Ironic

Whoosh!

"Th-this…?" a voice full of amazement, yet mixed with a hint of fear and confusion, came. Unfathoming of the power, strange, weird, new, and unknown.

His rage was almost gone.

"Ugh!" Tianna's ground echoed against the cave wall as if pushed back.

Hubert lifted his hands, his strength had returned. His bandages unwrapped, unbeknownst to him, revealing healthy and tight skin, untouched by the harshness of trauma.

His scars were gone.

Clenching and opening, it felt weird, as if his body was enforced by an unknown force and his spirit filled with a calming feel.

"Tianna… is this your doing?" Hubert turned around, now shirtless, his toned muscles oiled by ointments, gleaming from the dim torchlight.

"No," Tianna said. Her anger, too, had dissipated.

Only then did his sight see what he had done to the place. Once neat and tidy, now the cave was all but a mess. Books were scattered on the floor, pages ripped from it, the bookshelves collapsed, the desk broke, and the chair's post almost touched the waterfall.

"I-is this… my power?" he asked himself.

"Yes, Hubert. One that I have tried to contain," Tianna explained, her figure remained unseen.

"Why, though? Why would you contain me? Have I done something wrong?" Hubert asked, his tone getting agitated, he didn't understand, he couldn't.

"No, it is exactly that, you have done nothing of fault. And I feared that you will, one day,"

Hubert gritted his teeth upon the response, he was reminded of his memory. Hurtful and toxic, Aadish and his friends ganged up on him, the evening sunlight watching, just like those who enjoyed the show of his downfall from an honored genius. Doing nothing.

His head slightly looked down, his eyes closed, thinking.

"Why…? Your doing almost cost me my life, is my presence in your eyes insignificant?" Hubert said, clenching his fist hard, his bone peeking through his skin of veiny hands.

"..." Tianna was silenced.

"..." he raised his head, his eyes stormed, determined.

Wrath had returned.

"If so, don't disturb me on what I will do next on this ground. Your justice is dead in my eyes," Hubert turned and walked away. Each stride was fast and hurried, but precise and calculated.

He was coming for Aadish.

The forest welcomed, the evening sunlight was the same as that day, warm but uncaring. His brows curbed as he walked through the dirt road, piercing against the lines of trees, thinking of his next moves. Every plan mattered.

"Halt!" a figure stood in front of him, waiting since earlier, glaive in hand, the same wrath could be seen in him too.

"Dareon…" Hubert called weakly and weirdly, the name almost a stranger in his throat.

"Hubert," Dareon greeted back, eyes slightly widening as the redness in his peered into Hubert's healed body. It didn't matter, one thing was clear.

"Are you here to disturb me, again? If not, to stop… me? Don't bother!" Hubert asked.

"I'm not here for both. What is your business is mine as well, it is in my own right to be in this trouble," Dareon reasoned, his glaive pointed straight upward, meaning no harm.

"I don't need your help, Dareon, you won't stand a chance against me, much less them," Hubert reasoned, his tone dismissive and degrading.

Dareon's veins bulged, visible even from the thick leather glove he wore in his hand.

Swish

The sharp blade cut through the air, the glaive's head was elastic as it cut through the wind, wobbly as rubber. Now, the blade pointed at Hubert.

"Do you think so?" Dareon challenged.

Hubert was disturbed.

"I do," Hubert got into a stance. One hand clenched hard, to hit. Another readied, to cast.

"Stop! You two!" Ivanna came from behind Dareon, waving her handkerchief of white in the air.

"Ivanna?" Hubert nailed his attention to the girl, her ginger hair blazing, nearly blending with the evening. His brows relaxed, his eyes leisured though resolved, and the sight was oddly beautiful.

"Ivanna," Dareon greeted, retracting his glaive.

"Ho-how is it that there are no peaceful days between you two?!" Ivanna asked, almost fumbling her words and tumbling forward.

"There would, if onl-" Hubert said, though his words were quickly interrupted by her.

"Blaming others again, Hubert!" Ivanna said, scoldingly.

Dareon chuckled.

Hubert frowned.

"But it's the truth!"

"You want to know what's the truth?" Ivanna asked, approaching Hubert, a step by a step.

"Wh-what?" Hubert questioned her, knowing there was a hidden message between her words.

"You think that you walked to that old shed alone? And do you seriously think that your wounds covered themselves up? Your mind seriously thought that you did all of that by yourself, when unconscious as well? Senseless!" Ivanna pointed her finger at him.

