Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 93. Confession.

“I’m sorry,” Luca said with his head hung down. “I didn’t want to cause everyone trouble. I should have known better… sorry…” he apologized in a shaky voice, wishing that it all could already be over so he could start training and make up for this huge fiasco.

“Enough,” Jasmine spoke up resolutely. “It’s not just your fault, but also of everyone around you. Even this old granny didn’t think to ask you more questions before getting ahead of herself, so what’s up with this mood as if someone just died? You said you are still Patrick’s disciple, right? So, is the situation solved or are there any problems that need to be solved?” she inquired after attempting to lighten up the annoyingly serious and bitter mood, in doing what she appeared to have been fairly successful if the less tense looks on everyone’s faces were of any indication.

“Y-yes,” Luca said hurriedly. However, a second later he realized he wasn’t quite making sense considering that Jasmine asked him two question, not one. Thus, he added quickly. “I’m still teacher’s disciple. We didn’t argue or anything and there isn’t any conflict or demands to take care of.”

“Good,” Jasmine nodded, a slight smile appearing on her lips. “Normally, I would have loved to give you a lecture, but then I would need to tell the same things to myself,” she mentioned and smiled at Luca, then chuckled quietly when the boy’s expression finally lightened up. “I suggest we all keep today’s events in mind, but let us not ponder them more than necessary,” she said and looked at everyone’s faces, gauging whether they were inclined to agree with her or not.

While the majority of those present were still a bit confounded, the thirteen years old friend of Luca’s laughed a little. “Luca’s always been too emotional and stubborn, but the same can be said about the rest of us, no? It sure came to bite us back in the ass,” he said lightheartedly and glanced at Luca with a warm smile.

“That’s right,” Lea agreed energetically. “It wasn’t just Luca’s fault, we all screwed up in some ways,” she empathized, unwilling to see her little brother bear the consequences alone.

“You guys… sheesh,” Julien shook his head. “Aye, I get it. No one will be punished this time around, else like you are saying, I would need to punish myself too,” he said with a little sigh. It looked like everyone was on Luca’s side this time around and just like they were saying, he wasn’t blameless either. Although as a General, and especially in front of his officers, he shouldn’t let such matters go unpunished, he decided that just once it would be fine to make an exception.

However, contrary to the overall mood that became relaxed, Luca couldn’t help but clench his fists in frustration. “Stop it already! It’s not ‘everyone’s fault’, it’s my fault!” he raised his voice in helpless anger but didn’t quite go as far as to shout; he still had that much self-restraint left. “I’m really thankful you are all being understanding, but it’s only making it worse! I feel bad for being an idiot and causing all this unnecessary trouble and I do apologize for it very much, but I don’t need to be patted on the head. I’m no longer a child, I need to take the responsibility for what I did,” he said with a strong conviction, having just made a choice to face the issue head-on instead of averting his gaze and making excuses the whole time.

Perhaps as it should be expected, Luca’s words amazed the whole two dozen plus people present, causing a newfound respect to appear in the eyes of the officers and youths alike. Yet, there was one person who reacted somewhat differently; the pride in Julien’s gaze quickly changed into amusement as he smirked wryly. “You want to take the responsibility, huh? I guess I can take it that it means you want to be punished?” he asked teasingly, unable to prevent the smirk on his face from growing bigger and bigger.

“N-no, uh… that’s…” Almost instantly, the conviction displayed by Luca a moment ago shattered into pieces. He indeed wanted to take responsibility, but being punished by General Julien was a little… he wanted to spend his time training, not doing the miserable and pointless tasks Julien liked to assign as punishments! “Please spare me,” he pleaded helplessly as his shoulders sunk downward. He hadn’t ever been punished by Julien and he certainly didn’t want to experience the painful meaninglessness of doing something utterly worthless like ‘separating the grains by shape and color’ for seven days straight, only for the contents of the meticulously prepared tens of huge buckets to be thrown back onto the pile of grain and into the interspatial rings.

Julien chortled at Luca’s reaction as did many of the adults and youths in their group. “Just focus on training diligently and grow to be a powerful warrior of our country. If you do so, I doubt anyone will have any complaints,” Julien said with a smile. It wasn’t like anyone here

“I will,” Luca responded simply, feeling both motivated to fix his mistakes and relieved to not face a punishment. “I guess that for now, I will focus on training and doing my job as a guide,” he mentioned with a slight smile and glanced at Laien. The explanation and apology were done with, but this situation still felt a bit awkward to him; he wanted to move on already and leave it all behind.

