Tale Of A Knight 22 Volume 2: Chapter 12: The Chase

"The kid is already is a squire, aside from living here, he is no longer under my wing. Unfortunately I cannot help as he is not here at this time. Though I am curious, why would you, 10th Seat of the Holy Swords, would be interested in him?" Mekros asked of his impatient guest.

"That would be my business with him and him alone." That was Aristan Leon's terse reply. He proceeded to then storm off quickly.

"Wow, young ones these days…" Mekros couldn't help but utter. This visit by Aristan Leon was just plain awkward.

"I wonder what kind of trouble you got yourself into, Bakit. For a member of Holy Swords to be after you, just in case, I suppose I need to remove all the evidence of my brothels visitations…"

* * *

"Master Zen gave me a week off, he said I will need my strength until then. Well, might as well go to Rolgo's place."

For the last several weeks, Bakit was the one testing out all of Rolgo's new gadgets. Bakit specifically told Rolgo that he will not test anything that could potentially explode in his hands. Rolgo just shrugged and told him.

"My inventions wouldn't explode…Probably…"

Of course, Bakit was grateful for Rolgo constructing his fake hand. The fingers were magnetized to each other on the tips so that the hand could at least open and close. This allowed Bakit to be able to use his right fake hand to carry buckets or bags or use the palm in general.

Apparently, Rolgo has been experimenting with prosthetic hands, making a new version almost every few days, and Bakit was the one, inevitably testing them out.

One hand detached and shot a fist in forward direction. But its aim and the gunpowder used gave too much of backlash effect, so the idea was quickly abandoned.

Another hand had tiny mana crystals attached to it in order to supply energy to the fingers; the immovable fingers could then be set on fire. The idea was to have the fingers function like a match. The trouble is, the fingers and the hand caught on fire rather quickly, leading Bakit to throwing the hand away, lest he burned to death. That one clearly was a failure in more ways than one.

Rolgo also had made Bakit wear different necklaces with different magical effects, to see if they functioned like intended.

The necklace that was supposed to repel mosquitos attracted bees. So Bakit had a rather hard time sleeping considering bees managed to sneak into his room.

One necklace was supposed to provide resistance to heat, thus preventing burns and protection from sunlight. The problem was that it took heat cancellation a little too far. One day, Bakit woke up with an icicle hanging down his nose and his entire body blue from frost.

And the latest one, the necklace that supposedly made a person heal and recover quicker from injuries, it was simply impossible to wear for long. The side effect was the uncontrollable rash and itch after a period of wearing it. Of course rash disappeared after the necklace was taken off, but Bakit was sure none in their sane mind would want to wear that thing.

Today, he was testing out the capabilities of a ring of levitation. The ring supposedly could make small objects float at user's whim.

However the plate that Rolgo put on the table did not float no matter how much Bakit tried.

Instead, the shelf behind Bakit ended up being attracted to Bakit and ended up smashing into him, pinning him to a wall.

Rolgo quickly took off the ring off of Bakit, making the shelf stop being attracted to Bakit, making him able to get out of between the wall and the shelf.

"Rolgo, your inventions are simply disastrous! Why none of them does what it is supposed to? Every single time you take care of one problem you cause a bigger one!"

Bakit voiced his anger at being victim of this mad inventor's whims. Rolgo nervously laughed.

"That is why the inventions have to be tested; I cannot have customers buy products that can potentially endanger their lives."

"Of course not, but at least make sure they work properly before giving them to me to test!"

"Will do, sorry about that. Also could you please test this out over a few days?" he gave Bakit another ring, it was greyish in color.

"What is it? Another failed product? How deadly is it?" Bakit was understandably hesitant to touch anything that was made by Rolgo.

"Worry not, I already know it works as intended, but I need to know the duration of time it is effective."

"What does it do?"

"It is called the Ring of Calmness. It forcibly makes the user not feel any emotions like fear, stress, or any other feelings, only leaving cold logical reasoning. It will not explode or cause you any harm, I a.s.sure you, but I do not know for how long the effect of the ring lasts, so I need you to test it out."

