A Bored Lich

"Did you let them die-"

Ver Dilen flicked Wilhelm\'s forehead hard enough to snap his head back. "I\'m not that boorish. Now as I was saying, although you seem to hold no malice towards them, you almost got them killed today. Whose fault was it?"

Wilhelm lowered his head.

"Don\'t pretend you aren\'t thinking about it," Ver Dilen insisted. "And don\'t say it was only your fault, especially when it\'s partially my own fault as well."

"Why would it be your fault?" Wilhelm tactfully tried to switch subjects.

  "I gave you three weeks of menial tasks to relax away from the battle and from people, but you only interpreted it as the monastery abandoning you."

Wilhelm\'s expression several times, ending with a snarl. "You call that relaxing? You screamed at me everyday. You just want to throw me away."

Ver Dilen grunted in dissatisfaction and threw up his hands. "Patience was never one of my virtues, though your stubbornness certainly didn\'t help that. I nor the goddess want allies that will hold us back. Luckily for you, she needs her hero to protect her, but not like this, not when you\'re in your own way. It might take you a few days but it\'s necessary for you to pull yourself back together. You should understand, seeing as meditation and reflection are the basis of our religion. One again, whose fault is it that you ended up like this? Tell me who\'s also to blame, and you can begin to recover."

Wilhelm couldn\'t lie to himself. He didn\'t hate the names tickling the inside of his lips, but they had contributed greatly. All he had to do was let them out. In the end, however, guilt kept his mouth shut. He simply shook his head.

Ver Dilen scrunched up his lips. He seemed to consider several courses of action, likely all of them physical. "Damn it kid," he muttered to himself.

Wilhelm had always prayed that someone saw him as something less than a hero, something mortal and fallible, but Ver Dilen seemed to only see him as someone in need of help; heroes never needed help. He glanced at Ver Dilen and cursed under his breath.

Ver Dilen seemed to catch wind of his hesitation as he asked, "What are you doubting? Confess it and only I and the goddess shall know." He phrased it like he was insisting, but it seemed more like a threat.

"I can\'t bring myself to blame them for relying on me, but what if they\'re gone by the time I finish recovering?" Wilhelm asked, feeling exposed.

Ver Dilen thought for a moment. "Like with your village?"

Wilhelm blinked in surprise. \'Isaac must have told him about that as well,\' he thought as he took out his half-acorn necklace. "I already lost everything once. This is all I have left of them."

Ver Dilen focused his good eye on the necklace. "Why only half an acorn?"

Wilhelm chuckled painfully. "It was my best friend\'s idea to make a friendship bracelet, but we were broke. We used whatever we could scrounge around the farm. She found the string. I sliced an acorn in two with my father\'s old sword."

Ver Dilen raised a brow. "That\'s rather a clean cut, especially given a rusty sword at such a young age," he mused to himself before he reached into his sleeve.

Wilhelm instinctively shut his eyes for a half-second, fearing the worst. When he opened them, Ver Dilen hadn\'t moved. A small bracelet lay in his massive palm.

The bracelet, constructed by a knot of different colored strings, had gradually unwound with time. Once-vibrant colors had been scorched into an ugly brown, which could only be deducted by contrasting a red string amongst them which had maintained its color throughout the decades. While the knot had gradually come undone, the strings seemed to remember their shape and stick together, all except for the red string which had twisted away by its lonesome. The red string could have been made into a new bracelet, yet there it remained amongst its scorched brethren.

Ver Dilen held it with a distant look. "This is what my mother made for my sisters and I before our town got burnt to the ground, taking most of them with it. From what Isaac has told me about you, it seems the demons haven\'t changed tactics over the ages. I tried my best to never let it happen again, but it seems that destiny mandated it happen to you."

"I\'m sorry for your loss," Wilhelm said.

Ver Dilen put the bracelet back into his sleeve. "Don\'t be. It\'s not your fault, but the point is what happened afterwards. I had mana so the monastery took me and my surviving family in. I worked my ass off and chased down the fucker who did it, but I hadn\'t trained enough. Inevitably, I got my ass kicked." He gestured, with one of his three remaining fingers on his right hand, to the deep gash which ran down his eye to the edge of his mouth, which gave him a permanent, one-sided smirk.

"Is that true?" Wilhelm asked even though it was rude. Even though he could sympathize with Ver Dilen\'s story, he still wanted to punch him in the face.

"You think I want to impress you?" Ver Dilen chided.

Wilhelm let out a short chuckle. "I guess not. Did you lose anything else besides a pretty face that day?"

Ver Dilen didn\'t respond to the insult, simply nodding without elaborating.

Wilhelm frowned, feeling immature all of a sudden. "I…can consider taking a break," he said. "But will you protect them for me?"

"Of course," Ver Dilen said. "It\'s my job to make sure that no harm comes to them, or do you think that you\'re stronger than me?"

Wilhelm subconsciously rubbed at one of his bruises. "I\'ve never taken a break before."

"This is not a request," Ver Dilen said, losing his patience. "You will rest here whether you like it or not. I will tell the others to wait for you, no more and no less. What you tell them afterwards is up to you. Understood?"

Wilhelm hesitated.

"I swear you make me want to toss you into the deepest hole known to man. I said do you understand!?" Ver Dilen screamed, veins bulging all over his forehead. It seemed as if he would snap Wilhelm\'s neck if he were pushed any further.

Cold sweat formed on Wilhelm\'s back as he nodded. "I understand!"

Ver Dilen huffed. "Alright, our first lesson is complete." With that, he vanished in a puff of golden life essence.