Chapter Text
“Someone get herbs and any kind of medical supplies for this man!” One of the ship’s medical staff members’ crystal ocean blue jewels glinted menacingly at the small party of medics that zinged to the ship’s cabin. A grotesque frown etched at the corners of her fleshy pink mouth whilst her paranoid gaze ogled at the hardly conscious body of a samurai, whose heavily bleeding wound was carved into his chest, emanating from a sharp axe. “Immediately! We don’t have any time.” She uttered with rusty raspiness her yell.
Her paranoid gaze lingered on Yasuo, whose back was lazily positioned on a soft cotton blanket beneath the oak wooden ship’s planks as if anytime he could pass away from heavy bleeding. His katana was discarded from his belt, laying motionlessly next to him untouched and meaning no harm. The light-skinned herbalist’s responsibility was supervising the injured Ronin just like every passenger, who was brought almost dead on the ship whilst her colleagues had to swiftly gather medical supplies to cure them before it was too late. The time elapsed as fleet as the wind.
The ship from Noxus to Ionia was pacing slowly but surely into the crispy azure ocean under the blizzard of highly scintillating gilded sunshine rays, lasering brightly partly the ship and the unconscious Ronin’s face and timid muscles. It had been a handful of minutes since the ship had sailed away from Noxus’s coast as Yasuo was the last passenger that had been brought as a passenger lastly by Riven to escort him to safety and find help for him for his upcoming destination. It was an expression of her gratitude to Yasuo for helping her and due to being in a hurry to return back to her farmer home, she didn’t want to leave him starkly motionless and potentially unalived by dragging him onto the nearest ship for Ionia with her entire physical strength which was unmeasurably compared to her feminine identity.
Even if the herbalists and medics on the ship knew little to no information about the motionless Ionian except about his past and deeds, it was an inescapable responsibility for them to save his life. Pure vulnerability seeped the void patches of his unconscious body, illuminating him in an innocent light, where he had fought hard enough for someone he cared for or was part of his care not to receive medical aid.
On top of that, the middle-aged lady had witnessed a galore of innocent, even headstrong travelers to be her temporal patients after their travels’ intense fights as if they were coming back from a war or they were assaulted by vicious creatures. Natural and delicate compassion accompanied by sympathy painted across her wrinkled facial features and carved deeply inside her heart as a sign of her years of experience and how her benevolent nature hasn’t abandoned her. Some of the travelers and fighters had families or at least someone whom they sufficiently trusted to let them know about their current tragedies.
Yasuo was among the exceptions, even if he didn’t talk much about himself. His brother is dead. His father abandoned him, even before he was born. His mum was just a ghost of the past that soothed him, despite her abrupt death before Yone’s loss.
The herbalist leader’s hurricane of thoughts was flooded with more compassion behind her speculation what if he didn’t have an actual family to mourn over him if he suddenly disappeared or died from the severe injury bleed? What if there wasn’t anyone to pay tribute and their respects to someone like him? What if his friends he actually made in Bilgewater which is a foreign fact for her weren’t aware of his eventual disappearance and demise?
Gut-wrenching chills clung to her bones, shuddering at the haphazard thoughts of her overthinking process that preoccupied her mind while anticipating her team to be precise with the time and equipment.
The acute reek of blood, demise, ocean, and salty fish wafted past her tender nostrils, flaring impatiently with the crucial purpose of saving the juvenile samurai before the bell tolls.
In the interim, a flock of herbalists and medics emerged from the cabin in a hurry with a bunch of beneficial herbs and bandages, kneeling against the tall muscly figure while their leader snatched an oil of Curcuma longa herb recklessly to pour it into the open slit. The prospect was beyond petrifying as even the heaviest-clad knight armor isn’t tough enough to endure such a fatal blow until the bravely throbbing heart is exposed in its naked form. The old lake of crimson blood was minutes old, dried from the opening of the slit, and descended to his belt and cotton baggy azure trousers. It still continued to bleed, but not as much as before. It wasn’t his only body part victim of blood, but also a rich splatter of gore of slaughtered Noxians had spluttered across his leather shoulder pad, his feet, and partly on his face as a potent indication of the intense combat.
