
Both of my eyes opened again as I felt a gentle rubbing touching my head over and over again. The black shadow that was in front of me seemed a little blurred in view.
"Sa-chan," said the voice, the gentle swipe on my forehead turning down the cheek.
"Haru-nii," I said slowly as I moved my eyes to blink a few times.
"Thank God you're okay" she smiled at me, looking as if a small vibration was etched on the tip of her lips.
"Nii-chan, what happened?" I said back very slowly, still feeling my whole body that felt weak just to move the body.
"Queen, save you," he said softly to me.
The queen? Aahh, what does that black woman mean?
I glanced to the left, the black woman whose figure I had thought of before had walked up and stood beside the bed. The woman smiled at me as she stepped closer and sat on the edge of the bed looking at me.
"I'm sorry, for the sassy attitude of my people," he said, bowing his head at me.
The woman touched my forehead, I felt the heat flow from the touch she was doing. I moved my body to the side, many times I coughed followed by blackish blood that came out to wet the bed.
The woman stood up, and her legs disappeared from my sight. I looked at Izumi who had been standing before me, Izumi directed a small cloth in her hand to sweep my face.
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My eyes opened again, like never before... When I woke up, my body was already a little moved without any pain. I turned my eyes back to the right, my body sat up as I thrust my palm against Zeki's sleeping head leaning on the edge of the bed.
"I want a drink, can you get me some water?" As Zeki woke up looking at me, I pointed my index finger at a teapot lying away from the bed.
Zeki stood up and walked over to a table with a teapot and a row of cups on top. Zeki lifted the teapot and poured it over one of the cups he held.
Zeki turned around, moving his legs back closer. The cup in his hand, I slowly pressed my lips closer to the cup and drank all the water in it.
"Zeki, can you explain what happened?" I told him to look back at him.
"When you're dying, the woman they call the Queen approaches us. I strangled his neck when his hand touched your body. But, apparently he was trying to heal you, I found out when the wound on your body faded a little as he touched it" he said sitting on the edge of the bed grabbing the cup I was holding.
"Do you know where we are now?"
"This is one of the rooms in the Queen's Palace, and also Haruki, Izumi and Aydin are in the next room. He asked me to take care of you, as they searched for all the information about this place" whispered Zeki as he brought his face to my ear.
"And to my astonishment, they even have so many Knights who are not inferior to other Knights. I mean, when Aydin accidentally saw them practicing. Aydin said that if their fighting skills are not inferior to the Knights he saw in Balawijaya first," said Zeki again to keep his face away from me, his head bowed as if trying to remember something.
"More details, I think Haruki knows better. You can ask him everything later," he said, looking back at me.
"Are you okay?" My words grabbed his arm, the candlelight rays that filled the room slightly helped my eyes see the reddish marks on both wrists.
"It's because of the fucking chain that tied me up yesterday. I can't think straight when you're treated like that by them" she said, rubbing my hair.
"I couldn't think straight when they almost killed you. How are the women..."
"The woman who tortured you?" His words cut my words, I stared at the cup he had in his hand.
"I didn't hear much from him. However, what I heard was that he was in prison now. Because of the laws in force here, it is not permissible to torture women even more nearly to kill them even if they are not natives of this Kingdom," said Zeki opened his palm containing the fragments of the cup on the edge of the bed.
"That woman, just like us... He was stranded here when the man he loved dumped him into the ocean. Therefore, he always assures them that men are immoral creatures, that men are unworthy of life..."
"Connected, the citizens here even the Queen had never met a single man before, directly believing the words that the woman said..."
"Wait a minute, where did you find out everything?"
"Aydin, he went around tempting countless women to get information. Many women were stranded here before us, which is why Aydin was able to communicate with them..."
"Even the Queen herself, is still learning our language from some of the women they saved in the ocean first..."
"Enough, we'll stop talking tonight until here. You need to get back to rest" he continued, pulling the blanket that covered my legs.
"Lay down" he said again as I bowed my body to his words as his palm touched my shoulder.
"What are you doing?" I looked at him who had been lying sideways with one hand holding his head.
"I also need to rest" he turned and laid his body beside me.
"I mean, why are you lying here?"
"My neck hurts from always sleeping sitting for a few days, so yeah... I also want to sleep lying down to relieve the pain" she said, hugging her blanket-covered body.
"I'm just going to sleep, I'm not going to do anything. So, get some rest" she closed her eyes, I put one of my hands on her hair that touched my nose.