I hate you
Melissa stomped her feet on the ship’s wooden floor as she turned her head toward the front of the vessel. She hated that Lucien had run away from her question without giving a clear answer. His response was so vague that anyone could tell he was telling the truth, but the answer did not clarify her question at all. What did he mean when he said he had heard about Melissa from somewhere? Shouldn’t he at least say from whom he heard it?
She still could not believe how Lucien, the Northern Blade, had immediately run away without answering her question, like a cat with its tail tucked between its legs.
Melissa was still flustered by how he had practically glued his eyes to her face just some time ago, and when she finally confronted him after mustering her courage, he had run away. And he did so with such casual ease, his hands tucked in his pockets, walking away unbothered, his steps measured and calm. His back was straight and his posture rigid as a statue as he walked away from her, as if her question was not even worth answering. He was clearly hiding something, and the angst of not knowing it was killing her.
She wanted to know from whom or where he had heard of her, but at least she knew Lucien was telling the truth about having heard of her from somewhere. Otherwise, how would he have even found her without knowing about her from someone? She felt she was losing her mind over the mysterious person or source who had told him about her; she wanted to rip off Lucien’s impassive face and punch it hard.
Lucien had also lied to his parents yesterday at dinner, wearing that same impassive face and showing no fear of being caught. He did not stumble or hesitate in his voice as he lied. She had seen through the story he spun and knew it was full of fabrications. Yet, she kept it to herself. How could she accuse him of lying? She did not want to get tangled up in the mess, especially since the duchess clearly favored her son, and Lucien’s parents had accepted his story without a second thought. Even Melissa’s own parents had fallen for his tale about hearing of her from some traveling old man in a tavern.
I hate you, you bastard. What’s stopping you from telling me how you found out about me?
Melissa wanted to know how he had found out about her, since she had hardly ever left the village except to visit nearby places. She knew she was well-known around her village, but she couldn’t imagine being so famous that an old man would be spreading her story all the way to the stronghold, which was quite far from her home. If that were the case, there would have been carriage after carriage entering her village every day.
She was so shocked by Lucien’s confident lies to his parents about how he had found out about her that she felt she was seeing a devil hiding behind the mask of a human. That dark, gloomy heart of his only made things worse. But his heart had grown slightly less dark since his mother healed. When she first saw him, his heart had been dark like burning coal, but now it was at least somewhat bearable to witness—still dark, but not as dark as when she had first seen it.
Melissa sighed. From the way Lucien had run away from her question, she could tell that she would not receive a straight answer for now, no matter what she did or how many times she asked him.
For now, she turned toward the view around her. The questions that filled her mind faded as awe took over; she watched clouds drift aside as the ship moved forward. The sky was open, with mountain peaks visible in the north. The sun had already crossed the eastern horizon and was slowly rising higher, while everything around the ship was filled with both white and dark clouds. Some clouds floated above the ship, others at the same level, but most hung below. The ship was flying above the clouds as if it were swimming through a river, gliding smoothly among them.
Melissa smiled to herself, feeling childish for her metaphor. The clouds clearly were not holding the ship; it was probably some kind of artifact powered by mana that allowed the vessel to soar through the sky. Even without the clouds below, the ship would still fly. She had never seen an airship so close before, nor had she ever boarded one until now.
She had only occasionally—very rarely—seen airships flying across the sky. It was so rare she could count the number of times, and she remembered how small they had seemed when they flew over her village. They looked to be the size of her fist, some even smaller, as they passed by. She could still remember how she would run after them, trying to chase the shadow they cast on the ground.
I feel so childish remembering how I used to chase after the airship's shadow, Melissa thought, growing flustered at the memory of her childhood antics.
The ships she had seen before did not compare to the one she was currently standing on. Perhaps those other ships had simply flown too high in the sky for her to judge their true size, but the ship beneath her feet now was so enormous that if it flew just slightly above her village, it would cast two-thirds of her small village in its shadow.
Is this ship owned by Lucien’s family? She could not help but wonder how much wealth it would take to possess an airship of such scale.
Melissa clapped her cheeks and shook her head. She had decided not to think of Lucien, yet she found herself drifting back to him again and again, no matter how far her thoughts wandered. She wanted to focus on something else, but his image pressed on her mind like an annoying bug that hummed in her ear, refusing to be swatted away. The memory of Lucien neglecting her question and the image of his face kept coming back to her, persistent and unyielding.
She shoved the thoughts back inside her head and decided to enjoy the view for now. From what she had heard when parting with her parents, it would take a couple of hours to reach the academy. So, she would enjoy the view until she got bored or the ship reached the academy.
A huge cloud in front of the ship was sliced in two, turning into wisps of mist as the ship dashed straight through it.
***
"So beautiful," Melissa muttered as she gazed through the porthole window of the room she had returned to after growing bored of watching the endless clouds and mountains.
She was sitting on the bed in the corner of the room, right beside the porthole window. Melissa leaned forward, placing her head close to the glass, her face just a few inches away as she peered outside.
"Wow," Melissa whispered at the sight before her. The airship was slowly making its way over the walls of Solarin City. The ship flew just above the circular city walls, where troops signaled for it to halt. A knight approached the ship on a wyvern, and after inspecting whose ship it was, he saluted and permitted them entry.
Melissa looked out at the city sprawling far and wide. The tall buildings were painted in vibrant colors, and bustling crowds filled the city streets. Ahead, she saw the Imperial Academy of the Eldoryn Empire, the finest academy the empire had built to foster future talent. At the center of the city, a colossal white crystalline building with domes and spires seemed to pierce the sky itself. There were multiple buildings of varying sizes, but the main one at the center was far more grandiose than any of the others surrounding it.
The academy itself was encircled by yet another wall, forming a protective ring within the city. One wall guarded the academy, while the outer wall protected the entire city.
Melissa had heard from others and from her brother that the academy was a marvelous, palace-like building, the kind pictured in stories of heroes, but to see and experience it from the sky was something else entirely.
A warm sensation filled her chest, and she felt her heart beating faster under her ribcage with excitement at what the future held for her.
***
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