*Knock* *Knock* *Knock*

The sound of the high elf's futile attempts to contact Bell echoed in the corridor, yet he did not respond. He never was a rebellious child, even helping to calm Ais, but now she wasn't sure anymore.

"Bell, Can you open the door please, we need to talk about today..."

"...Yeah?..." She heard faintly from the door.

"I'm sorry... I should have listened to your side of the story first... But I may not know everything, Could you tell me your side please...?"

The door opened, revealling the white haired boy, his naturally red eyes a little more red than before. He guided the stunned elf to the bed and sat there before explaining to the high level adventurer:

"...I've been training with Ais... I could fight back and there wasn't any danger... So why can't I fight?" There was pain in his voice, one that didn't go unnoticed by Riveria.

"Bell... You know we can't afford you getting hurt, even with a falna you could take months to heal from a serious accident that potions could fix, why do you still insist?"

"...I...I... Want to be a strong adventurer! A hero!"

"But why?" She asked in a gentle voice.

"..." Silence, He wanted to speak but could not. She sensed his trouble but decided that letting him confront his insecurities if he truly wished to speak about it would be better.

"...I don't want you to leave me too!..."

It broke her seeing him that vulnerable, that desperate, and sad. How could she had forgotten... sometimes she cursed his behaviour of hiding important things and bottling emotions, that must have eaten him alive.

Why was it that Alfia had left him... The idiotic reason of their sacrifice... 'To help raise the next generation.' What hypocrites. She thought to herself, Perhaps this might be a step too far but I cannot deny this boy at least a mother figure... Haaaaa damn it Loki you were right...

"Bell?" She said, wrapping her arms around the child, "I won't leave you... I will be here for you no matter what happens."

"..."

He returned the embrace, saying nothing, but wishing in his head that this moment may never end, a silent but comforting warmth, one that Bell would never trade for anything in his life.

"Bell, I want you to have a family, a real one this time..."

Small tear could be heard falling down his face as he hugged her tighter.

"...If you wish, I can help you become an adventurer... Only if you still wish to, of course."

"I'd like that... I don't want to be a burden... And... I wish to be at your side... when future expeditions come!" His resolve seemed to burn bright like the beacon a certain silver haired goddess knew he would become.

"Then we will work on your magic knowledge."

"Will we start today or-"

"No! We will go somewhere, we can do it tomorrow."

"W-where?"

"The hostess of fertility. Today we have something to celebrate."

"Okay then... Can we bring Ais too?"

"Of course."

They stayed there for a while longer, though both eventually let go, having duties to fullfil and other people to talk to.

Bell left the room in search of Ais. He wandered around the training grounds only to find her beat up and exhausted, sitting on a bench by a weapon rack.

"How was it with the witch?"

"...It was great."

"...What!?" She answered surprised.

"We taked... And... I'm so happy..."

"Happy for what?!" She said, completely baffled by the boy.

"... J-Just happy! Also Ais... Me and Riveria are going out to eat later, want to go too?"

"Hmmm... I'd like that."

"Then let's go, it's almost time, and I have to get up early tomorrow!"

"Why?"

"I will finally begin actual training, as a real adventurer this time!"

Ais' eyes sparkled at the possibilities.

"So you are coming with us in expeditions?"

The girl's excitement however was quickly shot down.

"I'm afraid not, I will have to wait untill the next recruits enter the familia."

"Why!?" She was angry now. "You have worked so hard!"

"That I cannot change... I have to take special precautions... and I have to learn more about magic to control my spell, besides, not everyone start as early as you."

Ais had no argument against that, besides... How long would she even have to wait before he was able to join her in the dungeon... It couldn't be much... Right?

.

.

.

Time had passed since that day... A long time...

By the first rays of dawn she was already awake, it was the big day, the day she had worked so hard for, the day she would join the world's strongest familia! And if that wasn't enough, the one and only Lady Riveria was there too! She would fight alongside royalty! The dream of any elf EVER!

She was already wearing her dress, she had already gotten her things and now the only remaining challenge was calming her heart and getting to the Twilight Manor.

She left her old room at the dormitory, giving a last goodbye to her teachers and former colleagues.

