Chapter 11: Cracks
Percy sat on his bed, next to his grandpa. It had been two weeks since baldy started filling his second core. Sadly, they didn’t have anything to show for it yet, not even a hint they were getting closer.
Still, the young man was feeling some newfound appreciation for his grandpa. Not only because he was practically showering him with affection for the first time in his life, but also due to his sheer dedication and discipline. Frankly, the man was a monster. Every day, he showed up before sunrise, and didn’t leave his room until hours past sunset. Well, besides a few mandatory breaks of course.
‘I guess you don’t reach Violet by accident.’
Having delegated the family’s management to his sons and daughters, baldy didn’t slack at all. It took him nearly five minutes to empty his core and about twenty to refill it. He spent over 18 hours per day in Percy’s room and the young man once counted a total of 42 refills. Percy had almost expected him to give up after the first week, but Archibald showed no intention of doing that. Pressing on, he seemed determined to follow his words through to the end.
And watching him work hard, Percy was also motivated to keep his training up.
For the first few days, he’d continued honing the sharpness and integrity of his constructs. When he began experiencing diminishing returns, he switched to increasing their range. That said, his room wasn’t that large, so he had to stop when they reached the walls. Naturally, his soul mana could phase through, but he didn’t want to hit somebody on the other side by accident.
However, the weirdest thing was how his grandpa had started talking to him since the second day. In hindsight, it shouldn’t have surprised Percy. After all, the two would be stuck spending all their time together for who-knew how long. It would be stranger if they never talked. Still, he wasn’t used to casual chats with baldy, the two having limited their past interactions to the bare minimum.
As for what they talked about?
Well, at first his grandpa offered him tips and guidance on how to better manipulate and recover his mana. A few days later, however, they graduated to more idle chatter, even gossiping about Percy’s aunts and uncles, or teaching the young man about the other families on Remior. Stuff he couldn’t find in books.