A/N: Hi guys! I finally have chapter 21 finished, I apologize it took so long. I hope this was worth the wait for you guys ️, I'm going to try and get this series back on a schedule to once or twice a week but we'll see ?. Anyway I hope you all enjoy this chapter! Also there is mild language in this chapter!

—

Meanwhile, somewhere deep in the woods, Neva, Yuno, and Miku continued searching for a good place to start their training.

Neva let out an irritated huff as she took in their surroundings, so far the three of them haven't been able to find a good space to train. She wanted to find a nice open area for Yuno and Miku to be able to use their wind magic freely and without worrying of hitting anything other than tree's. But so far she has had very little luck.

" Hey guys-." She began to call as she turned around but she cut herself off at the sight.

Miku was sitting on a downed tree, her face paler than it already was and her eyes red and puffy from crying but they also held a distant look to them. As though she were physically there but not mentally. Neva then looked over and saw Yuno had the same distant look in his eyes as he stood there next to Miku.

There was no doubt these two were related. If they were closer in age one would mistake them as fraternal twins.

" I think Asta said there was a clearing up ahead that we could use to train." Neva told them and all she got in response were a couple of nods, the blonde haired girl let out a soft sigh before continuing forward.

—

After walking for a few more minutes the small group finally arrived at the clearing. It wasn't the biggest clearing they had ever seen, but it would be big enough for them to train a bit. Neva turned to look at Yuno, a small smirk on her face.

" Well? Will this work?" She asked as she crossed her arms, Yuno looked around for a bit before nodding.

" A clear open field would be ideal. But this'll work for now." Yuno muttered, the platinum blonde haired girl sighed.

" You're always so picky." She tsked before looking at Miku. The girl's eyes brightened slightly as she looked at the open area, Neva was glad to see the girl finally begin to brighten up a bit after everything that had happened yesterday.

" So," The dark haired girl muttered softly as she looked around. " what do you want me to do?"

" Just show us what you can do so far and we'll go from there." Yuno said as he moved to the side a bit, Miku nodded before letting out a soft sigh. She held her arms out in front of her and, after waiting a few seconds, a huge gust of wind shot out of her hands and flew towards a couple of tree's. Yuno and Neva's eyes widened as the gust of air had completely knocked all the leaves off the tree's.

" Well, you did tell her to show us what she could do." Neva said with a soft laugh, Yuno nodded in agreement.

" I did. Now we know what skill level she's at." Yuno stated coldly and matter of factly. Neva blinked in confusion as he walked over to Miku, it had been a long time since he had acted this way towards anyone, especially towards her, she knew it probably had to do with what he saw in Miku's memories but decided not to say anything about it for now.

" Since you still don't have your Grimoire it'll be difficult to teach you any type of offensive or defensive spells, so for now we'll just focus on magic control." Yuno explained as the small girl nodded. " Just try to hover in the air for as long as you can, like this." He added as he demonstrated, Miku smiled just a bit as she watched him.

" Oh I already know how to do that, you- I mean my father, already showed me how." Miku muttered as she looked towards the ground, her smile disappearing.

" I-, I mean your father, already showed you?" Yuno asked softly as he turned away and rubbed the back of his neck nervously. Neva watched as the two stood there awkwardly for a few moments before she shook her head.

" How about we do this," She began before turning towards Miku. " You stay as long as you can in the air and you can't go past this parameter." The platinum haired woman suddenly threw down a circle of Diamond spikes that surrounded the darker haired girl.

Miku nodded before closing her eyes, the two Golden Dawn members watched as the girl began to use her Wind Magic to levitate off the ground. Neva walked over to Yuno, tapped him on the shoulder, and signaled for him to follow her. Using her Diamond Magic, Neva created a small bench for them to sit on.

" You're distancing yourself." She told Yuno bluntly as he sat next to her. Neva saw his amber eyes widen slightly before he turned away from her, she also noticed a faint blush on his cheeks. He apparently hadn't realized she caught on to him.

" No I'm not." He muttered softly, although neither she nor himself were convinced. They both knew he was a very poor liar and that anytime he lied he would look away.

