Lana.
Lena is about to enter a kingdom, She had forgotten all about her wanted status as she couldn't careless at the moment. Octan hasn't shown any signs of life since this morning, After walking a bit she had searched Octan's body to find anything useful and ended up with a map. It had showed that a kingdom's capital was close by, so Lena decided to restock there.
With Octan's lifeless body on her back she walks down the path towards said capital. She doesn't know where she is in the grand scheme of things, and nor does she care. Hell she doesn't even know what her steps moving forward are.
Go to the demon lord? That would just end up with her and Octan dead.
Then what?
It was all that they had planned so she has no idea of what else to do. With nothing, but hunger moving her forward, she marches towards the capital.
She reaches the capitals entrance from the path. A long line is formed by travelers and merchants, but Lena skips it all and walks right pass it.
"Hey! Get back in the line!" A man fully cladded in armor shouts at Lena while hesitantly staring at Octan's body.
Lena silently reaches one of her hands into her pocket and pulls out the Gold crest, Octan, had left her.
"M-my apologies! I hadn't known you were a gold ranked adventurer. It's just that after last night everyone has been ordered to increase caution levels to maximum. Oh, please go right ahead!" The man bows down in apology and explains his circumstances before walking back towards the front of the long line.
"We were treated quite well..." Lena mumbled as she remembered her adventuring days.
'Hell...' she thought moving into the capital.
-
-
She spends quite a while looking around.
Finally deciding on a place, she seats Octan down on a chair only for his body to then limply fall on the table in front of him, and she sits down at the opposite chair. Looking at the sign on top of the establishment it reads "restaurant".
"Restaurant..." Lena had heard that word somewhere before.
Diving deep into her memory she remembers.
Suddenly she a scene flashes in her brain.
'Right... She took me to one once...' Lena remembered the death of someone she used to know.
'Though that one was a bit more lavish...' Lena said looking around at what seemed like your regular side street business.
She stares at Octan's lifeless body for a moment then just waits in silence.
Eventually someone approaches her.
"Hello. how might I help you." A dead voice, the sound of someone who had given up.
The voice of a woman who lives in despair. A woman who hates her job, her life, and her continuing existence.
The voice of a woman who doesn't know why she's still waking up the next day, The voice of a woman who didn't want anything to do with anyone anymore.
The voice... that brought Lena peace.
There she was. She had changed, definitely so, but Lena could tell. Immediately from the moment she pronounced the "H" she knew it was her.
Her dark hair was slightly cover her face, her arms looked weak and limb, her legs looked as if they would break any second now.
It made her wonder 'Why would anyone hire such a person as a waitress? Wouldn't it just drive away customers if anything?'.
But even though the thought had ran through her mind, she didn't care.
She truly and utterly didn't care, because all she could do was stare at her. Stare in peace.
Octan's lifeless body continued to droll on the table while Lena stared at the woman.
"U-uhh... Umm... Excuse me... Do I know you?" The woman with deep brown eyes asked Lena.
Her words hit like a condensed fireball.
"W-what?" Lena asked completely confused by her question.
"S-sorry, but do I know you...? and please wake your friend there up..." She said pointing at Octan's lifeless body.
Lena's peaceful look turned upside down.
'How could she forget?' Lena questioned the logic of this scenario.
"You don't remember?" Lena asked the confused and worried woman.
"Remember what? As long as I'm concerned this is our first time meeting, sir."
"Sir?! You should know this better than anyone! I'm a woman, not a man!" Lena stood up angry.
"T-that so...?" The woman steps back in a panic.
"It's me god damn it! Can't you even remember me at least! I'm sorry for everything, ok?! I know what I had done was wrong. I know I should have told you something at least, But... But... But I acted selfishly... for the sake of that dumbass! I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." Lena fell to her knees were holding The woman's shoulders.
The woman stood there astonished by the strangers sudden break down.
"I'm really sorry... Trestina."
Lena hugged Trestina and cried while Trestina just accepted it, bewildered by the whole scenario.
"E-excuse me, but how do you know my name?" Trestina asked the stranger who had a mental break down while hugging her for whatever reason.
Lena held her and let out everything without answering.
"T-there... There..." Trestina just gave up and embraced the stranger back patting her back.
-
-
-
-
After letting everything out Lena clamed down and got herself together.
Trestina tried to act like it had never happened.
Trestina took permission from her boss inside to take a quick break, and him seeing what had just happened between the two from the inside, he agreed.
Lena sits next to Octan's lifeless body still limply laying on the table, while Trestina sits on the opposite side of the table.
Lena looks at Trestina overwhelmed, such an important reunion happening so suddenly.
Trestina stares at Lena trying to figure out who she is.
In an apologetic tone Trestina breaks the silence "I-I'm sorry, but I really have no idea who you are...".
"I-I know! Hand me a hairband." Lena tells the confused trestina.
"A-a hairband? Well that's one thing to ask for...." Getting more and more confused Trestina hand's Lena a hairband from her pocket.
The hairband wasn't in the best condition, and was covered with pocket dirt, but Lena didn't really care as she was desperate.
Tying her hair into her usual ponytail she says "How about now!".
Trestina stares intently at her, then grows a sad expression.
"Sorry, still no Idea." Trestina says avoiding looking at her.
"Liar! Your look changed, why are you lying?!" Desperately Lena pesters her.
"Sorry, I had mistaken you for someone else. Someone I would rather not meet." Trestina continues to avoid looking at her.
"...What?" Lena's excitement disappears.
"Now that I think about it, you two really share a lot in common haha... She too was often mistaken for a man with her similar tall, yet flat physique, and that simple iconic ponytail of hers... Even that gauntlet cladding her right arm, though hers was a lot more massive." Trestina describes Lena from memory.
