The New World Chapter 64: Final Call to Action

Chapter 64: Final Call to Action

At least by post-apocalyptic standards. It looked like she’d borrowed a dress from Kessiah or Torix, considering the quality. It was stylish, fitted dress made of black fabric. A pretty normal garb though a slight split up the left leg and a split down the chest gave it an edgy vibe. It showed a little more skin than normal. She still had on a pair of leather shoes instead of heels. It made it obvious how uncomfortable she was in the dress.

I grinned, “You’re beautiful.”

Althea blushed, glancing down at her feet. I continued, my grin turning mischievous,

“But, yenno, maybe a tad over dressed for the occasion. It’s just lunch after all.”

She glanced up, a subtle smile tracing her lips. She shoved , more playful than forceful, “I don’t get an opportunity to dress up often. Cut so slack. Besides, what’s with the haircut? I’m not the only one to dress up.”

I hadn’t even thought about it, but it was a good point. I’d prepped myself a bit for the lunch as well. We’d crossed into date category by now. I shrugged,

“Well fuck…you got there.” I turned and picked up the supplies. Althea’s smile turned into a deep frown at the sight of the deer skin and bent out of shape shopping cart.

She crossed her arms, “What is this?”

“Lunch, it’s just unmade.”

She leaned towards the deer skin and sniffed. Leaning back, she put out a palm to it,

“Yeah, that slls terrible.”

I laughed, “Of course it does. It hasn’t been cooked yet.”

I walked into the tent, making telekinetic pads for my feet. The oversized tents had been sothing you’d expect a family would own, room for several people. Althea moved several small utilities into the open space since the last ti I’d been here. A small, electric stove, a giant block of granite she’d polished, even a sink with tiny plastic wrap beside it filled with water. It looked like a tiny bath she liked soaking in I guessed.

I walked over and set my supplies onto the block of granite. The rock already busted through the tent, reminding why I kept my feet from doing so as well. It did the job as a cutting board and prepping area for the at, however.

Before I got started, I glanced around the room, exploring for a few seconds. I’d never glanced that close to the inside of the place. It felt rude, since she never really invited in. Now I had the perfect excuse to see inside.

There was a place she slept and lounged in, a bunkbed carried into here. The blue sheets were unmade, more like she didn’t know how to make a bed rather than just being ssy. I didn’t comnt, knowing it was rude. The other painful part of the place was the books and magazines scattered about. They were unfolded, along with quite a collection of clothing.

That was the problem with her whole place. She just didn’t know how the hell to organize anything. It made a piece of my brain writhe in discomfort. I wasn’t soone with ocd, but I still hated inefficiency. This place was marred with it. It wasn’t filthy though. She didn’t leave food out or dirty dishes everywhere. From what I knew about cleanliness, that was the deciding difference between being filthy and just being cluttered.

Still, prepping the al would take so ti, so I got started. Under a nearby lamp’s light, I set the vegetables, herbs, and seasonings to the side of the granite block. I set the at of the deer out onto the boulder. It looked like was very recently polished, making it squeaky clean. It was perfect for a cutting board.

After that, I grabbed a few packs of the lemon powder and olive oil. I set them beside the at. After growing out a knife from a palm, I broke the object. After washing it and my hands in so soap and water Althea had nearby, I grabbed slabs of at. With my right hand holding them down, I started slicing the at down the grain of it.

It’s a pretty simple way of making tough cuts more tender. You slice the at in the sa order as the fibers of the at. This breaks of so of the tougher fibers, making the at take better to margination. With how precise and quickly I could move, this process took about two minutes. A few slabs of at later, and the cuts were ready.

“Althea, do you have any paper towels or sothing like that?”

“Uh, oh…Yeah, of course.”

Althea was waiting for , looking closely from her bed. After looking in a burlap bag beside her bed, she handed a bundle of them to . This let grab the olive oil with my hand without getting blood on it. Taking another bundle of paper towels, I grabbed a glass bowl behind the block of granite. Althea had gathered a few cooking dishes and stuff for , making this process much simpler.