Laien chuckled a little. He could recognize the look in Luca’s eyes and to be honest, he was in agreement with him. “If we are done, how about we get going? The sooner we get to the capital and drop off our five thousand people, the better,” he mentioned lightheartedly.

“Capital…” Julien murmured but then shook his head, opting not to bring the matter up. “Yeah, it’s time for us to get going,” he supported straightforwardly.

“Us?” Laien asked curiously. He didn’t hear anything about Julien tagging along with them before, but having a General accompany them would surely make everything easier.

Julien smiled and nodded in confirmation. “You guys helped one of my men when he needed it, so we need to return the favor,” he said with a laugh. He hadn’t been planning to go out of his way to accompany this bunch as he would certainly get complaints from those greasy Grand Elders if he neglected his duty to guard the border for such a reason, but he decided it would be worth it. They had not only all proved to be people he could respect, but they also were personas worth befriending with future in mind; especially those three boys, Laien, Yin and Arslan. With the above in mind, he could bear with the nagging and complaining of those old demented freaks.

Laien raised an eyebrow at Julien’s words and looked at Luca, who appeared to be just as troubled as he was amused. Technically speaking, the three of them hadn’t helped Luca all that much, but it looked like Julien wasn’t an ungrateful person who would bring it up just to not owe them that much of a favor. Still, this honest attitude of Julien’s was inevitably causing Luca to feel ashamed; no matter how one looked at it, it was him who was getting the short end of the stick in this whole situation.

“Okay, thanks,” Laien responded casually and after Julien nodded slightly, he was about to start heading back to the caravan, alas.

“Wait a second!” Lea spoke up, then blushed slightly when everyone turned to look at her; she really did raise her voice a little bit too much. However, she shrugged the awkward feeling off and looked Laien in the eye. “First, let me fight you. Wasn’t the deal that all seven of us can challenge you?” she brought up out of the blue, thus throwing Laien and the rest of those present off by a fair bit.

“Uh, sure,” Laien agreed easily despite feeling confused by this sudden request. Lea was just a martial masters of the first rank, so unless she was an absolute freak, he felt confident in making do with her in a few exchanges. “Maybe I should go easy on her in more spar-like fashion? Luca was going all-out, but maybe she simply intends to make it an experience while hoping to gain some insights,” he mused,

“So you accept then, yes?” Lea inquired just to make sure, for some reason being fairly persistent in getting a clear confirmation from Laien.

“Yeah,” Laien answered after a brief pause. In a normal situation, he probably wouldn’t have thought about it, but considering the kind of wordplay he had gone through with Patrick, he couldn’t help but smirk a little as he wondered if that thing was Lea’s aim. If so, then she really was quite a little fiend.

“Good,” Lea said with a smile. “I concede,” she added with a merry laugh, causing everyone but Laien to become dumbfounded.

“Why would you…” Julien began asking with a frown on his face, but when he recalled the conditions under which those seven were allowed to fight against Laien, he understood Lea’s intentions; and when he did, he let out a sigh and laughed resignedly. “This girl, did you think I wouldn’t let you accompany us if you asked? Why go through this trouble?” he asked a bit helplessly.

“That’s simple,” Lea replied with a playful smile. “This way I don’t owe you a favor, General. Isn’t it best to take the most optimal course of actions possible?” she asked and laughed once again. Her conviction not to repeat the same mistakes of not paying attention to her surroundings and decisions wasn’t an empty one, so she quickly made use of her brain and came up with this little roundabout method to tag along with Luca. It’s been quite some time since she had an opportunity to spend leisure time with her little brother, so she intended to make use of the opportunity.

However… there was also one more thing to her decision. As this thought passed through her mind, her cheeks flushed ever so slightly and her gaze was involuntarily drawn to Laien and Yin. Those two were younger than her by a few fair years, but in the long term what was the mere few years to practitioners with lifespans counted in centuries? She definitely wanted to use this opportunity to get closer to those two boys… and while Yin was dazzlingly beautiful, she needed to admit that Laien was more in her type, and it would be the more so in a few more years when he would grow out of his still slightly child-like looks and become a full-fledged young man.

“Urgh, women,” Julien shook his head. She didn’t want to owe him a favor? He was forced to admit Lea went about it the smart way, but it didn’t mean that he liked it at all.

“Let me fight you too,” the thirteen years old friend of Luca’s requested with a chuckle. “And since I didn’t formally introduce myself before, I’m Daniel,” he mentioned casually, not bothering to hide his intentions. He could see Julien rolling his eyes out the corner of his eye, but he didn’t mind and in fact, he was quite amused by it.

“Okay,” Laien responded with a half-amused half-helpless laugh. “Do you concede too?” he asked wryly.

