Sorry

"Jon, you magnificent bastard… Why'd you have to go and die like that?" Mikhail muttered to himself.

He coughed a few times, the brief muttering having caused his throat some more discomfort.

Mikhail looked down at the putrid filth covering the tree's roots, feeling drained both emotionally and physically.

"Yo, fool! What the hell was that?"

Mog had left the tent and followed after him, the other two still too disoriented from being abruptly woken up by Mikhail's shout.

"Just had the displeasure of living through some of my past…" Mikhail said as he turned away from the filth, wiping his mouth with the back of his arm.

Mog paused, surprised to hear that he had remembered something.

"Your past? What happened, fool?"

Mikhail sighed, walking over to him.

"I don't want to talk about it right now, man… I just want to get some more sleep in."

He then looked up to the sky for the moon, only to see the strange pitch black circle against the deep and dark violet sky, almost as dark as the spot was. Mikhail frowned as his eyes peered into the dark spot.

He didn't know how to tell the time based on the position of this thing. It could be midnight, or it could have been five in the morning, as far as he could tell.

"It should be around three in the morning right now…" Mog said, as he too looked up at the dark spot in the sky.

"You've probably got around two and a half hours to take that nap of yours."

Mikhail nodded.

'That should be more than enough time to shake off the bad vibes…' Mikhail silently thought as he made his first step forward to go back to the tent.

However, before he could make a second step, a stern and womanly voice suddenly voiced a question.

"What are you two doing outside at this hour?"

Mikhail flinched, before turning around to see Shel.

"Ah, shit! I mean, hello, Lady Shel!" Mog stammered, putting both his arms behind his back, his fists balled up. He had assumed the most tense "at ease" pose Mikhail had ever seen.

"Well?"

"Uh, you see, Mikhail here awoke with a shout, before running out and puking! I had to make sure he was okay!"

Shel looked down to Mikhail, her eyes briefly glancing at the putrid streaks of yellowish white along his arm.

"So, that's what the commotion was about… Mog, please return to the tent."

The short orc nodded, quickly dashing away from the scary woman.

"Mikhail… Explain yourself."

Mikhail sighed, really not wanting to draw up that horrid imagery nor those horrendous sensations. "I relived some of my past," Mikhail said, trying to avoid going into details.

"Your past?" Shel asked.

"Yes…" Mikhail's eyes were drawn to the glittering azure orb of water that began appearing in front of Shel, wondering what she was doing.

"I need you to tell me what happened, young one. Being honest now will save you quite a bit of trouble later, so don't lie to me."

As she finished her reply, the ball of glittering water shot through the air, causing Mikhail to flinch again. However, it was not an attack. The water simply harmlessly glided over his arm, taking with it the puke that had been wiped onto it.

Mikhail was momentarily amazed by how his arm was dry despite just being in contact with water, but his attention quickly went back onto Shel.

It was as if a palpable aura of authority was suddenly surrounding him, coming from her.

"What did you remember?" she asked, the traces of kindness gone from her voice.

"I… I remembered how a dear friend had been crushed to death beneath a slab of stone. How his blood and viscera sprayed onto my face and into my mouth… How my life was suddenly and irrevocably changed for the worse…"

He hated going into details about that day, and he hated the clarity of that memory, down to the puke-inducing taste of iron and gray matter. But he felt unable to hold back the details, as much as he wanted to stop.

And when he did finish, he involuntarily continued, the information flowing through his clenched teeth.

"I remembered everything about my past the day before. How my… My tribe was razed to the ground. How I had been drafted to use my talents for evil… How I was held hostage for refusing."

In the midst of the involuntary confession, he changed the description of his college town to a tribe, to be understood properly in Shagar.

The suffocating aura dissipated shortly after, and for a short while, Shel seemingly stared straight through him.

"...I'm sorry for your loss, young one. Please, go rest some more."

Mikhail's clenched teeth finally loosened, and he let out a deep sigh.

"...I don't know what you just did, but sorry absolutely does not cut it. Good night."

Mikhail walked away feeling a little angry about what had just transpired, and Shel looked on with pity as the young man returned to the tent, going back to sleep without incident…

『Three weeks later』

Mikhail looked around the large, circular floor of the carriage.

The adults, including Yagnar, were all meditating in a circle towards the walls of the carriage, taking on various and unique poses. Yagnar, for instance, kind of looked like The Thinker the way his fist was balled up against the bottom of his chin.

The one similarity they all shared, however, was the way they sat with crossed legs.

He had gotten used to such a scene, as the Orc Merchant Caravan had been moving almost non-stop for the past three weeks, only taking breaks to wash in the nearby river — and to eat — before going on the move again.

Mikhail's eyes drifted between his friends.

Mog was doing some calisthenics training. Push-ups, sit-ups, stuff like that. And Yargol was with him, though he was working out with much less enthusiasm.

And Yatur was right next to him, picking at his nose.

"We should probably get back to work too, huh?" he said, before flicking the booger in a random direction.

"Yeah." Mikhail wiped the sweat off his forehead while he replied, before preparing for another laborious workout.