It was cold, maybe I would have shivered if I wasn't wearing a coat because of the approaching winter, but I refused the cold and took a deep breath.
It felt good to catch my breath after the intense training, to feel refreshed by the cold breeze.
Except for one thing...
'Adrian... You idiot! I'm telling you, you need to practice more and more!'
I was getting sick of hearing this voice echoing in my head over and over again.
"Will you please be quiet Lithoa? I just went out for a breath, I'll be back."
Lithoa sighed with a huff inside my head.
'Heh! So what if you have beco civilized? You've just gotten lazy... I was a broken-ass old man when I beca immo-'
"Please just stop talking... I'll train harder than usual when I go back, okay?"
He was talking so much, nagging so much that even I was getting annoyed.
Lithoa fell silent after what I said. And I finally breathed a sigh of relief and kept walking.
My goal was to walk so more and really get back to the training. That's what I was thinking as I walked through the other students, but then, a voice I didn't expect to hear called out from behind .
"Uh? Adrian!"
I turned toward the voice and found soone standing in front of with a small luggage in his hand.
"Julian? Didn't you go back to your family?"
Almost all the students were going back to their families for the Academy's vacation. It was a good thing for them to take a little break after what had happened, to de-stress from their exams.
For those like who had no family... We were still here because we had nowhere to go.
"No, I'm going back now."
He lifted the luggage he was holding in his hand and showed it to . Then he turned back to .
"What were you doing outside? It's freezing..."
"I just wanted to catch my breath after training."
"Ah... I see."
After those words, there was silence.
Normally we always had Aiden with us and he was the one who communicated with us, but now, he wasn't here. So there was a distance between us.
"If you're just out, why don't we walk to the gate together?"
Julian smiled slightly and waited for an answer from . I looked at him blankly.
Even if it was Julian, it felt strange that soone other than Aiden was talking to directly.
Honestly... Have I ever considered Julian a friend?
"Sure, okay."
We started walking toward the south gate, at least side by side, if not talking like that.
The silence was still lingering between us, I didn't know what to do...
"Have you seen Aiden since the preliminary?"
"Last ti he said he had sothing important to do and left the hospital. I think it's been more than a day..."
Julian's eyebrows shot up, then he lifted his arm, opened his watch, and logged into his ssaging app.
"He still hasn't seen our ssages. Do you rember what that 'important' job was?"
"No, I didn't ask, but when I offered to help, he said he had to do it alone or sothing."
He looked thoughtful for a mont after what I said.
"Hmm... I see, then he'll be back soon."
It was like he didn't want to interfere in his business. I couldn't tell if he respected him or if he had so other reason, but I didn't press him too much, so we both stopped talking about Aiden.
As we kept walking, the crowd around us grew, and after a while, we ca to a very close-knit crowd of students returning ho with their families.
The south gate was just ahead of us, and this is where we parted ways.
"Anyway, I'll be back in a few days for the awards ceremony. Aiden should be done by then... See you!"
Julian put a smile on his face and walked back, waving at .
I raised my hand, waved back, and smiled, but when I did Julian's expression beca so strange that I couldn't help but wonder if I had done sothing wrong.
"I didn't think much of it when Aiden said it, but you really should smile more often Adrian, you're wasting your potential."
"What? What potential?"
Julian smiled again before turning away.
"Never mind, just smile more often. Bye!"
"Bye...?"
I didn't understand what he ant, but in the end, all I did was sigh because I thought it was a good thing for .
'Go back and start training again.'
And that's when I really lost my temper...
"Seriously... Why are you so insistent? I don't mind training or getting stronger, but you're too obsessed with it. It's not the end of the world, is it?"
A little annoyed, I turned around and started to walk toward the training rooms, but then paused, realizing that Lithoa still hadn't responded.
"Hey...? The end of the world isn't going to happen, right?"
My eyebrows furrowed even more when Lithoa still didn't answer . I couldn't understand why he was silent, but out of the corner of my eye, a whitish silhouette caught my attention.
Soone was standing only about two ters in front of , staring at . She had long, white hair that stood out easily and her coal-black eyes were fixed on . Her face had an air of calmness mixed with aninglessness.
"He-"
"Don't worry, I won't tell anyone you're schizophrenic."
I frowned and looked at her, so she reacted the sa way and started to stare at .
She actually looked like she wanted to leave, but she was waiting for what I was going to say after I frowned.
She would have laughed at if I told her I had an old man in my head... right?
But since when do I care what people think about ?
I took a deep breath and looked at her face, I was about to say sothing but then I suddenly rembered who this girl was.
This girl was with us in the preliminary, fighting the creatures. I was too focused on the battle at the ti to pay much attention to the other people fighting with , but this girl with her iconic white hair was definitely that archer.
That last arrow she shot in the battle had seed quite powerful, but I had never heard her na or her appearance in any rumors. How high was she ranked?
With these thoughts in mind, my eyes drifted to her collar. Then I saw the number one hundred and forty-two there and couldn't help being surprised.
Had she disguised herself?
"If you have nothing to say and you're going to keep staring blankly, I'll leave."
"Uh..."
Right... I forgot the topic.
"You can think of talking to myself any way you want, I don't care, but I'm not schizophrenic."
She eyed suspiciously for a brief mont, then sighed.
"Fine."
After that, she walked past without saying anything else and didn't turn around once until she disappeared into the crowd.
Alice Liate huh...
I kept watching her until she was completely out of sight.
She didn't actually give a very good impression. She was gruff, mysterious in her own way, and uncomfortably frank, but strangely intriguing.
