18 14. Going to Another Island

Heya me again not gonna lie this is gonna be the last time i try to do romance in Main story because it's hard i don't have any experience to write romance.

I'm gonna save the romance in fate episode so yea so i have the time to think what to write....

Don't forget to give me your feedback on this chapter

Thank you ~

By the way, I need to speed up the progression of Sturm and Rei's romance because they will rarely have opportunities to meet due to their different lifestyles. They will only see each other occasionally when they fight each other, because you know.... Sturm is a mercenary hired by the empire.

So i kinda change Sturm personality and make her easier to be approachable.

<~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >

When their lips almost touched each other, Djeeta and Rei's hearts were beating rapidly.

*kiss*

Their lips touched each other, causing Djeeta's body to shiver when her lips touched Rei's.

Even though their kiss was brief, it made both Djeeta and Rei's faces turn red and their chests pound like their hearts were about to burst out of their chests.

'This is nice...' Djeeta thought as their first kiss felt so romantic, with Rei hugging her and both of them enjoying the sky while gazing at the blue sky around them.

And she thought that even though she had almost died several times in the past 2 weeks, it was all worth it because she could feel this.

Then Djeeta stared into Rei's eyes as if wanting something, and Rei, seeing Djeeta's eyes, began to think it was unfair – why was she so cute, especially when her eyes looked like they were pleading for something?

Rei knew Djeeta wanted another kiss, but before he could do it, they heard Vyrn's voice.

"Reiiiiiii!!! Djeeeeetaaaa!!!" They both looked down and saw Grandcypher below them without realizing it.

"Vyrrrrnnn!" Djeeta shouted and waved her hand towards them.

Rei felt that the previous atmosphere had vanished, then he sighed because he wanted to kiss Djeeta again but oh well.

Rei's wings slowly started to move, and they both descended slowly.

Djeeta and Rei finally landed on Grandcypher, and Vyrn suddenly hugged them.

"Uhuuhuhuhu... Rei.... Djeeta.... I was so worried, I thought I wouldn't see you again." Vyrn cried as he hugged them both.

The others also approached Rei and Djeeta.

"Good job, Rei. I'm glad you two are okay and managed to come back safely" Katalina said, placing a hand on Rei's shoulder and looking at him with pride.

"Yeah, yeah, you two really made me panic. I thought both of you were going to fall through the sky, but luckily Rei has wings," Drang nodded while watching Rei's wings.

"I'm sorry for making everyone panic, I didn't expect the crystal to explode when it was destroyed," Rei answered them.

"Haha, at least you two are okay," Rackam patted Rei and Djeeta on the shoulder while smiling.

But Rei realized that Lyria and Sturm were missing, so he began to look for them.

Rei found them behind Katalina and the others, both of them looking at Rei and Djeeta with expressions that Rei didn't understand.

"Lyria? Sturm? Why are you two behind there?" Rei spoke to them, and upon hearing Rei's voice, they immediately woke up and approached Rei and Djeeta.

Katalina, Drang, and Rackam, seeing the two of them, could only shake their heads and think 'Youngsters.'

After that, Rackam started piloting the Grandcypher back to where Tiamat was waiting for them.

The Grandcypher arrived in front of Tiamat, and Lyria began to communicate with her. After a while, they saw Tiamat nod, then Lyria's necklace began to glow, and Tiamat started disappearing as if being absorbed into Lyria's necklace.

After Tiamat disappeared, the weather around them started to brighten. The sun shone through the clouds, illuminating the Grandcypher as if it were receiving a blessing from the heavens.

Then, Lyria opened her eyes, breathed a sigh of relief glad it finally over.

"Lyria, what's that in your hand?" Vyrn suddenly asked, pointing to Lyria's hand.

Confused by Vyrn's question, Lyria looked at her hand and saw a green crystal suddenly appear.

[IMAGE]

"Eh? Since when did this appear?" Lyria was puzzled because she had never seen a crystal like this before.

Vyrn and Djeeta, seeing it, looked happy as if they had seen it before.

"That's a piece of the sky map! It's just like the one your dad had, Djeeta!" Vyrn shook Djeeta's head in excitement.

"Ouch, Vyrn, my head!" Djeeta felt dizzy from Vyrn shaking her head.

"Oh, so this is the sky map. This is the first time I've seen it," Drang said, looking at the sky map with curiosity.

Meanwhile, Sturm still watching Rei, feeling confused about the feelings she had felt before.

"Whew. Nice work, Rei. I'd say we've earned ourselves a break," Katalina stretched her body.

"Yeah yeah, can you take us to Port Breeze? Now that the Tiamat situation is over, we want to return," Drang said to everyone.

"Huh, right, I forgot you all are mercenaries hired by the empire," Djeeta replied to Drang.

After that, Rackam started piloting the Grandcypher and returned to Port Breeze.