Surprisingly, a dissatisfied grunt escaped the young man’s fleshy strawberry-coloured lips as a sign of verbal protest against the itchy pain that coursed through his frail bones after the herbalist leader and one of her pupils applied the oil and started wrapping the rough bandage material to hug his upper torso partly after lifting up his azure scarf temporarily. The pain and agony stung as a wasp’s tiny, but as sharp as a honed weapon spear, poisoning Yasuo with passive suicidal thoughts of wishing the agony had ceased. He clutched tightly his eye slits closed as his anatomy fleshy fibers recoiled initially, gritting his teeth to decrease the physical agony that had consumed his vortex of thoughts.
“The pain and the bleeding will stop so soon. Don’t move, traveler!” One of the male medics' honeyed lullaby attempted to comfort the young Ronin when he retrieved swiftly from the ship’s cabin a glass of pure crystal, clean water they offered to everyone as mandatory to hydrate his whole inner organs. In the meantime, Yasuo came to his senses, squinting timidly at the horde of medical staff roundly encircled his tall figure, sensing the severely loud hammers into his bosom armor.
Vowels and syllables initially constructed impulsively, died on the fat of Yasuo’s tongue to express his reckless protests against the stinging physical pain and how lucky he was to be rescued on the ship. He couldn’t reject the offer the male medic bestowed him after his wound was cured and covered with the roughly uncomfortable synthetic fabric that contacted his muscular chest and partly his left shoulder. A glass of water was a stark salvation for him and his organs, a handful of hours which was the last time when he drank something liquid to dance inside his oral cavern.
One of his arms supported his raised back whilst his other hand’s rigid-textured fingers snaked around the fragile material, sipping the translucent liquid from his lower lip. Yasuo nodded in gratitude seconds after gulping ferociously the transparent liquid that descended inside his oral organs. He didn’t have the strength enough to speak except to emit unrepressed sounds to assemble with the ocean and the birds’ symphony.
Once the medical staff had finished their job, the leader decided to accompany Ronin’s lone presence, in case of an alarming emergency that could invade the time. The rest of the horde was dismissed and zinged inside the ship to spill their verbal shenanigans inside the humble inn.
During the ship’s advancement through the ocean, subsequently, Yasuo’s chocolate brown bijous scanned his surroundings and the empty prospect of one more medium-sized vessel gliding softly through the perky sea waves. A shadow-clad figure with familiar Vastayan features seized his lenient gaze that transformed into an ethereally eternal ogle.
An averagely tall woman with nine fluffy fox tails and pointy ears. She looks so familiar from his haunting memories.
“Is everything okay?” All of a sudden, the older gentleman’s honeyed question snatched Yasuo from his daydream stare arrowed at the Vesani feminine figure he recognized from far away.
“Y-Yes, I’m fine.” Seconds of awkward silence was exchanged between the gentlemen, whereas the Ionian swordsman pursed his lips nervously as a blush crept onto his well-structured, plump cheeks. He couldn’t redirect his brown eyes to the medic’s concerned stare. The prospect was too indulging, whereas the medic arrowed his big hazel eyes at the Vesani frame that was the most recognizable passenger on the other ship. “Everything is fine.”
“If you need any kind of help or anything, let me know, traveler. Don’t hesitate!”
--- *** ---
A half a day after the vessel for Ionia stubbornly sailed upon the perky ocean waves, the agile swordsman recovered partly from his own injury. The nocturnal darkness consumed the once delightfully sunny prospect with the sun descending while the moon and the troop of tiny vibrant stars inked the sky. It was sufficiently late for Yasuo to wander as his plan for the current night was to reserve a room for himself, and indulge himself into drinking and eating in the nigh inn. It was a long day.
A long day, full of persistent tribulations hewed his daily episode’s routine, where the fights were an unavoidable part. Aiding Riven and receiving medical assistance pronged his tender heart with a relief a as wee reminder that he wasn’t combating the concrete cold world all alone.
The rueful screams of mercilessly slaughtered civilians by the Noxian soldiers’ sharp axes and roars of defeat seconds before the bloodthirsty Noxian soldiers’ cadavers collapsed onto the solid ground, accompanied by their thuds, zinged Yasuo’s ears. Goosebumps crawled upon his rough from training epidermis.
His footsteps echoed timidly against the mossed stone path to the inn, seconds before he ventured up inside to become an oblivious witness of drunk fights and discussions, which the swordsman didn’t pay any heed to since it wasn’t part of his business at all. Nonetheless, his presence could be temporarily noticed and recognized by the drunken folks who would either glance at him or otherwise return back to their shenanigans.
