Chapter 334: Leaving (2/2)

Surprised by this revelation, the group kept asking the purple-haired girl as they slowly left the district and continued making their way through the Residential District, towards the direction of the Guild's Hall.

Eventually, as they arrived at the crossroad that would either lead them further along, and eventually towards the Salty Pig, the inn where Aiden still had his reserved room, or change paths and get to the Adventurer's Street, they stopped.

Aiden, who was now keeping his appearance hidden behind his black mask and hood again, turned to look at the awkwardly looking purple-haired psychic lady, he spoke after heaving a tired sigh.

”Sara, we need to say our goodbye's here. I will not be returning to the guild today. I want to get back to my room and rest up. I haven't had any rest since before we embarked on our mission.”

”I… I see.” Sara spoke up whilst lightly fidgeting. She was feeling extremely awkward and embarrassed, she wasn't sure what she should be doing. From her side, she has long crossed what she should be feeling towards a friend. As she was uncertain about Aiden's situation, she had come to the realization that he was already way too important for her. The thought of him being in trouble captured or worse was not a pleasant thought.

When she finally saw him returning, she just couldn't control herself anymore and flew into his embrace. At that moment, she finally accepted the truth: She liked this boy. Just like her mother, her mistress had wanted, she had fallen for him.

The problem was, that all the while the boy didn't send any obvious signals. Sara wasn't sure if what she was feeling was purely platonic, or if there was any chance for her to be in his heart already.

Still, whatever was the case, she at least wanted to give a chance to herself, to this happiness, even if it would remain purely platonic, one-sided.

As she was in the midst of such troubling thoughts, she suddenly felt a pair of strong arms wrap themselves around her and pull her into a warm and already quite a familiar hug. Shaking her head and forcefully coming back to her senses, she surprisingly noticed that she was being embraced by the masked boy.

”Be safe, okay?” Was the only words that she heard; the boy of her heart had gently whispered into her ears as he hugged her.

”Em.” She couldn't possibly respond, as her mind was a mess, and she had to hide her face from him, as it was red as a tomato. When they separated, she hurriedly pulled the hood over her head and swiftly turned around, hiding her mess-of-an expression from the group.

”I-I-I n-need to g-go now! S-see y-you guys, t-tomorrow!” She left, without waiting for any word from the rest of the group, even leaving Scarlet behind who was now over the shock of meeting the second version of herself and was grinning as she looked at the receding back of her recently made a new friend.

”Wow, she is so hopeless…” She chuckled, turning to look at her brother. ”So where to now?”

Looking at the departing figure of Sara a while longer before turning away, Aiden spoke as he turned towards the Salty Pig's direction.

”Not sure about you guys, but me and Galina here will return to the inn. It was an incredibly long and tiresome day, I really need some rest.”

”As for us little sis…” Drake added, matching her sister's curious gaze. ”We will also get a room there and take our well-earned rest. We also need to bide our time for the time being, as one of our brothers, Dan is still in this city.”

”What?!” Hearing him mentioning that a sibling of theirs is close by Scarlet jumped in shock. ”Little Dan is still here? Where? What are we waiting for, let's go and save him!!” She exclaimed, already ready to march into whatever dangers she had to, not caring about anything else. Although she had already learned about him back when she was just a slave, that was more than a year ago, she was quite surprised that he was still being kept somewhere in the city limits.

Seeing her, Drake smiled, before trying to calm her down. After all, they still had to wait quite a bit before the start of next year and with that, the beginning of the Academy's Grounds to open its gates for the yearly Admission Tests and select the few most talented and luckiest to be accepted as new students.