The Safehouse was a closed off facility surrounded by woods and was part of the Royal Estate. They were rarely allowed to leave and strictly monitored.
A few days ago, Noah had tried escaping with Acela and a few of our classmates only to be rounded up and thrown back in by the Demon Hunter.
So, having nothing to do on his off-day he went to the Library.
He was still recovering from yesterday's fight with Acela, and his body was sore all over. Billy went to train as always. He's been absolutely absorbed into his training recently and rarely talked with him.
'Good for him I guess.' Rey thought with a hint of bitterness.
He had to be guided by one of the guards and took the scenic route towards the place.
'Alicia should be there.' Rey thought fondly.
They had a friendly relationship with each other, since Billy was best friends with Alicia. Rey still remembered when she tried to hide her kitten in her school bag, and he hid it for her by putting it in the pocket of his hoodie.
Apparently, the kitten had just been born and wouldn't leave her side no matter what - so, she just brought it with her.
Rey walked in the library, finding Alicia reading in a corner alone.
She flashed a cursory smile at him and glanced back into her book fully absorbed. Sydney and Bethany was also there scouring over some books, they barely spared him a glance.
Sydney was a plain-looking girl with straight black hair and glasses.
He walked over to her and asked for a book recommendation.
"What kind of book are you looking to read?" Sydney asked thoughtfully, shifting her glasses back with her finger.
"Something fantasy like, I guess?" Rey muttered.
"Oh, then you should definitely read this!" Alicia said raising a book with one arm.
"Its about the Age of heroes, its basically a collection of fantasy stories but guess what… they actually happened!!!" Alicia said excitedly, her brilliant amber eyes glittering.
Sydney interjected. "That's mostly inaccurate and embellished with many half-truths for the sake of story telling, you should instead read…
"But, that so boring." Alicia whined.
"It reads like a history textbook on economics, even though it has dragons, elves and dwarves. And its so sad as well, like why does it have to list the name of someone that died every other page." Alicia said.
"That's because they were importat..." Sydney sighed.
"But, this book is just better." Alicia insisted.
Sydney rolled her eyes. "Fine, its his choice anyway."
They both looked at him, as if waiting for a decision. Bethany was still absorbed in some book.
Rey gulped. "Well, I'll just go for the simple one."
Rey quickly grabbed Alicia's book, their fingers touching for an instant and quickly retreated to a secluded corner of the library.
Alicia looked happy with herself, and Sydney looked slightly annoyed.
****
After a while, Bethany and Sydney left for the upper floor. They said something about, the first floor only having basic knowledge and less advanced texts.
So, it was only him and Alicia on the first floor. It wasn't awkward until Rey stretched his arms and spotted Alicia looking at him. Her mesmerizing amber eyes looking at him with a slight frown.
Rey's heart skipped a beat, he quickly looked back down and ignored his surroundings.
He slowly turned the pages, until he was absorbed into the world of the book.
It spoke of Filian - an ancient hero who was a Beastkin of the silver-haired fox. She founded the Filian kingdom and was the hero who had performed the first summoning of otherworlders.
Each one of these otherworlders brought a storm of change to the world, they razed kingdoms to the ground and created new ones that eventually became part of the UFHK.
It was said that the Dimensional Hero Summoning, as it was called in the book always predated the beginning of a new era…
Rey almost jumped in surprise when he realized Alicia was standing right in front of him.
He dropped the book, which Alicia crouched to pick up for him.
She placed it onto the table next to him and sat on the other chair. Looking at him, as if unsure what she should say.
'What do you want?' Rey thought internally but stayed quiet, failing to keep eye contact with her and constantly looking at the window to the side.
"Do you…" She started hesitantly.
"Do I what…?" Rey asked
"Do you think you could tell me more about Billy?" Alicia asked serious.
'Oh, its just about him' Rey didn't know why he was disappointed but he still was.
"What do you want to know? Shouldn't you know him better than I do?" Rey asked confused.
"Well, that's the thing… I forgot most of the memories I had with him." Alicia said.
'What!?'
She explained how resisting the cleansing had targeted groups of memories and the ones that she lost were mostly the ones with Billy.
It explained a lot really. Why Billy started keeping his distance from her, even though he was usually so overprotective of her.
"Its was just so awkward you know. He would try to talk to me during the dinners, and he had such affection in his eyes… it was uncomfortable…" Alicia said as if unsure about how to feel..
If she was able to recognize he had a crush on her in this state, she must have knew even then and just pretended to be oblivious.
"Do you want me to talk to him about it or something? Rey inquired
"No, Bethany already took care of that and explained the situation." Alicia said, tucking behind a strand of her hair.
"I see…" Rey.
"I just wanted someone to talk to, to figure out just how much I really lost and I felt like you were the safest bet. Since, you were childhood friends with Billy as well."
"Childhood friends might be pushing it a bit, we rarely visited each other when we were younger and just played games online together, but sure." Rey replied.
Rey looked her in the eyes.
"Well, what do you want to know?"
….
After an hour or something of recounting his memories with Billy, and trying to explain what their relationship was like. Rey was starting to get a bit tired.
'I mean its great and all to talk with someone so pretty… but its also really nerve racking.' Rey thought.
