New Horizons

  “Liam are you alright!?”

  Clutching my shoulders with a face full of panic, Julia crouched to my level, her eyes darting frantically as she examined everything from the top of my head to the soles of my feet. My body was being pulled, turned, lifted and oriented in just about every way possible.

  “I-I’m fine mother, see I'm not hurt at all.”

  Waving my arms around with that sentence was enough to subdue her panicked gestures, if only for a moment. She gazed at me intently, struggling to restrain the tears welling up in her eyes. Sure enough, after she calmed down she brought me into the familiar embrace I was slowly getting used to.

  “Thank goodness~”

  No words were said between us for a few brief moments. Judging by how hard she was holding onto me, I could only assume she was somehow trying to reassure herself.

  “Mother does this mean I can use magic now?”

  “Ah! T-that's right, your core just awakened, I can feel a lot more mana coming from you now!” She released me from her embracing grip, still teary eyed. It would seem that my safety had been the only thing on her mind thus far, I doubt she would have even noticed the mana subtly seeping from my body if I hadn’t brought it up.

  “Congratulations Liam, you’re a mage now.” She said, rustling my hair after wiping the fluid pooling at her eyelids. It was a gesture both of my ‘parents’ enjoyed so it must have been some way for them to show affection.

  A familiar figure came rushing towards the house from across the stone bridge connecting our house to Zale. It was a man with chestnut brown hair and eyes and dressed in a strange uniform. Ragged breaths escaped him as he increased the intensity of his frantic strides. The closer he got the more apparent his confusion became, especially since the house behind us had been reduced to rubble.

  Oliver’s confusion mellowed out into something a lot less perturbed after a while, seeing as Julia was still smiling nonchalantly behind me that must have been some form of reassurance in its own right. He gradually began reducing all the momentum he’d been building up until now, before slowly coming to a stop. Without hesitation, he asked the question we’d both been expecting, barely pausing to take the much-needed deep breath beforehand— “Are you two alright!?” he asked reflexively.

  The wording and tonality made it seem like that was the only thing he could say right now.

  “Fufu; we’re fine dear, Liam was just showing off a little.”

  “Eh?”

  Julia's nonchalant reply easily eased all of the tension in his body. Pausing for a moment, Oliver finally stopped to catch his breath.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “What do you mean...Liam was showing off?” His eyes drifted over to me with that question.

  “Heh-Heh, well you see -”

  Bracing myself for the ecstatic performance I was about to put on, I began focusing all my efforts on portraying the child like enthusiasm a typical four-year-old ought to have been feeling. “I can use magic now father!”

  Wrestling myself from Julia's grip, I announced the breaking news, watching as a surge of emotions suddenly flashed over his face in the few seconds that passed. First it was confusion, then recognition, and after cycling through a myriad of other emotions he finally settled on disbelief.

  It was as if a whirlwind of thoughts and emotions swept through him in that brief moment, leaving him momentarily speechless. Yet, amidst the turmoil of his reaction, I could see a glimmer of understanding dawning in his eyes, a realization settling in as he grappled with the implications of the news I just delivered. Soon enough, a thin smile had begun spreading across his face -

  “Well done, Liam!”

  “Heh-heh-heh, I knew you’d react like that.” Julia had somehow found this amusing but in my case, it was quite a bizarre situation. Without warning, Oliver had lifted me off the ground and was now throwing my body into the air, each time I began my descent he would catch me and repeat the process all over again. It was my first time ever experiencing something like this, so I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it, in fact I initially thought he was going to attack me.

  After tossing my body into the air more than five times, he finally decided to end this little charade, catching me one last time before allowing me to stand on solid ground.

  “Awakening at four years old, eh? It’s honestly a little hard to believe.” The man’s eyes scanned me from head to toe, his gaze bearing a mix of astonishment and intrigue. Regardless of the reason for the elation in his eyes, it was undeniable that he harbored a deep sense of pride at my recent achievement.

  “By the way Oliver, what made you think that we were in danger?” Asked Julia, tilting her head curiously.

  “While I was in town I felt that huge surge of mana coming from this direction, I didn’t know who it was and considering that the basilisk is still on the loose I ended up just rushing over here on instinct. I guess my fears weren’t entirely grounded but still...”

  Oliver diverted his gaze over to our fragmented house.

  “..Liam, I’m guessing you’re the one responsible for that too?” he probed, wording the question carefully.

  “Am I in trouble?”

  “No not at all." he replied, laughing it off. "These things usually happen when kids awaken for the first time but I've never seen it get this bad.” His voice trailed off unexpectedly, it seems he was still coming to terms with the scale of destruction I’d inevitably caused. Broken timber frames, shattered glassware and a destroyed patio was just grazing the tip of this iceberg.

  CLAP

  Julia drew our focus back to her.

  “Well, what’s done is done. The good thing about this is that Liam’s fine so let's stop worrying about that for now, we might have to spend a few nights inside the city though. Will that be alright?”

  “Yeah, I’ve put a few measures in place so if that thing shows up again, I’ll be ready to head out. Given the way things are right now though, I think I’ll call it a day, and besides it looks like we’ve got visitors.”

  “Ahh, looks like they’ve caught on as well.”

  Approaching from the same direction Oliver sprinted across, were the familiar figures of Owen and Vreena; steadily making their way across the large stone bridge. Apparently the day was going to be far more eventful than I initially anticipated.