[Salvos] 628. Let Him Cook (Patreon)

628. Let Him Cook

***

“Rachel.”

Valda called out, and the young girl looked back from the exit of the Demon Research Club.

“Yes, President Valda?”

“You’ve been pretty busy lately. Usually, you’d be spending all your time in the club room. But these days, you have been leaving early. Is something the matter?”

“Nope!”

Rachel replied cheerfully as she took a step back.

“Everything has been good!”

“Are you sure?”

Valda asked with a frown. In response, Rachel just nodded and gave a thumbs-up.

“Yep! Everything is good! But I’ve got to go now! So… bye!”

And with that, the young girl sprinted out of the club room.

Valda watched the door swing shut with narrowed eyes. She was the President of the Demon Research Club, so she couldn’t leave just yet, even though their weekly meeting had adjourned. But usually, she’d be accompanied by Rachel until they had to leave for the day.

The fact that Rachel was consistently leaving early seemed odd to Valda.

“Is something wrong, President?”

Jonas asked as he strode up to Valda from behind. The Club President pursed his lips, glancing at her friend, before looking towards the doorway. She shook her head and sighed.

“It’s nothing…”

And the two of them continued cleaning up for the day. Meanwhile…

***

“We’re almost there…”

Rachel was practically bouncing on her toes as she watched Mavos Academy disappear beneath her. All she could see right now were clouds, and she was still rapidly ascending to the sky. The elevator that carried her moved fast. Apparently, it was designed by Clayton Skyshredder himself.

He had added it into the Office of the Headmaster himself when he took over as the new headmaster several decades ago. Before that, any visitor had to climb up several tens of thousands of flights of stairs, or be a high-leveled [Mage] who could use some kind of [Flight] spell.

But Headmaster Skyshredder decided to give ease of access to anyone to enter.

Rachel was incredibly grateful for that. She didn’t have any artifact that could let her fly, and if she had to climb all those steps, it’d take her too long to even reach the top. That was not considering how exhausted she’d be, since her [Endurance] wasn’t her best Stat.

Anyway, she wasn’t even here in the Office of the Headmaster to visit the Headmaster of Mavos Academy. She was pretty sure he wasn’t even present at the moment, busy dealing with other matters of import. She had visited the top floor over a dozen times now in the last few weeks, and she had only seen him once.

And that was when he had given her his official permission to visit the top floor. Because previously, she had been kind of illegally trespassing, with the help of Willy.

But why did she even need to come up here anyway? Why was she so excited to visit the Office of the Headmaster? The reason was simple—

The elevator came to a halt, and the door slid open. Waiting at the other side was an excited gray figure.

“Rachel!”

A baby Wyvern exclaimed, sprinting straight at her. He leapt her way as she spread her arms wide.

“Oriur—”

She greeted him with the same excitement as him. And he crashed into her, knocking her down a moment after. The two came rolling to a halt as he tightly clung onto her.

“I’ve been waiting for you all day! You’re late— what were you doing?”

Oriur asked the question as he hugged her tight. Rachel wanted to respond. She really did. But all she could do was muster up a squeak as she was being squished under the baby Wyvern.

“O-Oriur… you’re—”

“Oh, oops.”

He scratched the back of his head and rose to his feet. She sighed in relief, and he helped her up. Rachel dusted herself off as she looked up at him. He was a baby Wyvern, but he was massive. He was as tall as any adult, despite being significantly younger than even the young girl.

That was because he was a Wyvern. They could grow up to over a hundred feet in length. The fact that he wasn’t larger for his age was already surprising to Rachel. But his siblings were significantly bigger than he was, so she was able to deduce that his size was due to his evolutionary path.

Anyway, most Humans would scream running if they saw Oriur because he was a monster, but Rachel was glad to see him. Because, first of all, Rachel wasn’t most Humans. And secondly, Oriur was not an ordinary baby Wyvern.

He was Salvos’ child. One of three, in fact. But the other two weren’t present today.

“Where’s Novis and Bellum?”

Rachel asked as she followed Oriur down the hallway. He waved a hand dismissively, gesturing at the empty room.

“They went out with Centina and Kron— to do more hunting.”

“They’re always going out, huh? Why don’t you go with them?”

The young girl cocked her head, and Oriur shrugged.

“If I did that, I wouldn’t be able to stay here and talk with you.”

He grinned back at her. She rolled her eyes as she took a seat at the dining table.

“Even before that, you’ve told me you dislike going out.”

“It’s not that I dislike going outside. I dislike hunting and killing, you know? If I went out, I’d rather learn more about the world— I’d rather connect with others. There’s no point in evolving if I’m alone in this world, right?”

Oriur explained as he reached for a cupboard, before producing a large tray carrying a chocolate cake. Rachel blinked as he set it down before her.

“Did you make that?”

She stared at the cake with wide eyes. Oriur nodded as he plopped himself on the chair next to her.

“I told you— I’ve been meaning to learn how to bake, so I asked Uncle to bring me a cookbook with some recipes. What do you think?”

Rachel dipped a spoon into a cake and took a bite out of it. Her eyes lit up as she turned to Oriur.

“It’s amazing! Did you seriously learn how to do this in just a few days?”

She spoke excitedly, and he flushed as he scratched the back of his head.

“Well… I’ve been practicing in secret for a few weeks…”

“For a few weeks? Wait, since when exactly?”

Rachel eyed him curious as he shrank back. The baby Wyvern shifted uncomfortably, before muttering under his breath,

“Uh… after the first day we met?”

