Once I returned to Blume through the Gates, I made my way to the training grounds of the Order of Knights, where the order’s flag displaying sword, shield, and flowers proudly flew. The banner also served as a symbol of Farblume, where most adventurers were knights. I’d come here to ask Rudith to go into the dungeon with us. I wanted to catch him here rather than at home because if father overheard, he would do everything in his power to come with us. As the commander of the Order of Knights, my father would have made a powerful ally, but all twelve slots would be accounted for if Rudith agreed to go.
“Is Rudith even here?” I wondered. Frey, Kent, and Cocoa frequently trained with the knights, and they’d told me that Rudith had been spending more time here. But he jumps on Mach and flies into trouble at the first sign of it.
Soon enough, I heard Kent’s roar from the training ground—a sign that they were hard at work again. I peeked inside and saw Kent actually holding his own against the knights. More than that, it looked like Kent was wiping the floor with them.
“He’s already a Dragonrider at that age...? Kent’s incredible.”
“I wanna be a Dragonrider too, one day...!”
The newer knights seemed to be looking up to Kent, who’d once looked up to knights and Dragonriders with admiration himself. He’s worked hard to get this far.
“Lottie?” someone called from behind me while I chuckled. I turned around and found Rudith approaching me, wiping sweat from his neck with a towel.
“Brother!”
“What brings you here, Lottie? It’s not every day you stop by.”
“There’s a favor I want to ask you. Do you have a minute?” I asked.
“Yeah. Come over here.” Rudith showed me to a bench a short distance from the training grounds. The bench was next to a flower bed that held a few different flowers and a bunch of herbs, perhaps used to supplement the knights’ diet. “So, what’s up? If you’re meeting me down here, it’s got to be something you can’t bring up at home.”
So he saw right through me. Despite being a gym bro type, Rudith—just like my father—possessed a keen intuition that shone especially during battle. He was extremely reckless but also very popular with his men. And too good of a brother for the likes of me.
“I wanted to ask you about a dungeon,” I began.
“Oh, a dungeon! Sounds great. Are we leaving now?”
“No, we’re not going now...” I said. How can he be this spontaneous?
“I felt like you’d want to go right away.”
“No!” What kind of adventurer does everyone think I am? Resisting the urge to ask the question out loud, I explained to Rudith how we were preparing for Holy Maiden’s Trial and who else would be going with us.
Once I was done, Rudith let out an obnoxiously loud sigh, which was strange. I’d expected him to be on cloud nine. “I’m worried about you, little sister...” he said. I gave no response. “But of course I’ll go. Taking on a brand-new dungeon? That’s the kind of stuff I live for!”
“I’m glad you’re fired up about it, but can you make the time?” I asked, relieved that Rudith was at least enthusiastic to go. I had to double-check that he could make his schedule work, though, since he must have asked for a lot of days off to come look for me in Zille.
“Velklet can handle it,” Rudith said.
“You can’t keep doing that...” I scolded him, concerned for Velklet, who also happened to be Anne Marie’s older brother. Those two were always taking care of us. Still, we couldn’t really afford to lose Rudith from the party, so we’d have to owe Velklet a big one.
“I know. If we’re going to warm up, why don’t we go to Bug Park?” Rudith suggested. Bug Park was a dungeon close to Blume. It was home to bug monsters and safe enough for even relatively green adventurers. “What, you don’t want to?” Rudith asked when I hesitated.
“It’s not that I don’t want to... I thought maybe we could go to the Labyrinth of Flowers. Monsters there can drop tasty honey, so Lulu will be happy about that,” I said.
“Just for the food?” Rudith laughed for a bit before his expression sobered and his voice lowered. “That’s easier said than done. Labyrinth of Flowers has barely been mapped because of its confusing layout, and its monsters are powerful. I wouldn’t consider it a warm-up dungeon by any means...but if you know that its monsters drop honey, you know more about it than I do.”
I could only laugh. As Rudith suspected, I knew the dungeon well. I remembered the correct path through the labyrinth clearly, and I was actually planning to defeat the dungeon boss in search of its honey.
Rudith blew out a breath. “Well, if you say we can do it, I’m sure we can. I’ve been wanting to clear Labyrinth of Flowers anyway. Let’s do this!”
“Okay!”
So, we settled on warming up in Labyrinth of Flowers before we tackled the trial.