Ever since the fight, Ramiron lost her power to decompose objects other than herself. Key had to wear a cast on his fractured arm for a month. HueCam Academy expelled Kirane with Tribe Kayama's consent. The tribe also agreed to take Ramiron to Haban for special treatment that would reverse the damage done to her. Under Ramiron's strong request, Loter was sent to accompany her in Haban. Although Hiroku was not involved in the event, he decided to join the trip to Haban. Glacia desired to follow. However, her lack of familial connection and relevancy was enough of a reason for the academy to deny the request.

They took two cable cars to exit the academy. Kirane was in the first one with three servants from his family. Loter, Ramiron, and Hiroku were in the second car with only one servant. These servants all wore identical black blazers and light brown trousers.

Loter and his two teammates stayed completely quiet while the car was going down Mountain Vault. Hiroku kept staring at the woods intentionally. Ramiron had her eyes closed and her head lying on top of the seatback, probably napping. Loter just awkwardly looked around once in a while since there was no internet connection in the mountain.

Outside the cable car terminal, two short limousines parked there. Kirane and the three servants around him went into the first one, and the rest went into the second. Since the servant could not hear a word from the driver's seat, the kids felt much more comfortable.

Ramiron sat in the rear-facing seat, and the boys sat opposite her. Loter put himself in the center of the bench seat while Hiroku was leaning against the car door, looking out the window.

"Lot, are you excited to go to Haban?" Ramiron asked. She laid her arms fully extended on the soft seatback and crossed her legs.

Loter looked up from his phone, pouted his lips, and answered, "It is my first time to leave MU, but I'm worrying about your injury—"

"Don't fret, Lot. It will be okay." Ramiron chuckled a bit.

"Also, we are seeing Kirane's family. Well, they are…" Loter paused himself, discreetly shifting his eyes to Hiroku.

Only glancing back into the car cabin, Hiroku sighed. "They are horrible people, I know. I've seen it because I'm one of them."

"You are not horrible." Loter stuck his head toward Hiroku and quickly pulled it back after recalling Hiroku's outburst in the dorm.

"Aye, you are much better than your cousin," Ramiron added. Her smile had been widened after hearing Hiroku's words.

"Sure," Hiroku replied. His visage was still listless and gloomy.

"Yeah, you even accompanied us on the trip," Loter said quickly and enthusiastically, "you are an awesome person!"

Hiroku closed his eyes, sighed, turned toward the two, inhaled a breath of air, and opened his eyes. He said, "I just want to pay you back. I'm sorry for my cousin's behavior and… I am sorry for not taking your help when you offered to. I'm sorry for both."

"You don't need to be sorry for what Kirane did," Ramiron said. A frowned sincerity replaced her smile.

"Yeah," Loter seconded, sticking toward Hiroku. There was a worrisome in his voice.

"No, you don't understand." Hiroku placed his hands on Loter's shoulders to put him back in his seat. He explained in his sad tone, "Kirane is a typical Kayama. He did what he did because he was groomed that way." He spoke faster and more frantically as he continued, "It is the culture of Tribe Kayama that created him, and it will keep creating more and more Kirane. Although I've never visited the manor of the main branch, I still have the surname Kayama."

He paused, let out a puff of air, and continued, "I feel responsible when someone with the same surname expresses how disgusting they are."

For moments, the cabin was completely silent. Hiroku went back to looking out the window, and the other two just glanced at each other and moved their eyes away.

Abruptly, out of nowhere, Ramiron asked in a light tone, "Is that why you are a feminist?"

"Hiro is a feminist?" Loter exclaimed in surprise.

"I'm just fond of their philosophy." Hiroku looked away and said, "Maybe my family has something to do with my preference."

Loter quickly followed with a proud and passionate introduction, "I personally hold no political belief." He tapped a hand on his chest. "My father said I am too young to have any."

"But you're seventeen," Ramiron said.

"My father told me this when I was ten. I just never looked into it."

"Because you don't need to," Hiroku commented in bitterness, looking away. His frown was still there.

"Yeah, I don't need—"

"How about social issues?" Ramiron frantically interjected. She swung between Loter's innocent eyes and Hiroku's slightly despondent face. "Is there any social issue that you have an opinion on?"

"I don't know." Loter placed a finger on his chin. "Ah, I know. I think bullying is bad!"

"It is bad," Hiroku replied, hiding his sadness and squeezing a smile on his face.

The limousines soon arrived at the airport. It was when they got into the airport shuttle that Loter asked, "Wait, where are our air tickets? Why do I not see them?"

"We are taking Kayama's private jet," Hiroku answered listlessly. He put a hand on Loter's shoulder to turn him in the right direction and guided him closer to the window.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Loter clung his palms to the window, letting out a "wow" as he saw the white airplane closest to the bus. The airplane was long and narrow, with a pink flower on its rudder.

"Hm? No, not that one." Hiroku shook Loter's shoulder and pointed at the right plane. It was much shorter and slightly wider than the one Loter was staring at. The logo on its rudder was a golden phoenix and a golden wyrm crawling around the phoenix in a circle. Three kanjis were written on the side of the jet.

"What are those words, Hiro?" Loter asked, lightly tapping on the window.

"Those are kanjis, Loter. They are letters in Habanese. Unlike kanas, kanjis contained special meanings. 'Ka' means both afterglow and twilight. 'Ya' means valley. 'Ma' means reality."

While answering, Hiroku glanced at Kirane several times. He was facing away, crossing his arms and looking out the shuttle by himself. Beside him, servants stood at an appropriate distance and never laid an eye on him directly.

