* * *

After feeding the hungry Lydon and Van, they headed back to the inn. Cadel was able to enjoy a relaxing bath to himself, thanks to Van taking care of Lydon, who insisted on going outside to explore. But even as he rinsed himself clean and lay in bed with the cool breeze outside, Cadel’s mind did not relax at all.

‘Let’s talk again.’

Though he urged Lumen to rest, it was his choice to leave. He never knew when Lumen would come to say goodbye, which was why he flinched at the sound of footsteps in the hallway.

‘What am I supposed to say? He said that leaving the mercenary corps has nothing to do with me, so what can I do to change that?’

Cadel didn’t even know why Lumen left the mercenary corps in the first place. He had no way of knowing because Lumen wouldn’t tell him.

But he wasn’t about to let Lumen leave without a fight. Lumen was one of his own. A comrade he’d fought alongside. A bond was a bond, even if it was a solitary one, and he would be lying if he said it could be easily broken. He didn’t want to find a new knight to replace Lumen, and he wasn’t sure he could find a better one.

‘Should I kiss him?’

When Cadel was cornered, he came up with a crazy plan that he wouldn’t normally do. He figured that since he was in a female-oriented game, he could capture targets if he threw himself at them, but that idea didn’t last long as Cadel quickly became miserable.

Cadel closed his eyes and thought, and thought, and thought. How to hold Lumen. How to get him to open up. A way to make him stick around until the promotion to knight order was successful.

He slowly drifted off to sleep. His hyper-aroused nerves fought off the intense fatigue, but he couldn’t resist the nap that was sneaking up on him.

It wasn’t a long sleep. Twenty minutes at most. At the very least, Cadel woke up with a start, like someone who instinctively realized they hadn’t heard the alarm.

Cadel clutched at his throbbing chest, surprised to realize he’d been distracted. The pounding was unpleasant.

“How can you sleep, you pathetic bastard.”

He pushed himself to his feet. A sigh escaped him as he washed his face roughly and dry.

“I’ll take some fresh air.”

He didn’t want to wake up and face Lumen half-asleep. So he left the bed to take a walk outside the inn.

“……Huh?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of a small note on the bedside shelf. His heart, barely calmed, began its ominous pounding once more.

Quickly snatching up the note, Cadel’s eyes darted around. The note was as short as it was small. Cadel’s face grew pale as he skimmed the same thing over and over again.

“……No.”

He squeezed the note, and the thin paper crumpled in his hand. He stood there, his gaze wandering, and before he knew it, he was out the door and out of the inn.

Hopeful that the owner of this ridiculous note hadn’t left yet.

[I’ll never forget you, so remember me, Leader.]

He ran frantically through the night streets that he didn’t even know. Without knowing where or when Lument had gone.

He looked again and again at the unfamiliar buildings and strange people, trying to find Lumen somehow. Lumen was always easy to spot, even when he was buried in a crowd, so hopefully, Cadel would find him this time. Cadel hoped, and he didn’t stop running.

“Please…….”

But no matter how hard he ran, he couldn’t see Lumen. Had Lumen taken a boat in the middle of the night? Or a carriage? Where did it go? Where was it going?

Cadel’s scrambled, jumbled thoughts slowed him down, and that alone was enough to make him angry, with the sky darkening and his vision narrowing.

With a harsh curse, Cadel pulled himself upright. Nearby, I could only see a bar with lights on, a drunken man walking around, and a sprawling scoundrel, but there was no place where Lumen could go.

“What remember? What do you remember, you piece of sh*t.”

He could have at least said goodbye face to face. There was a level of immorality in saying goodbye forever, leaving a piece of paper behind.

Cadel checked the note he’d been clutching tightly as he ran. The badly crumpled note seemed to represent his feelings. He stood and stared at the note for a long time before finally throwing it to the ground.

He took a slow step backward and felt a cold wall at his back. I slid to a stop. His legs were weak from the long run.

Cadel couldn’t tell if it was anger or sadness, but the emotions were coming and going in waves. He didn’t know what to do anymore. It didn’t seem real that Lumen was gone, even though he had told Cadel beforehand, and yet Cadel had vaguely thought he could stop Lumen.

“Why…….”

His voice leaked out in a tight, stifled whisper. He wanted to ask a million questions, but he couldn’t even think of what he wanted to ask. His mind was blank. He was confused and scared, and he felt a great deal of anxiety, wondering if he had been relying on Lumen this much.

“It’s up to him from start to finish.”

Lumen came and went as he pleased. Cadel shouldn’t have accepted him in the first place. He shouldn’t have coveted Lumen. He shouldn’t have had a subordinate he couldn’t handle.

Cadel leaned his forehead on his knees and gritted his teeth. The waves of emotion swirling in his chest were uncontrollable. He might as well lose his mind and go into a tavern and make a scene. It would make him feel better.

He was at a standstill, not knowing what to do with his tightening heart. Suddenly, his nose caught a familiar scent. Not the smell of sour liquor or gritty sand, but a crisp minty scent that made his nose tingle.

