"P-Please help, h-he's going to kill me!"
The moment was tense, in the middle of the busy street, the crowd cleared a space around Rei, Alair, and Johan, knowing enough about what goes on in Guella that they had enough street sense to at least make way for a fight that was about to go down.
Was it two men fighting over a woman? Did the woman herself do anything bad? Was an unjust murder about to take place? Whatever answer was correct, one thing remained clear:
It was none of their business.
"Once again, hand me the girl." Johan said, tightly gripping his spear with one hand, and extending his other as if commanding Alair to hand Rei over.
"I don't think I should, on the other hand though, can I know exactly why you're chasing her?" Alair responded coolly, his hand on the handle of his sword, although not quite yet pulling it out, as Alair wanted to avoid further escalation.
"She stole my money, my entire paycheck for this month, all of the 800 Yuleans I had!" Johan flatly stated, and as someone who clearly worked the same job as him, Alair simply coughed a bit, barely stopping himself from laughing at Johan's unfortunate situation.
Alair's head turned to Rei, who was starting to panic inside even more, making Alair ask Rei:
"That's what he says, so did you?"
Rei desperately clung onto Alair in response to this.
"I-I don't know what he's talking about!! I was just going about my business as usual, when this man just started chasing me after he threw his spear at me!! That's why I'm running for my life, I'm telling you the truth!"
Rei acted in earnest, however because of her fatigue and Alair's instinct, it was flawed, but it was enough to make Alair unable to discern whether she was panicking over being accused and almost being murdered for something she didn't do, or because she was trying to hide something, however he did understand that Rei was desperate.
"Do you even have any proof that she took your money?" Alair continued on with the conversation however.
"Proof …" Johan went silent for a bit, thinking about what to say, and after a bit, Alair interpreted the silence as a resounding "no".
Johan thought about it for a moment.
Johan's coin purse itself was already with him, so there wasn't any sort of specific mark that he could use to designate anything that could actually belong to him.
Moreover, even though Rei actually had the money with her, he couldn't use the justification of 'There's no way a slum pickpocketer would have that much money!', due to how Rei looked.
To put it frankly, she looked very attractive, which was the main problem.
From her undoubtedly high-grade appearance that indicates much care went into preserving her skin and such, it already looked like she was someone from high society, as no plebeian from the streets would be able to look like they can actually manage their own appearances.
Paired with that and the clothes she was wearing, although not looking too fancy, looked to be new, and out of reach for the normal pickpocketer, and people who live in the slums don't normally have an access to a wide wardrobe, or much cleaning materials to clean their clothes with, meaning that even if all of the reasons above could be given as reasonable proof, her clean clothes meant that she had just started to do pickpocketing, implying that someone who had just started doing the job had just managed to successfully victimize Johan, which wasn't by any means, to the knowledge of both Alair and him, possible.
"You went silent there, so I'm assuming you don't even have any sort of explanation that could be used as proof? I bet you just dropped it somewhere." The tension was raised simply from Johan being frustrated at his checkmate, and Alair being annoyed at Johan for being so stubborn.
Though, it was not like his inhumane stubbornness would kick in such a pathetic situation as this, and so, after being cornered and seeing resistance being too high, Johan's mind calmed down a bit, and he decided to cut his losses, and start turning his back around, defusing the situation as the aura around Johan started to dissipate.
However, it was as Johan turned around that Alair had made a clearly audible remark, a mocking tone clearly obvious for those that were within hearing range.
"Haahh, honestly even if it were true that you were stolen from, it's still your fault for being careless enough to have been stolen from so easily."
"What are you doi–"Rei's instincts kicked in, telling Alair to stop, but it was too late.
The moment Alair had said that, the sudden wave of killing intent has once again made itself known, the peaceful air around him from a moment ago completely vanished, and it seemed like Johan was about to come in charging at any time, and although he was looking at the ground, there was a clear ominous pressure exuding from him.
'It's your own fault.'
'You let yourself be robbed.'
'You are incompetent.'
Johan started to hear it, his complexes and weaknesses whispering words of sharp girth directly into his mind.
'Why are you so weak? So helpless?'
Johan started raising his head, and looked towards Rei and Alair, suddenly laughing.
"You're right, you're absolutely right. It's all my fault."
He continued laughing more, and by the time he had stopped, the crowd around them had already formed a circle large enough with more than enough ample space to enable Johan to move his pole of seemingly inevitable death around with ease.
"Give her to me." Johan's voice sounded stern, his expression unchanging as he glared at Alair as well, his eyes indicating that he had no wish to lessen the hostility between them. The only thing stopping him was the uncertainty brought about by Alair's fighting prowess.