“Yes,” Daniel confirmed. “I’m looking forward to traveling with you guys,” he added happily, content with this outcome. Since he and Luca were usually spending most of their time training together, it wasn’t like he missed talking with him like Lea did. However, he had never left the Fortress-City of Lugna in his life. He wanted to see some of the Federation and have fun with Luca and the others in the meantime; working was fine and all, but sometimes he just wanted to relax a little.

“Anyone else?” Laien asked and looked at the remaining four friends of Luca and Lea’s. Did they also want to tag along in this silly way? If so, then he would rather have it done all at once than to go through the same exchange four more times; after the third time, it wouldn’t be funny anymore, but purely annoying.

“Not really.”

“Nah.”

The four either answered negatively or shook their heads in response. They were all friends, but they didn’t feel the need to do everything together. Since the four of them weren’t especially enthusiastic about tagging along, they wouldn’t force themselves either. It would be enough if Luca, Lea and Daniel had their fun; they were fine with staying in Lugna and spending their days like usual.

“Mhm.” Laien waited a few more seconds and looked at everyone to see if anything else would be brought up. When he saw that no one was saying anything, he began walking and led the way back to the caravan.

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After a little over twenty minutes of walking, their group arrived at the destination without any complications. The only event worth mentioning was Julien shuffling his men to pick those who would come with him. By the looks of it, he intended to take none of the city’s officers and instead, sent for his thirty-five Cherubim to be called for. This choice of Julien’s proved to be of some surprise to Laien and the others since the strength of this unit was a force to be reckoned with; they couldn’t help but wonder if really was fine for so many experts to leave the border at once.

After all, including Julien himself, Cherubim consisted of twelve martial masters of the fifth rank, fourteen martial masters of the fourth rank and ten martial masters of the third rank. The unit was a highly mobile death squad that would be terrifying to face in the mountains of the Ruishi Federation; it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that they alone would be capable of stopping an army of one hundred thousand with the terrain advantage the Eagle Pass provided to them.

Yet, according to Julien, their absence wouldn’t be that much of a problem specifically because those people were his, and only his subordinates. This kind of an answer was fairly vague, but since Julien refused to give a detailed explanation, they had no other choice but to be satisfied with what they got.

“You’re back,” Albert greeted with Johan and Sarah by his side. “How did it go?” he inquired curiously but even without asking, he could tell everything had gone well just from the expression of Laien’s. It was contrary to what he had expected when he started talking with those two for the first time, but it unexpectedly was Laien who was easier to figure out. In contrast, Yin, who appeared to be extremely easygoing and lighthearted, was much harder to see through.

“It went really well,” Laien said with a laugh and exchanged a glance with Johan. He would tell him what happened like promised, but he would heed Patrick’s advice and not mention the tomes he and Yin had gotten their hands on. Perhaps it would be best not to mention them to Arslan either… but that was something the two of them would need to talk out before coming to any conclusion.

“We are ready to leave at any moment,” Sarah informed calmly. Unlike Albert or Johan, she felt there was a distance between her and Laien and Yin, so she couldn’t bring herself to speak quite as casually with them as she might have wanted. Their conflict had already been settled some days ago, but the sour aftertaste remained.

“Wait a few more minutes,” Julien joined the conversation. “After my men arrive with the horses, we can go,” he added for the sake of explanation.

Sarah and the rest of those who heard Julien were a bit startled to learn they would be escorted by the General himself, but they didn’t delve into the matter. In the end, it wasn’t up to them to question Julien’s decisions; it was easy to forget because of the casual attitude of those three little masters and their guards who were with them since the beginning, but nobles and powerful practitioners weren’t people to be offended, be it accidentally or not.

“Do we go back into the carriage?” Arslan asked and laughed a little, and so did Laien and Yin, thus making quite a few of those listening wonder what was so funny about this question. As for what the reason for the three of them laughing was… well, it was simple. They enjoyed their time in that carriage a lot, what was likely quite surprising considering it was a mere carriage that would drive most young nobles mad due to boredom. They just found this unlikely fondles of carriages of theirs to be weirdly funny, nothing more, nothing less.

“Do you three guides want to tag along?” Laien asked since he was in a good mood. The carriage they were traveling in was very spacious to begin with. It wouldn’t be a problem to have ten more people join, much less three. As those guys would be serving as their guides, he thought it wouldn’t be a bad idea to see if they would get along well in the long run or not. If they did then great and if not, there would be no harm done.

“Yeah, thanks,” Luca replied with a smile and secretly sighed with relief. The thought of sharing the carriage with some people he didn’t know at all, or even worse with those men of Julien’s was making him feel anxious. He was glad he would be spared the unpleasant experience.