The young elf got on a carriage that would take her to the other side of the vast city she lived in.

The trip was enjoyable, the driver had quite the experience working with the education district.

"So young lady, the Loki familia huh? Had to get pretty high grades to land such a familia."

"Yes... I still can't believe!"

"That is a great achievement. You know my son once studied right where you did, though he had a passion for plants so he went to work with the Demeter familia."

"Oh is thay so?"

"Very much! he brings vegetables when he visits now, greatest cabbages I've ever eaten."

"Wow!"

"So, can I expect great things from you miss...?"

"Viridis, Lefiya Viridis."

"Well then, I hope to hear your name on the news someday! By the way, we have arrived."

"Thank you sir!" She said as she left the carriage, now passing by the gates of the mansion being greeted by the guards.

"Excuse me Miss, I need to see your letter of acceptance before letting you pass."

"Of course." she took it out of her bag and showed it to guard.

"Welcome to the familia then Miss Viridis."

"Thank you!" She said as she hurried along, though a few other recruits were already inside and getting to meet their superiors, she arrived really early.

The hall was divided in three sectors, Supporters, who were headed by Finn, normal adventurers led by Gareth and of course magic users who were under Riveria.

She found her idol talking to what seemed like another recruit, his eyes were red like ruby and hair like fresh snow.

She was a bit shocked to see how close the two were, as were the few other nearby elfs, but she ignored it for now.

She walked forward and to her surprise was greeted by the famous elven princess that she always heard about.

"Ah, welcome, you must be Lefiya Viridis right? I've heard about you, a promissing young lady."

"L-Lady Riveria! It's an honor to meet you!"

She said it all in elvish of course, as was proper protocol.

The other recruit just barely stiffled a laugh, and counted.

"That is the third time today."

"Ahh, Miss Viridis, please, no need to use elven protocol. In fact, I especially request that you don't."

"But Lady-"

"That is an order, your first in the familia, but either way, we have a lot to talk about." She then looked at the white haired boy. "And you should be drinking another mana potion young man, your time is running out!"

"S-Sorry, I'll be back soon..." He said before disappearing into a doorway.

"Well then, Miss Viridis, I do look foward to see the capabilities of a class top scorer."

"Y-You w-won't be dis-sappointed Lady R-Riveria!"

"Then you should be meeting your new colleagues, a good morale is important in such large a familia, we will give tours of the manor later, right before Loki give you all a falna."

"Alright Lady Riveria!"

Well... It's like that every single time new recruits enter the familia... but it never gets less annoying... at least they seem promissing... I wonder how Bell will get along with them considering they are on the same generation of adventurers...

Thinking of her own son finally being allowed on expeditions was hard, he entered the dungeon before, mainly on a few test runs to see how well he could maintain Eden's veil, and he did good being able to keep ot for five hours without any mana potions or rests.

Bell was a special case, and she really hoped that he would not be singled out for this.

.

By the time that the familia had finished tours and new recruits were already in line to receive a falna, she saw how misterious the young man was, he seemed to know everyone there and was good friends with not only both of Loki's famous amazon twins but the sword princess herself, Ais Wallenstein, in fact, instead of getting in the line, he simply stood there, chatting with Tiona Hyrute.

I have to learn more about him...

She thought to herself.

.

.

.

Few weeks had passed

She was a bit shocked, training was separated by magic users, supports and vanguards/tanks, She was shocked to learn that the boy was a hybrid magic user and vanguard, since he was a human and just her age, yet even more surprising was learning that he was the adopted son of THE princess Riveria.

The new elven recruits around the familia were furious. More tham once had one of them tried to pick a fight with him, or show their superiority, which led the group of recruits to their situation, while training was supposed to be just friendly spars in order to increase agility and dexterity between mages and supporters, who would need to be able to dodge monster's attacks and vanguards, who need to learn how to hit mobile targets, it quickly devolved into a brawl whenever Bell was supposed to fight.

Bell, as she later learn his name, was assigned as a Vanguard for this particular experiment, since he had only one spell that did not need any chanting.

