"Hey!" Kane snapped his finger in front of Rui, drawing his attention. "Are you even listening?"
"Ah." Rui jerked back lightly. "My bad, I zoned out a little. You were saying?"
"I was saying that I was considering leaving the Empire someday." Kane sighed.
Rui's eyes widened. "But why?"
"To get away from all of this," Kane replied with a tired tone. "My family, the politics, all of it."
"I thought you had more or less resolved the matter regarding your family?" Rui raised an eyebrow. "By joining the Lightning Sect."
"I thought so too, but I realized that the Wind and Lightning Sects were just as suffocating as my family." He sighed. "They protect me from my family, but that gives them lots of leverage over me. Put that on top of the fact that they naturally have very high expectations from the start due to my potential and talent, it makes it hard to live the way I want."
"Damn..." Rui's eyes narrowed slightly.
