Chapter 20 - Argument

Chapter 20 - Argument

C lack-clack!

The sound of wood against wood echoed across the grassy clearing next to the barn. My arms throbbed down to the bone as I barely managed to deflect Lyra’s downward strike.

Off to the side, Saul stood with his arms crossed over his chest, his shadow stretching across the dirt as he observed us.

"Good block, Kyro," Saul called out, his voice unhurried. "Keep your wrists firm."

I reset my stance, raising my heavy wooden training sword, my eyes locked onto Lyra. She was bouncing lightly on her heels, grinning like a predator that had backed its prey into a corner, already winding up for another charge.

You might be wondering why Saul had me sparring with Lyra of all people. Honestly? The man had to be completely insane for even suggesting it.

Saul was tasked by Dad to teach us both of our fighting skills. I was not opposed to being trained in swordsmanship, that was far from the truth. In a pseudo-medieval era with savage animals, bandits and wild people, knowing how to use a sword was an absolute necessity for survival, and that was something that I was unfortunately ready to accept. I told Saul that I needed to learn the basics from him. But I made it very clear right from the start what my preferences were, and they were magic all the way.

Again, Lyra moved forward. I attempted to bring up my sword in an effort to block her weapon; however, she swung far too quickly. Her wooden sword slipped past my guard, landing a direct hit on my knuckles.

CLACK!

"Agh!" I yelled out, dropping the wooden sword into the grass as I clutched my stinging hand against my chest.

"Freeze!" Saul’s command barked across the yard.

By the time I managed to blink through the watering in my eyes and look up, the blunt tip of Lyra’s training blade was hovering a hair’s breadth from the bridge of my nose.

"S-shit..." I whispered under my breath, my heart hammering violently against my ribs as cold relief flooded my veins.

"Good work, Kyro, but your guard collapsed at the end," Saul said, stepping smoothly between us. His expression remained as unreadable as a stone wall.

I pulled my hand back, glaring up at him. "W-why are you making me fight her?! S-she could have split my skull open!"

"Just so you know, I was already prepared to stop," Lyra chirped.

"I highly doubt that," I whispered.

Saul released another measured sigh. "So that she would learn self-restraint."

He turned his attention to Lyra and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Precision and emotional restraint in a true duel will always beat sheer brute force. Unpredictable, wild swings may win against inexperienced opponents, but an experienced swordsman will disassemble a hot-headed bruiser in a minute. So, I am teaching her proper control of force. And I must admit, you turn out to be the best target for such training."

"Y-you must have lost your mind!!" I burst out, taking a step back. "You remember the time when she almost knocked out my jaw, right?"

"I am standing right here, ready to step in should anything fatal happen." Saul shrugged. "Also, I have reached an agreement with her: the moment she loses control of herself or causes you any unnecessary pain whatsoever, the entire week of sword practice will be replaced with a week of weed removal for our neighbors."

Lyra’s grin instantly vanished. She clicked her tongue and turned her head away. "Tch."

"And as you can see," Saul added with a faint twitch of his lips, "she deeply desires to avoid that outcome."

I looked between Saul's deadpan expression and Lyra's bitter frown. "...Right. Cool. Whatever."

"Can we fight for real now, Saul?" Lyra asked, turning her sharp gaze toward him. "I'm bored of holding back against this shrimp. I wanna actually swing."

"No," Saul stated flatly. "You will spar with him until his guard improves." He then shifted his gaze down to me. "And Kyro, this setup benefits you just as much."

I bent down, picking my training sword back up from the grass, shaking out my bruised hand. "How does getting used as a punching bag benefit me?"

"Because you're learning about combat through experience, with a partner who has unpredictable intentions," said Saul, heading back over to where he was standing near the barn and crossing his arms once again. "Sparring with someone like me is going to be more methodical and instructional. Sparring with your sister will teach you how to deal with body language and chaos of the situation faster than anything you can read."

You've got to be kidding me...

A bead of cold sweat rolled down my jaw, dropping into the dirt. I absolutely hated this setup. One lapse in concentration, one misread footstep, and she could genuinely break something.

Unlike her, Saul, and my parents, I couldn't channel aura to reinforce my body yet.

I closed my eyes, and my intent was to channel my mana into a barrier, "Rghh..." but after a few seconds, there was nothing.

I squeezed the wood of the hilt and lifted my guard as my throat constricted. I gulped.

"Again," Saul started.

Not even a delay and Lyra was already out as she closed the gap, and she swung her wooden sword in an upward arc towards me.

I wasn’t going to beat her at strength; I knew not to even try. So, I watched her shoulders move to the left, and let her sword glint off of mine.

CLACK!

The force of her blow came close to my head, but I stayed balanced.

All I have to do is stay back, watch her shoulders, and don’t get trapped.

Lyra feinted a strike; I fell for it, and she punished the mistake immediately, driving a kick into my exposed side.

"Rghh!" My eyes bulged from the pain.

THAT'S EASIER SAID THAN DONE!

