Chapter 107: The friend of wind
"You lied to me!"
"I did not."
"You did! Liar liar liar! You lied to me! I’m mad. I’m so mad...!"
"You are not. Now calm down and let me finish, alright?"
After spending some time with my family, I finally came out to the top floor balcony, the place where I knew I would find the person I was looking for.
She used to tell me stories of how she liked this place... I’ve been here before but it was still pretty new seeing her in my house like this.
Then, the moment she saw me, leaving her peaceful observation of the night sky, she ran up to me and asked where the second Az map was.
But to that question, I answered her in plain language.
’I do not know, I said.’
I genuinely have no idea where exactly that thing actually is. I know, however, where we can find it.
"What’s there to listen to?! You lied to me! You’re a liar!"
But here she is, acting all upset and broke once again. It’s pretty funny to see her like this when you know how different she is when she’s working.
"Liar liar liar liar liar liar."
(Speaking High Viskari: )
"Theodora."
"Liar-... huh?"
I knew she wasn’t going to get serious and continue blaming me for a little longer before giggling and saying she was just joking or something like that.
But that’s not what we are supposed to do when we have already shared those fun moments together in the past. At least, not today.
"I am a regressor."
So, I continued speaking to her in the language that she never taught me, and the language that she had kept close to her all this time.
"You know what that means, right?"
When I started speaking in this strange language, she thought I was just doing something ’I’ thought would be effective before her.
I could tell from that face alone just what she could have been thinking at that moment.
But, she was wrong. And she realised that when I brought up the topic of regression.
"Oh."
She calmed down quietly and looked back at the stars, thinking for a moment.
"Why do you know that name?" The first question she asked me was about the name that she related to the most.
"We used to be quite close in the past. You told me about your oldest memories." She wasn’t just three thousand years old. She knew that much.
But the oldest memories she had weren’t that far away from that time period. She had been around for much longer, but in what form, she knew not herself.
That was her ’question’. That was the foundation that had brought her to her current stage.
"I told you, huh..." She wasn’t looking at me yet. She wanted answers that she could not find with her own reasoning.
By now, she must have calculated all kinds of scenarios that may have followed in the past, backtracking why she would tell someone about something she had never wanted to talk about.
But then again, this wasn’t something that one could just logically understand. She wasn’t the only one who had walked the path led by fate.
"I don’t know how to feel about this, Pri-."
"Sam." I corrected her. "Call me Sam."
We are close enough for her to call me by that name at least.
And while it means something else in the language we are using right now, it does contain a value of its own.
"You..." She was embarrassed and blushing, acting like some innocent little girl before someone that knew much about her.
"Don’t think too much about this. We were good friends."
That’s how things were, and that’s how things should be. Having a friend like her was a blessing that I didn’t think too deeply about until I did not have it.
And I guess that’s just how things are for most people.
"Friends, huh?" Finally, she looked at me, her glowing rainbow-like, almost aurora eyes scanning everything there was ’of’ me.
She must have figured out the basic nature of a Synchronist’s taming methods, the artifacts and items I was using, and the strange things about my tamed beasts.
She could have gone through my memories as well, but I don’t think she did that.
When she was done looking through me, she took a deep breath and asked me one last question.
"Tell me one thing then." There was a certain anticipation in her eyes. "Do I ever find the answer?"
If one reads between the lines they would understand just how many things were put behind that one question.
She wasn’t just asking about the answer to her life’s question but about the things that she was looking for. For most parts, however, this question was something that only someone presenting to herself like me could answer.
"You did your best." That was the answer.
The answer to everything she was asking and everything she wanted to know.
The answer to her destined finality, and the answer to something that made her a little sad, as well as a lot more hopeful than she was just a moment ago.
"Then, if you were my good friend, help me do even better this time." She stood up, placed her hand behind and walked in a little circle before looking at me with a smile.
"That’s a mission this time, good Miss. That’s a... mission."
I would tell her everything about the past but it wouldn’t matter. The headmaster that I know wouldn’t be interested in what has happened or even in what might happen.
The thing that matched with her the most was the present.
And she was doing everything she could to maintain that present in her own little world.
"Good, then..." She gave me a small smile, and from that alone, I knew what was coming.
(Speaking common language: )
"Liar."
And I was right.
"Liar liar liar. Liar!"
She continued on where she had left off, calling me a liar once again.
"It’s in the lost underwater city."
But the moment I said those words...
"Lie-... wait. Wait what?"
She stopped, and looked at me with a stunned look.
"..."
For a moment, she just looked at me without saying anything, trying to confirm whether I was telling the truth or not.
"Oh... hells."
But when I didn’t say anything, she knew exactly what I meant.