Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 71. One Particular Day.

“I’ve made considerable progress,” Laien mused happily after opening his eyes. “It looks like I’m quite suited to this Profound Mystery of the Mist. I feel like its compatibility to me is around the same as of the Aspect of Tranquility. However, I don’t need to worry about keeping it in balance with the Aspect of Wrath and my insights into it are still fairly rudimentary, so it should be quite some time before the rate at which I gain new insights slows down. If for the next two weeks or so, apart from training the Profound Mystery of Inferno with Yin, I put all my attention to the Profound Mystery of the Mist… then I should be able to increase my overall strength by around half a rank,” he thought contentedly, feeling very pleased with himself.

Half a rank increase in strength, and not half a rank of the mortal realm, but of the Realm of Heroes! Laien could only grin as he thought about it. In the end, pure cultivation of Qi or spiritual energy was only the means of achieving the goal. What truly represented the power of a practitioner were his insights and his skill in applying them in battle! When he thought back to how everyone, including him, had been judging young practitioners by their level of cultivation back in the Sarkcente Kingdom, he felt like laughing helplessly. Even if one’s talent for cultivation was mediocre, as long as his comprehensive abilities were high enough, he would be able to more than make up for the weakness of his body or spirit.

Still… when one’s talent was simply too low, then it wouldn’t matter what kind of insights he gained, he would still be a weakling for his entire life. Without a deep enough cultivation the practitioner would simply die of old age before making any high achievements through the insights he was gaining. It was a bit regrettable, but if one didn’t have at least an average talent, then he had no future as a practitioner no matter how much effort he put into cultivating.

“You done for now?” Yin also opened his eyes. Since he was only meditating and didn’t enter a state of enlightenment, nor was he making any important breakthroughs, he could stop at any moment. Additionally, he could guess why Laien stopped meditating right now, when it was early afternoon.

“Yeah.” Laien nodded slightly. “We do the Soul Realm training, eat dinner and spar afterward. Does that sound okay?” he asked just to make sure, but even without doing so he had a pretty clear feeling that Yin’s idea for their today was pretty much the same as his.

“It does,” Yin confirmed casually. With the spiritual bond connecting their souls, they didn’t feel the need to exchange more words before releasing their aura along with the essence of the Aspect of Awareness and sinking into a deep meditative trance. Just like yesterday, they would spend three hours training in their Combined Soul Realm as long as nothing unexpected happened.

Time flew by quickly. By the time the afternoon was close to being over, the three hundred villagers who had previously looked like a bunch of dirty beggars had been transformed into what seemed like a group of brand new people. Their plain and often straight-up ragged clothes were swapped for the high-quality traveling suits that servants in Makarash would always wear. The disheveled and uncared for hair of the women and girls had been cut and arranged into fitting hairstyles while the growing-out beards of the men and older boys had all been shaved clean. Everyone had eaten two or three servings of a delicious dinner with a lot of meat in it, filling their tummies to brim.

Of course, after the meal, Sirius and Kasha remembered to take care of those who still needed medical attention and they were met with a lot of gratitude for their efforts.

From the time the three hundred villagers had left Ulme Village, only a little over twelve hours or so had passed. Their future was still mostly uncertain, but despite that, they all hadn’t felt so happy for a very long period of time; for some, it had been over a dozen of years since they last felt so light in their hearts. As a result, even the previously gloomy atmosphere in the camp had all but changed into a cheerful one. Those who weren’t tired were all gathering in smaller or larger group of friends to chat, eat snacks and drink wine provided to them by Reian and Jasmine. They weren’t worriless by any means, but they were looking optimistically at the future.

Amongst one of those chatting groups was Arslan, along with Reian, Jasmine, Sarah, Albert, Johan and a few others. The five-year-old was a bit tired after he had spent the whole day on various endeavors, but he was happy with himself as he felt that he had learned a lot of things today. Just like Jasmine told him, the people of Eulene appeared to have a very different mindset with regards to various things. They had been reluctant to talk about their concerns at first, but later on they began truthfully expressing their opinions, concerns and hopes.

What surprised Arslan the most what that all of those common people didn’t, as many nobles often thought, want to become rich and powerful. They wished not to be forced to obey laws they didn’t like, they wanted to practice whatever religion they wanted without being prosecuted for it, they wanted to have enough food to eat well and enough work to live calm, modest lives. There were other things they voiced on the individual basis too, but those four points were commonly repeated by everyone in one way or another.

