"Hey, Kenji, you okay?" Taka asked, concern lacing his voice.
My brother really was a worrywart. I waved my hand dismissively, too exhausted to give a proper response.
Flat on my back, I let out a heavy sigh, the weight of the battle finally settling in. Forget lunch—the fight had taken so long that the sun was already beginning to set.
We picked up the deer's body, hauling it back toward the base. Victory felt hollow, considering we only won because the beast had tired itself out. It had spent so much energy fending us off that, in the end, exhaustion was its downfall.
But one thing bothered me.
If it really wanted to escape, it could have.
Instead, it stayed.
It wanted to kill us.
I grinned.
I adjusted the weight of the deer on my shoulder, wincing as my muscles protested. If it weren't for these uniform jackets, I would've been skewered at least fifty times. Taking the front line meant bearing the brunt of the attacks while Taka worked to cut through that damn wind barrier.
"Let's go," Taka said, offering me a hand.
I took it, groaning as I pulled myself up.
The trek back was quiet, save for the occasional grunt of effort from carrying our kill. By the time we reached the base, I could only blink in disbelief.
The place was spotless.
Not just clean—practically shining. The walls gleamed as if they'd been polished, not a single speck of dust in sight.
My bastard little brother can't be good at everything… right?
As we stepped inside, Yushiro sat alone at the table, calmly polishing his short katana. The soft sound of cloth against steel was the only thing breaking the silence.
We dropped the deer in the kitchen, where Miss Annette had already begun preparing for dinner. She raised a brow at the sight of our hard-earned prize but simply nodded. "Thank you."
Taka, still full of restless energy, immediately started inspecting Yushiro's cleaning job. Even after that fight, he refused to fall behind our little brother.
I dragged myself over to the table, plopping down across from Yushiro with a groan. He glanced up from his katana, giving me a once-over.
"You look rough."
"You think?" I huffed, leaning my sword against the wall. "That damn deer was stronger than it had any right to be."
"I told you things here are different from back home."
"Yeah, you did," I admitted with a scowl. "But you didn't say anything about beasts that can use wind."
Yushiro blinked dramatically. "Wow. They used wind?" His fake look of amazement made me click my tongue in irritation.
"Yes, it did!" Taka shouted, entering the conversation as he sat beside me.
Guess he was done checking Yushiro's work.
"Yushiro, that thing blasted and stabbed Kenji with wind a ridiculous amount of times. And he still kept charging at it!"
Oh. So now he's ranting.
"Well, I probably let him worry when I was in my battle-crazy mode…"
"Can you imagine?" Taka continued, throwing his hands up. "He went straight at it without dodging after five blasts! For a moment, I thought he got a brain injury."
Yushiro tilted his head. "Don't you think you're a bit late for that?"
"You're right."
Okay, these bastards were just being rude now.
"Anyway," Yushiro said, setting his katana down, "if the fight was so tough, how did you win?"
"We kept attacking until it got exhausted," I said simply.
Yushiro stared at me for a second, then shifted his gaze to Taka.
"He's right," Taka confirmed. "The reason it took so long was that my attacks weren't strong enough to break through its barrier. Even when we got past the wind blasts, there was this invisible wall of wind surrounding the deer. I tried using Heavenly Soaring Wave, but it couldn't cut through. So I switched to a stronger form—Mountain-Splitting Wave. Even that wasn't enough."
Yushiro smirked at that, making Taka scowl before continuing.
"So I thought maybe if I could attack even faster, I could catch it off guard long enough for Kenji to land a hit. So we just kept cycling through every attack technique we knew."
Yushiro listened quietly until he finally spoke.
"The last part makes sense. There's no way the beast could keep that wind barrier active constantly—it had to run out of energy at some point. And catching it off guard was a smart move. It worked, right?" His gaze shifted back to me.
"Yeah," I confirmed. "When I finally cut through, it barely had any resistance left."
Yushiro hummed in thought, but I could tell he was already analyzing everything.
Despite being an arrogant little bastard, my younger brother was a genius. If Taka was a prodigy, Yushiro was something else entirely. Skilled in swordsmanship and sharp as hell—he was the kind of guy you could rely on when things got serious.
Just then, movement caught my eye.
Truth and Marko strolled down the stairs, looking relaxed. They weren't in their Division Knight uniforms, which meant they had probably returned before us.
"Sup, juniors," Truth greeted, sliding into a seat with a lazy grin.
"Yo," I greeted back, stretching my sore limbs.
"So what took you guys so long?" he asked, smirking. "Was the village that fun or something?"
"Huh? What village?"
Taka and I tilted our heads in unison.