Sent to Another World to Protect an Unfriendly Princess

Chapter 14 - A Flowery Farmhouse with a Lonely Girl

I made my way inside the big farmhouse.

"Who are you?" Asked a short girl with her hair tied up in two fluffy pigtails.

"Um, I'm a visitor?"

She thought for a little while. Suddenly, she seemed to have come to a revelation.

"Are you here for Lily?"

Not this again...

"No... I mean, I guess, kind of?"

"Oh, but I don't see any other reason for Master to take in another boy."

"What?"

"Never mind."

She seemed to have had her attention taken by someone else who was swinging around a wooden sword in the garden. It was two practising sparring with each other, there was also another girl sitting on the grass beside them watching. They were all around my age.

"Well, I'm Airi, you should probably be nice to Lily since she's always been pretty jealous of us."

"Why is she jealous?"

Suddenly Airi's cheeks went a slight shade of red.

"Never mind."

The two of us made our way and watched joined the others in the garden. The boys stopped their sparring and came over to us. 

"Who is he?" 

"He's Lily's guest."

One of them began giggling.

"Lily's guest... I see!"

He turned and face me. He looked like a very strong individual, with light brown eyes and a very large cleaver-like sword strapped onto his back. He seemed like a very happy and outgoing person.

"What's your name?"

"Ritsu."

He took out his hand for a fist bump.

"I'm Hector, you can call me Hec for short!"

Huh?

He gestured towards the other boy.

"This is Sammael and the girl sitting over there is Carmella."

Eventually, Lily came over and joined us as well, she was wearing a much more casual outfit now.

"Did you bring him here to train with us?" Asked Hector.

"I suppose so." She replied.

"Perfect!"

He threw me a light wooden sword and got into a fighting stance.

"Let's see how strong you are considering you managed to catch Lily's eye."

Hold on, wait a moment.

He slowed his breathing and began charging at me.

My arm was still in pain after using my sword forms against Lily. I tried to follow his movements with my eyes as best I could as he launched him and his sword towards me.

Suddenly, he stopped in place.

"This is not how we are meant to treat guests."

Sammael was gripping him by the back of his shirt.

"Hey, I just wanted to see how strong he was!"

Hector swung his wooden sword around, trying to hit Sammael.

Sammael managed to catch the sword in his palm, holding it tight. He was getting visibly angry, I could just slightly see the veins on his arm.

"Hector, what do you think you are doing?"

Hector cowered back after seeing his serious face. 

"Hey, hey calm down now." Said Carmella in a gentle tone of voice. 

Sammael eventually let go of Hector's sword. He turned and faced me.

"Sorry about that, Hector gets pretty excited by guests. Anyways, call me Sam, most people call me that except this weirdo."

"Ok..."

The mentor poked her head out the back door. 

"Dinner's ready guys!"

Everyone stumbled inside and began taking seats around the table.

I wonder what happened to Chloe...

It was a large square table with two seats on each side. Carmella sat next to Sam and Airi sat next to Hector. I could either sit next to the mentor or Lily.

I guess I'll sit with Lily, then.

She seemed to tense up when I sat next to her.

It was a very large homecooked meal, it was mostly vegetables with a very little bit of meat.

"Hey! Why did I get less meat than Sammael!"

"Shut up." Sam softly karate chopped Hector's head.

"Settle down you two." Said Carmella.

We slowly ate the meal in front of us.

"Let's do some games after dinner." Airi proposed.

"Yeah, that sounds good!" 

"Sure."

"I'm all for it."

They all looked at me.

"Yeah, I guess I'll join in too."

After dinner, we all made our way into a big empty training hall. 

This house really is quite big.

Hector brought out a sack of bean bags.

"Alright so we'll play two at a time, so, Ritsu, it's pretty simple, just throw the beanbag and if it hits them on the body, you win. You can block the bean bag with your arms or your legs."

"Makes sense."

