I lay in the bed for quite some time letting my body heal itself with both Yuna and Akira right next to the bed. I felt some soft fur on my other hand while I was asleep. I finally opened my eyes and looked to see Yoshi laying next to my hand, cuddling it for warmth.
I saw both Yuna and Akira looking relieved seeing that I have finally got back to my full consciousness. I waited for some time to create the sentences in my head that I was going to speak because I was still in a daze.
"Akira, how is your arm now?" I asked the noble and she clenched her fists together.
"It has been perfectly healed Kazuki-sama," she said and I let out a sigh of relief. Well, that was one problem solved out of the many we still had. "But I do want to say that I am not pleased about the fact that you made me drink your blood. As a servant, I am not supposed to be feeding off of my master’s blood. I am the one who is supposed to be helping and assisting you. Even normal human blood would have sufficed to heal the wound."
"I know but I had been stabbed by that sword too," I spoke in a quitter tone so that Yoshi didn’t wake up. "So I knew how much it was hurting you and even if getting human blood would solve the problem, we would have to first retrieve it and that would be a lot more problematic and time-consuming."
"Still, you are honestly too kind for your own good. As much as I admire and am very grateful for your kindness, your kindness can also be the end of you," Akira said in a worried tone. "The world you had stepped in is filled with everyone who is either trying to kill you or use you so you must put yourself before anyone else’s safety."
"I appreciate your worries Akira but there are a handful of people I deem truly close to me and I would prefer protecting those people with everything I have," I explained. I did say that but I was honestly very scared when I was in the daze myself. My body felt it was drained out of all the life it had in it and that was a very scary experience. Similar to when I was captured by the Noble at the church.
Even though I am wording out brave and courageous words, the reality of how I felt was far from it. Yes, I wanted to protect them with everything I had but I still have my time for hesitation. I have my time when my survival instincts just tell me to turn my feet and run in th opposite direction as fast as I can. I am scared, yes but knowing the feeling of losing someone close to me, someone I had started or did care about was something I didn’t want to feel again. I was acting brave because I am scared. Scared of that feeling of emptiness in my heart and regret in my mind of how things may have been different if something would or would not have happened.
"N-Nii-chan!!" Yuna cried out loud and gave me a big hug waking poor little Yoshi up from his sleep which he did not appreciate. Yuna clung onto my neck and tears started flowing down her eyes. "Never do that again…please…I thought I lost you for good for a moment there, twice…TWICE!! Please, don’t do something that reckless again."
I hugged her back and pat her back in the hopes to calm her. Seeing me in that situation was quite a shock for Yuna herself and I wouldn’t really be blaming her for reacting like this right now. I probably did look like the life was about to go out of my eyes.
"Okay, I won’t do anything reckless again," I said comforting her.
"You promise…?" Yuna asked in a meek voice.
"I promise."
She kept on clinging onto me and I looked at Akira’s eyes but she averted her gaze. I don’t really know why she did that, maybe because she is ashamed that she had me do that to save her. Knowing Akira that would probably be the case. I held onto Yuna for longer with Yoshi scratching her clothes which she didn’t really mind or gave any attention to making the cat meow loudly in frustration.
"Okay, I need to make a call so can you let go of me Yuna?" I asked her and she obliged with my request. "Also, take Yoshi with you outside."
Yuna didn’t ask any questions and took the not-so-happy Yoshi who was unwilling to leave my presence and struggling against the super strength of a vampire. He meowed again and again so that he could come close to me but right now I wanted to do something very important and I didn’t need any interruption during that. I pulled out my phone and started dialling the phone number of James which got instantly picked up as if he was expecting the call.
"You were expecting my call?" I asked the man and I got no answer. "Look James, I know you asked me not to go looking out for Ai all by myself and all. I do understand that you are furious right now but I do have two pieces of information you would find very valuable."
"Dominic has his hideout right outside of the main city and we finally know where the holy relic Trinity is," James said in a calm yet strict voice.
"Wait…don’t tell me you sent someone after me to spy on the situation," I said honestly shocked by this.
