Chapter 26

Chapter 26: Don’t fall into a love triangle, please! part

As soon as Helena said that the battle started. Both of them did their best to avoid showing their anger but at the same time glaring intensely at each other.

“Why do you say that? what makes you think you have the right to make that choice for him?”

“But Anne, you’ve been mean to him all this time, and I’ve always slept by his side, I’m accustomed now so...”

“It doesn’t matter who came first, Ryu and I slept together when we went to the cave!”

“YOU GUYS DID IT!?”

Helena’s words ignite Anne’s face filled with red leaving her almost out of combat. Now Helena is furious and she’s looking right into my eye.

“How could you do this to me Ryu? I thought we had something special”

.....

“But that’s not true! we didn’t do anything! we just slept on the cave floor, we had to sleep somewhere! Anne why did you make it sound dirty?”

“I-I didn’t intend to make it sound that way, but we were so close and I even let you...”

Anne’s cheeks are still bright red from the intense emotion and stops speaking, yet again causing Helena to misunderstand her.

“What are you doing now playing shy? you went behind my back and seduced Ryu! I told you I wanted to be with him”

“I didn’t do that! he came to me when he was tired”

“And you took advantage of him?”

“Girls please calm down!”

“Shut up Ryu! this doesn’t concern you at all, its between Anne and me!”

What have I done? I fell right into the wolf’s mouth! I knew this was a bad idea, I’m left speechless as they keep arguing about who’s right.

“You betrayed me Anne, I called dibs on him! I really thought we were friends!”

“But we are friends!”

“Friends don’t do this to each other!”

“Why are you acting like that? nothing really happened between Ryu and me, we just held hands a couple of times and I let him sleep on my chest! that’s all!”

“Wait, is that everything?”

“Yes!” we both say at the same time

“So... you really didn’t do it?”

This time I simply nod, to be honest Helena’s kind of scary right now. I never thought it was even possible for her to be this mad. It’s like she’s a whole different person.

*whew*

“Then there’s no problem... as long as you two keep your distance I won’t have an issue”

“Wait Helena, that’s not fair! I like him too, why do you get to make this call? shouldn’t he be the one to choose between us who he likes?”

I feel so ignored right now, they’re talking like I’m not even in the room.

“Isn’t that obvious? friends don’t get in between, when one of your friends calls dibs on a guy its reserved. It’s only natural that you keep your distance from him”

“why are you acting like a kid right now? Let’s just let him choose! what happens if he doesn’t even like you?”

“you can’t make a move anyways, because he’s reserved, or do you want to hurt your friend? you’re supposed to side with me on this!”

“I don’t know ok! I never had a boyfriend! I couldn’t even talk about boys with my friends back in our world”

Helena’s face freezes in shock as she sees Anne with a new set of eyes, Its a mix of pity and awe.

“You never had a boyfriend!? what about a first kiss?”

“stop asking me this questions in front of Ryu Helena!!! It’s embarrassing”

They both seem out of breath and I take it as my queue to go to the kitchen and fix something to eat. I take some seasoned meat out, it’s already been prepared so I just need to heat it. I could heat up each piece by separated, but I prefer to put it all in the oven at the same time. The fire is on and I just need to stoke it a little.

I hear them talking, but since there’s also a curtain at the entrance of the bedroom I can barely hear them. This place feels a lot bigger than the cabin. I guess this is because there’s only three people living in here now. There’s enough space to move around, at least Mochi seems to be loving its new home, but I don’t think I can stay in here after all. Not if I want to avoid a bloodbath.

“Dinner is served!”

I call the girls as I set a plate with some seasoned meat, bread cut into slices, some berries and three cups of tea. they both side on opposite directions, but don’t seem to be mad at each other anymore. Instead, they’re looking at me directly.

“Ryu, between the two of us, who do you choose as your girlfriend?”

“Why are you asking me this all of a sudden?”

“Because we need to get things clear from the start! or else we’ll keep on fighting until who knows when. geez!”

Helena seems dead set on making me choose, but the problem is I can’t really see a future where this won’t become a bigger problem. There’s no way to escape now though, and only by answering I may be able to get out of this one alive. Just like Ayumi said before, i need to man up.

“I can’t give you the answer you want, but let me finish please, I don’t want to choose either of you”

“what do you mean? you...”

“I said let me finish please! We’ve known each other for a short period and I’m still getting to know you. Who said I want a girlfriend right now? can we even afford to be talking about this?”

