"You want to rent a place with how much?"
Aureum scowled down.
This little rat-like man looked back up at her, unimpressed. Hiems crossed his arms. The rat-like man coughed.
"Well, it's just, with that budget, what can be done?" He shrugged. "You might be able to rent out a little hovel somewhere, but no one is going to sign a contract for a long-term lease. Where did you say you were from again?"
Aureum puffed her cheeks out as she released a breath. Gemmo looked at the strange little man who had been talking to her for the better part of the hour, irritation across his face.
"Forget it!" Aureum said.
"What were you lot expecting without even a recommendation?"
Aureum restrained herself from swearing at the little dirtbag as she turned and left. Hiems followed.
"So what now?" Aureum asked him. "I'm out of ideas."
Most of the day had been like this. This minor errand was the least of her frustrations. It was pointless to ask about housing when what Aureum truly wanted to do was leave the city for Fluentem. But she had no other idea of how to fill her time.
They had asked for what news they could about the war during breakfast at the inn. "Terrible news" was repeated like a catchphrase, but nothing of substance was given.
Does nobody have a cousin or something involved?
But they weren't so lucky. The news hit the city the day Aureum and Hiems arrived. Nix had attacked Fluentem first. That was fact, but anyone could have guessed it. Nobody knew what any of it meant yet.
"It means the wars are breaking out again," Hiems had said.
Aureum had side-eyed him.
"The Council of Aeternitus will be called," she said. "Nix will answer for this."
He shrugged, and they had went about their original plans to find a longer-term place to stay in case they didn't need to leave. Aureum hadn't expected to find a place easily, but neither had she expected it to be as much of a non-starter as citizenship.
"What's next, looking for work?" Aureum said.
"Do you have anything else in mind?" Hiems said, turning to look at her.
She'd been joking, but actually...
"No," she said.
The sun was bright. The day was warm. His eyes were pale green. His face was covered in mottled scales. There was a war going on.
Nothing stood straight in Aureum's world.
"Who will look after Gemmo?" Aureum said.
"You will?" Hiems said, like it was obvious.
Aureum's eyes narrowed.
"So you're the one going to find work, huh?" She said. "Doing what?"
She could guess what, but she wanted him to say it.
"..."
Hiems realized the trap, but it was too late.
"You're under orders to not use your mana, idiot!" Aureum said. "We're supposed to find a specialist for you. Can you really expect me to just let you waltz into whatever trouble you want? You'll kill yourself! And then who's going to watch Gemmo and find a way to make money? It's all going to be me!"
Hiems' eyes drifted away as Aureum's nagging dug into him.
"Fine, all right," he said. "It's not like we can't do it your way. You can get the job, but do you have any idea in mind?"
"Uh," Aureum said. "Noooooo, not really. Well, actually I've never had a job, so what should I do...?"
She scratched her head a bit.
"Heh," Hiems let out a small laugh. "Haha! Ah! You can't attack me. You'll drop Gemmo."
Her light slap on his shoulder wasn't doing any real damage, but he still protested. Gemmo was in her arms, but she would have to hand him to Hiems soon.
Heavy, and with each day heavier, was the kid.
"Maybe I'll just throw him at you and he'll gnaw on you!" Aureum threatened.
"Heh. I just find it funny. It's not anything to threaten me over! I've never worked normally either. It doesn't mean anything! If you never had the opportunity to do it, then you never did."
That means he really was planning to work as a thug, Aureum thought.
"Then what can we do?!" She said.
Frustration rose in her voice. They'd gotten to Ariolus, but they had no guarantee of protection, no permanent shelter, and no news on anything important.
What was the point of leaving the Hidden Manor if I'm just as powerless as before?!
"We still have choices," Hiems said. "If I can't do it, and both of us can't leave Hiems alone, then it's pretty simple. You can do it."
"Do what?" Aureum said.
"Hunt beasts for pearls," Hiems said.
Aureum blinked. Then she thought about it.
"If it was that easy, everyone would do it," Aureum said.
"That's true," Hiems said. "It's dangerous, erratic work where you get dirty and profits are hard to guess. By the time most sorcerers can do the work, it's pointless for them unless the pearls have an element they need. Any specific hunts requested will be outside of your abilities. At your level, you'll be gloriously underpaid for your efforts."
"Then why waste our time?!"
"Because we have no contacts and might need to leave soon," Hiems explained. "We can't get steady work. Even if we could, leaving a guard job in the middle of work would have... consequences. So it's all bad, but this is the best."
