42 Chapter 42: Smile

Lars drank a couple of mind potions and he calmed his breathing.

"Fuuu..." He sighed and cold air came out of his mouth.

"Damn, he looks so cool." Tione and Tiona were rizzed out of their minds.

"Hah, are you stupid? Now, Melen will be looking for who did this." Alfia pointed out.

"Eh? Shit, I forgot about that... Then shouldn't we just do this the old fashioned way?" Lars shrugged.

"The old fashioned way?" Alfia raised a brow and he smiled.

"We make a report and say that the ship from Telskyura did it." Lars had an angelic smile on his face.

"S-so evil..." Airmid frowned at him. "We love it..." Tiona and Tione gave a thumbs up.

After that, they immediately went to the authorities.

"Mister! Mister!" Lars called out to the receptionist.

"Yes, what is it? Please do be quiet and use your inside voice." The receptionist patiently chided.

"We can't be calm! A ship from Telskyura froze a big portion of the lake you see?" Lars reported.

'This guy is definitely built for evilus. He can spout such nonsense with a straight face.' Alfia sighed.

"What!? Are you for real?" The receptionist quickly went outside.

He then saw that from the shore, leading to the Telskyuran ship, the waters were frozen solid.

And it was starting to get cold in Melen. "Oh my gods..." The receptionist was shocked to the core.

'Heh, mess around and find out.' Lars smirked.

"We'll deal with them appropriately... Please call the Poseidon familia." The official ordered his subordinate.

And Lars had a twisted grin on his face. If he had both of his arms, he would be rubbing them like a villain.

"They'll be dealing with the poseidon familia... One of the strongest groups in the world, you're quite devious as usual." Airmid sighed.

"You get what you deserve." Lars snorted and he was sure that if they were any weaker, Argana would've killed him.

"Then let us continue our vacation, that is the reason why we got here, did we not?" Alfia was done.

"Ohh? Such a tsundere, so you were enjoying it." Lars teased her and she flicked his left side.

"Ahh! I'm still regenerating, woman!" Lars kneeled down as his nerves were still raw as hell.

"Hmph, that's not my problem. Come on, let's do whatever it is we need to do." Alfia snorted.

After reporting the Kali familia, they started swimming on another side of the lake.

(Pic)

"Damn... I guess that's going to be another core memory." Lars saw Alfia in her bathing suit.

"Hey... Where do you think you're looking?" Tiona glared at him and Tione pinched his cheek.

"I'm just admiring the view, pretty good if I do say so myself." Lars played it off and the twins stared at him suspiciously.

A bead of sweat fell from his brow. 'I've been staring for a tad too long.'

"Thanks, Lars." Tiona said out of the blue and he raised a brow.

"For repelling Argana... We don't really have a good memory of her." Tiona sighed.

Tione went quiet and he patted their heads. 'Must be unpleasant there.'

"Do... Do you know how amazons level up in Telskyura?" Tione asked him.

"I do, they cannibalize each other, don't they?" Lars frowned.

"Yeah, when it was my turn to fight against someone to the death to level up... It was against a friend of mine." Tione furrowed her brows.

"Her name was Seldas..." Tione started to claw on her arms until her skin turned raw.

"Tione... You don't have to tell your story." Lars sighed heavily.

"It's fine... She was a kind, big sister. The strongest in our stone room where we stay all day." Tione reminisced.

"Always waiting for me to return... Always taking care of us who were younger." Tione gritted her teeth.

"But on my 5th birthday, another ritual killing. A fight to the death, my opponent's mask shattered as she lay on the ground." Her teeth almost cracked as she gnashed them.

"Seldas with a terrified expression. A knife in the middle of her chest. I killed her with my own two hands." Tione tried to rub her skin again.

Tiona frowned heavily as she grabbed her sister's arms.

"No matter how many times I bathed, no matter how much I scrubbed my skin raw. I never felt the warm, crimson blood go away." Tione started hyperventilating.

"Shh, shh, it's okay. You aren't in Telskyura anymore." Lars hugged her and she started to calm down a bit.

"Monstro is our home now. Isn't that right, Tiona?" Lars asked her and she nodded.

"Rest in our hotel for now, Tione. Airmid, can you help her get there?" Tiona asked of her.

Airmid nodded and she healed Tione first before they went back to their room.

"Hah... Telskyura huh? I never really did have good memories of that place." Tiona sighed.

"So they make you kill close friends too huh? That place is messed up." Lars squinted his eyes.

His golden orbs glowed for a second before they went dull again.

"The very first time I killed one of my fellow citizens, I didn't know what to feel..." Tiona looked at the sky.

"At our 5th birthday, I killed someone that was our roommate as well. And the thought that came to me was... Ahhh, I killed again." Tiona snorted.

"And when I saw Tione, shriveled up in a corner. I asked her who she fought." Tiona smiled wryly.

"I was relieved that she was there, alive. And I said it was so. Naturally, she hit me really hard on the face with murderous intent." Tiona had a sheepish expression.

"Of course she would." Lars chortled and Tiona went quiet for a second.

"We then got seniors to train us. For Tione, it was Argana. The personification of Telskyura itself. While I got her sister, Bache." Tiona talked softly about Bache.

"She must've been a positive influence in your life?" Lars was curious about Bache.

"Yeah... It was hard being beaten to a pulp everyday, but one day. I saw a fragment of a story. Argonaut." Tiona smiled.

"I then asked her if she could read it to me. But it was in Koine, and she didn't know how to." Tiona laughed upon remembering.

"She went to Kali to teach her how to read and write it. She then told me the story bit by bit after our training." Tiona was fond of that memory.

"Argonaut, the hero that always smiled. So that the ones in despair would find light in this cruel world." Tiona's admiration of the story was obvious.

