The sky had turned into a promising orange-red hue. The bruised fruit color that appears right before nighttime.
Yunho looked at the man in front of him. He could feel an undercurrent of another meaning in his words.
Yunho eventually steeled his heart and formed his response.
"I'm sorry, but I..."
---
The training field was buzzing with people. Word of the game night seemed to have gotten around because there were a lot of people.
Not quite all of the base, but a fair quarter, Yunho guessed.
Yunho looked around for a familiar face, but he couldn't recognize anyone.
The game night attendees looked mostly to be soldiers and knights-in-training. It was to be expected, but Yunho felt a bit awkward.
Then, suddenly, he heard footsteps running up behind him.
—
"Iris! You made it."
Drelle was running towards him, waving.
Yunho waved back but glanced behind Drelle.
The man seemed to be leaving from a group of people who were now looking in his direction.
Drelle reached Yunho and grabbed his hand.
The action surprised Yunho, but he'd slowly come to expect sudden contact from Drelle.
"Maybe his family is really close… Some of the other kids at the hospital were the same way. Like personal space wasn't in their dictionaries," Yunho thought. He didn't really mind it, though. In fact, it was a little fun to be treated this closely.
"None of the other canteen workers could make it, so it's just you and me today!" Drelle said.
Yunho's eyebrows furrowed. It wasn't that he had any issue with hanging out with Drelle, but being at an event and only knowing one person felt awkward to him.
"Ah, I don't mean it's really only you and me. There are too many people for that to be the case." Dorian paused before continuing.
"You see that group over there? Those are some of my training friends and a few other guys, and we were planning on playing cards. It'll be even more fun with one more player," Drelle proposed, pointing at the group of people behind him. They were still staring, compelling Yunho to look away.
"That sounds interesting. I'll join," Yunho answered.
Drelle nodded and began leading Yunho to the group.
If he was being truthful, Yunho did not want to go. It felt weird to be shoehorned into this group without knowing anyone.
But after seeing Drelle's excited face, Yunho felt like he had already come too far to back out and decided to be untruthful.
Dishonesty always seemed to do him more good anyway.
Once they were close enough to the group of people, Drelle called out to them, "My friend can join, right? He's the person I was talking about when I said I was waiting for someone earlier."
Everyone nodded, but Yunho could see some of them exchanging glances.
Iris was a noble, and though many of the high-ranking military officers and knights were also of noble birth, it wasn't like Iris had a background related to any of that. The majority of the people on the base didn't even know why he was there in the first place.
Yunho mentally sighed.
"I'm not a temple worker, a soldier, or an official staff member... I look like I just came to the base for fun," he thought. "But it's not like I can just say that I'm the Duke's strategist."
On the surface, he had no qualifications. Not only could saying he was the strategist make him even more of a target for the spy, but it could cause additional drama if the Duke's commanders, who are supposed to be his official strategists, knew that they were being sidelined in favor of an unqualified young master.
"There'd probably be rumors that I'm pulling strings...like seducing him or something..." Yunho thought, his mind slowing on the second part of the sentence. It felt like his brain kept going to those places lately.
Him and the Grand Duke... Together.
"Maybe I really am sick," Yunho muttered, shaking the thought away.
"Huh, are you not feeling well?" A voice beside him said.
Yunho's eyes widened. He hadn't even realized that he said that sentence aloud.
"Ah, no, I've just been standing for too long. My legs feel a bit weak."
Drelle chuckled and nodded.
"Yeah, we're planning on sitting over there and beginning our game. I was a bit worried because you weren't responding when I was asking you what card game you like best."
"Oh, sorry. My mind was... elsewhere."
Drelle nodded again, but his eyes narrowed.
Yunho had seen that face before, but he could never quite decode the expression. There was always something about it that he couldn't quite place. Despite Drelle being kind, Yunho felt like he was a bit of an enigma.
Not quite there. Not quite here. Sweet yet hard to place, like mystery-flavor candy.
