Author's Note:
Honestly, I wanted to write a new chapter for Bahamut Effect: The Voidwalker Fleet and Kaleidoscope Adventure (DC): A Mistress of Finality, but inspiration works in strange ways.
XXX
Story Arc: Out-of-Town Visitors
Episode 1: A Ruined Evening (II)
Chapter 2: Welt's Shop of Madwomen
Plot: Welt Blight, having finished his shift as the Black Warlock, returns to work at his shop, the Owl House. Here, he deals with his colorful employees and some loyal customers. Somehow, there are more madmen around Welt than around the Black Warlock.
XXX
POV Narrator
Nightfall is a provincial city of 90,000 inhabitants, nestled on the jagged coast of Massachusetts, a couple of hours north of Salem.
The urban fabric unravels into eight distinct districts. The oldest is Greyport: a maze of salt-peeled docks, piers reserved for luxury yachts, and massive warehouses for fish storage, where the air constantly smells of iodine and diesel fuel. The beating heart of the district is an old wooden pier, whose planks creak under the weight of a converted amusement park perched over the sea, dominated by the retro profile of a large Ferris wheel. From that position, one's gaze inevitably drifts out to open water, where a rocky island lashed by the waves hosts the solitary silhouette of the Old Lighthouse.
Conversely, the Midtown district is the modern engine and economic heart of the city, a beehive of commuters and students who trample its sidewalks every day. Three landmarks stand out in this area:
- Nightfall High School: one of the city's three high schools, a solid structure considered the most accessible and common option for the average resident.
- Pavilion: the first true local shopping mall, a massive indoor complex spread over multiple floors, saturated by the neon lights of shops, restaurants, and a multiplex cinema.
- The Owl House: a singular shop built from scratch by Welt Blight five months ago, just thirty days after his arrival in town.
The backbone of Midtown's activities is Main Street. A short distance from the high school, the street widens into a small town square, adjacent to a bus shelter. Exactly on the opposite side of the road stands the Owl House.
The city bus pulls up with a hiss of hydraulic brakes. Welt Blight steps off the vehicle, leaving behind the semi-crowded interior and the buzz of the passengers. For the entire duration of the commute from his residence, he remained isolated from the world: a pair of wireless headphones firmly on his ears, connected to his personal phone hidden in the inside pocket of his crossbody bag. Welt detests wasting time. For him, boredom must be fought with productivity, and those minutes of travel were invested in listening carefully to an audiobook.
Stepping onto the asphalt, Welt crosses Main Street with a confident stride, stopping right in front of his creation.
Only five months earlier, that lot hosted a bankrupt video rental store, a pile of old plaster that Welt bought, tore down, and rebuilt from scratch. Now, he allows himself exactly one minute to observe his "castle": a modern three-story building that catches the eye. The walls are painted a deep, intense purple, an elegant shade that evokes mystery and pop culture. The window frames, made of black wood and dark metal, cut through the facade with sharp, clean lines, allowing the structure to stand out in the Main Street scenery without clashing with the typical Massachusetts architecture.
Above the entrance, the large retro LED-backlit sign stands out. In place of the word "Owl," there is the stylized profile of an owl with geometric eyes, ready to glow with a warm light as soon as the sun goes down; next to it, the light-emitting diodes spell out the word "House."
At street level, the large tempered glass windows offer a magnetic glimpse of the flagship products: millimeter-precise action figures, the week's fresh-off-the-press comic books, and a sign illustrating the Nerd Bar menus, strategically placed to catch the eye of anyone waiting for the bus across the street. Welt reaches out a hand toward the solid glass and metal door, where the opening hours and colorful stickers of the main collectible card games are prominently displayed.
'My father was right about one thing: being your own boss and running your own business is the best way to make money. Even if you end up with gray hair long before your employees,' Welt thought.
A bittersweet smile tugged at his lips. For an instant, the weight of nostalgia gripped his chest: he wished with all his heart that his parents were there, in that world, to see what he had been able to build from nothing.
Then, with a sharp movement, he shook his head. He banished the ghosts of his old life in Europe, refusing to drown in the memories of a now-distant past. It was time to focus on the present.
He extended his arm and grabbed the dark metal handle, cold beneath his fingertips. On the polished surface of the glass, right above his hand, the sharp characters of the hours sign stood out: Open Monday through Saturday, 7:00 AM to 9:00 PM. Welt applied a slight push, clicking the lock, and pushed the door open to enter his kingdom.
XXX
Pushing open the glass door, Welt Blight was greeted by an immediate shiver of cold. On that scorching summer day, the Owl House's air conditioning system was running at full blast, welcoming customers into a refreshing oasis. Welt left the sweltering heat of Main Street behind, breathing in the scent of printed paper, coffee, and fresh plastic.
The Owl House was not a simple shop: it was a temple of pop culture, a commercial ecosystem engineered to capture every nuance of the nerd world, strategically leveraging its proximity to Nightfall High School to maximize profits.
Ground Floor: The Pop Temple and the Nerd Bar
The street level was an explosion of colors and backlit shelving, divided into strategic zones to capitalize on the continuous flow of students and passersby.
- The Publishing and Merchandising Area: Walls saturated with comic books, manga, light novels, and literary classics. Alongside the paper volumes, revolving displays hosted CDs, DVDs, and audiobooks. The central tables overflowed with gadgets: thermal mugs, keychains, enamel pins, graphic t-shirts, and hoodies, topped by glass cases containing action figures and collectible statues of the most iconic anime characters of the moment.
- The School and Stationery Zone: Designed for students from the nearby school, it offered sturdy backpacks, notebooks, pencil cases, pencils, and all the necessary educational supplies for classes, placed right next to rulebooks, dice, and accessories to start Dungeons & Dragons campaigns.