“It’s been a long day for you,” Jasmine said while glancing at Arslan. “I can see you are sleepy, so why don’t you go rest? There’s no point for you to be sitting here with us if all you are going to do is to doze off,” she pointed out with a smile, seeing how Arslan was no longer paying attention to what was being said.

Arslan looked up at Jasmine, feeling a bit embarrassed that he stopped paying attention at some point. He was inclined to agree with Jasmine that he should go to sleep already… but. “No, I missed talking with Laien and Yin today. I’m going to wait until they come back from their sparring,” he said stubbornly. He had been waiting for them to come back for the past hour already, so waiting a little longer wouldn’t make much of a difference by this point.

Jasmine could only smile in face of Arslan’s stubbornness, and so could only do Reian. They had been forced to admit that those two boys were exceptional, but they still didn’t quite get why Arslan was so interested in them. It would have been understandable if he was older and the thoughts of making powerful allies for the future accompanied him, but Arslan was only five; given his character, he most definitely didn’t hold such calculative intentions. Were they perhaps overthinking it all and Arslan simply found those two likable and wanted to make friends with them? All in all, those two were probably the only kids who dared to treat him casually and without restraint. Maybe that was what he was attracted to?

As Reian and Jasmine pondered over this little mystery, Sarah made a suggestion. “How about we go to look for them? I’m sure they’ve already finished sparing. They are probably resting or taking a bath in the river, so you two could join them,” she said and gave Arslan and Johan an inquiring look. She thoughts it was a good idea, but if those two weren’t up for it then she wouldn’t force them.

“That’s a great idea!” Arslan said loudly. Why didn’t he think of it by himself? Maybe he really was a bit too tired already.

“Uh.” In contrast, Johan wasn’t really sure if he was up for it. Wouldn’t it be really awkward for him to be there? Would he even know what to talk about with those three if they were left alone? What if they ended up disliking him after he got nervous and blurted out something stupid? “I don’t know… maybe it’s better if I stay here,” he said timidly while looking down at his feet.

Whereas Sarah let out a light sigh and gave up, Jasmine pretty much habitually spoke up to scold Johan. “What are you saying, kid? Are you planning to whimper alone the whole time as we travel to the Ruishi Federation? You were able to man up when needed, so I see no reason for you to be so scaredy right now. You are going with us and that’s it,” she stated straightforwardly, not planning to allow Johan to sulk around in a miserable way. To see a kid waste himself just because he lacked confidence annoyed her to the same degree when a kid was too unruly to behave or get along with his peers.

“Wait a second,” Sarah spoke up almost immediately. “Why do you assume that’s the reason he doesn’t want to go? Maybe he’s just too tired or not in the mood for it. You shouldn’t force him,” she argued so strongly that she surprised even Jasmine, and at the same time caused Johan to grow nervous; the last thing he wanted was for someone to argue because of him!

“Ho?” After a second, Jasmine’s expression changed and in truth, it became quite scary. “Little miss, it’s good to care for your siblings, but you being so overprotective when it’s not necessary will only serve to hurt your brother in the long run. I know you got used to protecting him and everyone, but do you think there is anything you need to protect him from amongst us?” she asked bluntly.

“It has nothing to do with that.” Sarah refused to change her mind as she glared angrily at the older woman. Being protective of her little brother would be detrimental to him? Then, would forcing him to do things he didn’t want to do not be? She simply couldn’t agree with Jasmine’s reasoning.

The conflict between the two women was about to ripen and escalate, but before it could Johan interjected.

“Just stop it, okay? I will go, so stop arguing,” he pleaded apologetically. He was feeling really bad that because of him the atmosphere turned sour; rather than that, he would prefer to risk it and try hanging out with those three. If they came to dislike him, so be it. It would still be better than becoming the reason for his sister getting into a conflict with Jasmine over that whole thing.

“Johan…” Sarah groaned quietly. “Are you sure? You don’t need to go if you really don’t want to,” she said in a gentle manner, worried that Johan was forcing himself to do something he didn’t like.

“Nah, I will go,” Johan responded, his voice sounding a bit more confident than usual.

Noticing the subtle change in Johan’s attitude, Sarah could only give in and let the situation develop as Jasmine wanted.

