The Raven Wants to Say Sorry! (1)

[Corvus POV]

It was already noon when Corvus opened his eyes. He writhed in pain because the burning sensation after the seal was fortified still lingered in his body.

"It hurts…" Corvus curled up in his bed after the whole night of torture. His mother, Queen Seria, had fortified the seal around the tower. Although the seals wouldn't kill him, it would burn his feather every time the seal was fortified.

Corvus looked up at the ceiling. A big seal was placed on top of him, acting like a prison to prevent him from leaving the tower. He had lived ten years with the same seals and fortification. As a growing young man, it was bound to happen that he would someday surpass the seal's strength. And it happened when he was eighteen.

Though he wasn't sure how strong his magic right now compared to Ignis, he was confident that his magic was stronger than his mother and most Kingdom's mages.

"This seal has been useless since I was eighteen," Corvus scoffed. His mother and brother thought that he never left the tower. While in fact, he had been traversing around the palace, forest and even went as far as the main city as a raven.

Because his magic affinity became more powerful than these sealing magic, the seal was ineffective. It was actually helpful for him to shapeshift, though. At least, whenever he was inside his room, he wouldn't create a dark explosion when turning back into a human.

"I want to see Anna…" Corvus thought. He felt guilty for harming Anna yesterday, so he was thinking about apologizing.

How would he apologize as a bird in front of Anna? Well, that was a question for another day.

He checked at himself in the mirror and saw that his body had turned 'normal' again. At least, there were only raven feathers on his cheek and neck, compared to yesterday.

Though he wanted to meet Anna in his human form, he was still unstable and dangerous. He couldn't transform into a human without the risk of creating a dark explosion that might kill everyone. All he could do was to shapeshift into Raven and return back as a human at night when it was a full moon, or he was inside his room.

Corvus shapeshifted into a raven again and perched on the windowsill.

His eyes observed around the garden. 'She is not in the south garden, not in the east garden… OH! There she is!'

Corvus excitedly stretched his wing and flew to the west garden to see Anna doing her cleaning duty. He perched on a tree and observed carefully.

Anna was messaging her shoulder after raking the fallen leaves for a while. "That petty Crown Prince refused to pay my money. I should've gotten my five thousand Eyrs by now," Anna complained.

'Crown Prince? She is talking about Ignis?'

Corvus didn't understand why would he felt restless and bitter whenever Anna was mentioning Corvus. He instinctively flew towards Anna and perched on her shoulder.

"Cluck, cluck…" Corvus made a sound to tell Anna that he was here.

Anna's face brightened when she saw her Raven best friend finally came to her after yesterday incident. "Mister Raven! You are here!"

Anna patted the Raven's head gently. She decided to rest a bit because staying up all night to cater to Prince Ignis' tantrum was not good for her health. "Ah, Mister Raven, yesterday was a mess. The banquet got ruined, and some guests got hurt. And the worst part was… that Crown Prince refused to pay me up. Ah, my hard-earned five thousand Eyr. He said he will compensate me with a special privilege later on. I swear if it's not his bank account, I will not take it."

Corvus was shocked when Anna said, pay up. 'D—Did Ignis do something to Anna?! Did he touched her?'

As Corvus' mood slowly dwindled, a train of dark thoughts started to appear in his head. He was unsure whether he could defeat Ignis or not. But if he dared to touch Anna…

Suddenly, a gust of strong wind blew up the leaves that Anna had raked for an hour. Anna was speechless when he saw the leaves scattered again. "It took me an hour…"

'M—My bad…' Corvus said to himself.

Anna wanted to curse so bad, but she took a deep breath and calmed herself down. "It's okay, Anna. This is what mother nature tells you to do, pick up your rake, and do it again."

Anna picked up the rake again and start cleaning the garden without complaining. But Corvus knew that Anna was actually pissed off. Feeling guilty, Corvus tried to find a way to help Anna.

'Since the accidental gust came from the east wind, then if I slowly created a wind from the west, the leaves should be collected around Anna…' Corvus thought. He carefully felt the air around them and controlled the gust to blow from the west. 'Careful… careful…'

WHOOSH!

"Ah!" Anna covered her face when a strong gust from the west suddenly blew away all the leaves she had recollected. In the end, the fallen leaves were everywhere, and it tripled the amount of hours that Anna should do to clean it again.

"…"

'I—I've tried my best,' Corvus gulped. He tried his best to control the strength of the wind that he summoned. But it seemed that his control over his power was still far from perfect.

Anna took another deep breath and said in a low, almost inaudible voice. "Remember Anna, you got paid for this."

Anna silently raked the leaves again, with Corvus as the Raven perched on her shoulder. Corvus felt really guilty for making Anna work harder. Thus, he jumped from Anna's shoulder and started collecting the leaves by biting them with his beak one by one.

Anna saw the Raven helped her to collect the leaves, and she smiled, "Ah, Mister Raven, thank you so much. But you don't need to do this. It's not you who make the mess after all."

Corvus gulped, he silently helped Anna collect the leaves, and after two gruelling hours of tedious and tiring work, the west garden was clean once more.

Anna wiped the sweat on her forehead. She hurriedly searched for something to cover the pile of leaves in case some mischievous wind messed it up again.

She put a wooden slab over the leaves and sat on the bench to rest. Corvus flew and landed on the bench, roosting beside Anna.

Anna smiled and patted the Raven's head gently. "Thank you for helping me, Mister Raven."

Corvus said nothing and enjoyed Anna's patting instead. Anna had callouses on her palm because she worked hard every day, but it was still gentle and warm for Corvus.

And it soothed his heart.

Anna watched the silent Raven, and a thought popped out of her mind. "Mister Raven, why do I have the feeling that you were jealous when I danced with Crown Prince?"

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Ding Ding! First weekly mission has been completed!

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