William was sure this wasn't a normal land at all, but a hellish landmine, one that was filled with layers upon layers of traps.
"Who the f*ck said they deactivated most of traps here? Those unreliable liars!" William was feeling enraged about such a lie. If the place was filled with traps in such way, then how come Alfonso said such words back then in such confidence?
And then he recalled how people used to die here. And right now, he realised this was expected and made perfect sense.
"Master… What happened… I just used the technique and felt like… Felt like my spirit was going away from my body…"
Thomas looked a bit better in the next few minutes. But William knew the trauma of this event was still lingering around his spirit and mind. William looked at him and sighed.
"It seems you saw lots of things that are connected together, and that depleted your spirit power on an alarming rate," William didn't keep the explanation he got in his mind from this youth.
And when he said these words, Thomas seemed to recall something. His eyes shone brightly for a brief second, before he slowly said:
"I saw… I saw the world shining in many little dots, looking like a grand sky filled with stars… I saw… I saw a grand net of lights connected from the surface down to the deep bottom of the ground…"
"That's expected," William sighed, feeling that he was a bit rash in hoping to clear this damn place of all traps in just one visit, "that's what caused your spirit power to get depleted. Just get a little rest, and we'll head back…"
"Master… Master… Your name is William, right?"
Out of the blue, Thomas suddenly sat straight, holding William's arms as if he was pleading for something. William blinked twice, not knowing what went wrong in this dude's mind.
"Yes, I'm called William," he nodded. And before he'd knock this dude on the head with his fist, hoping this might repair anything that got broken inside, what Thomas said next took William by surprise.
"Master… Your name… You… You got a message deep down all this… A message left for William, a message from the old fox to the new fox…"
"What are you talking about?!!!" William turned his full attention towards Thomas. And just from looking in his eyes, he could tell this youth wasn't lying.
"Master, I only took a short glance at the entire thing, but I'm sure of what I saw. Your name was there, and there was a message left out for you."
"What message? What does it say?" William already had his own thoughts about this place and its ancient owner. Everyone kept calling the ancient owner of this place crazy. But William felt he just got a vision about the future and wanted to warn everyone from it.
Yet all his attempts ended in a big failure as no one ever believed his tales and warnings. On top of that, he selected a name that was kind of related to William, the fox!
"I… I didn't read the entirety of it… Only noticed it before you shouted…" Thomas paused, showed a struggle as he attempted to recall what he saw back there. And William just stood on the side, waiting in silence.
"It says… From the old Fox to the new Fox, From Sanchez to William…"
"And?" William waited for an entire minute, but Thomas only stopped there.
"That's it," Thomas shrugged, and when William gave him a weird look, he added, "the message got more, but things were quite blurry, and I didn't have time to read it fully. I need to try it again but…"
Thomas looked at himself, and William knew what he wanted to say.
"We need to find a solution for this little problem…" William was lost in thoughts. He was weighing between teaching this youth his own technique in replenishing spirit power or teaching him a weaker version of such technique.
But later on, his eyes shone brighter as he got another better idea.
"You do have alchemy stores here, right?" William asked, and Thomas nodded.
"We got lots of useless alchemy groups, calling themselves the Big Ten or something. But they are no way close to the Big Seven. And they aren't that great. They sell useless stuff at high prices…"
"I want to go to one of those Big Ten then," William didn't know why in this fort, the different professions tended to gather up, call themselves such catchy names like the Big Seven and the Big Ten.
What was the point? It was better for anyone to get known solely by his name and brand.
"The biggest one is just a few blocks away… But master, they are thieves!"
"Let me go there and judge by myself," William learnt to not trust any sayings of others, had to see and check things by himself and see if the rumours were true or false.
He wanted something, a potion or an elixir, one that could solve this entire problem for him. He knew how tiring dealing with these traps was. If it was up to him, he'd just move away and not care about these traps for the time being.
But now everything changed. He wanted to clear this place fast, and that was why he thought about going to such a store. Thomas was going to get his spirit power depleted each time they tried to inspect this place. Not to mention the number of traps here was indeed quite a mess and a headache.
But when Thomas mentioned this message, one that got his name and even the spirit that no one else in the world knew about, William decided to read the entire message at any cost.
if he got to break apart this entire place down block by block, he'd do it!
"Let's go," William helped Thomas to stand up. And that youth just staggered when he stood upright for a few seconds, before finally stabilising himself.