- The Print Center: A high-utility logistical corner specializing in quick photocopies, printing university theses, or last-minute school projects, complete with faux-leather binding machinery.
- The Nerd Bar: A small refreshment counter positioned to intercept anyone with a hint of hunger or thirst. The menu ranged from bottles of water and fruit juices to artisanal milkshakes, espresso coffee, and aromatic teas. For food, a display case offered a rich assortment of sandwiches, breakfast pastries, and shelves overflowing with savory snacks.
First Floor: The Gaming Arena and Digital Gaming
Heading upstairs, the environment transformed into a paradise for competitive players and groups of friends, blending tabletop collecting with technology.
- The Boardgames and TCG Area: Towering shelves dedicated to board games and the most famous Trading Card Games, such as Magic: The Gathering, Pokémon, Digimon, and Yu-Gi-Oh!. The area was dotted with ready-to-use tables; every Saturday, the space filled up for casual tournaments, where dirt-cheap registration fees guaranteed booster packs and themed prizes for the winners.
- The Retro-Gaming and Console Zone: A modern area equipped with desks and gaming stations hosting consoles from every generation, from vintage arcade cabinets to the latest generation platforms. Gamers could pay an hourly rate to tap into the shop's immense catalog, receiving a USB flash drive with their saved game data at the end of the session.
- The Private VIP Room: A soundproof, premium room available only by reservation for private sessions. A group of local streamers and YouTubers rented it regularly to record their role-playing campaigns and broadcast live. This guaranteed constant web publicity for the Owl House, as the creators showcased the dice sets and accessories purchased in the shop during their videos, while consistently consuming drinks and snacks from the room's private minibar.
Second Floor: The Atelier of Creativity and Hobbies
The top floor was the realm of DIY and scenic transformation, the go-to reference point for the local community of artists.
- The Cosplay Department: A space entirely dedicated to costume creation, stocked with rolls of all kinds of fabrics, professional scissors, needles, threads, styleable synthetic wigs, and high-quality pre-made costumes.
- Technical Publishing: Displays loaded with specialized magazines, sewing patterns, and illustrated manuals to perfect sewing techniques, cinematic makeup, and scenic modeling.
The Owl House thus established itself as the beating heart of Nightfall's subculture, a magnetic gathering place capable of welcoming and monetizing the passions of hundreds of enthusiasts every single day.
'Many would say that a place like this isn't a wise business move. In fact, that it's a pure gamble. But this is the project of my dreams. I wanted a sanctuary like this in my hometown,' Welt reflected.
The thought briefly brought him back to the dreariness of his birthplace in Europe: a sterile place where there wasn't even a McDonald's or a shop remotely aligned with his passions. There, the urban landscape was reduced to dozens of identical pharmacies, dusty shops, an endless number of pretzel kiosks, and department stores whose only offerings were heavy wooden furniture. A cultural desert.
'If nothing else, for financial security, I have locked down my future,' he thought, with a surge of pragmatic lucidity. Thanks to some shrewd stock market shares and royalties from an IT project patent, Welt had secured a solid Plan B. Even if the Owl House went under, his pockets would not suffer.
But fortune favors the bold. Nightfall was a provincial city lacking real competition in the industry, and no one offered the encyclopedic quality of his creation; loyal customers were increasing every day. Furthermore, Welt Blight—or rather, the Black Warlock—possessed an invisible and formidable resource: the Golden Rule (Rank-E) skill. A seal of good fortune imprinted into the very fabric of his existence. Luck, quite simply, was part of his DNA.
With a fluid movement of his fingers, Welt pulled off his wireless headphones, clicking them into their hard case before sliding it into the inside pocket of his crossbody bag. He turned left, walking with a light step across the shop's polished floor, straight toward the main counter.
Behind the command post stood Nia Honjo, the general manager of the establishment, the organizational mind who kept the perfect gears of the Owl House turning when he was away.
Nia was, without understatement, one of the most magnetic women in all of Nightfall. Of Japanese origin, she had moved to the city around the same time as Welt. She had features of an aristocratic fineness, framed by a short ash-gray haircut that made her two clear, watchful turquoise eyes stand out. Her complexion was fair and velvety like milk. Slender at her 168 centimeters in height, Nia flaunted model-like proportions (B76/W59/H80). On her ID card, her registered age was twenty-five, but her smooth skin and lively gaze gave her the air of a nineteen-year-old.
She wore a pair of dark red square-framed glasses that gave her a stern look, which was contradicted, however, by her relaxed posture. The upper part of her body was wrapped in the official Owl House uniform: a two-tone t-shirt, indigo purple on the chest and white on the stomach, cut exactly in half. Around her neck hung a white lanyard to which her ID badge was attached, also used as a keycard for the electronic locks on the upper floors. Beneath the counter, the uniform gave way to comfortable pants and sneakers.
"Welt-chan, it's good to see you. What have you been up to today?" Nia asked. Her voice flowed in perfect, casual Japanese, devoid of the rigid formality usually reserved for an employer.
A carousel of wild images flashed through Welt's mind.
'Last night, I hunted down a kidnapper in the dead of night. This morning, I snuck into the house of a psychopathic ice cream man, cracked his delusional plans, and tracked down his lair. I raided an abandoned ice cream factory, found the hostages, tripped the traps, and woke up aboard a pink airship. There, I had to sit through a supervillain monologue before breaking free, sabotaging the engines, and crashing the colossus. I managed a crash landing, defused a pastry-cream-and-freezer-based weapon of mass destruction, and captured the lunatic as he tried to escape. Then, I chatted with the sexiest detective in the department, coordinated the rescue efforts, and, yeah, I even found time to scrounge some free ice cream.'