"Johan, be reasonable, you do not want this fight, what was our scoring whenever we did practice matches?" Alair reasoned with him, bringing up his superior record, giving Rei the information that Alair was stronger than Johan.
However …
"You're protecting someone else though?" The fact alone that Alair had to watch out for Rei while he fought Johan, was a handicap that made Johan think that he could take Alair on.
Alair always won whenever he and Johan had fought over disputes before, but that was in a controlled environment, where there were no other factors besides each other, and besides, the gap between him and Johan wasn't that big at all, to the point that it also made Alair unsure of how a conflict with this scenario would play out.
But, Alair was not the only one who was unsure.
Johan's grip visibly relaxed, as after a few moments of death glares at each other, one thing became apparent to him.
He did not want to put his own life on the line to kill Rei, if that was the case, then he wouldn't have bothered talking and thinking as much as he did, instead going for a surprise kill as soon as Alair had turned his head around to ask Rei if she had actually done it.
Rei herself on the other hand simply prepared for the obvious. Though she may not stand a fair chance in a fair fight, the situation was different from how it was a few minutes ago, she had what seemed to be a reliable 'shield' in front of her, and all she needed was a brief moment of opening to deliver a killing blow.
Her hand wandered for the stolen dagger, all too eager to get this over with.
As of the moment, there was not one, but two that were steeling themselves for a fight to the death …
*Clap*
But thankfully, with the sound of two hands clasping each other, the final and apparently only nail in the coffin for Johan's temper to die down had been set.
"Now, what might you two … or three rather, be doing taking up such a large portion of the street? Johan, do you not know that this is going to get us a complaint too big to throw in the trash? The Captain will get upset."
A new person had popped up, a girl who looked to be about the same age as Alair, Johan, and Rei, comparable to her in terms of height and holding a staff between her arms as both hands were occupied.
Her bright aquamarine blue hair which shone under the light of the sun was in stark contrast to the clothing she wore; a dark and rustic robe, a sash that contained scrolls on her torso, and a notable ominous-looking book with seals and talismans dotting its surface hanging from her belt.
However, to Rei, what was most notable to her wasn't the girl's appearance, but rather the air around her that seemed so surreal that Rei could smell it.
No, she was actually smelling it, and it surprisingly made her drool a tiny bit, a mistake she made sure to quickly cover up without her noticing.
It was mana, and an abundance of it.
"Tsk." A click of the tongue soon followed, coming from Johan that had kicked Rei out of her focus at the distinct smell that made her heart beat faster, her body feel more excited, and hungrier at the same time.
"I just remembered I have something better to do." Johan said.
Simply put, his sense of rationality finally kicked in, and although he lowered his stance for a bit, Johan's expression showed no change, and while keeping his eyes fixated on Rei and Alair, took a step back without turning around, slowly stepping back into the dark alley that he came from.
Alair only breathed a long sigh of relief, finally softening up and only letting go of his sheathed sword's handle as Johan's bloodlust could no longer be felt after vanishing deep into the alley.
"Well, he'll get around to it soon." The girl simply said as she tried to conceal a smile of great amusement, and thereby looking towards Rei, and with the way she was eyeing Rei keeping a hold on Alair's body, Rei immediately had separated, sensing something within that look that she should.
"Elena, you really saved us …" Alair said, greeting the girl known as Elena and going in for a hug before being stopped by the staff on his cheek, preventing him from actually closing the gap.
"You on the other hand … what were you thinking!?" Elena had started hitting Alair lightly, arguing with him as the street went back to its normal flow as if no standoff had actually happened prior only but a few moments ago.
'Is this world a well or something?' Rei questioned the coincidences, why associates would be running into each other into what appears to be a sizable town.
Rei had tried to leave the scene while the two were still arguing, however Elena noticed Rei trying to be sneaky instead and so she grabbed Rei's hand, pausing for a moment as she felt what her hand was like before continuing.
"Ah … you're a really interesting person, why don't you come with us for a bit? I would really like to know you better." Elena said, looking up at Rei as she was done 'fondling' her hand.
"N-No, it's fine really. Thank you for your help so far but … I just have to be somewhere else for something really important at the moment."
"May I know what this 'important' thing is?" Elena asked, being quite a bit clingy like a certain someone she was reminded of back in the old Earth that Rei had come from.
"No!"
Rei had become determined to get away from the pair … at least until that 'important' thing revealed itself when her stomach rumbled, audibly enough for both Elena and Alair to hear.
"Ah …" This once again only managed to give Elena a reason for her smile to widen further, as she continued with magic words that Rei could only accept.
"It will be my treat."