"I'll go first." Volunteered Airi.

"Well she can play against Ritsu then," said Hector.

We took our positions on the opposite sides of the hall. We both had one bean bag and there was one bean bag in the middle of the hall. All of the others stood against the wall and watched us.

"Go!" 

Instantly, I threw the bean bag as hard as I could across the hall. Airi had plenty of time to react and easily swiped it out of the air with her hand.

She dashed across the hall, completely ignoring the bean bag on the ground.

She's running straight for me.

There wasn't anything I could do except stand there. If I ran forwards it would only shorten my already short game. She was just barely three metres away from me now. As she raised her arm to throw the bean bag, I leaned forwards and smacked her arm, causing her to drop the bean bag onto the floor.

The two of us both dived for the bean bag. Suddenly, I felt a sharp pain in my head. 

I looked beside me and noticed that she was rolling around on the ground holding her head. 

"Oww..."

I quickly grabbed the bean bag off the floor and chucked it onto her back before crouching down and checking if she was okay.

The others also came over to check on her.

"I'm fine..."

The others weren't exactly impressed by my victory.

"Alright next round will be me and Carmella," Hector announced.

The two of them got into position.

"Go!"

The two of them both dashed towards the centre of the court without throwing their bean bags. They ended up hovering around two metres away from the centre. Both of them aimed their bean bags and carefully watched the other's movements.

After a brief moment, Carmella fakes a shot causing Hector to flinch before throwing it straight onto his head. 

"Damn I lost."

The two of them shook hands.

"Alright and finally we have Lily and Samael!" 

They made their way onto the hall.

"Alright, go!"

Neither of them moved very much from their starting positions. Both of them just stood there staring at each other.

"So who's like the strongest here?" I asked Hector.

"Well Lily's definitely the best fighter here but Sam is pretty close."

"Oh yeah, I forgot to ask you, are you guys like all siblings or something?"

"No, we were actually all taken in by Lily."

"What do you mean?"

"The four of us were all children without a home. I'm pretty sure Lily was as well."

"Oh."

"Yeah, we came here after we had nowhere else to go. I'm still grateful to her."

Suddenly Sam took a large step and flung the bean bag at Lily. It travelled with incredible speed, like an arrow. After a thumping noise, the beanbag fell to the ground.

Did she get hit?

"What happened?"

"She blocked it with her arm."

After realising his shot was blocked he charged towards the middle, diving for the bean bag. She took aim as Sam slid along the ground. Instead of picking it up, he flicked the bean bag up towards her. 

She kicked it straight back at him. He just barely managed to block the returning bean bag with his hand, swiping it to the ground.

"Hehe." 

She raised her arm, preparing to hurl the bean bag in her hand. 

In his last moments, he swung his arms erratically. Lily simply leaned forwards lobbed the beanbag into his back.

"Ah." 

Afterwards, she stuck out her arm, helping him up.

I walked over to Lily. 

"Hey, can we talk?"

"Sure." 

The two of us walked over to the side of the hall.

"So, what is this about?"

"I just wanted to know what this entire place is."

"It used to just be me and Miti, well, actually, it used to be only Miti but after she took me in, some other lost children also came here. They are all children that either I or Miti found while we fought."

"So they're all like abandoned children?"

"In some sense, Hector and Sam were found while we were chasing one of Hatari's advance forces."

"Who's Hatari?"

"What? Hatari is the kingdom next to this one."

"Oh."

"Anyways, we found Carmella after both her parents were killed in the forest and Airi came to us seeking refuge after running away from home."

"Wow. So why did you first come here?"

"Well, Miti used to live here alone. I was the first one to join after my entire village was slaughtered by Reid three years ago."

"Reid?!"

I thought he was like a hero...

"Yeah, he was a knight even three years ago. Afterwards, Fourier took me to someone's mansion with lots of flowers. Then, I was put in the care of Miti."

"If you don't mind me asking, how did you manage to survive?"