Once the Ronin set foot inside the inn, the symphony of a bard playing his flute and a couple of drinkies babbles rimmed into his ears as his respectably large shadow loomed as his only company, catching their glances for a split second. His weary shooed feet’ elaborated series of steps to reach the countertop, where the innkeeper took note of his presence as soon as he made his presence known via the lenient door slam mingled with the doorbell’s brief symphony.
The inn’s interior bestowed his sensitive nostrils with a myriad of smells, varying from food to the cheapest tobacco and alcohol.
“Good evening. What kind of a drink would you like?” The husky, tobacco-stained greeting warmly welcomed the samurai, registering a mutually peaceful eye contact. The innkeeper smiled politely.
The innkeeper in question was a man in his late fifties, whose name was Hayato. Firstly, Hayato was towering approximately for an average man 5’10 and he was mildly overweight, due to his big appetite. His head was partly bald from the slowly but surely decaying hair from the aging process, accompanied by the relentless wrinkles adorning his lightly tanned complexion, beaming light at the wisdom and experience he had harvested through the elapsing years. A simple, however, neatly ironed and clean white shirt hugged his torso with a pair of military green trousers shielding his legs. Lastly, his facial hair ceased from existence, due to his habit of shaving it frequently.
“I would like some rum, please.” Politeness coated the tired Ronin’s voice tone once he perched his lower body on the wooden stool to rest temporarily from walking. His calloused, but amusingly strong hands clawed to the countertop lazily.
As soon as the bartender accentuated his focus on pouring rum into the scotch glass, thereafter, Yasuo casually scanned his surroundings, which he had witnessed pretty often in the inns.
“You have been traveling quite a lot.” Despite the fact that Hayato spotted the current visitor’s devastating condition, his verbal nuances were tinted into seriousness without any hints of sarcasm, in order to not disrespect him.
Their usual encounters in the inn as a client and innkeeper were usually full of jokes, and tipsy babbles once Yasuo had a couple of beverages, but tonight was much different. It wasn’t the first time he almost lost his life when the conversations weren’t crowded with merry chuckles and sarcasm.
“I helped someone from the past and got heavily injured by those dirty Noxians while helping her.” Once the Ronin replied rhetorically, thereafter, the innkeeper who played the role of bartender and granted some of his visitors temporarily a refuge for a night or so, glanced initially back at Yasuo. Grasping tightly the scotch glass as with his other hand worked on untapping the bottled rum’s cap, he inspected cautiously every feature about the samurai and widened his gaze at the bandage’s cue.
“Yasuo, you are always full of surprises to help and protect people. But you definitely deserve to stay out there for the night since you were injured in combat. It isn’t safe to stay outdoors when it’s dark.”
“That’s why I’m here. Not only to treat me for feeling a bit relieved to help the person in question,” A couple of seconds' pause dramatically interrupted the more juvenile man’s response whilst his long fingers maneuvered to fix his high ponytail, preventing any stray locks of his chestnut brown hair curtaining his fairly tanned complexion. “But also to sleep somewhere safely. This axe blow was almost fatal that I wouldn’t be here.”
“This fight must be so fierce with almost having your head. It’s so terrifying to hear it. But whenever you don’t have any place to stay and you are tired of wandering,” A frown grotesquely decorated the wrinkled innkeeper’s facial features, profoundly carved into bittersweetness from the agile swordsman’s revelation. “Don’t bother wandering and you are always welcome in this inn, Yasuo!” Within a couple of seconds after the untapped bottle nursed the once-empty scotch with brown liquor, consequently, a bittersweet smile crept on Hayato’s mask, scintillating the swordsman’s brown bijous with friendliness and altruism.
“You are so kind, Hayato! I don’t even deserve you.”
“Boy, you have been through a lot!” A dramatic exhale escaped the bald gentleman’s lungs, seconds before handing the scotch to his current client, tapping him amiably on his broad, muscly unwounded shoulder. “The world is evil and full of unexpected surprises that may have ceased your existence forever.” Meantime, the young man maneuvered a modest nod of gratitude for his glass of rum seconds before bringing the scotch’s rim to his lower lip to start nursing the enticing liquor.
