Let's face it: there are few sports that the Hero enjoyed. He would rather sit at home, staring at the ceiling or playing video games than sweating in the light of the sky, without any shame or embarrassment. Fortunately, this magically created light did not produce any heat, otherwise he would have already suffered from heatstroke.
However, he didn't regret coming for one second, for one reason only: Sylvania Beach! He had heard about it roughly but had not believed it.
"What do you mean that on a giant turtle there can be three distinct districts, a prison, an underground lake, a giant tree, an over-equipped hospital, a kind of mountain, plus a beach? And in a way, he was right to doubt it because there was indeed no beach in Sylvania: as for the sky, this beach had been created artificially thanks to the sand of the previous place where they resided before, magically they heated the water and they had their own beach... on a giant turtle... In truth, it was more like a giant swimming pool than the beach. No, that's mean, it was more like a medium-sized lake.
Nevertheless, what a surprise it was when he understood what it meant to be on a beach: girls in bikinis! He had only seen them in commercials or posters advertising some horrible chemical drink or some new artificial universe, or in old magazines in the Universal Library, but never in reality. He had already seen some women or females dressed like that in some gloomy bars, but seeing them in the sunlight gave a completely different aspect to the thing. They were not the only ones, the boys were also wearing bathing suits, showing their well-trimmed muscles and titillating all the ladies around. Strangely, he didn't see many adults.
Was this another way for the queen to bring the champions together? The Hero didn't think so since there were a number of unfamiliar faces present. These people did not seem to be warriors although they kept showing their nobility.
Although everyone was wearing swimsuits of all types: not just swim shorts, two-piece bikinis or one-piece suits, there had to be suits for all types of races, the Hero remained dressed, protecting himself from the bright sky with an umbrella and the Bible offered by the Fairy. She had asked him to come, but she had made no mention of the fact that he would have to engage in some kind of activity with his classmates. To keep him company, he had Mina, the dwarf, who was also not wearing a bathing suit and was hiding under her parasol.
- Mina? called the Hero.
- Yes.
- Go buy an umbrella, it's mine.
- Is that what you learn in your religious book? The cheapness? retorted the dwarf.
- No, it's only me who orders you to get an umbrella so you don't get in the way.
- Oh that's okay! Are you going to be mad at me because I was suspicious of you?
- If I say yes, will you leave?
- No.
- So no, I just want to be quiet today.
- Yet everyone is having fun, there are girls everywhere, with pretty bikinis and beautiful bodies with water flowing in places ..., she said the voice lascivious.
- Sis, pull yourself together, you're drooling!
Mina shook her head and put on a neutral face.
- No, but I'm saying this for you, Mina said, maybe among all these beautiful nobles you will find the love of your life and become a noble.
- No need, I already have access to royalty.
- That's it, you're going to make me believe that you're a prince.
- Yes, my dear and sweet Mina, he supported by putting his book on the table, and anyway, when I ask to be introduced to a girl I like, they put obstacles in my way.
- Camellia? asked the dwarf.
- Did you know about this? Of course the winged fairy is your friend, after all.
- And Marina too.
The Hero slapped his face. It didn't even surprise him. If the three of them agreed to keep him away from this Camellia, they would simply succeed, and he didn't really have the eloquence or the looks to play the womanizer like his "prestigious" brother.
- An infernal trio, it is not possible! he despaired.
- They were right to stop you in your tracks, she is not a good girl.
- What is good or bad in this world?
- Plus, she has questionable taste in boys to be around.
- But I am a dubious person! Let me dive into this dowdy morass.
A word straight from his imagination.
- You've got the brushes mixed up, there, laughs the dwarf, it doesn't mean anything anymore what you say.
- I lost my temper in the face of so much nonsense.
- Do you want me to ask the winged fairy to do it anyway?
- That would be nice.
Mina got up and walked out to the "ball rep" field, as they called it here, and called out to the Fairy so she could play matchmaker for her champion's cause. She turned to the Hero who waved her hand. Wearing his glasses, he saw that she had a frown on her face, before discovering a wide smile that did not bode well on the face of the Fairy. But he trusted the dwarf who had kindly made the proposal.
