Restart Again: Volume 2 by Adam Scott (hardest books to read txt) 📕

with Val, another opportunity to completely overwhelm her with every ability I knew and make her see that I deserved more respect than what she gave to me. A small voice in the back of my head told me that it was silly, and that the less she knew about my magic the better. While I knew it was right, it didn’t help to calm me down; I stalked back to the wagon behind Lia, fuming silently the entire way before loudly climbing up to take a seat inside.

Val returned to the driver’s bench a few moments later, and we began our journey into Attetsian territory. Lia looped her arm around mine and rested her head on my shoulder, and I felt a sudden wave of calm as her amber energy washed over me. While neither of us had ever specifically discussed the ability to convey emotion through mana, we had both taken to the practice naturally over the course of our meditation sessions. My foul mood was no match for her comforting aura, and I soon found myself feeling embarrassed at how childish I had acted. I let out a long sigh as the last traces of bitterness receded, then gave Lia a grateful smile.

During the following few hours of travel, one detail stood out to me as particularly odd; apart from being entirely abandoned, nothing about the surrounding area seemed to be out of place. My constant sweep of Detection magic found homesteads with meals still set out on their tables, and fields of unharvested produce with half-full wagons deserted midway through their jobs. While I was still mostly unfamiliar with the seasonal patterns of the area, it was easy to tell that the prime time for harvest had passed based on the shortening days and colder temperatures.

A unique pattern emerged as we continued to pass by empty houses. Each structure had one of two symbols painted on their front door: three circles linked together to form a pyramid with a triangle drawn in the center, or one large circle with an X drawn through it. When I asked Val and Lia about them, the description of the first symbol brought a look of instant recognition to their faces.

Val explained that the three linked rings were the standard symbol of the Elta’sahn Company, one ring for each of the three leaders: The Admiral, The General, and The Strategist. The addition of a small triangle to the center of the sigil was new, but it was easy to assume it was an addition made by the Attetsian revolutionaries. My description of the second symbol brought up less specific information, but the meaning seemed obvious to all of us: if you weren’t with the Elta’sahn Company, you were against them.

As the sun began to set and our destination drew nearer, our suspicions were confirmed. Houses marked with an X began to show signs of abuse the further into the country we traveled. It started as small disturbances, with chairs knocked over and drawers emptied of their contents, but quickly escalated to shattered windows and completely looted rooms. In contrast, the houses marked by the Company still stood in pristine condition with clear signs of inhabitants.

Just as the three story inn came into view, we had our first encounter with another living person; three men stood near the roadside harvesting what looked to be carrots, tossing them into an already overflowing cart. As our wagon drove by, the men stopped and stared with hard eyes until we were long past, and I could only see them with my Detection. One pointed in our direction and seemingly spoke a command, which caused the other two to pick up the cart and begin hauling it in the opposite direction.

The inn was a much more impressive sight in person than I had originally surmised from the road. The building was beautifully maintained, with cream-colored brick walls and dark green wooden shutters and doors. A veranda wrapped around the front of the structure and disappeared around the far corner. Ornate metal tables and chairs lined the enclosed porch, though they all sat unused when we arrived. Inspecting the interior with Detection, I found that the first floor sprawled back away from the road and housed a large stage, a comfortable restaurant, and long hallways lined with numbered doors. The second and third stories were divided solely into corridors of rented rooms; a quick count told me the inn easily had more than a hundred available, of which all but two were entirely empty.

“We have arrived,” Val said as the wagon stopped, drawing me back from my inspection. “I believe it would be best if we brought our extra rations inside with us. I do not trust this place as I once did.”

“Agreed,” I nodded, thinking back to the looted houses. “I’ll go in and handle our lodging situation, if you and Lia can take care of consolidating our things.”

“Can do!” Lia chirped. I gave her a light squeeze on the shoulder before I hopped down from the wagon. Val had parked on a large stone pad opposite the stables at the side of the inn, a space seemingly made for trading caravans and wagons like ours. The pad was empty apart from us, and I only spotted one other horse out of at least twenty empty stalls as I crossed the lot and climbed onto the porch.

Entering through the heavy double doors, I was immediately entranced by the smell of fresh bread and the soft sound of music. Two women sat on the stage on my far left, one plucking merrily on a lute while the other sang a sweet melody about a lost lover. They performed for a sea of empty tables; I counted eight patrons between the vast swath of booths and benches that took up a majority of the room. To my right was a long bar lined with vacant stools, tended by a young man polishing a mug and a white