-9-
After days of traveling across the Qin Plains, the youths have finally arrived at the forest, which divided the fabled trade metropolis of Dōng mén from the rest of the Qin Empire. Milla looks across the void plains, with it's dew enriched grass and scattered boulders, one more time before entering the terminal woods, I'm going to miss these relaxing plains.
The sun began to set as Milla salvage through her backpack and looked across the forest for supplies and nutrition, the clever hound somehow convinced Kai to hunt for more food again as Norah prepares the campfire and builds shelter. The basset hound grabs a piece of cloth and uses it as a pseudo plate for the several apples, berries and nuts she had found, she neatly places the cloth near the campfire and dumps the fruit and nuts on top as though she was preparing dinner. Norah had finally finish making the tents as Kai returns with some foul and even a couple of fish.
"How did you get the fish?" Norah questions.
"I found a creek so I did some fishing." Kai explains.
The husky dumps the meat into the fire as he begins the relax and eat a couple of berries as he waits for the food to cook, "So, what is the deal with you two?" Kai asks referring to both Milla and Norah, who at first denied any relation between each other.
Kai remains silent, waiting for one of the girls to respond; both girls began to whistle hoping for the husky's impatience to overwhelm him, however the canine maintained his composure.
Milla makes a large sigh in defeat, "We used to be really close friends." she reveals.
"So what happened?"
"Well, when me and Milla were friends, she lived by herself at Dragon Valley. I would come visit her whenever my mother would come to Shang Mu for 'diplomatic' reasons, one day we agreed to sneak Milla into my mother's air ship to take her home at Shuigang." Norah explains.
"I knew you were some kind of rich girl…" Kai validates, the tone of the husky's voice implies that he was trying to annoy the panda girl, which he accomplishes.
Milla interrupts to continue, "It was about one year before the Kingdom Stone's theft and it was the first time I've ever entered the city, Shang Mu was so noisy and chaotic. When we finally arrived to Shuigang we had so much fun. I couldn't stay at Norah's house though, so we agreed that I would stay at a cave off at the shore of the island. However, after a couple of weeks things started to change…"
It was cool and windy autumn morning at Shuigang.
Milla was sleeping against a cold boulder inside the hidden caverns at the island's shore as the sound of the wind whistled through the hound's ears, relaxing her.
Norah entered the cavern, however she seemed distraught, "Milla." the panda whispered trying to wake up the hound.
Milla wakes up and sees the panda next to her, "What happened, you look upset." she yawns slowly getting up and stretching after sleeping on the hard floor.
"I- I'm not upset, just a little confused, is all!"
Milla remained silent, waiting for Norah to finally explain.
"What's with the look, it's nothing!"
"If you say so, so what do you want to do?"
"Hey, wanna go over to the city?"
The hound made a reluctant face in response, "I don't know, the city just isn't for me. It's so noisy!"
"Don't worry Shuigang is not nearly as noisy or busy as Shang Mu."
"Alright." The hound submits.
As they played at the city with it's several jade buildings and stores, the two girls noticed a group of children around their age following an adult feline outside Shuigang. Milla and Norah approaches the group and asked the adult where they were going, "Hey what's going on?" The panda demands.
The adult feline notices the young panda and hound and responded with a smile, "Oh, it seems we have a pair of new guests everybody!" the feline announced to the other children before focusing on the two young females, "What's your name?"
"My name is Norah and this is Milla, though what is going on?"
"You mean you're not here to come with us to the Kingdom Stone?"
"What's tha- " Milla naively asks before the panda girl immediately covers her mouth.
"Oh! Of course we are!" Norah fibs with a mischievous grin.
"I suppose your parents gave you permission to come to the trip?" The feline asks.
Milla tries to respond however Norah continued to cover her mouth, this time with more force, "We wouldn't be here if our parents didn't give us permission."
"Alright fair enough, then follow, but do not stray off too far."
The school children begins to leave the city following the enthusiastic teacher with Milla and Norah following behind them, the hound made a worried expression, "Norah maybe we should turn back."
"Why?! It'll be fun and interesting, also I've always wanted to visit the Kingdom Stone during the autumn festival, but my mother would never take me."
"We're not suppose to leave the city though, your mommy will get angry at you. I don't want you to get in trouble!"
"Relax, like I said before: what she doesn't know won't kill her."
"But-"
"Milla don't be a coward, we're just going to check it out and we'll be back here by supper."
"Alright, but you've been acting strange recently…"
"I'm fine, besides isn't your birthday next month?"
"Yeah, I guess. October is next month, right?"
Norah nods in response with a smile in an attempt to relax the cautious canine, "So this is like an early birthday present, obviously I'm going to give you an actual present during your actual birthday anyways, but it's the thought that count."
"Fine but we're only watching! Promise!"
"Promise…" Norah reluctantly answers, the hound noticed the tone of her voice but remains silent.
"Look, I know I might have broken that promise and caused some trouble, though in my defense it wasn't entirely my fault!" Norah argues, leaning against one arm to keep her from falling backwards as she sat in front of the campfire.
"Some trouble?!" Milla was filled with outrage "You can't be serious?! We were just going to watch, but you sneaked into the Kingdom Stone's shrine! I also haven't forgiven you for manipulating me like that!"
"Well if you would've helped me instead of being some cowardly dog, then we wouldn't have gotten in trouble!" Norah counters.
"You shouldn't have done what you did to begin with!"
The argument between both the girls began to escalate into a fight, however Kai intervenes, "Hey! Ordinarily I would care less rather you girls kill each other or not, but given the current situation let's try to keep each other in one piece please." Kai mediates, as he tries to relax the enraged tween girls.
"Fine, but I don't want to talk about it anymore!" Milla retorts.
"Alright, though Norah that doesn't exactly explain how you became a mercenary, though."
"Exactly why should you care, Red Scarf." Norah retorts with a hostile tone.
Kai tries to maintain his patience with both females, Ugh, are girls always like this? Granted I've met worse females, I wonder what that demon fox from the Red Scarves is doing, I think Norah would give her a run for her money.
After the heat died down and the group finishes their dinner they began to fall asleep.
A few days later the party finally arrives at Dōng mén, the city was a large city with several large pagodas and warehouses with a few skyscrapers piercing through the semi-flat cityscape and several trees compressed within the city. The youths saw several trains manifesting from the large settlement as it carried passengers and cargo at fairly swift speeds.
Milla made a warm and nostalgic smile as she sees the familiar Qin city that she spent almost seven months at after she left the origin kingdoms.