"Why don't you test it out yourself?"

"Because I need my emotions in order to create, without them I cannot build anything new. This ring would forcibly take away my inspirations~"

Seeing that Bakit was hesitating, Rolgo made another offer.

"I am currently working on an advanced prosthetic hand; it will be controlled by a larger mana crystals located on the inside of the arm that is responsible for controlling the fingers. The fingers of this arm will be functional. So while you are testing out the Ring of Calmness, I will make you a better arm, how about that?"

In addition to getting a good compensation, Bakit also got replacement prosthetic hands from Rolgo, apparently he was testing out the prototypes, which made Rolgo able to improve upon the versions he made. With the versions that Bakit said were good, Rolgo put them on display on his store and already sold dozen of them for a good price.

With a sigh, Bakit agreed and put on the ring.

Now his feelings were completely gone. It was as if his mind everything became crystal clear. No feelings or emotions clouded his judgment.

He felt so calm and in peace.

A doorbell rang, someone entered.

"Welcome to the shop! How can I help you?"

The customer started making order and asked a few things.

As Rolgo saw Bakit leaving, he said.

"Have a nice one, Bakit!"

The customer's eyes opened wide in shock and he asked of Rolgo.

"Bakit… is he Bakit?! The one apprenticed under Mekros Renow?!"

"Uhm, yes. Dear customer, he is."

"Finally found him!"

The customer rushed out of the shop, following Bakit's tracks.

"But your order…" Rolgo muttered, his customer apparently forgot all about it.

* * *

Bakit's emotions were completely gone, then so were his fears and sense of dread he sometimes used to feel. He simply walked forward inside the city without a care.

Apparently they are making a new building, thus the construction was taking place, with the bare skeleton of the building visible.

"Admirable effort." Bakit muttered, before he sensed something.

The feeling was familiar. Due to his honed senses under Sword Lord, Bakit immediately recognized what it was, the air slashes, and they were coming right at him.

Without panicking or second thoughts, Bakit proceeded to dodge one air slash, duck to avoid another one, and jumped up in side flip in order to avoid the third one.

Someone was clearly trying to attack him and him alone. In other words, Bakit was the target.

"I am surprised to see you were able to dodge those…but I should give some credit to myself, I wasn't trying my hardest…"

A man with platinum white hair, golden eyes, fair complexion walked in Bakit's direction. He was dressed in n.o.bleman's attires of gold and white color, with a cloak of white outside and purple inside. On his head was a blue cavalier hat with a single golden feather on top. His fame could be described as very handsome by men's standards, without a single blemish or a scar.

In his hands he was wielding an elegant sword, its handle was decorated with gold and silver and the hand he was wielding it was covered by the hand guard connected to the sword. It was a fine sword indeed.

Bakit recalled that Mekros once told him about different types of swords, the one the white haired man was wielding is called a rapier, a gentleman's weapon.

"I suppose you already know why I am here."

"Not really, I was just on my way home."

"I have searched for you all over the city for the last several days. I even went as far to visit Prince Sala to obtain information on you, but every place I was told to look for you, you weren't there, I was starting to think you somehow disappeared into thin air like you disappeared after challenging Jansulu, but here we are." He was smiling wickedly.

"I am sorry, but who are you again?" Bakit's head tilted a little, he was clearly confused.

"Do not pretend not to know me, you fool! Listen up and listen well, I am Leon Aristan, cousin to the one you challenged, Aristan Jansulu. I don't know what trickery you used to fool her into thinking she lost to you, but rest a.s.sured, your tricks will not work on me!" he pointed his sword at Bakit.

"Squire Bakit, I, Leon Aristan, 10th seat of Holy Swords, challenge you to a duel!"

"No thanks."

Bakit proceeded to run for it.

He wasn't feeling fear, just a notion that being involved with this weirdo would bring nothing but trouble.

But apparently the n.o.bleman was following behind him.