"Bache even got lonely when I learned how to read from Kali. Ever since that day, I just smiled no matter the situation. Just like Argonaut." Tiona chuckled.

"A great coping mechanism, Tione must have been quite depressed and traumatized, yeah? It's great that you didn't abandon her. You did great." Lars patted her head.

"Y-yeah... It was hard." Tiona hugged him and she started crying.

"It must have been." He rubbed her back and Tiona wailed as her smile crumbled for the first time in years.

"Hah... You girls have been through a lot. You too Alfia, without you. Melen wouldn't be here." Lars commented.

"I already know I did great things for this world, Lars." Alfia snorted, but she did have a smile on her face.

After all, they did everything for the whole world's peace. But they were quickly forgotten.

The world definitely loves heroes. But what they love more, is their struggle and to see them fall.

"Come on, go back with Tione and Airmid. Greet them with a smile." Lars pinched Tiona's cheek.

"Un... Gotta be the positive one, am I right?" Tiona chortled and she went back to the hotel.

"Hah, being a therapist is hard." Lars sighed as he took out a cup of juice.

"Nobody asked you to be one." Alfia raised a brow at him.

"Well, unpleasant things need to be done by someone. And them bottling up things like that is bad." Lars shrugged.

They went quiet for a second as they watched the scenery of Melen.

"I'm tired Alfia, I demand a lap pillow." Lars' body was consuming tons of energy to regenerate.

"Hmph, if you insist." Alfia put him on her lap. "It's been some time since we were alone like this, Lars." Alfia commented.

"Hngh, that's right. We've been mighty busy." Lars chuckled.

"Alfia, have you ever thought of being just a normal person? Perhaps living in a port city like this and enjoy a normal life?" Lars asked.

"A normal life huh? Ever since I came to be, I have been gifted." Alfia clenched her fists.

It was hard to be a prodigy. And not just a normal one, a prodigy of prodigies that could become a special being even without the help of the gods.

"I can't imagine something like that." Alfia replied and he nodded.

"As expected, that would be impossible in your eyes. Do you regret anything though?" Lars asked and she was stumped.

"Regret... I think I want to see my nephew. He's the only memory of Meteria left in this world. Even though I want to gouge his eyes out." Alfia scowled.

"Damn, that supporter guy must be in your shitlist." Lars whistled.

"He took advantage of the fact that we were on the quests. I would've killed him if he tried to seduce my sister in front of me." Alfia glared at empty air.

"Then let's visit him one of these days. I've concluded that I can't relocate Monstro here in Melen.

So while I find a nice mountainous region, let'e go see if your nephew is doing fine." Lars offered.

She stared at him with an unreadable expression. "If you insist." She shrugged.

But she had a smidgeon of a smile on her face. "Anything for you. You'd be kind of a good mother you know?" Lars chuckled.

He got smacked immediately. "What do you mean by that?" She glared at him.

"Well, you'll definitely raise a kid to be successful. But they'll probably hate you for it. So that's a minus." Lars shrugged.

"Geh... Is that so?" She thought about it and got a bit depressed.

"Well, that's a story for another time." Lars stood up as he recovered a bit.

"Come on, let's rest for now. You've been fighting all your life. Let's relieve a bit of that tension." Lars smiled at her.

"A good idea." She smiled and they returned back to their room.

__Melen__

Roaming around the port city, with Lars buying out every store of fish. He was suddenly stopped by someone.

"Lars-san? Please, a minute of your time?" Somebody wearing a uniform called out to him.

'The police? Hmmm, this might get a bit dicey.' Lars smiled at him.

"What is it, sir?" He asked softly. "We're the peacekeepers of the city. And the Poseidon familia apprehended the Telskyurans."

"I see, lead the way. You want to ask questions right?" Lars cooperated.

"Wow, thank you for being cooperative. Let's go at once." The man led him to their station.

And there, he found that Argana was chained down. Along with someone that looked like her.

(Pic)

There were also two others, the ones he found at the deck that was staring at them.

(Pics)

Argana started shouting when she saw him, but of course, he didn't understand.

"He's the one who did it, not us." The lady who looked like her sister looked at him.

"Ahhh you must be Bache?" Lars remembered Tiona's story.

"There's the problem, Lars-san. They're not admitting to it. We even found that they were hauling slaves." The official sighed.

"Yeah, why you lying? I'm only level 2 you know?" Lars told the truth.

"Wanna see? I'm only level 2." Lars took off his shirt and showed his back.

Someone who could read hieroglyphs took a look and nodded.

"Bache Kalif, you are lying." The official squinted his eyes at them.

'Heh, too easy.' Lars hid a smirk on his face.

"Telskyura will be fined for this stunt." The official glared at them.

"Is that all, officer?" Lars asked calmly and he nodded.

"Yeah, this is going to be a fiesta. There are also slaves that are illegal. And one of them came from the far east too." He sighed heavily.

"The far east you say? Officer, you saw my familia crest. How about we adopt them for now, the Demeter familia accepts everyone." Lars smiled.

'Someone from the far east huh? I can get a lot of info from them. I need to get as many countries to my side as I can.' Lars squinted his eyes for a split second.

And he used the Demeter familia's reputation. Travelling towards the far east would take months, or even a year as well.

"That would help us a lot... The other ones aren't far away from here. So we can ship them back to their villages.

But are you sure? This is a huge favour." The officer felt bad.

"Yeah, it's fine. They can save some money to go back to the far east in Orario. And we can learn more from them about the far east, it's a win win situation." Lars feigned interest about the east's culture.

"Well, thanks little man. We'll let you meet with her later. She has to accept though." The officer nodded.

__

Thanks for reading everyone, ciao.