A trail of blood was descending from both my mouth and my nose.

I was only able to avoid that attack because I saw it coming and thanks to that I was able to slightly bend my head to avoid it. I could imagine the damage it would’ve caused if it had landed on my body.

Water splattered all over me. Something massive flew right past my ears at breakneck speed, narrowly missing decapitation by a hairbreadth.

I took a few steps back, attempting to put some distance between myself and my assailant.

My feet were drowning in very shallow water, and gravels and stones crunched together with each step, accompanied by water splattering.

I was able to narrowly avoid that attack only because I saw it coming and was able to slightly bend my head to avoid it.

I could only imagine how much damage it would have done if it had landed on my body.

The thing I barely managed to avoid was Han's arm, a flying punch.

He was the one who launched the attack.

He immediately leaped at me, shifting from a humanoid to a monstrous stance, crawling at me and clawing like a crazed beast.

I didn't have much of a choice but to back up.

After a few meters, I decided to counterattack, and while he was still crawling on his fours on the ground, I sent out my most powerful blow from above, aiming for his head, with my right prosthetic claw.

It should have done quite a bit of damage, even on him, but my claw was stopped before it could even reach his body by his long tail.

In the ensuing momentum, he delivered a powerful blow to my body, sending me flying through the air at an impressive height.

It was almost enough to knock me out.

But it didn't end there; while my body was still in the air, he jumped at me, grabbed me, and threw me like a rock onto a water surface.

“Aaah~” I couldn’t help but scream in pain.

My body flew onto the shallow water, bounced on the gravelly ground, and finally landed against a tree.

I tried to stand, gritting my teeth and ignoring the pain, but I couldn't.

I forced my body to stand up by using my appendage.

“You still want to keep this going on?”

Still unable to stand, I acted deaf to his words.

He lunged at me, slamming and pinning me to the ground with his massive hand.

Nonetheless, I shook my body in an attempt to break free from his grip.

“Let’s stop this… “

“-No, I can still-”

“You're causing yourself more harm than necessary here. If you haven't already, I'm sure you'll injure yourself worse than you did that time.”

“I don’t need your pity!” I shouted as I attempted to stand on my own two feet, only to fail miserably once more.

“-Look at yourself, weren't you the one who said this would just be sparring? You've been acting strangely for the past few days. What are you hoping to achieve with this?”

“I just….”

“Don’t even try to lie to me!”

“...”

I felt anger, frustration, and a strange feeling drowning me, so I sent my appendage under the ground I was in and sent them onto him with the clear intent to stab him, but he retreated several meters away from me before it could even make contact.

I was the one who asked for this duel, and I am the one who started it all.

I asked him for a duel this morning for reasons I don't know myself; I just felt like I had to do so.

At first, it was just sparring, but... I had this strange feeling that I needed to push it further, just like he said, even to the point of hurting myself.

He was stronger than I was, stronger than that DeathSeeker against whom I had been struggling so much.

It pisses me off.

He nicely offered me his assistance.

And here I am: currently harboring negative and hostile feelings toward him.

Tsk

What am I doing?

Is this it, or am I going insane?

"I think I finally understand, all of this... but first," he said as he walked around me like a predator around his prey.

He charged at me again, and I protected myself, but before I could do anything, he made a strange rotative movement, causing his tail to slam me from the left.

My body was sent ricocheting on the ground once more, I felt my body giving in, this time, unlike before, I don't have any strength to keep myself conscious.

What in the world am I doing?

"Yeah, exactly. I'm glad you're at the very least aware of that."

The next thing I knew, I was unconscious.

I wake up next to the crackling of a bonfire.

"Are you finally finished sleeping princess?" "Oi, if I were you-...," Han said from somewhere I couldn't see. ”And now you've done it."

I tried to sit, but my body automatically returned to a laying position, and the pain all over my body caused me to bite my lips and screech.

I wouldn't say I wasn't familiar with this kind of pain, but this was something I sought out on my own. I forced myself to sit down once more.

“Han.“

“Hum?”

“For earlier, Sorry.” I apologized.

In retrospect, what I did was extremely childish; I acted like a spoiled child.

“Oh, don't worry, it's nothing. I felt that kind of thing was bound to happen. It just happened kind of earlier than expected"

I think only one thing might have caused me to behave the way I did.

Jealousy.

“you know, I wouldn’t really call, it jealousy,”

“What you would call that then?”

"I believe it is accurate to say that I hurt your pride; of course, I won't deny the role of jealousy in it, but I believe it is primarily that."

Hurt pride, huh?!

I guess that’s a way to interpret it.

“Since your own thoughts are shrouded by fog, let me explain it for you. All that happened, you’ve been through you did these alone, all that has been around you all these time were mostly enemy that wanted your death, so far you could only rely on yourself alone, to you only you were present and only strong enough for you to protect yourself.

“Everything that happened to you, everything you've been through, you did on your own; everything that has been around you all this time has been mostly enemies who wanted your death; so far, you could only and had no other choice but to rely on yourself; therefore to you, you alone were present and only strong enough to protect yourself.”

“Even though you accepted my presence, you can't stand a certain aspect of my presence by your side. When you heard that I would be able to gain more strength by stacking another vessel, you were happy at first, but then Hon, you my friend became jealous; you know that I'm stronger than you, and you can't stand it.”

“I-”

“-Let me finish… When you accepted my offer, you explained that you would leave behind what was left behind, and now you're afraid of being the one left behind. You understand that my presence and power would be beneficial to you, but you despise the idea of being the one to rely on the other. What you did earlier was a clumsy attempt to show me that you don't need to be protected or even that you could be relied on.”

“I-”

“I’m still not done yet, you know what you are?”

“What?”

“A coward.”

“But not only that, you have a terrible tendency to become overly bold, straight-up cocky, diligent yet at times overly impatient how long you waited in the Frozen and how much you waited before going after that DeathSeeker is a good example of that, you’re small yet tough but not unbreakable and trust me you have a lot more flaws than just these, these were merely the visible tip of the iceberg.”

“On the other hand, you have your fair share of redeeming qualities. The fact that you've made it this far is proof of that.”

“I will not ask you to put your trust in me. But please understand that you have nothing to prove to me. You have already done so. I only have one request of you.”

“What?”

“Keep up the pace. Do your best to not get in the way. I don’t need your apologies.”

“You envy me? Then just surpass me.”

“I have no need for your words. Just show me, I don’t need you to prove me your worth. Just show me that you’re a teammate, not a liability.”

“So we’re good now?”

“Yes, we’re good,” I said honestly.

“Fine then, you know when you were asleep I found some lizards…. ”

Seriously, I couldn’t help but sigh and laugh internally.