“Leader?”

At the sound of the voice behind him, Cadel’s head slowly rose, his trembling gaze meeting the man before him. Blue eyes, the ones he’d seen again and again in his blurred mind, looked down at him.

“You…….”

“What are you doing here?”

At the sight of Lumen who he’d been searching for, his blood pressure, or maybe vigor, spiked. Scrambling to his feet, Cadel nervously clutched at his collar.

“What’s with that note, what are you trying to do?”

“……As written.”

The look on Lumen’s face, as he averted his gaze, dashed any hopes Cadel might have had. He had indeed left the mercenary corps, leaving behind a single note.

“I told you, I’ll leave as soon as we break Lydon’s seal.”

“No goodbye, just a lame note?”

“A separation doesn’t have to be grand.”

A strangely muted voice echoed in Cadel’s head. Lumen said a separation didn’t have to be grand. The same one that asked Cadel to remember him.

His grip on Lumen’s collar tightened until it trembled. His breath caught in his throat, and his steady gaze grew intense as if he were recording every expression on Lumen’s face.

“Is that, is that what you want to say?”

“I don’t know what you want. Should we have had a farewell party together?”

“Lumen!”

“Go inside. Don’t crouch down here without a jacket.”

There seemed to be no way in. Lumen’s tightly closed mind wouldn’t let him tiptoe in. Cadel was out of breath.

Cadel released his grip on Lumen and slowly lowered his head. His breathing was labored.

Lumen stared down at Cadel as he did so. His outstretched fingertips twitched but ultimately failed to touch anything.

Lumen closed his eyes tightly and let out a long breath as if to release all his emotions. It was a familiar pattern. But when Lumen lifted his eyelids again.

“……Don’t go.”

It was not Cadel’s bowed head that filled his vision, but a pair of vivid hazel eyes. The gaze, deepened by the darkness, only reflected Lumen and no one else.

“Don’t go. Even if something happens and you have to go, don’t go. Just stay with me.”

“Leader, I―”

“Is that so tiring? Or can’t you just stand being next to me? Did you…… Did you just simply hate me?”

Cadel’s voice quivered with anxiety, and he was speechless. His watery eyes scanned Lumen impatiently for a reaction. His heart stiffened as if he had been unexpectedly beaten. It was the first time Cadel had ever felt more pain in his heart than in his body. The pain was unbearable.

Just the fact that Cadel was looking at him like he was about to cry, and it was because of him.

A hand came up reflexively and cupped Cadel’s cheek.

“I couldn’t have hated you.”

“Then why do you have to leave? If it’s not because of me, you can give me a reason.”

“That’s…….”

The anxiety on Cadel’s face was unmistakable even as he insisted on asking for an explanation, like a child. Lumen’s desire to relieve Cadel of this negative emotion was overwhelming, but he couldn’t get the words out of my mouth.

Cadel’s eyes narrowed at the stuttering answer. Full-blown tears crawled down his cheeks. Lumen swallowed dryly, reflexively, at the warmth of tears that seeped into his fingertips.

“I can’t tell you that―”

“Don’t be ridiculous! I don’t know why you’re leaving, I don’t know where you’re going, and you expect me to hold on to fond memories like a fool, with no clue where you’re going or what you’re doing? You need me to be such a fool to make you feel better about yourself? Then just say it! Don’t make stuff up, just say you’re leaving because I’m sick of me!”

Lumen’s jaw clenched at the rage that shot through him. He couldn’t tell if the tremor that ran through the hand that cupped Cadel’s cheek was his own or Cadel’s.

Needing Cadel to be such a fool. Leaving because he was sick of Cadel. None of that was true. It was all the opposite, but Lumen didn’t have the courage to say it. All he could do was rub Cadel’s wet cheeks and wipe them dry.

The corners of Cadel’s damp eyes twitched. He twisted his head as if to reject Lumen’s touch, then clutched at his hand.

“If it’s not, tell me. Until I hear a good reason, I’m not letting you go. You’ve never been in a fight with me before, so don’t even think about leaving without a fight.”

“……Leader.”

“I’m not kidding.”

The sad eyes quickly changed the emotions and stared at Lumen. The tight grip conveyed his sincerity.

“…….”

Why would he do this, who would be so desperate to hold on to someone who was leaving?

Cadel’s behavior was unexpected. It was unexpected, at least in Lumen’s imagination, to see such stubbornness, such unwillingness to let go of someone as if so dear to him.

If only you weren’t like this, if only you weren’t so misleading. Lumen repeated the words like a mantra, but his mouth could not overcome the shallowness of his expectations.

“I’m thinking of returning to my family.”

“To your family?”

“When I was in the White Kingdom, I was visited by a man from Dominic’s family, who told me that I had made a name for myself with my exploits and that I should stop wandering and come back, because he didn’t like the rumor that I was a member of the Scarlet Scales Mercenary.”

