System of the Beast Slayer [litrpg Adventure]
Copyright© 2025 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 32
They had wrapped up the evening and Roy set the still-warm kebab by the barn door, knocked once, then went inside.
At the dinner table he told Henk and his wife about Ffion. Their description matched Tross’s: she taught at the House of Cardell and was well regarded. Roy tried, gently, to suggest they send their daughter there. Maybe, he thought, Toria could get accepted; the school might take a child in her condition. But the couple parried with excuses — they could not afford the tuition and, besides, they were convinced Toria was not bright enough. They had long since decided the girl was useless.
Roy learned their limits and stopped pushing.
They ate quickly. As he headed back to his rented room, he noticed a visitor at the doorway.
The lamp on the wall painted a small figure in the doorway. The girl stood with her back to him, shoulders uneven, slightly hunched. She was carefully wiping blueberries one by one and placing them into a bucket by the door. When she finished she sighed with relief and prepared to step into the barn, but froze when she noticed someone behind her.
She stood motionless. The smile that had lit her face snapped off, and she bowed her head, trembling as if she might collapse. But this time she did not run.
“Toria, don’t be afraid, I mean you no harm,” Roy said, keeping a respectful ten feet between them instead of rushing forward. He offered the gentlest smile he could. “I just wanted to say thanks. The fruit you left these past few days was fresh, it tasted good.”
“You...” The girl hesitated a beat, drew a deep breath as if it took great will, and then stammered, turning her face away, “You’re not afraid of me?”
Her voice chimed like a little bird, edged with childish innocence and a spilling, nervous hope.
“Why would I be?” Roy looked her in the eye on purpose. “You’re no different from any other girl.”
Toria’s breath hitched, like someone who had been starving and finally found bread. No one had ever said that to her — not even her father. Tears blurred her vision. For a moment it felt as if sand had been poured into her eyes.
Roy kept speaking. “Those rotten kids only know how to run and make trouble. They mock others. You, on the other hand, feed the animals, tend the garden, work the fields. You make a living with your hands.”
“You’re remarkable,” Roy said, easy and friendly. “I should introduce myself properly. I’m Roy. I’m about your age, from a small village called Lower Posada. I just got to Aldersberg. Since you took my gift and even left one back, we’re friends now.”
“Friends?” The word sounded like a distant star. Toria remembered having playmates when she was very young, but once her back twisted, the friends drifted away. People treated her as if she were dangerous or cursed. She had stopped expecting kindness.
The lamp threw soft light across her puzzled, almost blank expression. Slowly her taut guard eased; she stopped trembling and relaxed a little.
“Let’s move someplace to talk, okay? Nothing scary, just small talk. What did you have for lunch today?”
They walked to the pond not far from the mill. The moon had climbed into the sky and silvered the water, which shivered with the night breeze.
Toria sat on the bank a short distance from Roy. He had expected her to bolt, but she stayed. She was clearly uncomfortable; her fingers twisted together, she kept her head down, too shy even to glance at her own reflection in the ripple-dark water.
“Relax,” Roy said. “Have you ever seen a magic trick?”
“No ... what’s magic?” she asked carefully.
“Like a little sleight of hand. Watch.” Roy took a small, theatrical tone that made her blink and look up. “Don’t blink.”
He held out his empty right hand, palm up, then rolled his wrist once, twice, three times. For a stunned instant Toria watched the empty palm. Then a single playing card appeared: a vividly painted woman with flaming hair and a red dress, gorgeous and dangerous as an ember.
Roy let the card spin in his hand and, after a few turns, made it vanish without fanfare.
“How did you do that?” Toria’s whole attention snapped into focus. She had never seen anything like it in the mill or the village. “Where did the card go?”
“If I tell you, it stops being a trick. Guess.”
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