“Hey, Sammie, wanna try that one out” –A brunette young woman pulled at Samuel’s arm toward a tiny kiosk.

“Was it a kiosk?” -Samuel perplexed. But still follow along with the young woman toward a kiosk tucked away behind some thick shrubs, in a far corner of the book fair.

The first thing he felt was that kiosk look kind of dubious, he couldn’t recall much of the kiosk’s look aside from its sign, the most striking feature of it. Unlike other kiosk’s sign in the book fair, made of a plastic canvas stretched over an aluminium frame, this sign was made of wood for some reason. Indeed, hung over that kiosk’s entrance was an old, painted, dusty wooden sign, intricately carved with… with something… Letters? Symbols? Pattern? Relief? He couldn’t recall, but there was definitely something carved on it.

Then the next thing he knew was, he was browsing through that dimly lit kiosk’s ware with the brunette lady, rows and rows of shelves stacked with some antiques collectible, but mostly was books, old dusty hardcover books, some almost as big as a pizza box and some as thick as a cement block. The book’s cover was also elaborately decorative with metal fittings, carvings, and perhaps even gems and precious metal decoration, Samuel felt like he was walking around a medieval fantasy library or some sort. Then something startled him and the young lady, a… person, yes, “a person” was the best he could recall. A long hair hippie-looking person, suddenly, emerged from the dim corner of the kiosk.

Was that person had spoken something to him and the young lady? Samuel couldn’t be sure; all he could remember about that person was that ever present mysterious smile haft hidden behind that person’s curtain of black and white hair, and the feeling of being watch the entire time he was in the kiosk since the moment that person appeared, and... aside from that… was something else, he just realized it and wondered to himself. Was he had been walking for a while in the kiosk? Then why did he hadn’t run into the end of the kiosk already? It didn’t look that big from the outside, Samuel looked around in confusion.

Then out of sudden, Samuel felt like he was in a position of lying down rather than of walking upright. Then, a massive wave of headache just hit him like truck, Samuel’s head spun like gyroscope and his body felt weak.

A soft moan left Samuel mouth before his eyelids were even parted open, and when his eyes were fully awaked and started to send image of his surrounding to his brain, Samuel found himself lying on a bedroll inside a big tent, darted his eyes around in confusion, the next thing he found was a red hair woman sat next to him, with arms folded on her knees and face rested on her arms.

That face seemed familiar, squinted his eyes, Samuel tried to get the gears inside his brain to start working, after a while, his brain finally returned a result to him.

“Ugh… E… Emma?” –what came out of his throat sounded more like a whimper than a question.

But that was enough to stir the women from her sleep. Her face raised from her folded arms and turned from a half asleep expression to a face of pure joy like a kid just received her most wanted for gift.

“Challenger!? Oh, thanks the gods” -Emma wide flare lips stretched into a biggest and brightest smile- “How do you feel, are you alright?”

“Ugh… my head is killing me right now,” Samuel groaned, “Aside from that… I feel fine, I think.” – Samuel rubbed his forehead- “Where… where are we?”

Emma quickly filled him in what had happened after they fell down the river, Samuel face gone from discomfort to curious, wondered about the so called “Downer” to Emma’s concern of his health, she kept asking if he feeling alright for he had quite a concussion until Samuel reassured her.

“But… what about Elesil?” Samuel asked.

“Don’t worry, I’ll find some way to look for him, for the time being you just rest now, alright” –Emma comforted Samuel- “Well, you must be starving right now, I’ll ask the servants if they have something for you to eat” –Emma stood up- “Oh Samuel” –she turned back after a few steps- “Thank you, for everything” –A smile of gratitude bloomed on Emma’s lips, Samuel waved his hand signalled she was welcome.

“Wait a minute” -Samuel suddenly realized- “Will I get a reward after this? A kiss first would be nice,” Samuel asked with a smile.

