A Reunion [Solo | Job | Plot]

Job:

“My my... This city is very crowded, eh...?” She peeked behind the curtain while watching the townspeople swarmed around the city, murmuring her thoughts as she cupped her own chin with left hand. The woman gracefully adjusted her body to sit back politely, her right hand reached for the fan she slipped behind her Obi and she opened it, waving herself with the fan and slightly blowing her brown bangs because she felt the heat while sitting inside the cart that designed for the nobles. She was indeed a noblewoman, judging by how the woman moved so gracefully and how she acted or spoke. Her body was covered by white colored Kimono which has flowery pattern on it, the shoulders part was slightly opened to reveal her white shoulders. Two obsidian orbs perfectly stacked on her face, excitement was shown in it but there was much more hidden inside it. But then she closed her eyes and carved a smile on her face, “I wonder if he is here too...” She giggled while covering her peach colored lips with the spread fan.

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A melody could be heard throughout the city, it was beautiful, soothing for everyone who heard it in such a busy city. His morning routine became well known for most townspeople there as he would play his flute at the morning while sitting on the window of his inn room, some even already gathered there and waited for him to do his daily routine. Today he was not playing a very calming one, in fact it sounded a little catchy and energizing but still having this soothing effect for everyone. Oh how he loved how music could affect people’s emotions. He would send a bow and smile to everyone who was watching his performance before stepped back to slowly close the window. His smile faded as the window was closed, turning his face back into what he truly had, a cold one. It was fun for him, hiding his true self was not tiring at all, it helped him to build some relationship with people so why bother to change it? In fact, it was still him too even though it was not him in the current time. ’Caine’ was the one who had that kind of expression, and ’Tenma’ supposed to be the reversed one, at least that was what he believed. “Heh…” He chuckled, pitying himself. “I guess I need to find her quickly… Or I might lose it all…”

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The morning weather was very pleasant as it was not too hot and kind of windy, it was already crowded though but that didn’t made Tenma feel too lazy to go out. He wished to find a job today so he won’t just wasting his day only to sleep, train and then drinking. He always knew just wasting money would not bring any good to him in the future, he needed to make money too. So the man walked towards the city hall and planning to see the information board for any interesting job, but when he arrived, he could see the board was empty. He scratched his back head and turned his body just to see something that he recognized from the eastern land, a cart designed for a Kou noble woman was being lifted in the busy street, surrounded by many people who was curious enough to see the beautiful cart. Tenma wondered what business did such noble has that she needed to visit such city and even went as far as passing through the busy streets, but he stopped to think as soon as he notice an odd movement among the crowd. He dashed forward while maneuvered his right hand to reach the Katana’s handle, ready to cut through the suspicious man he saw. His sharp eyes could see it, the suspicious man pulled a knife from his sleeves and dashed towards the guards unnoticeably. Tenma didn’t stop his step and quickly rushed to the cart but he was too late as the man managed to slit one of the guards’ throat in a quick movement. Not long after that, the swordsman arrived right behind the man and unsheathed his Katana to send two downwards diagonal cuts, knocking the man up before he managed to attack someone else. After that, he would leave the assassin to another guard while he approached the injured guard after taking out his handkerchief, placing it on the cut and pressed on it to stop the bleeding. “Someone call a doctor… and what is his name…?” Tenma looked at the other guard and as soon as one of them told him, he quickly turned his gaze back to the injured guard, “Sun Chang, stay with me… Get a hang of yourself…”

“What happened…?”

Tenma’s eye twitched as he heard the voice that sounded familiar in his ears, making him turned his head to see the owner of the voice only to let out a chuckle and warm smile. The female smiled back and quickly kneeled down beside the swordsman, observing her injured guard and sighed while saying, “He won’t made it...” and as if her words had a power within it, the man didn’t made it as he breathed his last breath. The swordsman stared coldly at the lifeless body, using his hand to close the man’s pathetic eyes and then stood up. He would bow to the female while carving a smile that seemed not affected by the death of the man that he tried to safe, “It’s been a while… Master… What brings you here?”

