"How do you like Southampton City?"After the qualifiers, all of the sixty-four teams who had made it to the knock-out stages were required to return to Southampton City, where the tournament would be held this year. We were given a week"s break after all that fighting and competing, and Bu Fan wasted no time wheeling his sister out. Xin Chun was wheelchair-bound for some reason. Don"t ask me why. For some reason, even though healing magic existed, she couldn"t heal her own legs and still needed a wheelchair. Maybe her disability wasn"t something that could be healed, or it was a curse rather than an injury/disability. I had no idea. Knowing the author of Versatile Mage, I wouldn"t be surprised if Xin Chun turned out to be harboring a Divine Spirit inside her body, and thus the burden of carrying two souls inside one body was so great that she couldn"t walk. I guess we"ll find out after 1,000 chapters…a.s.suming we ever get that far (most likely we wouldn"t).
Anyway, as Harrison promised, we brought Xin Chun along. Originally we planned to bring her before the qualifiers first began, but the young healing mage had cla.s.ses and school stuff to do so she declined. Fortunately, she was able to come along right after the qualifying stages and here she was. Bu Fan turned into a completely different person the moment he saw her, and was always babying her, looking after her and wheeling her about.
"I"ll take you around Southampton City!" he declared, and left the rest of the team behind. He couldn"t even be bothered to stick around for strategy meetings and other discussions. With the knock-out stage taking palce next week, most of the team had gathered in Harrison"s room to watch video replays of the other teams" duels, and figure out the optimal tactics to tackle them. Unsurprisingly, the lone wolf Bu Fan (unless he was required to go grab some treasure item in the middle of a desert) declined to partic.i.p.ate in these group events and was more occupied with taking his sister out to play. Thus he was conspicuously absent.
"Southampton City? Isn"t this Stuart City?" Xin Chun sounded confused.
"Of course not. I know this city serves as the home base for the Stuart Clan, one of the ten great families, but why would they name the city after them? This isn"t Battle Frenzy."
"Uh, right…okay." Xin Chun didn"t sound convinced, but she went along with whatever her brother said. And the two disappeared from the hotel shortly after that, never to be seen again for the rest of the day. By most of us, anyway. Since they were step-siblings and were not actually related by blood, I wouldn"t be shocked if they developed a romantic relations.h.i.+p, despite Bu Fan already having a love interest in the form of someone from the Mu clan. Don"t ask.
"Are we seriously going to let Bu Fan go like that?" Craig complained as he glanced out of the window.
"Let him." Harrison sounded dismissive as he waved his hand. "It"s not as if he"ll contribute much to the discussion anyway. He"s the type who relies on brute force and overwhelming magic. That"s his strategy and admittedly it"s pretty viable."
"Besides, it has been a while since he got to see his sister." Sheila placed a soothing hand on Craig"s arm. "Give them some time together."
"All right, all right." Craig was grumbling, but he didn"t argue. Harrison nodded and swept his gaze across everyone with a bright smile.
"Let"s begin then. This is the replay video of the team from Adolf Academy…"
*
After spending a whole day of a.n.a.lysis and stuff, we broke up for rest. Several of my friends decided to go have dinner in some bar, but as I wasn"t feeling very hungry, I decided to return to my room for now.
"Are you sure you are all right?" Yue Chu asked me, concerned. I nodded and smiled to a.s.sure him.
"Yeah. Just a little tired. I"ll probably take a nap, and then go for dinner in two or three hours. It"s still too early for me."
It was only five in the afternoon. I usually didn"t eat dinner until seven or eight, mostly because I was too lazy to cook. My stomach ran on its own internal biological clock, always subjecting me to its whims. It sucked, but there was little point in forcing myself to eat when I wasn"t hungry, and I needed to eat when I was hungry.
Okay…that sounded weird. Anyway, I had more important things to focus on than to explain the whims of my stomach.
"Since I have some time, I should go practice and develop my ice magic more, and infuse more of it with my summoning magic."
That was right. The best way of making myself hungry was to train. By the time I finished training, I bet I would be starving. Burning up mana, energy and calories would cause my stomach to growl. Theoretically, anyway. As I said, my stomach was one weird one.
After training, I left the gym, took a shower in my hotel room upstairs to wash away the sweat. Even though I practiced ice magic and ended up freezing myself, I still perspired a lot from the sheer effort and exertion of practicing magic and sparring with my newly developed Constellation spirits. Cetus was much improved from before, and Scorpius had a new ice-type ability because ice magic was a branch of water magic, so it was easier for me to infuse him with ice spells than my other Constellation spirits.
Even so, there were a couple of others that I wanted to try and infuse with ice magic, but I didn"t know how it would work out. Honestly, it was going to take me a lot of time, but it should be worth it. Or so I hope. Well, one step at a time. Training and learning magic was a journey, not a single jump. You would get nowhere by being impatient and without making the required steps.
"Ugh…now I"m hungry."
Glancing at the clock, I saw that it was finally eight in the evening. In other words, time for me to get some dinner. Gulping down some water, I then left my room, took the elevator down to the lobby, and then departed from the hotel. There was a Korean restaurant nearby, from what I remembered. Right, Tofu House. That was the one.
I had a craving for white rice and tofu soup. Mild spicy, of course. The last time I went there, I was attacked by the Hei Clan…sort of, but fortunately Hei Xin stopped the a.s.sault and allowed me to eat in peace. Not that I needed her permission, mind you, but it was better than getting into fights when all I wanted to do was eat.
