Atrocities of The Royal Order

0702 - 08

"OK! Good!" she praised me. Today was a fine day. The breeze was cool, and the sun was not hurting over us. She raised her sword, it flared against the sun, "Stronger this time!" she attacked with another swing. It deflected. She was training me to reinforce the barrier.

A normal day in training. Repetitive exercises, defensive maneuvers, and some attack techniques. Normal, but not quite.

My mother was missing, and my father is out of his mind. Still, he never said a word. Some mornings I find him wasted on the floor, sometimes he's staring blankly out of the window.

"Ken, let's just leave for today." She's clearly disappointed.

"I'm sorry."

I have no more words. I'm not sure if she's tired or actually being considerate but as for me, I feel fed up, like I no longer wanted to do anything about it anymore.

"He's here again today." Yuuri tapped me lightly on the shoulder motioning for me to look at Hyuk that was waiting by the corner. He was back in his school's uniform. It's infuriating to see that after all the commotion, we still were forced to go back to school. These killers have free access to where we are and yet they wanted us to find the value of X or how many apples Mr. A is still holding after eating three, like come on!

"You can just come and see us comfortably. You don't have to hide by the bridge and then run up to here pretending you're just passing by. You've been doing that for weeks now." I scolded him. He looked down, felt uneasy, I guess.

"I just wanted to help."

"I'm sorry if I was rude to you that day but really, you shouldn't have been there. You could have died." Yuuri moved before me, like trying to shield me against Hyuk, like a little boy sporting the coconut head can hurt me, "...or killed us. I'm still not trusting you, Hyuk. Show your true self."

"I will not do anything to hurt you, I just wanted to be of help."

"You did well." I answered.

Yuuri shot me a look. I gave her a glance saying it's fine. For all I care, Hyuk did more than just saving me that day.

"I just wanted to help, to save you like you did for me. I just don't..."

"I did what?"

"When I woke up at the hospital, they told me that I almost drowned and somebody saved me, it was you, Ken, weren't you? But I just couldn't like, live up to whatever's needed to repay that."

"I'm not asking to be repaid. If I indeed saved you, you should've lived your life well and safe, that would have been the best way to show gratitude."

"I'm sorry, I couldn't do anything right." He slumped and seemed like ready to cry, but he didn't. "I am still grateful and will continue to be around. I'm sorry if I annoy you that much. I'm sorry!" and then he ran away.

"He seems to have a complex." I told Yuuri.

"He also had that big building we went to?..." she trailed off, realizing her gullible remark.

"Yeah, the first accident we had was in that complex and no, it's a different thing. He needs help."

"What more can you do for him?"

"He needs to know that I don't need to be repaid. I don't need to be continuously saved by somebody."

Yuuri looked surprised.