A handful of minutes elapsed through amicable interactions between the small party with wisdom-clad conversations, where Ronin took advantage of gulping his rum quickly as a result of the ginormous stress burdening him in the last hours and relaxing his tense muscles. He would have two more scotches of liquor before heading to bed and having enjoyable conversations with someone with whom he hadn’t achieved this since he last encountered Ahri.
Whilst cherishing the third glass of brown alcoholic beverage, both men were ultimately lost in the isolated realm of their own pleasant and personal conversations which were so intimate for Yasuo. He wouldn’t open up with ease to individuals since the trust was worthy for particular folks who weren’t deceiving and had known him for a while. The inn’s background bard tunable consonance and the drunken folks’ stories were a far cry from audible for Yasuo and Hayato’s years to indulge in the medley of music and gossip.
“How much I owe you for the room for tonight and three glasses of rum, Hayato?”
“Only one coin if we are talking about the reserved room. The rest is free.” A suddenness of lump, burdening the samurai’s Adam apple from initially eavesdropping on his beloved innkeeper’s answer startled him. He opted to pinch his bijous back to reality as if he was having an unbelievable dream.
“You must be joking.” Although the samurai wasn’t particularly wealthy, due to the fact that he had saved the precious coins he would work out from defending the villages and peculiar individuals to book a room to sleep in the inns, disbelief sketched upon his face. Furthermore, he was struggling to believe and trust people upon hearing that his ordered beverages were free, unlike the booked room.
“I am deadly serious, buddy. You deserve a discount for being a frequent client there and using the inn’s benefits to drink and sleep.” On top of that, the bartender encouraged Yasuo’s ear to contact timidly his dry fleshy lips as a piece of evidence of the wee secret he wants to shackle between both of them only. “It’s just one coin for tonight to stay over there. The drinks are free in your case.”
“What if they fire you for making an exception,” An awkward stammer escorted meekly Yasuo’s initially structured sentence that couldn’t be finished, due to the sharp interruption.
“There are no ifs, Yasuo! Nobody will fire me for this. You aren’t the first client that receives such a modest offer.”
“Oh, fine!” Suddenly, he rummaged through his bagged trousers’ pockets for a coin that was going to cover the price for his sleepover at the inn, whereas his other hand’s fingers clung to the scotch’s remaining liquor and sipped docilely. “Here you go, Hayato!”
“Thank you! And good night, Yasuo!” After gulping haphazardly the enticing liquor and handing meekly the coin to pay for his stay at the inn, subsequently, Ronin’s body was almost giving up as a result of his tipsiness and exhaustion. All he yearned for was dipping his calloused back on the soft mattress’s fabric and shutting down his vision temporarily, gifting it with a short break from bright lights, and disturbing images of blood, death, and fights.
“Good night!” At that moment, Yasuo retreated upstairs with the key he retrieved from Hayato after paying for his booked room.
Within a half minute, he finally found among the fewest free dorms that weren’t reserved by clients yet, which was a coincidence of his luck. After his brittle fingers manipulated the key through the keyhole for the labeled in numbers room twelve, the wooden door creaked open at the wide landscape of a king-sized bed, a bureau, and a floral carpet blanketing the wooden planked floor. A couple of picturesque images hung on the grass green wall, complimenting the inn room’s beauty and simplicity. A window was heavily curtained by the fat cotton curtains’ fabric to cease the interior’s view from perception and discourage robbers and hooligans’ increased piqued curiosity.
Afterward, the samurai set foot inside the dorm and locked it for his safety to evade any uninvited guests that would violate his personal space with noxious acts, varying from robbery to eventually unaliving him. It wasn’t ultimately safe inside the inns as some of them were notorious for being a refuge for burglars, merciless murderers, and individuals who wanted nothing more than trouble.
The impending day would be another monotonous routine of wandering and discovering fresh challenges ahead of him.
As he discarded his unsheathed katana onto the bed next to him to be near to him as much as possible in self-defense, he covered himself with the comforting woolen quilt that covered his body as an impenetrable shield against the frigid coldness the nocturnal daily episode cursed its respective hours and decreased temperatures. It had been a long time since he could sense warmness cuddling his athletic frame, preventing it from trembling and catching colds.
A quarter an hour before drifting off asleep, the Ionian swordsman’ initial insomnia chased him with childlike curiosity about his earlier today’s vision and potential cues about Ahri.
