Recently has sucked. Like capital S sucked. The gorgeous and talented people around me have basically been dragging me from town to town doing everything for me. It’s like a deadly vacation where I decided to Uber from tragic event to tragic event; it’s not fun.

  When most people fall into another world they expect to be the hero of the story, not the side character. Hell, I don’t even know if I can call myself the side character, I’m basically an NPC. The other people in this party they’re the heroes and I’m just… well not helpful.

  Of course when I finally got helpful it was bad. I’m pretty sure people died but I was not allowed to go back to the town center prior to our departure. I tried, oh I definitely tried during a fit of sadness but there was a big brute who prevented me from doing so. If you were curious, I could not physically over power him. There are muscles in that man that I could never dream of. It was akin to a small child trying to push a wall out of the way, impossible to accomplish. Instead we bounced out of town and continued our journey to our next destination.

  Which leads us all to now, where four highly attractive and highly capable individuals are staring at me with a look of wonder and confusion. Not sure why.

  “Did we just hear you correctly?” Dardania looks puzzled. Yet again, not sure why.

  “You did. You heard him loud and clearly.” Avis rolls his eyes and turns to walk away.

  “What took so long?” Avis spins around and rushes towards me. I felt like he would just barrel into me but he stops several inches in front of me. “I’m not saying I don’t get it, but it could have been helpful like three deadly situations ago.”

  “Rude.” I sigh. “I was scared.”

  “Shocker.”

  “Okay, Avis don’t be rude.” Prisha says pushing him out of the way. “We would be more than happy to teach you magic. I think everybody was just shocked that you finally asked.”

  Prisha decided to join us after what happened in Enkidu. She basically packed her bags and ditched Devon the first chance she got. It’s not that she doesn’t love him, but even that has its limits. That limit being turning in her friends when they’re wanted and the sentence is death. Feels like a reasonable boundary to me.

  “I didn’t know how to broach it to be honest. It felt like we never had a moment to really stop and breathe.” Madison finally interjects.

  “I just think you should have asked day one. That’s just me I suppose.” Avis turns and walks away and sits down on a boulder nearby.

  “You’re an ass Avis.” Dardania throws an insult towards her brother before looking back to me. “I wanted to make sure you were ready first, I didn’t want to pressure you. Which is why I never said anything. My shock comes from excitement. I find teaching to be incredibly fun.”

  “Let’s set up camp and get started while Avis makes us dinner.” Prisha begins walking towards an empty piece of land off the side of the road. Avis rolls off his boulder and sighs dramatically.

  “Why do I have to make dinner again?”

  “Because you’re the only one here besides James who doesn’t know magic. So, that’s why.” Dardania spits as she follows behind Prisha.

  ****

  “Okay, start from the beginning because huh.” At this point, all three of them have tried three different ways to explain to me how magic works in this world. Not a single thing has cracked through the thick skull of mine.

  Madison has attempted to replicate what her mentor taught her which centered around the concept of knowing the rules of the world so that you can break them. She seems to understand it in her head but explaining it does not appear to be her forte. I’m not sure what Prisha’s mother said to her, but to me it makes zero sense.

  Dardania has explained that it is akin to heart. That magic is an expression of the physical world. For example, her word magic. It is an expression of the thing itself. Much like literature we understand the word that applies to the physical world, like boom. We associate that with an explosion, and when you picture that imagery along side the word itself, it recreates the thing. It sounds like a bunch of nonsense to me so I just ended up with a question mark over my head.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Prisha’s explanation makes the most sense, but I’m still lost. For every facet of existence, there is a form of magic that coincides with it. So, as you learn about that individual facet, you eventually learn to manipulate it to your will. Like, it makes sense in theory, but the ah ha moment still hasn’t quite happened.

  “We will be here the next decade waiting for him to figure it out.” Avis says as she stirs the stew, not once even looking up towards me.

  “Can you not be an ass for like five seconds? Or is that too hard for you?” My patience was beginning to wear thin. My brain was already over flowing with a bunch of information that didn’t make sense to me and his snarkiness wasn’t helping anything.

  “Maybe if you actually took the time to pay attention you would realize it isn’t that hard to grasp.”

  “Oh so the guy who doesn’t use magic just gets it? So you’re the super genius now?”

