Chapter 42
“Hey, Spirit!” Mara came skipping to my pond.
I bubbled as a return greeting. Mara seemed to come to my pond every day after she finished her farm chores. Mara had grown into a young farm girl. She was a beauty just like her mother. She had long light brown hair and even lighter brown eyes. She had grown long legs and was budding in all the appropriate places. Of course, even when she swam in the pond, I didn’t do anything like measure her. She had grown up beside me. I had even been there at her birth. I wasn’t a creep.
“How are doing?” Mara asked. “I’m going to be heading back to the city one day. I saw a boy who doesn’t work on a farm. He spends his entire life in the city. I asked him how he would survive if he didn’t grow food for himself, and he said that he does other stuff for money, and then uses money to buy food. Isn’t that strange? I liked visiting the city, but I can’t imagine living there. It feels so cramped. Even the farm feels cramped sometimes. I’d like to just go off one day. I want to see the world. What about you? It must be restrictive living in that pond. Wouldn’t you like to see the world?”
I squirted water, although I didn’t aim it a Mara. She still knew it meant no. I knew enough to know this wasn’t my original world. However, I still had no desire to explore it. People weren’t worth my time. This pond had everything I needed.
“Really?” Mara’s eyes widened. “Well, I suppose that makes sense for you. However, for me, I want to see more of the world. I read about things called mountains. Supposedly, there is a mountain so high that you can’t breathe near the top. Only evolved can climb up that high. They say there are entire communities of evolved who live in the mountains where humans would perish. They create sects where they seek to become immortals.”
This was a typical conversation with Mara. She liked to prattle on and on about her studies. Her mom and dad had taught her to read and they had a fairly extensive library in which they required her to read one book a week. This constituted her education. She’d just talk seemingly to herself while I gave noncommittal responses. At first, her presence annoyed me, but occasionally she would talk about things that interested me a little bit, like the story about immortals. How high an evolution did someone need to be to become immortal? I had no clue.
“Anyway, about that boy earlier. He’s a blacksmith’s apprentice. They do all the metalwork for our family. Dad sent me to get horseshoes, and that’s when I talked to him. He’s somewhat muscular like daddy, but his face looks like a potato.” She looked back at the house worriedly and then leaned forward. “Momma says I shouldn’t say things like that. However, he gave me this metal piece, he called it a blacksmith’s puzzle. He said, if I couldn’t figure it out, I had to kiss him!”
Water squirted incidentally. She giggled.
“I figured it out real quick.” Mara declared proudly. “He was sour as an apple, but he gave me the puzzle for free.”
She pulled it out and displayed it. It was just two nails bent around each other. I had seen similar things back in my old world. I was impressed Mara could finish it, but my thoughts were more on that despicable boy. While I had no eyes for Mara, that wasn’t the same for the boys in town. The once desolate land I occupied was developing at an unbelievable rate. The forest that used to harbor the goblins had all been cut down and turned into farmland. The small trading outpost had slowly become a small city. With a city brought increasingly more people, including countless boys Mara’s age.
When Mara wasn’t working on the farm, she would go to the city to help her dad sell their produce. He ran a pretty successful farm, but the thing he was most famous for was his particularly plump fish. After continuously bringing me fresh fish for over a decade, I created several varieties. Of course, there were my evolved fish, which were being raised to the slaughter. However, I had also experimented with creating plump, tasty fish with a lot of meat on them.
My relationship with Tanner slowly changed from him making sacrifices to me to the pair of us trading goods. He’d try to bring the best and most exotic fish he could get his hands on, and I provided him with enough plump fish to sell. These fish became the envy of the city, but after the second covetous neighbor attempted to steal from his pond and disappeared without a trace, there wasn’t a third. Rumors of the guardian of the pond spread, and while many believed it to be a hoax spread by Tanner and his daughter, no one wanted to test it.
Thus, Tanner became well-known and popular in town, and his wife and daughter were even more popular. Carolina was a source of envy for all men, and the younger ones looked at Mara more and more, wanting to become her boyfriend. Speaking of which, a group of boys was approaching now.
“Mara!” A boy called out.
He was about fifteen, and pretty attractive for a farm boy. He had dusty short cropped hair and was well toned. Next to him was a lanky kid with freckles and a beefy short kid. Together, they looked like a movie version of bullies. Mara’s face twisted as she heard his voice, looking up at him.
“Markus…”
“Whatcha doin’ down by the pond? Didn’t you hear the rumors it’s cursed?”
“Those are just rumors.” Mara huffed. “Spirit wouldn’t hurt nobody.”
That wasn’t true. There were countless skeletons at the bottom of my pond. That wasn’t true. I corroded away the bones long ago to use for other projects. My equivalent to Inventory was full of bone meal.
“Spirit?” The guy gave her an incredulous look. “You named it?”
“He’s protected our family for many years!” Mara declared, looking him up and down. “He’s a gentleman, unlike some people.”
“You’re right about that!” He laughed. “I ain’t gentle.”
The boys next to him let out laughs as Mara’s face turned a bit red.
“You know that pond is just a pond, right?” The fat boy declared. “Daddy says there ain’t no such things as curses.”
“Spirit is real! He even responds! Right, Spirit?”
I created bubbles. The boys looked at it and then broke into laughter.
“Bubbles!” The lanky guy laughed. “Did he also protect you with bubbles?”
The pretty boy smiled, as his friends hooted and laughed, but his eyes were locked on Mara. This guy annoyed me, but I couldn’t put my finger on why. He seemed confident. If I had the confidence he had when I was his age, I might not have run away from home and joined a gang. I might have been able to save my sister.
“What do you want, Markus?” She asked, annoyance in her voice.
“There’s a dance in town tonight.”
“The summer solstice festival, I’ve heard.” Mara stiffened.
“Well, why don’t you be my date?” he asked.
My bubbler stopped, and Mara stared at him in shock. After a moment, she gave a strange look.
“I don’t know how to dance.”
“I’ll show you!” He declared, causing his two friends to giggle, and him to shoot them glares until they were silent.
“Don’t you have Louise?”
“Louise?” he made a face, reaching out and grabbing her arm. “I don’t like Louise! I like you! Come on, Mara, we’re perfect for each other.”
“Isn’t there rumors you… b-bedded Louise though? She seems to think you’re together…”
“Forget about her!” He declared, grabbing her other arm. “I want you!”
He moved to kiss her right there, but her knee suddenly slammed into his groin. He let out a cry, finally letting go of her.
“I’m not interested in being your next conquest, Markus!” She declared. “The other girls talk! I know you’ve kissed half the girls in town.”
Not bad. This girl was smarter than she looked. If she bought into his hard sale, I might have looked down on her a bit.
“You…” He growled as he stood back up.
It was getting dangerous. Mara was backing up, and the boys were all around her. The boy called Markus looked furious, and he looked like he was going to grab her.
“Mara?” Carolina’s voice came from the house.
“Coming, momma!” She shouted as the boys took a step back, afraid of being caught by her mom.
She shot them one more defiant glare, a sniff, and then ran past them. Markus ground his teeth and then turned and yelled.
“You will be mine, Mara! It’s only a matter of time!”
His friends busted out laughing as he glowered. The three left the pond, Markus grumbling the entire way. These guys were jerks. Thankfully, Carolina appeared before I had to take action, and Mara also had a good head on her shoulders. She rejected the shitty guy. Good for her.
That’s what I thought, but three days later, Mara was sitting and talking once again.
“Spirit… I think I’m in love… with Markus!”
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