“H… how dare you talk to me like that?” –Emma baffled with Samuel’s audacity- “Well… you… you’ll be reward accordingly after I got back with my convoy, alright” –Emma turned her head away, cheeks and nose slowly turn red- “In the time being, if you dare to touch my lips… I’ll have your head, you hear me.”

“You’re loud and clear, Princess” –Samuel chuckled

“Oh, Samuel, one more thing” –Emma’s tone turned serious- “From now on, every time the Downers were around us, I’ll be your cousin, I don’t want my identity to be known, and neither I want too much attention drawn to me, please” -Samuel nodded in acknowledgement, wondered what was her reason.

When Emma got outside of the servant’s tent, a servant lady suddenly came up from behind her holding a tray of food, with somewhat broken common speech she said the food was brought for Emma and concernedly she asked how was Samuel. Emma thanked her for the food and concern, then asked if she could bring another meal set for her as she would give Samuel this tray. With a hospitality smile the woman nodded then head back to the kitchen, but unbeknown to Emma as she headed back into the tent, the woman turned her head around, her eyes squinted to almost close with nothing but suspicion in her gaze.

That servant then continued on her way, but instead of headed directly to the field kitchen, the servant changed her course toward the biggest tent in the camp and stayed in there for a while before resume back to the field kitchen. On the other while, as Samuel was fully dedicated to consume the meal set to recharge his body, Emma was looking on at him with an eyebrow raised in bewilderment, she was puzzled by the way Samuel control those two stick-thingies that the Downers use as eating utensil, looking on in wonderment of how Samuel could use them with such skill and grace for a man that never heard of the existence of the folks living in southern Varlaurea continent prior to that day, it was a complete one eighty from the way Emma fumble and struggling like a new born baby with the sticks last night, thus the question of “who Samuel was” came back to her mind one again.

After the meal, Samuel was astounded to learned that Emma had asked the Downers to help find Elesil, and reminded her of her reaction when she first meet Elesil.

“Oh I think it’ll be fine” -Emma lips curled up into a smile of confident- “Well, I do apology about my behaviour at that time, it just… us Uppers folk doesn’t trust Elvas much…” –her smile turned from confident to awkward when the incident was mentioned- “It still amazed me that you could befriended a Elvas, but it’s the opposite for the Downers, I bet they would be thrill to actually met an Elvas, especially these people was Aulacian.”

“How come?” Samuel curious.

“Er… I did learn a little about their culture when a diplomat of them visit my kingdom” –Emma gathered her memories- “Apparently, they believed that they are the descendants of Elvas and Dragon.”

“The what?” -Samuel couldn’t held in a laugh.

“Yah… I know how absurd it is, but I’m serious, they actually believe that” –Emma shrugged, shook her head in sarcasm- “Claiming that their kingdom was the direct continuation of an ancient empire called Varlann, Varlenn something.”

Afterward, the Aulacia’s delegate packed up their camp and continue on their journey with Samuel and Emma tacked along. Samuel was pleasantly surprised by these Downer-folks’ friendliness with a smile always present on their face and their curiosity about things around them, thus Emma and Samuel were the centre of attention of their conversation when the two ride along on the servant staffs’ carriage.

The hills and mountains of faraway horizon slowly dripped through the carriage’s window, followed the riverside road, the Aulacia’s convoy rolled on with a leisurely pace, frequently took rest stop at town for the passengers to sightseeing and strolled around the local market. At first, Samuel was kind of curious about their casual approach of the diplomatic trip, wasn’t they supposed to attend a political summit or something, this seemed more like a tourism trip than a diplomatic mission. Until Emma explained that the reason they frequently checked out the local market of towns and cities was to checked on if there were any kind of new merchandize available, to checked on the prize of goods and seek to establish more new trade deal and strengthen or renegotiate old agreements with the local nobilities, a kind of market research, Emma and her uncle were doing the same before they got attacked by lizardmen.