I took the glass and poured the oil into it. After that, I mixed in the packets of lemon substitute. From my experience with cooking, this worked better than real lemon juice. The packets mixed into the oil better, because lemon juice had water in it. After that, I washed my hands in the sink.

Reaching back to the granite, I grabbed a few pinches of lemongrass and mint to throw into the marinade. I took a bundle of cilantro, and reached out a hand towards Althea.

She stared at , confused. I shook the bundle, and she reached out a hand before I pinching so off.

“Taste this and tell what it tastes like.”

She tried so, nodding as she chewed, “It’s good. I can’t really describe it.”

I frowned, “Does it taste like soap?”

“What, no. Why are you asking?”

I turned back to the marinade, pouring so cilantro in, “So people say cilantro tastes like soap. I didn’t want to ruin the at for you, so I checked before adding it.”

She blinked, “Oh.”

I mixed in so pepper, salt, and dill from there. After stirring it with my hands, I dipped the at into the solution. Making sure to work the marinade into the tiny cuts I made, I squeezed the at until it was saturated in the solution.

After that, I walked over towards the sink and washed my hands with soap. I made sure to wash the bottle of soap as well, because leaving bloody gunk on the bottle was disgusting. Cross contamination was a serious problem in restaurants, and I wasn’t about to let it happen under my watch.

After that, I walked over and cleaned the granite with a few antibacterial wipes I had on hand. I let the antibacterial solution soak in, cleaning my new knife in the soap as well. After that, I cleaned the boulder with water twice, making sure to get the antibacterial stuff off it. Otherwise the salad would taste like complete and utter shit.

After preheating the oven, I set the vegetables onto the granite, lining up the tomatoes, cucumbers, and herbs. After grabbing a wooden bowl from behind the granite boulder, I cubed the tomatoes and sliced the cucumbers into thin slices. Tossing them into the bowl, I grabbed oregano, thy, and a bit of basil and tossed them onto the salad.

Skill unlocked! Cooking(lvl 1) – So craft symphonies with sound. For you, the ingredients are your notes and the al is your chorus.

After that, I poured a bit of olive oil and lemon juice onto the vegetables. After adding a generous portion of salt, I stirred with a wooden spoon grabbed from behind the granite boulder. Althea had piled up as many kitchen wares as she could. It looked like she just grabbed a whole aisle of them and piled them behind the boulder.

I chuckled a bit at them before Althea frowned at ,

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing. You just took a whole store’s worth of kitchen stuff. It’s kind of funny is all.”

She blushed a bit before watching stir the salad. After I set that aside, I handed it to her with a fork,

“Taste it and tell what you think. I can make sothing else if you don’t like it.”

She grabbed the dish from , tasting it with an almost ravenous look on her face. After the first bite, she recoiled back for a second before taking another. A few bites later and she set the dish onto her lap. She threw her hands up,

“This tastes so good. How is this so good? I tried eating this green stuff before and it tastes like dirt.”

I busted out laughing, “That’s lettuce, not cucumbers and tomatoes. If you don’t rinse lettuce off, it keeps so of the grit on it. That makes it taste like dirt.”

She blinked, “Why didn’t you ever tell you were a chef?”

With an irrepressible grin on my face, I went back to work on the granite table top,

“I wouldn’t say I’m a chef. I just know my way around a kitchen. No one cooked for when I was younger, so I learned to cook for myself. It was fun, so I just kind of kept at it until I had a couple of dishes I liked. This is one of them.”

I pointed at the venison, “Most at is expensive for example, so I have to get the tougher, leaner kinds of pork.” I gestured a hand out to my side, still holding the knife, “The thing is, they’re barely edible if you don’t learn a few tricks for eating them. After that, I just wanted sothing lighter like a salad for the al. That-“

I picked up a pack of rice, “And sothing like this to fill up.”

