Chapter 160 -  Conflicting outlooks

Meanwhile, Aile tried another skill he learned. It was the skill that gathered the souls, closing his eyes, his hand moved in a slow-motion forming a fist, a small whirlpool formed with suction force. Once he opened his hand, he noticed a small ball the size of a grain of rice. He continued using it to gather the souls of the deceased. After 8 hours, he managed to gather all the soul in this area and formed a small ball of souls power the size of a pea.

He then rested in Hazel's lap for 2 hours, restoring himself. He had pushed himself mentally and physically. Once awake, he noticed Hazel again and was tempted to see if she could absorb this concentrated soul power to heal her. But he shook his head, it would be the same as before, it would end up making thing worse between Hazel and Sara. He went in, kissed and held her tightly in his embrace. Aile was scared of losing her. Especially now, they have been getting along really well as the two of them were alone in here. They had developed their intimacy, and their bond strengthened with each other.

Hazel, too, was surprised seeing his overly caring nature and somehow felt something was wrong. "Is everything ok? Did something happen to you after you contracted that weird dark ball?"

Nodding and then quickly shaking his head as he held her tight, and said, "I am perfectly fine, do not worry. I just wanted another hug."

***

A few days ago, while Fiona and Emily were on their way back to Fort Bot. Sara woke up once again, sweating and worrying with a nightmare. Something she had been experiencing more and more recently. From the other corner of the room, Sophie came towards her from her bed. She sat next to her and held her hand to comfort her.

"Another nightmare?"

Sara, as white as a sheet of paper, nodded. It took a while before she calmed down.

"We should call a healer, Sara. This is getting worse and worse."

"No, I know what is wrong... do not worry... soon, it will be fixed," said Sara melancholically.

Seeing her closest friend in such a state again, she decided to confront her.

"Sara... What is wrong? What are you hiding from me? I do not want to lie to him or my mother about you. I am worried..."

Sara looked at her and said, "Nothing much is happening, I will die soon... It is no big deal, let's go to the sweet shop, I have decided to only eat sweets from now on."

Sophie was looking intently at her, expecting a laugh. Sara liked to joke around, and this was not the first time she had taken a joke too far and quipped about death. However, something was telling her that this was not a joke.

"Sara... It is not funny, tell me what is wrong?"

Sara smiled and said, "What is the big deal? We all will die anyway. It will happen to me sooner."

"Are you poisoned? What is the problem? We have to tell Aile... He will help you?" Sophie tried to find what the issue is and was thinking of ways to solve the problem.

"I think he already knows and does not care. He has not visited in years." Sara's voice became lower and sadder as she said this, although she knew that he had his reasons. She needed to lighten the burden on her soul and reduce the pain she feels, so she talked and vented to Sophie. This was the best solution to let go of the negativity and return to her cheerful self. No matter what she did not want to lose her happy smile.

"He had to cultivate alone... you know that right?... What is the problem? Let's go to the healers, we will cure you, and if Aile knows, he will find a way to help you, he always finds a way."

After Sophie finished speaking, she looked at Sara, who had a sad countenance and eyes filled with tears.

"Sara.."

"Stop Sophie... I will die soon, and no one cares. It is ok... I knew this day would come for a year now. Something happened 2 days ago, and now I am sure I will die." She was referring to the day Hazel absorbed one petal of the Soul Nether Flower. She could no longer hold her tears back.

Sophie was confused, she did not know how to comfort Sara. If it was someone else, she would have been able to help better. However, Sophie has almost all the time been cheerful. She thought about her training and decided to use the strategies Emily thought her and decided to find the root of the problem.

"Sara, can you tell me why you are saying this?"

Sara was quiet and then decided to talk. She told her about the time she and Hazel fainted. How Aile explained the ailment to her that they needed to stay away from each other. Initially, she said she believed it, but something happened later. As the soul of Sara and Hazel resonated more, some very emotional memories were shared. These were either from Hazel's time of loneliness from before or the time she spent 'healing her soul' with Aile. This made Sara realize that perhaps Aile kept his distance to feel at ease being together with Hazel.

Recently she got another visual which was Hazel seeing Aile collect the soul nether flower. After that, she saw Hazel consume it, resulting in the weakening of her soul, which would allow Hazel's soul to absorb her with ease.

She could only make the absence of Aile and Hazel, plus this elaborate method of getting rid of her as deception. She felt sad. What made things worst was that she had seen through Hazel's eyes when he had kissed people and recently Violet and Ellie, due to Hazel's jealously.

Aile had abandoned her, tried to kill her, taken her mother as a lover. He has kissed other people, and yet he has not even bothered to meet her. How can she be happy, although she does not want to judge him based solely on these snippets of memories, they are hard to ignore. In the end, he was always there for her. So him abandoning her seemed too unnatural, she was going to get to the truth before she acts. She will find out everything first. Sharing her thought out loud made her realize that she was missing a lot of information, but it also made her sadder because she knew there was some truth to what she saw.

More importantly, seeing Sophie in the same position as her, brought her more grief. She wanted to meet Aile because she knew now that the calling for her soul kept on getting stronger. Sara wanted to resolve these problems face to face with Aile.

After listening to Sara's conjecture, Sophie too became as white as a sheet. She thought 'he is kissing other people.' She was thinking that she made the wrong decision of leaving his side and not visiting him much. She had made this decision because Sara could not go, and she did not want her to feel left out. But why did he not even visit once? Was it because she did not have a background or use to him? It was Sara's turn to calm her down. To avoid more grief, Sara did not continue to tell her about his kiss with Emily after seeing her worried expression. Over the years, they had become very close, and they ended up sharing a room and became more like sisters.

After calming down, Sophie decided to find more information through Sara's visions. After getting an understanding of the situation that he was not lying about his solo cultivation, they wanted to confront Fiona and Emily before they make their decision. Sara was bolder and was sure that she can get everything she wants from Emily as long as she explains the situation to her.

Although she felt conflicted to use Emily's involvement with Aile to pressure answers out of her, she did not mind anymore. Her time was decreasing, and she needed to be in peace.

***

At the same time in Port Kiar, the environment of the town was right at the edge, and the air was filled with gunpowder. After the chat with Aile, Aurelius, Beshoy and the two girls became more reserved and fearful that someone was targetting them. Although it was not something new, however, the two girls and Beshoy trusted Aile's warning that this time it was different. He had proved his insight to Beshoy, and the two girls had kept an eye on him, and his business. The merchant hall had traversed many adversities with ease because of such warnings.

Due to this, they too knew the value of the warning.

Today they were meeting the remaining group of the bandits and getting their resources that they would exchange with money. Aurelius with his usual team was there for the collection, while a group of reinforcement was hidden just in case. Aurelius was against wasting his people's time with the backup.

But with the interference of his two daughters, the backup team led by Beshoy was there. His two daughters were also far away with a binocular type of treasure to look at the trade.

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