[8] Artor'ius'/'ria'

Meeting the woman who stole his heart made Akira nervous. Still, he understands that he must not appear nervous or suspicious in front of the woman.

Especially his condition, which unexpectedly appeared on the way to the small village far from the kingdom where Artoria lives with her guardians, Sir Ector and Sir Kay.

He met her right here, where their gazes were locked.

Akira takes a quick breath to instantly eliminate all of his nervousness before showing a slight smile and opening his mouth. "Pardon me, my name is Akira. I am a traveler from afar who wants to visit the nearby village to seek help while looking for work, as I was robbed while resting in a forest not far from here."

There was no gap between his words, and his gaze was firm and polite.

Artoria, who is still riding her horse and looking down at Akira due to their height difference, remains silent for a while while confirming that the person she stopped was not a dangerous person who would cause trouble in the village.

Trained as a knight and familiar with the country's situation, which had already seen some internal or external conflict, made her vigilant and observant at the age of fifteen.

After confirim her gut and intuition, Artoria then dismounted from the horse before opening her mouth.

"I see, it seems some rumour about there being some bandits nearby the village was right. My condolences about your condition, Sir Akira. Also, pardon me, my name is Artorius."

Artoria easily calls Akira with a prefix Sir, as, with just a look, Akira was older than her, where it looks like he was in the same years as his foster brother, Kay.

Hearing his name preceded by the prefix Sir made Akira smile helplessly; he found it amusing to see the woman in front of him act like a man, despite the fact that he knew her origin and future end.

With a slight smile, Akira opened his mouth, "Oh, Artorius, you are too polite. You can just call me Akira if you want; in my country, there is no need to address others with polite names."

"All right... Akira." Artoria fell silent before nodding slightly. It's weird to her to suddenly call the stranger who she just met with just a name with the suffix Sir.

Artoria then asks Akira to follow her, and they walk to the village together. Artoria was raised in a good environment where it was considered impolite to simply mount a horse and walk on foot.

At the same time, it was difficult to ask Akira to ride the horse with her because the horse was sensitive and did not want anyone else to ride it except her, Ector, and Kay.

"It's kind of suspicious to suddenly have a visitor in our village, as the situation in this country was not good, as you can already see the bandit nearby that made us more vigilant than before."

Akira nodded while listening tentatively to the word that came out from Artoria. 

He knew he had jumped into the correct timeline, where Artoria was still far from the days of her journey to become king, as she pulled out the sword of Caliburn, which was stuck on the stone.

He did not know how long it would be before that promised day arrived, but he was not worried because he was ready to always stand by her side no matter what changes to the timeline of the story occurred as a result of his presence and interference.

"Did we meet in the past? As you know, I can tell by your expression that you know me."

Artoria cannot help but ask, as Akira was so balantly looking at her with those weird gazes, as if he finally met someone that he knew from the past.

Akira stunned for one second before instantly killing the suspicious Artoria.

"You know, it's my first time to arrive in this country. Like I said, I was a traveler from far away, where I found it's nice to visit different countries and see the many kinds of events, scenery, people, and many things with my own eyes."

Akira smiled before smiling slightly at Artoria. "Sorry if my gaze made you feel uncomfortable, Artorius. It's just that I think you would be popular in my hometown with your look."

Artoria fell silent hearing the explanation before smiling slightly. "Oh well, I think my look is still far worse than my brother Kay."

Akira just smiled while taking a mental note to not tone down his emotion and feeling, as Artoria was a sharp intuition knight woman who can easily guess something on others.

It does not take a while before they get inside the village, where Akira can see clearly that the village isn't too deserted and quite decent, where many people are busy with their own businesses and activities.

There's also children who play at each other, and some of the boys play the knight role and sparring at each other using the wodden branch.

"Wait here, as I need to get this girl back into her home." Artoria said while pointing to the horse.

Akira nodded, then waited for Artoria like a good kid. He was a stranger, and it's not good to wander around without the girl around.

While waiting for Artoria to attend to the horse, which appears to take some time, he notices a man who notices his presence and walks with a furrow in his brow, looking at him with suspicion.

"Who are you? What is your business in my house?"