As I poured so water into a pot, Althea frowned, “Do you need any help?”

I shook my head, staring at the pot as I put so cumin and powdered garlic into the pot, “I said I’d make you lunch, not have you help. Sit down, relax. I’m here to feed you, not to make you feel bad.”

The sounds of her adjusting herself and grazing on the salad ebbed through the room for another minute. Once I finished adding so salt and pepper to the pot, I poured a dash of the canola oil in. Olive oil made the rice taste like shit, even in small amounts. I don’t know why, but it does. Trust .

Breakthrough! Cooking (lvl 1)—>Cooking (lvl 25)

It was a pleasent bonus for using my skills. At so point I would want to get breakthrough’s in all my previous life skills. That would have to wait till later. After seasoning the rice’s water, I set the venison into the preheated stove. With that finished, I cleaned up the area. Althea stood up and walked up to the granite. I was about to wipe it down, but she pushed my hand down,

“Let . Please.”

I grinned, “Alright, sure.”

I handed her the bundle of paper towels I was about to use. She set them on the nearby sink before stretching out a claw from her finger. She sighed before slicing through an ultra-thin slice of granite. So thin, light leaked through the plate she pulled of it. Her hand didn’t struggle with the cut though. Combine her overwhelming strength and armor piercing, and feats like that were normal.

Not normal for though. I spread out my hands, “How in the fuck did you do that?”

She shrugged like nothing was out of the ordinary, “You know, armor piercing.”

I blinked, “Is it that strong?”

She nodded, “Depends on the stuff I’m cutting through. Steel or tal in general is much harder to cut, because it’s like cutting through you. You have too much health, so I can’t do enough damage. Once I can do enough damage though, I can cut through whatever it is like it’s nothing.”

I frowned, “Jesus…It’s crazy to look at.”

She frowned, “Yeah, I know. A bit freakish.”

I waved my hand, “No, I an like crazy aweso.”

She glanced up at , almost like happiness was trying to crawl out but she wouldn’t let it,

“Really?”

I nodded, “Hell yeah. It’s cool. I wish I could cut through my armor like that. It would make carving out the runes so much easier.”

She grinned, “Yeah, but the runes are so hard to work with anyways.”

I turned back to the stove, setting a tir for 30 minutes, “You just have to get used to them.”

She shook her head, “No. They’re really hard to get. All those extra perks let you understand faster than you think you do. I could stare at one all day and not get a thing from it.”

I weighed my hands back and forth, “But I can’t cut through granite like paper. Trying to get there, but it’s tough.”

She rolled her eyes, sitting onto her bed. She crossed her legs and leaned forward,

“When’s lunch ready. Slls great.”

I made another invisible chair, sitting near Althea, “Eh, about forty minutes.”

Looking surprised yet again, Althea chid,

“How did you learn to do that? That’s straight up like Torix.”

I glanced down, “Oh, the chair thing.” I glanced back up at her, “It’s a mix of telekinesis and molding my armor.”

She nodded, fascinated by the casual display. A minute passed, a silence passing but never turning awkward. Althea had that effect on the people around her. She was one of those kinds of people you could be quiet with, pass the ti, and it never dawned on you that things were awkward. A pleasant calm would co to pass.

After I placed the rice into the boiling water, Althea started back up the conversation, “So uhm…how did you get so good at all this stuff?”

I raised an eyebrow, “What do you an?”

She fumbled with her hands, “I uh…I don’t know. You got good at all these different things so fast. Maybe if I knew how you did it, I can do it to…or sothing like that.”

I grabbed my chin, organizing my thoughts for a mont. I glanced at the orange lamp in the corner of the tent, “I think it’s really just three things. A bit of discipline, motivation, and making goals.”