The real answer was an action-movie odyssey. But Welt simply crossed his arms, offering an enigmatic smile.
"The usual things that happen every week. I just stopped by to see how business is going," he replied in the same language, offering a half-truth that, to Nia's ears, sounded like nothing more than a report of a boring morning running errands.
"Same old routine here too," she replied, leaning her elbows on the dark wood counter without losing sight of the ebb and flow of customers at the entrance. "A steady stream of sales. However, we recorded an absurd and inexplicable spike in milkshakes and iced coffee."
Welt stroked his chin, evaluating the situation with a clinical eye. "Maybe for the summer period, I should invest in a larger industrial refrigerator. Perhaps we could set up an outdoor stand with artisanal ice cream machines to catch passersby."
Nia looked out past the large glass windows, watching the asphalt of Main Street shimmering from the heat as if it were a desert expanse in Mexico. She visibly shuddered, shrugging her shoulders.
"You're the boss, Welt-chan, go right ahead. But forget about sending me out there to melt under the summer sun. I belong to books and air conditioning."
Welt shook his head, amused by her firmness. "Nia, you are an authentic and hopeless Otaku."
"I lived just a stone's throw from the Akihabara district in Tokyo for years," she countered, straightening her back and raising her chin with a smile steeped in almost regal pride.
Moved by a hint of genuine male curiosity, Welt took a step forward, a light blush flushing his cheekbones. "But... speaking of Akihabara... is it true there are as many Maid Cafés as the media says?"
Nia immediately caught the boy's embarrassment. Her turquoise eyes flashed with mischief. She leaned over the counter, grabbing the hem of her purple t-shirt with her fingers to pull it slightly taut, accentuating the contours of her chest.
"If you double my salary, on Saturdays I might even consider wearing a lace maid outfit instead of this uniform," she murmured in a deliberately flirtatious tone, her eyes locked onto his.
Welt opened his mouth to reply, but his tongue tied. He closed it, then opened it again like a fish out of water, completely thrown off by the girl's sudden shift in rhythm. Nia had to bite the inside of her cheek to hold back a laugh at such a genuine reaction.
Patching his employer's dignity back together, Welt cleared his throat and took a step back, turning on his heels. "I'm going to check what the others are up to on the upper floors. You keep it up... and as for the raise, we'll talk about it again at the end of summer." He marched with long strides toward the bar area, trying to maintain his composure.
"Whatever you say, Welt-chan," Nia called out after him, her voice ringing clear and bright down the aisle. "But keep one fundamental rule in mind: in stories, the first girl introduced is always the one who wins in the end!"
Welt didn't turn around, but his answer echoed back firm and a bit piqued: "We aren't inside a manga, Nia."
"Oh, come on! I feel like I'm living in Crystal Cove dealing with a hero straight out of a D&D campaign," she exclaimed in Japanese, giggling to herself as she went back to arranging the badges on the counter. "Reality isn't all that different from an anime!"
XXX
In a way, it had been Nia herself who convinced Welt to build the Owl House.
Five months earlier, Nia Honjo and Welt Blight had crossed paths for the first time right at that bus station located on the opposite side of the street. Both had just arrived in Nightfall, two strangers lost in a strange land.
Nia had started venting, complaining out loud about the all-too-intrusive presence of Yankees. Welt, who was standing just a few steps away from her on the platform, couldn't help but crack a joke and add fuel to the fire, contributing his own personal opinion about trigger-happy cowboys. That bizarre spark of understanding had prompted them to share a solid fifteen minutes of mutual complaints about the paradoxes of the United States of America.
Welt, polyglot that he was, had chosen to address Nia directly in her native tongue. Hearing her native language spoken with such fluency by a stranger had instantly captured the girl's attention and curiosity.
From that moment on, the two immigrants had begun talking about everything, inevitably landing on their favorite topic: the total lack of gathering places or noteworthy shops for people with their same nerd interests. They told each other that someone really ought to roll up their sleeves and build a proper place for the local community.
At that exact instant, an imaginary lightbulb had gone off over Welt's head. The boy had begun working feverishly on the project, sketching out drafts and financial calculations. In the following days, he met with Nia several times; the two continued to exchange ideas, and as soon as the foundations of the Owl House were laid, Welt offered her the position of manager.
The Japanese girl had accepted on the spot, eager to quit her job at the local supermarket, an employment she detested with all her heart. The move had turned out to be a total success for business, especially since Nia boasted a tight network of old friends in Akihabara: strategic commercial connections who had no trouble exporting and shipping top-quality merchandise directly to that small provincial town in Massachusetts.
XXX
Welt turned to the right, moving toward the Nerd Bar. The refreshment counter was manned by his two part-time employees, Sadie and Lars, who at that moment were busy serving a very regular customer.
Sadie was a sixteen-year-old girl with a sturdy build and an dependable air. Standing just 150 centimeters tall, she had a fair complexion, deep black eyes, and a cascade of thick, curly blonde hair that rippled down to her shoulders.
At her side, Lars towered at 180 centimeters tall. He was a seventeen-year-old boy with a slender, lean frame, sporting a flashy, reddish-brown Mohawk with the sides of his head completely shaved.
Both wore the official Owl House t-shirt and were talking to a rather short preteen. The young boy had a mop of curly black hair and wore a bright pink shirt decorated with a large yellow star on the chest.
"Hey Steven, how's summer treating you so far?" Welt asked, approaching the trio with a nod of greeting.