The Fairy went to see Camellia and spoke to him for a few seconds before she came to see him, he didn't even have time to introduce himself when he received a slap and the big fairy left the ball field. Mina came to see the Hero who was shocked by what had just happened.
- Satisfied?
- Are you kidding me? Why did she do that?
- No idea. It was Princess who interceded on your behalf.
- What kind of crap did she have to tell him?
- That you thought she was an easy girl to spend the night with.
- WHAT?" bellowed the Hero, "but I never said that!
- That's not what she seemed to think," Mina replied.
- That's it, I'm out of here.
- Yippee!
She gave a thumbs up to the Fairy who gave it back to her.
- All the same, the women are of a maliciousness to all tests.
- You're pushing us. Besides, what Princess said is relatively true. She is an easy girl. You just have to see why her champion agreed to defend her honor. That vampire just took advantage of her knowing full well he didn't stand a chance.
- Like he has the right and not me?
- But he is not our friend.
- However, she, she is your friend, and you talk about her like that...
- Well, she's not my friend! replied the dwarf, and anyway, you can't understand the social criteria of women.
He stared at her for a long time before sighing and lying back in his folding beach chair.
- Your condescension towards your kind touches me one without moving the other, he says in Franca.
- I understood your sentence but not the meaning.
- Basically, I don't care.
- Roh! I declare you the flame of my friendship you sulk it? she mocked.
- Let's just say that I appreciate part of the gesture...
- Well, that's it!
- But you girls are such hypocrites!
- Roh!" exclaimed the dwarf.
- Otherwise why don't you go play with the others?
- Because I don't know how to play ball repellent.
- It's called volleyball.
- We change the name each time we discover a human activity.
- Yet the queen did give me a holovision and did not name it differently.
- The name change is exceptional, especially for sports.
I can't tell if it's ridiculous or not, the Hero thought.
After this thought, there was a blank between the two. The Hero didn't know what to say to her, it was the first time they both spoke without animosity. He considered pretending to be asleep, but it was laughable as a behavior, it was better that he got to know her better since the situation was going to be like that. He then thought about the advice his older brother had given him in this kind of situation: "Ask her about herself.
Oh yes, that's it! Thanks brain.
He may have been an extremely intelligent person, but sometimes he was as dumb as a bottle butt.
- How long have you all known each other?
- I would say since our early childhood. Except for Lin. He arrived a few years later. It is the queen who introduced him to us.
- Personally?
- Yes. That's because apparently he came from a fallen kingdom and the queen took him in while he was wandering around a battlefield not knowing where to go.
- Are his parents dead?
- It must be. No one ever went to see if there were any survivors from that place. No sooner had he been welcomed into a family than his adoptive mother lost her life to an unknown disease. Even though it had been a year since he knew her, he was greatly saddened.
- Understandable.
- Despite this, he is still a smiling and welcoming person.
- I saw this at the reception, and even when he came to pick me up to play with you.
- He's always thinking of others. That's the kind of person he is.
- I have to admit that I thought he was a complete idiot with his rotten puns on his last name, but it's just that he's way too nice compared to me and the people I've met on my way. What about you? What's your story?" he said, handing her a pen that served as a microphone.
- Me? Well, I am a refugee from the north of Eden. Because of the many conflicts in our land, we left our country to come here and on our way found this giant turtle walking in front of us. That's what my parents told me, anyway.
- You're the first person besides my mother who came directly from Eden.
- It is true that it is rare to meet people from this continent, she conceded.
- Although I don't look like you, I come from there too, apparently, he confided to her.
At this announcement the dwarf was startled, she really didn't expect to meet a fellow human being coming from a country as far away as hers. She threw herself on him to examine him from every angle.
- Oh my! Calm down, said the Hero, amused by Mina's reaction, I'll show you.
He held out the back of his hand and pulled the Darkness back from it to his wrist, revealing a hand full of scars, but mostly ebony in color. Mina was even more surprised, but he felt a hint of disappointment in her eyes.
- When I told you that I came from the same continent as you, you were thinking closer...
- That's right. But you're even rarer than I am.
- Inside these walls, maybe, but outside, I'm not the only one with this skin color. And then I remain human, we are still more than you.
- Taken on a case-by-case basis, surely. Nevertheless, making an amalgam of all the races, I don't think so, she smiled.
