Blood and Roses || Lee Taeyong

Chapter 44 | "at your best"

Chaerin smiled as she stretched out her muscles. With everything that had happened a few days ago, she hadn't been able to train for a while. She missed it.

She picked up a few knives and approached a target, throwing them one by one into the center, each one hitting with a satisfying thump. It felt good to finally back to doing something physical and not just moping around all day.

She picked up a few more knives and continued, a small pile of blade growing in the center of the foam board.

"Woah there, killer, I think your victim is definitely dead." She heard Jaehyun laugh as he walked into the training room with the rest of the gang. "Seems like you haven't lost your touch."

"Yeah well Jaemin is a good teacher." She replied, high fiving the younger boy. "What are you guys doing down here?"

"Similar to you, we all thought we needed to put in some work." Johnny shrugged. "Group training."

"Ah..." she nodded, seeing the boys streaming into the room and quickly putting away her knives.

She skipped over to where Yuta, Doyoung, Ten, and Kun were all sitting on the mat stretching together.

"There's the princess." Kun chuckled as she sat between him and Yuta. "Ready for training?"

"Yeah, it's been a while." She sighed. "I'm gonna be so rusty."

"Wasn't the last group training the one where you yelled at Taeyong?" Yuta asked with an amused smirk.

"Ugh yeah." She groaned in response. "Hopefully we won't have a repeat of that today."

"Alright everyone, on your feet." Taeyong demanded after a few minutes of stretching.

All of them quickly obeyed, lining up by one end of the mat. It had been a while since their last group training, and a lot had changed in that time, especially between Chaerin snd Taeyong, but she still knew to listen to him during training.

He was different than usual when leading a training session. He wasn't a full demon, but there was a seriousness around him. Unlike other times, the guys were scared of him when he was like this, but they respected him and trusted him to help them. Chaerin was the same.

"I want to have a look over your skills. Jaehyun and I will be observing as you spar. Partner up and we'll get started with the first rotation." He said, nodding as his second in command went to stand by his side.

Chaerin instantly felt Yuta's hand wrap around her arm, dragging her to the center of the mat as the others paired up. She laughed as she faced him, competitive smirks on both of their faces.

"Ready to loose, Hwang?" He said with a taunt.

"In your dreams, anime boy. Even rusty I'll still kick your ass." She replied playfully.

"Yeah we'll see if you're still saying that when you're begging for a yield."

Their eyes narrowed and Chaerin could hear her heart beating hard in her chest. Obviously this wasn't a real fight snd it wasn't like either of them would hurt the other, but that didn't make them any less competitive. It was still a match where they'd be getting evaluated and neither wanted to loose, especially to one another.

"Alright everyone, ready?" Jaehyun called out, him and Taeyong standing on the observation platform by the side of the room. "Begin!"

Immediately Yuta launched himself at Chaerin, catching her off guard by his quick reaction time. She stumbled, the two of them rolling on the ground and bumping into Jaemin and Jeno. She quickly shoved Yuta off of her, flinging him to the side and sending the two younger boys an apologetic glance before launching herself after her friend.

"That was a cheap shot, and you know it." She growled as her eyes narrowed playfully at Yuta. "You know I wasn't looking."

"Yeah well that's your fault for being a slow poke, sweetheart." Yuta replied with a wink before swinging at her again.

She was rusty, and she could feel it. Her reaction time was slower and she felt herself just thinking a lot. It felt like that's all she'd been doing as of late: thinking. Thinking about Taeyong, about her family, about everything. A harsh punch in the shoulder snapped her out of it as she let out a pained grunt.

"You're in your own head, Chae." Yuta said, giving her a moment to recover. "I'm being nice by telling you to snap out of it when I should be beating your ass. You're better than this. Prove me right."

She closed her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath before zoning in on the boy in front of her. With a darkened gaze, she flew at him, stringing out with punches and kicks. Her moves were quicker and her attacks were sharper, although she was obviously not going full power as she didn't want to hurt her best friend.

Even as she began to gain the upper hand, she could see the smirk on Yuta's face. He knew she was winning and he didn't care, he was just happy to see her back to her old self.

As her instincts took over, she was able to flip the match and within a few hits, Yuta landed with a thump onto his back. The two of them sat there for a moment, panting heavily and regaining their breath before she gave him a hand and pulled him to his feet.

"You let me win." She said with a huff, giving him a playful shove.

"Neither one of us was going full power." He replied. "And I don't want to wear you out too much."

"I'm fine, Yuta." She sighed.

"I know, but I'm still your best friend and I'll always look out for you." She rolled her eyes as he threw an arm over her shoulders. "Plus, we have more matches to fight today and something tells me you're gonna want to be at your best."

She turned to him with a confused expression but he didn't say anything else, silently dragging her to the side to recover until the rest of the matches finished.

It's been a while since we've seen a bit of Yuta and Chaerin's relationship so I thought I'd show some love to everyone's favorite best friend Mr. Nakamoto Yuta.