[KURAYAMI-YAMASHITA BORDER]
Always alone while training on the riverbank, Ayami hadn't expected company. It was the one reason she had chosen this place because she knew that no one from Kurayami ever came to this side.
It was a little too far from the city and even the villages. Hell, even the servants had never been sighted here, so when she saw two women heading towards the riverbank, she knew that something was wrong.
Either the servants had to be new, or the water had been polluted and they had to come to this side.
Or maybe, the Kurayami citizens had decided to explore this far out, a place where no one in their right mind ever came because the border patrol was a little far inland, despite the typical blanks there.
'Who are they?' Ayami asked herself as she kept training.
She knew that if she stopped, she would raise an alarm, and perhaps it was just two women who were oblivious to the unspoken rules of the realm or even the power that was Ayami Araki.
Maybe she had to wait and see what this became for her and them.
As they got closer, the first thing that Ayami noticed was the long black hair that had freely fallen down the taller servant's back. It was almost too beautiful, too perfect, and for a moment Ayami wondered if this was a trap for her.
For years she had had people come to her with the same features and she had learned to expect them. But there had never been any from Kurayami, because the Kurayamis were easily the strongest kingdom in the realm.
Their queen was a devil and everyone knew it. No one would ever imagine that the psycho queen of Kurayami would be bothered to send her servants to spy on Ayami, not even Ayami herself.
That was because Ayami had trained here for twenty-eight long years and never had she been the reason for any problems between Kurayami and Yamashita.
So today had to be a coincidence.
After all, they all knew about the mad queen of Kurayami who never cared about shit, because Kuramitsu was a proud shameless yet formless queen who did everything she wanted, on her own.
But what if Ayami was right?
'Aya, you alright? You stopped training… should we come down?' Kujo, Ayami's only friend, said in the mind links when she noticed the woman had taken a pause, which was unlike her.
Perhaps it was something that they had to sort out before Ayami went back to train, right?
'I'm fine. I just need to check something out. Don't break protocol. I'll let you know if anything happens,' Ayami responded before she shut the mind links and focused on the two women who were now at the riverbank on Kurayami's side.
Even then, she didn't stop training.
****
Queen Kuramitsu's sharp eyes were like a curse to Yuzuki Fukada when she had walked downhill with Rinko by her side. She hadn't expected that she would be able to see the woman on the other side ever so clearly and it was almost unsettling just how precise it all was.
Yuzuki stared at the woman on the other side of the river, the woman who looked beautiful and one who seemed to be luring her in with just her presence. It was something that had never happened to the Fukada alpha and right now, she was considering a lot of things.
"There she is, Your Majesty," Rinko pointed out when they got to the river and Yuzuki felt her heart start beating erratically — like it used to… when Matsui was close to her.
Her confusion was out of this world as she tried to keep her cool, but how the fuck was she supposed to do that when all her life she had only ever been unbalanced by Matsui? It was almost shocking to her, but Yuzuki had not come here for Ayami's beauty.
She had come to see, for herself, the enforcer who was considered the cruelest in the realm and the one who had made such a beautiful name for herself. She had come to see if she would be a match for the woman or if she had to be better.
"Your majesty—" Rinko began but Yuzuki interrupted her.
"Yuzu. Call me Yuzu whenever it is just us on here," Yuzuki said.
Rinko stared at her in confusion.
She had never known that the queen even had a first name, given the entire time, the realm had only known the Kurayami queen as Kuramitsu. No one had been that close to her to even know her first name.
Queen Kuramitsu had always been alone, a tragedy that had never bothered her, but the people of Kurayami hoped that maybe, just maybe, she made a connection with someone.
And yet for years until her untimely reprehensible death in the borehole, she had remained a ghost in her universe. Oh, the shackles of a fate no one would ever truly understand.
This was confusing as fuck and Rinko hoped that she wouldn't be used as an example to teach the people of Kurayami a lesson. It would be the most unfortunate thing for her either way.
"Yuzu?" Rinko asked worriedly.
"That is my middle name," Yuzuki said in the hope that no one in the realm truly had the records of Kurayami heiress's middle name.
It was probably the greatest gamble of her life, but with what was being presented to her at the moment, the Fukada alpha had to think fast, because otherwise, her reincarnation would end up a shameful waste of precious time.
"Alright. We should get started with the laundry then. The enforcer is looking at us," Rinko said and Yuzuki let out a soft sigh. Everything about the woman on the other border screamed the love she had lost on the battlefield thanks to Kazuya.
"Have you heard any stories about Ayami?" Yuzuki asked as they did laundry.
"Just that she is the most lethal weapon for King Kazuya," Rinko said earnestly.
"Only that? What a weird woman. The entire realm doesn't know shit about her?"
Yuzuki wanted to figure it out as soon as possible. Nothing was stopping her from crossing that river, but there was a lot that she would be risking if she tried to do that, much less as a servant of Kurayami.
It just wouldn't make sense, but maybe it wouldn't be so bad for them. Maybe the day wouldn't end as terrible as it had begun, right?
"Well, King Kazuya is pretty secretive too and cruel. Rumors have it that he flattened one of his packs because he couldn't get the alpha's mate back then. It was a long time ago, but the rumors have been a bit louder over the years," Rinko said casually.
Yuzuki stilled.
She hadn't expected to hear about her gruesome past from the mouth of a Kurayami servant but damn was it the reminder of why she needed to find Kazuya and hang the man by the balls for everyone to see.
"He flattened a pack? Damn," Yuzuki said absentmindedly, like she hadn't been the one who had been affected the most back then. All that shit had ruined her life and it haunted the shit out of her in the afterlife.
Perhaps she would fix it before she found Matsui.
"Don't look up, but the enforcer is coming over," Rinko said.
Yuzuki laughed lightly.
Someone was playing a dangerous game.