The fluffy nine fox tails, the pointy ears, and her averagely tall frame were the sole details he could recall, even if both ships’ proximity was plentiful of meters, where the cues were difficult to be distinguished from the facts, due to the far sight. He ideally recalls how she gave him a hint about her forthcoming destination to Shadow Isles and vice versa after celebrating Viego’s defeat, besides wanting to meet one another in the future.
By judging Ahri’s hint about her forthcoming destination, therefore, Yasuo analyzed straightforwardly the logic that she was returning back home after her adventures in Shadow Isles and planning to potentially meet her. Little did he know where her nowadays home could be.
Where she would sleep? Is she safe? What if something dreadful happens to her, even after he served as her bodyguard back in Bilgewater?
A swarm of questions burdened his conscience as a troop of aggressive wasps, materialize with their imperiling presences an individual with predictably incessant moves against them. Even if he accomplished efficiently his job as his bodyguard for the Vastaya woman, his vow to meet her someday tempted him to apprend his plan to the forthcoming day to try to roam any nook of Ionia, especially the woods, where he was well aware via her stories that her shadow sauntered.
She was a wanderer like him, but unlike him, she had distanced from humans for plentiful of years. A long period of time to isolate her presence to not loom over the Ionians and the rest of Runeterra with the notorious past of her first love’s death and the cause of his demise.
His vow to protect her as her former bodyguard actually initiated their relationship that escalated into more than professional. Shared their own traumatic woes how they had killed singlehandedly their own people which meant candidly a lot to them, having private conversations and showing vulnerability which was a blue moon, especially emanating from a stoic persona such as Yasuo. It bonded them in a more personal way and developed mutually more undeniably powerful feelings for each other. There were sufficient reasons that progressed their initial professional relation.
--- *** ---
--- The Next Morning ---
The very wee hours of the morning were blessed with the lifelessly monotonous, silver clouds surfing the sky, seeping the sun’s presence to crawl and show signs of its powerfully radiant presence. The most profound nooks of the Ionian forest, which would Ahri call her own home were only familiar to her, where she lived in an old abandoned one-story cottage. It was far away from the vicious, self-centered human civilization. A bright contrast to the greed, pride, and malice she would encounter on a daily basis.
Peace had resided within the deepest forest’s corners, where she had been living for hundreds of years. The forest was fueled with a rich variety of beauteous and brightly coloured flowers, healthy herbs for cure and tea, mouth-watering trees, and bushes with fruit.
On this particular morning, Ahri sat on the heavily creaky oak wood’s porch outside her house as her long slim fingers curled around her mug of brown caffeine drink. It was second nature for her pair of big amber jewels to indulge in the majestically ethereal nature’s realistic painting she could stare at for hours. It comforted her, while her frail skeleton leaned against the porch’s column, emotionally supporting her weight as an invisible, but doting cuddle.
All of a sudden, heavy rain poured, ushered by spontaneously haphazard, fleet-lighting bolts striking the ground. It has been a while since Ahri has been widely awake and planned her morning to be precisely spent in leniency after her travels to Shadow Isles.
The melancholic presence of the refreshing rain joined Ahri and the old cabin’s modest company. The woods’ atmosphere extravasated peace and serenity, even though sometimes the excessive quietness caused more harm than good. As if an unsettling shadow of an unknown presence invaded bluntly her surroundings, even when she knew the least. Ahri wasn’t all alone.
In the initially desolated forest, a masculine large framed figure emerged from far proximity as he was aimlessly wandering without any specific coordination and guidance. Within his progressing saunter, his features became way more distinctive, even from the raven-haired lady.
A highly tied long ponytail in a brown elastic band, baggy azure pants with a sheathed-katana clad belt, a fairly tanned skin tone, azure scarf that covered his mouth and his shoulders, accompanied by the leather shoulder pad. The remarkable scar on the bridge of his nose.
But something seemed a bit off about his usual and outstanding physique since the last time they had met and talked. He wasn’t as heavily wounded as before. The bandage caught her severe accent to spear it with her pair of amber jewelries. She sipped nervously her warm morning coffee seconds before her coffee-stained lips could elaborate her initially invasive sentence under her breath, solely audible to her ears, impatiently waiting to vomit from the fat of her fleshy tongue.
“Yasuo!”