"Hello, Mr. Blight! I'm having a blast, especially since you opened your shop. You have tons of fun things here. My aunt Amethyst goes literally crazy for these Japanese snacks!" Steven replied. The boy enthusiastically raised his hand, showing off a package of treats shaped like cat heads.
"That book you ordered arrived yesterday. Go ahead and head over to Nia at the main counter to pick it up," said Welt, who always kept his most loyal customers' requests in mind.
Steven's eyes lit up. "Great news! My friend Connie loves that series, and I promised her I'd read it so we can chat about the story together afterward."
Lars leaned forward, resting his elbows on the counter. "Steven has a little girlfriend..." he murmured in a low voice, accompanying his words with a mocking smirk.
'I already know who's going to be standing out there dying of heat selling ice cream,' Welt thought, having perfectly intercepted Lars's sarcastic comment.
"You're a kind boy, Steven," Welt continued, ignoring the clerk and straightening his posture. "Go get your book from Nia. Afterward, you should take a trip to North Point Plaza. I heard the Black Warlock faced off against an ice-cream-themed supervillain right there, and now the entire parking lot is buried under mountains of ice cream."
Steven's eyes widened, nearly letting his treats slip from his hand. "Are you serious?! I gotta move fast!" the boy exclaimed. He turned on his heels and bolted forward, running first toward the register for the book and then straight toward the exit, his mind already projected toward those mountains of ice cream.
Left alone with his part-time employees, Welt crossed his arms and focused on them.
"Good morning, Mr. Blight!" Sadie exclaimed, straightening her shoulders with a tone full of respect and positivity.
"Hey, boss," Lars muttered instead. The boy flashed a patently forced smile and pushed himself away from the counter, trying to adopt a professional demeanor.
"Hey guys. I heard you have a lot of work on your hands today," Welt said, intending to test the waters.
Sadie nodded energetically, pointing to the insulated containers. "With this sudden heatwave and the neighborhood supermarket having a major power outage last night, people all over the area started desperately looking for something cold to drink."
"Other people's misfortune is someone else's luck," Lars commented, shrugging his shoulders with total indifference to the competing market's problems.
Welt shifted his gaze past the teenagers' shoulders, examining the smoothie and draft beverage machines. The tanks were ninety percent empty—a clear sign that the two had been pouring liters of liquid without a pause.
"You did an excellent job today, Sadie. Expect a little extra on your next paycheck," Welt said. He was the kind of employer who didn't hesitate to reward dedication and merit.
Lars furrowed his brow, turning sour. "What about me? Don't I get anything?" he asked, a hint of resentment in his voice.
"You get an order," Welt shot back, narrowing his eyes. "A chocolate milkshake, a vanilla milkshake, a toastie, a chicken sandwich, a protein bar, and that kind of star-shaped Japanese snack. That is my order."
Lars opened his mouth to protest but closed it immediately. He sighed loudly, turning on his heels to get to work. As lazy as he was, he certainly couldn't refuse to serve the man who signed his paychecks.
While Lars's back was turned, Welt leaned slightly toward the girl. "Sadie, did Lars actually give you a hand today?" he asked in a low voice. He knew the boy well: he was the classic employee who did the bare minimum, always ready to take advantage of kind people's willingness.
"Yes, Lars helped me..." Sadie replied. However, as she uttered those words, the left corner of her lips dipped downward, betraying her lie.
"Got it. Keep up the good work," Welt said with a nod, pretending to believe her version. In his mind, though, the math was already done: at the end of the month, Lars would find a measly symbolic one-dollar bonus on his paycheck, while Sadie would receive a flat one hundred dollars as a reward.
A few minutes later, Lars returned to the counter, placing two sturdy paper bags containing the packaged food and the takeout cups with the cold drinks on the surface. "Here is your order."
Welt reached into his pocket to pull out his wallet.
'I always find it bizarre having to pay in my own shop. Technically, this money will return to my pockets in the end. Wait, no, it doesn't work that way. Only a tiny fraction will turn into clean profit. The rest will go toward taxes, employee wages, and supplier payments,' he calculated mentally as he slid out the bills and grabbed the bag handles.
"I'm going upstairs to see what Mordecai and Rigby are up to," Welt announced, lifting the bags. "When those two have the same shift on the same floor, they tend to slack off a bit too much."
With such a colorful and unpredictable team of employees, his work was never truly done.
XXX
Going up the stairs, Welt Blight arrived at the first floor, the area entirely dedicated to the sale of trading card games, board games, casual tournaments, and rental consoles. For kids who didn't have wealthy parents or high-end computers and consoles, this setup was a godsend; it was far cheaper to pay an hourly rate to reserve a gaming station and a game.
Of course, with calculator in hand, after about 1,500 total rental hours, a kid would have accumulated enough money to buy a console of their own and maybe even a game, but a child or teenager couldn't afford such an investment without a part-time job and endless hardships.
As soon as he stepped onto the floor, Welt noticed a thick crowd of middle schoolers, high schoolers, university students, and even a few adults. They were all huddled around two young men: Mordecai, a tall, slender guy with blue hair, and Rigby, a short, small young man with brown hair. The two were sharing the same controller, moving their fingers at a frantic speed. To their left, an adult man with a thick, unkempt beard stared at them with a visibly stressed expression, livid with rage.
"It's almost done! Mordecai and Rigby are about to break the world record at this game, sending the current champion straight into oblivion!" shouted a teenager who was livestreaming the event on his phone.
'If Mordecai and Rigby win, they'll get a pat on the back and a small bonus on their paycheck. But if they lose, I'm going to give them a severe scolding and send them to scrub the bathrooms top to bottom,' Welt thought, certain that stepping in and breaking their concentration right now would be a terrible disaster.
