Chapter 7: An Absence and an Encounter
AMY had no idea where her feet were taking her, but before she knew it, she and Scott had already arrived at her brother’s waiting room.
More and more people had trickled into the waiting rooms to offer friends and family members words of encouragement, making the atmosphere even livelier than it had been before. But Amy didn’t see Harold anywhere in his waiting room.
“He’s not here?” Amy asked, slightly disappointed.
“Sorry, Amy. Hal’s out in the practice field,” explained Hal’s friend and party member Gilbert. His twin brother Nicholas stood right beside him.
“He’s just the type of guy that always needs to be moving around, you know? He told us he was getting bored during standby time.”
“Oh, dear… I should be the one apologizing for my brother, then.”
“Oh, no! There’s nothing you need to apologize for, Amy.”
Gilbert and Nicholas took turns thanking her for going out of her way to visit.
Visiting Harold might have been a fool’s errand, but Amy thought those two, always getting caught up in Harold’s whims, got the shorter end of the stick. Visitors were not allowed to enter the practice field. There wasn’t much she could do about seeing him if he wasn’t here in the first place.
However, she was worried about Harold’s tendency to lose track of time when he concentrated on something. This quirk of his had angered their mother many times in the past, both in this life and the last.
“I wonder if he’ll make it back in time for his match…” Amy wondered.
“He’s not training on his own, so he should be fine,” Gilbert assured her.
“That’s right! He’s got his chaperone with him,” said Nicholas.
The twins smiled with knowing looks, and Amy suddenly remembered that Harold wasn’t the only one missing from the waiting room—the party’s new addition was, too.
“Is the new party member with Harold?” asked Amy.
“Yep! She’s been helping him practice a new technique.”
“She keeps an eye on him to keep him from doing anything too crazy, and unlike Hal, she actually knows how to keep track of time. We can rest easy.”
“Oh gosh!” said Amy, putting a hand over her forehead. “That makes me feel kind of guilty…”
The adventurer who was supposed to join their party as a dual support-healer specialist was being forced to be Harold’s babysitter?!
“No, no, it’s fine! Yasmine enjoys it, too!”
“He’s right. They really make a good duo!”
“The new party member’s name is actually Yasmine?” Amy asked.
In Harold’s most recent letter—which had just been a map with some scribbled notes on it—he had written that he found “Yasumi.”
Amy thought that Harold had meant that he found someone who roughly matched the skill level of Yasumi, the name of the person he used to play with in his last life. But what on earth were the chances that person’s name was Yasmine?
Amy had never heard the name Yasmine before in Luducia, so she must have come from a foreign kingdom. But just as she had this thought, Gilbert and Nicholas shook their heads.
“Yasmine is just a nickname. Her real name is something else.”
“We don’t really know the whole story, but Hal started calling her that right when he met her, and Yasmine said it was fine.”
“What? Really?”
So he had given her that name because she was a support character, just like Yasumi in his past life, and Yasmine told him it was fine? Amy hung her head in shame, telepathically apologizing to Yasmine once more for her brother.
“We met her around the border of Dubhe…or was it by Salaiza?”
Both Dubhe and Salaiza were famous for being home to many magical beasts. Predictably, both locations attracted adventurers.
They explained that Yasmine had been hunting magical beasts there, but she wasn’t a permanent member of any party despite her amazing skill. She had been registered with the guild as a freelancer and was traveling with a party that had hired her when she encountered Harold’s party, who had come to the area to hunt.
“She was amazing, so we were sure she must’ve belonged to another party. But she didn’t.”
“Yeah. She’d gotten many offers for permanent positions, though.”
They explained that it had been around a year since Yasmine had become renowned as an extraordinarily talented temporary support party member. She never agreed to join a party on a permanent basis, even when offered exceptional terms, and had always remained temporary hired help.
Then Harold, totally enthralled by her skill, told them with sparkling eyes, “We’ve got to get her on our team!” and immediately started taking steps to do just that.
The twins gleefully explained to Amy that the guild members were shocked when they heard Yasmine had decided to join them as a regular party member—it even caused a bit of an uproar in the local area.
“I’m glad such an amazing person joined your party, but…why did she? She rejected everyone else, right?”
“Yes, well…” said Nicholas, looking far into the distance as if he had achieved enlightenment. “She just got caught up in Hal’s energy and inadvertently agreed.”
“That’s right!” said Gilbert, smiling and giving Amy a thumb’s up, clearly pleased with the end result.
“Hal…” Amy groaned.
Did he slide onto the floor and bow, prostrating himself and bombarding her with pleas? Or did he come right out and passionately tell her, “I won’t give up until you join my party!” The reality had probably been a little of both…
Either way, he’s so embarrassing…
Amy rubbed a finger between her eyebrows, where a wrinkle was trying to form, and grumbled for the umpteenth time, “I’m so sorry about my brother…”