Slowly, Aylrentyrth the ancient gold dragon nodded in response to Eisen's question about what the lord of this town they were currently in was like, and began telling him what he could remember.
"That child was one that was quite fit for my gift. While he wanted to look deep into the existence of others, he wanted to hide his own. I could tell that he grew up in an environment opposing his inherently kind personality. So you do not have to worry about trusting him. What you should worry about is if he truly showed you his true intentions. Despite him only wanting to do good in the end, his ways often seem quite wicked. It was the same during the trials that I gave him." Ailren explained to Eisen, who immediately nodded.
"I see. That calms me down a bit. Zaran wants to throw out the inhabitants of the church's facilities, but if you say his personality is like that, he may just be trying to protect them from something. And you're sure he can be trusted?" Eisen inquired, before Ailren seemed to think for a bit.
"Well, people change over time, so I can not say for sure. But I can at least tell you that he has not fallen from grace, as I would have noticed this being the case if he had. So he is still inherently kind. Whether his means to reach the goal have changed to be more radical is unknown to me, however."
"That's fine. Everything I know so far points toward Zaran being a good kid, so there shouldn't be anything to worry about, at least not immediately. Bol, I'm sure you've had an encounter with him before as well, right? I mean, a champion as the lord of the town you live in should catch your attention, usually." Eisen asked before the bronze dragon simply nodded.
"Yes, I've talked to him before. I even offered him to take my trial, but he didn't want to yet. He would be great for infiltration because of the reasons that Ailren stated before. And because my Gift is transformation-based, it would have been a good fit." He explained, and Eisen slowly nodded.
"I see. So two dragons wanted to make Zaran a champion, then. Good to know. Thanks." Eisen said with a smile, before the two ancient Dragons next to him slowly nodded, and he looked over toward the ceremony that was slowly unfolding in front of them.
The base for this ceremony, a large magic circle, carved into the floor, had different materials; crystals, liquids, and minerals, as catalysts placed methodically around the edge. In the center of the circle stood Kirisho holding her amulet as Xenia looked over toward the old men watching and jerked her head in the opposite direction to get them to come closer since she was about to start.
Quietly, Xenia then held her hands forward and poured her mana out of her palms, enveloping the whole space in her energy, making the light shift in response so that everything seemed as if it was flowing around due to the mana shifting the perceived space around.
Curiously, Eisen activated his Truth-Seeing Eyes and watched Xenia's still pure-white mana as she began to manipulate it. It started to twist around the space and slowly absorbed the mana contained in all of the different materials, dyeing different areas of it in numerous colors as it seemed like a rainbow, before the colors all mixed together and Xenia began to compress her mana around the amulet, before she began to chant a quite long spell.
Just that chant alone took around a minute or two, and after that, a bright light enveloped the amulet and Kirisho's body disappeared inside of it as the amulet itself dropped to the ground. Just then, Xenia finished the ceremony off with a single world.
"Dispell." She exclaimed with her regular cold gaze before the light enveloping Kirisho's amulet disappeared as if shattering, revealing its new form. Overall, it didn't change too much, the only difference being the gem at the center of the amulet. Before, it was pitch-black, but now it shone in a pure white, the same color that Kirisho's mist had.
And soon after this happened, that exact mist started spilling out of the gem and filling out the area around the amulet as Kirisho re-appeared. Her priorly black robes had now changed to be mostly white as well, while still keeping the black base.
"Alright, the curse has been removed," Xenia exclaimed, smiling as she looked at the woman in front of her as Kirisho picked up her amulet. With a smile, Kirisho stepped up forward toward Xenia after noticing the change.
"Thank you, and it was so kind of you to do this." She told Xenia, who looked away embarrassed in response before the High-Elf looked over at Eisen. "Thank him instead… I wouldn't have done it if someone else had asked."
Surprised, Eisen looked at Xenia, stepping up to the two of them, before Kirisho grabbed Eisen's hand. "Then I thank you once more, Eisen. I feel so light, now that these curses have been lifted from my body." She exclaimed, looking over toward Ailren as if to confirm something before the Ancient Dragon slowly nodded.
"I… Want to come with you. I have spent many, many years with Aylrentyrth, but now I feel ready to leave his protection again. And if you are alright with it, Eisen, I would like to accompany you on your travels." Kirisho explained, moving closer toward Eisen as she did.
Slowly, the old man began to think about it. While he barely hesitated to invite the other people with him into his party, with Kirisho… he felt unsure. He didn't exactly know why, but he felt guilty whenever he looked at Kirisho. But he knew that this was just some dumb issue that he had to worry about at another time, and logically, he had no real reason to deny her. So, Eisen simply nodded, hiding his worries for now.