He put his hand away and sat back down on his beach chair. Mina shifted the table between them, wanting to continue talking with him. The discussion drifted to many things: the macabre and crazy adventures of the Hero in the corners of the country and his mini-trip across the ocean, the schemes of his older brother, the misadventures of Zelda and his long-time sidekick: the Hero not yet a hero of the legend - that's what he called himself in his anecdotes - and many other stories. He had taken the habit of telling his life to others because he liked to make them laugh with his misadventures without ever going too far in telling them about his many setbacks and his malaise, and also the stories where he took a stinging defeat on the psychological and mental aspect - as in the Oranas prison.
At the same time, he learned about Mina's "dark" side, that she liked scary things but was a coward. She told him about her plan to become her friend's sword arm when she became queen and about her hard work in training to be strong enough to wield her hammer as nimbly as the greatest swordsmen in the kingdom.
Is it possible to use a hammer as sharp and precise as a needle?
He was a real tomboy, and this aspect of his personality appealed to the Hero.
However, all these stories came to an end when the wingless princess came to take a break. Being exhausted after so much effort, she sat down on the Hero's thighs, who exhaled deeply, emptying his lungs, not expecting to be weighed down by his protégée.
- Say I'm fat.
- You take the words out of my mouth.
She put her weight on the Hero's body, but the boy didn't flinch, it was just that he wasn't expecting it that surprised him - after all, he was the man who was able to fight while holding six meter long beams. He nodded to the dwarf that his friend was strange, she only shrugged.
- Isn't your fiancé here for you to do this?
- No, he never comes to the beach, and never to my ball rep games...
- So I'm doing better than him in one outing? Am I not your real Prince Charming?
- Maybe," she replied, "but that'll be the day you wake up earlier than ten in the morning.
- Always the same old story, he sighed.
- It's not my fault that you don't make any effort.
- More than Beneltig anyway, he laughed.
- That's right. I'll leave that point to you.
- Anyway, you seem to be having a great time.
- At the same time, we're at the beach, I'm playing my favorite sport and the weather is nice: what more could you want?
The weather is always nice in this kingdom.
It was exhilarating to always have perfect weather as if you were in paradise, but the Hero also liked rainy weather - when he wasn't outside because acid rain was no thanks. If he threw a little tantrum to the queen would she grant his request for rain or would he have to go to the fields to get it?
Nevertheless, this festive setting troubled him. He had just returned from the city's Underbelly and had seen the most awful things that could exist. Extreme poverty, people living in unsanitary housing, and a soil nourished by the blood of its inhabitants.
It made her stomach turn just thinking about it.
Fortunately, he was distracted by the Fairy who called out to his best friend by pointing out a group of boys with fairies, elves, ibexes, and muscular centaurs.
- Did you see the cute boys over there?
- I admit that they are not bad, answered him the dwarf of a monotonous voice.
One of them winked at the Fairy, who was not indifferent.
- Pfff, I crumple them up as I please," intervened the Hero, "and they're not that muscular.
- More than you already, she replied.
He feigned disinterest by looking away, muttering that muscular or not, their muscles did not stop plasma or lead bullets. This sentence made the Fairy giggle, not expecting to see him being jealous of other men. But it was quite normal that he was with a body as defective as his.
As time passed, she offered to play ball repellent with them.
- I don't know how to play your game," the dwarf replied, "and you know it.
- Do you know how to play what sport?" the Hero asked, because we played basketball, no excuse me, "throwing balls in a basket", and you managed to score against your own side!
- It's not true!" she protested.
- Of course it's true!" said the Hero, "It's true! That was the last time Lin came for me.
- Well, I don't remember!
- You remember what you actually want, right!
- If you're better at sports than she is, why don't you come and play with us?" the Fairy asked him, making eyes at him.
His excuse was religious reading and the fact that he didn't have a bathing suit.
- Say especially that you didn't want to buy any.
- I came, that's something," he laughed, crossing his arms behind his head and closing his eyes.
The Fairy got up and went to look in her bag and threw a pair of swimming shorts on the Hero's head.
- I had planned it knowing you.
- No kidding..., he grumbled in Franca.
