[b]Knock Knock Knock[/b] That was the first thing I heard a week later, the sound of my door being bombarded became my new morning alarm. It wasn’t from my fathers’ antics nor their friends, so I had a great guess on who it was. Wanting to stop the noise, I approached the door with a groan and swung it open. What stood in front of me was the same black wolf with silver eyes, standing in front of me. The same one that I’ve been seeing almost everyday whenever I leave my room. “Good morning neighborino,” Null shouted at me as if he was cheering me. I could see the impact marks he left on my sturdy door as his fists seemed to remain unharmed. I closed the door on his face, turned around, and headed to bed to get back my beauty sleep. [b]Knock Knock Knock[/b] I instead immediately turned around and opened the door again to see the smiling wolf. “Good morning buddy,” Null happily greeted me again, this time with more energy than I wanted to deal with. “We are not buddies,” I answered in a monotonous tone before I slammed my poor door on his face again, hoping it would drive him away. Instead of heading back to bed, I stood by the door, waiting to see if he gave up. [b]Knock Knock Knock[/b] He didn’t. “You’re right I’m sorry,” Null replied, his ears and tail momentarily drooping before springing up with more energy, “we’re besties!” I could feel his exuberant energy and my murderous energy clashed against each other. I gave up my rage to his persistent nature as his energy overwhelmed me. “What do you want,” I asked, “I don’t know about you, but it’s way too early for me.” “But it’s already noon,” he pointed out, forcing a growl out of me, “but anyway, I was wondering if you want to come do some training with me,” he revealed as I finally noticed a spear on his back. “A friend of mine gave me a spear, so I wanted to try using it. So wanna be my training partner?” “Sure,” I answered as a thought sprung to mind, “let me just wash up real quick and we’ll be on our way.” This time gently closing the door, I did as I promised and got ready for today. I gave my face a wash in the restroom, while my reflection happily stared at me with my purple eyes. I was about to head out with my casual outfit, before remembering the outfit and sword I got from using my parents’ money and chose to go fetch them. Quickly, I put on my black field jacket as it was adorned with red zippers and gray colored pockets. Below my black t-shirt was some black jeans I purchased randomly, but I quickly attached my new iron scabbard on the left side of my hip. With just a quick check of a light press on the trigger switch at the handle and sweeping my fingers against it, making sure I’m not putting my entire hand on it. I could feel heat coming off of the scabbard, telling me the sword is still working as intended. With that done, I put on my black fingerless gloves and headed outside to meet my opponent. To my own surprise or obliviousness, Null was dressed to fight as well. He was wearing a black overcoat with blue rims that draped over his dark blue shirt and black jeans. Floating above his left shoulder was a shoulder pad sprouting a blue digital wing. He was leaning over against the rails that overlooks the whole tower, watching down on the daily lives of the people below. He looked a bit down as he exuded a solemn air around him, very different from the peppy, annoying pup I’ve known for a week. “Something on your mind,” I quietly asked, silently walking next to him. He jumped when he saw me, immediately making an irritating smile as soon as he saw my face. “Just some fun, intrusive thoughts,” he answered happily as he excitedly looked down, “from up here, people down there looked like ants and I was just thinking what would it be like if I suddenly grew giant. You think I’d be a scary, ruthless, rampaging monster?” “Nah,” I answered back, “you’re too kind to be a monster, but you’re also not clumsy to accidentally be a menace.” I saw a genuine smile formed on his face and I felt myself doing the same. “Thanks Jack.” The wolf immediately backed off the rails, grabbing my hand in the process. “Let’s get going then, the earlier we start, the more time we get to hang out.” He was pretty quick when he was setting up the colosseum, he did try to teach me how to do it, but I pretended I wasn’t paying attention. We got to our positions, but he immediately went up to me to most likely give me some words of encouragement that I didn’t want. I swung at him immediately as he talked, just like I did to Simon, but he didn’t panic as I was hoping to expect. Instead, he used the rod of his spear to clash with my blade as our eyes immediately met each other. “You really are eager about this aren’t you, Bestie,” Null commented as both of us equally tried to overpower each other. “I’d say you’re actually trying to kill me, but you wouldn’t want to do that to your best friend, right?” “You’re ready to kill too,” I barked back, ignoring his question, “your eyes look fiercer and sharper than I thought.” I quickly navigated my spellbook, silently mouthing it as I got ready to hurl a spell at the wolf’s face. “Well I had to if I have to fight for real,” he replied as I quickly noticed his silver eyes glowing, “but it sure does