As Raul and Anakitty took out names from an urn full of papers with new recruits, Lefiya discovered that she would have to carry her elven colleagues hopes and dreams to finally put Bell Cranell in his place.

"You can do this Lefiya!"

"Yeah, humiliate that brat!"

"Okay, I can do this!" She said to herself, sure, she didn't like the boy, but she still feared the anger of Alicia, who once exploded on them for not giving Bell a chance:

"How cruel can you be? As if you were any better than him, to disrespect the wishes of your own princess just because you view her on a pedestal!"

It was on the tours around the manor, where one particularly foul mouthed recruit had asked her how did she tolerated him 'Corrupting' their princess.

Both of them entered the small circle arena.

"Good luck Miss Viridis." He said with while grabbing a dull training sword.

"Well... Good luck to you too..." She reluctantly said.

"Well then, in 3.. 2.. 1.. go!" Raul shouted, starting the match.

Lefiya jumped back, sure she had good grades on magical theory, history of the mortal realm, common chanting and even basic science, but she was not the most phsically fit person out there, luckilly for her, Bell was not either, though he knew exactly how to overcome his poor health.

The sword went on to shine it's dull silver glint in the shape of crescent, the arc was quick but she was already away, then came another slash, this one was faster and more precise.

She narrowly dodged it too, then a his expression shifted, his eyes seemed to focus and peer into her very soul.

His shift in stance was notable, as was the next thrust.

It was a quick piercing attack that only stopped when the tip of the touched her throat.

"Hmmm... Good match, You have great instincts Miss Viridis just needs more time to train."

It looked almost too horrifying to be true, it was an utter humiliation, yet he was not prideful or rude about it, he covered his hand with a plain white handkerchief, a sign of respect in elven custom, and helped her get up from the ground.

"...T-Thank you..."

He was about to put away the piece of cloth when she felt a small discharge of magic, like a spell being undone.

*Cough* *Cough* *Cough*

Red liquid stained the white cloth, yet he quickly put it back on his pocket, stopping Anakitty who went to help.

"...I'm alright..." He said, catching his breath. "I've just used too much magic before actual training..."

Lefiya's curiosity spiked, why was the seemingly normal teen coughing like a disease ridden soon-to-be corpse? How did he spent his magic already if he had good mind reserves?

Questions that lefiya would need to finally answer...

.

.

.

Bell had returned to his room once his magic had ran out, only to grab a minor mana potion and drink it, restoring his capacity for another hour or two, then he bolted down the stairs to return to training.

After that ended, Anakitty and Raul would announce that they were indeed having an expedition, and that the lower levelled adventurers would come to serve as supporters untill floor 18, where they would rest for a while and part ways from the expedition as one group, this was a common practice in Loki familia, to give the new blood a taste of what's to come in the future, should they rise up the ranks.

The recruits were chatting as they went back to the manor, where dinner was waiting, though Lefiya had other plans, seeing how the boy had slipped by and sat on a bench.

Then, another surprise that shocked her was the golden haired girl that appeared there.

"Bell! I'm sorry, I shouldn't have dragged you off to spar so early in the morning..."

"It's nothing, We have been training since we were kids... And it's about time I become stronger."

"But still ! You are-"

"Don't speak that, I am not hurt neither need any help, and if I do need any assistance, it's not about my disease, I am asking this Ais. Will you help me overcome this? My status has been decreasing ever since I received my falna, I can't be left in the dust, not now that I have the chance to pursue this dream!"

It was a simple yet unwavering resolve that made Ais realise how much the boy truly yearned for this chance.

Bell perhaps never said it, never truly showed such determination, but he wouldn't let Ais belittle herself over nothing.

In a way, he did more to assure himself than Ais, knowing that she would see through his attempt. What he did not know, however, was the spark he ended up lighting in his heart.

Though Lefiya had left after the words disease, she wasn't sure about whether or not she should eavesdrop their conversation.

That did however paint a small picture of their misterious colleague's past, one that many people knew little about, sure the fact that he had some sort of health condition was no secret, yet how severe it was, that was no common knowledge.

After that small talk though, both went back to the manor, where Bell was greeted by an excited Tiona.

"Argo! Look at this!" She shouted while waving a small advertisement in her hand.