- Tutut. Stop speaking in Franca or you'll lose your Oli'Ane. Come on, I'll wait for you on the track, she said while running away.
- The ground, they say, he corrected her.
He looked at the shirt before crumpling it into a ball.
- What a pain in the ass, really...
- Can I ask you a question?
- You've done it before.
- Can I ask you three questions?
- You're no fun," he grumbled, "but go ahead.
- Do you like Princess?
- Yes, otherwise I wouldn't defend it at the tournament.
- Like mercenaries appreciate their clients... I'm talking to you in love, dummy.
- Ah!" he pretended to realize this before speaking slowly, stretching out each syllable, "you mean this way?
- Yes.
- Well, let's just say that I can't remain indifferent after all the help she gave me and that she remains a pretty person despite her bump on the nose.
- A detail.
- Yes.
- If she left her lover, would you introduce yourself to her?
- She will not leave him.
- Are you sure?
- One hundred percent. From what she told me they have known each other since they were kids and have been dating for at least four years. At this point, the next step is marriage.
- It doesn't always happen that way, you know.
- I hope so for her sake. I can't bring her the happiness she's looking for, and involving her in my bloodthirsty quest would do neither her nor me any good. In any case, I don't have the love for her that you expect from me.
Rising from his seat, he stretched and prepared to leave to change.
- If you say so, it's up to you.
- Because she's going to leave him?" he questioned her casually.
- Interested?
- Not really.
- So we don't need to go on and on about it. You who don't like to show you how to play? she changed the subject.
- My legs are bandaged and I'm going to keep my top on, I think that's enough for people not to be disgusted by my bruised legs.
- You really get your head around a lot of things. You're already human, it's already disgusting!
- I stink of magic, it mitigates the smell!
- Let's put it this way.
Leaving Mina alone under the umbrella, she made a simple reflection that amused him as he left to change: "What a troublemaker."
Elena's son could say what he wanted, but when he didn't like a sport, he made no effort to struggle, especially if he didn't know how to play it, but the longer the game went on, the better he got, to the point where he was able to become a pillar of the Fairy's opposing team. Once the team changes were made, both of them on the same side became invincible, covering each other as best they could. One would stop shots and the other would send bullets flying back at full force: in short, she was his shield and he was her sword.
Their little game must have lasted two hours at the most, the time for the light of the sky to fade. People were leaving the beach to go home, and it was the Fairy who had to support the Hero who had exhausted himself valiantly to live up to the expectations of his protégée, while controlling his strength and not using more power to keep the game fair.
- It was a great game," commented the Hero.
- To whom do you say it, retorted the Fairy, in any case, thank you for having wanted to play with me, and especially for having come.
- Don't worry, I'm as happy as you are. And to make you fully happy...
He lifted her off the ground and carried her on his arms.
- ... and if I carried you to Java-Aleim?
- Don't do that! It's disgraceful!
- Carrying yourself like the princess is shameful? First news.
The princess blushed, but the hero ran at full speed to the bottom of the tree where all the blue-blooded fairies lived.
- And you don't feel anything for her...," said Mina.
Having taken his damsel home, the Hero reflected on that afternoon of play he had with the people of Upper Town and Sanctuary. It is true that he liked them, and they seemed to like him as much as he did, but the uneasiness he felt was that he did not belong to that milieu. He was not in search of social advancement, but had reached the highest strata of this society by chance, escaping his original social background. However, seeing those idle children in the Sylvania slums, he could only feel dirty after playing with those bourgeois and forgetting those children who were dying of hunger and thirst.
What kind of hero was he to not share the happiness felt by others? Was it wrong to have fun while others were starving?
Outside, this kind of thinking had never occurred to him because he was a mercenary, a monster hunter, a bounty hunter, the one who was looking for the man who killed his mother. But here it was something else, although he was hated because of his humanity, people had come to forget him and were more interested in who he was. It was an advantage because the queen treated him as her son, but not only that: his nature as a nice and friendly boy helped him to be accepted.
Nevertheless, was he betraying Malalalivia by playing with the nobles? And more deeply, was he betraying her expectations by wanting to fulfill the Fairy's dream?
- Rah! I don't have to think about that. This country is not mine; they'll do fine on their own! he raged.