His cold gaze gone, Touya continued the story, "We go to the last floor. I was in front a little. Suddenly 4 slimes appeared and started to change their form. Soon I realized that the form those slimes were taking was a little familiar."

A muffled yelp escaped from Linze's mouth. She quickly hid her face. After a few seconds of staring at her, all eyes went back to Touya.

"The slimes were taking the forms of the four girls. A moment later I felt a dull hit in the back of my neck. I woke up hours later lying in the meadow. The tower from the quest was on fire, the four girls watching the flames in satisfaction."

The queen Yuel glanced at the girls. Their red cheeks, trying to hide their faces told her everything.

"Touya, I'm sure you can understand that the girls didn't mean to…"

"I understand well enough. This was no accident. Do you see any of them apologizing for this 'accident'? Right now they are thinking if they beat me up hard enough that maybe I'll forget what happened."

The queen was at a loss for words. To try and show Touya that the girls weren't thinking that, she looked at the them.

"Hmph." was all that Yumina responded with while the three others didn't want to look the queen in the eyes.

"You see? Not only did they betray me, they aren't sorry and they want to beat me up again. And all that when I did absolutely nothing wrong."

Yumina and Elze had enough. They felt that they suffered much more than Touya since he wasn't the one that was exposed shamefully. A small hit that didn't even hurt much wasn't a big deal.

"What were we supposed to do?! Let you watch that shameful act?!"

"It was just a small, hit. Hit me back, I won't resist." As the one that hit him, Elze turned her back to Touya and parted her hair, showing the back of her neck.

Following their example, Linze stepped forward. "I'm sorry Touya. I didn't think you would feel that way."

Touya raised his hand to stop them talking.

"All right. I'll tell you what I would have expected from a girl to do in that situation. Any normal girl would jump in front of me and try to block the view with her body. Or cover my eyes with her hands or divert my attention so I look way."

The three girls that rushed towards him felt a sharp pain in their hearts. Touya didn't consider them normal.

"I didn't attack you. I wanted to cover your eyes."

The three that weren't normal, saw hope in Linze. The one didn't move when the incident happened. The innocent one, the savior.

"Let me tell you a little story. Ten people come to a village. You Linze are one of them. The other nine start to slaughter people left and right not showing mercy to anybody, even kids. You are alone, you can't stop them. They won't listen to you even if you try. You don't do anything, you just watch. Are you a good person or a bad person?"

The king and queen understood the story.

"I'm a good person. I didn't do anything wrong, I didn't kill anybody."

"All it takes for evil to thrive is for good people to do nothing."

Until now Linze was standing. Hearing what Touya said last, comparing her to evil people who slaughter kids, her legs buckled and she dropped down on the sofa.

Their savior no longer able to fight, the girls admitted defeat.

"Touya, we're sorry for doing that." All four expressed their sincere apology.

"I could accept that when I first woke up but you all pretended like betraying me wasn't a big deal, like it's nothing. What will you do next time something happens? Gouge my eyes out? Beat me so badly that I'll take months to recover and possibly lose my memory? How can I trust you after this?"

Touya sighed and leaned back in his chair.

"This is why I can't stay here. I help the kingdom and the princess betrays me. As a princess your actions have consequences far more reaching than the other three. I considered you my companions and friends but you don't care about me or my feelings at all. You only care when it suits you."

Feeling like she will lose him for good, Yumina couldn't take it anymore. Tears streaming down her face, she keeled in front of Touya.

"Please don't leave me. I'm sorry for what I did."

The other three followed suit. The king and the queen couldn't believe their eyes. Yumina was always proud of herself with good reason. She was young but already accomplished a lot. Very few were a match for her cleverness. Now she threw away her pride and kneeled.

"Get up. I'm not a God for you to kneel before me. Besides, I don't want words, I want actions. I want you to show me that you regret what you did."

Yumina stood up first. "What do you mean?"