hire mercenaries or adventurers, only to have to pay a percentage on the goods they wished to sell and trade just to enter this town. At that point, the profit margins would be way too low and would be absolutely not worth it. So in order to increase trading in this town, the one in charge made the wise decision to not tax anyone coming or going. Most other towns don"t do this, Jizhen is special. Because this town is so near the border and most other towns and cities are too far, this town can"t make reliable long distance trades with them but because there are many small villages around and this is the only town out here, the villages are forced to come here for any actual profit."
Nia, Luna, and little Ben"s eyes began to spin with all this talk about taxes and trading but Lowen understood it.
(Hmm, this makes sense. If there were a tax to enter then traders and merchants would be few and far between but because there"s no tax to enter or leave, it makes the trip here worth it. Whoever runs this town seems to have a head for making money.)
As the group made their way through the town they made it to the town square. There, there were many stalls of people selling every little thing you could possibly imagine. From pots and pans to swords and shields, the town square was filled with items as well as people hawking their goods. This lively atmosphere both excited Luna, Nia, and Ben, as well as frightened them a bit, it was almost overwhelming. Everything here was entirely different from their village, even the people. Just as things seemed to be reaching the apex of excitement, the sound of a loud drum suddenly wrung out.
*BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM*
At first, the group thought the town was being attacked but when they saw a crowd of people split apart, they realized what was happening.
A large group dressed in black carried several large long boxes upon their shoulder. Looking closely, everyone could tell what it was except for little Ben.
"Big sis, what"s going on? Why did everyone go quiet and whats in those weird boxes?"
Nia quickly covered Ben"s mouth and shooshed him.
"Be quiet and don"t ask right now."
Inside those long odd shaped boxes were, of course, the dead. This was a funeral procession and counting the number of coffins, there were more than 20 of them. Lowen overheard someone in the crowd whispering to someone.
"This is the 3rd one today, when will this all be finished, I still have a business to run."
"Shh, do you want others to overhear you. You know as well as I do hundreds died only a few days ago, so the people at the church are backed up. That tragedy, thank the G.o.ds it didn"t happen to us."
Lowen didn"t know how many people had died from Rize"s attack but seeing the names on his list and then overhearing the townsfolk, Lowen knew at least a few hundred had to have died. As the last of the precession made its way to the local graveyard, business started up again and Lowen released a long sigh.
(What would these people think if they knew I was the one who could have prevented this tragedy and didn"t.)
Lowen shook these depressing thoughts away. He had fought his hardest and done everything he could and it had just barely been enough. There was no time for regret in this world. The only reason to ever look back is to see your mistakes so that you can fix them in the future. Everything else, for Lowen at least was just a waste of time. That"s how he now felt about his previous life.
(No regrets, only forward.)