***

I slumped onto the wooden bench in the living room, letting out a breath I felt like I’d been holding all afternoon. My forearms were burning, and my fingers twitched with a dull, throbbing ache from trying to absorb the sheer weight of Lyra’s strikes.

I gently massaged the palm of my left hand, groaning at the dark red welt forming near my knuckles.

"It’s so annoying that she doesn't hold back," I muttered to the empty room, shaking my head in frustration. "Saul told her to measure her strength, but she still swings like she's trying to chop down an oak tree. It’s ridiculous..."

"What are you whining about? I did hold back," a voice barked right into my ear. "If I wasn't, your ribs would be in three different pieces right now."

"AH!"

I nearly jumped out of my skin, my legs tangling as I bolted straight up from the bench. Lyra was standing right beside me, leaning casually against the backrest with her arms crossed. I hadn't heard a single footstep.

"Geez, Lyra!" I clutched my chest, my heart hammering against my ribs. "Make your presence known! Y-you're bigger than me, y'know, and it's creepy how you can just slither into a room without making a sound!"

"I don't slither, you wuss," she huffed, rolling her eyes. "You're just so slow you don't notice anything unless it's written in one of your stupid books."

I let out a long, exhausted sigh and sank back onto the wooden bench, keeping a safe distance from her side. "What do you want?"

Her scowl vanished, replaced instantly by a sharp, mischievous grin. She slid onto the bench right next to me, leaning in close with a playful nudge of her shoulder that almost knocked me off the edge.

"Teach me magic."

I squeezed my aching hands together and didn't even look at her. "No. Not yet."

"What do you mean, no ?" Her tone dropped, the friendliness vanishing like smoke. "We had a deal yesterday! I gave you back your stupid journal, so now you have to teach me."

"Our deal was that I would teach you, not that I would do it the exact second you demanded it," I said smoothly, leaning back against the wall. "Besides, look at my hands. I can barely hold a pencil right now thanks to your 'restrained' swinging. I'm in no condition to lecture."

"Oh, cry me a river," Lyra groaned, throwing her head back. "Your hands are fine! You're just making excuses because you're scared I'll learn it faster than you."

I scoffed, turning my head to glare at her. "Learn it faster? Lyra, you don't even have the patience to sit through ten minutes of subtraction without getting distracted by a beetle on the floor, or dozing off in your own imagination. Magic isn't just waving your hands around and making sparks, but it requires deep understanding of Mana Core concentration, and hours of tedious reading. Things you explicitly hate."

"I can read!" she snapped, her golden eyes narrowing. "I just don't like reading the useless garbage you spend all day staring at!"

"It's not useless garbage, it's mana theory!" I retorted, my voice rising a notch. "And if you actually listened for once instead of throwing tantrums, you'd know that theory is ninety percent of the work. You can't just brute force a spell like you do with a wooden sword."

"I don't throw tantrums!" Lyra slammed her fist onto the wooden bench, making the frame creak loudly. "And I don't need to read a hundred boring pages just to throw a fireball! You do it, and you're five! If a weakling like you can do it, it should be easy for me!"

That hit a nerve within my head.

"That's exactly your problem!" I stood up from the bench, facing her directly. "You think everything in the world can be solved by jumping around and hitting things hard! You think strength is just muscle and loud noise, but you don't have the discipline to understand a single fundamental concept!"

"I have discipline!" Lyra stood up too, towering over me, her chest heaving as her face flushed red with anger. "Papa says I'm a natural with the sword! Saul says I have great instincts! You're the one who just sits in his room all day like a useless rock!"

"Instincts?!" I let out a sharp, bitter laugh, completely losing control of my tongue. "Instincts are just a fancy word for wild guessing! You don't have discipline, Lyra. Instead, You’re just a brute who thinks hitting things is the answer to everything! You're so utterly stupid that you can't even see how annoying you are to everyone around you!"

The moment the words left my mouth, a heavy silence fell over the living room, especially the space between us. My heart dropped straight into my stomach as I realized what I had said to her.

Oh no.

I glanced up into Lyra’s face. Her eyes were wide, staring down at me, and she shuddered slightly. Her teeth were clenched together so tightly that I could hear them grind against one another. At her side, her fists were clenched white-knuckled, shaking with barely contained fury. My senses told me to move. I jerked back, cringing away from her, raising my shoulders, dropping my chin down to my chest, and screwing my eyes half-shut in anticipation of the impending blow.

But no blow came.

Instead, I felt a rush of wind as she whirled around on her heel. She made her way over to the front door, grasped the brass handle and wrenched open the door.

BANG!

The heavy wooden door slammed against the outer wall with a deafening rattle before bouncing back. She didn't look back once as she stormed out into the yard, her boots stomping down the wooden porch steps then to the grass.

I slowly uncurled my arms, standing alone in the quiet living room, my breath coming in shaky gasps.

"W-what just..?"

I honestly didn't know what came over me.

***

I sank into my bed as the early afternoon rolled in.

It felt strange to be without Lyra at lunchtime. When mom inquired about Lyra’s whereabouts while serving the plates, I only shrugged my shoulders saying that she might have gone out somewhere with her friends. Just as I had gone out to Captain Jyroh’s house, I felt she might have done the same and ended up having a free meal at someone else’s place.