“But Ryu, now you know how both of us feel and I thought maybe you too felt something for one of us”

“If it’s too much trouble then I just have to stay away from the both of you, I’ll be asking Ayumi to switch places with me tomorrow and that’ll end this argument”

“You cant run from this Ryu, I’m not saying I agree with Helena’s approach but she’s right in one thing, we can’t remain the same. We’ve been fighting over little things lately and if we don’t find a solution things might escalate”

“And how is that my problem? If it’s because I’m your leader that’s the solution I came up with. But if you’re asking me on a personal level, then I’m not interested. Who said we had something going Helena? I’m not saying there was nothing, but why do I find about your feelings in this petty way? Could it be that you just wanted to beat Anne over this?”

“No way! that’s not it!”

“If you truly had feelings for me you should’ve talked to me long before it came up to this point. And Anne, I don’t think I owe you nothing, I’m sorry if I’m too honest here, but just a while ago you were spitting nasty comments at my back whenever i showed up. I’m not saying that feelings don’t matter, but it’s not a priority for me right now”

Now that I spoke my mind i actually feel a lot better, they both look guilty now and we start eating our dinner in silence. When it was time to go to sleep, I simply lied on my jackal fur on the opposite corner of them, leaving enough space to fit two more people in between us.

By the next morning everything was as awkward as it was last night, but it can’t be helped. They completely forgot the situation we’re in. After using my mana to light the fire the whole room was illuminated by the fireplace. Its morning already, I’m pretty sure since I wake up everyday at sunrise, but there’s something different today, its still dark.

At first I thought this was due to being in a different type of building, and I was pretty impressed that the sun didn’t breach in. But then I realized something that truly worried me, the door wasn’t opening. The door was made with wooden boards and a stone handle, it’s sturdy and a bit heavy but not heavy enough to be this difficult to open. It feels as if it was jammed.

I quickly go to the bedroom looking for help, Anne wakes up to the loud sound of my steps and she gets up as we speak in a soft voice to avoid waking up Helena.

“Whats the matter Ryu?”

“Anne, I think we’re trapped in here”

“That’s impossible!”

“But I can’t open the door!”

“Why didn’t you break it then?”

“what would be the purpose of a door if you need to break it to get out?”

“Oh”

As soon as we go to the entrance Anne opens the door in a single movement and I feel so ashamed of my weakness that I can’t even speak anymore. When the door was completely opened we were greeted with a completely different scenery than the day before. It looks like snow fell the whole night and it’s deep enough to almost reach Anne’s knee. By the worried look drawn in Anne’s face I see that I’m not the only one who understood what happened.

On the other cottage a shadow can be seen exiting through the door and waves its arm towards us, It must be Hiraku but we can’t see him at all. Only a blurry shade in the distance, that’s because it’s dark and its still snowing.

“Anne, wake up Helena... we need to get ready, I’ll go talk to Hiraku. Hey! Hiraku! can you hear me?”

He doesn’t respond so we walk closer to each other until we can finally hear each other clearly. Even if it wasn’t a great distance yesterday, today it felt like both buildings were really far from each other, even walking that small distance felt tiresome.

“Young Ryu I think we’re in trouble”

“You don’t say”

“Why are you so moody?”

“if it wasn’t for you I wouldn’t be on my current situation”

“what do you mean by that?”

While we were chatting, Anne and Helena started yelling at us so we came back at the girl’s cottage.

“What’s the matter?”

“Didn’t you guys notice? we started losing health points as soon as we got out”

“Hiraku, can you get back to your cabin?”

“That shouldn’t be a problem young Ryu, but why so soon?”

“Ask Ayumi to finish the water tanks for today, even if they are small... its better than nothing. Ask bob to divide our supplies and to deliver them to both cottages, if possible I’d also like him to bring me as many stones and imperial stones as he can. I can’t go out anymore and since I’ll be trapped in here I may as well do something useful”

The whole place was covered in snow, if it wasn’t for Bob’s incredible strength and endurance I’m not sure we would have made it in time, but by the end of the day we were stocked in everything we needed and Ayumi finished the stone water tanks for both cottages. Since Luke is both agile and lightweight he could climb into the roof to install the water tanks without a problem.

.....

The stone water tanks were designed to be attached to the chimney itself, by taking advantage of the heat produced by the fireplace it slowly melts the snow. there’s a pipe going down and it goes to both the bathroom and the kitchen, at the end of each pipe there’s a water tap.

Our cottage is so filled with food, firewood and stones that it looks like a dumpster, this seems to have affected Anne’s mood and now she’s as grumpy as she used to be when I first met her, but at least she’s not mad about our previous argument.

Now we’re at the kitchen waiting for the pipe to fill up, Helena’s so impatient to try the water tap that she stays close to it the whole time.

