854 C-7, Sun Month 4, Moon 18
I hobbled my way over to the monastery’s stone garden—the place where I’d be meeting Soreya—after an incredibly filling meal. It seemed that she’d gotten here before me because she was already sitting on a stone bench, gazing at the moon.
“Hey,” I called out.
She turned her head toward me and smiled. “Hey. What took you so long?”
“You can’t tell me that you’re not being weighed down by that huge meal.”
“What can I say? I have a fast metabolism.” She shrugged.
“Yeah, right...” I sighed, sitting next to her.
We stared up at the moon in silence for a bit with the soft sounds of the leaves rustling in the wind as our background music. But after a little bit, she finally spoke up.
“Change of plans. Let’s go for a walk, yeah? There’s somewhere I wanna show you,” she said.
I nodded in agreement, but as she was about to lead the way, she stopped and turned around. “This goes without saying, but we’re leaving the monastery, so we gotta be quiet, okay?”
“Okay... But are you sure about that?” If we’re caught, I can’t even imagine what kind of punishment Master Crayne’s gonna put us through.
“Yeah. Promise it’ll be worth it.” She grinned.
So, we slipped out through the side of the monastery and went down a steep hill covered by a thick forest. When we made it far enough away, we finally felt safe to talk again.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“I told you. There’s somewhere I wanna show you. Don’t you trust me?”
“Of course! It’s just that...” I glanced back at the monastery.
“Don’t worry! Even if Master Crayne finds out, we’ll just apologize and maybe have to run some laps. No big deal. Or what? Are you worried about your safety?”
“No, of course not. Not with you here. There isn’t anyone out there stronger than you, or at least on this mountain. That’s for sure.”
“Aw, thanks for the vote of confidence. But hey, don’t sell yourself short. You’re stronger than you think.”
“Only you think that...”
“Yeah? And if I think it, it must be true,” she quickly quipped. “Seriously, you gotta get outta your own head, at least on your birthday,” she sighed.
“Yeah, yeah. Hesitation and all that.”
“Exactly. Once you conquer that, you’ll see just how strong you are.”
“Sheesh, did you really wanna go somewhere, or was this all just one big ruse to lecture me?”
“Can’t it be both?” she asked, giggling. “But yeah, point taken. Enough with the lectures. Full speed ahead!”
After reaching the bottom of the hill, we continued walking through the forest for what felt like ages until we reached a cave.
“We just need to go through here,” she said, beginning to enter.
“Wait. Will we have time to get back before morning?”
“Uh...probably? Eh, we’ll be okay!”
“I’m really starting to think that we won’t be...”
“Don’t be such a worrywart! Come on; we’re almost there. We just have to go straight through this cave. Put your hand on the side of the cave and follow it,” she said, beckoning me inside.
“Okay...”
Ever since we’d been little, she’d forced me into a lot of precarious and dangerous situations, so honestly, her dragging me to a cave in the middle of the night wasn’t anything I was too surprised by. Yeah, no. This is completely on-brand for her.
The cave was pitch-black, so I kept stumbling over uneven pathing and unexpected rocks. From the sounds of things, Soreya wasn’t having problems at all though. All I heard were her steady footsteps echoing against the damp walls of the cave. But after a little bit, I began hearing something else.
“Is that...a waterfall?” I asked.
“We’re almost there,” she said, not answering my question.
Not too long later, I saw a dim light filtering in ahead through a curtain of what looked like vines. She pulled them back, letting the moonlight in. My eyes had gotten so used to the dark that I winced a little as I exited.
In the next moment, I was greeted by an amazing sight. It was as if we’d reached an oasis. A waterfall flowed into a large basin of water, and then in the middle of it was a green spot of land decorated with flowers and a circular patch of dirt in the middle.
I stared at it all in awe, drinking it in.
But Soreya’s giggle broke me out of my trance. “Yeah, I had the same reaction when I first found it.”
“How did you...?”
“On a night like this, I woke up from a dream, and then it was like I was called here. I’m not sure why, but I followed the voice and ended up here.”
