It was not an hour after sunrise when Leon encountered an unexpected situation that caught him off guard and caused an inability to say "no". And thus he found himself whisked away to another location where he was currently covered in an oily potion, which glistened in the sunlight peeking through the dense canopy above. A deep grumble of satisfaction came from below him, the sound reverberating through his fingers as he worked the oil into each crevice and along the increasingly slippery surface."Done," a sudden voice muttered nearby.
"Yes," agreed a voice that sounded much the same.
"En," Leon said, with a soft sigh, before picking up the rag cloth beside him and cleaning the remnants of the potion from his hands.
The Giant Tortoise, which really was gigantic, not just a larger version of the small original, rumbled its thanks, nearing purring its relief, for the itchiness caused by its dry and cracking sh.e.l.l had eased immeasurably.
Rewinding time a few hours; Leon had risen with the sun, making tea for one and a solo breakfast before heading towards the Herb Hall to gather and allotment of herbs in order to practice making some pills he felt were still too unfamiliar to him. He had been concentrating so much on making pills to sell via Pharmacist Clawse and the pervert Ursam, he had become worried that it would effect his schooling. So with renewed interest, he"d made his way to the main thoroughfare of the outer alchemist school. Only, not half a heart beat of him reaching the doors of the Herb Hall, was he tapped upon the shoulder with a slightly heavy finger.
Turning around, he had found himself facing his senior brother; Hue. "Come and help?" Hue had asked him, without really explaining what he wanted. Leon was curious, not so much that he would willingly follow anybody to sate it, but Hue had never done him any harm and was, afterall, his senior brother.
"Where are we g-going?" Leon had asked him.
"Beast Taming school," Hue had replied and they had made their way there by Baku.
The journey had been made in silence, Hue did not mention his intent when they arrived earlier, but it was clear that he knew exactly where he was going when he reached the school, familiar with the location and surroundings. He went straight to one of the buildings housing students and knocked on the door. This had been opened by a man who was the mirror image of Hue. In fact, were it not for the fact that Hue wore robes and this man wore leather trousers and a wrapped jacket, Leon had doubted he"d be able to tell them apart.
"You arrived," the man had said. His tone was much like Leon"s senior brother, deep and short of expression.
"En, I have the potion," Hue had agreed and then nodded.
The man had then glanced towards Leon, who had been standing in silence behind his twin. "No Stygar?"
Hue had shaken his head. "Stygar went with Master," Hue had mentioned and Leon hadn"t helped but detect a small hint of unhappiness and loneliness. Teacher Sagi had left the school with his oldest apprentice just yesterday, seeking to renegotiate a few things with a sect that they often dealt with, which happened to be the Heavenly Arts Medicinal Sect. Leon did not happen to know the details, but if he had, he might have been quite surprised.
In the past, the Heavenly Arts Medicinal Sect sent several worthy disciples to the Ascending Mountain Inst.i.tute to learn from the alchemists of the school. These disciples were neither useless peons nor top or succeeding disciples, keeping their best close to them, while not revealing their failures. The disciples sent to be students were both to learn, to identify worthy, unaffiliated talent and to spy on the disciples of other sects. This was all pretty normal in the inst.i.tute. However, the Heavenly Arts Medicinal Sect felt their disciples should only be placed in the Inner school, not the Outer school. Ordinarily, the inst.i.tute would never place self-interest before talent, however, the Alchemist school was not that popular and it was not as if they couldn"t spare the s.p.a.ces. However, the inst.i.tute would also not do this just to give face to the influential sect.
Something as cra.s.s as money was not exchanged, so it could not be considered a bribe, however the Heavenly Arts Medicinal Sect often sent gifts to the school. Usually, these were rare herbs that the school could not grow themselves, but there were often shipments of cauldrons (ones that had been rejected by the sect as being too low quality or just ugly), jade bottles (for the same reasons) and revised editions of Herb books (or rather, last year"s books that were a bit worn and no longer looked pristine).
However, the Inst.i.tute, much like many other places, had heard about the new pills which had mysterious origins that had recently come onto the market. Although they, themselves, had attempted to reverse engineer the pills, the results were baffling. Despite tests declaring that the Burning Energy variant pills would perform exactly as the sellers claimed, the ingredients appeared to be no different that normal Burning Energy Pills! When it came to knowledge and understanding of pills, the Heavenly Arts Medicinal Sect were far above others and it was also believed that they had been the ones to purchase the new pills and their stronger variants at the Auction that they had first appeared in. The Inst.i.tute was hoping to pry the secrets of the pills from the Sect"s fingers, for surely they have become aware of them... right?
How was the school to know that the one who was truly holding the secrets of the variant pills to his chest actually was at that moment spreading a medicinal potion over the cracked and dry sh.e.l.l of a Giant Tortoise within the Beast Taming Outer school?!
Once the three young men had finished their task, (it had taken all three of them to cover the beast"s central circus sized sh.e.l.l in oil using brooms and brushes), Drue (the older twin brother of Hue) patted the beast"s huge nose fondly, before guiding his brother and his brother"s junior to the wash up in his dorm room, pa.s.sing through the stable as they did. Instantly, a white furred face appeared, pressed against the protective barrier of its nest. It mewled and purred as the group of three pa.s.sed it. It was particularly attracted to the smiling face of the smallest person, the scent of the body similar to the scent of the little wooden fish that was its treasure. It called out to the person, but the person walked away, not aware that he was wanted.
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The larger, black body behind it, scratched at the loosening fur along the length of its hide; another scale was beginning to poke through, before yawning and urging the cub to settle down. The forlorn cub, looked at it then buried itself into its nest in a sulk.