"I knew you’d do something like that knowing how emotional you get about Ai so I sent some hunters to follow and spy on you from the distance and make sure of your safety. It was very risky and careless of you though Kazuki. I will not condone the actions you took. Come to my office at 1 PM tomorrow," James said and cut the call right after.
I put down th phone and let out a sigh. Looking up at Akira I sat up straight easily now that my body was properly healed. I pat the place at the edge of the bed indicating Akira to sit there. Though she wasn’t looking right at me, she did as I indicated and sat at the place.
"Akira, listen to me. Whatever I did back then was to help you, I know you are not too happy about that but you should also understand that there are some things that I can’t do," I tried explaining to her though my message didn’t seem to be getting to her.
"I understand how Kazuki-sama is thinking and I will be forever indebted to you for doing that to me but I am still very ashamed," Akira said in her monotonous voice. Her face back to her normal blank expression. "Kazuki-sama has treated me the kindest out of all of my masters and that is something I really admire about him. I’m someone who had put my survival above those of my masters because, like servants, even masters can change for a servant if the former master doesn’t want to keep the servant or is deceased. Though I joined you at that moment clearly due to the fact that your group was capable of killing my former master but even so, I’ve not really been too dedicated to serving my master. It was more of an obligation to me than anything else. It was something I had to do and there was nothing more to it for me."
I sat there listening to Akira’s explanation now confused where all this was even leading. Akira opening up about herself was a very rare sight to behold and I would say that I was happy that she was trusting me enough with this information.
"But this is different, instead of a mere obligation, I want to serve Kazuki-sama. It was somewhat of a gradual yet true feeling I had. Yes, I have started at first just doing it out of obligation but you didn’t force me to do things except for when it was really needed and when you are going easy on me. Though it may seem minute, that did have a big impact on my current view of you. You’ve given me more freedom to do what I like and let me experience peaceful days when I don’t have any obligations except for just being on the lookout and making sure you’re safe which was also something you never asked of me but I did on my own," Akira kept going on. "Which is why I feel ashamed that I had to put you through all that today. I was in pain, a lot of pain but I still refused to drink your blood because of my own reasons. The wound though would seem not that bad for a vampire but it was from a holy relic and those weapons are made to spread their damage slowly and torturously through the body of a vampire so I would need a lot more blood than I normally would."
"So that’s why you were so reluctant to drink my blood?" I asked her and she nodded.
"Moreover the fact that I had to feed over Kazuki-sama’s blood when he was already injured himself was just really embarrassing for me. And…one other thing happened that I feared…" Akira said the last line with her expression breaking and I could see her being a bit shy for some reason.
"And that was?" I asked Akira.
"I…really enjoyed drinking your blood…" she said hiding her face. "It tasted really good…"
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"Ahaha," I laughed a little and rested my back. "Man and here I thought it was something really serious. Don’t worry Akira, if you ever crave my blood, I suppose I can let you drink some. Though I’m not sure if Ai ma- "
"Absolutely not Kazuki-sama," Akira said standing up and getting closer to me. I could hear the strictness in her voice. "You do not understand what your blood does to a vampire, I had the urge to suck every last drop of it because it tasted like no other blood I’ve ever drunk. It was so sweet, pure, and I could feel myself being revived by powers I never knew I had. It is like a drug for vampires, if you keep feeding me your blood every now a then, I will get addicted to it. I can understand why you do that with Ai-sama but please keep it to that. It is very dangerous for both you and me. It was scary, how I felt for that one moment, that I was ready to take the life of the master who was sacrificing his blood to save my life. So please, don’t do this again, and if you do, only when it is in a very dire situation. Other than that, keep this blood in your body."
I nodded hearing Akira being so strict to me all of a sudden and she realized what she did and stepped back to apologize but I said to her that it was alright. With that, I let Akira go back to her place and just stay in bed for some time.
I miss Ai.
I need Ai.
"I’ll kill Dominic and get to you," I said in a spiteful voice. "I promise you."
Amongst all this commotion this feeling of hatred and rage never left my mind. Tomorrow I am supposed to meet up with James to see how to proceed with this plan. Though it pained me, it became more apparent that with just me and Akira, Dominic is still leagues above us and the difference between our powers was like day and night.
I am still, very weak.
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