NOVEL NEXT 52: Bonding in the Castle
A clear dark sky, one glittering with stars, each twinkling, little points of light that gave life to the darkness of the night. Under the sea of stars that made up the sky was a castle, in the center of a city around it, home to a number of adventurers all gathered to stop the monster wave.
Among the castle walls, a number of windows let out little patches of lamplight, each being a hole into a different person’s life.
Through one such window was a black-haired adventurer named Kaitlyn, doing some maintenance on her twin swords in preparation for the days ahead.
Knock.
Knock. Knock.
“Come in,” Kaitlyn answered, raising her head towards the door, “The door’s unlocked.”
Pushing the door open with an awkward smile, Rachel, scratching the back of her head, asked, “Can I come hang out for a bit? You uh... offered earlier during dinner so I thought I’d come by.”
Waving her in and putting her swords aside, Kaitlyn commented, “I wouldn’t have offered if I was going to say no now that you came by, you know? I feel like that'd just be... rude.”
The door closing behind her with a click, Rachel sat down on a chair beside Kaitlyn, sighing while lamenting, “You’d be surprised how many people have done that. I even had a few professors do it while I was still in school...”
“Huh... that doesn’t sound fun,” Kaitlyn sympathized while shaking her head, “How are you though? What did you end up doing this afternoon?”
Sinking into her chair and becoming a bit of a blob, Rachel tapped her chin while studying the ceiling as if it was a critical study guide for a final exam, “We... trained. A lot. Also watched you fight Chelsea... then trained some more. Yeahhh... we were going to go out and get some drinks but everyone was just tired after training.”
Feeling the fatigue radiate off of Rachel, Kaitlyn, having also sunk into her chair and become a bit of a blob, stuck her tongue out towards the ceiling without much thought, “I hope you didn’t train too recklessly though... we’re fighting starting tomorrow, probably.”
“Yeah, we didn’t push too hard,” Rachel reassured, looking over at Kaitlyn’s antics with an amused smile, “We made sure to stretch a lot too, like... we spent wayyy too much time stretching.”
“Though,” Rachel continued, a satisfied expression on her face as she stroked her chin, “I can do the splits quite comfortably now... I’ve been stretching every day after training, after all.”
Having given up on her ill-fated quest to touch the ceiling with her tongue, Kaitlyn asked, mystification clear on her face as she tilted her head, “The splits? I’ve never heard of these...”
Impressed, Rachel murmured, “I thought it might be a thing here... I guess not.”
“Well, I might be really dense...” Kaitlyn added, not wanting to become the representative of the world to Rachel.
Shaking her head while trying to suppress her laughter, Rachel, standing up out of her chair, let out one more laugh before taking a few deep breaths to calm down, “Here, let me... show you.”
With that, Rachel dropped to the ground in a split, beginning to laugh again watching Kaitlyn’s eyes widen, impressed at the feat of flexibility.
“These are like the normal splits,” Rachel explained before beginning to lower her chest towards her leg, gripping the foot in front of her with her hands, “But I’ve been able to get to here now! Much better than I could previously.”
Clapping with an impressed light shining in her eyes, Kaitlyn, having watched Rachel’s skills, began attempting one of her own.
------
With the conversation flowing beyond the splits into the later hours of the night, the two eventually sat together by the window, staring off at the starry night sky. With the window open, the two felt the night chill blow in at times, but for the most part, they just sat there, staring off into the night sky, shoulder to shoulder.
“Reminds me of that night...”
Nodding at Kaitlyn’s little reminiscence, Rachel agreed, “Yeah... I feel like I can recognize a few of the same star patterns too. Do you know any constellations? Well, er-... do constellations exist?”
“They do, for sure,” Kaitlyn answered after pondering for a second before admitting, “I have no clue what any of them are though... I'm really quite bad at recognizing the shapes of things within stars.”
“Ahhhh, you’re kinda like Oliver then,” Rachel teased, poking Kaitlyn in the arm, “Josephine, Damien, and I all enjoy looking at the constellations, but no matter how much we tried teaching Oliver, he couldn’t learn...”
“Y-Yeah...” Kaitlyn shook her head, poking Rachel back in retaliation, “Sasha tried to teach me wayyy long ago. I couldn’t learn at all.... Everything just looked... star-like. Are the stars here the same, though? It seems like it’s not considering you didn’t manage to find any constellations you know of.”
Clutching her stomach while laughing at Kaitlyn’s “star-like” comment, a comment she had heard from Oliver too, Rachel wiped a tear from her eye, “No... the stars are very different from where we all came from. Everything kinda is...”
“Do you miss your old world then?” Kaitlyn asked as Rachel’s words trailed off near the end.
A bit of a melancholic tone seeping into her voice, Rachel confessed, “Yeah... I sorta miss the technology, the ease of living... But, honestly, life here is good. I wouldn’t say I miss the world all that much.”
A smile surfacing on her face and a laugh escaping her mouth, Rachel continued, counting on her fingers, “I don’t have student loans, I have my closest friends, I don’t have overbearing teachers, I don’t have taxes as an adventurer, I’m financially set.”
Then, pulling Kaitlyn into a hug, Rachel emphasized, “I even met a bunch of new friends, people like you! You’ve been someone so fun to hang out with, and I would’ve never met you if I didn’t get summoned.”
Returning Rachel’s embrace under the starry night sky, Kaitlyn, a small smile on her face, could only reply, “You’re... you’re really fun to hang out with as well...”
