Delayed Transfer

Mark, the twins, and Liriel started walking towards the town. He didn’t even know the town's name and frankly, he wasn’t interested in knowing its name because it didn’t have any notable feature like Culano Village with its dungeon.  They were walking slowly while Mark was holding the little girl’s hands and beside them were the twins, since Liriel was walking very slowly and Mark was surprised that the twins were not urging him and Liriel to hurry.

He was glad that the twins were considerate of their little sister and that meant they were beginning to treat the little girl as their sister. Of course, it helped that Liriel was a very beautiful girl just like a doll.

Once they reached the gate, the town guards just looked at them and allowed them to enter without even asking who they were. Mark guessed that this place wasn’t very strict when it came to visitors.

Soon, Mark had to carry Liriel since the little girl looked like she was getting tired of walking. The first place that they saw was some sort of residential area. The houses were made of wood but they looked like they were sturdy and most of them were just up to two stories.

All the residential houses were surrounded by plants and there were trees in between each house making the place look very green and beautiful.

There were surprisingly a lot of people walking towards the exit where Mark and the children came from and he reckoned that the people were going to check out the circus. All those people who passed them greeted them cheerfully but Liriel just hid behind her hair which was glowing due to the wisp and hugged Mark’s neck. At least, Liriel’s glowing hair wasn’t noticeable since the sun was up.

The twins were a pair of truly extrovert kids so they greeted all the people who greeted them.

While they were walking, Isaac brought his attention to a shop that stood alone between two trees. Mark saw the sign saying it was Nicholas’s Toy Shop and he wondered at the coincidence regarding the shop’s name. Maybe it was really Santa Clauss, Mark thought and he laughed inwardly. Mark imagined briefly that maybe Santa Clauss was a powerful wizard and his toy factory was located in another world and he traveled to Earth during Christmas. It was absurd but it was fun to imagine.

They all went to the shop and were glad that it was open. The shop had a massive table at its center and shelves on the walls and they were all filled with toys. There were dolls, jacks in the box, some music boxes, horses pulling carts, toy soldiers, and more. Some looked very intricate with movable parts like birds with movable wings and Mark wondered if they could fly, some dolls that had wings and it was moving too, and dolls that had waving arms.

Mark knew looking at the toys that the toy maker was a great artist based on how the toys looked. Every one of them was well-made and the artisan paid great attention to the details.

An old man and a teenager entered from the back. The old man was tiny with white hair but he was still walking straight and the teenager was following the old man.

“Welcome to my toy shop strangers. My, you all looked like nobility!” The old man said.

“Are you Nicholas? All of your toys are well-made! You’re a great artist sir,” Mark told the old man.

“Yes I’m Nicholas and this is my grandson and his name is Mark,” The old man smiled at Mark’s compliment.

“Hey, your grandson has the same name as our Mark!” Isaac shouted.

“You’re name is Mark as well?” Nicholas the toymaker asked.

“Yes sir. May we look around?”

“Of course! This is a shop, silly boy,” The old man laughed.

“Mark your toys are better!” Aaron said loudly and to Mark’s embarrassment, the kid retrieved a toy from his storage ring.

Mark remembered Hamil’s warning that the twins wouldn’t care about keeping their artifacts secret as long as they could show off but he couldn’t bear to take the items from the twins. He just noted that he would lecture them once they were back in the circus.

The old man and his grandson gasped when they saw the transformer toy appearing in Aaron’s hands.

“Where did it come from?!” The teenager asked with wide eyes.

Aaron kept boasting and Mark wanted to slap his forehead.

“It came from inside my ring!”

“What toy is that!” The old man asked Isaac.

“It’s called a transformer. It’s a giant robot that can turn into a car!”

Isaac then demonstrated by transforming the robot toy into a vehicle by manipulating the movable parts of the toy.

“Are you really nobles? I was joking earlier but if you can give a storage ring to your sons, which means that you’re truly nobles or very rich,” The toymaker asked noticing Isaac and Aaron’s rings.

“Mark is not our father, he’s our brother, and we're from the circus! He’s the most powerful wizard of them all and Yoda the dragon is ours!” Isaac told the old man.

Mark cringed at what Isaac said and the old man just laughed. The teenager though was looking at Mark in awe.

The toymaker then asked Isaac if he could look at the toy and the kid generously lent his transformer to Nicholas.

Mark thought of the fact that he hadn’t talked to the twins about what to share with people outside of the circus.

The old man studied the toy details minutely and Mark heard Nicholas muttering while looking at the details of Isaac’s toy.

“What is it made of? And what is a robot and a car?” The old man asked and it was Isaac who answered.

“Mark said that it’s made of plas…plastic. A robot is a giant metal golem and a car is like a cart but doesn’t need an animal to move. That’s not my favorite toy. My favorite toy is this!” Isaac then retrieved Luke Skywalker’s X-Wing made of Legos from his ring and showed it off to the old man.

“This is called a Lego toy and you can build a lot of things using these tiny bricks!” Isaac then demonstrated by dismantling the X-Wing and assembling it again. Then Isaac used space on the table and retrieved the huge Lego Death Star from his ring.

Nicholas’s grandson, who was also named Mark gasped when he saw the huge toy made of Legos and asked what it was. Isaac and Aaron babbled an incoherent story of Star Wars to the teenager and then told the old man and his grandson about the television and movies.

Mark just gave in and let them be so he and Liriel looked at the toys together. Liriel then pointed at a very beautiful doll so Mark took it and planned to purchase it from the old man once the twins, Nicholas, and his grandson stopped talking to each other. After several minutes of storytelling, the twins paused and they retrieved a cold can of sodas from their ring and drank some, they offered the old man and the teenager some sodas and they accepted. They exclaimed at the taste and Mark was impressed at how the twins boasted their storage items and things that they could retrieve from it.