Hero Vs Villain (BoyxBoy)

In Which Vandel is Rude to the Elderly

Vandel

I'm not a truthful person, in fact I often pride myself on my lies and deception. However, recently I found myself lying to someone I probably shouldn't have lied to.

That person...was my mother.

I told her I planned to keep up my association with Ridley as a way to find out more information about Alteria. She even helped me create a means of communication between the two of us (I planned to give that to Ridley later). What I hadn't told my mother was that I didn't want to continue to spend time with Ridley as a means to trick him into getting more information. Surprisingly...Ridley had been the one I had actually told the truth to. I genuinely wanted him by my side to investigate the Corisathium and the Bone King. Both of these situations could become dangerous for our kingdoms and as much as I hated to admit it, we did seem to work better as a pair. I never would have found the Corisathium in the first place if it hadn't been for Ridley and I doubted he would have survived the Bone Monster attack if I hadn't been there. No matter what my personal feelings for the knight were, it was impossible to deny the fact that Ridley was hard working, dedicated, and passionate, all traits I often found myself lacking.

I doubted Ridley would even have told me information about Alteria to begin with, his country was the most important thing in the world to him. Hence after we had learned as much about Corisathium and the Bone King as we could I would report to mother that Ridley simply didn't trust me and I wasn't able to get any information from him. I would apologize for my failure and she would probably just scold me.

Honestly, what was the worst that could happen?

"Vandel!" Ridley called, pointing straight ahead. "That must be it!" The tunnel we had been following led to a large underground cavern. Buildings that appeared to be carved out of the rock itself rose up from the ground. The cavern was filled with women around the same age as the Ancient we had met earlier. Despite the fact that Ridley and I were CLEARLY outsiders none of them paid us any mind.

"Maybe...we should ask one of them for directions?" Ridley said softly.

"Directions to where?" I asked, arching a brow. "Another rock?"

Ridley shot me a stoic, unamused glance. "Obviously not. But we are looking for information, so I'm sure someone here could help point us in the right direction."

I gave him a small nod. "Sounds like a plan. You ask them."

"Wha...why do I have to ask?" Ridley stammered.

"Cause I don't feel like it."

Ridley sighed heavily. "Okay, I'll do it...but only because you'll probably be rude to them if you talk to them yourself."

I shrugged. "Fair enough." Ridley went off to flag down a passing Ancient and I just sorta stood in place, rocking back and forth on the heels of my feet. I accidentally made eye contact with a passing Ancient which was extremely awkward. I just kinda looked at my feet after that, continuing to rock back and forth.

I suddenly heard a dry chuckle behind me and I spun around. An Ancient was standing there, a knowing look on her face.

I narrowed my eyes at her.

"What do you want old lady?" I asked slowly.

The Ancient simply smiled thinly at me. "You look like a child waiting for his mother to finish up buying something from the market." She gestured to Ridley when she said mother. I glanced to Ridley quickly, hoping he was close to wrapping his conversation up. I furrowed my brow. The idiot wasn't even asking for directions at this point, we was telling a story about a kitten and the Ancients were eating it up. Gods, why did he have to try and be so nice all the time? We only had an hour!