Air slash after air slash was sent his way. Many of them ended up colliding with the surrounding buildings, people were starting to panic.

"There is no way I am letting you become my brother in law!" Leon screamed as he kept unleashing air slashes at Bakit.

But Bakit kept calmly avoiding them.

If he were not wearing the Ring of Calmness, he would have been panicking or suffering a nervous breakdown, instead, however, he was calmly running away from danger.

They ended up approaching a more populated area.

Bakit brandished his sword.

If this idiot keeps doing air slashes in this place, civilians will get hurt, I know how to counter Master Zen's air slashes, so countering this guy's should be the same.

The sword hanging on Bakit's belt on the right side was a dull bladed sword. It was a replacement sword given to him by Rolgo until he finished making a custom sword for him.

Before an air slash could end up killing children who were cowering in fear, Bakit stepped up and managed to counter the air slashes with his own sword.

Bakit's slashes cancelled the power of his enemy's air slashes and were reflected back at Leon. Leon in turn ended up having to dodge his own reflected air slashes.

I will need to lead him away from here. Somewhere with less people.

Bakit ended up running towards the construction building.

But before he could run further, Leon ended up sending air vortex in his direction.

It was far larger than a standard air slash. But while it was larger, it was slower, thus Bakit managed to avoid it. However, the air vortex ended up swallowing some of the construction workers sending them up into the air to their deaths.

"Level 4 spell: Air Vortex!" Leon tried to cast the same spell again. Apparently it was not a swordsmanship but magic instead, he was resorting to mixing his swordsmanship skills with proficiency with wind magic. But before he could cast the spell, he was. .h.i.t with a rock to his temple.

The spell ended up exploding him, sending him crashing into one of the metal pillars of the building that was being constructed.

Back of his head hurt, but Leon was not about to give up.

Well, throwing a rock at his head did not knock him out, he is still chasing me.

Leon proceeded to use air magic in order to give himself air bursts, he was now literally stepping up and walking in the air.

Both Bakit and Leon were now were in the middle of the building of being constructed.

Having a higher ground, Leon overconfidently sent air slash after another, which Bakit calmly dodged.

He did not notice however that he was weakening the metal pillars that held up the building, the air slashes were damaging them. In his pursuit of Bakit, he irresponsibly used wind magic to enhance his swordsmanship.

The infrastructure was breaking down, it was barely holding up. Only one pillar remained. Bakit saw his opportunity.

Leon proceeded to unleash his largest air slash yet.

Concentrating his will upon his left hand, holding tightly to his sword, Bakit proceeded to counter the air slash.

He aimed it above Leon, to hit the last pillar that held everything from falling down. Leon mistakenly thought that the reflected air slash was aimed at him, so he ducked.

Bakit proceeded to run for it.

The last pillar was cut down; now the entire building proceeded to fall in on itself.

With his wind magic Leon managed to prevent himself from being critically injured, but one of the metal pillars ended up falling on him.

His entire body was trapped. He could not move.

By the time he received aid, Bakit was already gone.

Because he was the only one found at the site during the construction accident and the fact that he did not deny his guilt in destroying the construction site, he was charged hundred gold coins for the property damage. Though as a n.o.bleman, he was easily able to pay it.

But having to pay for the costs of damages was not the worst part, the worst part was the fact that he lost.

He, Leon Aristan, lost to this squire Bakit.

"After this, I have to acknowledge him, huh. I will apologize to him the next time I meet him. Losers have no say in the matter, I suppose."

Bakit, he was loath to admit it, but maybe, just maybe, he is a good match for monstrously powerful Jansulu. Bruises he received for his attempt to challenge Bakit was a clear proof of it.

However, Leon failed to take into an account that his injuries were technically self-inflicted

On the other side of the city, after confirming that Leon was not chasing him, Bakit took off the Ring of Calmness.

Immediately, his emotions rushed into his head.

Oh no, he said his name was Aristan, just like that crazy girl! Are there going to be other people named Aristan coming after me now?! Why me?!