make sparring fun, so thanks for going all out.” I immediately backed away after deflecting his spear away, aiming my sword at him and shot a fireball out of the tip with my magic. It was a direct hit as I watched the ball of fire exploding when it made contact with the wolf and created smoke. With the black smoke blocking his vision, I charged in immediately and swung my sword at him again, not realizing how much of a dumb fool I am. I instead got stabbed in the shoulder in midair by his spear, the smoke soon dissipating to reveal Null using his left hand to hold the spear and in the right hand is a small ball of fire that was probably absorbed. “That’s pretty reckless of you Bestie,” he noted as I struggled to push myself off, “your Eyes aren’t glowing, so that’s good for me.” I was a bit too occupied to question what he meant, knowing that he’s at a big advantage. He lowered his spear to get me in arm’s length before pressing the small ball of fire to my chest. “This round is mine Bestie, let’s go for another.” I was blasted away towards the wall as I quickly crumpled to the floor, eating the sandy floor beneath me. With a quick heal by the systems of the arena, I angrily got back up to my feet as I saw both the timer resetting and Null smugly smiling at me. “Take this advice from one fighter to another, don’t go all out so quickly Bestie.” I quickly prepared my spells I was going to cast as I raised my sword again. “Shut up, you just caught me off guard,” I defended, my sword pointing at the wolf, “at least I know what you’re capable of now. I thought this was your first time fighting.” “My bad, I’ve trained with a friend of mine multiple times,” the wolf apologized, “I just want to get used to the new spear I got.” He clapped his hands twice, turning the timer off. “How about this, let me put you on the same level as me. Knowledge wise anyway, I’m already a bit more experienced compared to you.” I definitely did not want to learn anything, but then I remembered what he said while I was stabbed and lowered my sword. “Sure,” I begrudgingly answered, “so tell me that thing with your eyes. Why were they glowing? I haven’t seen anything like that when I was here.” “Oh that,” Null answered with glee, “that’s my eye power, Eyes, as people call it these days. Everyone has one and they vary in what power they give you based on the color.” “So what’s yours and how does it work?” So I can exploit it and beat you up. “Mines? My power allows me to alter the properties of any magic, so sling a spell my way and I can do some fun stuff with it, like storing it into a little marble and making it so that the spell becomes very dangerous.” “Can you demonstrate it for me,” I asked while my spellbook was in my face, “I didn’t get a good look since you were covered in smoke.” He put away his spear as he opened his arms up with a smile before saying, “Sure, just cast a spell my way, I can take care of it.” I chose to use a new spell as I pointed a finger gun at Null, feeling a surge of electricity swelling up to me before a spark shot out towards the wolf. His silver Eyes glowed as he swung his right hand at it, catching the sparks in the process. Definitely doing it for theatrics, he placed the closed hand close to his heart before outreaching his arm and slowly opening it up his hand to reveal a marble of energy. “Catch,” Null shouted as he tossed the marble at me, almost missing the tiny thing, “now throw it. You’ll see how different the spell is now.” I did as he instructed and tossed it at the side of the arena, seeing a series of strong lightning bolts striking the spot the marble landed. “So can you help me with mine then,” I asked with a hint of jealousy, “I don’t know what mine is.” “I would love to,” he happily exclaimed, “but sadly I don't know much about the types of Eyes other than mine and my friend. You have your UI thing right? It should tell you somewhere.” Thanks to his reminder, I navigated through some menus and still found nothing. It says my eyes are colored purple gray, but there was no title or name that was associated with it. “Well, I’m sure you’ll figure it out one day,” Null comforted when he saw me frown, “do you still want to fight? I can go easy on you if you want.” “Don’t worry about me Null,” I answered as I raised my sword, “we’re going to keep fighting and I want you to go all out on me.” The wolf smiled at me, snapping his fingers as our countdown started to tick down. “Do your best then, Bestie,” he replied as he took up his spear again, “With enough work, I’m sure you can beat me. I’ll be rooting for you.” Once the countdown reached zero, he quickly lunged at me with my response being dodging to the side and slashed at him. I didn’t want my magic to be caught the third time, so I noted how Null used it the second time. I wasn’t aiming at his body, but his right arm, trying not to cut off the wolf’s arm, but to temporarily cripple it. When we looked at each other again, he was grinning from ear to ear. The bastard probably knew I would slash at it, but my attack wasn’t enough to get through his shields and pierce his arms. “Good idea Jack, but not strong enough,” Null egged me on as he prepared for my next move. I rushed at him, swinging my sword