"Athie! Athie! wanna play with me?" Little Lily said as she toddled after the kid, a few years older than she was. He was sitting on a chair with a scroll on hand.
She figured that if Sister Sylwen and her brother ended up together, then she’d be family with him. She didn’t mind. He was very pretty.
The boy looked at her and looked away, turning his attention back to the scroll. The little girl blinked and peeked at what he was reading, feeling dizzy at the dense writing and the odd symbols.
"Waaa yew so smat... you aweady undewstand this?!" she mumbled. Her eyebrows furrowed. Because she knew a lot as soon as she was born, she was under the impression that she was extremely smart, wise, and much better than her peers.
Now, she encountered a wall where she had no idea about a single paragraph.
"Can you teach me?"
Athie looked at her with his usual stoic face, with eyebrows furrowed a bit.
"Can’t you?"
"This is elven ancient language. Of course you cannot read it."
"I see..." she mumbled, looking down in disappointment, her cheeks puffier than usual.
Athie, with that neutral face, was actually feeling bad and did not know how to comfort her. In the end, he could only sigh.
"Fine," he said. "I cannot guarantee you will be able to learn a few letters, however."
"YAY!"
"In exchange, I also teach you a few interesting games, too!"
These games were simpler ones Finn taught her, like rock-paper-scissors, hide-and-seen, and a few others.
Finn sat at one of the lawn tables and watched the children play. He was drinking lovely flower tea with Syl. While they played, he couldn’t help but look at his sister and remember the type of magic she had.
It was not elemental like the others. Was it more...telekenesis? But there was no such affinity here, from what he knew.
"You can see stats, can’t you?" Syl just replied to him when he asked.
"Did I?"
Syl gave him a look.
Finn smiled. He never said this explicitly, but there was no need for secrets between them.
The slots for staff members were now full, so he could only register his sister as a guest. Her bedroom was registered to his, though she seemed to have a fondness for sleeping with Syl, because she was soft and magical.
Finn could only chuckle, but he was also a bit envious. Should he just sleep over there, too?
Anyway, he looked at her stats in the [Guest Logbook].
[Name: Lilienne | Race: ??? | Age: 4 | Level: Charged State Tier 1 | Class: Mage | Affinity: ??? | Status: Okay | Room: Luxury Bedroom 1| Duration of Stay: Indefinite | Mood: Happy | Needs: None | Status: N/A ]
"..."
Those ??? were really worrisome for some reason. But what could he do?
Anyway, Finn just needed to do what he always did: Cook, train, and make money (while bonding with his important people at the same time).
Starting that day, he temporarily increased the cooking slots to 100 dishes! However, the payment was in toughened cores!
He was willing to make 1 C-Class meal or 3 D-class meals for 1 toughened core.
This naturally caused a lot of (good) chaos in the inn!
Many of them, even after using the inn for so long, could only smell Finn’s food, drool from a distance, and then glare at the lucky bastards who got the slots!
Now, they could finally achieve one of their dreams!
With the help of his staff preparing the ingredients for him, including handling the gardens, Finn streamlined the cooking process so it was possible for him to create a hundred meals in a day, all while still having time to train.
For efficiency, he made set meals, so they only needed to prepare a number of ingredients and pre-prepare them en masse. The customers would have the option of whether they wanted grilled, mashed, or baked thornroots, and these can mix well with most other cuisines.
With the extension up and running, it had become easier than ever to gather these cores, and the amount of toughened-level (and even fortified-level) cores had spiked up!
For the next few days, he did this, and then he’d train at night, surrounded by toughened cores. His concentration overtook his whole body now, and he was absorbing forces more than just with his hands. When he woke up, a good portion of his crystal mountain would be gone.
His methods were unconventional, but he did not forget he still had a mission. He was just doing it in the way that he knew best!
...
Meanwhile, the two kids continued to bond and play various games for the next few hours. They even gained playmates...and none of them were human.
One was Pang, and the others...were the sprites.
"Wowowow! That’s amazzinn!" Lily exclaimed and clapped her hands when she saw some plants in the garden flower in front of her own eyes. This was done by the plant sprite, who was doing manual pollination on the plants.
Pang was there to watch, confused, but he played with them anyway.
The Spirit Guidebook did not include this!
For some reason, Lily could see the sprites. She could even ask them to do stuff. For example, the Buff sprite tended to play favorites and send her buffs, causing her attacks to become even stronger. There was also the Thrower Sprite, who targets annoying people she disliked.
Anyway, there weren’t many people making trouble inside nowadays, and the thrower sprite would only assist when the monster was troublesome to the person facing them.
Even the cleaning sprite would appear whenever she got too dirty from playing in the mud, which made Lily even more careless when playing.
"It’s true! There are a few of em!" Lily told Athie, who was puzzled by the random changes going around him.
Athie felt there really was unusual energy there but couldn’t tell what they were.
He sighed. It seemed like he hadn’t read enough books yet.