He stuttered a few times when their eyes met and was a bit fidgety overall. But at least his back was pressed against the back of the chair, or otherwise Alicia might have noticed how sweaty he had gotten.
"Well, I think its about time I left." Rey said after answering Alicia's latest question of how she was like with Billy.
Alicia smiled. "Thanks for answering all my questions."
Rey slowly got up, "Your welcome!" he said, a bit louder and more high-pitched then he wanted to sound.
Rey quickly grabbed his book, to read it later on and in his hurry accidentally stumbled over his chair and fell on his knee.
'Fuck, why do I keep doing stupid shit.' Rey lamented.
"Are you okay?" Alicia asked, failing to suppress that chuckle that came out of her.
Rey was so embarrassed he wanted to dig a hole and stick his head in it until he woke up tomorrow.
"The girls probably left by now, why don't I walk you back?" Alicia said offering a hand.
He grabbed it soft and unnaturally smooth fingers grasping his as it pulled him.
"Sure"
****
They walked back and the tempo of the conversation fell on Alicia with her doing most of the talking. While Rey liked to enjoy his quiet, Alicia instead like to fill the empty noise with chatter.
She talked about the cats she had at home and damn did she love cats.
Rey knew most girls loved cats, but she talked about them with such fanatic devotion in her eyes even though the relationship she had with them sounded more like an abusive boyfriend.
"I actually have a C-Tier skill called [Summon Pet], which I picked cause I thought I could someone one of my cats back home. But, it didn't really work like I expected to." Alicia said.
She explained in Bethany's words, that the summon failed to penetrate the boundary between dimensions or something along those lines.
He was a bit weirded-out that they were talking so much, she wasn't usually this friendly or talkative towards him. The way she was interacting with him now sounded exactly like the usual conversations she had with billy…
Alicia continued."So, I'm trying to awaken my class first. But its going really slowly, since it's quite a rare one. Sydney was actually helping me find more information about it at the library today."
"Whats the class called?" Rey asked curious. It was probably a powerful class, considering her relative popularity.
"Umm… its called [Feline Queen], and it's an A-rank Class." Alicia said with a slight blush to her cheeks, that made Rey glance away.
'Fuck, she's sooo cute.' Rey thought inwardly.
"It might actually fit you, that's at least better than Sydney throwing her B-Tier [Swordmaster] down the drain for a D-Tier one." Rey said, he tried reaching out a hand to pat her shoulder but hesitated and ended up awkwardly scratching the side of his head.
Rey was often appreciative of the fact that it was the best of them that got the most powerful.
But it kinda sucked to know that he could have been more powerful, if he was a better person. He really didn't have anyone else to blame. He avoided interacting with other people like the plague, and wasn't particularly kind to anyone.
He was probably the type of guy to ignore a little girl crying and hope someone kinder than him would help her out. And that kind person was Billy. He was the nicest person he knew and probably had the most karma points out of everyone.
He also had… in Rey's very professional and unbiased opinion had the coolest skill of them all.
S-Tier Sill [Instant Teleportation]
Rey still remembered when he just walked out of his room and Billy thought it was a good time to show off his skill.
He said "hey" from the other side of the room and the very next instant he was right in front of Rey.
"AAAAAAAAAaaaaah" Rey was so shocked that he struck out both hands and hit billy on the shoulders and then screamed and fell backwards.
"Hahahaha, you should see the loook on your face. It was so worth not using this skill for this long." Billy said laughing and helping him up.
"You sly bastard." Rey said angry but also impressed. He took his hand and pulled him down for a headlock.
To which Billy used his skill again, leaving a confused Rey to grasp at air.
Thankfully or maybe for the worse. Only Adam was at the living room at the time, who laughed sooo hard that he broke a chair in his fit.
Rey was brought back to reality by the guard who reached the boundary of the Safehouse.
He pulled out a token that allowed them to get in, and ushered as inside.
"See you tomorrow." Alicia said with a smile and walked away. Her silky hair shined in the setting sun and her amber eyes were more alluring than ever before.
'I don't have a crush. Definitely, not. If I had a crush I wouldn't even be able to talk to her. So, its definitely not a crush. Its only a crush if she appears in my dream like the Demon lady.' Rey assured himself and headed inside.
He walked to the living room and said greeted Billy who was sitting by the hearth.
"How was training for you?" Rey asked.
Billy clothes were sweaty as hell, and within the two weeks they were staying here had already formed quite a bit of muscle. Not as much as Justin but certainly well-built.
"Yeah, Brutus made me train like a dog for four long hours, then he made me duel Acela. I can't believe she won twice even though I have my S-tier skill and B-Tier[Grand Knight] Class." Billy complained.
"Well, that's Acela for you. She won't even let an angel talk down to her." Rey said.
Billy nodded, none of their classmates seemed to appreciate how impressive Acela truly was.
"Oh yeah, why did you come back with Alicia." Billy asked.
His tone was casual, but the air was tense despite it.
"We just came back from the library. She just wanted to go over the memories she might have lost." Rey explained, his reply came a bit more hurriedly than he meant it.
Billy paused and his expression clouded for a second.
"…why couldn't she have asked me." Billy muttered under his breath.
"Huh"
"Nothing, see you tomorrow." Billy shook his head and went back out.
Not inside, the cozy home and warm bed that awaited him. But the cold training grounds outside...