Laile saw a small store across the road, it was just a normal store with a sign hanging upfront saying “Bookstore” and an open door welcoming whoever passes by. But Laile felt otherwise, at first glance nothing seems out of place but with more observation he noted that there was no one in the store. Maybe it could be accounted because the store look old and ragged so no one wanted to go inside, but its also not it!, one by one people just passes by the store not even sparing a simple glance in it. It felt as if it was non-existent, but there truly is one trait of the store that made it eerie, it was gloomy.. no gloomy is not the right word it was dark, there was nothing to be seen inside the store but a speck of darkness covering the windows but it did not stop there, the seemingly welcoming open door in front the store was full of darkness. Even though it’s currently noon and the streets are basking under the raging heats of the sun there was nothing to be seen inside the store, not even a speck of dust. He just stood there staring at the darkness covering the door, the darkness just like the abyss stretched out to nothingness and in that deep darkness was a voice, a voice calling out to him telling him to go inside the store. And before he knew it he was entrance by the unknown voice inside the store, he unknowingly lifted his left feet but before he could even take a single step another voice called out to him.

[ile.. Laile!!]

[Huh?]

Laile was confused, he then remembered the store and the voice. But before he could recover from his shock a sudden splitting pain penetrated his head.

[Arghhh!]

[Are you fine?]

Gen asked worryingly.

[What happened? I tried calling you out many times but you wouldn’t answer.]

Gen was a bit confused at first because Laile just suddenly stops walking and was facing a store across the road, he called him out a few times in futility but Laile would not answer. He became increasingly worried that something had happened to him.

[Ahh I’m fine, maybe I just ate something bad haha]

Laile scratch over his head while pretending that it was just nothing, he didn’t want his grandfather to worry about him so he chose to just avoid it.

[Okay as long as you’re fine]

The three of them hit back the road to Noel’s residence, Laile shot one last glance at the store and was bewildered. This time the store was different from before, the deep darkness covering the insides of the shop was gone, and unlike before there are small candle lights spread all over the shelves providing Laile a small glimpse inside the shop, but there was still none inside the shop, no customer nor storekeeper.

Gen glances at Laile to see if there was something wrong with him.

[It seems that he’s fine, I’m worrying at nothing.

Hmmm?]

Gen noticed a small crowd slowly gathering in the streets, intrigued he dove in the crowd. Seeing this Rei and Laile quickly followed suit.

Inside the crowd Gen saw two grey stallions with ropes around their bodies tucked on a carriage with a coachman in front guiding the stallions around, the carriage was quite normal in size but what set it different from others is it’s luxurious design. Covered with colorful flower patterns, gold edges and a emblem in the center, one can easily tell that the one inside the carriage is someone of a special status most likely a noble. But what confuses Gen is that he didn’t recognize the emblem on the carriage, it was a long sword vertically impaling a lion on its head.

(Is this the person Noel mentioned?)

He can’t help but recall of what Noel said yesterday.

(In a few days time a royal from another kingdom will come here, even though their intentions are still not known. It’s likely connected to the nearing festival in the empire.)

The founding festival of the Ranella Kingdom, held on the 24th day in the 13th month every year. This festival celebrates the day when Ranella was officially recognize as one of the Kingdoms in the entirety of the Arcanian continent.

Noel’s voice rang inside his mind for a while before glancing back at the carriage, he observed it’s surrounding clearly and carefully noted everything around it. He quickly took noticed on how lacking it’s security was, there are just 27 knights around guarding the carriage. Judging from the aura exuding from the knights he can easily tell how strong they are, the 8 in front of the carriage wearing gold armors are all Spell Swords and the rest of them wearing silver armors surrounding it are Apprentice Knights. Although it could be said that it’s a strong force to be reckoned… if it’s an ordinary noble that is, a force that a royal can command is not to be joked about. If a royal is traveling or visiting in another kingdom they would at least have 50 knight accompanying them, and those 50 would mostly contain Spell Swords and at most one to three Master class knights so Gen doubted that the inside the carriage was a royal, after all it’s very hard meeting a royal of a kingdom. Gen was just about to leave when

[Oi MOVE YOU PEASANT!!]

