Calamity Upon This World

Williams had ordered a lot of snacks and drinks to enjoy today.

He had tried to order liquor, but he was stopped by Mark due to his real age.

'Ugh, so annoying, he grimaced.

William knew that technically he was still 10 in this world, but mentally he was easily above 30.

So being denied alcohol like this really annoyed him.

The mood felt really light and comfortable in the bar.

It was just the four of them here today, and yet there wasn't even a moment of silence in the bar.

Every minute was lively, with one of them making light-hearted jokes or asking questions.

It felt really strange to William, as this was the first time he had ever experienced anything like this.

While it was a new experience, he didn't hate it.

'So this is what it's like to have friends?'

He wondered.

Moments like this, where he could forget about everything and just enjoy the company of his friends, were truly rare.

And the. being so rare only made them more precious to him.

'I wonder if it's possible to have moments like this more often? '

William wondered, but he didn't think too much into it and instead asked Jasmine something that probably everyone in the room was curious about.

"How did your mother's treatment go?"

The atmosphere suddenly became quiet as all eyes moved towards Jasmine.

"My mother is safe now," she said with a strained smile.

Even though she tried to hide it, others were able to tell something was wrong.

"What's wrong, Jasmine?" he asked, worry etched on his face.

"Mana contamination," she muttered with clear difficulty.

Hearing that term, Mark and Raya seemed confused.

But William, who knew about it, finally understood why Jasmine looked troubled.

In Astressa, everyone is born with a certain level of affinity to mana

No matter how small their affinity is, mana shouldn't be harmful to them.

Due to this, mana is considered a gift from the gods themselves to help humans live and thrive.

But it should be noted that while every human possessed affinity, not everyone could wield mana.

This was the reason why awakening was such an important part of a person's life.

As it dictated the course of their whole life.

Through awakening, it was possible to make a mana core inside the body.

Which allowed a person to freely absorb and store mana inside their cores to use it for various purposes in the future.

But just like everything else, exceptions always existed.

Some special people were born without any affinity for mana.

Usually, this wasn't that bad, as Mana just ignored their existence.

Meaning they would never be able to use mana, but that was all.

They still had the option of training and acquiring aura.

The problem came with the second type of exception.

These special people were born with too high an affinity for mana for their own good.

Mana was naturally attracted to them, but their bodies were too weak to form a core.

It led to mana conglomerating inside their body but being unable to form a core.

This is where the term mana contamination came from.

Such high quantities of mana inside the body without the presence of a core to contain it ends up slowly poisoning and destroying the body from the inside.

The disease starts shortly after a person is born, but it only starts showing symptoms many years down the line.

Mana as an energy is property-less and malleable to whatever its owner desires.

Due to this, it doesn't harm the body even in its pure state unless it is willed to.

But after a few decades of its unauthorised presence in the body, it slowly grows in quantity to the point where it starts interfering with the natural bodily functions of humans.

And before long, the infected end up crippled, and if the condition is still not cured in just a few months, death is guaranteed.

While the disease might sound pretty serious and lethal at first glance,.

The main problem stemmed from the fact that it was so rare.

Out of every billion humans, barely 10 people were born with it.

And it showed no symptoms for most of their lives, only acting when they reached the middle stages of their lives.

Due to it being so rare and incontagious, not much research has been done on finding cures for it.

As almost no one ever suffers from it,.

Or at least, that was how it was before the merger with Morgov happened.

After the merger, Morgov wasn't the only planet to have benefited from it.

Once the situation with Voidstruck was brought under control, thanks to the help of people from Astressa and their powerful magic,.

It was Morgov's people's turn to help Astressa.

Especially in terms of development in many fields of the world.

While mostly all the brightest minds in their world had long died.

Their technology was mostly compromised, and many years had passed since the regression of their civilisation.

Knowledge of what they once had still existed in the minds of people.

While it was mostly just concepts inside their heads without technical know-how  on how to recreate them,.

Just their innovative ideas and concepts were enough to completely revolutionise the world's people in Astressa.

And bring forth an era of peace and development in almost all fields of life.

It was during this era that some genius a couple centuries ago came up with a 'cure' to mana contamination when his wife was infected with it.

But due to no one ever caring too much about such a disease, no one cared to invest a significant amount of manpower and resources to look for a cure.

And yet, even without support from the government or any significant organization, against all odds, he managed to make a 'cure'.

Even if it was only a temporary cure, it allowed him and his wife to live a normal life by each other's sides.

William had found the story quite inspiring and sweet when he first read it.

Which he was able to so easily recall after hearing the term today.