"So all the jobs you're thinking about include combat," Aureum said. "I thought most kids started out as something like a server or a laborer."
"There's no point in us doing that," Hiems said. "Those jobs will pay like dirt. Half of them come with cheap places to sleep because affording a place to live on is impossible. But they won't allow a kid. You have skills, so you get to do skilled labor."
"Oh," Aureum said.
But the skilled labor is also dirty, she thought.
She could only sigh. Life couldn't always be pretty.
"So what do I have to do?"
They'd do it Hiems' way this time.
———————————————————
"Now, one of the hardest things is trying to find the beasts—
"I already know how to do that," Aureum said. "Spesavia showed me."
They stood outside the city. The large and old trees swayed overhead. Yet, the road was wide enough to let the sunlight clearly in. Gemmo was walking around, mostly going in circles.
Hiems stopped talking for the moment. There went his plans for how to prepare her.
Well, let's try and see what other basics she might be missing before I throw her out there.
"And you know relatively well how to fight," he continued. "You've been diligent with the basics, even if you lack experience. But you can't know for sure where the heart is on each beast unless you're a hunter, so going for the throat is an excellent choice. Also, any pearl sticking out, but that's very well-known..."
"Ah, the throat is a good option?" Aureum said. "Great."
You've aimed for the necks of beasts this whole time, Hiems thought.
It didn't sound like she was mocking him. Was it instinctual?
"Mostly, be aware of your surroundings and your abilities," Hiems said. "You have the butterfly cloak, so as long as the sun shines, you can flee nearly everything. Still, try not to take on any fight you're unsure of without a clear escape route. Avoid shaded areas. Avoid any beast that might have projectiles, like the wolves we fought."
Aureum felt herself tensing up. Every fight she was unsure about. She simply didn't have the experience in real combat to know whether she could take someone or not.
"It might be a little hard in the forest to find well-lit areas, but I'd urge caution," Hiems continued.
"What kind of beasts do we need?" Aureum asked. "I can bring the bodies back for you to skin like we agreed with the ring, but I don't even know what sells well."
"Anything will work for now," Hiems said. "We aren't that desperate. If you let greed get the better of you, there's a good chance we will become truly desperate if you get injured."
Aureum bit her lip.
I'm not being greedy, she thought.
The scale of ignorance had hit her. What she needed versus what she could do, none of that she knew.
He watched her.
"You'll be fine," he said. "You already dealt with the guards of the Hidden Manor."
"With you beside me!" Aureum said. "Don't try to butter up my confidence! I'm not that stupid. And what do I do if I meet guards from the Hidden Manor by myself?!"
"Run," Hiems said. "Don't stop to think about hiding. As long as you return before nightfall you'll be able to outpace them."
"..."
More and more Aureum felt uneasy.
"Just stay close enough to the city to make it back," Hiems said. "They must be busy with bigger things than us, or we would have seen them already."
She just scowled in response.
"Can't you trust that I wouldn't let you go alone if I thought anything was wrong?" Hiems said.
"Pfft," Aureum made a noise close to a laugh. "No. We have to, otherwise we'd be hiding, right?"
Hiems observed her with dry eyes. When he spoke, his tone was serious.
"You're right, in a way. But if I really believed this was something you couldn't handle, I would still do it myself."
Aureum sighed. The only option that seemed worse than this was returning to the inn and staying cooped up for days.
"Well, I guess I'm off," she said. "Unless there's anything else?"
Hiems shook his head.
She took a jump as her cloak billowed out behind her.
The feeling of freedom was instant.
There was no extra weight she was carrying. Not a backpack, not a child she worried about dropping, and not a single man with a sharp pointy stick chasing her in the immediate vicinity.
She looked back immediately. Hiems was squinting up at her. He waved.
It was difficult to wave back while flying, but she managed a sort of aerial bob in response.
Then she leaned forward and truly felt the wind.
Being up so high made all the little things beneath her look so small. And it made the wind, her element, move with little obstruction. She could feel its force as it blew over the horizon.
If he really doesn't care about how much money we need right now, I'll just pick off the weakest ones I can find.
Aureum had had enough close encounters. She just wanted money. If the beasts didn't have wind mana, it was pointless to kill them for her own strength anyways.
Her first hunt was a wily little fox. It had no outward mutation. Death was as quick as she could make it.
Its body went inside her ring.
The second one was a fiendish raccoon she caught sleeping.
The third one was a surprise. An eagle who flew higher than her caught her by surprise.
