My Extraordinary Childhood Friend (#Wattys2016)

31 - Rift

Regine's POV:

"Vexillum et erípe aperire ostium..."

The portal opens to our seat of government in Niño. Upon arrival, we are already welcomed by a horse carriage in front of our bungalow...

"Huh? What is this doing in our home, sir?" Azusa asked the guy who is in the carriage.

"Milady, this will lead you to the capital of the kingdom, Brianbe. The king is looking for you."

"Yes, I understand." Azusa quickly replied to the offer. "But let my friends join me there."

"Sure, milady. In fact, I believe you have a familiar that is as strong as you..." The guy refers that familiar to Akihiko.

All five of us: Me, Akihiko, Regine, Danica and Danielle, fitted into the carriage as it rode hours and hours into the road...leading to the Brianbe, the capital of Alaniab. We just stay silent...as we observed the changing landscape: from the vast farmlands and forests...up into the villages with bustling businesses...

It's nightfall when we arrived in the castle in Brianbe. The guards lead us to our respective apartment to stay there...and Azusa is feeling uneasy...so I tried to confront her...

"Umm...Azusa-chan...is there something wrong that I could help?" I saw Azusa staring blankly at the window of our apartment.

"Nope. It's nothing." She faintly smiled at me. "I'm just a little bit worried about what is to come. Maybe our plan to liberate our home may not turn out accordingly to our wishes..."

"...sigh...you only realized the weight of this now?" I pat her shoulder to cheer her up. "Don't worry, we still have a lot of time to be prepared. Besides, when that's over, you will become our newest Empress. Right, Princess Lily?"

"Hehehe! Regine, you're more optimistic than I am, huh?" Azusa giggled at my opinion. "Alright then, I'll do my best!"

Lily/Azusa's POV:

"Princess Lily! Princess Lily!"

A call from the door of our apartment has awakened me early in the morning. I sat up and pulled myself into my wheelchair and wheel myself towards the door...

"Princess Lily speaking, what is it?" I spoke loud to be heard to the other side of the door.

"Mam, can I accompany you towards the lobby? Somebody wants to see you."

Accepting the offer, I opened the door and let the royal maid push my wheelchair for me until we reached the lobby...where a boy is there in the sofa... waiting for me...

"Oh...hello, Princess." The boy greeted and vow at me with uttermost respect. "I'm Napoleon Bourbon. Nice to meet you."

"Mine as well. I'm currently curious why did you know me?"

"Well...that's because you're popular in Alaniab." Napoleon explained. "You are dubbed as a tough and brave fighter, liberating some parts of your country!"

"Um... re-really? Huehehe...thanks." Though embarrassed by the accolade, I thanked him. "So, what's will be our agenda early in the morning?"

"Well...we come to our knowledge that you need external support for your planned revolt against General Ronald Castillo. I might wondering about having additional support from my private militia."

"Woah! Re-really?! Kyaaa!!! I'm very honored! Thank you so mu-huh?!"

My jolly mood was interrupted by an disturbance outside the castle.

"He-heeey!!! What are you doing?!?!" I saw a elf forcing to break away from the guards that are dragging him. "I'm not going there especially it is not of my business, not even that Princess is there!"

"...sigh...that's my distant cousin...Darwin..." Napoleon starts to explain. "He has always been that since we are just children...I don't know why he has been stubborn ever since..."

I'm just about to give an advice to him... when he suddenly stood up and exited the castle to confront Darwin.

"Hey! Stop it, Darwin! You're embarrassing our guest!" Napoleon shouted at his cousin.

"I don't care! It's none of my business anyway." Darwin shouted back. "Besides, who will gonna bite with that stupid plan of what so called "liberation"?"

"Shut up! That's the thing that I don't like with you!" Napoleon starts to pissed off. "You're already judging things even you're yet to trying it! Why you just try everything that I offered to you for just one day?!"

While the cousins are arguing with each other, I decided to go to outside to know what's happening with them...not knowing that...

"No! I don't!!!" Darwin picked something from the ground and attempted to stone his cousin...only that it landed somewhere else...

"OUCH!!!" It hit my head...good thing that it doesn't form a deep wound in it. Regardless...

"DARWIN!!!"

"What? It's not my fault that it landed to the girl! You're the one who dragged me here!"

"Hey! Don't pass the blame on someone else!"

The cousins continues in exchanging arguments at each other...they even threaten themselves with their own swords...leaving behind the real thing...on whether somebody will hold responsible for hitting me with a stone...that had already pissed me off...

"If anybody of you can't stop from blabbering...I will force you to do it!!!" What comes to my mind first is my Book of Truth...

"Tutela inermium, destruendo malos, tradentes lucem et stabilienda pace. Aperi! Nova Ascia Imperialis Scriptura Veritatis!!!"

As the Book of Truth begins to appear in front of me, the cousins stopped from fighting...dropped their swords to ground and stand themselves in front of me...

"I know a spell in my book that would silence everybody who doesn't respect me. So unless you stop fighting about random stuff and all, I'm not afraid to use it!"

"Alright! Alright! I'll stop!" Darwin raised his hands to prove it.

"Sorry, Princess." Napoleon, on the other hand, lowered his voice in surrender.

"Well then, can both of you come together to the lobby and talk what is the root cause of all of this ruckus?"

Upon my orders, the cousins entered the castle together...though they didn't bother to look at their faces. As I make my book disappear and follow them, I realise about what Alice said two days ago...yes...there is a rift between the humans and the elves. I need to resolve the issue between Darwin the elf and Napoleon, his human cousin, so that my plans to liberate Nova Ascia will be realised.