房客(糙汉)何璐程曜坤

"...found you..."

"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGHHHHHHHH...!"

"!!!"

A calm voice was followed by a bloodcurdling scream that successfully stopped Rokiana from patronizing Zoemi.

"Wh-what is going on...?"

The blue-haired girl asked, taking a step back while shivering from the cold – before she noticed the temperature drop enough for her breath to become visible as a puff of steam.

"Who knows? It might be that my dad is learning about the motivation pushing those people to attack us... but it also just sounds like he is hunting them down."

The black-haired boy shrugged his shoulders before smiling.

"It's hard to believe that dad has only as much mana as an average earth magician, don't you agree, miss Rokiana?"

"How do you know my name?!"

Zoemi snickered, straightening his back and raising his head proudly, causing the blue-haired girl to tens up and point her saber at him.

"..."

Zoemi looked at the trembling tip of the blade and then slowly looked up at the girl who was gradually losing her composure.

"I heard you giving yourself a motivational speech earlier."

The boy pointed out while tapping one of his ears with his index finger.

"Law of Sagittarius enhances the body with star energy. At the early star levels at least. My other senses get heightened too but my naturally good hearing gets the greatest boost... Oh...?"

Zoemi added before his brows shot up and he turned in the opposite direction that the girl arrived from.

"I wonder if dad got both the light and fire magicians?"

"There was a light magician here too?!"

The boy wondered as his smile turned more sinister, causing the blue-haired girl to gasp in shock.

"Of course. How else do you expect a group from the city we left behind suddenly ended up in front of us? Although... there is a big chance that they were just transported in and the light magician dropped out, not wanting to be a part of what was going to happen... that sounds like a more plausible answer, now that I think of it. If they were still here, they would either pick us all from a safe distance or at least illuminate the area giving their comrades a chance for survival."

Zoemi nodded in response and a wide smile never left his face, even when he came to a realization.

*rustle*

As he went silent, the sounds of hurried footsteps, the rustling of the frosted plant life, and heavy spasmatic breathing became loud enough for Rokiana to pick on it too.

"Hiiii...!"

A few seconds later a roughed-up red-haired man emerged from the bushes and let out a muffled scream when seeing the black-haired boy.

The man holding his side seemed to be charred by the fire...

...and he seemed to be crying too...

"H-huh...?!"

But then he realized that the boy had a saber pointed at him, and his eyes widened with hope as he looked over to the person wielding the weapon just to be confused seeing the blue-haired teenage girl.

"M-miss...! wh-where is the rest of your group?! We need to get help! There is a vicious murderer on the loose and...!"

"Wow, you used one of your spells against yourself to get rid of the ice? You are quite clever, aren't you?"

The fire magician gasped, biting onto his pale lips that were slowly turning blue and waving a hand that was missing three fingers – but his hushed words got interrupted by Zoemi's whistle of admiration.

"Good idea, but you should have used at least a fireball. Enflame and ember can deal with my dad's ice on the outside, but just as it is with humans – it's the inside that counts~"

Zoemi applauded the magician's ingenuity, but then hummed in amusement and shook his head at the half-assed attempt.

"Wh-what do you m-mean...?!"

The fire magician asked, petrified with fear, stuttering as his body continued to be shaken by more intense shivers as his skin was turning more and more blue.

"I mean that you had a chance of survival right after you got wounded, but because you were too afraid of hurting yourself with your own fire, you will die now."

"...!"

Zoemi explained calmly, causing both the wounded fire magician and the young water magician to stare at him in shock.

"You... YOU...! FIREBA...!"

As expected, the red-haired man desperate to keep his life was not going to accept his fate – he became enraged and raised his voice, pointing his hand at the calm child and howling an incantation of the spell...

*stab* *stab*

"...hurgh...!"

...but got interrupted, pierced from behind by the ice-cold shortsword, and...

"...you were with them too...?"

The fire magician gasped, turning his head a bit...

...and from the front by the saber wielded by the blue-haired girl...

*haaaaaaa*

*thump*

The fire mana already coiling in the man's palm dissipated, releasing the sound of a person breathing out in relief, and the fire magician fell to the side, and his glossy unseeing eyes reflected the night sky visible from behind the branches...

"Eh...? EH?! Why did I do that?!"

The sound of the body hitting the frosted ground made Rokiana shake her head and step back, gasping in shock at her own action she apparently performed subconsciously.

"Why indeed."

The light-blue-haired man who appeared after the fire magician had toppled over nodded, keenly observing the blue-haired girl's movement.

"..."

Under the cold glare of the light-blue-haired man, Rokiana clenched her fists and took a deep breath.

"M-my name is Rokiana Grea Perserios. The eldest daughter of the Perserios territory. Originally I wanted to participate in the knight training in the Victureo territory so that my father would not try to stop me, but after what happened and was said there, I decided to return home and talk things out with him. And since you two appeared to be going there too, I wanted to suggest that we could travel together. It's safer to travel in a group..."

Without being directly asked for it this time, the blue-haired girl introduced herself and even gave her motivation for following and approaching Mizoe and Zoemi earlier.

"..."

"...I understand. Let's go back to the horses..."

Mizoe exchanged glances with Zoemi and then nodded, shaking off the blood from his sword and sheathing it.

"Are... are we not going to bury them before we return to the camp...?"

Rokaina asked timidly as the two passed her without acknowledging the corpses in their immediate vicinity – not to mention the others that must have been in the area too.

"The person who got them all here might show up here at any moment – and with reinforcements too - we need to get away from here. No camp, no sleep. Understand?"

"Y-yes, sir!"

Mizoe merely shook his head and commanded, causing Rokiana to respond affirmatively out of habit.

The duo-turned-trio returned to their camp and gathered their stuff n a hurry before saddling the horses and rushing the dark road.

"How many thugs were there in total?"

"Only seven including the fire magician leading them, no surprises, all dead now."

"...!"

Zoemi asked his father, and Mizoe responded with a shrug, making Rokiana who was listening in from behind flinch and go wide-eyed.

"...how come an ice-magician with as much mana as an average earth magician can be this strong...?"

She mumbled to herself not expecting to be answered at all.

"It's because dad is ridiculously dedicated and stubborn."

"...!"

Still, Zoemi did hear her clearly and leaned from behind his father's torso and snickered right into Rokiana's face.