When Derek was 10 years old,
Taterra, also known as Tanelitta Terra, is from the main family of the Terra family which is the highest-tier inland species. Derek and Tanelita meet when they were younger. Derek is a year older than Tanelita and always acts like Tanelita's big brother. Tanelita doesn't have any siblings and Derek has 2 twin younger brothers, and because of this, he has always been in the role of an older brother.
Derek remembers the second time they meet and that is the first time they had a conversation. she was always jealous of my brothers acting dumb around me. She comes to me and said "Can you be my older brother too?" with hopeful twinkling eyes. In Derek's mind, he thinks Tanelitta wants to act dumb too.
Tanlitta has always been proper since she was little. From Derek's observation, Ms. Sarenta, Tanelitta's mom is a very proper young female construction leader and her father is a designer and architect. Her parents are full of manners and etiquette and even though they didn't impose their lifestyle on their daughter, their example molds Tanelitta's habits and manners. However, they always bring Tanlelitta to any dinner event or party that allows children. They bring her not because they want to introduce her but to have more time with their daughter. They are very busy because of the construction and fast development that happen in Thauria. Even more, the land tribe has the most focus on construction since it is much more convenient and much more assessable for 3 tribes to meet on land than on top of mountains and in deep water. The land is the midpoint for everyone.
"No! Derek is our brother! You can't have him!" The twin pushes Tanelitta's hand from Derek's arm.
"No! I want Derek as older brother too!" Tanelitta screams and grabs my hand and the twin grabs the other hand. Now it become a pull competition and never in Derek's life has he thought he will become a rope for children to compete with. Of course, 1 girl vs 2 boys will result in twins because the twin outnumbers her. She falls and cries. After that, she stands up and runs away somewhere. It becomes chaos and loud that everyone looks at them. After 3 chicks fight for mommy chicks, mommy chick aka Derek has to fix the problem. In Derek's mind, he just wants everything to end and he can go home.
Derek go and talk to the twin and said "Go apologize to her." Definitely, the twins don't want to apologize since they see it as nothing wrong on their side. So Derek has to use his triumph card., "If you didn't apologize to her, I will tell the butler that you guys will not have a dessert for a week." With that threatening words, the twin rushed to chase after her.
Tanelitta is fast, she is a pure dominant land tribe and running is her specialty so the twin run to the floor hole where there is water, take off their breathing mask on their gills, and jump into the water. They can't chase Tanelitta running but they can chase her by swimming. The twin is the dominant water tribe, they are very much a very cable swimmer. Jump from the floor that has openings on the floor to other openings. There is a lot of hole opening for the water tribe to use for breathing in the facilities and even more so dinner revenue hall like this and this building is made after the commercialization of glass.
The floor of this dining hall is made out of glass and has a lot of openings for the water tribe to breathe in or dip in for a quick break or refill their breathing mask so they can stay on the ground. You can see the twin swimming under the floor. Some water tribe who are pure and didn't has lungs like me will prefer to stay in the water and some prefer walking and using a breathing mask on their gill, like the twin.
Derek takes the twin breathing masks and apologizes to the crowd and bows, especially to Tanelitta's parents. The adults just laugh and said "It is fine." and take them as child play. Tanelitta parents were more shocked than angry since Tanelitta never acts greedy like that. Tanelitta's parents said please take care of Tanelitta to Derek and Derek just reply with a nod. Derek then follows the way Tanelitta runs before disappearing.
He walk quite far from when he started and see Tanelitta crying while on the ground with the slippery substance on her feet. That is the work of the twin. They must have made the floor slippery so they can stop Tanelitta from running and making her fall. Derek searches for the twin and sees them pouting quite far from her, presumably didn't get forgiveness. Derek gives the breathing mask back to them to wear since they stay out of the water now and even though their gill is still wet and able to breathe, it will be dangerous when they dry.
Derek then goes to Tanelitta and pets her head. Tanelitta who is crying stops immediately but with a hiccup. Tanelitta looks up and sees Derek. "I didn't say no.". Not just Tanelitta but the twin also shock. The twin scream "No! You are our brother! Don't leave us!". Derek doesn't know how they get to that point but he still pats the crying twin that comes running to him after wearing their breathing gill mask. "I can be an older brother for the three of you. So now apologize and befriend each other." The three of them look at each other and give each other a handshake. Since then they always meet up and play together but for Derek, it is more like babysitting one more kid and more problems.
If the topic of this event comes out, Tanelitta always says she didn't remember but I know she remembers the darkest embarrassing past in her life. She will change the topic, pretend she didn't hear, or do anything that possibly can stop people from talking about it.
After that Derek and Tanelitta meet Grale and that whole different story.