" You are, and I'm assuming it's because of that memory you saw yesterday." When Yuno didn't respond, Neva knew she was right. The two sat quietly for a few moments, she didn't want to push the subject, instead she wanted him to answer in his own time.

Yuno didn't quite know where to begin. He didn't really like talking about himself very much, he was one of those people who normally kept their feelings to themselves, so he had no idea what to tell Neva. He glanced at her over his shoulder and saw a look of warmth on her face and her eyes held nothing but patience in them. It was like a light switch had gone off in his head as he was reminded that he wasn't just talking to anyone, he was talking to Neva.

As he opened his mouth to say something he suddenly heard a small squeak. He and Neva looked over and saw Miku had unintentionally made a small tornado and inside it was a small…ball of Mercury? Neva and Yuno looked at each other then back at Miku, who had also turned to look at them.

" I think it belongs to Kaiyo. She's the only one with Mercury magic and she still doesn't have control over her magic, it came from over there. I just…used my magic to keep it from hitting us." Miku muttered with a small shrug, Neva and Yuno looked over to their right and saw the broken trees and limbs where the ball had gone flying through. Yuno turned back to Miku and put a thoughtful hand under his chin, she had the magic control he did, and obviously she had the power since she was able to stop the spell.

" We'll continue talking later, right now let's get back to training since we don't have much time left." Yuno said as he walked towards his 'daughter'. Neva opened her mouth to argue but quickly closed it, of course Yuno was right, they didn't have much time, but she also knew he was using it as an excuse to change the subject.

He wouldn't be able to push this conversation off forever, but right now Neva wasn't going to push it, instead this was something he was going to have to come to terms with himself first before he talked about it with others.

—

Somewhere else in the woods

Aloys grumbled under his breath as he walked ahead of his 'parents' and Maelie, he was trying to find a quiet place for them to practice their magic but instead the memory of what happened a few moments ago kept playing in his head.

Earlier

Aloys had tried to keep quiet during the entire meeting, but it finally got to be too much. So the next day when the families were going to spread out to go train, he decided to finally confront Alistar about the things he said at the meeting.

" So you knew everything the whole time? Even before we left?!" Aloys shouted as he stomped towards the white haired boy, Maelie trailing behind him, trying to get her brother to stop.

" What are you talking about?" Alistar asked as he turned to face Aloys, who in turn grabbed the front of Alistar's robes.

" You know exactly what I'm talking about! The scouts, the dangerous mission you sent them out on, you knew what would happen!" Aloys shouted, as the others stood around and watched things unfold, Alistar stood there with his head hanging low.

" We…we didn't know-." Alistar began weakly, but Aloys cut him off.

" Bullshit!" He shouted before suddenly feeling someone grab his shoulder and pulling him away from Alistar, he turned and saw Hikari staring at him with a stern look in her eyes.

" What is going on Aloys?" She asked, her voice sounding somewhere between the sternness of her mothers and the sternness of her fathers, Aloys moved out of her grip with a glare before turning around to walk away. He blinked as he saw his 'parents' and Maelie staring at him, as soon as his eyes met Gauche's he turned his anger towards him.

" And you, you're selfish and only think about yourself! When will you think about others for once, and how your words and actions affect the people who care about you huh?!" Aloys shouted before walking away, Gauche stood there confused for a moment before his confusion turned into annoyance.

" The hell's his problem?!" He shouted before picking up Maelie and following after him with Grey squeaking out an apology at Alistar before following as well.

Now

" M-Maybe you should try and talk to him, Gauche." Grey suggested softly as the two followed behind Aloys, Gauche made a 'tsk' noise before shaking his head.

" Why should I be the one to initiate the conversation?! He's the one with the problem here!" Gauche argued, so far he didn't really have any problems with Aloys, sure the kid was a momma's boy and was a pain in the butt. But it was mostly him giving back what Aloys was throwing towards him.

" Well, that's what parents do right? T-They talk to their kids, find out what's wrong, and they try to solve it together?" Grey asked softly, Gauche shrugged a bit. Neither of them could really remember their families, all Grey could remember was how mean her step mother and sisters were, and Gauche really only remembered the last night his parents were alive and how all the other nobles treated them afterwards. So was that really something parents were supposed to do?

