By Zephyria 
Aska’s body exploded, and I woke up from my dream.
“…….”
The pain of my body being torn to pieces was still vivid, as if it had happened to me. I stared at the ceiling with a serious expression, then turned my head slightly.
I saw Aska, facing me with his eyes closed. Unlike in the dream, his face was peaceful.
I had already expected it, but seeing it directly… No, it was more accurate to say that I had experienced it. I really confirmed that Aska’s body had been shattered like that.
I felt both impressed and sorry for Aska, who somehow recovered on his own in that state and searched for me. He must have been in pain and lonely, but how did he feel when he saw me, who had lost my memory and couldn’t recognize him?
I recalled the day I reunited with Aska in the narrow alleyway.
‘I know you’re angry, but I didn’t do it on purpose…’
Why did he think I would be angry? If I were Aska, I would have hit him, cursed him, and been angry, asking where he had been all this time. No, now that I think about it, I probably wouldn’t have been able to hit him.
Anyway, if I saw Aska, who had lost his memory and was weak, while I wasn’t around, my heart would have been torn apart and festered.
Just imagining it made my heart ache, and I unconsciously placed my hand on my chest. At that moment, I noticed Aska’s left chest through the slightly open collar of his shirt.
A thin layer, as if something had been overlaid, was visible on the smooth, white skin without any scars. It wasn’t very noticeable, so at first, I thought I had seen it wrong.
Even when I lowered my head and looked at it from right in front of his nose, the mark was so faint that I couldn’t be sure. I gently scratched the boundary with my fingertip. I thought that if it was something attached, it would fall off if I scratched it like this.
But no matter how much I scratched, there was nothing to catch on my fingertip, and nothing fell off.
“Kyle?”
I was so focused that I didn’t even realize Aska had opened his eyes. I lifted my head at the sleepy voice and saw his drowsy face.
“What are you doing?”
Aska reached out and hugged me tightly. It was such a strong force that my cheek was pressed against his chest, which I had been scratching just a moment ago. With my face half-squashed like that, I fell into thought.
How should I bring up the story I saw in my dream? As I listened to the faint heartbeat in my ear, I was lost in thought, but Aska was too quiet. Was he falling asleep again?
Come to think of it, it was still dark outside the window. Being held in a warm embrace and listening to a steady sound made my eyes droop. If I fell asleep like this, would I dream again?
I was curious about Aska’s past days when he was alone without me, but my heart ached, so I needed to prepare myself. It would be nice if I could only see what I wanted to see.
What if we had met when we were young? Aska had said something like this to me before. It was something that had already passed and was impossible to realize, just a ridiculous fantasy, so I just listened and ignored it back then.
But I fell asleep desperately wishing for that ridiculous thing. Was that why? Like a lie, I dreamed of meeting a young Aska.
I took Aska’s hand and went to the stream first. And while washing away the mud that was smeared on his face and body, I said what I had always wanted to say.
“If you’re dirty, you can wash it off. You smell because you don’t wash. Your sister will smell if she doesn’t wash too. Just wash and you’ll be clean again and won’t smell, so don’t cry about things like that. Everyone gets dirty if they don’t wash. It’s not a strange thing.”
The Aska in the dream didn’t say anything, but he smiled at me. I tidied up his messy hair and took off my clothes to dress Aska.
His hair was a bit strange, but he looked much neater than before. I ran and played with Aska in the mountains and fields. When we were hungry, we picked tree fruits to eat, and when we were tired, we rested in the shade.
“Kyle.”
I woke up to the sound of someone calling me from afar. I was so immersed in the afterglow of playing with the young Aska that I couldn’t easily come to my senses. Aska stroked my forehead, eyes, and cheeks and said.
“Abyss just came by, and Mahir is coming.”
“…….”
If I fell asleep again like this, could I continue the dream? I seriously pondered that, and then I suddenly came to my senses. I asked again, wondering if I had misheard.
“Who’s coming?”
“Mahir.”
I stared blankly at Aska with a puzzled expression, then raised my upper body. The letter I had written last night but hadn’t sent was still on the desk.
“I haven’t even sent the letter yet?”
“He’s not coming here, but visiting for the purpose of diplomacy.”