It is understandable that the man is suspicious, given that he is the son of the village's leader and recognizes every face in the village.

Akira is not bothered when he is greeted with a suspicious tone because he is aware of the other identity.

"I apologize, sir. My name is Akira, and I am a distant traveler. I am standing close to your house because I met Artorius on the way to this village, and he asked me to follow her. He instructed me to wait here while she attends to putting the horse back in the barn."

The way Akira explained was so smooth without any stutter, and his expression was neither too subtle nor too nonchalant or even serious.

It's like he acts like a normal passerby that just happened to have business in the village.

In layman terms, he was now perfectly wearing a mask or using a persona to hide his true identity.

"....."

The opposite talk was silent, like brother, like sister. They had a habit of having their own judge someone with their own thought.

"Is that so... then my pardon, my name is Kay. I'm the older brother of Artorius. Nice to meet you, Sir Akira."

Akira smiled slightly. "Nice to meet you too, Sir Kay. Well, I know it's a little bit weird, but you can just call me Akira, as I think we're not that far."

"Hmmm... If you say so," Kay nodded.

Not long after they talked, Artoria came to them while fast walking.

"Sorry for making you wait... Oh, brother?" Artoria was a good girl; she was concerned enough to make her guest wait for long, even though it's not even past 15 minutes.

Kay nodded. "Well, let's get in first, as I've already known the situation of Akira as we had little talk."

Artoria nodded, then three of them walked into the house.

The house itself was ordinary, and Akira can feel the image and ambience of medieval the moment he gets inside the house.

He and Kay were sitting at the chair in the living room while Artorius seemed straight to the kitchen, preparing something for Akira as he was the guest of their house.

"So... Akira, did you really have nothing right now? Like how you easily stay alive while all your luggage was taken by them?"

Kay felt the explanation of Akira was kind of odd, as the bandit he knew wasn't that good to leave alone the people they robbed alive.

Akira smiled embrassedly hearing it. "It's kind of embarrassing, but I was sleeping at a branch tree that is so far from the ground and cannot be seen easily. It's way of surviving from the wild beast."

He then started a pitiful act like sighing depressedly and put an expression of sadness. 

"It's just that I cannot bring my luggage with me and leave it on the ground while covering it with some bush. Those bandits were so lucky to find my luggage the moment I was sleeping last night."

"...." 

Kay can feel the sadness from the way Akira expresses his feeling. Completely be fooled by the way Akira acts.

"I see... my condolence. Also, how are you going to do after this?" Kay asked.

"I don't know; maybe ask others if they need help with exchanging a place to stay temporarily and food to eat." Akira explains while sighing slightly. 

"I think it's was good, as I know well the people in this village. There's some family that needs extra hand to do some labor...

As for a place to stay to sleep and food, maybe it's not as easy as you can see."

Kay looks at the window that shows some of the scenery people of the village that are busy on their own business.

"Our situation was pretty bad right now."

Now that Akira is silent, he already knows the situation from the history that he learned from FATE and the real history of King Arthur.

Akira wanted to open his mouth to ask about the situation, but undoing his intention, Artoria came out of the kitchen while bringing some dry bread and boiled water into them.

"Thanks, Artorius," said Kay and Akira at the same time.

Artoria nodded before joining to sit with them; she then looked at Akira.

"Are you finally sure what you're going to do?" She asked.

"Yeah, just going to ask some people if they're needing help to exchange a temporary place to live and a little food to fill the stomach."

"I see..." Artoria nodded, then looked at his brother. "Brother, I think we need to hunt those bandits, as we don't know when they would start to invade our village."

Kay fell silent for a moment as he looked at his brother/sister, knowing full well what Artoria's true identity was.

"I know that's why I would discuss this with father later, as for now how about we prepare for our usual training." said Kay.

Artoria nodded. "Yeah." She then looked at their guest, Akira. She then turned to Akira and asked, "Akira, do you want to see our training or just go ask around?"

Akira, seeing the opportunity to witness real combat of his King, was naturally eager to see it firsthand.

"I would like to see you two train," he said with a small smile.

Artoria nodded in response before the three ate the dry bread and made small talk with one another.