Diana said nothing as Kiara''s eyes stayed on her for a moment. She said nothing as the others entered the resort and nothing as she followed their presence back to the room. Several minutes of silence passed all the while, but, she supposed, at least Keigo hadn''t run away. He looked like he wanted to, however. Although he stood aside, waiting for her to approach, she noticed the subtle hints of a boy ready to flee. She remembered them, in fact, and laughed to herself as she finally went over.
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He tried to give one back. “I’ve seen you act. I don’t know how you could make me prouder.”
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She sighed. “Yokumori…that word stuck with me. I think you said something different last time though. “Yokumori bestow me.” I don’t think I realized it was spirit magic back then. I just thought that you were a lot stronger than I ever guessed.”
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Defeat almost claiming her, Diana responded, “What are you saying?”
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His eyes said he didn’t understand, but he was speechless. She sighed again. Now was the time to share something she had cruelly kept to herself.
“Honestly, I think I even knew it would happen. I hoped it wouldn’t. Sometimes, I hoped it couldn’t, because we were never in one place too long. But, if I used my sense, I would have known the truth.”
It started shortly before the two of them met; shortly after her father convinced the world that Daphne had been killed. Never a man to spend time with his children, he took to traveling the Green Lands, seizing on the people’s sympathy. He wasn’t so foolish as to leave his kids alone, however, especially not so soon after the truth Diana later learned. Daphne was “dead” not because she mistakenly trusted the wrong commoner, but because she underestimated their father’s ego. Dalton Fillmore would not suffer the same insult twice, and the attendants he brought to Diana and her brother were his play against it.
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A new shop was opening in the academic district. Their father was the owner, and there’d be a club where they could make Forward Society trinkets. Most children of merchants and lesser nobles had no interest in such a thing, but the words were music to Diana’s ears.
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So she found a disguise, making herself a bright-eyed commoner too. She went back after school one day and found the place welcoming. It was better than she had ever expected. There were different magic texts, different magic materials, and different means of working them together awaiting her growing curiosity. The shop itself was just a toy store, but the sitting area on the second floor was like a second home. A few other kids had come too, and they all loved what they were learning. No one even looked at Diana long enough to wonder who she was. They were too captivated by their activities, too engrossed in the things that’d make Magdalea like the fictional Nandaxia.
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One day, when Diana was late after school... She knew the group would start without her, so she wasn’t worried until she finally arrived. A crowd gathered around the storefront, shattered and bloodied glass keeping them back. Panic swelled as she saw them, and pushing through only made the matter worse. Chest tight and heavy, she found Tizarae with a squad of Fillmore guards. Her friends were wrangled, and the storeowner bled profusely from scars she couldn’t see. Tizarae had a foot on his mangled fingers. When she spotted Diana, she gasped. It was the only time the noble girl saw the woman’s expression change. And it was terrifying.
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The betrayed looks hurt more than the attendant’s deception. There were pleas in bloodshot eyes, wanting answers or at least an end to this misery. Diana didn’t know what to say, but she knew no words would ever be enough. She sucked down a whimper and pointedly looked at Tizarae.
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“Later, after the crowd was gone and I was alone with her, she told me the truth. I didn’t need it, but it wasn’t for me. She knew I was sneaking there from the start. She wanted me to feel safe before she taught me a lesson. My life belonged to my father and she was there to remind me. I grieved for Daphne more, until I guess my tracking sense awakened? I ran away after that, but I knew Tizarae would never let me have peace. I don’t know how she found out the first time but I didn’t think she’d give up. I had three years to tell you and the others, but I was scared of being alone. We saw how that turned out.” She laughed sadly. “Does a good person ruin lives and do it over again?”
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A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
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Keigo nodded, “It wouldn’t be the first time someone tried either. Still, Hijikata wasn’t going to convince the Spirit Guards to attack the forest, not with some of them working with my parents, and others believing it was too risky. So, somehow, he recruited a member of the Magic Council and his second…”
The day was bright in a way Keigo liked back then, with the sun shining through the leaves above. He was playing on the outskirts at the time, in a village recently built by those grateful to his family. His brother was home from a stay in the Triumvirate, and for once it didn''t seem like there was a mission on the horizon. Despite being a killer, he felt like a normal kid, blending in so well that he was just another bystander when Hijikata appeared. A small part of his unit was with him, but they didn''t compare to the foreigners that walked in tow. One was a fit man with short sandy brown hair and strange weapons fastened at his hips. The other was a woman of average height and slender build, young like her commander, with short brown hair, tan skin, and pink eyes.
Diana didn’t need their names. Thane Almatt and Sasha Almatt were the strangers in this tale, though she supposed the woman wasn’t an Almatt at the time. She knew about their involvement, but not how the story went…
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“No, no! We will not be killing a kid!”