“Okay,” Jasmine said contentedly. “Since we’ve come to an agreement, let us move before those two return and make this little discussion entirely pointless,” she said with a smile and rose to her feet. She glanced over everyone very briefly, then began walking towards the forest and upstream the river. They hadn’t heard the sounds of Laien and Yin sparring with each other, so she was quite sure the boys were a fair distance away. There was no time to waste if they wanted to let the boys play together until the nightfall, or rather until the youngest two didn’t get too sleepy.

Arslan jumped up right away and followed after Jasmine. Reian accompanied him by his side, while Sarah and Johan rose up a few heartbeats later. As for the other few people who were in this group, they had enough sense not to force themselves into a place where they didn’t belong and thus, none of them attempted to join the five in their little undertaking.

The five didn’t chat much on their way. They had exhausted the most obvious subjects throughout the day and none of them felt like picking up a new one just for it to be cut short when they found Laien and Yin. As a result, they walked in a relative silence, only sometimes exchanging a few words.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“They should have fought around here,” Sarah pointed out the obvious after their small group arrived at a somewhat destroyed part of the forest around three kilometers away from the camp. By the looks of it, since those two had chosen to spar in-between the many trees and in consequence, they’ve cut down quite a few of them. There was still leftover frost here are there and some of the trunks appeared to have been smoldered and charred, likely by Yin’s lightning. Still, it didn’t look like either of the two used any wide-range attacks else this forest wouldn’t have suffered only this much.

“To the river then, right?” Arslan said with a laugh and ran ahead. He had been patient for so long, but now that they were so close he couldn’t hold back anymore. The way he had spent this day was productive, he knew it himself, but it wasn’t the most fun or enjoyable thing in the world. At the very least, he wanted to play around a little in the later afternoon and in the evening.

“Shesh.” Jasmine shook her head resignedly. She was used to drilling and reaching youngsters, not to playing with them and acting like a nanny. Still, it wasn’t like she disliked this new temporary role of hers… but she wasn’t used to it yet. After all, she never had children of her own to raise and take care of. “Good Rala, you stupid old granny, what are you thinking about…?” she scolded herself as her thoughts strayed towards Reian and his constant advances towards her.

Technically, thanks to her deep cultivation base she could easily conceive children as her body wouldn’t begin to show signs of aging at the very least for the next three or four hundred years…

“…!” Getting agitated by her own thoughts, Jasmine made sure to look away from Reian. Given how hot her face was feeling at the moment, she was sure her cheeks were bright red. She wasn’t about to give that cheeky brat a reason to tease her! Why was someone thirty times younger than her teasing and courting her anyway?! She truly didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

“I wonder what is she thinking about,” Reian wondered quietly. He had of course noticed the unusual agitation of his teacher’s, but instead of making comments on it right now he decided to leave them for a more appropriate opportunity. In the end, all he would get to do now if he pointed out Jasmine’s weird behavior was to tease her; if he wanted something more, he needed to pick a better time and place, preferably when the two of them would be alone and in a good mood.

“Are they bathing…?” Johan wondered quietly. Out of all the options, he was most worried about getting naked in front of someone else. Sure, they were all boys… but it was too embarrassing for him to bathe with other people. Wouldn’t it be possible for him to keep his underwear on, he wondered? “Maybe I shouldn’t have agreed after all…” he thought resignedly. If needed, would he be able to bear through it without remembering those terrible things that happened to him in the village? He wasn’t sure, but he would try to avoid making trouble for his sister.

“You two should go back,” Reian pointed out as they were approaching the river. “It’s one thing for us to intrude on them, but I’m sure that two pubescent boys wouldn’t be too pleased with women peeking on them,” he said with a meaningful smile. He was pretty sure that those two would shrug it off anyway, but since he himself wouldn’t have liked to be placed in such a spot he preferred not to do it to them either out of the pure principle.

The point was one which Jasmine had somehow managed to miss, what paired up with the fact that her thoughts had been in a dismay caused her response to be somewhat delayed. “Well… you do have a point. We will wait here for you guys to finish, so take your time,” she agreed without arguing. If Laien and Yin were younger then she would have brushed Reian’s worries off, but she needed to admit that it would be rather improper of her to walk onto two naked twelve-year-olds.

“Will you be fine on your own?” Sarah asked Johan, seeing how his face was slightly pale. She really didn’t want to make her little brother go through anything remotely unpleasant anymore; he had gone through way too much already for an eight years old kid.

