房客(糙汉)何璐程曜坤

"Ah...! I... I'm sorry."

The light-blue-haired man gasped in shock, and his expression changed immediately over to embarrassed and remorseful as he apologized.

"But while we are on the subject of reckless decisions... I am pretty sure that I saw some light-blue lines appear on your hands... dad, you were going to jump right in to help me even though you thought I was incredibly stupid, weren't you?"

Zoemi breathed out in relief, and directed their conversation in another direction, giving the light-blue-hiared man a nudge to the side.

-----

"[Hello? Zoemi? There unfortunately might be some coming after your life. They will most likely try to get you whenever you will stay for the night, or even right after it will get dark.]"

Mizoe and Zoemi were on their way to the Perserios territory – despite the initial aversion to the idea, the light-blue-haired ice magician ended up agreeing to follow Miiette's idea – and the soft pressure brushing against the black-haired boy's mind was followed by a rather worrisome message.

"|I thought as much too, although it's nice knowing that we still have a few hours of peace.|"

Zoemi didn't let Mizoe notice that he was having a conversation with the daughter of the Espine family and even bit his lips to not let out even a peep – accidentally or not.

"|...are you in trouble...?|"

He added clenching his fists on the very edge of the shadow while lowering his head.

"[Not at all, but you, Mioze, and whoever you two are associated with are – mainly the Auequas family will be receiving some heat. Not that you should care about that.]"

Miriette snickered, and nothing in her voice suggested that her words were anything but the truth.

"|As long as they will not try to mess with the Tallaran family. Dad and I kind of have our home there now.|"

Just as Miriette assumed, Zoemi could not care less for the state of the Auequas family as it was now... although as he was thinking that rather dark thought, he was reminded that Arreta wasn't a bad person at all, on the contrary, she was quite innocent and naive, and only following the whims of the main family...

"[Tallaran territory...? Well, if the memory serves me right and the events will play as they did in the previous timeline, it will be safe for two or three years but after that...]"

"|Miri. Veo, and Teo live there. Although their names are Leveo and Teofee. Teofee seems to be having flashbacks to the past timeline.|"

Miriette didn't have access to Zoemi's every thought so she only focused on his words, taking interest in one particular part – the part that Zoemi was more than happy to reveal to her.

"[...! I guess that I must make sure to keep the Tallaran territory safe too then.]"

"..."

Miriette's voice tensed up for just a split second, she also put a little too much pressure on the word 'too' which instantly got Zoemi's attention – but even so, the boy remained silent.

"[Once I will arrange for you to become my full-fledged attendant, I will make sure to visit there a lot. Teofee Tallaran, eh... it suits her.]"

Miriette's voice became much gentler as she thought of the first person besides Zoemi and Horeo whom she befriended. An actual female friend that she made on her own without being approached first.

"[...tsk... I need to end. I will bother you later, my knight. I love you.]"

"|Take care.|"

Without any warning, Miriette clicked her tongue and ended the connection of the message spell before Zoemi properly said his already short farewell.

The black-haired boy stopped biting his lips and instead closed his eyes and began focusing on meditation – as he was now, he was nothing but a burden on Miriette who was surrounded by some of the most powerful mages in the kingdom. He had to get much, much stronger, and as fast as possible too.

A few hours later it was already getting dark and there was no sign of any city, town, or even a village on their way, which meant that they would have to camp outside.

Both Mizoe and Zoemi had a talk about potential threats that could come their way – the black-haired boy outright admitted that he received a message spell from Miriette informing him of the attack that was coming their way – so seeing the setting sun had made them both wary.

The light-blue-haired man was looking around, both for the best place to set the camp and the most plausible place for the hired thugs to wait for them.

The attack could come from anywhere really, judging by the complete lack of human settlements in the area, the pursuers should be coming literally after them – from the direction of the city that they left...

...but at the same time, despite not being spoken out loud, no one would be surprised if a high noble family like Victureo had some hidden forces here and there – and contacting them with a message spell could not be easier...

"...the person following us on the horseback increased their speed, they should catch up to us in a few minutes..."

Said Zoemi, who was sharpening his already great hearing with the augmentation of the second star level of the law of Sagittarius.

"Then we might as well just stop here and set out our camp."

The light-blue-haired man nodded and pulled the horse off the road before dismounting it and helping Zoemi down.

"...oh... they slowed down..."

Zoemi twitched and furrowed his brows when he realized that the speed of the other traveler seemed to be directly linked to their own.

"I see... the chances that they are just a random traveler on their own way are disappearing as we speak."

Mizoe sighed putting one hand on the hilt of his sword, which caused it to become frosted over with a thin layer of scruffy ice.

Zoemi didn't respond to that verbally, but he nodded – it still could be someone unrelated, but the tactic of bandits sending in a spy to decrease the cautiousness level of the group they were about to ambush was as old as time.