Three years had passed since the heavy tears in the drawing room and the bitter taste of Ruth's medicine, and the world had moved forward with a quiet and steady rhythm that slowly replaced the terrifying panic of the past.
The dark, sludge-like medicine that the ancient dragon had brewed from the Kalmia petals and the World Tree roots was only a one-time process, a potent and legendary cure that had settled deep into Fainyx's bones and was slowly, steadily burning away the Hollow Constitution Syndrome day by day, and so there had been absolutely no need for Ruth to ever make another batch.
Fainyx was now six years old, his hair has become longer and his skin is still pale white, and though his body was still small than a usual 6 year old, and appeared incredibly pale his body is just a bit small but not too thin, the terminal clock ticking in his body had slowly stopped he still coughed some blood sometimes, but nobody knows about it as he cleaned it fast enough for them not to realized it.
The sky inside the Aetherium was a perfect, brilliant blue, and Fainyx stood on the edge of a grassy hill looking out over a landscape that completely defied logic and reason.
Three years ago, when he had first created this portal to hide his things, the space had been the modest size of a small village three years ago, but now it had expanded so vastly that it was quite literally the size of an entire kingdom. Massive, winding rivers cut through deep and towering forests, and the single magical apple sapling he had planted had grown into a sprawling, glowing orchard that produced the most delicious fruit he had ever tasted.
The dark-leaved coffee plants had multiplied as well, creating fields of ripe red berries under the artificial sun.
Fainyx walked down the hill toward his small, self-built cottage, carrying a cup of perfectly roasted coffee that he had made himself using his chantless fire magic, and he looked at the sheer vastness of his private world with a quiet sense of awe.
"I suppose I will need to build a larger house soon if this river keeps expanding," Fainyx said out loud, his young voice echoing slightly in the perfect silence of the dimension.
It was a clear and steady voice, completely free of any damage or strain, and it was a sound that absolutely no one in the outside world had ever heard. Ever since the moment he had reincarnated into this magical realm, Fainyx had never spoken a single word to his family or the outside world , his instructors, or the servants. He only ever used his vocal cords when he was safely hidden inside the vast kingdom of the Aetherium and talking to himself, he kept tryjng to talk so that it exercise his vocal chords but he can't do it outside, because he had spent so long pretending to be a mute that it had simply become the easiest way to maintain his quiet life.
He knew that the moment he spoke, people would expect things from him, and neither his master Yong nor the dragon Ruth had any idea that he could actually speak.
He finished his coffee, set the cup down on a wooden table, and tapped into his mana core. He pulled the fabric of space apart and stepped back into his bedroom in the real world, the portal sealing seamlessly behind him.
His days in the mansion had fallen into a very specific and highly guarded routine over the past three years. Every single night, when the estate was entirely asleep and the guards were patrolling the perimeter, Yong and Ruth would slip silently into his room through the window.
They spent those midnight hours secretly teaching him the absolute basics of magic and mana control, always being incredibly careful not to force him to use too much energy because his six-year-old body was still considered fragile and recovering.
Then, during the daytime, Yong would return through the front door in his official capacity as Fainyx's instructor, teaching him the complex history of the kingdom and the tedious rules of noble etiquette while his family watched with protective and hovering eyes.
And also he always got some letters from the main character of this world Orion, he mostly ask him what he did in these past few weeks and even though they didn't see each other Face to face they still wrote each other's letters and tell their own daily life. Mostly Fainyx didn't said anything about his illness as he just says he just stayed inside the mansion for these past few years.
'Orion doesn't need to know about it'
The grand mansion was unusually empty and remarkably quiet today it seems.
It was the week of the annual Harvest Festival, a massive and important celebration in the Duke's territory that required an immense amount of preparation, funding, and security.
The Duke, along with Adam and Liam who were now eight and seven years old and eager to help their father with his duties, were out in the capital managing the festival arrangements, and almost all of the staff had been deployed to the town square to assist the citizens.
Adam and Liam still are worried for Fainyx but it seems that Fainyx kept telling them that he's ok. They are satisfied with it as he didn't throw up blood for this past few years. So they'll go with their father.
Because of this rare event, Fainyx was left entirely alone in the quiet sunlight of the estate's grand library with his master, Yong, for his afternoon history lesson.
The library was warm and smelled of old parchment and leather bindings, and Fainyx was sitting in a large velvet chair with a thick textbook resting on his lap, turning the pages with a blank and neutral expression.
Yong was sitting across from him by the large window, bathed in the afternoon light, but the black-haired master was not looking at the history book in his own hands.
Instead, Yong was staring directly at Fainyx with his dark eyes narrowed in a particular and piercing kind of thought. The silence stretched between them for several long minutes, and Fainyx began to feel a very subtle shift in the atmosphere, his heightened senses picking up the sudden and serious focus of his teacher.
