Chapter 395: Two Best Friends on a Search
Fourth Street
Tolgue City
Githal Region
November 14th
530th Divine Year
Two teenage girls were walking through the streets of Tolgue City, taking in the city sights while buying roadside snacks.
The first of the two boasted long white hair and her bright hazel eyes that seamlessly complemented her appearance.
She was wearing a plain brown turtleneck atop black jeans and sneakers, and she held shopping bags in one hand, with an ice cream cone in the other.
Her friend beside her was fairly tall and had hair of the opposing black colour. She had a ’relaxed’ air about her and her face betrayed no particular expressions.
With her pair of gold-coloured eyes, she looked at the street around her, gauging the magi-technology level of development from the equipment and apparatus she saw.
"Honestly, I don’t think it’s possible for you to find that guy—whoever he is—in this world.
You’re looking for one demon among millions of them. It’s going to be hard to find him with just his name.
Who knows how many demons have that same name?"
Upon hearing her friend’s abrupt words, the white-haired girl turned her attention back from the dress she was looking at through a shop’s window and replied.
"It’d be fine, Arty.
Sure, there may be other demons with the same name, but I don’t think any one of them would have Light Magic better than even gods and angels."
"...what? That’s possible?"
"For him, it is. Did I also mention that he comprehends the law of light as well?"
The golden-eyed girl, ’Arty’, looked at her friend with a gaze that clearly showed her disbelief.
"Leaving aside how you’re just telling me the person you’re after is a Transcendent. Why would a Demon want to comprehend a law on the other end of the spectrum of their base Darkness affinity?
Isn’t that a waste of time?"
Arty stopped for a few moments to try and make sense of her friend’s words, but it still seemed incomprehensible to her.
"Leaving aside his light magic, it’d still be har-"
"The ’Demon of Light’?"
Arty stopped talking when she heard that foreign voice and turned to the side to see her white-haired friend talking with a roadside bard who was seated beside a water fountain.
The girl nodded when she heard the bard’s words, before explaining the same thing she had just told Arty.
"He’s a demon who can use really good light magic. Is that what he’s called around here?"
"Well...there’s only one person who fits the bill of what you’re talking about. And he’s a real scary demon folk.
He’s been givin’ our Divine Human Generals one tough battle after another."
"Mhmm. It’s definitely him."
The white-haired teen nodded repeatedly with her eyes shining—literally.
The bard was shocked and nearly dropped his instrument as he saw that he was now beginning to see different lights in the girl’s eyes.
He felt as if he wasn’t looking at someone’s eyes but at the night sky with stars in it.
Upon seeing the expression on the Bard’s face, Arty quickly understood that her friend had gotten a bit too ’excited’, before moving to tap the girl on the shoulder and pull her mind back to reality.
"Hmm? What’s up Arty?"
Her eyes returned to their normal hazel colour, while Arty just sighed and asked the bard one more question.
"Do you happen to know the location of this ’Demon of Light’? As well as his name?"
"...huh? Ah...yeah.
That’s common knowledge ’round these parts. That demon’s one of the biggest Demon Generals out there.
They call him ’Sargon’...and as for his location; he’s probably down south. Our Generals have kept the demons from advancing Up North, after all."
Arty glanced at her friend for a moment and when she saw the ’shine’ in the white-haired girl’s eyes, she knew they were onto the right person.
"Okay, thank you."
She tossed the bard a coin which the man caught in his palms, only to open them and see it was a golden coin.
"...wha?! Misses, this is too...muc..h..."
The man’s voice trailed off as all he saw were gold-lame particles falling to the ground as the two girls disappeared into the sea of people moving around.
"...who were those misses?"
◇ ◇ ◇
Said ’Misses’ were checking into a Hotel where they planned to spend the night and also discuss how they were going to find their way to the Southern part of the Continent.
Well, Arty was the one doing all the work while her white-haired friend just kept sitting in the corner while opening a new cone of ice cream with a smile on her face.
"Let’s go, our Suite’s on the top floor."
"Kay!"
She jumped off her seat and followed Arty towards the private Elevator for guests who booked Suites, and when it opened up, a teenager around their age walked out of it.
Neither Arty nor her white-haired friend paid the boy any further attention until he walked right past the white-haired girl.
’?!’
The white-haired girl suddenly froze in her tracks, her whole body twitching instinctively as she sensed ’something’ move right past her.
’What in the world is that Time Power??!!’
It felt as if her own energies wanted to spiral out of control, and that feeling only increased when she felt a gaze on her back a moment later.
Her body flinched under the pressure she felt from the gaze, but it disappeared a few seconds later, right before Arty called out to her.
"What’s wrong?"
The girl ignored her golden-eyed friend and turned around, spotting the boy who had just walked past them at the counter with his back facing theirs.
She hadn’t taken note of the boy’s facial features since her gaze was faced down when he passed, and since his back was turned towards them, all she could tell was that he had a head of silver hair.
’But his time energy...it’s honestly frightening...’
The teenager quickly turned her gaze around and quickly pulled Arty into the elevator, while claiming that ’nothing happened’ when questioned by her friend.
The two made their way to their rooms without any other incident, and after entering, the white-haired girl’s first course of action was to toss the bags she had on the floor before running to the nearest bed and diving into it.
"I found him!!"
She jumped off the bed and towards Arty who was removing her shoes, pulling the black-haired girl into a hug while screaming the same words over and over.
"Stop jumping around, you’re gonna spill ice cream all over the floor."
"Huh? I took care of that first."
Arty glanced at the white-haired girl’s hand and noticed that in contrast to the colours of the world around her, the ice cream cone alone strangely just had two colours; black and white.
"Hehehehehe...did you think going to a different Star System would have kept you away from me?
You can’t run, Alvey."
Seeing the white-haired girl suddenly start muttering to herself after a very strange laugh, Arty silently backed away with a single thought running through her mind.
’I think my best friend has gone crazy.’
But just as a certain Progenitor thought, said Best Friend, was also very perceptive.
"You just thought it was ’crazy’ now, didn’t you?!"
"Nope."
’She’s crazy sharp.’
"You did it again?!"
Arty maintained her poker face and tilted her head to the side before asking.
"What are you talking about?"
"Don’t use that poker face on me!"
The white-haired girl placed the time-frozen ice cream on a nearby table as she whined, while Arty slowly inched closer to the room doors.
[Room Service]
"Oh, look. Our food’s here."
"Arty! We’re not done with this conversation!"
"Oh, look. Our food’s here."
"Arty?!"
The Room Service Attendant, who coincidentally happened to be the one who served Arthur earlier, was quite dumbfounded when the door opened to reveal the white-haired girl who was chained to the bed for some reason.
"Place the food here, and I’d like you to take the clothes in that bag for Laundry."
"Um...is she okay?"
"Don’t worry, she’s fine. Just take the clothes and go."
There was something about the smile Arty gave her that made the attendant silently comply and leave the room without asking any questions again.
