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Clara was currently shopping in the marketplace. She was in the process of trying to find a nice little gifts for those at the Duke's head. She really enjoyed their company. She was trying to find a gift for the hawk king. She had no clue what he liked though. She picked up a pendant that was shaped like a hawk.

"Maybe he will like this?" She asked herself

"I'm sure I will like it quite well." She heard someone say. She turned around, and was a little scared. It was him again. This guy had been stalking her for the past few weeks. She had tried a lot of things to get him to leave her alone. Two days ago he even tried to take her. She punched him in the face and that scared him off for the time being. This time though, he brought friends. Ten other men were with her. They surrounded her quickly. What made things worse was that they were also armed with weapons.

Good thing Clara hadn't bought any thing. She tossed the pendent aside and pulled out her sword. This would be a tough situation to get out of. There were 11 of them and only 1 of her. She was also wearing her weights and there wasn't any opportunities to take them off. She also didn't want to hurt any of them badly, she just wanted to scared them off. That would be her downfall.

As Clara swung her sword she wasn't trying to cut them. After one of them dodged her sword, two more came and kicked her down. Her sword flew out of her hands. The men grabbed her and she started to struggled.

"Help!" She screamed as she tried to get free.

"Heh," One of the men said, "There is no one around that can help you. You're ours now girly." Fear came to Clara's eyes. She was scared of what might happen to her.

Clara was being dragged off by the men when, one of them got zapped. Where did that come from? She turned her head as saw that is was a lone mage. He was out numbered, but with time, she was freed and the men left.

"That was amazing," She said. She picked up her sword. She noticed that the mage was leaving. She wasn't about to let him leave. She came running to the mage.

"Hey!" She said to him, hoping he would turn around and see her face to face. She would like to know who rescued her.

As if he sobered up from his earlier high, Lance got most of his senses back...he was still completely entranced by Meryl in every single way, but now he could think individually again. He felt his face flare up after all the things he said, and had difficulties keeping it hidden, too. Nevertheless, with now back at 70 % of his regular thinking capacity, he could reflect a bit more before speaking. As such, he just now realized how forward he must've come across. It was still in the middle of the day, and he had just met a complete stranger, and while he fell in love at first sight with her, that would mean nothing if he scared her away by being creepy. Then again, she had stuck around for this long, so maybe she was weird like him, or she was smitten with him too, or maybe...she was desperate. Why would a pretty girl like this was desperate, it made no sens-...

No point in fretting too much about it. He spun her out and kept her at an arm's length, smiling brightly all the while. "Ah, I must beg your pardon, Lady Meryl! I was so...overwhelmed by your presence that I completely forgot manners. I apologize for being too straight-forward, any questions you may have, I will answer."

He let go of her as he pulled out his locket that was hanging around his neck, and opened a small compartment in it. After infusing it with his magic, a holographic image of words started circulating around his hand. After studying it for a brief moment, the words dissipated, leaving the locket as it was again. "To tell you the truth, I don't know much more about this place than you do. It's called Learania, which is a quite exciting land, where there seems to be major battles around every major season holiday. Various people come here in a wide arrange of ways, but all can be summed up with a certain thing called The Door...I don't know much about it, I'm afraid. But all the people that come through The Door seem to have one thing in common, that being that they all originate from a world different from this. More or less."

He put his locket back around his neck. "Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to bore you with all that..."

Meryl only stared in awe, small gasp and all, at Lance's magic with the locket. She'd never even seen magic before! And this was really cool looking! And then, he even started telling her about where she was!

It was some place called "Learania". It was a lot nicer looking than anywhere in Verdane, that's for sure. And things happened in this town, too! Hopefully it wouldn't be things like barfights turning into mobs or anything like that. Maybe something like... a dragon comes and attacks the town, and her knight in shining armor, the amazing Lance Dartel, gets to kill it! Or maybe stupid bandits would attack the town, and she could kill them! Or something. She was definitely looking forward to the next holiday.

"Oh, that's not boring at all, Lance!" She giggled a little more, giving a careful look at his locket. Was it magical like in fairy tales, or something? Now, instead of being so interested in this new place, she was becoming more and more interested in just what was making Lance so astounding.

"Wow, so this isn't anywhere near Verdane! This is perfect!" Meryl let herself squeal just a little, finally coming to terms with the fact that she seemed to be as far from the land of her birth as she could be. And that was perhaps the greatest thing that has happened to her so far! She'd never be anywhere near those ugly thugs again!

"So, you're from another world, too, right?" After all, she didn't see anyone else that looked anything like him, so far, so he probably wasn't a native. Plus, the ease with which he told her about Learania made her think that he'd probably seen quite a bit of things in his time. And that meant stories of his exploits. "Then what have you seen before I came here?"