Temporarily ignoring the crowd, Welt headed toward the VIP Room, the soundproof space frequently used by the InnTaleNF channel to broadcast their magnificent role-playing campaigns to the platform's numerous subscribers.
He walked inside and retrieved two objects used as props for the livestreams: a heavy ornamental battleaxe that belonged to the campaign's barbarian, and a golden chalice that served as the Holy Grail.
'Punishment and reward,' Welt thought. He gripped the golden cup in his left hand, tucked the battleaxe under his left armpit, and held the two paper food bags in his right hand.
Exiting the VIP Room, Welt scanned the room with his gaze and noticed a figure sitting at an isolated table in the opposite corner. She was the most loyal and constant customer in the history of the Owl House: Natsumi Kyouno.
Natsumi was a twelve-year-old girl with an extremely fragile and unkempt appearance. She was just 144 centimeters tall, and her measurements spoke clearly: B69/W55/H70. Her physical frame was slight, tiny to the eye, almost sickly or malnourished. Her eyes were two emerald greens, but the gaze dwelling within them was dark, dull, and veined with a deep melancholy. Her skin appeared pale, lacking vitality and poorly cared for.
On her feet, she wore a pair of old, worn-out sandals that looked on the verge of breaking at any moment; she wore black pants faded by time and marked by conspicuous tears. The only thing that seemed brand new was an oversized blue hoodie decorated with a print of Yu-Gi-Oh's Dark Magician, paired with a red-and-green Robin-themed backpack.
'If I had a daughter or a younger sister, Natsumi would be the classic best friend who stays glued to her side every second and never goes back to her own home,' Welt thought. With a fluid movement, he sat down at the table across from her, placing the Holy Grail and the battleaxe on the wooden surface.
The young girl sharply lowered the comic book she was reading: The Adventures of Batman and Robin. Despite the grim nature of Gotham City, the publishers' artists had decided to draw inspiration from sightings of real urban heroes to create a comic series that fictionalized their deeds, making them suitable for the general public. According to the plot of that volume, Robin was a street kid saved by Batman who, after a series of adventures, had become his right-hand man.
Natsumi looked up with a start, her posture rigid and tense, but as soon as she recognized Welt's features, her muscles visibly relaxed.
"Good morning, Mr. Welt," Natsumi said with a tiny, timid voice, immediately lowering her eyes to avoid direct eye contact.
"Hey, Natsumi. I see you're here as always," Welt replied, his tone serious and protective.
The young girl never missed a beat. From Monday to Friday, right after school, she stayed inside the Owl House until late in the evening. On Saturdays, she was the very first customer to step through the door and the last to leave. Now that summer had arrived, Natsumi spent fourteen out of twenty-four hours, six days a week, inside the establishment. Despite the strict regulations regarding the presence of unaccompanied minors, Welt let her roam the shop like a stray cat looking for a safe haven.
"Your shop is my favorite place in all of Nightfall," Natsumi murmured, her cheeks flushing with a light blush.
"A customer forgot to pick up their order at the bar. Do you want it?" Welt asked, spinning a blatant lie so as not to embarrass her. With a calm gesture, he pushed the bag containing the vanilla milkshake and the chicken sandwich toward her.
"Thank you, Mr. Welt," the girl replied. She grabbed the bag with her slender fingers and began to devour the food with such eagerness that one would think she hadn't touched food the entire day.
"Eat slowly," Welt advised, watching her with a gentle gaze.
It was by no means the first time he had provided food to Natsumi in such a discreet manner. In fact, even the oversized hoodie and the themed backpack that the green-haired girl sported with so much pride were not of her own making; Welt had passed them off as defective merchandise, unsellable by the shop's standards, and had gifted them to her under a pretext so as not to wound her dignity.
'I know full well that in matters like this you have to proceed slowly, but I really wish Natsumi would open up more to me. I'm not a detective by trade, and I don't want to hurl hasty accusations at a single mother who maybe just has to do backflips to get by. Are they simply a poor family, or is Natsumi systematically ignored at home and left to herself?' Welt thought, feeling a pang in his heart.
He continued to stare at her while she consumed the meal rapidly, moving her cheeks just like a timid little squirrel trying to secure her provisions. The desire to do something concrete, to step in and tear her away from that loneliness, pressed hard against his chest.
'I want to help her with all my heart, but I can't afford any missteps. If I act on impulse, I only risk making a already precarious situation worse, or even worse, scaring Natsumi. If she loses trust in me, she will run away from this shop. She would end up spending her days on the streets of Nightfall, or worse yet, in dark places where children should never set foot,' he reflected, forcing himself to remain entirely calm. The Owl House had to remain her safe harbor, no matter the cost.
"I'm going to handle a boss-related situation now," Welt said, rising from his chair. He grabbed the Holy Grail with his free hand and rested the heavy battleaxe on his left shoulder, moving toward the console screen.
Mordecai and Rigby's match had reached the end credits.
"The two guys from the Owl House won!" the streaming teenager exploded, shouting into his phone camera as the crowd erupted into a roaring ovation.
'My employees will get the good side of me,' Welt thought, elbowing his way through the mass of kids.
Rigby spun around, catching sight of the owner. "Mordecai! Welt is here!" he exclaimed in a shrill voice, panicking.
"We can explain, Welt!" Mordecai added, raising his hands and getting ready to rattle off one of his usual absurd excuses.
"You two shut up, enjoy the moment, and lift the championship cup," Welt cut them short with a firm, authoritative voice. With a sharp movement, he handed the heavy golden Holy Grail to the two gamer employees.