Hopefully nothing too dramatic would happen. I recalled the courageous chef who stood up to the bullies from the Hei Clan, not caring that they were from one of the top ten great families of the Federation. As he said, this was his restaurant, and n.o.body was exempt from the rules he inst.i.tuted. All customers were equal in his eyes, as long as they were within his property.
"Yeah, I"ll have that."
My mouth was already watering when I thought about the food that was sure to be cooked in the establishment. I could already taste that awesome tofu soup.
"Welcome!" the waitress greeted me in Korean when I stepped through the doors. She didn"t recognize me, of course, even though I somewhat vaguely recalled her. I mean, she had to deal with hundreds of customers on a daily basis, she wasn"t going to remember each and every one of them. "How many?"
"One person."
"Oi! Make that two. Let him sit here."
I was puzzled when I heard that, and caught sight of a bespectacled guy waving at me. He looked like the scheming type, with dark black hair and a smirk, dressed formally in what seemed like a suit. He didn"t really emanate much mana, so I wondered if he wasn"t a mage. If he wasn"t a mage, then what business did he have with me?
"Don"t worry lah, bro. I mean no harm. I very friendly one (I"m a very friendly person)."
"…oh? You"re from Singapore?"
It had been a while since I heard that Singaporean dialect – Singlish, as we called it, was a hybridized version of English and a bunch of Hokkien, Catonese and Malay words all thrown into it. Kind of like rojak, one of the signature dishes of Singapore, where you basically threw everything together and pour sweet, spicy sauce over it.
"Oh? Whoa, you d.a.m.ned pro sia (you"re pretty smart…well, hard to translate this). How you know I from Singapore?"
"…you"re speaking Singlish."
"Wah kao, you even know about Singlish? Nice one, sia. Come here, bro. we really need to talk."
The waitress had already left me to talk with the guy, so I had little option other than to take the chair opposite him. As I sat down, the waitress returned to hand me a gla.s.s of iced water and a menu.
"What you want to eat, huh? I recommend the silky tofu soup. d.a.m.ned nice, sia."
"Yeah…"
"Trust me lah, I"m not lying." When I regarded him with a raised eyebrow, he waved both of his hands to show that he meant no harm. "Oh, by the way, I"m Zhao Zi Jun. you are Richard, right?"
"Yeah. Are you here to partic.i.p.ate in the annual tournament as well?"
"Ya lah. I"m from the Black Demon Academy. Nice to meet you."
To my shame, I didn"t recognize him, though I could guess why he knew me. He clearly had done his research on the other teams and took note of the partic.i.p.ants that his team might possibly face. Speaking of which, I did hear about the Black Demon Academy. Wasn"t that the school that the heirs to the Hei Clan – one of the ten great families of the Federation – enrolled in? It was pretty famous and was regarded as one of the top schools.
"Oh, no lah." Zi Jun must have read my expression, for he shook his head. "It"s just that…Hei Gui actually approached me to launch an a.s.sa.s.sination on you."
"…excuse me?"
"Don"t worry lah. Of course I don"t want. What kind of lan jiao (stupid) request is that? Oh, and you also don"t have to worry about him. He kana (got) sent to a mental hospital when his parents found out that he was trying to jio (hire) a.s.sa.s.sins. Unlike him, they normal people." Zi Jun sighed heavily. "Don"t know what"s wrong with that seow chi bai (crazy idiot), he d.a.m.ned f.u.c.ked up sia (he"s damed f.u.c.ked up). Small thing also want to a.s.sa.s.sinate."
"Small thing? What small thing?"
"How I know?" Zi Jun threw up his hands in despair. "Some bo lio rumor about you having an ambiguous connection with Cecilia Stuart."
"I don"t have any connection with Cecilia Stuart," I protested, frowning.
"I know lah. That"s why I say he seow (is crazy)." Using a finger, Zi Jun drew circles next to his head. "Like that also want to kill people. His head something wrong (there"s something wrong with his brain)."
"Okay." I was still watching him suspiciously and wondering why he was telling me all this. Zi Jun must have read my mind for he chuckled.
"Don"t worry lah. I"m not here to kajiao (disturb) you. I here to belanja (treat) you. Take it as me saying sorry for the trouble that seow zai (crazy fella) caused, "kay?"
"He didn"t exactly ccause me any trouble, especially if he got locked up before he can do anything…" Even though I appreciated a free meal, I wasn"t sure if I could just accept Zi Jun"s treat at face value. Perhaps he wanted something in return?
"No lah. Just consider this networking. I d.a.m.ned suay sia (I"m d.a.m.ned unlucky). With my patron locked up in mental hospital, I now looking for new friends. I very good at intelligence work, so if you need me to find out anything, let me know. I don"t mean to hao lian (show off, brag), but I can hook up to the city"s entire camera network and track down whoever you need."
"…okay." I nodded. "Thank you. I will keep that in mind."
"So in return for belanjing you, accept my name card." Zi Jun then waved the waitress over. "Waitress, check! I also pay for this guy."
"Understood." As the waitress went to bring him his check, Zi Jun turned back to me, standing up and putting on his coat.
"I"ll leave you to your meal then. Remember, if you need anything, can call me, "kay? I very good one (I"m very good). I"ll find out whatever info you need, guaranteed plus chop (guaranteed)."
"All right. I will." I acknowledged his sentence with a smile and watched him leave, whistling to himself after he paid for his meal by swiping his credit card across the tiny holographic reader that the waitress brought to him. Unsure of what to make out of this conversation, I returned to eating my meal when the waitress finally brought me a steaming bowl of soup and rice.
I love Tofu House.