"Prelurésia—the land of ice and snow under the Evereeshas."

♣

Chapter Twenty-Eight  ♣  Dealing With Bullies

A day after her training session with Lady Seraphina, Valeriana was once again walking through the library to find some books she needed to study about. The lady knight would come for her in two hours, and although she was told to rest, she didn't feel like it was right sitting around doing nothing when she had to catch up with a lot of things. In order to ease the feeling of restlessness, she opted to study instead in order to lessen the work load piled over her table.

 "Demonology . . . demonology . . . aha! Here it is!"

As she strolled through the aisle of books trying to find the book she needed, she heard voices echo in a distance. She didn't want to interfere with whatever business they got, but she took notice of the familiarity. Valeriana couldn't resist but pay attention to what they were saying.

 "You became aides for that stinky human? Seriously?" A mocking tone reached her ears. Valeriana froze on the spot as she realized she was the one being talked about, and she might have a clue who it was being spoken to.

Hand still reaching towards the shelf for the book she was looking for, Valeriana paused and listened curiously. She knew that eavesdropping was wrong, but she couldn't help it.

"So what?" Replied the other. "We thought she's amazing! And she saved us! If you were there, you would've seen it! But you didn't! So what you gave you the right to judge?"

"She's a total fake! She probably cheated to beat Lady Courtney! Besides, there's Lord Corvan and Lord Rowe! They're much better than she is. Why did you pick her anyway?!"

This again? Valeriana thought tiredly, sighing dejectedly while she did.

She was already tired of being called a fake over and over again. Although unlike the last time regarding blabber-mouth Julian, she wouldn't easily lose her composure. She decided to tell herself that she would fix this situation smoothly without hurting anybody.

As much as she knew that interfering was not a good habit, this situation had a lot to do with her since the three were probably being bullied because they became her aides. She would probably die full of guilt if she just left them alone.

"Shut up! You don't have any right butting in on our business!" The other one replied again. Valeriana figured it must be Poulette.

"Poulette . . ." She heard a girl's voice whisper, as if trying to hold back the fight. "Please stop it. They're not worth it."

"Let me go, Quincy! I'll kill these guys like I have to!"

"And what are you going to do about it?" A male voice taunted. "Like I said, there's no way that human won without cheating!"

Tucking the book under her arms, she decided to walk out of her hiding place and reveal herself. "And who in the world made you the judge for that?" She asked, making her voice loud and clear.

She stole a glance at her aides. Poulette looked like he was going to kill someone while Quincy was desperately clinging to his arm. Zoel was shaking like a leaf, looking scared to the boot.

The four other kids, scared out of their wits, jumped at the sound of her voice. She stopped within a few steps away from their current position and crossed her arms over her chest, posing as threatening as she could. She tried imitating Corvan's ever scary expression when he was annoyed mixed with Brindon's usually impassive face. Being around the Twelve taught her to be somewhat reproaching.

The three looked happy to see her, but reacted differently when they saw the expression on her face.

"W-well . . ." The boy stammered. "Y-you . . . aren't . . . worth being one of the Twelve."

"That's why I'm asking you about who gave you the right to be a judge about that." She held a warning tone in her voice, adapting Charles's stern way of scolding somebody. "I will respect your opinion, but to force it to somebody else is unacceptable. That's very childish, especially for someone your age."

Valeriana was mentally applauding herself for managing to act this way. The confidence in her tone and how she managed not to stutter was something she simply had to be proud of. She fought back a grin.

"Everyone is entitled to their own ideas. But for you to say something as such without anything to base it from is a big mistake." She took a step forward tauntingly and couldn't help but notice how much she sounded like the fourth-ranker. "What evidence do you have that I actually cheated? Everything that I did in the arena was considered as a legitimate act—either to defend myself or to attack. I can swear on my life that I never did anything underhanded to make myself win. If I won, don't ever assume immediately that I cheated. My victory was thanks to my luck . . . so I hope that satisfies you."

"I-I-I . . . y-y-you . . ." The boy stammered.

"Also, these people have asked themselves to become my aides." She nodded towards Poulette, Quincy, and Zoel. Poulette puffed out his chest proudly while Zoel's shaking finally stopped. Quincy looked as if she was going to break down crying at any moment that it made the girl smile.

"I won't tolerate them being bullied because of me. If you have any more complains about me ascending to the position as fifth-ranker, take it up with me directly—then we'll see. Alright?" She finally ended her speech with a sickly sweet smile.

The boy growled loudly in frustration before running away, his friends following him out. "This isn't over! We'll get back at you someday!"

When they disappeared, Valeriana sighed and muttered, "I surely hope not."

She wasn't entirely sure if she would be able to act the way she did once more, but this would hopefully give peace to the three for a while.

Turning to them, she flashed a soft smile. "Are you guys alright?"

Quincy broke down crying like a child as Valeriana predicted and ran into her arms. It startled her for a moment but she instantaneously returned the gesture and smoothed the girl's hair comfortingly. Poulette was grinning proudly while a relieved smile was painted on Zoel's face.

"Listen you three." She told them, sighing. "My situation is sort of hard right now. Being a human as I am, I'm being discriminated from the rest of the other students. Now that you've become my aides, there's a chance that you're going to be treated like me as well. So in order to prevent this kind of occasions from being repeated, I think it's best if you—"

"No way!" Poulette said, cutting her off. "We decided to become your aides, so we're going to stick by that until the end! You saved our lives and it's going to be really shameless of us if we back out now."