"Sure… I would love to have you come along." Eisen told her before Kirisho happily smiled at him. "Thank you. I'm glad that I will be able to help you after all." She replied, before letting go of Eisen's hand in the end, before stepping over toward Ailren, probably to properly thank him for everything he has done for her. To respect their privacy, Eisen instead concentrated on Xenia, who was currently engaged in a conversation with Bolremgar.
"You want to give me your Trial?" She asked, surprised, and excited before Bol swiftly nodded. "Yes, you would surely be a great help, and I'm sure you could have a great use for my gift as well."
Confused, Eisen then tuned in, because he was quite curious about Bol's gift anyway. He had thought that because he was fit for Bol's gift, that someone with completely different abilities to him wouldn't be. "Bol, I know that I maybe shouldn't ask you this, but what is your gift anyway? You said it had to do with transformation, right?"
"Oh, go ahead and ask. You are quite likely to finish my trial soon, anyway. There are different gifts that we give out. Sometimes it's a specific skill, like what Ailren gives out, while it sometimes is more abstract. Mine is the latter. I give out the concept of transformation, and what kind of ability you gain differs for each person, but it always has to do with transformation in some way. For example, you say you are a half-giant, are you not?" Bol inquired before Eisen slowly nodded.
"Yes, I'm a Giant-Dwarf halfling." He said, and Bol continued. "You see, halfling children often will not retain the whole racial skill, or rather they won't gain all the abilities that their full-blooded parents would have. Giants have the ability to change their size on will, while half-giants don't do so regularly. That is something that can usually only be taught to half-giants by other giants, but I am quite sure that you should be able to gain such ability through my gift." Bol explained to the old man, who listened quite curiously.
"Is that so? Interesting. That should be quite useful, indeed." Eisen muttered out lowly as he thought about having such an ability, while Bol returned to look at Xenia, who immediately told the ancient dragon that she would love to take his trial.
"Perfect. Now then, my trial for you… You are a summoner, are you not? And one that specializes on elementals as well, according to Aylrentyrth."
"Yes, I'm an Elemental Spirit Summoner." Xenia excitedly nodded before Bol seemed to think for a short while. "This is the first time you are to become a champion, so there will be multiple trials. First, I want you to train yourself. Come back to me once you have reached level 100." Bol told her, and Xenia smiled softly.
"Alright, I'm on it. Just have to go back to the Dungeon for a while then." She said happily, and not long afterward, Xenia began to clean up everything from the ritual, although the majority of the materials that she used simply fell to dust the moment that she touched them again.
Once all the items were picked up, the group made their way back to the town together with their new companion, Kirisho. Of course, she was quite excited while at the same time being pretty scared, hiding somewhat behind Eisen on the whole walk through the town.
Eisen suggested that Kirisho should maybe stay in the amulet if she were so nervous and that she could come back out when they were at the Inn, but Kirisho said that she wanted to see everything like a regular person, now that she was able to walk around like this again.
Finally, the group made their way back to the Inn, where the rest had already gathered in Eisen's room. After explaining to everyone that the curse-breaking ceremony had worked and that Kirisho was now part of the group, the old man sat down on his bed and looked at Komer first of all. He still hadn't asked how everything went, after all.
"Komer, how much did you end up selling today?" Eisen inquired, and Komer swiftly nodded and grabbed the notebook from his pocket, before flipping through it and reading out some of the numbers, and how much inventory they sold and of what.
"This time around we didn't have Evalia singing to attract customers, so it was a good bit less than previously. But everyone that did buy something was quite impressed. A few of them were interested in the custom build, but nobody ordered anything yet." The young merchant explained, before Eisen nodded in satisfaction.
"You still have enough to sell for a while, right?" Eisen asked.
"Oh, yes. I limited what I would sell today anyway so that we could keep selling things every day even if we suddenly became popular and people rushed to us or something." He told the old man, who softly smiled. "I see... good job, Komer. Keep going the way you were, then." Eisen said with a smile and then looked over at the rest of the originals before the four of them joined Eisen and sat down at the edges of the bed.
For a while, the group now began explaining what had happened to them until now. Eisen told them all the things he did back in Melroe and Ornier, and how he had met everyone in his current group, and Evalia and Jyuuk swiftly did the same.
And then came time for the two that Eisen was personally most interested in, considering that he had already heard Jyuuk's and Evalia's stories.
"Yeah, I guess I did a few interesting things here and there. But now that I listen to what all of you did, it feels pretty boring, because I've been spending the majority of my time reading…" Xenia sighed before looking at everyone around her and beginning to speak about what happened since she 'woke up' back then.