After Beneltig's last-ditch victory, all the champions were rushed to the kingdom's hospital basement just below the castle. All the princesses who were bound to their injured champions rushed to join them.
As the Hero was about to join the Fairy who was leaving, Tadzi and Caesar stopped him in his tracks.
- We've met twice now, young human," commented the blob announcer.
The Hero put his guard up, preparing himself for the worst, but the only thing that happened was that Tadzi bowed to him and Caesar grabbed his shoulder.
- I had forgotten to thank you for wanting to save me, although it was unnecessary considering my nature.
- You have shown courage, my young boy," congratulated Caesar.
Suddenly, the Hero noticed that the old man was missing an arm, he also saw that not only his face was scarred but also his wings were split. He must have been unable to fly.
He nodded and looked away, accepting the congratulations with a grunt.
- We heard you speak, you don't have to pretend to be dumb.
- I... I am compelled not to speak," he confessed.
- So that's the reason for the seal of power on your belly, Caesar realized.
- Huh?" shouted the Hero.
- You really thought that we would not notice it, said Tadzi, maybe you, you can not see it because you have no mastery of magic, he explained, but if we spend some magic energy on it, it reveals itself.
- Oh," said the Hero, "and how do you know about that?
- We're in the queen's good books," boasted the blob.
Then there was a blank between the three men, the Hero didn't know what to say. At the same time, he was not used to talking, let alone holding a conversation that went beyond three answers. Finally he said:
- I am delighted to talk to you but I must join the princess without a name...
The tournament organizer stopped him by grabbing his arm, the Hero turned to him, full of incomprehension.
- You do not have any right to accompany him, the princesses have an exceptional exemption to accompany their champions to the underground hospice, exposed to him the male fairy, you had better return in the boxes and to wait for him, if you do not want more problem. Already that you are supposed to be restricted in your apartments.
The Hero chewed his tongue, wanting to contradict him, he imagined various possibilities to get rid of him but decided to obey him. He withdrew the embrace that the fairy had on his arm and returned to the princely boxes before leaving the stadium completely.
The two "men" watched him go out of the dressing rooms, Caesar made a remark to Tadzi:
- He has the voice of a thirty year old.
- Perhaps he is a thirty-year-old adult.
- No, his reactions are those of a teenager, he does not have the maturity yet.
Then he asked her something much more serious.
- So were you able to gather more information about this faceless boy?
- No more than my spies, was sorry the slimy being.
- It's nothing, Caesar excused him, the queen, in spite of her worries, will not hold it against us.
Tadzi thought about it and asked her opinion about this young man.
- Seal of power, artillery in the body, he gets imprisoned, has fun with a kid because he is locked against his will in an ivory tower and the queen is able to defeat him in one blow, stated Caesar, he is undeniably not the Nemesis.
- Why is that?
- I don't believe that the one who chose his herald would let him roam around without a phenomenal amount of power to confront the hero of the legend.
- He could be playing a double game," Tadzi justified, "he still whispered to the queen that he wanted to kill the hero. Do you think she heard him wrong? Seriously? She did?
- This is the only black spot to his innocence, admitted the organizer, I grant you.
- Moreover, if he is not the Nemesis, who would he be?
- A human who would be angry with the hero or else..., he said, not finishing his sentence, on purpose.
Tadzi made a disapproving mouth noise while shaking his head.
- You've been smoking the carpet to think it might be.
- Nothing exists, everything is allowed! Laughs Caesar loudly, well, it's time for the second fight. Let's go back to our place.
- Very well. You know that one of the fights has been postponed to the evening? warned the blue slime.
- Is that so? Why did you allow such a delay?" asked Caesar.
- Because one of the fighters is a vampire, and he comes from the protectorate of our kingdom, Tadzi explained.
- He's not here yet? he wondered.
- No, apparently not.
- Who is this pipsqueak?
- A kid named Lucello Ficas.
- Never heard of it.
Meanwhile, Caemgen Barskersclay, the minister of festivities, entered the royal box and saw the queen in the arms of the guard Sawyer, who was stroking her long pastel hair.
- Did she fall asleep?" asked Caemgen.
- Well, it's going to irritate me to converse with you for more than two minutes with your slow pace, Sawyer told him.
He reached out in the direction of the minister and performed the glyph with an acceleration spell:
- Acxel: Allow my target to double its speed!
Suddenly, the minister of festivities' gaze seemed less off, but it was still just as bleak.
- It's getting a little better," said Caemgen.
- Go see a psychomagichologist, advised the queen's bodyguard, it will be faster than waiting for someone to make you well.
- The pssyymagicholoogues seem to be charlatans.
I should have tripled his speech speed, Sawyer thought.
- And anyway, you know that I became unable to use the maaagiiie deep since the last invaaasion of the kingdom, otherwise I would have already accelerated.
- I know that.
Sawyer cancelled his spell and reaccelerated Caemgen to boost his speech.
- Well, we need to talk about the young human, said the Minister of Festivities, when does she plan to wake up?
- In a few hours, maybe, two, three," Sawyer surmised, setting the queen down in a chair other than her seat.