“Happily,” Lea said brightly. She wouldn’t have accepted any other option than to travel with those guys; that was half of the point of her coming with this caravan.

Seeing that Daniel appeared not to have any objections either, Laien left the management to Albert, Sarah and the adults and went back to the carriage with everyone else. Their caravan then set out about five minutes later, all according to the expectations. With Julien leading the way, they headed further north-east, deeper into the Ruishi Federation and towards its capital, the City of Barn.

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The day passed quickly and soon, it started getting dark. The caravan would have needed to stop for the night, but thanks to Julien’s knowledge of the terrain, they crossed well over two hundred kilometers and by using a few shortcuts, arrived at the beginning of the main road that was leading deeper into the lands of the Ruishi Federation. With a leveled path before them and with good horses pulling the carriages, they didn’t need to stop and thus continued traveling through the night.

Meanwhile, within the foremost carriage, the passengers were each doing what they wanted. Reian and Kasha were training quietly in one corner, Jasmine had long since left and joined Julien and his men on the horses, while Sirius was acting as a coachman just like every other time. As for the youths, with the exception of Sarah, who refused to come, everyone else was sitting more or less in one area within the carriage. They would exchange a few sentences amongst each other and from time to time get involved in a longer conversation, but with how much time had passed, it couldn’t be helped that they all became relatively silent, especially when it started getting dark outside.

“Here goes a whole day without physical training,” Lea mused quietly. “When was the last time I skipped on practice, I wonder? I can’t remember… but it should be okay since I did the Qi training properly,” she thought randomly, allowing her thoughts to wander as they pleased. She recalled some events from her childhood, some fun and pleasant, other painful or dull… then, she started thinking about the last three years, about her own future and about Luca’s future… and soon enough, her thoughts returned to the matter at hand that was causing her to feel a bit annoyed.

“Is he that clueless, or is he not interested in women yet?” she asked herself rather angrily and sneaked a glance at Laien, who at the moment was chatting quietly with that green-haired friend of his. She was fairly confident in her looks; her hair was long and silky, her skin was perfect, her figure wasn’t overly muscular… and well, although it annoyed her when that was pointed out as her strength, her breasts were on the bigger side. She had been trying to chat Laien up multiple times so far, but without exception, the talk would dissolve into a discussion everyone joined either out of Laien’s initiative or because of Yin or Arslan’s disruptions, which honestly caused her to feel a bit frustrated… or truth to be told, really frustrated. Did those two boys have a grudge against her or something? The fact that she couldn’t discern whether they were doing so intentionally or not from their behavior had been making the level of her frustration rise steadily the whole time.

“Do I really need to be more straightforward?” she wondered, only able to sigh at the thought. She had trouble accepting she couldn’t even make an adolescent boy interested in her without being too obvious about her intentions, but her patience had pretty much reached its limits. If she wanted to make something out of this whole thing, then she only had a few days up to a few weeks at most. There was no time to be ‘slowly building up a friendship and waiting for a good opportunity’. Instead, it seemed like she needed to create the opportunity herself.

“To begin with, I need to get him away from those two,” she thought while looking in Laien’s direction. From the very beginning until now, Yin was sitting to Laien’s left and Arslan to Laien’s right; with those two being an obstacle, she couldn’t approach him properly even if she wanted. “Might as well try now. If it doesn’t work out, then I will try again when we stop somewhere,” she decided.

“I should wait for them to stop talking first,” she thought a bit resignedly. She was planning to put a stop to the conversation of those two, not to join it, so she needed to wait for an appropriate moment to do so. Were she to try when they were obviously in the middle of talking about something while enjoying themselves, it would increase the chances of Laien refusing her; and to begin with, even if Laien agreed it would cause him to be in a worse mood while chatting with her.

However… what she didn’t expect was that this random, quiet chat between those two would start dragging on mercilessly. Every time she was about to speak up, she saw one of them say something else. Thus, she ended up watching the two go on for almost an hour while laughing and chuckling, what resulted in her accumulating quite some unnecessary stress. Thankfully, the two boys stopped talking after just about an hour passed, what gave her a chance to make her approach.

She rose up from her spot beside one of the front wall of the carriage and got closer to the youths, then crouched in front of them and looked Laien in the eye. “Say, could we talk alone, on the side, for a little bit? There’s something I wanted to tell you,” she requested in a soft voice, trying not to gather too much attention with what she was doing.

“And you can’t tell me that here?” Laien raised his eyebrows slightly. He was sitting really comfortably at the moment so he really didn’t feel like moving.