As sweet and wholesome as the story was, it also meant that after his death, no one cared enough to do further research into the subject.

That meant there was no permanent cure for the disease.

Meaning every few years,Jasmine would need to spend an exhorbant amount of money just to prolong her mother's life by a few years.

He finally understood why she had such a strained expression on her face.

For a second, he considered offering help.

After all, his family was very well off and could definitely help them.

And yet he didn't.

After all, doing so would be nothing short of disrespectful.

Offering her help like this would've been no different from spitting on her face and making fun of her goal of earning money for her family.

Providing help to her now would make it seem like she had only revealed her personal problems so that he could pity her and help her out.

She already knew his identity; if the situation ever seemed out of control, she was free to ask for his help, and he would lend it to her without a second thought. Discover stories with m,v l'e|m-p| y r

But since she didn't, it must mean she had it under control or at least had plans for it.

Besides, this was her personal problem, and he had no intention of being a busybody or disrespectful to her.

But looking at Mark and Raya, he could tell that they were very confused about what Jasmine was talking about.

This was only normal, as it wasn't a condition many people were familiar with.

So he took the liberty of enlightening them about the disease and its implications.

**

"Ah, I see," Mark exclaimed, doing his best to keep his voice low.

Hearing Williams explanation, a somber and uncomfortable silence overtook the tavern for the first time.

But it was broken by none other than Jasmine herself.

"You guys are acting like somebody died here."

"Come on, cheer up; my mother will be fine."

"I'm just going to earn so much money in the future that it wouldn't matter even if I had to spend some spare change for her."

"You guys don't need to worry about us; instead, let's just focus on partying it up tonight. After all, we don't get chances to let loose often."

Hearing her bold words, everyone was speechless, unsure of how to react.

But as if on que, a bar waitress arrived holding all of their food and drinks.

Seeing this, William was the first one to break out laughing.

It started with a small chuckle that he tried to contain but failed miserably, and before long he was laughing cheerfully with small tears leaking out of his eyes.

"Hahahahahahaha!!"

Now everyone in the room was left speechless for the second time today for a completely different reason.

This was the first time any of them had seen John, or rather, as they now knew William, laugh, let alone so heartily.

"You have a beautiful laugh; you should laugh more often."

Williams laugh was stopped by Mark, who caught everyone off guard with his comment.

Unfortunately, his comment was met with a completely different response than what he expected.

"Sorry, dude, but I'm not into guys."

Mark almost choked on air hearing his reply, and it took almost an entire minute for him to compose himself.

But eventually he did, and when did he retort with a remark of his own?

"Yeah, I'm not into kids."

Mark felt really proud of himself for his comeback and didn't think William could come back from this.

Too bad he was proven wrong less than a moment later.

"Does that imply you would have been into me if I wasn't a kid?"

This time, Mark couldn't even retort, as he knew that no matter what he said, he had already lost.

'So much for being nice to this Bratty Prick, never again'

He wanted to cry at being slandered like this, but he couldn't, as that would only make his loss even more pathetic.

Seeing the usual social butterfly blabbermouth Mark be speechless like this, everyone laughed except him.

Finally, the jolly mood from earlier had returned.

Today was a special day for the cleansers, as they could finally let go of all the troubles of life for tonight and let loose.

Not needing to worry about their dying mother, missing brother, being married to an alleged rapist, or a flaw threatening to kill everything they know and love before painfully killing him.

Even if only for tonight, they were free of the worries of the past, present, or future.

Instead, all that was left were four friends drinking and eating all night while having fun.

**

AN:

Hi guys, it's been a while, so first of all, I would like to apologise for being missing the last few days.

I try my best to be upfront with you guys about these types of things, so today will be no different.

Due to some personal issues, I was really disturbed mentally and was in no condition to write.

Once I finally figured out my personal issues, I realised I wasn't satisfied with the way this novel was going and what I had planned for the future plot.

So begrudgingly, I decided to take a break to revise my entire outline of the novel.

And now that I'm back, I'm pleased to announce that this novel is finally in a state where I can be proud of it.

Which is why I have resumed it, and now that I'm back, I promise you that I will be doing my best to upload as frequently as possible.

Hopefully, that turns out to be daily.

Also, while you're here, consider checking out my second novel.

http://wbnv.in/a/94iQwJg

I sincerely think you guys will enjoy it a lot, and while you're at it, join our wonderful and growing Discord community to talk with me or our fellow readers.

If in the future I ever stop uploading feel free to barrade me on discord where I'm usually pretty active.

And once again thank you for all the support you guys have shown this novel and me over the past few months