Book 2. The Grand Gathering. Chapter 11. The Banquet. (Part III)

“If you are done, how about suppressing your killing intent already?” Rudford said sourly, seeing what kind of effect the two brothers were having on the children.

“I’m not releasing it on purpose, you know?” Einrah retorted with a smile, as always trying to get on Rudford’s nerves.

“How could I not know?” Rudford snorted angrily. “You can suppress it if you want to though, so I’d appreciate it if you did,” he said sternly, not in the mood for a pointless argument about nothing.

“So edgy,” Einrah shook his head with a smirk on his face, but since they weren’t here to compete with Rudford for once, he refrained from irritating him further and suppressed his aura.

Watching his elder brother have so much fun while bickering with Rudford, Ninrah smiled to himself. He had been releasing his aura just like Einrah since his elder brother had insisted, but now he withdrew it too and then glanced at Anatis right afterward. “How have you been?” he asked simply, not sure how else he should formulate such a question to his son.

“It’s been… good, I guess,” Anatis said in a rather stiff, awkward manner. He didn’t harbor hateful feelings towards Ninrah, but since Ninrah had never intervened to help him when Einrah was making his life a living hell, he couldn’t quite bring himself to like him either.

“That boy of Rudford’s, do you like him?” Ninrah followed up with a question, not wanting his conversation with Anatis to end after one brief exchange.

Anatis followed Ninrah’s gaze and glanced at Laien. When he thought about the question itself, he couldn’t not smile a little. Really, Laien must have teased him way too much for him to briefly wonder if Ninrah didn’t possibly mean the ‘like’ as in a romantic sense.

“I do. it’s fun being with him, though he’s quite a handful,” Anatis said with a light chuckle. He could never have imagined that he would get along with someone like Laien, but life was full of surprises of which not all needed to be all that bad.

“Ho,” Ninrah raised his eyebrows a little and nodded contentedly. He has always had trouble understanding what his son was so secretly displeased about as to always look unhappy, even when he smiled, but now… he could tell that the smile on Anatis’s face was genuine.

“It looks like it hadn’t been a mistake to help Rudford convince elder brother to agree to some kind of compromise,” Ninrah thought to himself, hoping that the boys would have no trouble realizing the requirements of the deal they were about to be faced with.

“Rudford, you gonna tell them or should I do it?” Ninrah spoke up, his opinion being the sooner they got over with the most important things the better.

“I will,” Rudford replied without a second thought. “Anatis, right? Come here for a bit,” he gestured with his hand, eyeing the golden-haired blue-eyed youth just like Einrah did Laien a brief while ago.

Despite feeling somewhat intimidated by Rudford’s presence, Anatis exchanged a quick glance with Nila and walked up to the three; to Laien, Rudford and Einrah.

“Mm.” Rudford smiled. “The three of us have come to an agreement and we are going to fully support you in the path you decided to take, but we have one condition you will need to fulfill if you want to keep things as they are,” he said with a slight smug, then quickly got straight to the business.

“In short, we want you to take two top spots in the Grand Tournament. If you do, you will be allowed to do as you like as you will enjoy our full support,” he revealed casually but then, added more seriously. “However, if you don’t… you will both be staying under Einrah’s care and be trained by him for the next four years.”

After Rudford finished speaking, the two boys showed two entirely different reactions. In Anatis’s case, he came to worry about dragging Laien into his mess as he could already imagine how terrible the four years under Einrah’s personal care would be, but as for Laien… he chortled and smirked confidently.

“As long as we are on the opposite sides of the tournament bracket, it won’t be anything hard to achieve,” Laien said cheekily, his brave and confident statement causing many of those who were listening to the ongoing conversation to drop their jaws in a flabbergasted and frustrated manner.

Looking at Laien, Einrah first chortled with a bright smile on his face, then laughed out loud while holding his hand on his forehead. “Rudford, I never thought I would say so, but your disciple is starting to make me jealous!” he praised with a laugh, wondering why despite his best efforts his nephew still remained such a wimp without a proper backbone.

Rudford shook his head and tried to keep his cool, but couldn’t hide the fact that having Laien praised by his old rival made him feel incredibly happy and proud.

“So we’ve got Rudford’s kid’s agreement, what about you?” Einrah questioned Anatis, truthfully expecting him to chicken out… but when he noticed the expression on the boy’s face and the look in his eyes, he began feeling some hope for this nephew of his.

“I’m definitely not returning there, so we’re going to win,” Anatis said strongly, looking Einrah straight in the eye and not backing off by even an inch.