The scene was nothing out of the ordinary, while they both were very close, thanks to their shared passion for heroic and old tales.

He took a look at the paper, It was about a new book collection.

"Ooh... Hard covers..."

"...Professional Ilustrations!"

"..Tiona, are you free the day after tommorow?"

"Eh?!"

"If you have free time of course, I need those books."

"W-well... since you asked nicely... I'd love to go with you then."

"Okay then, I would ask you to go earlier but tomorrow I'm going in the dungeon."

"The dungeon? But the lower members' expedition is next week."

"I wish to go on my own, I will not stand idle while you are all getting stronger."

"Oho, then we will spar when we get back!"

"Okay then, it's a deal."

.

.

.

Damp air, moist stone walls, the sense of dread that litters the place... this is definitively the dungeon, more precisely the first floor.

Bell walked around the corridors untill finding his first prey of the : a simple goblin.

But the young adventurer had a purpose, or more importantly, a test, to complete.

"Eden's Veil!"

He disenchanted himself, and felt the weakness of his sickly body, yet a thrilling sense of adventure.

A sword was raised in the air, the brought down on the goblin, whose magic stone was hit.

Weird... It seemed too powerful...

He would not mind it though, as long as it made him a step closer to the goal of standing among the great adventurers he'd come to love as family.

Then the nexts few steps were interrupted by another and another, who would all meet the same felt, Bell felt a bit tired, more so than he would be were he to fight with eden's veil on, yet the attacks seemed too strong for his actually negative status.

He would then reactivate his magic, and proceed to the next floors, where the test would resume and the results would again repeat. It was the same until the fifth floor.

A kobold narrowly slashed his chest, it's claw slid across the armor he got from his familia's storage.

The boy anticipated it's movements, though he still had to use his armor as a crutch for his speed. The sword he used then went straight into the hands of the beast, pinning it against the dungeon's soft stone walls.

Bell then ducked under another slash, only to grab a knife he used for carving out stones from his belt and stab the creature between it's legs, the adventurer took advantage of the opening and freed his sword from the creatures body, only to cleanly cleave it's head off his body.

Of course after the battle he got to work on the corpses, carving out stones and gathering drop items...

W-Wait a minute! One, two, three, four... Nine goblin claws! And look at the other pile of kobold teeth... I need to look into this...

He decided to go back, seeing as he had spent most of his time with his magic off, he had enough mind to use it again and bolt to the exit.

Deciding to exchange his items at the guild, he found a rather familiar face once again working at the exchange.

"Hello Miss Eina."

A half-elf, whose mother, Aina, was considered a sister to Riveria, In fact she even joked that her daughter now had a cousin.

"Oh Bell, came to say hi? Or are you taking care of Loki's paperwork?"

"No, no. Just left the dungeon."

"A-alone?!"

"Yes."

"A-alright..."

'Never judge someone, or treat them differently, for a condition they cannot change. Remember this Eina.' It was something that her own mother had said once, though she meant no offense to Bell, on the contrary, she was just worried.

"Eina, relax, I am careful enough to take proper precautions."

"I know is just..."

"Again, there is no need to worry, besides, Miss Eina, I wanted to ask you, what is the normal number of drop items for an adventurer on level 5?"

"Hmmmm probably 3 or 4 goblin claws... maybe one kobold tooth. Why?"

He then took all the loot items to the exchange tray, shocking Eina.

"And they say a rabbit's foot brings luck huh..."

"Please don't say that..." He managed whisper, afraid that the nickname could somehow catch on.

"Okay then, your total comes tu around 24.000 valis."

"Thank Miss Eina, though I believe I should get going."

"Goodbye then. Say hi to Lady Riveria for me."

"I will."

As he went away, a pink haired girl wearing the same uniform as the half-elf appeared, her face spoke of mischief and perhaps of too much time spent having to compensate for late forms and paperwork.

"Oh, your little brother was here?"

"We are bot related Misha."

"Pfttt, you are no fun!"

.

.

.


That is it folks, a chapter that sets up the ACTUAL ship of the fic, the rare BellxTiona, though that date might take a while before you are able to read it...