The noble woman laughed a little in a graceful way while covering her lips with the fan, bringing her voluptuous body closer to the black haired man in a seductive way. “I am just walking around… How are you Tenma?” The man looked directly at the female’s eyes, he didn’t seem affected by the seductive gesture from the noble woman itself and answered casually, “I’m still alive, master. But to think that a beautiful noble woman like yourself strolling around this kind of area… quite dangerous isn’t it? Although you surely can protect yourself…” His gaze was not sly, if the woman noticed she could see the respect shown in his eyes and also admiration. Well, it was to be expected since the woman herself, was the one who taught the man how to wield a sword like a warrior. It was long time ago when Tenma went to the country of Kou to find a clue regarding to his little sister whereabouts. At that time, the noble woman in front of him was the one who took care of him, giving him place to live for a while and also teaching him the way of swordsmanship. But just like everyone else, she didn’t know Tenma’s true identity as he never told her and had no intention to tell her about it too.

“I am very grateful to meet you right here, Tenma. You also saved me from the assassin even though one of my guards didn’t survive. Could it be fate…?” The woman chuckled and folded her fan, pointing it towards the one eyed man so the tip touched Tenma’s chest. “And yes… I can protect myself… But I am not here to stain my hand… nor engaging myself into any battle as I want to avoid it right now. So... Are you interested if I hire you to become my bodyguard? Only for three days until I am done with my business here and after that I will pay you. What do you think?” As soon as she said it, one of the guard moved beside her and glared at Tenma, “Ouka-sama!” But the female hushed the guard, staring at him with a cold gaze, signaling him to stay quiet. She would say something again but stopped when the swordsman chuckled and nodded. “If this is a fate, then it is my pleasure to be your bodyguard. Even though it is only for a while…” He felt it, he could feel the jealousy from her guards, as if the guards was nothing than just a symbol of her noble status and the way she asked him to be her bodyguard in front of them was also amusing, at least for Tenma.

The woman named Ouka chuckled and clutched Tenma’s arm tightly before she said to her guards, “Don’t worry… I just hired him to replace Sun Chang for a while. But of course he would be the closest one to guard me since we go way back, right? Now I am tired… and I want to quickly rest. So please give Sun Chang a proper burial and meet me at the inn.” Just like a roaring thunder, she didn’t let the guards talked back and continued with a smile, “Tenma will escort me as I will walk to the inn… and this is an order. Understand?” The guards went speechless and nodded weakly, knowing that they wouldn’t able to refuse their princess’ request and quickly did what she ordered. She would then look at Tenma with a calm smile and then pulled his arm, making her way through the crowd and heading to the inn. “So…Mas—“ The black haired man raised his eyebrow as his mentor put her index finger to his lips, “I told you right…Tenma? Call me by my name… It’s Ouka…” and with that, Tenma smiled while gently pulling her hand away from him and nodded, “Got it… Ouka then… Don’t you think it’s kind of troublesome leaving your guards like that…? As I believe some more assassin will come again…” but the woman only chuckled, telling him not to worry because she had him as a bodyguard right now and marched towards the inn.

As soon as they reached the inn, Tenma would stay outside the room to guard her but was not permitted by the woman as she asked the man to guard her inside the room. He gave up and entered the room since Ouka didn’t stop whining and telling her new bodyguard to enter the room. He knew his master very well, a graceful, noble woman who can be a very demanding one if needed even though not every day and not to everyone she would act like that. As soon as he entered the room, Ouka already prepared two cups of tea and ordered Tenma to take a seat before finally talked about many things. It was pleasant and nice to be able to talk with his mentor, able to hear her new experience and also shared his own, but as usual, he only share about what he thought was necessary to share and not giving very much details to his own story. Sometime he would add some additional information inside his story that of course, was only a lie. Well he couldn’t help it right? He needed to keep himself safe no matter how much he respected his mentor, but he never know when a friend would be a foe. The woman also didn’t give him a solid reason about why she would visit Heliohapt, spending too much time to travel from Kou to such city only to take a stroll was not a logical reason in his mind. But he brushed it off, as long as he got his own payment then he wouldn’t give too much care in this.

