Chapter 58 - 2.19

"Besides, it's not like we're committing a crime, are we? Why are you so nervous about this? Could it be that.."

This was the last straw. Zenith immediately quietened and took off his frontal armor to slide inside his own sleeping bag. He was not used to approaches, and rarely thought about anything else than trying to achieve better results and climb up to power as much as he could. Being teased like this repeatedly, it made his heart do some crazy exercises that made him think he carried a disease.

Xu Jiaqi almost couldn't contain her laughter as she saw the man turn his back on her and not say a single word. How could there be someone reacted so colorfully?

The System who was watching this from above: Host, you are also incapable in loving others, who are you to speak in such a manner.

"Tomorrow, we have to work a bit harder. We will spread a false rumor about what happened today when we reach a town. We definitely can not be pointed out as the assassins' killer. It will just alert our enemy, and the next time they send troops, they will be much stronger than this round. At that point, we might truly be in heavy danger." Xu Jiaqi narrowed her eyes as she warned.

Recovering from his shyness, the Knight too sensed his lady's seriousness and made a sound of acknowledgement. "I understand, Lady Ariel."

"Then, you too sleep well, Zen. Can't have my knight yawning in the day!" Xu Jiaqi hid back inside her sleeping back, closing her eyes and gradually falling asleep, this time for real.

Time seemed to be so fleeting when you fell asleep. You could be thrown into a long dream, one that definitely surpassed your real sleeping time. You could also be thrown into a short dream. Snippets of scenes that may or may not make sense.

When you woke up, hours had passed, and you struggle to recall the contents of said snippets.

The same thing happened to Xu Jiaqi. She dreamed about a man, which was very irregular of her to do.

There was a man clad in loose robes, with a blurred face and a distorted voice. She did not know why, but her heartbeat sped up as she desperately ran towards the man. She felt a sense of longing for him, her 'soul' missed this unknown figure dearly.

But then, as she got closer and closer to him, the man was swallowed by a huge fire and disappeared into black ashes.

Tears streamed down her face. Chaotic screams entered her ears, turning into loud buzzes.

Seeing the man be set ablaze like that, it was as if her heart was torn apart into pieces. It left a gaping wound in herself, one that she reckoned she would never be able to recover for.

'...These dreams really have to stop. I may have been reading too much fantasy content.. I will cut back on those.' Xu Jiaqi thought.

But it seemed realistic. A large part of her denied any relation to said dream, brushing it off as just a mere hallucination that she ought to forget. But another part of herself, one that she hid carefully, stated that what happened was a fragment of her past, one that she currently did not have any cognition of.  It was terrifying. Like her mind got swallowed by the unknown. Like she was missing something important.

Her head hurt a bit. She woke up, and Zenith's figure showed up.

"Zen, you are awake." Xu Jiaqi was also feeling rather unwell since the dream seemed to have lingering effects on her emotional state. She shook her head repeatedly to wring her attention away from the distressing imagery, but the figure of that unknown man kept popping up inside her head.

"Yes, Lady Ariel. I've woken up early so that I could have prepared our breakfast ahead of time, and am ready to go whenever you are." Zenith replied as he held a plate of food with a serious face, making Xu Jiaqi sigh in relief and take the food gratefully.

"Thank you for the meal." Xu Jiaqi said before digging into the food. As expected, Zenith was a spectacular cook no matter what ingredient he had in hand. Yesterday it was rabbits, and today it was bird meat, but none of them felt repulsive to her palate.

Zenith then started to act weird, as if he had something to say but didn't have the guts to spill the beans. It made Xu Jiaqi, who was originally enjoying the smoked bird meat start to become uncomfortable.

"..Zen, is there something you need to say? Do tell me, you shouldn't be moping about like that." Xu Jiaqi interrogated.

"That.. Lady Ariel, when you were sleeping, you seemed to have had some.. Pardon me for being nosy, but you looked extremely burdened. You also shed some tears, but I didn't dare to wake you up. Are you alright, Lady?" Zenith expressed his concern for the woman after hesitating a lot.

"Don't fret much about it. It's probably just one of my many dreams. It just happened to be a bad one today. It's nothing special, but next time you think I'm having a nightmare.. you can wake me up from my slumber. I won't get mad at you." Xu Jiaqi replied carelessly with a rather unpleasant tone, not wanting to recall the dream anymore now that she was distracted by the food.

Zenith seemed to have taken the hint that the lady was aversive to the mention of her dream, so he nodded and shut up,  continuing to prepare their carriage for the take off. The two representatives of Palla's corpses were stored inside the carriage, whereas today, the two of them would be sitting in the coach deck.

Xu Jiaqi huffed a tired sigh. It was still early in the morning, and she was already feeling a heavy burden. She gave a side glance to Zenith, and got an idea.

Xu Jiaqi: Hehe.