“Aw. That’s so sweet.”

The young girl smiled and patted him on the head. Which wasn’t easy, since she needed to stand on the chair on her tiptoes to reach him. He smiled, almost purring like a cat in response.

The two of them had developed quite a close bond even though they had only just gotten to know each other. They’d meet up practically every single day and talk about a variety of topics. It could be about anything, ranging from what Rachel learned about in school that day to what Oriur dreamt of doing one day.

But the most common topic they discussed was always—

“I read that she doesn’t like sweets. That she never liked to eat.”

“Hm?”

Oriur looked up at Rachel as she spoke softly. The young girl shook her head, eyeing the cake from the side.

“Your mom— Salvos. She hated eating, they say.”

“Oh, yeah. Mama is like that. She’s kind of like bro and sis. All she likes to do is fight.”

“And you don’t?”

Rachel raised a brow, and Oriur shrugged.

“I can see the importance of learning how to fight. But as I said, I care more about meeting and knowing people. Mama was like that too. She had so many friends.”

“Really?”

“That’s how she was able to save us all— if she was by herself, she wouldn’t have been able to save the Human lands, right?”

Oriur explained simply. Rachel nodded in understanding.

“That’s true. If Salvos hadn’t convinced Headmaster Skyshredder to join the war, we might all be dead today…”

It was a grim thought, but Rachel had come to terms with death long ago. The idea didn’t disgust her or scare her. It was a fact about reality. Just like it was a fact that she would have died if she hadn’t been saved by Salvos all those years ago.

“Exactly!”

Oriur nodded simply as he leant back in his chair.

“And that’s what bro and sis don’t understand. They keep telling me I’m wasting my potential by refusing to join them, but even Mama had to join Mavos Academy and make friends to accomplish all she did. She was never alone.”

“Yep. That’s why I joined Mavos Academy too!”

Rachel agreed with a smile. She shook her head as she swept her gaze towards the window overlooking the campus below.

“I wanted to follow in Salvos’ footsteps. I wanted to learn all that she did. So I can…”

The young girl trailed off, not finishing her train of thought. Oriur harrumphed, placing his hands on his chin.

“You get it. But no one else seems to understand it. Not even Centina.”

“Well, everyone has a different perspective in life.”

Rachel shook her head, recalling one of the many lessons she learned from William and the other [Priests] at the Sanctum of Elements.

“What matters is that you listen to what they have to say and absorb what’s important for you. That’s how you can keep growing and learning. Because there is always a little bit of wisdom in everything.”

“That’s true…”

Oriur scowled as he lowered his head.

“But I just wish that they wouldn’t leave me alone so often. I wish that they’d listen to me for once.”

“There, there.”

Rachel placed a hand on his shoulder reassuringly. Oriur sighed.

“I mean— I understand why they won’t let me explore Mavos Academy. But they won’t even let me go out to visit Mama’s Lair!”

He threw his hands up in the air in frustration. That made the young girl pause.

“Salvos’... Lair? Wait, where is it?”

“Oh, I’m not actually supposed to talk about it because Clayton doesn’t know.”

Oriur scratched his cheeks, before shaking his head.

“But apparently according to Centina, Kron, and Uncle, Mama has a Lair located right outside of the campus. It’s somewhere over there— hidden away in that forest.”

He pointed in the distance, and Rachel looked in the same direction with a frown. She narrowed her eyes as she tilted her head.

“Huh.”

She looked between Oriur and the forest, before taking a step towards the baby Wyvern excitedly.

“If you tell me where the Lair is at, I’ll visit it for you!”

That made him hesitate as he shifted back.

“But Uncle told me that I’m not supposed to tell anyone about it…”

“Willy doesn’t have to know!”

Rachel shook her head. She took Oriur’s clawed hand as she looked him in the eyes pleadingly.

“Come on— please?”

“I…”

Oriur closed his eyes, before eventually acquiescing.

“Fine.”

“Yay!”

—--

And that was how Rachel ended up here, standing in the Cave of Companions. Oriur had spilled everything he knew about the Lair, but it still took her about a week to find its exact location. It was hidden away, and it took her some time to uncover it. But now, she swept her gaze over the small cavern.

She saw the scattered books strewn around alongside the odd trinket or so decorating the walls. A magic circle was drawn on the ground in the center of the room. It wasn’t very spacious, and it wasn’t kept neat and tidy either. But it held a lot of secrets. Secrets which piqued Rachels interest.

Secrets that could help Rachel find Salvos.

She strode forward as she tapped a finger on her chin.

“Where should I start investigating?”

Rachel wondered aloud, before a strange glint caught her eye. Her brows furrowed as she spotted a strange gray goblet placed ceremoniously in the back of the room.

“What is that?”

She asked no one in particular as she approached it. But before she could get close, the ground beneath her began to shake. The dirt below the ritual circle began to crack open. Rachel blinked and spun around, immediately recognizing the danger.

Then she heard the clicking sound, followed by the hissing shrieks. An undulating crimson figure exploded from the earth, before landing right ahead of the young girl. She raised her dagger with pursed lips as she saw another pair of creatures crawl out of the hole.

And Rachel could only stare at the three of them as their furious gazes bore down on her.

“Huh.”

[Junior Centinel - Lvl 55]

[Junior Centinel - Lvl 57]

[Junior Centinel - Lvl 61]

Author's Notes:

What thonk?

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