Aska handed me a flyer. It stated that the Emperor of the Empire would be visiting Calderia.
I was planning to go to the capital at the right time, so there was a high possibility that I would meet Mahir. But what kind of diplomacy is this all of a sudden? Is he perhaps roughly figuring out my location and just coming to see me? Seeing that he’s advertising his visit so grandly, it might mean that he wants me to find him on my own.
“…….”
Suddenly, I felt like I was sweating cold sweat. I didn’t do anything wrong… Or did I? Still, I don’t think I did anything that terribly wrong.
“It’s next month, so there’s plenty of time. We can prepare slowly and leave.”
At Aska’s words, I nodded and placed the flyer on the bedside table. And I gently combed Aska’s slightly disheveled hair with my hand and said.
“Let’s go out and buy you some clothes today.”
“Clothes? What clothes all of a sudden?”
I kept thinking about Aska’s grimy appearance as he was pushed around. I sighed and carefully examined Aska’s face.
I was worried that he wouldn’t be able to speak properly when he went outside, since he only bickered and got annoyed with me. If he just acted like he did with me when I wasn’t around, there would be no need to worry.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
Aska frowned, not liking my gaze very much. I took Aska’s hand, patted the back of his hand, and earnestly told him.
“If someone kicks you or says something to you, you have to do the same to them.”
“What?”
“I’ll take responsibility, so just hit them too. You can beat them half to death. Got it?”
And I took Aska to the bathroom and washed him clean. Aska always washed me, but this was the first time I washed Aska, except when we were young.
After having a meal with the clean Aska, I called Sakira. The quick-witted Sakira brought a bunch of accessories, clothes, and jewels when I told her I was going to give Aska a gift.
“I brought the best quality items I could find, but they’re still lacking compared to what’s in the capital. They’re even more lacking compared to what you saw in Actan.”
She had prepared quite a lot in a short amount of time, considering she was worried. As she said, some of the jewels weren’t of good quality, but they weren’t too bad to look at.
“What’s all this?”
Aska was horrified to see all the jewels and clothes filling the large room where all the furniture had been removed. I looked at the rings displayed in the showcase and asked.
“Isn’t that okay to wear on a regular basis? It’s not too big, so it won’t be uncomfortable in everyday life.”
“I don’t like things that are cumbersome.”
“You don’t like rings? Then what about bracelets?”
“I just don’t like having anything on my hands.”
I had no choice but to take Aska’s hand and go to the place where the necklaces were lined up.
“Necklaces are okay, right? You wore that medal necklace well.”
“That’s because you kept going out because of the necklace… No, what is this all of a sudden? What is all this mess?”
I listened to Aska’s words without really listening and found a small hairpin. I opened the showcase, handed the pin to Aska, and said.
“Use this when you tie your hair.”
“I have a lot of hair ties.”
When he said hair tie, I suddenly remembered the black string that Aska used to wrap around his wrist. He hadn’t been wearing it for a while, so there was nothing on his wrist now.
I bent down, narrowed my eyes, and stared intently at Aska’s wrist.
“Why?”
“Was that black string you used to wear on your wrist perhaps imitating Sealing Magic?”
I also thought he was angry when I first saw him after he lost his memory, and if that wasn’t the case, why would he wrap a cumbersome string around his wrist?
I just guessed, but Aska’s face instantly hardened at my words. His expression was so obviously hit the nail on the head that the corners of my lips naturally turned upwards.
But when I remembered that Aska’s body couldn’t withstand it because of that Sealing Magic, my smile disappeared in an instant.
I could be sure because I had experienced it myself. The reason Aska’s body eventually shattered that day was because of the Sealing Magic. Aska usually suppressed his rampaging energy, but he couldn’t control his power at the moment when the ominous light burst from the necklace.
I didn’t understand why he endured until he was in that state when he could have clearly released the seal on his own. Was it because I vomited too much blood the first day the seal was released, and that became a trauma? Or was it because he promised me that he would never release the seal again?
It was funny that even after that happened, he thought I would be angry just because the seal was released.
“What are you looking at?”
Aska frowned and acted fiercely at me, who was staring intently. The tips of his ears turned red. He was probably annoyed because he was embarrassed that I found out about the identity of the string he was wearing.