Myron was reading like he always did. He couldn't concentrate properly as of late due to the recent problems they were having. He couldn't help but keep wondering about the past events.
'First, Mark's departure and crazy invasion on paladin territory; then, a threat to our own territory; Mark getting disowned and stripped from his surname; after this, our two best scouts were assassinated brutally not by a paladin only, but by humans as well. Now, we don't have more information about what's going on out there,' Myron thought, then finally realized that he wasn't concentrating on his book anymore and returned to his reading.
That is, returned to read just for a couple of minutes before his mind went wild again.
This same pattern was repeating itself various times. It came to a point where Myron needed to read the same book twice to be able to memorize everything and understand what he was reading, which was something definitely not common when he was studying. Few were the books that he didn't memorize and understood right away.
Soon, he heard a knock on his door that made him stop his reading for the umpteenth time.
'Damn it... It has been some hours that I am reading this same freaking paragraph... I can't concentrate at all,' he thought while hitting his table with his fist. He was very frustrated.
Myron got up quickly once he heard that the person on the other side kept hitting the door, almost slamming it with their fist. Such a thing made him get wary and somewhat worried.
'Is there something this urgent happening out there? The last time that I saw someone so agitated was when that troop of paladins got near the borders and was going to invade us as punishment for Mark's actions.'
Myron reached the doorknob and opened the door. It wasn't looked at all, so he didn't understand why the person on the other side didn't open it right away.
'Ah... it's a woman, that's why,' he thought as he looked at Valory, who was glaring at him while crossing her arms.
"What took you so long?"
"Close the book, hit my table, then walk here. This is what took me so long," he answered.
Valory sighed, shaking her head.
"I always forget that you are this straightforward weirdo, honestly," she commented as she entered the room, still with her arms crossed.
"Yeah, though I cannot really interact with women otherwise. Not even with men. I stay stuck here the entire day just reading," Myron retorted.
"Hmph," she snorted while taking one of his books, then flipped quickly some pages. "Why is it so fun to read books all day instead of interacting with people?"
"Well, funnily enough, I discovered that inanimate books are incredibly more charismatic than most people..."
Once he finished his sentence, Valory glared at him, her eyes got sharp enough to cut paper once she was wearing a serious expression.
"Really...?"
"Yeah, they won't glare at you for something you said, for example," Myron walked towards her and took the book out of her hands before she decided to do something with it.
"Anyway, I bet that you are not here to discuss my lifestyle and make me turn into a normal person, right? If that's your objective, get off," Myron assertively said, clasping his hands behind his back and pointing towards the window with his chin.
'This bastard is basically telling me to jump out of the window...' Valory narrowed her eyes but decided to leave that idiotic discussion aside.
She definitely didn't like Myron at all, but she would need to put up with it for the time being.
"Anyway, what do you need?" he asked.
"I bet that you are intelligent enough to know what's going on here, Myron."
The man nodded his head, sighing hard.
"You are going to leave the territory won't you?" he said as he analyzed her clothes. She was using the clothes she normally would wear when going to missions. Also, her hair was tied in a ponytail, something that was not usual unless she was prepared to fight.
"Will you really be as much reckless as Mark?"
"That idiot promised me that he would let me follow him. He broke his promise, he lied to everyone, including me. Although I am very pissed off, I cannot let him die before I myself kill him."
"How romantic of you..."
"Anyway, I am planning to go there, and I would need someone to back me up. The rest of the team will do the same," she explained.
Myron narrowed his eyes.
"Team? You mean, Alpha-4?"
"Yes," she nodded her head.
"If you go there with me, Lily, and Kyle, things are going to get serious, Valory. The paladins know very well when was the last time that this team was called to do something. I bet that the results of those missions are still tattooed in their hearts. Also, by going there, you are threatening to trigger the war as well. Will you really do it?"
"I will. I already took off my Sorority Pendant, threw it away, and I won't even tell Baltazar about it. I bet that he will discover soon and also figure out what he needs to do."
Myron gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. He came closer to Valory.
"Do you know the consequences of your actions, you moron!? One thing is to have lost the strongest soldier we have. Another is to lose all the other excellent ones! If you go away, you will be opening enough space for them to invade. And if you think that they will give a sh*t about turning into war criminals and waste this opportunity, you are dead wrong. They will just subtly invade here and annihilate all of our friends!"
Valory sighed, then took two Sorority Pendants from her pocket. For a moment, Myron thought that they belonged to Lily and Kyle but that was not the case. Those were the Sorority Pendants of the two scouts that got assassinated.
"These two guys died suddenly, in a very brutal and explicit way. That's not how paladins carry out their killings, usually. I noticed that both were spending more time in enemy territory and getting more agitated every time they came back. However, it looked like they wanted to keep anything that was going on a secret until they could get more information. I guess they were suspecting that something was happening.
"Well, they got killed a few days later. You know that spies nowadays aren't invisible. We know that there are spies here and they know we have ours there. People tend to kill them just when important information leaks. Otherwise, they aren't worth killing since these spies can be used for their own benefit sometimes. I bet that the scouts could discover something that the paladins didn't want to get to Baltazar's ears. It means that something is unfolding inside their territory that we can't even imagine."
Myron pondered about her words for a moment but didn't need much more time to get to a conclusion.
"I know where you want to get... This is meant to be something related to the war, right? The paladins supposedly are scheming something that will be dangerous for us. Isn't it just an excuse to throw everything behind and keep up with this reckless attitude of yours?"
Valory nodded.
"Be it an excuse or not, it doesn't matter at all. This is enough for me to go out and do something. I can't leave Mark to fight out there on his own. And, c'mon, you are his best friend! Don't tell me that you didn't have the urge to save him!!"
Myron got silent after that inquiry. He just couldn't answer it right away. He bit his lips and dodged her look.
For a moment, his eyes laid on the chessboard which, in the previous days, had its pieces moved a lot.
"I... I don't know," he answered, finally. However, there was no assertiveness in his voice.
Valory clicked her tongue, glaring at him for the last time before turning her back to him and walking out of his room with firm steps that seemed to shake the entire building.
"If you are willing to stay here like a coward, you can do it on your own. However, there will be always a place for you on the team, like in the old times when we were just a bunch of idiot teenagers playing the soldiers," she winked at him, though still with a serious expression, then disappeared in the corridor.
Myron sighed, scratching his head anxiously while walking toward the chessboard. He stared at it intently while clenching his fists. The pieces were in the same positions he left them before.
With quick movements, he took three pieces; a horse, a bishop, and a tower. Then, he placed them beside the black tower and the queen in the middle of the chessboard, surrounded by whites.
He was going to turn and leave, but stopped, looking at the other bishop on the chessboard. He felt something strange in his chest, then a bitter taste in his mouth as he saw the team of blacks together and the bishop just watching them from far away.
Myron clicked his tongue while cursing.
He took the bishop and strongly put it among the team of blacks.