“May the Gods be praised!” Einrah called out with a smirk and raised his hands to the heavens in a joking manner. “My nephew finally grew some balls!” he added through a laughter, resulting in everybody but his little brother and the Grand Elder of his school staring at him in confusion.

“Um, Master Einrah…?” Laien spoke up as the first one, thinking that the image of Einrah he had gotten from Anatis’s story not matching up at all to what he was seeing.

“Drop the formalities and call me by my name, boy,” Einrah said casually, then proceeded to ignore the Grand Elder Huan who started coughing heavily as he apparently choked on his own saliva due to the shock he just received.

“So, let me ask you… you don’t seem to be all that bad of a person as stories make you out to be, but you hate Anatis… why?” Laien asked without mincing his words or minding the place, simply feeling that right now was the best moment to make everything clear.

Well, although Laien thought so and was unconcerned enough to bring up such a subject in public, Anatis and Nila literally froze the moment he asked this question. Sinra, Injar, Rudford and everyone else from the Red Dragon School’s side frowned, while the many Royal Children began listening with curiosity.

One might have thought that Einrah would be angered by Laien’s question… but both he and his brother appeared to be rather composed and just like Laien, couldn’t care less about the subject being discussed in front of everyone.

“What are you talking about?” Einrah asked patiently, not dismissing the whole thing only because he came to hold Laien in high regard. “Can you mean how I ordered Elders of my branch to pay him special attention to polish him up properly?” he guessed, not being a clueless person himself. Since Laien was mentioning something like this, he could only assume it was about that.

“Polish up… well, pretty much about that? I had a chance to see how his senior disciples treated him and it wasn’t anything pleasant,” Laien mentioned, beginning to wonder if the story told him by Anatis wasn’t a bit too one-sided.

“Hmph,” Einrah snorted and after giving Anatis a disappointed look, returned his attention to Laien. “If you were in his place, what would you have done?” he asked instead of trying to explain himself.

Laien wondered for a moment with a thoughtful expression on his face. Although Anatis didn’t like to talk about it, he still heard a few stories about his life in the Twin Phoenix School from him and to be honest, could relate it to his own past situation in the Valius family. If he were to be placed in Anatis’s shoes, with Siana taking Nila’s place…

“If they wouldn’t leave me alone either way, I would fight them, grow stronger and pay them back for what they did one day,” Laien replied, his body leaking a slight murderous aura. “Your school has a rule that you can’t kill or cripple your fellow disciples, after all. I don’t think I would be able to hold it in like Anatis and wait until I’m strong enough to repay all debts at once,” he answered according to his own feelings, without pretending to be someone he wasn’t.

“Ho?” Einrah seemed to be honestly surprised by what he was hearing; not by what Laien would have done as he very much expected the boy to live up to his expectations, but to learn that Anatis had actually been planning to fight!

So far, everything the Elders and Core Disciples were telling him was that Anatis never fought or even talked back and was taking all the bullying and beating without a word of complaint. It had been five years already, but Anatis failed to fight off even the disciples Einrah knew he was capable of beating, so he was beginning to think that this nephew of his was a lost cause… however, Laien’s words brought back some of Einrah’s faith in Anatis’s potential.

“If you were planning to fight back at once point, then why didn’t resist at all when you were being beaten up by your seniors?” Einrah questioned Anatis, his voice carrying more surprise than anything else. “Dear gods, I’ve been waiting for you to start acting like a man, but you went about it in such a roundabout way?” he asked helplessly.

Admittedly, he had failed to consider that Anatis could have been biding his time and waiting until he grows strong enough to fight back not only against his current prosecutors, but even their seniors and Elders, perhaps even him. Yet, given that Anatis refused to have any contact with him whatsoever, how could he even have had a chance to learn how the boy truly felt?

“I wish you had told me sooner, what a waste of time!” Einrah groaned and sighed heavily. “I would have started training you personally so long ago, eh!” he complained resignedly, thinking that it would be nice if Anatis was stronger and not just on par with Rudford’s disciple.

“Told you…?!” Nila asked through her teeth, having finally snapped. “You murdered his whole family! You killed his mother before his own eyes and you ‘wish he had told you’?!” she roared furiously with complete abandon for her own life and safety, making everyone in the great hall hold their breaths in anticipation for what was going to happen next.

Rudford, Roderick, Vatras and Injar all readied themselves to intervene just in case, however, Einrah reacted very differently than they expected him to.

“What a joke,” Einrah snorted disdainfully. “I admit I let my emotions get better of me at the end and accidentally killed that woman, but you are trusting the stories of me being a ruthless murderer too much,” he said and snorted once again while looking at Nila coldly.