Mordecai and Rigby exchanged a quick, bewildered glance, then grabbed the golden chalice and lifted it together toward the ceiling, screaming with joy.
"No way... you guys must have cheated!" the bearded man growled, proving to be a terrible loser in front of the audience. His fists clenched, the muscles in his arms tightening beneath his shirt; he was clearly ready to spark a fight on livestream to redeem his bruised pride.
Welt took a step forward, placing himself between the man and his boys. "I'm holding a battleaxe in my hands. Do you really want to pick a fight inside my shop?" Welt asked. His tone was low, cold, icy. He gripped the weapon with both hands, aiming the metallic blade directly at his opponent.
Rigby leaned to the side, whispering to Mordecai, "You know, maybe we should hang out with the boss outside of work too... he'd be super useful for getting us out of most of the messes we usually get into."
Welt turned his head slightly, glaring at his shorter employee with a deadly look. "If you suggest an idea like that ever again, Rigby, I swear I will cut you in half right after I deal with this bum."
The bearded man took a step forward, puffing out his chest. "I'm not afraid of you, kid!" he exclaimed, convinced that his size could intimidate the young owner. With a theatrical gesture, he ripped off his dreary coat, letting it drop to the floor and revealing a massive build, bulging with gym muscles.
"Let me guess: you spent all your savings on booze, steroids, and video games," Welt commented, scanning him from head to toe with utter contempt. "You lost fair and square in front of the whole world. Leave now, with the very little dignity you have left."
The opponent's reply was a lightning-fast right hook, thrown directly at Welt's face.
Welt didn't back down a single millimeter. With feline reflexes, he twisted his wrists and raised the axe crosswise, intercepting the trajectory. The man's gnarled fist crashed with all its impact force directly against the rock-hard reinforced wooden handle of the weapon.
CRACK!
The dull sound of fracturing bone rang out clearly in the room.
"My hand! Damn it, my hand!" the bearded man screamed, taking two steps back while clutching his right wrist, his face distorted in agony.
"Leave before I completely lose my patience. I wouldn't want you to walk out of here in an ambulance or, worse, a hearse," Welt said, his eyes beginning to glow with a dangerous light. He was sick and tired of this charade.
The bearded man, blinded by pain and the humiliation in front of the still-active cameras, gathered saliva in his mouth and spat angrily toward Welt's face. "Go back to the country you came from, asshole!"
Welt dodged the spit-projectile with a minimal, imperceptible twitch of his neck. His gaze shifted, emptying of any trace of humanity; the Black Warlock's lethal aura pressed to surface from beneath.
"This will be the last game you ever play using your hands, rest assured," Welt whispered, ready to settle the score his own way.
XXX
Five minutes later.
"Don't you ever show your face here again, or I'll use the sharp end of the axe!" Welt shouted.
With one last controlled exertion of his arms, he hurled the bearded man past the shop's threshold, sending him tumbling badly onto Main Street's scorching sidewalk. The instigator was reduced to a human wreck: both of his hands were fractured and stiff, two prominent, purplish bruises sealed his black eyes, and a great many teeth were missing from his half-open mouth, lost during the incredibly swift and brutal physical correction he had suffered inside.
Mordecai and Rigby, along with the crowd of customers and some employees who had rushed over from the counters, stood packed behind the entrance glass, mouths agape, after witnessing the entire spectacle from start to finish.
"Maybe we shouldn't make Welt angry anymore. Apparently, he knows how to handle himself..." Mordecai said, swallowing hard. In his eyes now was a deep respect for his boss, mixed with a healthy dose of pure terror.
"Or, we could buy him a warhammer, give him the nickname Thor, and enter him into an underground fighting match to wager all our savings on him," Rigby commented. The boy flaunted an excited smirk, his mind already projected toward completely different get-rich-quick schemes.
XXX
Half an hour later, inside the Owl House, calm had been restored once again. However, the echo of the racket had not yet died down: the general attention remained equally divided between the two new world-record holders and the commentary regarding the New Thor.
Suddenly, a small luxury yellow car slammed on its brakes right in front of the entrance door. The maneuver was so reckless that the nose of the vehicle ended up completely blocking the threshold of the doorway.
Leaping out of the cabin was a twenty-four-year-old girl, a staggering 180 centimeters tall, blessed with an athletic, statuesque, and incredibly sexy physique sculpted by years of competitive sports (B94/W68/H98). She had healthy, amber-toned skin from a tan, warm aqua-blue eyes, and a mane of blonde hair tied into a flashy pair of twin pigtails; a thick, soft, and perfectly rounded bang fell across her forehead.
She wore a short, straight, light-blue dress held up by razor-thin straps, paired with a pair of electric-blue basketball shoes. In her hands, she clutched a massive plastic bucket overflowing with ice cream, with a mason's trowel plunged directly into the cream.
She was Lola. The daughter of the current mayor of Nightfall and the heiress to a billion-dollar fortune, Lola certainly didn't shine in terms of intellect or sanity, but she was the undisputed star of the city's women's basketball team, a multi-award-winning golf champion, and a black belt in three different martial arts.
Lola was, for all intents and purposes, an international-level celebrity. At just eighteen years old, without anyone yet understanding how, she had managed to enter the Olympics representing the United States, bringing home the gold medal in four different gymnastics specialties and one in golf. During the Winter Games of that same year, she had swept the competition by winning the gold in women's singles figure skating; despite her crystalline talent, no male athlete had ever been able to withstand her bizarre temperament in pairs competitions.
At twenty-two, she had walked out of the house simply to buy some milk, only to end up joining a traveling circus for three months. After a series of even more absurd misadventures, she had entered the Olympics once more, capturing another gold in golf, one in archery, one in Taekwondo, and one in Judo. In the subsequent Winter Games, she replenished her medal count with gold in Freestyle Skiing and Alpine Skiing.