Before Yunho could get swept up by that train of thought, everyone was moving to the spot to play. After sitting down, the cards were dealt out. Yunho wasn't familiar with it, but from what he could immediately gather, this game was a partner game. Drelle was about to take the spot of Yunho's partner when another guy in the group pulled Drelle over to his side.
Yunho looked around.
"Is no one my partner? I'm pretty sure there was an even number of people?"
But just as he thought this, he felt someone walk to his side. He could catch the fiery color of their hair in his periphery.
"Want to be partners?" The person asked.
Another voice called out from within the circle of people.
"Beyr? You're always partners with Quince, though?"
Beyr looked at the person who said that.
"That doesn't matter. Quince can pair up with someone else."
The person chuckled at this and shook the shoulder of the brown-haired man to his side.
"Aw, poor Quincey has been abandoned. Don't worry, I can be your partner."
Yunho could see Beyr getting ready to say something when the game leader asked everyone to settle down so they could finish distributing cards. All the conversations and bickering came to a lull, and the game finally began.
It was a relatively simple game wherein, in their pair, they had to work together to gather combinations of cards and sabotage other teams, but Yunho had some trouble getting over the learning curve.
The game had assigned trap cards that could be used to punish other groups, but the large deck they were playing with made it hard to keep track of things.
But once Yunho got the hang of it, He and Beyr managed to win one round. Beyr reached over to give him a high-five with a smile on his face. Yunho met his hand with similar excitement.
"Looks like Beyr and Yunho won this round! That makes three rounds so far. Anyone want to take a break?" The game leader announced.
"Yeah, I'm feeling game fatigue already." The dirty blonde from before answered. He yawned and turned to Drelle. "Hey, where's the stuff you said you were bringing earlier? The thing Mr. Jon gave you?"
Yunho perked up at the mention of Mr. Jon.
Drelle made an "oh" sound and got up.
"Let me get it. I left it in a bag near the training sword storage room." Drelle said before leaving.
Yunho could see Beyr quirk up an eyebrow.
"What is he getting? I didn't hear him mention anything."
The man with dirty-blonde hair shook his head and placed a finger to his smiling mouth.
"It's a surprise!"
Beyr didn't seem impressed by the non-answer but let it go.
It didn't take long for Drelle to come back. He was holding a sack in his hand and quickly opened it, slowly pulling out a corked jug from inside.
"Mr. Jon's been practicing his alcohol brewing skills, and he let me take one of his test batches."
The group cheered, and everyone got up to surround Drelle.
Yunho stayed behind. He still had to see the Duke later tonight; for that, it would be best if he were in his right mind. Not like he seemed to ever be in his right mind lately.
But from the corner of his eye, Yunho saw that his partner, Beyr, had also not moved, either.
"Ah, you don't have to wait for me. I just don't want to drink," Yunho said.
Beyr waved his hand.
"Oh, no, I'm not waiting. I don't react well to alcohol." The redhead replied.
Yunho's cheeks heated up with embarrassment.
"Why did I assume he was waiting on me?"
Yunho was about to apologize when he noticed that Beyr seemed to be staring at something. He followed his line of sight and ended up at... The brown-haired man Yunho had learned was named Quince.
Beyr turned around and started walking away, motioning Yunho to follow.
"They'll probably be busy with that for a while. Let's just go for now."
Yunho agreed. Though the game leader had proposed a quick break, now that drinks were involved, there was a high chance that the game was going to be forgotten about.
Well, at least, it would end on their win.
Yunho followed Beyr. Walking side-by-side, Yunho could see that Beyr was shorter than him by about a pinky's length. Though he'd never say it aloud, that did give him a small ego boost. Yunho wasn't short, but especially in this world, he seemed shorter than most men.
The Grand Duke, the Crown Prince, Drelle, and even the old Mr. Rizer were all taller than him!
Novel characters really did follow unrealistic standards...
"Hey, Author, can you spare me some extra inches too?" Yunho asked, directing his plea towards the sky. As if a hand would descend from the clouds and elongate his legs.
"Did you hear me?" A voice cut through Yunho's thoughts.
Beyr was staring right at him.
Maybe instead of longer legs, Yunho needed a longer attention span.
---
End of Chapter 41