While its ferocity was not in doubt, its mana was weak, and it went alongside the rest.
That short list was all she could manage. The kill was quick, but finding them and traveling across the sky was not. There were more beasts that she avoided because they were too deep in a forest or outside of what she was comfortable dealing with. Besides the fact that she also had to get back before the sun went down, and she wanted to be very early for that deadline.
When she got back to the inn, her hands were dirty, the dress under her cloak was sweat-stained, and her cheeks were tenderized from the sun. The door to their room opened to Hiems reading Gemmo to sleep with him on his knees.
It looked very comfy.
"I did it," Aureum said, tearing up.
"Hewwo, Auruma!" Gemmo said, perking up.
"Hello, Gemmo!" Aureum said. "Shouldn't he be saying other words? Is it fine for him to still be stuck on hello?"
Despite the energy of her voice, she was still sinking to the floor.
Hiems got up off the chair, taking Gemmo with him.
"Go ahead and get washed," he said, "then we'll skin the beasts you got. Gemmo is fine."
"...I won't say no to that," Aureum said.
She was grateful for the opportunity to bath, but it was over too soon.
They found a secluded spot once she was done. A little tree offered shade, and they were far enough from most of the main parts of the city. Hiems already had a knife ready. Aureum stood off to the side.
Hiems watched her lurking to the side with amusement.
"You told me to bath, so I doubt you want me to help," Aureum said.
"You can still watch and learn," Hiems said.
"I've seen enough from our trip here," Aureum said. "How many times are you going to force me to watch this? Is it fine to let Gemmo watch this too?"
Aureum held Gemmo, mostly for the convenience of not having empty hands. He squirmed. He was tired of being carried.
"Why wouldn't I give him the chance to learn?" Hiems said.
Aureum lowered Gemmo and let him toddle around as she stretched her back.
The normalization for Aureum of skinning beasts was an ongoing battle that Hiems was unaware he fought.
Hiems and Aureum had different backgrounds. Hiems had fought beasts often and dealt with the aftermath frequently. For him, they were resources and bonus money if he could spare the time.
He wouldn't put a life ahead of it or take a kill that wasn't his, but a beast was a beast to him.
Meanwhile, Aureum had been a sheltered lady of the Zizan's. Sheltered in such a way that she didn't even know what the world expected of her.
This wasn't entirely her parent's fault. They hadn't been of any major bloodline, so they raised her as best they could. Yet, they couldn't raise her exactly as they were raised, because their lives had changed. This made her existence seemingly useless to most places she could go to. Skills and sensibilities most women had, she lacked.
Not that Hiems was normal either. If anything, he was desensitized.
Hiems paused before he began.
"If you really hate this," Hiems said, "once you learn how to do it, I can instead."
"Only once I learn how to, huh?" Aureum said, grimacing. "Shall I thank you for such kindness?"
"Not at all," he replied teasingly, "I do it because I care."
"Thanks," Aureum said, sarcastically.
Hiems got to work, and Aureum winced. After the fox was done, he turned back and saw her face. He wiped his cheek.
"...We might be able to open a little business of some kind," he said, "if you hate this that much."
"Selling what, even?" Aureum said.
"We'd have to figure that out," he said.
Aureum felt a little of her tension ease.
"Thank you," she said, and this time it was in earnest.
"Ahhhh!"
Hiems and Aureum turned to what Gemmo was doing.
The little boy had a piece of raw meat in his hands. He was lifted towards his mouth with slow relish.
"Gemmo!" Aureum said, as she dashed to pull away the dangerous substance out of the little boy's hands. "No! That's not good for you."
She yanked it out of his hands before he could swallow it. Gemmo looked up at her.
"Eha," he said.
She thought he was going to cry. He sniffed and opened his mouth. She lowered the raised hand to comfort him.
FWoOOSH!
A stream of fire came from the boy's mouth, directed to where Aureum had held the small piece of raw meat just a moment ago.
Clink!
Hiems dropped his knife. Aureum froze.
In all of Aeternitus, this was not normal behavior. The boy didn't have a pearl but was controlling mana.
"Arrgwooohhh," Gemmo said. "Ahhhhhhh! Want. WANT."
This snapped Aureum out of it.
"NO! You can't have it!" She said. "It might make you sick!"
"Maybe, just maybe," Hiems said, "the boy has the teeth and the stomach for it and would be fine."
"No maybes!"
"WAAAHHHH!"
"Cry all you want," Aureum said. "I'm not going to let you get sick. We'll feed you soon, but not this!"