Chapter 166: Warm Welcome
"I...I’m so sorry! I may have been deceived, but that doesn’t excuse my actions. Whatever punishment you deem fit for me, I won’t complain or beg for forgiveness, I know I don’t have that right. If I am to be executed, I’ll accept it without a fuss. But, at the very least, I’d like to request that it be painless-...!" Began Akila as he bowed his head.
"Uh, please calm down, there’s really no need to apologize. Like you just said, you were deceived, so I have no intention of blaming you. And besides, there was no real damage done in the end, so it all worked out fine," Responded Lyra with a smile.
It was the next day, the 26th of August, 1919. The Irregulars set Akila up in an inn to get some rest, the shock of finding out that he was being tricked and used left him pretty worn out, both mentally and physically.
And after having some breakfast in the morning, they took him to the Capital for an audience with the Queen. He’d been pretty nervous and on edge, understandably so, but thanks to Lyra’s friendly, amicable disposition, he was a bit more at ease now.
"Still, it could’ve been a lot worse. I even ended up badly injuring one of the Knights. Not to mention the innocent child that was sacrificed to summon me in the first place," Replied Akila with a guilty look on his face, as he lifted his gaze.
"You don’t have to worry about that, that was in no way your fault, Alphonse Plore was entirely to blame for that. And as for the Knight you injured, rest easy, he was healed shortly afterwards and is perfectly fine now. If anything, we owe you an apology...you were abruptly taken away from your old life, but we have no way of sending you back," Remarked Lyra apologetically, before elaborating, "The Hero Summoning Ritual is a relic from over a millennium ago, we didn’t even know a copy of it still existed until this incident, let alone how it works.
You see, in our current era, we simply don’t have the knowledge required to understand how Ancient Magic Rituals work, let alone make a Spell that can reverse their effects. So, to be frank, we have no known way to send you back to your own world. We have been searching through our archives to try and find such a Spell, but we don’t know if such a thing even exists. So, there’s a high possibility that you’re stuck in this world."
"Oh, that’s fine by me. Even if it was possible to send me back, the truth is, I don’t want to go back to my old world. My life there was pretty miserable, so I’d rather stay here, if that’s okay. Regardless of the fact that I was being deceived, I still tried to kill some of your people, after all, so I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t want me around," He replied, before turning to Jules, who was standing next to the throne, and added, "Um, I’m sorry for attacking you at that abandoned mansion...and also for saying you look evil, about how your face looked wicked and your eyes devilish and stuff, that wasn’t cool."
"I-It’s fine, I’m not concerned about that in the slightest," Responded Jules with a strained smile, her eyebrow twitching slightly as Lyra stifled her laughter and tried to pass it off as a cough, not particularly convincingly.
"I have warned you not to frown so much all the time, your face is going to end up getting stuck like that if you keep it up," Remarked Lyra with a teasing smile.
"Th-That’s not-...! I-I mean, I’ll keep that in mind, your Majesty, thank you for your advice."