  “I have a much greater grasp of it than you, that much is obvious by your whole staring into the nothingness with drool dripping from your mouth like stupid baby.”

  “Oh okay captain know it all, explain it to me then.”

  “Can you too please stop. This isn’t helping.” Dardania tries to jump in the middle of it.

  “Okay pay attention stupid. There are rules that govern our world, like this for example.” He raises his knife up and drops it. It falls to the ground with a thud. “There is a force that pulls every item towards the ground, even if you have no idea why, you know that it happens. When you understand that force, you have the concept on how to manipulate it. Like applying a greater level of force in the opposite direction to cause something to levitate. You keeping up? Dardania’s word magic is like a story in a book. She takes the word and basically paints it in the world, but she can only do it with words she understands or has experienced. Otherwise, she can’t recreate something she has no knowledge of, and Madison-”

  “Madison understands the base concepts on how the world works which means she has the ability to manipulate them. Like knowing that by causing atoms to rapidly increase their movement would cause the temperature to rise and to eventually catch fire.”

  “Exactly. That same concept exists for every aspect of the world. That’s why people have very specific types of magic, because your knowledge can only extend so far. No one person can just know everything. Like any talent, some people are just born with the skills to break those rules. Some people even think there is essentially an infinite number of types of magic that we have yet to discover because it’s all knowledge that we ourselves haven’t figured out yet.”

  “What are we witnessing right now?” Madison asked, staring at me and Avis confused.

  “I… have no idea.” Dardania said, mouth agape. “I didn’t even know my brother knew all this.

  “I get it! I think, but I get it!” I unintentionally hug Avis. When I finally realize what I instinctively did, I try to pull away but he stops me. Honesty, I wasn’t going to fight him on it. It felt nice.

  After what happened in Enkidu, I’ve felt really overwhelmed. This event is what pushed me to want to pursue magic. I hated just standing by watching as everyone almost died. I couldn’t do anything. I was useless. I hated feeling like that. So, I’ve decided I will never let it happen again. I will become useful to the group. I have officially entered my hero era.

  “Thank you.” Avis whispers to me. “You saved my sister’s life. Beyond that, having you here over the last few days has been nice. Someone who understands me. It— It makes me feel a little less alone. Don’t ever repeat that, I’ll deny it.”

  Avis pulls away and gives me a slight smile, it’s not much but it’s genuine. Avis and I both turn as the other three are just staring at us, mouth’s wide open.

  “What?” Avis questions.

  “Just didn’t want to interrupt anything.” Dardania smiles.

  “There was nothing to interrupt.” Avis spat back.

  “Yeah okay, you continue to tell yourself that. Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

  “Nothing happened!”

  “I’m pretty sure the two of you were falling madly in love.”

  “Dee!”

  “A romance in the making!”

  “Dardania, I swear.”

  “One for the ages!”

  Avis jumps up and rushes his sister who jumps to her feet and runs away as she continues to make fun of him. I just sit there smiling after them as they chase one another like two children playing with no worry in the world.

  “I’ve never seen them like this before.” Prisha smiles as she watches the two of them. “It’s the two of you. I think you’re the reason why.”

  “Why do you say that?” Madison asks.

  “Your sheer existence has given Dardania hope. Your desire for revenge against the Order has lit a flame under Avis, and also made him feel less alone in his hate.” Prisha turns towards me. “You. You have made a huge impact on him. Whether that feeling is simply platonic, or perhaps even romantic, you have caused him to feel something deeply. Something that makes him feel good. Which also in turn makes Dardania happy to see her brother expressing happiness. The two of you have completely turned their world upside down and for the better.”

  I can honestly say the same of them. Since the death of my father I felt lost. I thought the adventure would be the thing that made me feel alive again, but it wasn’t. It was these people. They made me feel less alone at a time when I felt like I had nothing left.

  After a few moments Dardania and Avis came crashing to the ground several feet in front of us, both of them laughing hysterically.

  “Dinner’s ready.” Prisha smiles and motions towards the stew. Avis quickly flips around and gets ready to serve everyone.

  “And then next stop, Anz?.” Dardania pulls out her book and begins plotting our journey.

  Anz?, I wonder what will await us in this new city. Hopefully it’s less dramatic than what we have seen so far.