Chương 97: Changed Man

Martin quietly sat down and scooped a viscous stew into his mouth. It lacked the perfectly balanced seasoning; in fact, it was incredibly bland. But, even then, Martin contently enjoyed the fractured view of his surroundings. For the last several months, Martin had gone through agony like never before. He met a devil that turned him into an unmoving slab of meat, starved him, threatened him, beat him, and haphazardly dragged him across wastelands and beautiful pastures alike. It was….

'Beautiful.' The world around him had always seemed so small, so impossibly abysmal and pointless. Martin never understood why people struggled so hard to survive. He looked at the strife of others, and no matter how much pain he inflicted on them, nothing ever happened. It was a world without consequence or colour. He licked his gifted spoon clean. This was the first time he ever caught his own food, the first time he ever butchered his kill, the first time he prepared it, seasoned it, cooked it, and ate it.

Why did he find his bland meal so satisfying? The royal chefs made him whatever he wanted, sweet or savoury. He travelled with his father to hundreds of kingdoms and tasted thousands of dishes, but why did this simple stew bring a tear to his eye? Why did looking at the crumpled and ruined lands enrapture him? Was it because he travelled these lands and calloused his body within them? Was it because he experienced a pain that he had never experienced before?

His pudgy hand quivered while holding a hand-carved spoon.

'I have been doing this to others my entire life.' Without help, he would have never caught that fowl. Without help, he would have never figured out how to butcher it. Without help, he would have never found the herbs and spices to make it taste slightly better. Without help, he would have never figured out how to start a fire. Without someone else's kindness, he wouldn't have a bowl or a spoon to eat with. There were no attendants to cater to his every need, and with it came a struggle.

Martin took another scoop of stew into his mouth and savoured its blandness. It was nice being able to see and experience the world as it was, despite the terror brought upon the first week of the twelfth month. Once the party arrived at the Brighthaven caravan, Martin was handed over to their head of council, Leonard. Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Other than the fact that the elven man scowled whenever Martin even breathed in his presence, the council head was a merciful man who gave Martin a second chance; even the devil himself took the elven man's words into great consideration. So by the grace of Leonard, Martin was assigned to a foraging unit dedicated to feeding Brighthaven, which was simultaneously the most lax and busiest unit. While the craftsmith unit would work for days, then rest, the foraging unit was in a constant battle of supply and demand.

Food and water weren't a necessity in the virtual realm, but the Brighthaven faction didn't care to hyper-optimize their factionalists to the degree that the Royal Faction did. People in the Brighthaven faction were able to switch jobs at any time, were able to take breaks at any time, were given a steady supply of food and drink, and even had enrichment available to mundanes instead of just the powerful.

Martin found it both jarring and understandable why they were thriving despite being on the run; he couldn't help feeling both betrayal and understanding whenever someone from the Royal Faction defected over to Brighthaven.

His living conditions were slightly worse and significantly more rigorous than his sedentary life as the Royal Faction leader, but despite being one of the lowest on the chart and sharing an unroomed carriage with mundanes, Aspirants, and Dreamers alike, the mad prince slowly grew to enjoy the company.

The sun had already long set. Leonard looked at his reflection within a barrel full of water in his tipi and slowly shaved some peach fuzz off his face with a small pocket dagger that he commissioned from Ann. His new assistants were driving him crazy. Eren and Ann had been pestering Leonard repeatedly to get assistants to offload some work.

Leonard's workload was heavy, and the responsibility of his duties had crushed several promising prospects, so when June overheard Eren and Ann pestering him to hire assistants, the damned Lord of Light took one look at him and allocated two Dreamers and a single Aspirant as his assistants. The two Dreamers, Felix and Felicity, seemed promising; they had enhanced stamina, didn't need to sleep as much, and had superhuman reflexes.

They were perfect for completing the tasks that an Aspirant like himself had been handling on his own for the last several months, but to Leonard's disappointment, they were both fools. They seemed eager to start their duties since that meant they wouldn't need to be in the presence of someone who thoroughly beat them, but their eagerness wore off quickly.

Felix was arrogant; his strength came from acting brave in front of his sister, but without her, he became hopelessly anxious to the point where even next-door delivery tasks were too much for him. He was the type to get queasy at the slightest scent of rot, which wasn't a particularly useful trait when the representative of the Brighthaven faction was a monster of rot and gore.

Felicity, on the other hand, was way better; she completed her tasks quietly and confidently with or without her twin but had a problem with pacing herself. She would continuously work without rest and then collapse from exhaustion, which was a problem since Leonard was constantly on duty. She also tended to zone out and go stiff whenever in the presence of June, which was a pain since he had to reiterate to her things after a meeting with the representative.

River, in a harsh contrast to the Dreamer twins, was everything Leonard could ask for in an assistant; he was an Aspirant like Leonard but was continuously able to pace himself, could handle complex tasks right off the bat, was an innate problem solver, and had the voice of a leader. Leonard understood why June made the three his assistants: River was the best possible candidate and practically a second Leonard, and the Dreamer twins were more of a bodyguard unit than actual assistants.

So in the end, it did lessen his workload even by a small margin. With River by his side, he was able to accelerate any plans involving Brighthaven, and with the twins by his side, he was able to risk more and achieve more. A drip of blood fell from the side of his face and rippled into the barrel of water. Leonard slowly lowered the dagger to the rim of the barrel and looked dead ahead, ignoring the sputtering cut on his cheek. Something was watching him from just outside his tent. Something inhuman.