I woke up the next day not feeling good, knowing I can't meet him for the next couple of years, destroying all my current goals. I still have hope that I'll meet him someday. After all, I need to confront him. I want to know why he did everything he did—something I will always fail to understand. Is there another hidden motive, or did he just do it for money? Something I will always be curious about until I meet him again.
I got out of the tent. Lina was already out; she had everything we needed to get these criminals to the adventurers' guild. She knew I was down mentally, so she didn't want to give me any more work. She's a kind person, so I greeted her. She returned it, and we started going back to the city again.
After a while, we got inside the city. Everyone gave us weird looks as we had, behind us, seven people tied up with a high-level sealing spell—especially since we looked so young. Anyway, after a while, we got inside the adventurers' guild and handed over the criminals. We got our money, which was around 100 gold coins. They were pretty popular, so this amount of money was reasonable. And as we were getting out, Lina said, with a warm and gentle smile on her face:
"I think we should become officially a team in the adventurers' guild, so we'll split our earnings. But don't worry, I'll give you the gold coins I claim. I know you need them more than me, to go outside the continent."
"Oh, okay. I think this would work well," I said with a nearly emotionless voice.
"Yay! Let's go!" she said as she held my hand, pulling it toward the reception of the guild. She is so damn charming.
We did all the needed requirements to get officially registered as a team, then we got out to just explore the city. After some time of me having a depressed expression on my face, Lina tried multiple times to open interesting subjects to talk about, but I show that I'm not interested in any of that. She said, with a cute pouted expression on her face:
"Ooo~ is there any way I can cheer you up? I have no idea what you're going through, so I have no right to judge you. But nothing ever deserves for your cute face to have this expression on it. A smile fits you way more... I mean, there is no absolute despair in this world. There is always hope, right?"
She is right, so I nodded. But as I was walking, I felt a sudden pain. It was more than any pain I had ever experienced for some reason. The same second I felt it, I tried running away as a small scream leaked from me, but I couldn't. I looked at the reason—and it was nothing other than Lina pinching my cheek to get me back to reality. She had the same expression she had before. So, without even realizing it, I giggle, and as soon as I did that, her usual smile returned to her face. She's so charming. After my reaction to her pinching, she said:
"I'll add this to my notes: best way to get you back to reality when you're upset is to pinch your cheeks."
"You better never do that again, I warn you, or the consequences will be worse than you can imagine."
"BRING ME YOUR WORST!" she said while opening her hands, wanting to show how she'd endure it all.
She really made my mood way better, and I like that. Anyway, after a couple of minutes of keeping our little role-play going, she said in a serious voice:
"Will you stay in this city?"
"I think so. It's in the middle of the continent. This is where we'll find most quests and missions."
"Yeah, that's true. I guess I'll get a room for us to stay in at night. Also, I wanted to give you something—and that is about 2,000 coins. Let's go to the guild; I wanted to give you this but I forgot."
What. Why is she giving me an amount of money like this like it's nothing? Is she just rich? No, she is just like me. This is the money she got by her own effort. Then… why is she giving it to me?
"Why are you giving me this like it's nothing? I mean, you spent a lot of time on it."
"But you need it more than me. Also, sorry, I only have around 2,300 gold coins, so I think that's all I can give you."
"Why would you give me something you spent a lot of weeks making? I don't deserve it."
"Well, it doesn't matter. You need it more, so you deserve it more."
I don't understand. This mindset of hers... being so kind... it's not useful in any way. It's nothing but a pain to be kind to everyone. But is it really satisfying for her to be kind? Does this fucked up useless ideology really make her happy?
After some arguing, I had no choice but to agree to take her gold. So we went to the guild, and she transferred her money to me. She didn't really seem dumb and silly enough to be like this—yet she still is this way. I wonder what made her become like this. But as we were getting out, Lina said in a casual way:
"Want to fight?"
"Huh!" I said, surprised.
"You know, I wanted to fight you for some time now. Just a friendly fight. I wanted us to start training together. So best way is practicing against each other."
"Hm, good idea." The thing I can say for sure is that the best way to get stronger is by fighting someone with a different fighting style. And so we got out of the city and went to a nearby empty space. I decided to use my sword, as she was using a sword too.
"So, are you ready?" I said as I got ready to fight.
"Yes, go easy on me, hehe~" she said in her playful voice. Then she completed what she was saying and gave us the signal to go:
"Start!"
And as she said that, I threw myself at her with all I had in speed and strength, trying to strike her. She stopped each attack I gave her but still struggled. I decided to go all out because, in pure power, I was superior. After some moments, she backed down a bit. I followed her almost instantly, but this time something attacked me from behind. I was able to dodge it—the wood that came out of the ground. It was made in a way that would have passed through my body. She sure is scary while fighting.
After it, lots of wooden attacks were thrown at me. I kept dodging, but after I got two scratches caused by them, I started surrounding my hand with blue fire. I somehow feel how hot it is, yet it doesn't harm me or give me any pain. But it was able to stop any wooden attack. I burned out any wood near me, as they all came from the ground—probably created by Lina from her feet, passing through the ground and attacking me. Such a smart way of fighting.
I kept dodging and burning them until I got up from the ground by flying. Her wooden attacks are so obvious now. But then the wooden attacks stopped—just for two blue ropes to surround my hands. They were magical, resulting in me not being able to break out of them. The one who held the ropes was Lina, obviously. She pulled me in her direction. I tried running away but couldn't do anything, and just as I reached her range, she kicked me in the stomach as hard as she could. It was painful as fuck. She couldn't use her sword because she used both her hands to keep me from moving, and she also removed the ropes as soon as I got kicked, making me go flying into the sky for a couple of meters. She tried slashing me with her sword while in the air, but I was able to avoid getting cut. Still, I got sent a couple of meters, resulting in a powerful crash into the hard ground. I used a pain absorption magic on myself as soon as I crashed. It's still a bit painful. I got lots of scratches, so I think I will get really serious.
I attacked her with blue fire, in a way that was kind of like a laser. She dodged it easily. But the thing she didn't know was—I could move it. And as soon as I did, trying to reach her as fast as I could, she started running away from it, but she still got outrun by it. I made sure not to hit any dangerous part of her body, as that would kill her, but I was able to obliterate the side of her hand. The downside to this was that it consumed a lot of mana, so just 15 seconds after starting, I was now unable to keep using it. I couldn't use any more blue fire. But she had spent lots of mana too, meaning she didn't have much left either. So, I don't think I'll use any more elemental magic. I'll only fight with swords—and I think that's what she wants as well.
After around 30 minutes, the fight ended with both of us just getting tired. She's really strong. And so, we decided to always fight each other each evening until we both got tired, and that each one of us would teach the other what they lack. She'd teach me how to control mana even better, and I'd teach her how to get even better at swordsmanship.