The perfect | TBATE X COTE

Chapter 25: Director

Kiyotaka point of view:

Are they still out there, Sera?

Apparently Sera had spotted two elves watching us from a distance; having a phoenix as a lookout in the sky wasn't such a bad idea after all. At the moment, a gray-haired woman was taking measurements to make clothes for Arthur and me. But what really interested me was the information my bond conveyed.

I'm keeping an eye on them, they're just... watching. They don't seem to have bad intentions.

Two elf girls... Could it be the princess my brother was talking about? Still, it was unlikely, it was understood that she had just awakened, so she would not be able to participate in a tournament.

Describe them. First the little girl. I asked Sera as I watched the woman continue to measure Arthur and me.

Petite, silver hair, green eyes, pretty, smug. The older one is much better hidden, but has blue eyes and blond hair.

While her information was good, I had to repeat something she said due to my confusion. What did you say? Smug?

How could she tell if someone was smug from a distance?

Yeah, I don't know, she just gives me that feeling.

While I doubted her statement, I ended up shrugging my shoulders at Sera's eccentricity. Keep watching, we'll start the training I told you about in the night

I felt the excitement of my bond through our connection. Really!?

Yes.

I did not receive verbal confirmation, but I could feel her enthusiasm through my bond. Despite what she thought, the training I had planned for her was not so pleasant.

Or, well, if my theory worked, if not, I would probably just try to get her to a decent level. But I was pretty sure it would work. After all, I needed her at her best for what was to come, and there was only one way to do that quickly and with almost no side effects; share some of my memories of the White Room with her. The only one would be that it might drastically change her personality. But that was a small price to pay.

When I was told of the existence of these asuras and what was to come, I thought of different plans, weapons and so forth, but what made the most sense to me was to fight fire with fire. Asuras against Asuras.

Since I was not an Asura, Sera would be my best weapon. And to train her, I would use my memories.

Memories of the White Room; tactics, martial arts, arithmetic, quick processing, and everything else required for her to be at least as cognitively powerful as someone from a generation after mine.

It would be unpleasant for her, but it was required.

"Hey, Kiyo, how about we run away?" Arthur suggested next to me, pulling me out of my thoughts.

"Why should we run away?" I asked, tilting my head slightly.

He just pointed out to our family that he was in a dressing area with couches, carrying mountains of clothes of various types, formal, casual, and athletic. Ellie, in particular, seemed to really like the formals, as she carried more than two sets of outfits, presumably for us, in her little arms to drop off at the pile of clothes that was already almost as tall as she was.

'We're not trying on all those clothes that... are we?'

(***)

In the end, I regretted not listening to Arthur about running away, because we spent more than two hours getting dressed up for our meeting with the director of Xyrus. The worst aspect was that they were all pretty much the same, with little variations in tone or appearance.