[Arthdal Chronicles] Fight for freedom

FLASHBACK CHAPTER 8: Nothing but us. (EDITED 06/22)

- Yangcha's point of view -                  

 - Weeks later -

Far from the Daekans' camp, in order to not get caught, we were training as usual. She had gotten better but she was still far from being good enough to go to Arthdal, I didn't want her to go there anyway. It had been almost two years since we began training together and I wanted her to stay by my side as long as it was possible.

That day, as always, I was winning. She ran away laughing and as she was expecting me to do, I chased after her. It had become a sort of game between us. She was quite childish but I guess I was too, or at least I was with her.

I already knew where she was hiding, she wouldn't be able to surprise me, I had heard her walking on a branch.

She went out of her hide-out with her sword raised. "I guess I am still too noisy, that's a point we will have to work on," she said as I blocked her attack.

Because she was talking she wasn't concentrating and she accidentally fell into the mud puddle that was just behind her. That was predictable and even if I had tried to prevent that from happening, she would have fallen anyway, and probably me with her.

I put my sword on her neck. It meant she had lost, if that was a real fight she would have been dead. I had won, again and just like her falling because of her two left feet, that was predictable as well.

"I lost, you won, again," she said before she sat and wiped the mud away from her arm. She laughed seeing the state she was in.

I sheathed my sword and squatted in front of her. She gave me her hand as she knew I wanted to say something.

« Rule to follow : Do not get distracted, concentrate and do not talk » I wrote.

"I was concentrating though," she defended herself before she pouted.

"Then you're just clumsy," I teased her.

"Do you think I don't know that? Clumsy is my second name."

I hardly kept from laughing, she was cute. I stood up but I felt a kick on my leg making me fall in the mud as well, I didn't see that coming.

"Rule to follow: do not drop your guard even if you think you already won the fight," she said with a satisfied smile before she stuck her tongue.

Under my mask, I smiled and I was sure she was aware of it because she laughed.

It ended up as a mud fight that she won this time. I was fine with losing, seeing her laugh was already a win for me.

When we both felt exhausted from our fight, we stopped and she looked at me up and down with an amused look.

- You can't go back to the camp like that... I doubt Tagon will believe you took a mud bath to take care of your skin. She giggled. Follow me, I have established my hut near a river we can wash in.

I stood up, almost fell down again because of the slippery mud but managed to find my balance back under her mocking eyes. Then I followed her. She was right, I couldn't go back like that to the camp, even though nobody never ever noticed I slipped away from the camp as much as I could, the state I was in would be hard to explain if I was asked a question.

She had chosen a pretty place to set up even if it was only a temporary place. Her hut was well done, she always put her heart and soul in doing it well even though she always changed her living place to follow us.

I took off my mask and we entered the river fully dressed to wash the mud away. She splashed me, chidlishly. So I ended up splashing her too.

When water entered her eyes, she shook her head and rubbed her eyes. I approached her and took her head between my hands to check if she was fine.