The media and her opponents had accused her on multiple occasions of doping, corruption, and financial cheating. Unfortunately for her detractors, every single medical test and federal investigation had confirmed that her victories were honest and that her body was one hundred percent human, devoid of mutant genes or artificial enhancements. However, the analyses had revealed that she suffered from ADHD, displayed some brain damage dating back to childhood, a couple of minor behavioral disorders, and that, in all likelihood, as a child she had been exposed to radiation. This dramatic discovery had prompted her father to investigate thoroughly, uncovering that tons of eighty-year-old toxic waste lay beneath the city playground—an epiphany that had convinced him to enter politics and become mayor to clean up the city.
Despite her sporting triumphs and the infamy on the tabloids for her follies, Lola was the second most loyal customer of the Owl House. She didn't spend fourteen straight hours in the shop like Natsumi, but she visited the establishment every single day to make wild purchases.
'The number-two stalker is back,' Nia thought behind the counter, knitting her brow into a scowl. She knew exactly what was about to happen shortly: an avalanche of racket and pure comic madness.
"Teddy Bear! I saw the video on the internet of you fighting that buff bum!" Lola exclaimed out loud, with a vocal timbre so powerful it made everyone present in the shop turn around.
Having spotted Welt, who to her was a mix between a friend and a living obsession, the blonde bolted forward at supersonic speed, starting to inspect him from head to toe in search of wounds or scratches.
'Irritating, no doubt about it. But if you get used to it, it even becomes comical to watch them,' Nia thought, enjoying the spectacle of her boss dealing with the mayor's wild and talented daughter.
"Lola, don't worry, I'm perfectly fine," Welt said. The boy paused his arranging of the volumes on the shelves and offered her a calm smile, treating her with the patience reserved for an old friend.
In response, the mayor's daughter wrapped her arms around Welt's neck, squeezing him in a strenuous and titanic embrace. If Welt hadn't possessed the durability guaranteed by his magical nature, the pressure from those champion's muscles would have surely fractured a few of his ribs.
'Why do I get the distinct impression that I'm decisively safer in the shoes of the Black Warlock than when I am simply Welt Blight?' Welt thought, certain that no other superhero on earth had to deal with a problem like this.
"Teddy Bear, I'm so happy you're okay! I was so worried. As soon as I saw the video, I rushed straight here. I didn't pay attention to red lights, the sirens of the police cars chasing me, the robot dog that was crossing the road, and those flying rabbits!" Lola exclaimed, rattling off with total casualness a series of traffic violations and oddities that she would have done better to keep to herself.
'The robot dog is four-month-old news, but this flying rabbits thing is new to me. Just how much toxic waste did the previous three mayors hide in this city exactly?' Welt thought, genuinely surprised that there wasn't a minority of citizens with phosphorescent green skin in Nightfall yet.
'That's what happens when a family dynasty rules a city for three consecutive generations: they only make terrible decisions. Especially if they are historical immigrants from Gotham City. When the citizens had to choose between Mark McLean IV and Lola's father—who looks exactly like his daughter in every way—they preferred to vote for Lola's dad and his bizarre environmental policies,' Welt reflected. The boy didn't care in the slightest about the infractions committed by the blonde; after all, Lola was a problem that belonged to the mayor and the traffic police, not to him.
On a minor note, Mark McLean IV's cousin, Chris McLean, had fully inherited the terrible family habit: he had crammed a ridiculous amount of toxic waste barrels onto a single island in Canada without even attempting to bury them, populating the territory with mutant animals before filming a Reality Show there. It was a wonder he hadn't ended up in handcuffs sooner.
Lola, finally, loosened her iron grip, releasing Welt.
"I admit I've been worried about your safety lately. A cute young man living all alone in that old witch house, and in a neighborhood full of such suspicious people..." Lola said. Her voice, for once, sounded sincere and deeply apprehensive.
'I should call her a hypocrite, but if I think about my own neighborhood...' Welt reflected, mentally reviewing his bizarre neighbors. 'In my neighborhood, there's a man constantly dressed as a Wild West bandit; an old lady who swears she fought alongside Captain America against the Nazis; a decidedly dysfunctional gay couple where the problematic guy drives a carnival float; a whiz kid whose mother is a weightlifting champion and whose father is an astronaut; then the family of the great child psychologist, whose three children are desperately hiding the fact that their dog talks from everyone—which is useless anyway, since said dog runs a blog on the internet; and finally, the Pie family...'
The human landscape around his residence was a gallery of freaks that made Lola look almost ordinary.
"Honestly, I was thinking about buying you a car, getting myself a cute chauffeur uniform, and driving you around personally," Lola continued, gesturing animatedly. "The bus is full of weird people. As soon as I get on, everyone suddenly gets off at the next stop!"
The blonde didn't realize in the slightest that her auction-fast chatter and eccentric personality were capable of snapping most people's nerves within five minutes.
"That won't be necessary, I can manage perfectly fine on my own," Welt cut her short. He had no intention of accepting a car; among other things, he didn't even have a driver's license.
"Now I know! Before, I thought I had to protect you and keep you safe, but I think I should teach you a thing or two about self-defense," Lola said, sporting a smile that promised nothing good. "I saw that you have great reflexes and steady nerves, but there's so much to improve. Don't worry, we won't overdo it—I don't want my teddy bear becoming a bull or a muscle-bound brute!"
'A classic courtship move. You can't get your target into bed, so you settle for putting your hands on him under the pretext of martial arts lessons,' Nia thought from behind the counter, having learned everything there was to know about behavioral clichés from the 2D world.
