Y.O.W

Chapter 9: Adapting

After Mary had gotten him to agree to stay, they'd gone back to eating dinner. Ren struggled to get the spoon to his mouth and spilt more of the soup onto the table. He glanced up at Mary, who seemed to ignore the mess he was making and enjoying her own dinner. Mary-chan's a lot more mature than I imagined her. He looked down at his bowl and then peaked back up at Mary. How long has it been since I've eaten a meal with someone else? Trying again, he struggled to get the spoon to his mouth, and this time dropped the whole thing. The spoon bounced off the table and onto the floor, splattering liquid everywhere. Heat filled his face. Am I really this bad at using my left hand?

Mary stood up and walked around to his side.

"Ah, M-Mary-chan, I can—"

She ignored him, picked up the spoon, and walked over to a bucket of clean water to rinse it off. When she finished, she pulled her chair around to his side and sat next to him. Picking up the bowl, she scooped up some soup with the clean spoon and tried to feed him.

"M-M-Mary-chan! I'm not a child," he snapped, and regretted it when he saw the disappointment on her face.

She set the bowl down and huffed. She placed the spoon in his hand, crossed her arms, and looked away from him. "Try just moving the spoon around first."

He felt bad but didn't know how to apologize. Slowly, he pretended to make a scooping motion with the spoon and dropped it onto the table. What? I shouldn't be that weak. He flexed his fingers and found them stiff.

"Why?" He mostly asked himself.

Mary looked back at him, still pouting. "Did you cast high level magic today?"

He blinked. "I just used one of my normal spells to take out that Cat Claw."

She shook her head and sighed. "Why would you cast high level magic on a forest beast? High-level magic takes a big toll on your body. You need to be more careful with what spells you use."

It's possible to overdose on potions, and it will affect my body when I cast magic. This is so different from Y.O.W. No... I should get rid of that thinking. This world isn't Y.O.W. The rules here aren't the same. I'm going to need to learn from scratch how everything works.

There was a knock on the door, and Mary went to answer it. The burly guard from before entered holding a bundle and poles. It looked like Ren's tent and bed roll they'd left behind. Well, I guess items aren't storable in inventory. Maybe inventory doesn't exist in this world. Maybe it's like earth. Great, that's annoying.

"I went and retrieved your tent boy. Next time be more careful." The man growled at Ren.

Ren could feel the man's overwhelming presence and wanted to hide, but he didn't want to look lame in front of Mary. He stood up and bowed, but only made it halfway because his shoulder throbbed.

"What are you doing, don't move around too much," Mary scolded and came to his side.

"T-Thank you for saving me earlier." Ren lightly touched his shoulder and wanted to scream.

The man stared at him in surprise then cast a confused look at Mary. "Is this the same flicker who was dripping fancy words up until yesterday?"

Ren blushed deeply. "I, uh, that was..."

The man raised an eyebrow then looked at Mary. "You sure picked an odd one."

Mary didn't comment as she fussed over Ren's sling.

The burly man cleared his throat and finally introduced himself, "My names' Role Millar. I'm Mary's father. I chased you around a lot when you were a Flicker, but... Um.. Well... If you make Mary sad, I'll pound you into the dirt."