" I don't know." Gauche admitted with a grumble before he set Maelie down. " But, I guess it's worth a shot." He added, he turned and saw Grey give him a small but happy smile and he swore his heart skipped a beat, how could she always be so cute? He felt his face heat up before quickly clearing his throat. He sped up his walking pace, grabbed Aloys by his collar, and dragged him towards the small clearing that was ahead.

" H-Hey! Hey what are you doing old man?!" Aloys shouted as he struggled to get out of his 'father's' grip. Gauche growled.

" I told you not to call me that!" He said angrily before he let the boy go, the two stood there glaring at each other for a while before Gauche sighed.

" So, do you plan on telling me what crawled up your ass and died?" He asked, using one of the many lines Captain Yami had used on him in the past. Aloys snorted before rolling his eyes as well.

" It's none of your business."

" Well you made it my business when you decided to have a yelling match with the Golden Dawn's Captain's son!" Gauche pointed out, causing Aloys to look away and mumble. " So tell me what's going on and why you're so angry at him."

" Why should I? It's not like you'd understand." Aloys grumbled as he clenched his fists, Gauche crossed his arms.

" Try me." Aloys snorted again before shaking his head.

" Really? Alright then, how would you react if you saw the person who killed your parents?" He asked coldly, Gauche blinked in confusion, what was that supposed to mean?

" Those scouts they keep talking about, the ones that died? It was four people who were sent to that damned kingdom. Klaus Lunettes and his wife, and then you and my mom. The four of you went there on a mission, and none of you came back." Aloys explained, Gauche felt his stomach sink to the ground. That's why Alistar Vangeance had looked over towards them apologetically at the meeting, why Aloys said Maelie was all he had left.

" You wanna know something else? He's not even the one I'm really mad at." Aloys continued with a humorless laugh, he suddenly looked towards the ground, his hair covering his face.

" The one I'm really mad at is you. You and I weren't really close when I was a kid, so we always fought. But I needed you to tell me you were proud of me! Just once! And when you did, it was because you knew you weren't going to come back! " Aloys shouted, lifting his head up, Gauche's eyes widened slightly. Aloys was crying.

" You…you waited until you went on a suicide mission to tell me that you were proud of me! Why couldn't you have told me that when I was little and needed to hear it huh?!" Aloys shouted again, his voice slightly cracking. Gauche just stood there and stared at him, it suddenly hit him that the two of them were not only alike in personalities, but in family experiences as well.

Gauche had lost both his parents at a young age and he was forced to take care of himself and Marie when they were both just small children, not only that, but he also couldn't recall his father ever saying he was proud of him before he died. The more he thought about it, the more he began to understand why he told Aloys those words before he left.

Because he didn't want his son to never hear those words from his father like Gauche did with his.

Gauche started to reach out a hand towards the crying teen, he wasn't really sure how to comfort him. Did he run up to him and give him a hug while apologizing for his future self? Or did he just stand there and let Aloys take all of his pent up anger and resentment out on him? He looked to see if Grey was there since maybe she would have some idea, but she must've still been lagging behind with Maelie.

'Screw it.' Gauche thought before walking over towards Aloys, right now he was going to treat the teen like he would if it were Marie or Grey in front of him. He stood in front of his 'son' and gently placed a hand on top of his head. Aloys's head shot up at the action.

" Just let it out kid, keeping all of that inside…it begins to twist you as a person. Don't keep it all to yourself for years and years, otherwise you'll end up like me." Gauche muttered softly as he patted the kids head again. " You'll end up angry and with serious trust issues. So just let it out."

Aloys couldn't help but feel more tears well up in his eyes at Gauche's words, as much as he didn't want to admit it his old man was right, it was better to get it all out now otherwise he might regret it later.

A few feet away, in the cover of the woods, stood Grey and Maelie. The two watched the exchange between them with a mixture of sadness yet hope. Maybe this could be the beginning of Gauche and Aloys having a better relationship in the future.