Chapter 23
Ollie followed Red deeper into the forest behind the library, flashlight in hand, with Noble beside him.
It was a dark, cloudy night with very little moonlight, growing darker still as they moved further away from the illuminated area around the library.
Dark or not, thankfully, it wasn’t a particularly cold night.
“Do we really need to go this far in?” Ollie asked.
While they were still on what was considered his property, they’d already gone so far that he really wasn’t looking forward to walking back afterwards.
“Yes,” Red grunted without any explanation.
As why explain anything to him? What was one more unanswered question in his life? Not like I’m not already living in a constant state of unknowing, he thought sarcastically.
He sighed and kept walking, just minutes later, huffing, “Finally,” when Red eventually came to a stop.
“This is just screaming to me that you need exercise in your life even more than I first thought,” his cat drawled.
“I exercise enough!”
“Hardly,” Red scoffed.
Ollie looked at Noble with a frown when the man hesitantly said, “Perhaps, less exercise and more…training?”
“Isn’t that what I’m doing right now?”
“I was thinking more physical self-defense over magical.”
His brow rose at that. “I mean, I have taken classes before.”
“Yes, but I have a feeling it’s been a while, and…you could possibly be rusty?”
Ollie winced. Well, the man had a point… He had taken them, but it had been a good ten years ago and he supposed he was possibly a bit out of practice. “I can…see your point.”
“Would you consider training with me, Ollie?” Noble asked.
“Me, with…you…” Ollie trailed off as he tried to imagine it, but then his brain brought forward visions of Noble on top of him, muscles bare and sweaty, causing him to blurt out, “Yes!”
Noble blinked before chuckling. “Okay, then. How about Sunday morning? We can use one of the larger rooms in the library, and spread out a mat?”
At the word mat, the vision in his mind swiftly shifted to him being in a lot of pain, and getting tossed around in the not so fun way by his boyfriend. “That sounds—”
“Good, he’ll do it.”
Ollie glared at Red for cutting him off as he’d been about to say horrible, but he just sighed and said, “Sounds…good,” on noticing the pleased expression on Noble’s face.
He glared harder at the smug smile his cat sent his way.
His familiar’s smile only widened as the cat ignored him and instructed, “Turn your flashlight off.”
Sighing, Ollie didn’t question it and just flicked it off, plunging them into darkness. Blinking as his eyes adjusted, he didn’t ask what he was supposed to do, as he figured it was obvious, with the focus being on The Ceaseless Hunter, and uh, senses.
At first, all he could see were barely distinguishable shapes in the darkness, until it was like a switch was flipped, but this time, on his eyes.
One moment there were indistinguishable shapes, and the next, he saw a world of muted dark colors.
Every detail was now clearly visible from the texture of the bark on the trees to Noble and Red.
As Ollie looked around, his gaze narrowing and focusing randomly, he gasped as he began to see things further and further away, through the weaving trees of the forest. From the bugs on the ground, to the bird’s nest high up in the branches.
“Wow, that’s cool!” he mused, before having a thought and tugging his glasses off.
Ollie then stared dumbfounded, as while things remained as bright, everything blurred instantly, and didn't get any clearer as the minutes ticked by.
“Really?! The magic doesn’t fix my nearsightedness!?” he snapped in irritation as he shoved his glasses back onto his face.
“For the same reason it didn’t fix your inability to absorb certain vitamins, you were born that way and you shall remain that way.”
“That is so…STUPID! It’s magic! How does that make sense?! Even surgery could fix my eyes to a point. Like, come on!? Also, I didn’t get glasses until I was like one and a half, so technically, it wasn’t right from birth!”
Red tsked, his snout wrinkling in disgust. “Based on how many corners and things you crawled into, you definitely needed them before that, but your parents had been preoccupied, likely with their impending doom, and Rowden put it off for a half a year or more when he became your guardian because, well, he kept missing your doctors appointments due to his hatred of phones and…calendars.”
Noble chuckled. “Funnily enough, your magic would likely fix it if you were perhaps blinded by an accident, or injured, and you may even be able to find a spell to temporarily fix your current issue, but there is nothing permanent, as far as I know. You’d honestly be better off finding a spell to create a pair of glasses that adjusted with your eyes.