The jet contained two lounges. The one closer to the boarding gate had a huge television and a single couch. The other was smaller but with two beds, a television, and four couches of various lengths. Loter jumped onto one of the beds as he entered the smaller lounge.

While his teammates were entering and some servants were walking across the room, Loter exclaimed, "It's my first time on a private jet!" He bounced on the bed and added with disapproval, "But it belongs to that awful kid."

"The damage is done. The punishment is given. You would enjoy it much more if you just let it go. Remember, this is a vacation. We are here to have fun." Ramiron slumped onto the couch closest to the television.

"Yeah…"

While Ramiron inspected the remote control, one of the servants announced, "If you ever feel hungry on the plane, you may enter the kitchen and take as much as you please."

The servant closed the door between the smaller lounge and the kitchen, leaving the room completely for the kids.

Hiroku climbed up onto the other bed and wrapped himself in the blanket. He faced the wall and yawned. "It's a ten-hour flight. You better—"

Before he could finish his sentence, Ramiron turned on the television. A blast of extremely loud news noise shut Hiroku up and startled Loter.

"Oops." Ramiron lowered the volume while asking, "What do you boys want to watch?"

"They have connections on the plane? What channels do they have?" Loter crawled down the bed and hopped onto the longer couch beside Ramiron's.

Not answering, Ramiron turned to Hiroku, smirking. "Hey, what do you want to watch?"

Grunting, Hiroku got off his bed and sat on a couch not too close to the other two. "Whatever."

Eventually, they settled on a horror movie about a zombie in a nuclear dugout. Hiroku watched it comfortably on the couch, enjoying the distraction from his internal and external problems. Loter curled together and shut his eyes several times but could not resist the urge to keep watching. Ramiron enjoyed both the film and Loter's reaction.

After the movie, they switched to a Habanese channel about people dressing up as different things. For example, a man painted himself blue and pretended to be an aircraft carrier. Ramiron fell asleep several times but got shaken back awake. Loter kept trying to verbalize what was on the screen and comment on them. Hiroku rotated his response between "right," "uh-hum," and "I see."

Eventually, Ramiron fell asleep completely. Loter could not easily wake her. Taking this opportunity, Hiroku grabbed the remote and turned off the television. He said, "Let her sleep, Loter. She must be very tired."

"Yeah, you're right. I should go check out the kitchen."

A dozen or so seconds after, Loter's loud voice came out of the kitchen, "Hiro, they have ice cream on the plane!"

"Uh-hum," Hiroku replied while reclining on the couch, facing away from the direction of the kitchen.

"Do you want some?" Loter yelled.

"No." Hiroku raised his volume a bit, trying to send his words through the door.

"Okay, what flavor do you want?" Loter clearly misheard Hiroku.

"Whatever," Hiroku complained to himself.

"What?"

"Vanilla."

"What did you say?"

"Vanilla!" Hiroku impatiently exclaimed, waking up Ramiron.

She asked while rubbing her eyes, "What are you guys up to?"

"Loter is getting ice cream."

"Oh, nice. Can you please tell him I want a mint one?"

"Fuck, do it yourself. I'm as far away from him as—"

"I'm back!" Loter came back, singing his words out. He was holding a cone of vanilla ice cream and a cone of chocolate ice cream.

"Hey, can you get me a mint one?" Ramiron playfully raised her hand like an elementary student in class.

"It will match the color of your shirt," Loter abruptly said as he headed back into the kitchen.

Ramiron glanced down at her sea green polo and replied, "Kind of. My shirt is much darker, though."

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After landing at Haban, they took another several-hour-long trip in some limousines to reach the coast. There, they took their last several-hour-long trip on a yacht to finally arrive at Cho-san Island, the island practically owned by Tribe Kayama. Their arrival time was two-fifty in the early morning.

Not a single building on the island was built like those modern rectangular boxes. All of them were in the traditional Habanese style, with triangular rooftops, black tiles, sharp-edged red arches, and stone-made foundations.

"Do they even have electricity?" Loter discreetly asked Hiroku while they were climbing up the mountain on a sparse pebble trail among the trees. Since those servants in suits were both before and behind the kids, Loter had his voice soft and low.

"It's just the architecture. These people aren't that backward," Hiroku answered, rolling his eyes.

When they finally reached the top of the small hill, they saw one of Tribe Kayama's estates. Its outer walls were made of stone bricks and timber planks above them. The heavy wooden gate was opened only when the servants on both sides of the gate pushed and pulled together.

Loter could hear their strenuous grunt as the door panels parted. While the servants who escorted them were wearing suits, the servants inside the estate wore nyanza(greenish-white) kimonos.

Going through the gate, Loter swiftly glanced at the edge of the gate, trying to measure its immense thickness.

Inside the walls, not a blade of grass could be seen on the dry ground. A dozen or so meters away from the entrance gate sat a long pavilion with walls and sliding doors.

Two female servants stood on the sides of the wide stoop before the pavilion. They had their heads lowered and eyes closed like they were waiting for a master.

"Are they napping?" Loter whispered to Hiroku from behind.

"No, look at their hands. They had their hands before their lower abdomen. They were waiting for a superior."

"A superior?"

"Someone who has power over them."

"But why don't other servants, you know, those in black and those in green, do the same?"

"First, those men in suits are bodyguards, not servants. Second, those two women were only doing this because it's their job."

Loter opened his mouth, trying to keep asking, yet a sudden rhythm of drums had him startled. Two sliding doors were brutally split. A middle-aged man strode out from the pavilion, standing on the stoop between the two female servants.

He wore a jordy blue(grayish pale blue) kimono. His head was bald. Two gray clumps of mustache were above the corners of his mouth.