Once they landed in Port Breeze, they began informing all the townspeople there that Tiamat had returned to normal.

Upon hearing this, they all jumped in joy and they could start repairing their damaged homes.

But because it was starting to get dark, Djeeta and the others chose to stay overnight in Port Breeze before continuing their journey the next day.

At night, Rackam told Djeeta that he wanted to join Djeeta's crew, with the reason that if he join he felt like he would never be separated from the sky again.

Meanwhile, Rei was walking around the town, enjoying fresh air. Rei saw many houses destroyed by the storm from Tiamat, but at least they had managed to drive away the empire so the damage doesn't get any worse.

As Rei was walking, he accidentally saw Drang and Sturm, who appeared to be sneaking back to the Black Knight to report what they had seen. Rei remembered Sturm's expression when he and Djeeta landed on the Grandcypher, and quickly moved behind Sturm, poking her waist with his finger.

"Eeekkk!" Sturm yelled out in surprise as she suddenly felt something poking her waist.

Drang heard this and immediately turned around, pulling out his ball, thinking someone was attacking them. But when he saw it was Rei, he put away his weapon while smiling.

Meanwhile, Sturm, shocked, tried to attack whoever was behind her with her weapon, but Rei easily leaped back to dodge it.

"You! What are you doing?" Sturm looked at Rei angrily, as ever since she's saw Rei and Djeeta kissing each other when she's on Grandcypher, she had been thinking about it and couldn't get it out of her mind.

Rei laughed at Sturm's cute expression while she was angry at him and pouting.

Rei then looked at Drang as if talking to him with his gaze. Drang, who understood what Rei meant, nodded and left the two of them.

Sturm who appeared to want to stab Rei, suddenly stopped moving as she felt Rei stroking her head.

Her feeling of anger seemed to disappear and her heart began to race. She didn't know why she felt this way because all her life she had been focused on being a mercenary and making money.

Sturm enjoyed the head pat from Rei, closing her eyes and without her realizing started to humming something.

Rei, while patting Sturm's head, suddenly heard Sturm humming and smiled because it seemed like Sturm was enjoying his pat, and her mood is improving.

After a while, Rei lifted his hand from Sturm's head and stopped caressing it.

"Ahh..." Sturm made a sound that sounded like disappointment, which made Rei laugh softly.

"It seems like you're back to normal now," Rei spoke to Sturm.

Upon hearing that, Sturm lifted her head and gazed at Rei's face.

"Back to normal? What do you mean? I've been normal all this time," Sturm replied to Rei, but her tone somehow sounded irritated.

"When we were on the Grandcypher earlier, I noticed you were just lost in thought since I came back, and even when we went to Port Breeze, you were still lost in thought, so I'm sure you're thinking about something."

Sturm was surprised to hear this, as she didn't expect Rei to have been observing her since they were on the Grandcypher.

"I apologize for making you worry, Sturm, when I fell from the Grandcypher earlier."

Upon hearing this, Sturm's body trembled as she remembered Rei falling from the sky.

She didn't know why she felt that way, considering they had only met today, but seeing Rei fall from the sky and thinking she wouldn't meet him again made her body weak, and tears flowed.

"This..." Rei heard Sturm's voice, even though it was soft, he could still hear it.

"I... I don't know why... seeing you fall to the bottom of sky made my chest feel tight...."

Upon hearing that, Rei immediately embraced Sturm and tried to calm her down.

Feeling herself being hugged, Sturm returned the embrace and both of them fell silent for a few moments.

"It's okay, Sturm. It's normal for you to react like that when you see a friend falling to the bottom of the sky," Rei spoke to Sturm while stroking her soft red hair.

"Friend...." Rei heard Sturm murmuring something.

At that moment, Rei suddenly realized that he was hugging a Draph with really big chest, and the soft feeling he felt on his stomach... could it be?!

Rei panicked and wanted to release the hug before something standing up.

But it was too late because Sturm felt something poking on her thigh, confused, she began to look down.

Seeing this, Sturm's face immediately turned red, and she released their embrace.

Rei, seeing Sturm's very red face, didn't know what to do and finally could only say something.

"Sorry, Sturm," Rei apologized while looking to the side and trying to forget the sensation of Sturm's soft chest.

Upon hearing that, Sturm became angry and began to stab Rei repeatedly.

The calm night enveloped the town and only the sound of someone in pain could be heard.

<~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >

After finishing the conversation with Sturm, Rei finally bid farewell to the two of them and they went off somewhere.

After they both disappeared from his sight, Rei went back to enjoying the view of this city and when he got tired, he returned to the house they used to stay overnight.

The next day, Rei woke up and looked out the window. He saw that the sun had not yet risen but it already felt like morning.