"Ye--" Lena tried to claim herself but was immediately cut.
"But, Unlike you, She had brown hair, a patch covering her right eye, and Hazel eyes."
"..." Silence.
The boy fall into deep silence.
While Trestina is in a more of saddened silence.
Lena enters a deep state of confusion.
'But, Unlike you, She had brown hair, a patch covering her right eye, and hazel eyes.'
"...What...?"
She understood the patch cover her eye part, but.
'But, Unlike you, She had brown hair, and hazel eyes.'
"Excuse me, where can I find a mirror?" Lena asked politely.
Surprised by the sudden question Trestina answers in an unsure tone "In the room at the back?".
"Thank you." She slowly stands up and walks towards the said room.
She sees the shop owner at the side of her vision as she enters the establishment, but pays him no mind.
A mirror, She needs to find one right this instant.
'There!' She sees a mirror and runs towards it.
She stares at herself.
'But, Unlike you, She had brown hair, and hazel eyes.'
"I see..." It all suddenly made sense.
Why the guard didn't pay her no mind despite being a wanted criminal, why Trestina didn't realize who she was, and why Octan was able to tell her to live normally despite knowing her status.
That was his parting gift alongside the crest. She didn't know how he had done it, but if he was able to create a wormhole, then changing a terran's appearance certainly wouldn't have been that difficult.
She had lost her hazel eyes for emerald green eyes, and her brownish hair that matched her eyes, for a more dark brown.
And... 'the capital closest to here, I recommend heading there, you will get to meet someone there.' He had it all prepared for her.
A new start.
-
-
-
-
-
Lena slowly walks back towards the table and sits back at her seat.
"Sorry about that. Had to fix my hair." Lena says nonchalantly.
"I see..."
"Anyway, That friend of yours. She sounds very much like someone who has been causing me trouble for a while. I have been mistaken for your friend multiple times, Lena, That is right?"
"...Yes..." Once again trestina avoids eye contact.
"Can you tell me more about her? I know of what she had done, but I would like to know more about this person that keeps giving me troubles." Lena said acting like she doesn't know herself.
"Lena... Huh... Well, She was always a weird one. She always looked cold from the outside, but the moment you talked to her she would open up instantly, As if acting like a person she isn't. She was someone who was hard to understand as her motives were all around the place... So everyday was a surprise. Like there was this one time where she just randomly decided to join someone to slay a dragon even though she was only a silver ranked at that time...!" Trestina starts to slowly get into it.
"And there was this time she joined a dungeon expedition squad only to then return half dead! And there was that time when she had just randomly decided to tell me about she had a friend who was married to one of the biggest families in the world! And then... and then there was that time..." Trestina went silent.
"That time... your talking about her killing the king of kinolera right?"
Trestina clicks her tongue and nods.
"...can you tell me about that? What happened to you after that?" Suddenly the questions somehow became about trestina instead of Lena.
"..."
"*sigh* After what had happened... A family we were acquainted to was executed alongside her family only keeping their less than a year old girl. They were people who knew Lena for a long time so they had to hold the blame until Lena was caught, so they were executed in her place for the moment. They did nothing to me, they acted as if I had not existed, leaving me do as I pleased.
Given the chance, I immediately left Kinolera. I couldn't live my everyday life in a such a place after, I would've never been able to forget that incident. The look on their faces as they were falsely blamed, and killed. You should've seen it." Trestina grits her teeth.
"...The mother. Right before the execution, she begged me... She begged me to raise Lulu myself, and to not let anyone else take her. She trusted me with her daughter... Accepting her last request Lulu now lives with me here. Thanks to her I will never forget that incident... but it's also because of her that I can still live and get myself to work to raise that little girl. You should see her she's absolutely adorable." A smile grows on her face.
This was the first time Trestina had looked like her usual self which Lena knew.
"But why am I talking about all that. That's not what you care about right? You care about if I know anything about Lena. Simply, No. I don't have, and neither do I want to. For all I care she's dead somewhere in the middle of nowhere, and I want it to stay that way. I don't want to hear from her ever again." Trestina says with her expression growing serious.
"I see..." Lena hates herself.
But, She's sure. Even if she was given the chance to redo everything, She wouldn't take it.
She regrets it and will continue to do so, but she deeply understands that she wouldn't have it any other way.
She stares at the lifeless body next to her.
A look of pity covers her face.
"So, What's your name?" Trestina asks.
"Me? I'm L-- Lana." Lena says with a straight face.
"..."
A sad smile grows on Trestina's face.
"...You're terrible at this..."
"Sorry..."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
They both sat in silence.
Lena held an extremely guilty expression, while Trestina held a sorrow smile.
"..."
"I think It's better you leave."
Trestina breaks the silence.
Lena doesn't retaliate.
She looks at her with guilt covering her being and sorrowfully stands up.
She picks up Octan's lifeless body, and properly places him on her back.
She slowly walks away.
"Don't you want to see her?" Trestina speaks suddenly.
"..."
"No. I think it's better that way." Lena speaks without turning around.
"I see... Look... I don't want anything from you, Lena, as far as I can see you've went through your own fair kind of shit, But I want you to understand that I will forever blame you. Not for killing toto's family, Not for ruining my life, nor for destroying a kingdom, But because you ruined Lulu's life. Because of you, she will never get to experience what having a mother and father is like, nor will she ever get to play with her caring older sister... and that's all because of you. I want you to understand that if anything, Lena. Die with it weighing over you Lena, only then will I live in peace."
Trestina then turned around and entered the 'restaurant.'.
Lena said nothing and walked away gritting her teeth.