Quincy pulled away and sniffed. "Poulette's right. Human or not . . . we wanted to learn from you so we decided to become your aides! I'm sorry . . . I just . . ." She sniffled.

Zoel stammered, "T-they're both right . . . I agree with them."

"Crybaby!" Poulette huffed. "I can't believe you still act that way when you are old!"

"I'm not old!" Quincy growled to him.

Valeriana chuckled. "About teaching you guys . . . I'm not entirely confident if I can teach you anything. I'm no good at Valemnia's ways and all . . ."

"No problem. Just teach us what you know! That's what we're after."

She sighed again. "Are you guys sure? I'm sure there are more of the other rankers who're willing to take you guys as their aides. They're way much better than I am."

"No way! We want you, Miss Valeriana!"

"Well . . . if you're really that persistent . . . how can I refuse?"

They all shared a smile.

"By the way, I've been wondering about it sometime now . . . but you guys are at my level, right?"

"Not exactly, Miss Valeriana." Quincy replied, rather shyly. "We're students from the preparatory level. We won't be in your level until about two or three years, depending on our performance."

"What? This school has a preparatory level?"

"It's for people like our age, Miss Valeriana. It's like an eye-opener for the real training that we're about to do—like a test run to see if we're able to handle the real thing. But we're allowed to partake in the school activities. We're just not allowed to become members of the Twelve until we step on our first year."

"Oh . . . how old are you guys?"

I am so gonna regret this.

"I'm turning twenty-eight!" Poulette stated. "Quincy and Zoel are too."

"I see . . ."

She trailed off, musing at the new information she just received. "Well, I'm off! Make sure to come to me if anyone bullies you again!" She then waved at them and started to walk away.

"If you need anything, Miss Valeriana, please don't hesitate to call for us!" Quincy told her.

"I'll keep that in mind."

It took a few moments to reach the door, but as soon as she got there, she received a piercing glare from Rinda which made her stop instantaneously on her tracks.

"Surely you like to bring trouble to my library, don't you?"

"Um . . . er . . . I'm really sorry about that, Miss Rinda. I couldn't help it. Anyhow, see you again soon!"

With that, she sped out of the room as fast as she could.

Incidentally, someone opened the door the same time she did. She ultimately collided with that someone, their heads clonking against one another. Valeriana felt dizzy at the impact and ended up falling on her rear end.

"Watch it!" Someone exclaimed, seeming familiar and annoyed.

Valeriana looked up to see Corvan glaring down at her. The other students backed away, not wanting to face the wrath of the first-ranker. The human girl frowned at the young lord and brought herself to her feet.

It was strange how they seemed to be frequently bumping into each other, and sometimes quite literally. Valeriana would always end up meeting him somewhere and they would end up fighting.

"You watch out! It's not my fault there's only one door!"

"Shut up, clumsy witch." He told her, knowing any more of his efforts upon telling her that he was sitting on a higher rank than her would all go to waste since she constantly refused to heed his words. The girl always seemed to have a good comeback. All her witty retaliations were hard to counter.

"Don't call me clumsy! You blind demon!"

"And don't call me blind either!" He retaliated. "Now, cut off this childish argument!"

"Hmph." She said, lowering from her yelling tone. "What are you doing here anyway? Came to take book for yourself?"

"That's right," he began with a deep, troubled sigh. "But since I bumped into you, I might as well tell you."

"What?"

He looked up at her with his seemingly snarky gaze. "Lady Seraphina came to the residences looking for you. It seems she finished earlier than expected and was hoping you could start training right away. She recalled telling you to rest although a certain someone thought otherwise. I never thought I'll find you here."

Valeriana's gaze softened at the mention of Lady Seraphina's name and Corvan found it annoying as to why she immediately turned cranky when she looked at him, but did the opposite at the mention of someone else's name.

"Lady Seraphina?" She thoughtfully muttered. "Oh, well, I'll be coming right away. She's in the dormitories, yeah?" Her voice this time held excitement and . . . how was he supposed to describe it? He didn't know. He wasn't familiar with that tone of voice.

He made a sound of annoyance escape his lips. "Go and don't keep Her Excellency waiting."

She looked up at him, her gaze twinkling. "Thank you, then."

He was shocked. He was hoping for something . . . harsh coming from her. "What happened to your attitude from earlier?"

"Well, you are still that arrogant, cocky, overconfident, brash, conceited, smug, haughty, egotistical, proud, supercilious, bigheaded, vain, pompous, pretentious, immodest, swollen-headed jerk Corvan I know, but that doesn't mean I can't thank you."

Corvan looked even more irritated with her statement. "What's with your vocabulary?"

"There's many more where that came from. Those words aren't enough to even describe your attitude."

 The young lord gritted his teeth. "Are you insulting me?"

"No, I'm not insulting you, in fact I'm praising you—not! Of course, I'm insulting you. What do you think I'm doing?" She remarked sarcastically. "Common sense, idiot!"

"Why you—"

"Yeah, yeah, sure whatever." She cut him off and waved a hand at him lazily.

Without even so much as looking back, she walked away.