Yong slowly closed his book with a soft thud and set it down on the wooden table, leaning forward in his chair and resting his chin on his crossed hands.
"Fainyx," Yong said, his voice dropping its usual casual and playful tone, replacing it with something deeply serious and incredibly direct.
Fainyx looked up from his history book and met his master's gaze, his crystalline violet eyes perfectly still and unreadable as he waited for the instruction or the history question that usually followed.
"I have a random question that has been bothering me for a very long time," Yong continued, his black eyes locking onto Fainyx's face as if he were trying to see straight through the boy's skull.
"In fact, I have been thinking about it a lot for the past three years, ever since I first became your master and saw the way you move your mana."
Fainyx tilted his head just a fraction, reaching for his notebook and charcoal pencil, but Yong raised a hand to stop him before the pencil could touch the paper.
"Don't write yet. Just listen," Yong instructed, and the air in the library seemed to grow slightly heavier with the weight of his words.
"When you first coughed up blood three years ago, and Ruth and I were sneaking into your room to teach you magic, I used my aura to examine the internal structure of your body to ensure the medicine was actually working. I checked your mana pathways, your lungs, and your throat to see if the illness had caused permanent damage."
Fainyx froze, his fingers tightening minutely around his charcoal pencil, but he kept his face completely and perfectly blank.
'He examined my throat?' Fainyx thought, a sudden and rare spike of alarm flaring in his chest. 'I thought he was only checking my core and my veins to monitor the Hollow Constitution Syndrome.'
"And when I examined you," Yong said, his voice quiet but echoing clearly in the empty library, "I realized something very strange. Your vocal cords are perfectly healthy. Your voicebox is entirely undamaged, and there is absolutely no physical or magical reason why you shouldn't be able to make a sound. You can use it perfectly well."
Yong leaned in closer, the sunlight catching the sharp angles of his face and highlighting the intense curiosity in his black eyes.
"So tell me, my brilliant and secretive disciple," Yong asked, his voice a low and challenging whisper that demanded absolute honesty.
"Why can't you talk? Or rather... why do you refuse to speak?"
The silence that followed the question was heavy and absolute, and Fainyx sat perfectly still in his large chair, staring at the man who had just smoothly and effortlessly dismantled a lie he had carefully maintained for six entirely peaceful years.
Fainyx looked down at his notebook, and then he looked back up at his master, his internal monologue racing through a hundred different excuses and explanations, but he knew that Yong was far too sharp and too experienced to believe a simple lie written on a piece of paper.
He had spent his entire past life on Earth as an orphan avoiding attention and avoiding the deep complications of human connection, actually he was also a mute in those previous life of his and he had carried that silence into this new life because a voice meant...
'Tsk... An old memory...'
He just wanted to be left alone to enjoy his coffee and his dimension, but his master was sitting there waiting for an answer, and the dark eyes looking at him were completely uncompromising.
Fainyx slowly picked up his charcoal pencil and brought it to the paper, his small hand moving with deliberate and careful strokes, while Yong watched him with a gaze that refused to let him escape.
[ I have nothing that I want to say to anyone. ]
Yong read the line on the paper, and a complex emotion crossed his face. It wasn't pity, and it wasn't anger, but rather a profound kind of understanding mixed with a quiet, lingering frustration.
"You have a family that loves you so much they would burn this kingdom down to keep you safe," Yong said softly, leaning back in his chair and running a hand through his black hair. "You have a father who doubled the security of this entire estate just because a rumor made you look weak, and two brothers who spent the last three years treating you like a patient. And you are telling me that you have absolutely nothing to say to them?"
Fainyx looked at his master, his violet eyes shimmering in the afternoon light, and he thought about the heavy burden of words. He knew that if he spoke to his father or his brothers, they would cry again, they would hover even more, and the fragile peace they had built would be replaced by a new kind of overwhelming attention that he did not know how to handle.
[ Words are heavy. ] Fainyx wrote carefully, his face maintaining its stoic mask as he slid the notebook across the table. [ And I am still too weak to carry them. I can't for now.]
Yong looked at the notebook for a very long time, the silence stretching out between them like a physical thing in the grand library, and then the master finally let out a long and heavy sigh, closing his eyes and shaking his head before he opened them again, the playful smirk slowly and naturally returning to his lips.
"You are an incredibly frustrating child, Fainyx," Yong said, picking his history book back up from the table with a casual shrug.
"But fine. Keep your secrets for now. Just know that one day, you are going to have to open your mouth, and when you do, I expect it to be something profound."
Fainyx did not react, he simply picked up his own book and returned his gaze to the pages, but inside his head, he let out a massive sigh of relief, grateful that his master had decided to drop the subject, even as he realized that his perfectly quiet life was slowly and inevitably beginning to unravel.