Manic Pixie Flower Girl (1)

Bleuuugh!

I gently pat Josh's back as he loses his breakfast after our lap around the palisade. While I was pretty beat up after getting blown up yesterday, I'm almost completely healed after a good night's sleep.

Carroll freaked out when I got home due to my poor condition along with her fear about the news of the Griffith attack. It took a while to convince her that I was okay, but she was still hesitant to see me off again this morning.

The kid hasn't been talking much recently and he didn't even want to take over to talk to his mother. Maybe he's still worked up about the incident yesterday.

"You alright?" I ask Josh after he rolls over on the ground. I try not to notice the remnants of vomit still stuck to his face as he looks up at the sky.

"Okay." He pants.

"I'll take that as a yes." I smile and sit down next to him.

"Hey, Nick." Sampson walks up to us with a big smile on his face. "Thanks for your help yesterday."

"No problem, but I think you should really be thanking whoever killed that thing."

Sampson blinks in confusion.

"You did."

"What? No, I just stabbed it. Someone else blew it up."

"That happened because you broke the Monster Core as it was preparing a spell. The mana went rampant and exploded."

"Wait, really?"

"You have a seal, right? You probably leveled up some from that little stunt."

I quickly check my status and see level seven.

"Wow. I guess I did."

"We were going to give you the remains of the Griffith to sell to the Adventurer's Guild but there wasn't really anything left." Sampson shrugged.

"Well, thanks for trying anyway."

"No problem, we'd probably all be dead if you hadn't acted when you did. One spell from a Griffith can take out a whole squad."

I shiver as I think about how close I was to getting vaporized yesterday.

"By the way," Sampson starts. "I see you two training a bunch and I was wondering if you'd like to practice swordsmanship? I may not be great but I know enough to be dangerous."

"Sure, what do you think, Josh?"

"Okay." Josh gurgles from his position on the ground.

"That's a yes, but why don't we take a break first."

"Sure thing, I'll be over by the gate when you're ready."

I lay back and look up at the sky with Josh. The twin suns make for a spectacular morning sky.

While enjoying the view, I casually check my status and notice the number ——— next to the phrase 'Bonus Points.'

[You can use the bonus points to increase your stats.]

Oh, thanks. By the way, where have you been? Are you alright?

[I'm okay. I guess I'm just a little tired after everything that happened yesterday.]

Alright. If you say so. Make sure to tell me if anything's wrong, okay?

[I will.]

With this new knowledge, I contemplate where I should place the points and decide on Endurance as it may help with my running training.

Once we've recovered, we meet up with Sampson by the gate. He spends the first hour correcting our grip and stances before moving on to footwork. We spend the rest of the morning working on that until Josh is too exhausted to continue. Considering I just dumped a bunch of points into Endurance, I'm barely out of breath.

"Good work today, boys. Why don't you come back tomorrow and I'll teach you how actually to swing a sword this time."

"Sounds good."

"Okay."

Josh answers before hobbling off towards his house. I watch him leave and then begin stretching.

"Not done yet?" Sampson queries.

"Not quite. I think I still have a bit left in me."

I take off jogging around the palisade and run seven more laps. It's amazing how drastically my increased stats have affected my performance. Satisfied, I head home.

Unfortunately, things aren't going so well on the home front.

"You can't sell that, Vincent! That was given to us by my father."

"Then what should we sell, Carroll? They're all precious to me!"

I grimace at their argument and walk up to my room.

You don't have any cash paying around, do you?

[No, I've never needed any and my parents never offered.]

Damn. What about doubles? Do you have any extra copies of books?

[Yeah, my whole bookshelf is spare copies.]

Why don't you go downstairs and offer to sell your books? It should be fine since they're spares, right?

[Me?]

Yeah, they're your parents, right? It will mean more coming from you.

I move back and watch as the kid gathers himself to confront his parents. It's cozy in the back. I can see how he gets lost back here sometimes.

After adjusting to having control of his body again after a few days. He hesitantly walks downstairs and enters the library where his parents are talking.

"I have some spare books."

"What, sweety?" Carroll asks as she runs up and hugs us. Her smile is so bright that it's hard to look at. The kid gulps and tries to explain himself.

"I have spare books in my room that we could sell."

"Oh no, dear. We don't need to do that."

"I know we're having problems with money. So why don't we sell the spare books I have in my room first before selling something more valuable." I can feel him clenching his fists as he makes his case. Despite his earlier hesitation, he is surprisingly assertive.

"Sure." Vincent says with a shrug.

"Vincent!" Carroll cries.

"What? He made a good point."

"Niccolo, why don't you wash up and get ready for dinner. We'll talk about this later." Carroll's gaze shifts from a sweet smile while looking at us but ends with a sharp gaze as she turns to her husband. The look of shocked grief on his face kills me as he silently pleads his innocence to his irate wife.

"Okay." The kid responds as he walks back to his room.

[You did great!] I say from my position at the back of his mind.

"Thanks. I couldn't have done it without you."

Sometimes I feel bad for falling out of the sky and disrupting this poor child's life but times like this make me feel like I'm helping. Maybe I'm here for a reason or maybe it's a cosmic accident but I decide to do everything I can to make a difference now that I've got a second chance.