As I walked up behind him, he didn''t move. Not even an inch. He must''ve been expecting me, otherwise he would be halfway across the forest by this point. He probably knows that if he runs away I''ll just let him take whatever trip he wants.


    If this is really some play for affection, is it, why-


    I''ve been up for too long. I can barely walk towards him without tripping over myself. I''m going to have to pretend to care about his whining about how bad his life is repeatedly beating me up at every chance and how I''m the problem.


    I''m going to have to pretend to care. I wonder what the odds are that the teacher will just kill me if I don''t bring him back with me. How long can he really go without running back to the house and lying down in his bed fit for some noble?


    I mean I do sometimes say that he can run off to some other house but we''re a large distance away from any city, any village, even a tiny town. I don''t even know if there are any military outposts near where we are.


    I inched behind him trying my hardest not to fall over, using my sword as some sort of cane. Even that didn''t help much, and I still tripped over roots and uneven dirt as I walked past the trees surrounding me. If he wasn''t sitting right there I would just cut them down.


    I might just cut them down now, he isn''t injured. I don''t think he wants to die, he just wants someone to hug him while he laments about how the world sucks and how everything "bad" that has happened to him could never be his own fault.


    When I finally found my way in front of him I was leaning on my sword that was dug into the ground with both of my hands, I could barely keep my head upright so I could see his face.


    His eyes were swollen, of the parts that I could actually see they were painted light red with dark red branches sticking out from the sides. His clothes were roughed up, torn around the elbows and knees but he didn''t have any injuries. He was just sitting there hugging his knees to his chest looking right back up at me.


    What should I say? I''d rather slice my head off cleanly right in front of him than act sentimental and start tearing up. I''m pretty sure faking being sad and actually caring about whatever predicament he''s put himself in is worse than just being honest about my apathy.


    Does that mean that I should fake being sad? I''m not sure he''s currently sane enough to get that I''d be screwing with him, so then he just thinks that I actually care and I still don''t win.


    What should my first line be? I''m going to spare the effort of faking tears so he''ll just have to deal with the fact that I don''t care in the least bit about his temper tantrum.


    "Come on, let''s go."


    He looked a bit surprised. What a bummer, he must''ve actually expected that I would play along with him and talk about how I will do something better. Did he want me to apologize? That would be too far, I know that he probably told the teacher that he wanted me to trek all the way out here and "save" him.


    "Saving" him doesn''t sound right, this is more like forcing me to help someone who doesn''t need any help.


    "No."


    Well, that seems about right. Thinking that he would just let me show up and then agree to end this whole affair was dumb, so that''s my fault. It''s going to be hard to hide the fact that I''m annoyed, so I''m better off just saying the truth instead of not speaking at all. He can clearly tell that I''m glaring at him because he started to shift around a bit.


    "What''s it gonna take? Do you want me to get on my knees and grovel? Maybe you want me to go find some fruit so you can indulge while I break my back spoiling an already-spoiled toddler."


    He didn''t respond. So this is how he''s going to play it. I knew he was a child but I didn''t think he would abandon all of his dignity and give me the silent treatment. He was glaring back at me. I could barely tell through his swollen eyes but I saw the slightest bit of anger in his expression.Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    Un-be-lievable. I don''t know where he got this from. Usually, he didn''t have to act defiant because he would always win against me whenever I would insult him or tell him no. It''s kind of funny. If I weren''t breaking my back and driving myself insane just to get him home maybe I''d be a little bit happy that he''s finally acting in a way that doesn''t scream obnoxious.


    Unfortunately, being petty right now is not something that I can appreciate while I''m about to fall to the ground right with him.


    If he''s like this, then he isn''t prepared to do any sort of fighting. He probably wouldn''t expect it if I got angry, if I started screaming at him. Alright. Let''s try it.


    "You''re unbearable. Do you know that? Every day I''m here you beat me relentlessly, and then just walk away like you''re some master swordsman teaching me a lesson. Every day you lecture me, you tell me why I''m wrong, you berate me for not being able to beat you, and now, what, you think that if you run away that I''ll come chasing right after you, and sit with you and cry with you until you say that you''re fucking ready to cut your bullshit act and come back?"


    He still wasn''t responding.


    "DO YOU?"


    He flinched and hit his head on the tree he was leaning against. Some of the leaves fell down and stuck to his now dirt-covered clothes. He was shaking a bit, watching closely to see what I would do next.


    I needed to speed up this argument so I wouldn''t fall asleep on the way back to the house. I raised my sword up from the ground and quickly sliced the tree that he was leaning on. I got my sword as close as I could to his head without actually hitting it, and the tree immediately fell over. I expected it to fall away from him, but instead, it fell towards us both.


    I dashed forward and placed my foot against the ground and the tree to brace myself. I dropped my sword to my side and raised my hands straight up above my head in preparation to catch the falling tree. I couldn''t look up, my head wasn''t listening to me at all at this point so I just had to hope that the log would fall onto at least one of my hands.


    It fell onto my left hand and I immediately repositioned myself to catch the log on my left shoulder. As soon as it made contact with my shoulder I heard a loud cracking sound in my back and I nearly fell to the ground with the log. Somehow I stayed standing and I looked at him.


    "Properly scare-"


    I saw something. His hand was holding something tightly. I couldn''t quite see what it was, I didn''t know what he was holding, but I knew that it was something. What was it? I looked closer and closer, I tried to make out any details of the object. The weight of the log was really starting to bear down on me. Just before my shoulder gave out I caught a glimpse of it, and just as quickly as I saw it, a glare cast by the sun obscured my vision.


    I quickly ducked under the tree and shoved it off to my right. It fell straight to the ground and nearly buried my sword with it. I quickly pushed my sword a bit to the left with my foot, and after everything was said and done I just stood there staring at him still leaning on the stump of the tree that was left.


    He knew that I had seen what he was holding in his hand because he didn''t have that defiant look in his eyes anymore. He didn''t have any look in his eyes. He was blankly staring at me the same way the teacher did. He was thinking of the next best move, but he didn''t have one. He couldn''t have one. He would never have expected me to see it in the first place.


    What was he going to use it for? Did he think that I was actually going to hit him? He must''ve been preparing it for something. I guess scaring him worked better than I expected, better than he expected, even.


    I didn''t want to talk to him at all. I couldn''t say anything to him. I glared at him as he quickly got up from the ground and quickly stepped back away from me, coincidentally right out of the distance of a swing of my sword. We exchanged glances instead of words, and he knew that he had no reason to say anything, to act out in any way as we walked back to the house.


    The entire time that we were walking, he didn''t say a single word. He didn''t run, he didn''t come up near me, nothing changed. Nothing at all. We walked at the same speed the entire way with him a short distance behind me, and didn''t say a single word. The only sound there was the occasional stepped-on branch and hum of nearby insects.


    When we got back to the house I slowly opened the door and motioned for him to walk inside before me. He kept his head down as he walked by me and we still did not say anything to each other. The teacher was in the main room when we walked in, and he was probably going to say something before he saw the both of us.


    Whatever sentence he had prepared was wholly interrupted by the sight of Koyo sulking as he rushed through the room without running and went straight up the stairs back to his own room. Before I went up to my own room I just stood there and stared at him for a few moments. We exchanged glances ourselves, and after a bit, he understood the situation fully. I was glaring at him as I walked through the room and up the stairs, and he was left speechless.


    I walked into my room and closed the door behind me, and I sat silently on my bed thinking about what I saw.


    I hate this fucking place.