'Go to fucking practice now! Are you going to start chasing girls now?!'
"No, of course not, stop talking nons-"
I paused, sothing had just occurred to .
It was a few weeks ago, the day Aiden and I had spoken. That day he had given advice I didn't think I would forget for the rest of my life, he had made feel for the first ti that he was 'really' my friend, and he had also talked about sothing else: love.
Falling in love... What was it like?
'Idiot...'
Lithoa's echoing voice brought out of my thoughts and back into the world.
'Okay... I'm going.'
I didn't want to get on Lithoa's bad side anymore, so I took slow steps toward the training room, but the thoughts I had just had were still in my mind.
*******
"You can think of talking to myself any way you want, I don't care, but I'm not schizophrenic."
"You can think of talking to myself in any way you want, I don't really care, but I'm not schizophrenic."
I thought about how he had just spoken looking up into the air and I watched him suspiciously to see how his body would react.
Despite what he had just said, he continued to stand there. He wasn't shaking or sweating. It didn't look like he was lying.
"Fine."
I was in a hurry already, and I had no reason to bother with him. So I quickly walked past him and went straight into the crowd.
I finally exited the academy a mont after I had checked out through the south gate, and now all I had to do was wait.
I stood where I was for about five minutes, and then I saw a woman with short black hair and brown eyes, dressed in rather ordinary, everyday clothes, approaching .
"Ah, there you are, Alice!"
The woman ca up to with a big smile on her face, looking at with joy clearly visible in her eyes.
I looked around, ignoring her behavior. The car she was driving every ti was not in my line of sight.
"Where is the car?"
"It's just over there, let's go."
Despite my attitude toward her, she kept a smile on her face and turned back the way she had co.
I sighed, followed her and after only a minute of walking we ca to a white car that looked quite normal and cheap.
"Get in, we need to move fast."
"Okay."
I got in the back seat while she got into the driver's seat.
When I finally pulled the doors open, the whole atmosphere changed. It suddenly beca heavy. The smile on the woman's face disappeared.
"Sir Laute would like to see you in person."
The car started moving and I just stared out the window, not wanting to look at my watch because doing so in the car made nauseous.
"Understood."
I continued to watch the scenery change out the window as we quickly turned onto the main road. It was going to be a quiet, ignored journey as usual.
In fact, I was relieved to finally be in a quiet place, where I could relax and not deal with silly, useless things.
Yet this only lasted until I realized sothing.
My eyes widened as my vision began to blur slightly, as the world began to shake as if it were shifting.
The blurring of my vision suddenly intensified. The world that had started to spin slowly suddenly seed to turn upside down.
As my head began to ache with sharp pain, I felt the icy cold spreading throughout my body. I began to shiver uncontrollably, the level of cold increasing with each passing second.
"H- he-"
I tried to speak but I swallowed the words, my voice stuck in my throat.
"Ah? Again?"
The woman looked at in the interior rearview mirror, yet her expression didn't change one bit. She slowly pulled the car over as if she didn't care about in the slightest. She took her ti when I was shivering non-stop from the trendous cold, writhing in pain.
After pulling the car to the side of the road, she took out a dinsional button from her pocket and took out an orange pill, almost the size of a child's candy. Then she turned around and looked pitifully at , leaning against the seat, breathing heavily.
"Do you want it, Alice? No, Alysia?"
She gently offered the pill, but she was still far away from , I couldn't take it without reaching for her.
"Co on, show how much willpower you have."
She continued to hold the pill in her hand and didn't take her cold eyes off for a second.
I was in pain. The cold was penetrating my whole body, freezing . As if that wasn't enough, my blurred vision and dizziness made it hard to keep the pill in its proper place, but I still tried to reach for it when I could.
At first, I tried to lift my hand, but I couldn't. Then I pushed myself harder and reached for the pill, but this ti my arm was too short to reach it.
The cold and the pain that ca with it continued to intensify. Finally, it reached such a point that my arm weakened on its own and fell to the ground.
I gritted my teeth and put everything I had back where the pill had been.
"h, you're so boring. I expected you to at least scream."
The woman rolled her eyes and dropped the pill in the palm of my unsteady hand.
Despite the pain and my shaking, I pulled my hand away so fast that I almost dropped the pill. Nevertheless, I successfully popped it into my mouth and swallowed it, and then the cold inside began to slowly retreat.
First I felt a comforting warmth, then the pain slowly subsided and my blurred vision began to return. The car was already in motion, and the woman didn't mind one bit.
"Sir Laute will give you a few more pills, but take them more regularly."
"O- okay..."
I gritted my teeth again without saying anything else. As the warm feeling that balanced the cold inside continued to slowly spread through my body, I was at least at peace, but I was also sick of it.
Why did I have such a disease? Why did I keep having seizures?
I knew the answer to both of these questions, I knew, but I was getting fed up.
It was all the fault of two people, two people who had brought into the world in this state. It was because of them that I had this disease that would never kill , thanks to my body, but would always make suffer.
I paused when I realized that my emotions were starting to surface, took a deep breath, then closed my eyes and cald myself.
It's stupid to think emotionally, and foolish to be angry about things that have already happened.
I need to co to my senses.
I opened my eyes again and looked out the window for a while. I wanted to clear my head, to watch the world outside so I could think better.
It didn't last long though, and as I slowly closed my eyes again, little bits of curiosity began to creep in.
What kind of thing will I do this ti, what kind of mission will he give this ti...?
*(A/N: Two chapters today :) )*
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