“By voice do you— Huh? Like the Blade Saint’s voice? Or maybe a Celestial’s?!” I asked excitedly.
She shook her head. “I have no clue. I say ‘voice’ but it’s not like it was literally speaking to me. It was kind of like...an instinct? I’m not sure how to describe it. But after some research, I found out that this is actually the place where the first Blade Saint came to meditate. Can you feel it?” she asked.
I wanted to say “Of course not. I’m not the Blade Saint,” but truth was, even if I wasn’t, I could tell that the aura here was different. I silently nodded, still absorbing my surroundings.
“Come on!” She pulled me by the hand to a small land bridge on the other side of the area, which we used to reach the island in the middle.
When we reached there, she got on both of her knees and faced the waterfall. I stared at her for a bit before she glanced up and indicated with her head that I should do the same.
“We’re gonna meditate here for a bit,” she declared as I knelt too. “I think it’s gonna really come in handy for the future.”
“Like for training?”
“Not...exactly.”
A frown spread across her face, and she seemed like she was having difficulty getting the next words out of her mouth.
“Can I ask you something?” she asked.
Her usual confidence was lacking, giving me pause, but I cautiously nodded, encouraging her to continue.
“Do you...resent me at all?”
My eyes widened. “Huh? R-Resent you? Why would I ever—”
She held up her hand as if to stop me from saying any more. “I’ve been reflecting a lot over the years. I know this is selfish, but listen to what I have to say until the very end, okay? No interrupting.”
I nodded, keeping my mouth shut.
She then took a deep breath before continuing. “Well, so, I can’t stop thinking about how I stole you from the only home you knew. Look, you don’t have to tell me how horrible your parents were. Even now, it feels wrong to call them ‘parents’; those monsters don’t deserve the privilege to call themselves that. But still, it didn’t mean that I had the right to whisk you away from them because you still might’ve had some kind of future with them. But at the monastery, you have no real future if you’re not the Blade Saint. You could train all these years only to, one day, be told that it was all for nothing. By then, it might be too late to change your life and choose a different path. After all, everything you’ve lived for here has been for becoming the Blade Saint. I...I’m scared that I’ve forced you down a path you didn’t even want, and now that you’re on it, you can’t get away from it.”
I looked at Soreya, my best friend, as she sat there, her head hung, tightly gripping her hands in nervousness and frustration. But I’d promised not to say anything until she was done, so all I could do was earnestly listen.
“I don’t want to keep forcing you down a path you didn’t want to go down in the first place. It might not seem that way to you, but I stole your future, and...I don’t want to do that anymore. I want the next choice to be yours, so that’s why I want to know how you feel.” She looked straight into my eyes, the moonlight making her moist eyes glisten.
“Soreya, I haven’t resented you once. How could I? Without you, I don’t even know if I’d be alive today. The only reason I’ve been able to come this far is you. That’s why I’ll say it one more time: no; I’ll say it as many times as you need me to—I don’t resent you. You’re my everything, Soreya. Wherever you go, I want to be right there with you.”
I could see the whites of her eyes widen, but in the next moment, she looked away, hiding her face from me. “O-Oh, I see. Heh heh. Okay, so that’s how it is... Heh heh.” Then she let out a long exhale, as if trying to reset her mind, before taking several deep breaths. But after she did that enough times, finally, it seemed like she’d made up her mind about something. “So, actually, Master Crayne told me today after we ran those laps that I’m going to be officially named as the Blade Saint.”
My eyes widened, and my gaze flung to her, a mixture of joy and bitterness filled it.
“That’s great!”
The only emotion in my mind was excitement. It’d been a long time coming, and I was so glad to see her finally being named as the Blade Saint.
“Yeah. Two Guardians will be coming in the morning to verify me as the Blade Saint, and then they’ll be taking me to Saint Aliriheim Academy the same day.”
“Wow...that soon?” Excitement and disappointment battled each other in my head. It’s about time! But also...does that mean I won’t be able to see her anymore? Is this our last night together?