“Be patient Helena, it’ll eventually fill up but it’ll take time”

“But Ryu! we’ll have running water! you don’t know how much I need this!”

“It’s just water...”

Helena keeps stoking the fire even though it’s wasteful I just let her be, if we were to run out of firewood we still have a lot of charcoal... The fire stones!!!

“Girls, we’re in trouble... I asked Bob to split supplies evenly but I forgot about something”

“What, did you leave your man pants in the cabin or something?”

So... it turns out she’s still mad at me. Now, how do I tell them about the fire stones without them feeling betrayed.

“I think it’s better to just show you, also, I can still switch places with Ayumi”

Anne scoffs at me for ignoring her comment, I’m regretting staying in here already. I search for a charcoal basket and put my hand deep into it, after rummaging into it for a bit I finally find what I’m looking for.

“This is a small fire stone, I found them into the charcoal piles everytime I make charcoal...”

“It looks pretty! let me see!”

Says Helena with glowy eyes

“That’s the thing... these are dangerous and I’ve done my best to keep them hidden from everyone”

“why would you do that Ryu? don’t you trust us?”

“It’s not a trust issue, its a safety measure, if they make contact with fire the fire grows wildly... I’ve been meaning to tell Ayumi so that she can make some experiments, but now there won’t be a chance”

Anne places her hand in the forehead and looks down disappointed.

“Ryu, why would you put such a dangerous stone inside the charcoal baskets? what happens if the others use the charcoal in a basket and there’s a stone in there?”

“That’s precisely why I’m telling you, we need to find a way to tell the rest to avoid using them...”

“That won’t be possible and you know it, Even Bob had a hard time outside, none of us can go there so we’ll just have to trust that they won’t be as stupid as to put something they don’t know inside a chimney”

****

Two weeks have passed after the snowstorm hit the settlement and they can finally get out of their shelters. Bob is the first to go out and a beautiful landscape greeted him, trees were dressed in white and the sun reflects on every surface giving birth to the most shiny day he has ever seen.

Everyone is in top condition, they had running water, food, shelter, a fire, every need was covered but they still missed the outside. It was hard on everyone to stay inside for so long, even though their bodies were fine their mind was a different subject.

Without much to do inside and being unable to even open their door, they craved some fresh air more than anything.

One by one everyone goes outside being Ryu the last one, he looked really tired and had bags under his eyes. It didn’t go unnoticed and Bob couldn’t help but joke about it.

“What’s the matter Ryu, was it that hard to keep up with two beauties at the same time?”

Ryu didn’t answer, he looked and acted like a different person.

Ayumi was about to barge in but decided otherwise, even she felt pity for Ryu’s condition, he seemed so gloomy that even she could tell that he needed his space. Only after he went to the lake she asked Anne.

“What did you girls do to him?”

“Come on darling, don’t be so nosy... I’m a bit jealous though”

“Well, you shouldn’t he’s been... busy”

“Hahaha! I knew it! you dirty girls! At least you solved the issue”

“That’s not it Helena, read the room!”

“what are you talking about Helena, we’re outside”

“You know what I mean, he’s been worried sick about you guys... its about the fire stones, he thought all this time that you guys may use them by mistake and end up burning down your place to the ground”

“you mean this things?”

Ayumi said while showing Helena a small red stone in the palm of her head.

“yes! so you did found them after all”

“yeah, Bob wanted to throw one in the chimney and see what happened but I stopped him”

“So Ryu was right after all... We’ve been telling him all this time that you couldn’t possibly be so stupid as to do something like that”

Anne said

“What can I say, they would have been lost if it wasn’t for me. anyways, that can’t be it, he seems really tired”

“I don’t know anything about that”

Anne replied trying to keep her usual poker face, but failed miserably.

*****

“What the hell is wrong with them!?”

I can’t avoid talking to myself. Ever since I politely declined being anyone’s boyfriend things started to go downside, and being trapped with them in the snowstorm was actually the worst that could have happened. If I knew from before how things would turn up I wouldn’t have agreed to switch places in the first place.

I thought that they were mature enough to accept my decision and everything was fine. It all started a couple days after we were forced to shut in... small “accidents” started to happen and I didn’t think much of it. I would ask if someone was in the bathroom and after waiting for a bit with no reply, i would get inside only to find Anne washing herself up. Other times, small bumps into each other when I was cooking with Helena.

They seemed to notice what the other one was doing and it was like a competition. Everything escalated up to the point that the last days were pure hell, they would even sleep naked!

I can’t take this anymore!