Though, now that your powers have awakened, you won’t necessarily be dealing with worsening eyesight, due to the lack of aging. ”
“Excuse me?! Lack of what?!” Ollie squeaked, his eyes growing wide as he looked sharply at the man.
His boyfriend cleared his throat. “Ah, that hasn’t come up, I see… Red, you can—”
“No! No, no, no. I do not want to know. Later! One of you can tell me about it later, when I am ready to digest more life-altering news. As I doubt it will matter much to me in the near future.
“Let’s go back to the cool, yet stupid, enhanced vision that only works with my glasses on.
Back to The Ceaseless Hunter. Or maybe to what it could mean for me going forward.
For instance, maybe if I could get these new senses of mine to work all the time, I won’t have to worry about being snuck up on again, and therefore, can stop freaking out at shadows and people coming up behind me. ”
Red snorted. “Not going to work. Having your senses hyper-focused constantly is not only draining, but extremely disorientating, and pretty detrimental towards normal functioning. Therefore, it's not recommended. I would surmise that at this very moment you are already starting to get a headache, because you haven’t pulled back from the magic yet.”
He did in fact have the beginnings of a pressure headache behind his eyes, but he really didn’t want to admit that. “What good is it then?! Also, how do I pull back? Not that I have a headache or anything, but it would be good to know how to do that.”
“Relax. Close your eyes and stop trying to see things clearly,” his cat explained simply.
Relax and close his eyes? He could do that. Ollie took a deep breath and slowly let it out as he closed his eyes. He thankfully didn’t see clear details of the inside of his eyelid, but then, how could he since glasses were apparently required for it to work for him.
Taking another deep breath, forcing himself to ‘relax’. After a moment with his eyes still closed, he asked, “Now what?”
His cat hummed. “Open your eyes and if you did what you were supposed to, you should be good.”
Ollie did as instructed, smiling when he found barely distinguishable shapes in the darkness once again, but whined when things snapped right back into focus within seconds, things lightening once again. “Dang it! It worked and then it didn’t.”
Red snickered. “I forgot to mention that it’ll be hard to switch back once you’ve already focused on the details while still in darkness, as your body’s need to see tends to override it once it has awakened.
Really, tonight’s lesson is more about putting up with the headache for as long as you can. ”
“W-why?!” he sputtered.
“Because practice makes perfect, or rather, it builds up your tolerance for it. Each session, or moment you spend focused, improves and lengthens the amount of time you can do so the next without feeling drained, or in this case, getting a headache. It’s also one of the simplest and almost passive ways to build your magical pool along with the energy that fuels it. ”
Ollie glared down at his cat. “So, what you are telling me is…training tonight is just to see how long Ollie can stand his headache? And you, what? Want me to just stand here?”
His familiar smiled evilly. “No, we will practice smell at the same time. And you will, in fact, stay here for the normal allotted hour, as you promised.”
“Noble, my cat is trying to torture me!” he whined as he looked at Noble in desperation.
“Baby, it is…for your own good,” the man drawled slowly, before looking to Red and adding, “Though an hour seems a bit much for—”
“If you would like to find yourself uninvited to Ollie’s daily magic lessons, human, you can keep talking,” his cat stated stiffly.
Noble sighed and sent him an apologetic smile. “Sorry, Baby, I tried.”
Ollie sniffled and then sighed dramatically. “It was a nice attempt.”
“It was.” His boyfriend’s smile widened, clearly in humor, before looking back at Red.
“Though, speaking of his practice and magic…not to undermine what you said earlier, Red, but Ollie wasn’t completely off base about wanting to use his improved Ceaseless Hunter senses to keep people from sneaking up on him.
He can actually train them to automatically activate when someone draws near to protect himself, which wouldn’t be as draining as having them engaged constantly. ”
“Yes…” Red conceded, before smugly adding, “But that takes time, and some very specific targeted practice. A lot of it.”
“Oh! OH!” Ollie gasped excitedly, bouncing on his feet, as he beamed at Noble. “Noble, you seem to be really good at accidentally sneaking up on me. Why don’t we just have you purposely do it and see if I can eventually pick up your approach?!”
Noble’s smile dropped at Ollie’s words, as an annoyingly knowing smirk slipped onto the familiar’s face. The cat’s expression read: ‘don’t look at me, you brought it up’.