wildly as he blocked them with the base of his spear. I was too enamored with beating him up that he knocked me off balance and kicked me down to stab me. I narrowly rolled out of the way and got myself back up to fight again as our weapons clashed. Our fight from there was just us exchanging blows to each other, no magic being spilled and no Eyes activating, an exhilarating fight of brawn between men. We were sprawled on the ground after our bout, with Null being the winner once again. I wanted to be mad at him, but that won’t help me beat him. “How’d you get so strong,” I unconsciously asked and went silent once I realized what I said. “Well I already told you,” the wolf answered back, “I practiced with a friend of mine.” I asked him who he’s referring to and he spoke, “it’s some random guy that I met in the tower. I can introduce you to him tomorrow if you want.” I agreed to it before we started relaxing on the sand, with the wolf talking whatever thoughts that came to his mind as I just nod whenever he asked something. By the time I knew it, I was dragged around the tower by Null because he wanted to thank me for getting beat up by him or something. We went to one of the shops, a hobby shop, and browsed around doing some window shopping, well I was anyway, Null was scouring through every aisle trying to find something specific. “Jack,” the wolf yelled as his voice echoed across the store, “come over here! I want your opinion.” Not wanting to get more attention, I hurriedly walked over to him to see what he wanted, only to see him holding onto a small package. It was a pin set of some random cartoon characters that were from a new show. It was some random popular hero show that started airing recently, the special effects they had were pretty cool even though they just used actual magic. “You want a set,” I asked as I looked at the other packages that contained only one of them, “you could just get one of your favorites instead.” There were sparkles in the wolf’s eyes as he shoved it in front of my face. “True, but I love them all, so I might as well buy it,” he answered happily, “I could also give you one of the pins as a gift too. Oh wait, did you watch the show by any chance?” “No,” I immediately replied looking away, “but I wouldn’t mind if you give me one, specifically Blue Whiskey.” From the corner of my eye, I saw the wolf smirking at me as heat rushed over to my face. “I just know the name because I saw the character before and I thought he was pretty cool. He’s a lone wolf kind of character that cares for his friends and I think that’s pretty cool.” His smug face continued smiling as an urge to punch him and run away came to mind. “Whatever you say Bestie,” the wolf taunted, “well that’s fine with me, I’ll go buy it then and don’t worry, I have money now.” He ran off to the cashier to quickly buy it as I just walked out to get myself calmed down. When he left the store, he tore open the package viciously before handing me the pin of a blue wolf wearing cowboy attire and putting the rest of the set in his pockets. “Now that we got that out of the way, let’s get some food because I’m starving,” he exclaimed as he grabbed my hand, “there’s this cafe I know that opened up in the tower recently and I want to try out their food.” Without letting me respond, he dragged me with him to a new area. He dragged me up the floors until we hit the 100th floor, one of the many floors that were meant to house shops and entertainment. There weren’t many of them on the floor, probably because it’s pretty high up, but the cafe had a modern minimalistic design. When we entered through a pair of black and white doors, we were greeted with a bengal cat standing behind the black and white counter. Other than wearing a black and white suit, he has a blue bandana with a gold streak running across it while on his left arm was a fanged bracelet. He seemed to be a bit older compared to Null and I, but he seemed pretty gentle. “Friend,” Null happily shouted while pointing at the startled cat, “that’s the friend was talking about! Hi Tye!” The cat awkwardly waved at him as Null joyfully dragged me towards the counter, luckily there weren’t any customers for me to worry about. “Hey Null,” Tye replied, quickly calming down as we approached him, “I didn’t expect to see you here today, but how’s the spear I gave you?” “It’s good,” Null answered with a smile, “it was pretty lighter than the last one I used and it’s long enough for me. I even stabbed my great friend over there with such ease.” I held my head down as he said that. “His name is Jack by the way, he bought me food last week and we became Besties after that.” When the two looked straight at me, I let out a nervous smile when I saw Null’s sparkling eyes as I walked towards them. “You already told me about him though Null,” the bengal cat responded as he patted the happy puppy, “but it’s nice to meet you in person Jack, the name’s Tye Graves, a retired explorer, now barista. Null’s first friend you could say.” “Jack Heart, the prince of demons,” I replied back with my intro, getting no reaction from the cat but a smile towards a new friend. I smiled back as Null and I ordered our drinks and food, with me unsurprisingly paying for all of