“That child is a part of the forest. If we let him go the spirit will channel through him completely. His life is not worth the troubles he’ll cause later.”
“Maybe you misheard me. We are not killing a kid. Not me, not you, not Thane. You can try, but you know what’s really not going to be worth the trouble?”
It seemed like the two would fight for a moment, and trapped as he was, Keigo couldn’t use it to escape. Hijikata backed down first, however, choosing to meet the woman in another place instead.
“You’re an abyss born, right?”
“I am.”
“Then let’s use a blood seal instead. With Abyss Ichor, even Yokumori can be weakened. We’ll seal the boy and lock him away.”
“They did and for a while I was just stuck there. The seal wasn’t enough though. My family was gone and my chest wouldn’t stop hurting. All I could think about was revenge. Against Hijikata, Thane, and Sasha. That was all I was, until I found away to escape. I thought killing Hijikata would be the hardest, so I went after the other two first. It took months to get from the Dens to the East Wing, and by the time I got there I was weak. I passed out and a brother and sister found me.”
“Sis, over here!” Keigo remembered those first words through a haze. There came the sound of shoes on grass next, and then an older girl.
“I don’t know how you spotted him, but good eye.”
“Do you think he’s an orphan, or a runaway? He’s in bad shape.”
“Why are you pretending like you haven’t already decided to take him home? You planned to before I even saw him.”
“Because we’re a team.”
The girl sighed, “Go ahead, Ballard. It wouldn’t be right to leave him anyway.”
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Keigo nodded again, "Ballard and his sister, Bianca. They were kind to me." Feeding him, bathing him, and giving him a place to sleep.
The Weller siblings lived in a private home in an Enforcer compound. Their father worked closely with the faction, after all, and their mother had been one. Both of them got their sense of justice from her, and because of it, Keigo’s heart hurt a little less. When Bianca trained, Keigo spent time with Ballard, making a true friend for the first time.
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First, a demand to his father to let Keigo stay. Then there was day after day of being a kid again. Ballard loved to talk about Enforcers doing heroic things. He followed papers like Diana followed the Forward Society, always rushing to tell Keigo about one successful operation or another. He talked about what type of Enforcer he’d be, and what type of training was best for him. Ballard was a normal nine-year-old, but Keigo…
“I wasn’t.” His smile broke with a sigh. “I thought I was for a while, or that I could be. I even taught Ballard some of my training, and started believing his idea that we could be an Enforcer duo. I almost forgot what brought me to that compound, until Ballard wanted to let me in on something…”
Quite literally let him in. Ballard knew how to get under the floorboards of the compound. He had even found secret nooks, places where he could hear the room above him. He found one under his father’s office and that’s where he took Keigo that day.
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Keigo knew they were in the right spot when Brand Weller’s musings reached them.
“According to the boy, Gyo is the practice of manipulating your aura. It’s the foundation of spiritual magic, and doesn’t use your magic particles. Could I improve this process to make a magic-less combatant?”
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“Elven crimes are apparently on the rise. Enforcers have been getting antsy, which means I have to solve this problem. Because, apparently, it’s not in your employee handbook or something.”
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It wasn’t a consolation, but wasn’t an insult either. Even with a part of him screaming that he had to do it, he wasn’t going to wound his friend like that. He wasn’t going to make his death worse than it had to be. He wasn’t going to make it any more painful than it already was. But, as they left the tunnel he knew he had to do it.
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Diana knew how the story went from there. An assassin came for Thane Almatt, attacking him in his office. The councilor put up a good fight, but poison eventually did him in. The assassin escaped, and later the world found out that Ballard Weller was targeted too. Authorities suspected the plot had something to do with the upcoming mission. Thinking about it now, Diana supposed that was why she never suspected anything. Even when he first told her how he got his bounty, she didn’t give it a second thought.
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“I’m not fighting for something I’m fighting for someone!”
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The troupe wasn’t traveling the Green lands anymore. There were no pop-up performances or silly nights with the crew. She destroyed that, not Keigo, and she still wished she was smart enough to do something different. But, she was a kid that was scared of being alone.
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Brow furrowed, she let him go and looked at him. There was nothing on his face that said he''d change his mind. Despite the clear misery, there was still a stubborn belief that this was his fight and his fight only. Diana grimaced, tried to think of the right thing to say, and stomped her foot instead. She was beaten and couldn''t tell if she was more sad or more angry.
Keigo smiled but didn''t respond to her effort to lighten the mood. Instead, he did his hypnotic trick, leaving only an afterimage to hold his expression. Diana fell against the Traveler''s house. This felt like a loss, but she''d take it as a battle instead of a war. She''d trust him to come back, simply to stop her from going after revenge…
[Chapter 40 ends…]