“Stop pampering him so much,” Jasmine rolled her eyes and said resignedly. “I understand he is shy and he likely has some terrible memories, just like all of you, but how do you expect him to ever interact with people normally if he is getting scared of this much? It’s not like we are telling him to pick up a sword and go fight in a life-or-death battle, so stop overreacting to every little thing,” she reprimanded, by this point getting considerably annoyed with Sarah’s attitude.

Sarah wanted to rebuke Jasmine, but she was stopped by Johan pulling onto the sleeve of her shirt. She looked at Johan with concern, but Johan shook his head slightly.

“I think she is right, big sister,” Johan said weakly, startling both Sarah and Jasmine. “I will be okay, so just wait here,” he added with a little more strength in his voice and even forced out a smile. What Jasmine said now and before made him think about himself and his behavior; in the end, what was scarier, being hunted down and toyed with by Zakar, suffering under the hands of those Ikarians back in the village, seeing how his sister and the others were being hurt… or trying to get along with a few boys around his age who had been nothing but nice to him so far? When he thought about it like that, the answer became painfully obvious.

While Sarah was at a loss for words, Jasmine revealed a bright smile and commented energetically. “Good, that’s the correct attitude!” she complimented, as a result turning the somewhat forced smile on Johan’s face into a genuine one.

“I hate to interrupt the moment,” Reian called out from a few dozen steps away. “But Arslan already got away. Hurry up!” he urged, but his tone remained gentle and more encouraging rather than reprimanding. He had gone through his own fair share of misfortune in his life, so as much as he agreed with Jasmine’s way of doing things, he also sympathized with Johan.

“Coming!” Johan replied loudly, perhaps to bolster up his courage. He threw all the anxious thoughts away and ran towards Reian, intent on getting through today with his head help up high no matter how the evening went.

Reian smiled and when Johan caught up to him, he tousled the boy’s hair before walking further ahead.

This action by Reian had caught Johan completely off-guard, to the degree that he forgot to move his legs for a second or two. His face flushed as his smile grew even wider; somehow, it was different to be praised by a very strong adult man. It made him very happy to see that Reian was pleased with him and it further encouraged him to act in a way that would maintain this state.

“Don’t worry so much, he will be fine,” Jasmine said in a more amicable manner compared to before. “If there is any trauma, the best time to overcome it is when you are still young. The younger the better,” she then attempted to cheer Sarah up, but achieved the opposite effect of making her mood worse. It was hard for Sarah to simply trust Jasmine’s words, after all.

Meanwhile, a few hundred meters up ahead, at the edge of the forest and by the wide, shallow riverside, Arslan was standing motionlessly, his face growing redder by the second. He had a feeling that he shouldn’t be watching, but his curiosity was stronger than his common sense and so he continued standing there without making a sound, hiding behind the line of trees.

“They are kissing… and hugging…” he swallowed, the sound resounding so loudly within his head that he was sure that those two would hear it too. Yet, nothing like that happened. On the other hand, the two would have surely been alarmed had he not held back a yelp when he saw the two touching each other down there and when he noticed how big their weenies had grown.

Despite feeling incredibly embarrassed just from watching what was going on, Arslan kept looking as if hypnotized, his curiosity taking over any remnants of the reason that remained in his mind.

It didn’t take much longer for Reian and Johan to catch up to the spot Arslan stopped at. The two of them were naturally confused to see him just stand there, but maybe because of a twist of fate or because the atmosphere around Arslan was kinda strange, neither of them called out to him. They approached closer and looked in the same direction Arslan was looking at, only for Johan’s jaw to drop and for Reian to smile with a mixture of helplessness and awkwardness right afterward.

“So those two were in this kind of a relationship.” Reian felt like laughing at himself. No wonder those two weren’t coming back for so long! He should have known, but regardless he didn’t consider it the end of the world for Arslan to have seen this scene. The only nuisance was that he would end up being the one who needed to have an awkward discussion with him later as many questions were certain to pop up after today.

“Hm?” Laien and Yin suddenly looked over in the direction of the trees, having sensed a thin presence of a powerful practitioner appear nearby. Of course, the moment they started paying proper attention to their surroundings, they saw the three guys peeking at them from behind the trees. Seeing them, Yin chuckled while Laien smirked and released some spiritual energy, producing a wall of ice between their two parties. As for as Laien and Yin were concerned, there was no reason for them to feel angry since in the end, they had been doing naughty things in the open, but there similarly was no reason for them to allow this little spectacle to continue.

