Kurao eyes fluttered open as he slowly raised himself from his bed, rubbing his eyes and looking to his bedside dresser seeing a still lit candle that was mostly melted as there was barely a few centimeter left of wax. A large book was open with a black cover near the candle, on the page that was open a drawing depicting a human with blue waves surrounding the body drawn.
Kurao's eyes scrunched up while looking displeased as he stared at the book.
'It has already been a month since I have left Father's Treasury with that book and so far I haven't been able to decipher a single thing from it. I have check the royal library and found nothing relating to any of the text. The closest thing I could find relating to the book were some simple inventions that have been introduced throughout the empire, besides that I can't find nothing about the book even those drawings of what I have to assume is mana around the body don't even make sense. I even asked Brother Alex and he didn't even know anything about the unknown text or the book. Is this book really just gibberish?'
He got up and did his new morning ritual as he held the book from the page he left off of from last night, while scanning the page and while checking other pages to see if he can cross reference the text while he wrote down the text on a separate notebook. Hours pass while he continued to study the book, a frown became more prevalent on his face as the time passed as he was about to flip another page, suddenly a knock could be heard at his door as he looks at the door before looking back at the book and notebook with barely a few lines written in it.
Just thinking about his progression made his mood sour more along with the knocking at the door he visibly blew a fuse.
'This is so frustrating!'
Kurao then closed the book and threw it on the bed hearing the constant knocking at his door. As he walked toward the door he got lost in his thoughts,
'It has already been a month and I have got nothing to show for it, I have spent multiple hours trying to transcribe this book. I have been sleeping less, I am suffering from more headaches, and this whole situation is even taking time out of mana training. I am lucky that I am so blessed with magical talent, but that doesn't mean I should slack.'
Upon reaching the door he quickly yells at it in a irritable tone as he yells at the person on the other side.
"I AM BUSY DON'T BOTHER ME!"
"What did I do wrong-g?"
A sad voice came out, Kurao who was very irritable and not caring to much about his tone suddenly felt slight panic, hearing that disheartened voice. He quickly opened the door and saw
a blonde haired girl a little taller then him with a downcast expression. Seeing this Kurao realized his mistake and quickly held the girl's hand just to rectify his mistake of temper.
"I am sorry, I didn't mean that Elyse I was angry and thought it was a maid trying to clean my room again well interrupting me again." Kurao hurriedly said patting her head trying to make her mood feel better.
"Is-s that so?" Elyse meekly said while her head still hanged low down even though her voice carried a bit of elation at the fact he wasn't mad at her.
"Yeah I am sorry for snapping like that I have been frustrated lately since I haven't been able to solve this problem. I don't want to let down Mother, Aunt Vayla, or Father."
He sighed at the last part since he still hasn't even made any progression since obtain the book. Elyse finally looked at him in the eyes hearing him, she lost that sad expression and was instead a face full of happiness with a large smile to cover her cute face.
She instantly latched his hand in hers as she started to drag him down the hallway before he was even able to realize what happened in the short period.
"Elyse-Where are you taking me?" Kurao surprised by her sudden action asked.
"Your big sister has decided on her decision to rescue you and take you away from your miserable den." Elyse said not turning back to face him while saying this in a righteous way and not elaborating anymore. Kurao on the other hand just stared at her back while being dragged along,
'You act more like the younger one between the two of us when did you consider yourself the big one in this relationship?'
Kurao said inwardly but decided to be whisked away since he felt he needed a break from his 'mission' but thinking this he felt a bit sour thinking about how his obsession with the book has taken the past month of his life especially since he just awakened.
'I know I said I wouldn't regret my decision, but I think that vault picking wasn't really a test.. Or at least not a test that was related to making the 'right' decision and more like a test of maybe my character? Seeing if I would pick the easiest path? Since I am pretty sure now that I would've been able to walk out with any item in there... Well maybe besides a small few like the Life Tree Branch. But I am starting to regret thinking to hard about my decision when it was not as complicated.'
His mood dampened but was brought back to senses when the person dragging him abruptly stopped. Looking up he noticed a haughty looking sky-blue haired youth walking their way with a smirk.
The haughty youth got closer and sneered at Kurao with not so well hidden contempt.
"I heard you have been locked up in your room for the past month, what did you do Kurao to end up locked up in your room?" He asked with a fake innocent inquisitive question.
"I have been stu-" Before Kurao could finish his sentence he was cut off.
"Oh did Mother Vayla lock you up in your room cause you did something bad? I heard a rumor yesterday-"
"N-" Kurao could only get one syllable out before getting cut off again by the light blue haired youth who was intentionally speaking over him.
"That you nearly beat a servant to death, and got yourself grounded like your mental case of a mother? How ruthless you are little brother, attempting to kill someone at the ripe age of 8."
Kurao angerly stared at him with his diamond like eyes, and if looks could kill the youth would dropped dead on the spot after making that baseless accusation. Elyse on the other hand who heard the crude remark this felt the tension getting a bit out of hand stared at the light blue youth for moment before giving a slight smirk.
"Awoa the reason that Kurao has been in his room this month is he working on a important project that father assigned him. Isn't that right Kurao?"
She looked at Kurao with a look that said 'Follow Along' as she squeezed his hand a little trying to signal her scheming intention.
Kurao getting the gist of what she was trying to do just looked at her weirdly.
'Who would believe father of all people assign me a project? Elyse you are terrible at coming up with believable excuses.'
But seeing that she tried to help him made him cool down and not get agitated. He decided
instead of getting into a pointless argument with Awoa, that he would rather to drag Elyse away. Only making it a meter, he heard another snarky remark from Awoa.
"So you are guilty Kurao I fucking knew it, like mother like son."
He smirked before turning around. Elyse who heard this stared at Kurao, while she was being dragged away by Kurao while giving a fake taken aback face.
"Awoa how un-noble like of you for using such rude and crude langu-" But before she could finish Awoa crashed onto the floor looking like he seemingly tripped.
"Huh?"
Awoa who had just fallen, sat up angrily after the fall and felt his feet slightly sluggish, glancing at the soles of his shoes he was shocked to see ice had formed on his shoes.
Seeing this he looks back up at Kurao with fire in his eyes as he discovered how he fell.
She looked back at Kurao to see that he just made a motion with his hand while he had his lips parted in a smirk. She smiled knowing how and who was responsible for how Awoa 'randomly' fell.
"YOU FUCKING BRAT!"
Awoa stood up and was about to chase him again before he crashed into the ground again his chin hitting the ground first making him a little disoriented.
Kurao seeing his anger and seeing the perfect opportunity decided to grip onto Elyse before running down the hall knowing that once Awoa gets up he will attempt to beat him up. Elyse and Kurao run down the halls as they started laughing well running not caring about whether there would be repercussions or not.
"Hahahaha Kurao when did you learn to do that!?"
Elyse said wheezing a bit after all the running and laughing. Kurao who had his hands on his knees as he was bent over just looked up and gave a smirk in response to Elyse's questions and
grabbed her hand again.
"So where did you want to take me? Did you want to go to the playground in the garden?" Kurao asked while gesturing for her to take lead again.
Elyse shook her head in denial over that and started dragging Kurao before turning around.
"Kurao I found this super secret spot and I wanted to show you it." Elyse said in a low whisper even though they were the only ones in the empty hallway.
"What's so secret about this 'Super Secret Spot'" Kurao said raising one of his brows while Elyse started dragging him along once again.
"You will see!" Elyse said as she gave a giggle and a huge smile.