"Elibe... It may be standard for you, but I'd love to hear about it, sometime..." She smiled sheepishly, with a tinge of embarrassment, once more blushing. Stories of heroism, comedy, tragedy, mystery... He'd likely be able to entertain her just with his stories! And he seemed very worldly, so he almost definitely would be telling the truth. Not like she'd know if he wasn't, though.

And secret stories? A shiver crept down Meryl's spine as she wondered just how deep the rabbit hole of the man's mind went. To have so much to tell, and still stories that have gone unheard, the thief was almost grinning with ecstasy. It seemed she really did find a man that was perfect! Screw Verdane, screw Jugdral, Learania was going to be Meryl's new home, and she was loving it.

"...I'd love to be in your next stories, Lance..." Her voice turned soft, and she began to blush. So, to not seem like such a romantic girl, and to keep herself from blushing any more, she looked away, towards the ground, the small smile still on her face. But, beneath the smile, she was scared. Terrified, really. Lance was so much different from the thugs and vagrants she'd been around all her life. And for him to have as many stories as he made it sound, would he just... throw her away, after he'd gotten his fill of his time with her?

Now, the smile was slightly beginning to fade, only something noticeable if Lance was doing nothing but watching her mouth the entire time. But, it wasn't getting far from the smile it was before. After all, he did mention her stealing his heart, and things like that, so maybe he wouldn't leave her...

She was blushing again, she'd noticed, as Lance raised her chin. He just kept driving home the fact that he wanted her to be with him! As soon as Lance finished his sentence, Meryl's heart skipped a beat or two, and she began to smile once more. But this time, it wasn't a small smile, it was a full-blown, happiness-coated, if not a little embarrased, smile! After all, Lance was being so nice to her, and she was still trying to get used to it.

And then, he began to talk about how, over the course of only a few minutes, she'd changed his entire life! Meryl didn't even know she could have that kind of effect on someone! And again, he managed to perfectly describe her, word for word. But this time, it was... comparing her to himself. The girl sighed a content sigh as he began to seem embarrassed himself. "What do you mean, an idiot?" She laughed, shoving away the fears past the back of her mind. "You can't be an idiot, you're too interesting." After all, she knew plenty of idiots, and they were about as interesting as drying paint.

She sighed as he mentioned the prospect of sharing stories. Would she even be able to hold a candle to his accomplishments? ...wouldn't know until she tried, really. "So, where should we go, to tell each other all of our stories? We can't just stand in the middle of this place, after all..."

The Tempest King

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Ok, so plan B, just as much as a failure as plan A... perhaps even worse considering of how the tiger laguz was now...

OH GOD WHAT WAS HE DOING?! The situation had just gone from, kind of creepy but manageable to MAJOR SHITSTORM in the space of about thirty seconds.

The swordmaster struggled ineffectually as Rajin sucked on his neck, Joshua would never look the same way at a woman who gave him a love bite ever again. In fact he was liable to dropkick the next person to try.

Joshua had had enough, no more mister nice guy. He didn't care about the later consequences.... just as long as he got out of this crazy situation. It was time for plan C, otherwise known as “Screw you guys, I’m going home.”

"Why yes Rajin my dear, I have been told that I taste good. In fact women tell me all the time! Wha!" Joshua made a grunting sound as he brought his knee up into the big mans crotch, from this distance he couldn't miss and just for good measure he brought it up a second time.

Now he didn't care what race you were, there was one thing the location of never really changed and high pain tolerance or not, no man liked being hit in the balls and Rajin would have to loosen his grip, or risk being hit again.

And when that happened Joshua broke the man’s grip by throwing himself backwards and ran, like hell he ran. Without realizing it he charged headlong down the street in the same direction Roy had gone, Joshua figured he had about 30 sec----- HAD THE ENTIRE WORLD GONE CRAZY OR SOMETHING?!

The swordmaster literally skidded to a halt as he saw Roy pinned up against a wall by Ephraim, now call it swordmasters intuition but something was definitely screwy here and he had a feeling a mirror image of him and Rajin was being played out.

Was it headcrabs? No that was crazy! Alien parasites attacking only people with red hair? Now that might be more likely. Either way, he had to help Roy, darting in on Ephraims left quickly and unexpectedly his arm shot out to grab Roy firmly by the wrist yanking him out of the corner he'd been forced into. A mad look in his eye must have slowed the lancer from reacting right away as he managed to get Roy out without the smaller Lord being grabbed and soon they we're taking off down the street.

"Roy? You too? What the hell is going on?" Joshua practically yelled while attempting to subtle scrunch his neck up to hide the mark Rajin gave him.

It probably didn't work, as nothing seemed to be going right today.
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