She leaned towards as I continued, “I make tiny changes every day, and after a month or two, it makes a huge difference. That’s the discipline part. Making goals gives a direction to focus my thoughts. Otherwise I’d be making changes without any purpose. Motivation is trickier though.”

I leaned against a hand, like I was floating in the air, “I just think of where I could be in five years. If I focus and push myself every day, what’s the best outco possible?”

She frowned, “You kill Yawm then have to fight in an endless war forever. Life still sucks.”

I shrugged, “Eh, I disagree. Once we kill Yawm, there’s a whole galaxy out there to explore. You think this food is good? Wait till we go sowhere in space and have a chef make us sothing. Or, or, what about finding a developed world, where Schema has been around for ages. They probably already have the dungeons and stuff sorted out.”

I turned to her, “Not everyone has to fight there. I’m sure there’s plenty of people who would love having a chef cook them delicious food. You could be that chef. You could open a restaurant, start a family, whatever you wanted.”

My eyes turned harder and less hopeful, “But you have to want it, and I an really want it. Not so half ass kind of want, I an a desperate, ravenous, all-consuming kind of want. Right now, we’re trapped on a dying planet called earth. Either we kill Yawm, or we die here. I know you hate fighting. I know you hate endless war. Hell, I know you want to live out a peaceful, calm life. I understand that. I really do.”

I turned back to the al, “But peaceful days and als like this are numbered unless we stop that festering sore nad Yawm.”

Althea nodded, glancing down. She sighed before looking back up at , “Yeah…ok.”

The first word was ek, like a half resolution. Her words gained strength as she spoke them, like sothing was pushing her. It was like she saw a light at the end of the tunnel, sothing to aim for. She nodded,

“I’ll make a plan with Torix. Maybe set up a schedule for training with Kessiah or sothing like that.”

I stood up from my seat as the tir went off, “Sounds good.” I walked over and pulled out the glass from the stove. Turns out that venison cooks the sa as pork, so I grabbed a few dishes from the boulder pile. After that, I set them on the tent floor, setting up the al with reasonable portions.

The conversation turned lighter after that, Althea asking questions about my cooking. The light chat was a pleasant contrast with lead laden conversation from earlier. The entire ti we talked, I hoped my words went through to her. Getting Althea to train and use her powers with all her might was damn near necessary to beat Yawm.

A combination of Kessiah’s blood arts and Kessiah’s assassination was our best thod of killing a follower. Sure, Torix and I could hold the line against an army with his summoning and my tenacity, but we’d falter eventually. We needed Kessiah and Althea to get their heads in the ga. Either I pushed her to change, or this world would eat us alive.

After how many speeches I’d given Althea, I was getting frustrated with her. Coming into a ssy room, lounged in for weeks, then seeing her waste her ti on wearing pretty clothes…I won’t lie, it tested my patience. After this, I wasn’t going to spend any more ti convincing her to try. Either she and Kessiah killed Yawm, or I would dive into another dinsion with him. Fun tis for all.

Wiping away those cynical thoughts, I chatted until the al was finished. After that, I said my goodbyes. As I left, Althea almost said sothing. She didn’t finish her words though. Maybe it was sothing to try and restore my confidence in her. Maybe not. I couldn’t tell.

What I could tell was that I needed to finish the rifle I was making her. If she wouldn’t improve herself, I would do the job for her. Getting Kessiah to improve herself was simpler. I just had to nudge her in the right direction with a bit of competition and good faith. Torix needed a reminder of how serious the situation was. Althea…well I don’t know what she needed to get off her ass.

Before Yawm ca out of his world tree, I needed to find out. We had no way of knowing when Yawm would co out. My intuition told along with a sinking feeling in my gut that it wouldn’t be long now. The forest grew closer to the quarantined wall every day. The eldritch evolved as Yawm’s minions fed them. As I gathered ingredients for this lunch, I even ca across an eldritch or two.

Interrupting my thoughts, a small earthquake shook the ground for a few seconds.

We were running out of ti.