“You think I eradicated his family for no reason? Hah, I shouldn’t really be surprised; he also refused to listen to anything I wanted to tell him and had only attacked me again in his rage, then later on never cared to talk with me,” Einrah explained with a sigh, even though just recalling those events from five years ago was making him really aggravated.

“You want to know what really happened, missy? I will tell you,” he said somewhat angrily. “And since you’re here too, listen well,” he added and gave Anatis a bitter look.

“Your so-called ‘father’ had charged into the main mansion of the Cioze family and started spewing accusations of rape towards my little brother, then when the Elder of my school who was at the place got into an argument with him about it, your father killed both the man and his disciple who was with him!” Einrah began speaking in a fairly calm manner, but with each word grew angrier and angrier and ended up nearly shouting in rage, before taking a deep breath and continuing what he was saying.

“When I arrived, he was already stirring up all the powerful families in Buare City to throw my school out and ban it from recruiting disciples from the province all the while calling for my little brother to be ‘confronted with justice’.” Einrah laughed helplessly, trying to cope with and suppress the urge to destroy something in the vicinity.

He only didn’t stomp his feet to relieve some of his stress because he knew it would result in the whole wooden stage collapsing.

“Do you think I was obliged to listen to him calmly and let him spit in my face? Since he was refusing to listen to what I was saying, I killed him and all those who dared to support his ridiculous claims!” Einrah stated with a snort, his aura and killing intent beginning to leak from his body again.

“Then, to get the future problems rooted out, I ordered his family to be wiped out and you and your mother to be brought to me,” he said unapologetically, having had experienced first-hand what the consequences of leaving unsettled grudges alone were.

“Perhaps I should have held back when your mother told me she’d rather kill you and herself than to let her son live with murderers, but when she roused her Qi and was about to attack you, I failed to restrain myself and killed her on the spot,” he said with a bitter sigh and closed his eyes for a few seconds to calm down, then opened them and looked at Anatis, waiting for the boy to say something.

“You… no…” Anatis shook his head slowly as he started at Einrah blankly; he refused to believe what Einrah was saying, he kept telling himself that even if there was some truth in his words, there was no justification for murdering all people of his family, but… if what Einrah was telling him was true… then everything else…

“No, it can’t be…! You are lying…!” Anatis lashed out in a breaking voice, refusing to believe that his own mother could have attempted to kill him. He was unable to accept that the torture and suffering which he had been going through the past five years… which Nila decided to share just to support him was nothing… but his own fault!

There was no way he could accept something like that was true! There was no way that he could have made everything normal if he just had talked with Einrah…! Or even with Ninrah…!

Why… why?!

Why was Einrah telling him something like this? Couldn’t he have told him that he hates him and wants to see him suffer? At least that way, everything would have been so much easier to accept...!

“Hmph, why would I need to lie to you?” Einrah snorted, but as he looked at Anatis there appeared an unlike-him hint of care and sympathy deep in his eyes. He might be one to act heartless to other people, but he would never hurt somebody who shared the same blood in his veins.

After Einrah asked his question, Anatis didn’t respond at all. He lowered his head and stared at the ground, his body trembling ever so slightly.

The moment the two stopped speaking, the whole great hall fell into a complete silence. No one felt appropriate to interrupt it, some in respect of the subject, others in fear of Einrah’s anger shifting towards them.

The long seconds passed during which only breaths and occasional rustling of someone’s clothing could be heard.

“… Why didn’t either of you explain it to him sooner?” Laien asked, breaking the prolonging silence. He glanced at Ninrah, then looked at Einrah as he anticipated the answer.

“I told you, he refused to talk with me,” Einrah shrugged his shoulders. “If he won’t listen, I won’t be dragging him and shouting into his ears by force,” he added stubbornly.

“He just didn’t want to listen,” Ninrah said with a sigh. “I tried telling him that elder brother must have had his reasons, but he would always shut the conversation immediately and stop listening when I touched upon this subject,” he explained and sighed a second time.

Laien groaned quietly and scratched the back of his head. He didn’t feel as if these two brothers were lying, but it was just his gut feeling; he couldn’t tell for sure. There, of course, existed the possibility of having Anatis speak with the people of the Cioze family who had been directly involved in those events, but whether Anatis would even consider doing that was entirely up to him.

Suppressing a sigh, Laien took a look at Anatis, but his friend appeared to have shut himself down completely. Feeling bad for Anatis, Laien stepped closer and hugged him with his arm… however, he ended up being pushed away almost instantly.

“Well…” Laien revealed a slight, helpless smile. “I know it’s hard, but why don’t you try thinking about it calmly?” he said simply, hoping that Anatis won’t get too frustrated by his words.