When the wall of ice emerged, Reian laughed awkwardly. He should have brought Arslan and Johan away immediately, but he didn’t and they ended up getting spotted by Laien and Yin. “Ah, I guess they will come over soon, so let’s wait for them a bit further away…” he suggested, for the time being omitting the option of returning to where Jasmine and Sarah were waiting for them. First, those two kids needed to cool their heads down a little because their faces were as red as ripe tomatoes.

Still rather flabbergasted, Arslan and Johan nodded in a lightheaded manner and followed Reian. The three of them sat down a hundred meters away or so and proceeded to wait. The two boys were unsurprisingly too ashamed to bring up any questions or make any comments on their own, so with Reian not bringing the subject up on his own, it turned out that they sat there in silence.

Around two minutes later or so, the now clothed pair of twelve-year-olds walked over from the direction of the river. The cheeks of the two were a bit flushed, but overall they didn’t appear all that bothered or angered. It proved to be a pleasant surprise to Reian, but truth to be told it wasn’t all that surprising. Laien had been raised in the almost overly open-minded south, while Yin wasn’t someone to mind little things to begin with and was naturally quite open about sexual matters.

“We ended up disturbing you,” Reian spoke up with a laugh and with an apologetic smile on his face. “Sorry,” he added simply, guessing that there was no point making excuses as the situation was a pretty obvious one. He was sure that those two have already figured out how everything happened.

“It’s okay,” Laien said with a wry smile. “You came towards the end anyway, so it’s not as bad as it could be,” he mentioned playfully, causing Reian to become a little stunned.

It was one thing in Arkaria as a whole, but the traditions and social norms in Makarash were pretty conservative in comparison. It wasn’t unusual for youths to get married by the age of thirteen, but the topics related to sex wouldn’t be normally mentioned too much; everything related to the human desires was accepted as more or less of a norm, but it was kept in the private and not brought up openly. All such topics were considered to be something that shouldn’t really be talked about; Reian still remembered the incredibly awkward conversation he had had with Jasmine when he was around ten years old… but it didn’t seem like the same thing would repeat itself now.

“Anyway, you came looking for us,” Laien picked up since none of the three said anything else. Was there some specific reason for them coming over, or were they just bored?

“Yeah.” Reian scratched the back of his head with a little smirk on his face. “Those two wanted to hang around and play with you, so we came here,” he explained a bit awkwardly. Would the questions be left for later, or would they appear straight away? Without knowing what Arslan and Johan were thinking about, he didn’t really want to tell those four to ‘go ahead and play’.

“Say,” Arslan brought himself to speak up, seeing as neither of the two appeared to be angry at them. “You were doing what lovers do with each other, right? I didn’t know boys can do that with each other two! I mean, I get that they can do that with each other, but I thought it was only a bad thing in those harems… but it isn’t a bad thing, right?” he questioned, towards the end becoming slightly less excited and more uncertain.

A bit surprised to hear questions like that, Laien and Yin exchanged a glance. Should they just answer honestly? That was what they would do, but what about Reian…? Well, judging by his expressions it didn’t look like he was against this conversation continuing, so they assumed that there was no reason for them to restrain themselves either. As the milk had been spilled, there was little point to dodging the subject and pretending nothing had happened.

“Hmm,” Yin revealed a wry smile. “Calling us lovers is a bit embarrassing, but it’s not wrong I think? I’m also pretty sure we aren’t doing anything bad. There are normal relationships between men and women and there are the bad ones in harems too. It’s the same thing,” he explained briefly, using the example of harems since going by what Arslan said, his misunderstanding originated from them.

“Huuuh,” Arslan tilted his head, but soon enough nodded and smiled in understanding. What Yin said made sense, so he accepted it as a truth. “I want to hurry up and grow up so I can do naughty things too…” he mused aloud, causing Reian to become speechless, Johan to smile awkwardly and Laien and Yin to chuckle.

Dear Rala, what was Mustafa going to say when he learned about today from Arslan? And it was only the beginning of their journey to the Guode Yimarate… It scared Reian to think about what was going to happen next, considering how ridiculous the first two days had proved to be.