Raining (Emma)

After Emma finished her round of spells, all the water had been evaporated and the steam blown out.

While the spells dissipated and their fragments reabsorbed into her body, Bernice came out and greeted her. She then went over to George to ask if Melissa was awake.

Emma watched her go over to Melissa's tent with complicated emotions.

Bernice has been her only friend that has stayed this close to her throughout her life. Her past friends have either stopped being friends or have moved to another part of Akora.

At the same time, Bernice has never had any friends except Emma for most of her life.

Before they arrived at Roastberry, Bernice still acted as her shy self in front of others and did not interact with the party much, only engaging in basic conversations.

Then came their future guide George Foster.

For some mysterious reason, she seems to have resonated with him and has continually gotten closer to him in response. Perhaps she has gotten used to the party's presence and has opened up more, but George seems to have played a role in it.

Not only does he read books like her, they have similar tastes in genre.

Another reason could be that Bernice seems a part of her past self in him. He is distant, cold, and reserved towards the outside world. She was like that at one point until she met Emma.

Emma is not a psychologist of any sorts, but she felt like these two points were the main reason.

Of course, she does not have a problem with it anymore after she talked with George. Rather, she wants to encourage Bernice to be more social so she can make friends and lead a happier life.

Regarding Melissa...

She is still a little wary of her. Although Melissa has put in the effort to socialize with her, Emma has noticed she maintains a bit of distance in regard to certain matters but tries to be friendly for other topics.

Her main wariness comes from their earlier fight and her sudden appearance in these mountains.

Melissa claims to be of the [Ranger] class, but all of her abilities she displayed leaned more towards shadow skills and a little bit of assassination.

Emma is heavily inclined to believe Melissa is lying.

She has interacted with [Ranger]-class adventurers during dungeon raids and naturally knows most of their common skills. Melissa has the agility magus like they do because it is used as a foundation for the class, but everything else has no similarities.

Since her [Clairvoyance] skill was blocked, Emma has no way of deterring her true class.

She is including to think of Melissa possessing the [Assassin] class because of the skills she showed. Not to mention, her physique is perfect for the class.

However, with only that as evidence, Emma cannot make a solid conclusion.

That is the main reason why she is still wary of her.

...

"Here's your meal." George handed Emma the same meal packets as he did with the others, with the only difference being the larger meal portion. After all, recovering any kind of magus energy puts a toll on the individual's metabolism.

"Thank you." Emma thanked him in a sincere tone as she took the meal packets.

After which, she sat down in her foldable chair while maintaining the [Shield] spell.

Except for Bernice, Emma actually trusts George the most out of the party members.

It sounds contradictory considering his cold indifference and mystery.

However, George is straightforward in his answers and does not beat around the bush. He speaks out only when necessary and expresses a lot of his internal thinking.

It makes it easy for Emma to understand most of his intentions when he shows them, which has made it easy for her to determine he never harbors evil intentions.

Even when he releases his [Aura] and demonic magus, his mind remains clear and void of the emotions someone would have under the influence of demonic magus. Even when he does express some emotion, Emma can tell that they are genuine.

In summary, Emma has a lot of trust in him because he is a straightforward guy who expresses genuine good intentions whenever something happens even if he claims it is because of money.

'However...'

Emma narrowed her eyes over a past matter.

Recalling the fight with Melissa, Emma was easily dominated when George joined the fray.

Although her mind was corrupted and full of evil thoughts at the time, she remembers everything that happened very clearly.

Emma had released her full power and had even temporarily upgraded it through the spell [Wood Extraction], reaching the rank of S for a short period of time.

Her attacks at this point would be enough to cause substantial damage to Roastberry City.

Yet the moment George appeared and released his [Aura], the flow of the battlefield was instantly controlled by him.

The power he had displayed at the anomaly paled in comparison to this feat of performance.

What is even more humiliating is that George did not seem to be exerting himself. Rather, it was like he was holding back and casually flexing.

The sheer amount of demonic magus was enough that it turned into demonic flames around his strange sword, with enough energy to counter her strongest attack spell and injure her.

This only increased the mystery in her eyes.

Regarding his statement two weeks ago that he only has leftover demonic magus from Diabolus and he used an [Upgrade Stone], Emma again had the urge to smack him on the head.

Emma has never fought demons before since she was born after the war ended, but she felt like the amount was enough to rival a demon lord.

Yet that amount if concentrated within his thin body.

In Melissa's mind, this explained why his status showed zero magus nodes when they had first met.

Demonic magus is naturally produced by the living organisms of Diabolus, but is corrosive to the mind, body, and magus nodes of non-natives.

In small doses, this magus amplifies the power of other magus energies, skills, and attributes at the cost of decreased sanity. More of demonic magus further decreases sanity at the gain of even more amplification.

However, this reaches a plateau when the concentration is equal to the amount of magus native to the person or creature. After that, the energy degrades the magus nodes and body of the person until they are no longer able to use magus anymore. At this point, they will likely turn into an insane rapid creature.

The exception of course is George, who has a mysterious ring which suppresses the corrosive nature of demonic magus to the mind at the cost of most of his emotions.

Of course, Emma felt a lot of sympathy for the old man who looks incredibly young.

She would have helped him if they were not in the Northern Mountain Range, but since they are a month away from civilization, she can only keep her opinions to herself.

Watching George cook some more meat to eat for himself, Emma could only sigh and put her burning questions aside.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Notes:

* I've been reading a good novel recently.

* I did not feel like it was very important to talk about her feelings towards Abe and Hester, so I left it out.

* I took my time to type out this chapter, so I hope it is of better quality.