Welt evaluated the offer, weighing the pros and cons. "I have a rather busy schedule, but maybe we could organize a brief lesson on Sundays?" Learning a move or two from a triple black belt and multi-time Olympic medalist, after all, couldn't hurt.
"Excellent! I absolutely must break the news to my parents!" Lola exclaimed. The girl reacted with such enthusiasm that it made that simple agreement seem like an official marriage proposal or, at the very least, a decisive first step in the right direction.
"Lola, calm down. Rather, can you tell me where you got this huge bucket full of ice cream?" Welt asked, pointing to the container. He had a vague idea of the answer, but with Lola, surprises were a daily occurrence.
"I checked my new smartphone for the latest news from Charlotte Gagnepetit," Lola explained, lifting the bucket with a single hand as if it weighed nothing. "Our Furry Wizard of Oz faced off against a fake Santa Claus dressed in pink, burying the entire parking lot under mountains of ice cream! Me and hundreds of other people couldn't resist the chance to make ice cream angels, custard snowmen, or simply take home twenty kilos of free stuff!"
"I perfectly understand the dynamic. But the trowel?" Welt asked, staring at the metal mason's tool stuck in the middle.
Lola lifted the tool, rotating it before her eyes with an expression of total perplexity. "What's a trowel? Isn't this a special spoon for industrial ice cream?"
Welt sighed, deciding to focus on the shop's logistical priorities. "Why don't you go park the car properly while I go put this ice cream in the freezer?"
"You're absolutely right! Otherwise, how is the pizza guy going to bring the boxes into the shop?" Lola exclaimed, handing him the heavy bucket.
Welt blinked, confused. "What pizza guy?"
"Since you're doing well and beat up a bad guy without getting a single scratch, we have to celebrate big time!" Lola announced, already halfway to the exit. "I'll order about twenty of them. For me, for you, and for all your lackeys!" Without waiting for an answer, the blonde turned back toward her luxury vehicle.
'Who am I to refuse free pizza?' Welt thought, agreeing to go along with Lola's madness, especially when there was material gain involved.
"Pizzarriba! I want twenty giant pizzas for my teddy bear and his lackeys! By any chance, do you have a professional ice cream scoop?" Lola's ringing voice echoed powerfully all along Main Street, filtering from the cabin of her yellow car.
Nia turned to Welt, barely holding back an amused smile. "Welt-chan, you attract exclusively weird people. Are you the protagonist of this story by any chance?"
Welt preferred not to answer his manager's provocation. He gripped the handles of the bucket and headed toward the Nerd Bar to put away the accumulated ice cream.
The next few hours promised to be decisively busy, chaotic, but happy for Welt and the staff of the Owl House. And that moment of normalcy was a precious asset; because once the shop lights were turned off and the shutters came down, it would be time for the Black Warlock to go back to work.
To be continued...
XXX
Author's Note:
I decided to do something a little special, a brief Codex about interesting or rather important things in this story.
CODEX - The Owl House - Layout:
■ Ground Floor: The Commercial Heart & Refreshment:
The most dynamic area, designed for walk-in customers, commuters, and students from Nightfall High School.
- Main Entrance: Facing directly onto Main Street, opposite the bus stop and the town square.
- Pop Sales Zone: Shelves and display islands with comic books, manga, light novels, gadgets (mugs, pins, t-shirts), and action figures.
- School & Stationery Corner: Backpacks, notebooks, pencil cases, and pencils strategically positioned near the entrance.
- The Copy Center: Counter equipped for quick photocopies, thesis printings, school projects, and artisanal leather binding.
- The Nerd Bar: Counter with a coffee shop, tea, milkshakes, snacks, pastries, and a wide assortment of sandwiches, completed by small tables for quick consumption.
■ First Floor: Community Hub & Gaming:
The city's nerd social gathering center, engineered to monetize customers' free time.
- Tournament Area: Large modular tables for free D&D sessions and board games. On Saturdays, it hosts casual trading card game tournaments (Magic, Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh, Digimon) with cheap entry fees and booster pack prizes.
- Tech & Retro-Gaming Area: PC stations and consoles from every generation. Customers pay an hourly rate to play and save their progress on a custom shop USB flash drive.
- The VIP Room: Private and soundproofed room, bookable for reserved sessions. It is currently rented on a permanent basis by a group of local YouTubers for their D&D livestreams (which guarantee free publicity for the establishment).
■ Second Floor: Creative Space & Cosplay:
An entire floor dedicated to manual skills, hobbies, and art.
- Cosplay Area: Displays of fabrics, wigs, pre-made costumes, needles, threads, professional scissors, and modeling foams.
- Specialized Publishing: Modeling manuals, cosplay guides, art magazines, and non-fiction books for hobbyists.
■ Basement: Logistics & Operations Center:
A restricted-access zone, rigidly divided between daily management and Welt's secret life.
- Workers' Zone (Common Area): Locker room for Owl House employees, personal lockers, a small private bathroom, and a break area with a microwave for lunch hours.
- Storage Zone (Warehouse): Metal shelving loaded with stock for the bar (syrups, snacks), pallets of paper for the copy center, boxes of comic books, and the central servers for the high-speed internet network supplying the first-floor PCs.
- Welt's Private Office: A room secured by a solid armored door. It contains his desk, business computers for accounting, monitors for the shop's security camera circuit, and the safe.
- The Vault (Secret Chamber): A hidden section of the office, accessible only via a secret passage behind a bookshelf. This is an official panic room, complete with a bed, a TV, a computer, provisions, and the real safe. Additionally, there is a second secret passage leading directly into the city's sewage system.