it. The cat got to work, taking out some premade dough and tossing it in an oven. “So, how did you two meet,” I asked as I watched the cat moving around behind the counter. “Nothing really outstanding really,” the cat replied as he blended some ingredients together in a blender, “I just found him wandering aimlessly around the tower, trying to get anyone’s attention. No one really helped him from what I saw, so I just made my way to him and acted as a guide for them.” I looked over at Null, who was enthralled at the bread rising and falling in the oven as it emitted a sweet scent. “I’m happy he has a friend at least,” Tye chimed as my focus went back to him, “I was pretty worried that Null wouldn’t get any, considering that a lot of people thought he was some random beggar that wandered in the Tower.” “So how much have you found out about him?” “Nothing too interesting, he prefers to fight with a spear, he has his own room key, watches too many shows in his room, and his Eyes are unique.” I furrowed my brow as I heard that last part as I egged him to explain more about it. “Well Eyes are categorized by their colors usually, with some rarer than others. Silver-colored Eyes are considered the rarest, usually because those types have powers that’s insanely powerful. Null’s Eyes are a new variant that hasn’t been discovered, so a name hasn’t been given yet.” I recalled Null’s demonstration earlier and how mine wasn’t given a name either, then got incredibly jealous of him. “So you’re telling me Null got lucky with his Eyes, got it,” I responded as I glared at the oblivious, happy puppy, “I don’t have mines yet, so do you have any advice on how to activate it?” “Sadly all I can say is that it’s up to you to figure that out. Everyone awakens theirs differently, whether it’s stress related or just reaching a specific age.” Got it, got to put myself into a stressful situation. “Please don’t put yourself in danger,” Tye noted as he read my thoughts, “the last thing I want to hear is Null crying over losing a friend.” I thought about the depressing aura Null had earlier during the day and let out a sigh. “I’ll try not to,” I quietly replied as I looked over at the puppy, “as much as I find him a bit annoying, I think I'd get irritated if I heard he was upset.” I felt a part of me flare up in embarrassment as I admitted, “don’t tell him I said this, but he’s the first friend I made here, but he’s also my first rival too.” The cat let out a soft chuckle while the heat rushed to my face before he served me my cold drink. “Your secret is safe with me,” he answered, “and, if you want, I could give you some pointers. I’ve seen my fair share of techniques that I could probably teach you.” I nodded my head as I saw an abrupt notification about his contact info being added to my list of contacts. Immediately, he sent me a document that gave a basic background at what the Eyes generally do based on its color. I looked at the cat’s face, noticing his bracelet shimmering as he stared at me with his green eyes and a smile. “Hey Tye,” I asked him, opening the document while staring at his eyes, “what’s your Eyes?” Green Eyes, they give the people the ability to defend others or are attuned to the element of earth. He didn’t seem to be a mage, so I assume he’s some sort of defender role or something. “Mines the Survivor’s Eyes,” he answered, “it’s nothing really special, I just perceive traps and stuff more easily. If I’m in any danger, I’ll find a way to slip out of it, even if I get put behind bars or something.” I was going to ask what he meant by that, but we were disrupted by Null coming at us. “Tye, the food is burning” he exclaimed, we looked over to where the stove was to see some smoke emitting out of it. We, mostly Tye, took care of the problem as quickly as we could while ensuring the food wasn’t as charred. Instead of baking another, Tye gave me and Null our charred and very cooked sandwich. “Hey Tye,” the pup let out as he taps the food brick on the counter, “how do we eat this? It’s like a rock.” I didn’t care about eating anymore, I wanted a refund instead. “Use your Eyes Null,” he answered while cleaning the stove, “you can tell Jack to launch a spell at you. Be creative, your Eyes let you do a lot of things after all.” I didn’t understand what he meant, but that got Null riled up immediately. He turned immediately and looked at me with his cute, puppy dog eyes. “You heard him, launch a spell,” he requested, “I know what to do now. Put your sandwich next to mine and I’ll fix it for you too.” He distanced themselves from me, ready to catch whatever spell I was forced to cast. I just casted a basic spell, but Null grabbed, changed its properties while transforming it into a marble. He simply placed the marble on the sandwich, activating it, putting the two in some sort of bubble before I witnessed time going backwards in it, the burnt parts fading away as it turned into a toasty delight. After it was done, he gave me my sandwich and ate his as he stared at me with his glowing, silver eyes. I felt a bit of my blood boil, but I calmed myself down before I began eating my sandwich with the pup. It was pretty relaxing being with Null and Tye, a moment I wouldn’t mind being in forever.