“Well… I would rather not,” Lea said in an appealing tone, hoping that Laien wouldn’t insist on speaking where they were.

“Eh, okay,” Laien agreed reluctantly. His impression of Lea was very good so far and he thought he could get along with her well in the following days, so he gave in to her request. After Lea smiled in thanks and moved first, he followed her to the opposite side of the carriage that wasn’t occupied by anyone. “So, what is it about?” he inquired after sitting down lazily and leaning against the wall.

“Mm,” Lea also sat down, seating herself to Laien’s right, just close enough for their shoulders and legs to lightly brush against each other. “I wanted to thank you for getting along with Luca and helping him when he needed it... as his older sister, I’m really grateful,” she said quietly and smiled warmly.

Not quite sure what he was supposed to say to that, Laien only shrugged his shoulders slightly. “You’re welcome, I guess?” he said, feeling a bit confused. Was this really something he needed to be thanked for and in a semi-private conversation at that? It seemed rather pointless to him. “It that all you wanted to tell me…?” he asked, thinking it would have been perfectly fine if she had said that without dragging him to the side.

“No… there’s one more thing,” Lea mentioned both shyly and daringly. She leaned a little closer to Laien while looking him in the eye, then put her right hand on his leg, just below his thigh. “I wanted to ask… what if I also want to become good friends with you?” she asked, her slightly flushed cheeks making her appear extremely cute and alluring as she did so.

Laien felt his face get a bit hot due to the closeness of Lea’s body and due to the implicit context that was behind her words, but he breathed out slowly the next moment and calmed down. “Sure, we can be friends too,” he replied casually, grabbed Lea’s hand and put it on Lea’s own leg, removing it from his thigh. It didn’t feel bad to have such a strong and beautiful young woman show interest in him, but he simply wasn’t keen on developing any kind of a relationship with her.

It took quite some effort on Lea’s part to prevent the feelings of surprise and confusion from showing on her face. She had expected many things to happen, but she didn’t think Laien would turn her down without blinking an eye. In fact, this rejection of her advances was so cool-headed on Laien’s part that it made her wonder if he really understood what she meant. After all, it would make much more sense if Laien was unusually innocent for his age than for him to reject her like that, or so she assumed in her thoughts.

“We can be friends then,” she began saying with a warm smile. “But what if I want to be something more than friends? Would that be possible too?” she asked enticingly and quite straightforwardly, having come to the conclusion that it was the best way to make her intentions clear to Laien.

“I don’t think so,” Laien answered clearly, the advances of Lea’s proving to have little effect on him apart from making him feel a little ashamed. “Sorry. Is that everything?” he apologized and asked, on one hand feeling sorry for rejecting Lea and on the other, wanting to get out of this awkward situation as soon as possible.

Speechless, Lea could only nod in answer to Laien’s question, then watch him return to his original spot. She hadn’t ever imagined that an adolescent boy would turn her down without a second thought and although she wasn’t angry, she was fairly frustrated. This was a huge blow to her self-confidence, one that would take a while to recover.

“I can’t believe she was trying to hit on him,” Daniel whispered to Luca. They might not have heard what was being said, but Lea’s body language was obvious enough for them to reach certain conclusions. However, the surprise of Lea showing interest in Laien paled in comparison to the fact that she appeared to have been rejected! That great ‘big sister character’ Lea had always displayed in the city finally suffered a dent; it was making Daniel feel like chuckling due to all the amusement.

“Ugh, big sis…” Luca shook his head. He had been suspecting something with how strongly Lea had been trying to chat Laien up throughout the day, but he didn’t think she would do something as embarrassing as trying to hit on him when everyone was watching. As her little brother, he was genuinely ashamed of his big sister’s preposterous behavior and shameful results of it.

“Uu,” Lea moaned silently. She was only now beginning to realize that she hadn’t been nearly as secretive as she thought in her actions; she could see everyone sneaking glances at her and revealing weird smiles. If possible, she just wanted to disappear. She had really done something stupid… but just a second later, her train of thoughts stopped as she noticed something unusual happening.

“Laien,” Yin said quietly and raised himself up. Then, when Laien turned his face to look at him, he placed a light but fairly long and deep kiss on his lips. A few seconds later, he separated himself from Laien and smiled at him. He could feel that his own face was flushed red since he really wasn’t used to taking initiative in those things when people were watching, but so was Laien’s, likely because he didn’t quite expect to be kissed out of nowhere.

Satisfied, Yin slid back onto the pillow he was sitting on and sent a competitive look toward Lea, causing her mouth to involuntarily open a little.