A knight shouted to a beggar in the street blocking their way

[You dare block the way of the third princess of Boreas Kingdom!!]

[Hi … hiiiii!]

The beggar tried to back off hearing the words of the knight but couldn’t do so because of her limping legs, the beggar struggled but in the end it was futile. The crowd around them were also startled for a short while. Who was that?? the third princess of the Boreas Kingdom!!, A royal from another Kingdom. There were shocked faces on the crowd but among them were are also confused faces, the sudden information struck them like a lightning and they couldn’t help but look at the carriage with eyes full of both judgement and fear. They didn’t care about the knight nor the beggar anymore, instead all focus was now centered at the carriage. Gen on the other hand had a mixed of shocked, confused, and partly getting intrigued. He didn’t really think that it was a princess from another kingdom, if not for the knight stating it out loud it would never cross to him. He also thought that it might just be a lie and they’re just pretending but he quickly shrugged the thought, after all no one would dare impersonate a royalty as openly as that. And to top if off it was a royalty from one of the three great kingdoms. He can’t help but reassess the carriage again.

[It seems that your courting death]

The knight lifted his hand preparing to hit the beggar when someone suddenly grabbed his wrist, caught off guard the knight quickly looked to the person grabbing his hand. A red haired man stood firmly in front of him tightly squeezing his hand, it was Rei.

Let’s go back for a few minutes.

Rei was just standing behind Gen observing the commotion happening when he suddenly heard the knight’s loud voice insulting the beggar, and this action of the knight made Rei’s blood boil, aristocrats are known to look down on poor and incapable peoples such as beggars and this trait of them are sometimes also present at their subjects such as their assistant or knights. Then he saw the knight lifting his left hand seemingly trying to hit the beggar, seeing this Rei snapped, he casted away his thoughts and just quickly ran and pushed out of the crowd to stop the knight’s hand from hitting the beggar without thinking about the possible consequences of his action. Laile was a bit startled seeing his big brother suddenly run off, he quickly tried to grab Rei and stop him but when he saw what was happening he backed off his hands.

Luckily Rei is on time and was able to stop the hand of the knight before it could hit the beggar, but as a result of his actions he incurred the knights anger.

[You, what do you think your doing?]

The knight glared at Rei while trying to break free from his grasp but to his shock his hand wouldn’t budge even a little, this caused the knight to be put in an awkward position. Rei on the other hand just stared at the knight with furrowed brows seemingly annoyed while tightly grasping the knight’s hand. Putting more strength in his hand the knight tried to release his hand one more time, and this time he succeeded on freeing his hand. After breaking free, the knight quickly put his hand on the hilt of his sword and unsheathed it, seeing this Rei back off a bit eyeing the knight trying to wait for his next action but….

[STOP!!!]

A loud voice gathered everyone’s attention and broke the tension created by the two, hearing this the knight reluctantly sheaths his sword back in his waist.

[We’re not here to cause trouble]

The voice was cold and domineering, it was unlike the normal voice you would hear from a lady.

[I apologize my lady]

The knight quickly got down on his knees apologizing for his actions

[Let’s go]

Again, the voice commanded the knights, the knight who caused trouble also got back on his horse. Then they just left without even batting an eye like nothing happened.

[Tsk. They didn’t even try to apologize]

Rei glanced on the carriage one more time before turning his back to face the beggar, then he saw the beggar kneeling in front of him thanking him for saving her. He quickly told the beggar to stand up and stop kneeling but the beggar still insisted on kneeling so he just got down and hugged her before going back to his grandpa and Laile, he was then met with the two smirking and giving him a thumbs up for what he did, seeing this he chuckled for a bit then said.

[Alright let’s go back to Grandpa Noel]