Dad was away in the city of Fritz selling off healthy cattle, leaving just Mom and me at the dining table. Once we finished, Mom washed the dishes while I wiped down the table. As soon as my chore was done, I headed straight upstairs, planning to dive back into my mana research.

But I couldn't focus. Every time I looked at the parchment, my mind just... drifted.

So, I just lay back on my bed, watching the open wooden shutters creak softly in the fresh afternoon breeze. I stared up at the blank wooden ceiling, eventually slapping a hand over my face with a heavy groan.

"Darn it, Paul... you really need to learn to keep your mouth shut."

Lyra hadn't even done anything wrong this time. Honestly, it was just... the way she carried herself sometimes rubbed me the wrong way. I couldn't explain it, but it was like a knee-jerk reaction in my gut, and I’d ended up snapping at her for no reason other than letting my own sheer exhaustion explode like a volcano.

I let out a long sigh, sitting up on the edge of the mattress.

"I should go apologize."

I pushed myself up, walked down the stairs, and headed for the front door.

"Mom, I'm heading out! I'm gonna go look for Lyra!" I called out toward the back of the house.

"Alright, sweetie!" Mom yelled back from the backyard where she was hanging laundry. "Be careful, and make sure you both get back before evening!"

"Will do," I muttered, stepping over the threshold and closing the heavy door behind me.

***

I went house to house trying to track her down.

My first stop was Captain Jyroh’s place since it was closest to ours. Nathan and Nathalie were hanging out on his front porch, and the moment they saw me, their tails started wagging as they tried to drag me into another round of chess. I politely turned them down. I was way too stressed about finding my sister to sit through a board game.

Lyra wasn't there. I moved on, knocking on doors and asking neighbors if they’d seen a loud, aggressive eight-year-old passing through. Three houses down, and still nothing. Nobody had seen a trace of her.

Next came the fourth house.

Even before I got close enough to touch the gate to this property, I saw that a group of village children had gathered in front of the dilapidated wooden fence dividing the village boundary from the Western Forest. There was nothing much to this fence, which consisted of some decaying fence posts and crossbeams that a kid could easily go through without much trouble.

Dad had always warned us not to cross these fences at any cost. The Western Forest was a scary place, and the deeper one got into the forest, the more dense the foliage became, making the place nothing but a hazardous swampy area.

My curiosity and anxiety peaked, prompting me to change directions towards the children. The fear I saw on their faces filled me with dread as they kept glancing at the ominous wall of trees far away.

The precise moment they became aware that I was coming towards them, all of them tensed up as if they had just done something wrong.

"Hey," I called out, quickening my pace. "Have any of you seen Lyra around here today?"

They hesitated, nervously exchanging silent looks.

Finally, a tiny, pale girl near the back squeezed her eyes shut and mumbled, "She went straight into the forest... down that path..."

I flinched upon hearing that.

"W-what?!" My voice cracked, ringing out way sharper and louder than I intended.

An unruly looking young boy, with a sprinkling of freckles and an atrociously choppy hair cut, nodded his head frantically, eyes wide in genuine terror. "She-she said she’d show us! Said she didn’t need magic to be strong! Took my dad’s sword and… and went in there!"

I stared at him in utter bewilderment. "A sword?! H-how did this happen?"

That’s when a scrawny boy with a bowl cut sheepishly raised his hand like he was answering a teacher in a classroom. "Uh... she took my dad’s iron shortsword. It was resting on the rack in our shed, a-and he asked to borrow it, and... well..."

He trailed off, unable to look me in the eye.

My eyes narrowed into slits as I stepped right into his personal space. "And you just gave her a real weapon?!"

"She said she'd break my nose if I didn't!" he blurted out, cowering backward. "I panicked, okay?! Have you seen how hard she punches?!"

I mean... I get the fear, little buddy, but WHAT THE ACTUAL HELL?!

I groaned in disbelief, reached out, and grabbed him by the collar of his shirt. "You handed over a live blade because she threatened you?! Are you stu-" I cut myself off, and I just groaned.

"I didn't know what else to do! She's terrifying!"

I let go of his shirt with a harsh exhale, slapping both hands over my face in sheer frustration. Of all the reckless, stubborn, utterly brainless things she could have done!

She really took my words to heart.

I snapped my head back toward the gathered kids, my chest heaving. "Listen to me very carefully! Go find Saul immediately! Or go find my mom! Find any adult you see, I don't care who it is! Tell them Lyra crossed the Western Forest border, and she's armed with a real steel blade!"

The kids didn't waste a second. They scattered down the dirt road like an anthill that had just been kicked.

I didn't hesitate. I spun on my heel, kicked off the dirt, and sprinted at full speed straight through the broken fence posts toward the dense, dark tree line ahead.

"Hold on, Lyra," I gritted out through my teeth, my heart hammering against my ribs like a war drum as the cold shadow of the forest swallowed me whole. "Please don't do anything stupid. Just... please be okay."

[End]