Since there was no clock here, he thought maybe he woke up at 5 a.m., like his habit when he was still sleeping at Djeeta and Vyrn's house.

Initially, Rei wanted to go back to sleep because he was still tired from the incident with Tiamat, but when he tried to sleep for 10 minutes, his body still wouldn't fall asleep.

"Damn habit" Rei muttered, and finally he got up and headed to the bathroom to wash his face.

After washing his face, he saw that Djeeta and the others were still sleeping, so he left the house and headed to the city gate.

Rei wanted to train his powers and practice swordfighting as advised by grandma before he left Zinkenstill.

He went out to the grassland on the side of the road leading to the city and started practicing the sword techniques taught by grandma.

After practicing for 30 minutes, he stopped swinging his golden sword and finally made it disappear.

He began to focus, and two wings emerged from his back. Rei then tried to make himself fly using the two wings.

But after a while, he could only floating and couldn't fly properly at all.

He was confused why he couldn't fly even though he had wings, and eventually he stopped there and went back to the city.

Initially, he wanted to try using Lucilius' other techniques, like trying to control his red sword as he did when he defeated Furias.

But he didn't have much time before people started waking up from their sleep and seeing him training.

He was curious if he could use

"The End," Lucillus' strongest ability, but it seemed unlikely because he only had two wings.

When he arrived at the house they stayed overnight, he saw that no one had woken up yet.

It was strange that usually Katalina, as a soldier, would wake up earlier, but Rei thought maybe they were still tired because of Tiamat.

Finally, Rei tried cooking with the ingredients in the kitchen and made some dishes from his world.

After Rei prepared the food and set everything on the dining table, Katalina appeared with Lyria, followed by Djeeta and Vyrn.

"Good morning, everyone," Rei greeted them, but they seemed not fully awake yet.

But when Djeeta and Vyrn saw Rei's cooking, they suddenly became excited and immediately sat at the table. Meanwhile, Katalina and Lyria slowly sat down, and finally Rei also sat, noticing that Rackam was not there.

"Hey, where's Rackam?" Rei asked them.

"Huh.... Rackam went to check on the Grandcypher.... this morning when I woke up, he told me he.... wanted to check for any damage on the Grandcypher," Lyria replied sleepily.

Hearing this, Rei nodded and started urging them to start eating. He would set aside Rackam's portion for him later.

As Katalina and Lyria tried Rei's cooking, their eyes widened and they quickly quickened their eating.

Watching the two of them, Rei chuckled a bit because their behavior was similar to Djeeta and Vyrn when they tried his cooking for the first time.

After finishing their meal, Djeeta said they would soon continue their journey.

Then Rei prepared food to bring to Rackam, who was still on the Grandcypher, and told them he would head to the Grandcypher first.

Rei then went to the Grandcypher, and when he reached there, he was still amazed by the size of the Grandcypher. It was truly larger than any other airship, which explained why so many characters could board the Grandcypher in the game.

Rei boarded the Grandcypher and searched for Rackam, eventually finding him in the engine room, fixing something.

He greeted Rackam and told him he brought his food.

Hearing that, Rackam turned to Rei and thanked him for bringing the meal before returning to fixing the Grandcypher's engine.

Rei then placed the food he brought in the dining area of the Grandcypher and started exploring the Grandcypher.

After some time exploring the Grandcypher, Rei returned to the deck of the Grandcypher and started trying to practice fly with his wings again.

After practicing for a while, despite keep failing, Rei heard someone approaching.

He saw Djeeta coming, it seemed they were ready to continue their journey.

"Rei, next we will go to Valtz Duchy," Djeeta informed him of their destination.

"When we were about to return to the Grandcypher, Sierokarte suddenly stopped us and gave us a letter from Drang and Sturm."

"I don't know why they entrusted the letter to Sierokarte instead of giving it to us directly, but we were curious about what they wanted, so we chose to follow the letter and go to Valtz Duchy."

Hearing about Valtz Duchy, Rei tried to remember what would happen there, but aside from their meeting with Io and the place where Colossus was located, he couldn't recall anything else.

<Meanwhile >

Drang and Sturm were seen on the airship talking to someone wearing black armor and a golden cape.

"And that's all. We entrusted the letter to the Knickknack Shack, as per your instructions," Sturm ended their conversation.

"Good work both of you... but Rei, huh? If what you both said is true, it seems he could ruin my plans..." a voice from the Black Knight was heard, but because the voice was muffled by the helmet, it was difficult to tell whether it was a woman or a man.

Hearing this, Sturm felt worried that the Black Knight would order them to kill Rei.

"It's okay as long as they continue to absorb primal beast power, everything will go smoothly."

"I'll get you back no matter what. Just hold on a little longer for me, Orchis..." The Black Knight looked towards the girl sitting hugging a cat doll, she appeared motionless and just silent as if she were merely a doll.