“Then…….”

“I’m not coming back to please my family. The reason I decided on that is…….”

Lumen’s gaze traveled to Cadel’s hand. The warmth radiating from it seemed to encourage him. It was as if Cadel was urging him to speak, to tell him everything.

“To renounce the family. Being a patriarch, being a knight defending the family as the second son, everything. I’m going back to throw it all away.”

Defeating his brother and taking the family’s patriarch position, that had been Lumen’s only goal. He had grown stronger, greedier, for that alone. If he couldn’t become the patriarch of Dominic’s family, there was no point in living. He had been so desperate for it. There had been no room for anything else.

It had been definitely like that.

“I said it before. The past that has supported my life so far, the future that drives me intensely. I can’t move on without giving up on one of the two. I couldn’t decide what was more important at the time because I was scared to give it up, be it the past or the future. But now…….”

Lumen twisted his grasped hand to get a proper grip and pulled it upward, then leaned down and kissed the back of Cadel’s exposed hand. He hoped the warmth he left behind would stay with Cadel as long as possible.

Slowly his lips parted and he spoke in a whisper.

“I can’t imagine a future without you, a future that I have to give up on you.”

It was a ticklishly sweet voice. Cadel mulled over the words, forgetting the fact that he was supposed to be fixing his frozen expression. The back of his hand where Lumen’s lips touched felt like it was on fire, but he couldn’t stop thinking about it.

“Then why…… If you didn’t give up on me…….”

If Lumen had told him this from the beginning, Cadel would have rejoiced in his departure, not mourned it. He would have waved a handkerchief and wished Lumen well.

Whether he realized the absurdity of the question or not, Lumen untangled his fingers. As Lumen hesitantly lowered their untangled hands, Cadel could see the movement of his pupils beneath his eyelids. Unable to contain Lumen’s uncharacteristically timid demeanor, Cadel was about to open his mouth again when Lumen spoke first.

“Because it’s shameful.”

“What are you talking about……?”

“My family will definitely try to catch me and it’s going to take me a long time to escape. Even if I’m lucky enough to get out, I’ll have pursuers, and Leader will be harmed. ……I couldn’t ask you to wait. It’s burdensome…… to say ‘I’ll throw everything away for Leader, so please leave my position empty’.”

Such a lack of confidence. Cadel had never imagined Lumen capable of this expression, this look in his eyes.

“So what were you gonna say when you came back?”

“I was going to help Leader until you acknowledged me.”

“What if I’m so pissed off and I won’t acknowledge you forever?”

“But until the end…….”

“Aren’t you a crazy punk!”

Cadel, who had been listening intently, shouted out. His stomach was in knots, and he didn’t think he could stand it if he didn’t do something. Cadel paused and hit Lumen in the chest as he looked at him.

“When have you ever been so loyal? Since when have you been so unselfishly subservient?  What, it’s shameful? It’s burdensome? Why do you get to decide that?”

Lumen silently accepted Cadel’s touch, even as he was pushed back a little by the growing force. As he did, Cadel’s expression grew more intense. The corners of his eyes, barely dry, were becoming wet once more.

“Do you know what is really shameful? In front of a person who only thinks of grabbing you while trembling with thoughts like ‘I don’t want you to leave, I want you to stay with me’, it’s your act of saying ‘Don’t grab me because I’ll cut off everything and leave’.”

“I’m…….”

“If you told me in advance, I would wait for as long as it took. I would wait for the day you would come back, and if you didn’t show up, I would come and get you back myself. Why are you not confident at times like this? Why only at such an important time…….”

Cadel’s voice, shaky with rapid breathing, was interrupted by Lumen’s next move.

Grabbing his wrist, Lumen pulled Cadel closer. He stared at the brown eyes looking up at him with surprised eyes, then slowly bent his head. Long eyelashes brushed down Cadel’s wet cheeks as if tickling them, and the tip of Lumen’s nose pressed lightly against his soft cheek.

Heated lips hovered over Cadel’s closed lips. They were so close that they seemed to touch. Cadel’s shuddering breaths did not push Lumen away, did not stop him.

But instead of continuing to kiss him, Lumen loosened his grip on Cadel’s wrist and stroked a hand through his hair. Slowly, his lips grazed the tip of the rounded nose, then the bridge of the nose, and the fluttering eyelids. Then, inch by inch, his lips left a brief kiss on Cadel’s forehead.

“Please wait for me.”

Lumen lowered the tousled hair and kissed the top of it once more. Holding Cadel still, he pressed his cheek against his temple.

“I’ll leave it all behind and come back, but until then, wait for me. I’ll fight to the death…… so that I can stand proudly beside you.”

Lumen closed his eyes and took in everything about Cadel. The heat of his body, his hair rubbing against Lumen’s cheek, the feel of his rounded shoulder blades, and…….

“I’ll wait. Until you get back.”

A voice that soothed him, like a loving comfort.

It was the only gift given to a long separation.