- As soon as she wakes up we will have to make a decision about the human living on our soil.
- Do we agree that his death is not a factor? I don't want his first executioner to be an innocent man, especially him.
- Absolutely, it has been confirmed with the other ministers. But why especially him? asked Caemgen curiously.
- Because, I have some suspicions about his identity, he revealed to her, and if this turns out to be true, he will prepare for the worst.
- No matter who he is, you can't deny that this human is more than dangerous?
- I know that, but the queen has the final decision, I just hope she doesn't remember her promise, otherwise our precautions will be for nothing.
- Anyway, you are supposed to be able to stop them, Commander of the Saints of the Queen, you who are the successor of Torn.
The spell had stopped far too quickly. He was really starting to become more and more insensitive to magic, it was already evident with his difficulty to fly.
- I know my role.
Back in his room, the Hero went straight to his bed, not to sleep - although that would inevitably happen - but to think about it. Putting his hands behind his head and staring at the ceiling, he reflected on his short confrontation with Tarkus. He had noticed that the cyclops had the same crazy eye as the lizard-man, if this Thoosa hadn't lied, and if he was to believe the difference in form between the assassin before and after their first altercation, someone was boosting the fighters skills, or worse, but he would need clues to prove it.
But well, that was not his problem, the shenanigans of this tournament, he had brought his stone to the building of the realization of the dream of the fairy princess by encouraging Beneltig, it was enough before his departure.
It had been really too long that he had stayed here, locked in this vegetal tower, walking around in a huge castle made of plants. He hadn't done anything interesting in about a month.
If within three days he was not allowed to pack up, he would give himself permission.
By staying in the same position for too long, he would eventually fall asleep and lose his anger towards the object of his revenge and his abilities would weaken.
Then he literally fell asleep, closing his eyes without realizing it. During his nap, he had no dreams or nightmares.
A sleep empty of emotion.
It was better than nothing...
In the basement hospital, doctors, magicians and other nurses were parading through the corridors of the underground hospital, the princesses were looking for the room where their injured champions were. Selma-Keltna, Zetgrieker, Morgul and Beneltig had been taken to the various emergency rooms. The surgeons were attending to the physically injured and the medicine men were trying to find out how dangerous the magic used on the nameless princess' champion was.
All four were waiting in a waiting room, one floor below the operating and emergency rooms. There was a heavy silence in the room, none of them daring to open their mouths to lighten the atmosphere in view of their extreme anxiety.
But the losing princesses could not help but cast evil glances at the wingless fairy princess, the winner of this first round. She who had no wings, no name, no title of nobility and who had been taken in by a family that was not noble had managed to win, although they were the ones who were destined to become queen, not a vulgar menechme of the Witch Temptress, great traitor of this kingdom.
They thought she didn't deserve her victory because of the devious way her lover had used to win against Tarkus, especially since they had teamed up before the tournament - not knowing that the Fairy knew nothing about her champion's ploy.
The Fairy could only endure these accusing looks filled with contempt towards her, waiting for a good news to come to each of them.
As time went by, the parents of the princesses and their champions came to see their children, some princesses were in tears as they recounted what had happened - they too had witnessed the massacre perpetrated by Tarkus. Then their looks added to the previous ones, they too did not understand how the Fairy Abomination could win with such a pitiful champion as Beneltig.
Without even speaking, they forbade her any rejoicing, she hadn't even had time to rave about her victory, considering the ardor of the fight and the speech of the human she had under her tutelage, there had been so many things...
As the minutes ticked by, she waited for her parents, her head down, hoping that her lover had not succumbed to asphyxiation stuck in the crystal block.
The minutes passed and, desperately waiting for her parents, she was finally swept away by sleep and was about to fall asleep, she was pulled from the arms of Deliabelle, the emperor-god of dreams and immortality, by her father who shook her awake.
- Don't fall asleep, we have to go see Beneltig.
She blinked frantically as she awoke and followed her father to the room where the crystal block had been placed. Across the street, Niselios left his daughter to go see her lover alone.
In the room were various doctors, mages... and stonecutters?
Beneltig was still stuck in the crystal block, which worried the Fairy even more. She was reassured that he was able to breathe through the crystal that covered him, and that his nutrition was going to be provided by space magic, carrying the food that had been mixed and transformed directly into his stomach. And it was in the same way, but reversed, that they proceeded with his digestion - I'll draw you a picture, they had already extracted his excrement directly from his small intestine so he must be alive.
The princess was hardly reassured about her lover's condition. She could only wait until he was dislodged from his gemstone prison.
After all, he was under the care of the best doctors, mages - and jewelers? - of the kingdom, he was bound to come out of this story alive.
Despite her concern for Beneltig, she was admiring the courage he had shown against Tarkus, one of the favorites of the tournament, he who had fallen so much in her esteem lately, she had only one wish: to thank him with a languid kiss.
She kissed his hand and placed it on the surface of the diamond block.
Her next destination was going to be the Hero's apartments. Now that he had started talking, she had many questions that needed to be answered.