Hubert's eyes peered into her teary eyes, uncomprehending her words, yet trying gauging what she meant.

"Ivanna…" he called, his last ditch effort at calming her.

"Yo-you've changed, Hubert. I thought you were kind and caring, now you forgot even those who helped you," Ivanna gasped between her words, not that of exhaustion like before, but that of sadness.

Only then did it flick a switch in him. Hubert looked at her, then at his body.

Then at Dareon.

"I-is it the truth?" he asked Dareon, his voice shaky, unbelieving of his deed.

Dareon nodded.

"N-no… no, what have I done? I-I-I've done wrong to you all?!" he spoke, his eyes looking at himself, and his fingers felt around his body, disgusted.

"Hubert…" Dareon's usual braveful demeanor was nowhere to be seen.

"No, Dareon, leave me, the two of you," Hubert said, his voice commanding.

Ivanna stared, so did Dareon.

"Now!" was his last warning.

The two left afterward. Hubert and them, each to different directions.

The night was approaching. The waterfall was right behind him as he sat at one of the rocks that pierced the surface of the water. Detached, very cold, and lonely.

The sound of water should've deafened his hearing, yet there was only one true sound his ears kept to. In the distance, too far in the distance, a group of students playing with each other in the stream.

The stream they experienced, soft and caring. Unlike his, harsh and rough.

His tired and spiritless eyes watched.

A man, another man, and a woman.

Joyful and happy, enjoying each other's companions.

"..."

Hubert, Dareon and Ivanna, he hallucinated to himself of the group as his own.

Yet, it was never true from the start.

Lonely, alone, their choice

"Or mine?" he muttered.

"I-I thought I'm a good friend…" he muttered again, reminiscent of everything. The moment training he spent with Dareon or the flowery conversation he had with Ivanna during his stay.

The wind whispered, a friend, a fake one he imagined. Once he thought loneliness friended him, but now, he knew, it was the other way around.

The one that distanced themselves was himself, the one that chose this path was himself. The one whose idea was so bright was himself and the one who was always weighting on others was himself as well.

"And I dared to blame them, huh? I'm such a good friend, aren't I?" he asked to the night

"Of course not," the night responded.

Whoosh

A figure landed on one of the rocks behind him.

"Master," he called without needing to glance, the respect returned, his wrath, once again, nowhere to be seen.

"Disciple, ehm, no, Hubert," Tianna responded.

"Even you seem to agree, well, I don't blame you, I can't, not after everything I did," Hubert affirmed, watching as the group in the distance dried themselves off the stream and disappeared from his sight.

"You are a bad disciple, of course I would agree," Tianna said.

"You came to mock me again. I see…" Hubert's eyes were blank, staring at the darkening sky.

"Well, you did say that my justice is dead, then I'll act on your words," Tianna said, jokingly.

"...I will stand with my words, ever since the beginnin-"

"Ever since the beginning, I've always protected you, the trial, the infirmary, and even when you awakened your talent, I've always been there for you," Tianna said, cutting him off.

"..." Hubert's silence replied.

The water continued flowing, as with her words.

"You said my justice is dead, and yet, you found yourself here, with me, again,"

"Then where am I supposed to go if not here?" Hubert asked, his tone rising.

"Nowhere, stick here, Hubert. Trust in me, trust in me that I will deliver what you desire. Trust in me that you would know that my teachings are beneficial," Tianna said, her voice pleading.

"Ha… master, I-I don't know…" Hubert replied.

The moon rose from the horizon.

"You don't need to. I know of you well, surpassing any of those instructors and hallmasters. I know you, Hubert," Tianna said, like baiting him.

"No… you don't, you're a prodigy, someone who rose to the seat of headmaster… with that… voice," Hubert said, his eyes watching the moon that greeted him with its blue light.

"My voice… you spoke of my voice when even you don't know my face, ironic," Tianna continued.

"Am I wrong, though?" Hubert asked cockily, he hadn't glanced toward Tianna since the start.

"Yes, very. This world is a cruel place, one that even someone talented has enough to survive this world. Yet…" Tianna stopped her words, it was too sudden.

"Yet what?" Hubert asked.

"Yet… the moon is as beautiful as the struggle of people. Dim, but it shone, nevertheless," Tianna muttered, her voice soft, carried by the east wind.

"The moon… huh,"