Day passed by quickly and it was already the second day since he started to guard Ouka, the noble woman from Kou that was also his mentor. It was midnight and again, he was in the room with the noble while the other guard waiting outside, trying hard to brush off their mind from what they thought might happen between their princess and the one eyed man since they spend a long time together inside the room. But they were wrong, those two were just sharing they thoughts about swords, sharing their interesting story and the rest was just silence. “They may be coming tonight…” Tenma was leaning beside the window while closing his eyes, giving the woman some room to change her clothes because she wouldn’t let the man to exit the room no matter what and being very stubborn. Ouka just hummed and tied her obi skillfully, “Well... I’m counting on you… and you can peek Tenma…” She chuckled and continued, “Oh yes, I forgot, you are the man without desire towards woman. I feel so safe…” Tenma would just smiled at the woman while still closing his eyes, it was true that he didn’t feel any desire even though there was a good looking woman with a very nice body changing clothes in front of him, that was because he averted that kind of desire into another kind of desire and he was not interested in any woman, at least for now.

Tenma stopped thinking as he felt someone’s presence, someone that had ill intention towards them. “…get down.” He said when he felt this someone become closer and readied himself to attack when a masked man showed up, delivering a slash towards Tenma. He unsheathed his sword and performed two quick sharp slashes immediately, blocking the slash and then proceeded to send two front kicks to the masked man, knocking him down. He planned to interrogate the assassin but he was too late as the assassin bite something that looked like a pill and died with foam leaking out from his mouth. Tenma sighed but then pulling the corpse away, opening the door and handed it to the guards, asking them to take care of the corpse before closing the door and turned back to see the woman smiling at him. “Your skills are amazing… looks like you’ve been training a lot… and I see you have some new moves… clever…” The swordsman closed his eye for a second before opened it again and chuckled to the woman, “Well, thank you… Ouka.”

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The black haired man walked close beside Ouka, guarding her from any ill intention while heading towards the port. Today she was being stubborn again, refusing to ride the cart and chose to walk beside the swordsman, still clutching his arm tightly. For three days, the only thing she did was just doing some shopping and then went back to the inn to rest. Tenma noticed it and felt that it was strange routine, but he didn’t try to bring it up and just doing his work to guard his master. He didn’t feel the need to ask any further about what her true intention and only focused to get some money right now. It was also the last day he needed to guard Ouka and he would be free from the job soon although it was fun. Tenma kept his guard up, forecasting that more assassin would show up at the port and attempt to kill his master. What he forecasted really happened, as he spotted two assassin coming out from the crowd. One of them was ready to send a slash to his throat but he parried it and attacked by sending a horizontal slash to his target followed by sending a downward diagonal cut, knocking the assassin up. He would waste no time and dashed towards the last assassin, sending four diagonal slashes but failed as the assassin used parry to deflect his attack. But Tenma didn’t sway, he lifted his Katana again and deliver four surprise cuts to the assassin, making him fell on the ground. Tenma would looked around and observe if there would be another assassin until the ship arrived. After that Ouka approached the man with a smile on her face, handing him a pouch filled with money and then said, “Good bye Tenma, it was fun…” With a chuckle, Tenma replied, “Yes it is, until we meet again then, Ouka…” But the woman didn’t say anything, she would lift her hand and cupped it on the man’s cheek. She whispered, “Until we meet again… my beloved student…” Then planted a soft kiss after pulling the man’s face to become closer to her on his lips, she would pull away before she walked away and waved her hands. Tenma watched as the woman entered the ship, giving her a smile and waved back to her before turned his back to head back to his own inn room. Well, Tenma knew that Ouka was around four years older than him and quite seductive with the figure she had, but Tenma was not interested in any romance. The kiss didn’t affect him at all as if it was never happened, but then again it was not the first time the woman kissed him. She did that a lot before and Tenma never cared to do something about it, he was just not interested in it and would just remain to not doing anything. ‘Beloved student…eh…’

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Dear Lamia,
Code Name : Chaos is doing fine and he is become very skilled too, I’m contempt with his growth. He is able to control it from what I can learn in the meantime when I spent several days with him. But I do want to observe a little longer as I believe he can be a successful one. I cannot wait until he is able to find his sister… and learning the truth… It will be interesting.
Regards,
Fenrir
P.S: I kissed him again today, but he showed no emotion or reaction. I am sad…


A chuckle escaped her peach colored lips and she lifted up her fan, spread it and touch her lips with it before she scrolled the letter and put it on the messenger’s bird foot. She would let the bird fly to send the message to her colleague before she sat on the bed, touching her own lips while murmuring, “Caine…”

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WC: 1500+/1500
Magoi/Stamina : 90/250

Abilities: