A Mere Memory [Rufus Lore x Reader]

Chapter 5- The Job-Part 2

That night was a peaceful one. No attacks or monsters. You and Rufus took turns to keep watch. Rufus seemed awfully quiet. Who cares? It was hell of a lot peaceful.

The next day too you both spent your days separately scouting the area. Before long evening rolled along. You were keeping watch near the river while Rufus, well, you had no idea what he was up to.

That night they attacked. It was a horde of really nasty looking creatures. Four small eyes, Massive hanging ears, short, rounded head, and long athletic body stood straight staring at whatever it is they are staring at. They look vaguely humanoid but disgusting enough.

They looked big and bad. No one told that they could wield fire. Ha! Lucky villagers, they called the right man uh...woman for the job. You froze their fires and started picking them out one by one using your ice magic. No sign of Rufus. What is that idiot...oh! Suddenly it looked a million shooting stars have descended. A spark of it hit all the monsters and wiped them all out in seconds. Rufus appeared near you.

"I take it that was your doing?" the answer was obvious. Of course he had to have an awesome move like that.

"Naturally." That gave you an idea."Watch me do something even more impressive." You touched your hand on the ground and focused.

"Frozen Castle of the troubled souls"

Suddenly all the monsters in the vicinity were frozen in massive chunks of ice. You turned to Rufus victoriously but he was nowhere near you.

"Not bad."

---

It was day by the time you both finished up with everything. Since you were drained of magical power, both of you decided to spend a day resting up before returning. Anyways you finished the job quite early, you needed that rest. So when you returned to your little shelter, you let sleep consume you immediately.

---

You bid your farewells to the villagers and after collecting the rewards made your way to the train station.

"Not again." You groaned loudly."I'll live in that village for the rest of my lives."You said turning back but Rufus grabbed you by the scarf you were wearing.

"Stop being so immature [F/N].Since long train journeys are obviously making you go crazy we'll stop at Balsam Village."

You knew that place. It's the spa town of Fiore. They had everything from spas to hot springs. Could Rufus be doing this because he is actually concerned about....

"I don't want another incident like THAT to happen"

Of course you thought smiling to yourself about the scene you caused at the village train station two days before.

With a refreshing hot spring in mind the rest of the train journey wasn't as tiring as you thought.

---

You both had parted deciding to go to hot springs and then return to the rooms. You had a single room but there were two separate beds. Luckily.

As you stepped into the women's area you saw that it was empty. You quickly stripped and tied your hair back up and stepped into the steaming waters."Ah...." you moaned at the soothing feeling the waters made. This was a great idea. Have to thank him for thinking this one. You could feel your energy returning to its former glory.

---

You were now wrapped up in a beautiful blue yukata. It really felt good, to just enjoy all this. You slide open the door to find Rufus sitting by the kotatsu. He had a similar yukata and his hair was in a long ponytail.

He saw you come in and asked you to close the door. You obliged and sat opposite to him.

"[F/N] we need to talk." He was looking pretty determined.

You sighed."Yeah I know." Once again you both were surrounded by uncomfortable silence.

"Why did you leave me?"You blurted out. It was a question that you wanted answer to very badly. I thought those were the good times. And he just left.

"I was forced to [F/N].We started depending on each other more often. If I had stayed any longer we could never learn to be independent." He averted his eyes. He's lying. He was always a bad liar. What actually happened Rufus?

"What about you [F/N]? What happened to you?" No. You were not ready to relive those experiences again.

"I can't tell Rufus. After you left me, I wandered around a lot and finally some ...people found me. They experimented on me. That's how I got two lachyrmas implanted. Something went wrong and they left me. I don't think they expected me to survive. But I did and here I am. Well in a way I am thankful for the power they gave me." You said.

Rufus looked sad and regretful. He took your hand in both of his.

"I sincerely apologise my friend. I do. I know I shouldn't have left you all by yourself."

"It's fine. After all I found you again." You said."But why did you act so different back in the guild?"

"Friends doesn't give you strength [F/N].That's how Sabertooth always worked .Power and Strength is the only thing that is needed." He was all serious once again.

"Do you believe that?"

"To an extent. We got stronger when we got separated right?"

"But that strength we found can be made stronger if we work together right?"

He looked conflicted. It was a while before he replied.

"I don't know."

You sighed leaning back. "Well anyway thanks for coming here. This is a really nice place. Now I need some sleep. Good night"

You left Rufus alone and went to get some sweet sleep.