"Baculum of the last necromancer."
Matt corrected Hiyama, then simply pulled out a staff about four feet tall with a strange texture and a small skull nailed to the top.
"It's..."
Hiyama was speechless for a moment, seeing the staff makes his heart beat slightly, his mind reels and his body feels a slight spasm.
"I've never seen anything like this before, it's simply something from another world...", Hiyama could feel it, the staff was magic.
Without hesitation, Hiyama threw a bag of gold coins before snatching the staff from Matt's hands and running in a random direction.
Matt was stunned, about to follow Hiyama but when he saw the gold coins he simply smiled before shaking his head.
"Crazy...", is what Matt thought at that moment.
...
Now, as Matt leans on the counter eating the sweet bread he just bought from time to time, he can't help but overhear some muttering words from passersby passing near his store.
"Hiyama is going to meet the Blue Roses group, Have you heard about that?"
"No, Blue Roses... I mean, they are a group of beautiful powerful girls, except that Gagaran, she is uglier than me when I wake up in the morning..."
"Hahahaha"
"Forget that, stupid Wasi, just think about this, Sir Hiyama meets with the Blue Roses, Doesn't that mean there's romance involved?"
"..."
"Who's stupid now?, maybe they're just going to talk business, stupid."
Matt who is resting his head on top of the counter squints slightly with some confusion.
Hiyama?
Matt remembers that not too long ago a strange, yellow-skinned, Asian-looking man came to buy something from him and left him some generous gold coins.
"What was the guy's name?, something with Hiyama?... Daisuke..." Matt mutters under his breath a little sleepily.
Matt, who hasn't sold anything in the last week is about to close the store when a strange voice comes from not far away.
"What's this, sir...", A delicate voice is heard not far from the counter, and Matt, a little curious, can't help but raise his head slightly to look at a possible customer.
Hair in a slightly long yellow bowl bob cut, blue eyes, fair skin, a delicate little face and a developing body.
If it weren't for the little growing adam's apple on the client's neck, Matt would have thought the blond in front of him was a girl.
The name of this boy is Armin, what Armin is pointing to is a large sword over four feet long with a wide blade and a strange shape with straight lines, a hilt with red and gold shades of protection, and a kind of sun embedded in the back of the tip of the sword's blade.
The sword that is visible thanks to the transparent glass of the counter looks like an artifact out of a video game, besides looking impractical for combat, its blade is so wide that its weight should be over thirty pounds.
"Ashbringer...," Matt replies, looking at the small, girlish-looking boy in detail.
"It's a legendary sword used with two hands, it was forged from a purified crystal of the Naaru, the weapon's history says it was wielded by..." Matt squints, trying to recall the history of the sword from the inventory.
"I think his was named Alexandros Mograine, yes, I think that was the name of the former wielder of the sword...", Matt smiles with his sour face at the delicate boy.
The boy, watches with a forced smile at Matt's grin before swallowing saliva and looking back at the sword.
"Well, I mean, Sir, it looks.... Magical," the boy rubs the back of his neck with a nervous laugh, "My name is Armin Arlert, nice to meet you, Sir?" the boy looks at Matt.
"I'm Matt, but people around here call me Ogre, you know, something about my appearance... I think," Matt smiles again.
Armin watches Matt for a moment before looking back at Ashbringer, he doesn't say anything at Matt's nickname, he simply decides to remain silent.
Something about that sword seems to have caught Armin's attention, the sword itself, it looks, spectacular, worthy of a work of art.
However, inside, Armin feels a slight connection with the sword, it is as if it is calling him and wants him to be its bearer.
It wasn't spectral or psychic, it was simply the connection of an object with a soul, Armin feels it, his eyes narrow, his fists are clenched and his heart beats, especially when he sees the price of the Ashbringer not far away written on a piece of paper.
"1000 gold coins," Armin mutters inside his mind, an exorbitant price if he had to say so, few swords in the Re-estize realm could reach that value, especially if Armin takes into account that a good forged metal sword costs no more than ten gold coins.
However, Armin hesitates, the sword itself has captivated his mind and soul, his heart, his body.
After a moment's hesitation, Armin raises his head to look into Matt's tired, sour face.
"Can I work here to pay for the sword?" Armin raises his head and looks determinedly at Matt's sour face.
There was a slight moment of silence, Armin, looking gentle and kind looks up with teary eyes, takes a few steps forward, his eyes shine brighter than usual, and his gaze fixed on Matt makes him look like a pretty girl.
"Please, Sir, Sir... I need the... sword, yes, I need that big, hard sword," Armin begs, he looks like he's about to cry.
Matt opens his eyes with a small smile forming on his face, he watches Armin for a moment before he begins to chuckle lightly.
"You're...", however, before Matt could finish speaking, someone else has approached the store.
" Sir Matt, I'm back...", a slightly deep voice is heard before a person enters through the doors of the store.
Whoever entered is the same man Matt had seen not too long ago, Daisuke Hiyama, however, now, instead of looking like some sort of Asian villain from an old movie, he looks more like a slightly tired and stooped man.
Matt watches Hiyama for a moment before turning his gaze to the staff which Hiyama uses to walk by resting it against the ground.
"Sir Hiyama!!!", Armin's high pitched, loud voice is heard in the tent before he swallows saliva and takes a couple of steps back.
Armin's heart twists in his body, his eyes tremble, his body feels weak, his mind itself wavers and his mouth hangs open.
Armin blinks a couple of times, he had seen Daisuke Hiyama a couple of times walking along the main roads of Re-estize, in Armin's mind, Hiyama is a terrifying man whose true power is unknown.
Far from the fascination of many civilians with Hiyama, who see him as a future hero, Armin feels that Hiyama might actually be some kind of monster hiding in a human body.
Hiyama watches Armin huddle against the wall of the store near a counter before smiling slightly.
The skull on his staff glows faintly for a moment before fading, Hiyama opens his eyes, he seems to have understood something, he watches Armin again with a new intent in his eyes before he starts walking to the counter.
"Sir Matt, I am here because I have come to bring you a gift and a message to his excellency", Hiyama speaks respectfully, he walks calmly like a knight before a king, from between his robe he slowly takes out a small box which he then places on top of the counter.
Hiyama's actions take Armin by surprise, some of the fear in him is replaced by surprise, Armin then observes Matt who seems to be calm before Hiyama, then, Armin swallows saliva, Is it possible that Matt is someone more powerful than Hiyama?
A little conjecture is born in Armin's mind.
"Is this it?", Matt observes with some confusion the box on top of the counter, it is a beautiful box not very big, it seems to be made entirely of gold cast in one piece, with decorations like small traces on the sides and a widely detailed lid with unknown patterns.
Hiyama observes Matt's reaction with a slight smile, in fact, the delay in his latest mission is due to this particular object.
"On the border of Re-estize with the Heiligh kingdom and the Eldia empire, a kind of.... catacombs," Hiyama says, recalling his last mission.
"In fact, the adventurer's guild mission was for me something... a bit strange, I had to investigate those catacombs, hehehe," Hiyama laughs for a moment before sighing with some uneasiness, in fact, his experience inside those catacombs remind him that the world is stranger and more dangerous than it seems.
"In the depths of the catacombs... I mean, it was strange, the walls had inscriptions that looked like they had been written in blood, the passages damp and silent with a musty smell, when I investigated those catacombs I always felt anxious, watched..." Hiyama swallows saliva, his grip on the skull of his staff tightens and he lowers his head slightly.
"I found, going down a few levels in the catacomb, a strange, hot, pulsating construction, with a slightly triangular appearance and claw-like protuberances on top, it was... gigantic, at least forty feet long, and at the top was this box."