Anatis clenched his fists, then raised his head and looked at Laien. He had gotten to know Laien all too well during the past week, so he knew that Laien wasn’t speaking empty words; he really knew how despair, anger and hopelessness felt. Thus, he had no choice but to listen to him and try to calm down as much as possible.

“I need some time alone,” Anatis said weakly and forced out a smile in thanks. Without waiting for anyone to say anything else, he began walking away but got halted right afterward.

“Wait a second,” Rudford said as Anatis was about to walk away. “There’s something important I wanted to talk with you all about,” he explained, but he wasn’t quite sure how he should ask Anatis to stay longer when the boy was in such a poor state.

Recognizing the problem, Laien walked up to Anatis and spoke up with a slight smile. “Elder brother wouldn’t be asking if it wasn’t important and either way, it will let you think about something else for now, so how about we go together?” he asked and extended his hand to Anatis, smiling with just a little hint of playfulness.

Anatis wavered momentarily, but when he saw the very familiar look on Laien’s face, which undoubtedly was connected to the fact that Laien was reaching out to him with his hand, he couldn’t help but smile a little. “Don’t expect me to be talking much though, okay?” he said with a weak laugh and grabbed Laien’s hand, holding onto it tightly.

Perhaps it was stupid of him to think like this, but Laien’s hand was really warm and it felt somehow… reassuring. Just holding it certainly made him feel much better than he did before.

“I guess that’s it for the banquet, so let’s get going,” Laien said with a little smirk as he glanced at Rudford, then started walking towards the exit with Anatis.

“Well, that’s it,” Rudford mused aloud and followed after the two youths, soon to be joined by everyone else from their camp, including Injar and Sinra and the three men of the Twin Phoenix School.

Seeing the whole group leaving just like that, Lamuel was startled and troubled. He wanted to call out and tell them to wait until at least the main ceremony was finished, but his voice got stuck in his throat. He couldn’t possibly demand of those powerful experts to stay when they didn’t want to, and surely not in the atmosphere which was left after the argument between that boy and his uncle.

“They really are unique people,” Eleonora said with a chuckle. “They didn’t care for a second if all of us are going to listen to their private affairs, just look at those flabbergasted expressions on Finella’s and Sauras’s faces! They are thoroughly speechless,” she laughed quietly and exchanged an amused glance with Anna.

“The main guests have already left, so let’s leave too,” Anna suggested, not feeling like playing along with the awkward game of Lamuel’s. She still remembered how he first began selecting his favorites when the early generation of Royal Children was all just that; children, but now this show had turned into a farce. As long as it was done relatively professionally, she could bear with it… but now, it would be a pure torture to watch whatever was going to happen next.

“Agreed,” Eleonora nodded and with Anna, Alex and the other two girls headed to the exit.

Noticing that, all the Royal Children who had allied themselves with Sinra began leaving and soon, even those who weren’t a part of his camp began vacating the great hall.

“It’s a good opportunity to put an end to this children’s game,” Sauras murmured somewhat loudly. Without giving it a second thought, he nodded at his uncle and left the place with his followers.

Lamuel didn’t bother to argue with either Suras or Finella when they chose to leave. After all, there was little point in having them speak about their representatives if almost everyone else had gone up and left.

“They really are no longer the kids they used to be,” Lamuel thought to himself. “It pains me to think how many of them are going to die in the coming years… it can’t be helped, though,” he released a heavy breath and just like everybody else had done, he left the great hall.

---

“What is it that you wanted to talk with us all, Rudford?” Injar asked along the way to one of the medium-sized private rooms in the building.

“The Secrets, or how the kids call them, the Aspects,” Rudford answered without making a big secret out of his intentions. He wasn’t worried about any of the guardians walking behind them listening either; just learning they were going to talk about a certain subject wouldn’t be of much value to those Royal Children.

“You want to share information with us?” Ninrah said in a questioning manner, finding it quite difficult to believe. Both they and their schools were old-time rivals and although it couldn’t be said that they hated each other, they certainly weren’t in any kind of friendly relationship either.

“Isn’t it quite obvious?” Rudford asked with a smile. “For good or bad, our kids became friends. It wouldn’t be fair if our old rivalries were to be an obstacle to them,” he said casually, considering this as something normal.

“You’ve grown so soft with age,” Einrah commented with a slight smirk, but judging from his expression, he wasn’t disagreeing with Rudford at all.

“We can enter this one,” Sinra said and pointed the group to a specific door amongst many others, through which they entered a medium-sized private meeting hall.