A week has passed since they arrived at the embassy.
Lying down on his new, albeit smaller, bed, Raka let out a tired sigh. It was another morning in the embassy, and he still felt odd.
If he had to be honest with himself, being here felt more surreal than back home. While everything might be peaceful, having creatures he only knew from fantasy novels and magic as a part of daily life made things feel foreign.
He got up from his bed and wiped his eyes. Oh yeah, another thing he didn't account for was having "jet lag" from being here. Time was somehow different once you passed the fusion borders of Earth and Arche.
Looking from one side of the border, you might think it was daytime if it was day on your side. But once you walk past it, the time could suddenly switch to night.
How does that even work?
He didn't have a clue and did NOT want to think about it.
"Raka! It's already morning!" his mother yelled from outside his room.
"I'm awake!"
Even with this relatively small "house," they still had a room for each person—except his parents, who got a bigger room for the two of them, which made sense.
He walked out of his room and was greeted by the smell of eggs. His mother, wearing a purple apron, was flipping a pan to make another perfectly fluffy omelet.
"Good, you're here."
She turned off the stove and put the omelet on a food tray. Raka looked at the kitchen table and saw dozens of plastic food trays filled with omelets.
"Wow, what's the occasion?"
"Grab one of those and give them to our new neighbor on the right. She just arrived here," she said, already pointing at the trays.
"But I just got up."
"And that means you can do this one thing. Come on, it'll barely take twenty minutes."
He was still too groggy to argue, so he gave in, grabbed a tray, lazily put on slippers, and walked outside.
It was still really early. He barely saw anybody out. Taking a moment to breathe in the fresh air, he looked up to see the two shining suns.
'I'm never going to get used to that. How does anyone keep track of time here?'
Walking a short distance to the right, he arrived at his neighbor's house. The building looked the same as his, only a little smaller.
'From what Mom said, it's probably only a single person living here.'
Stopping before the door, he raised a finger and rang the doorbell.
Ring!
Ring!
It was silent for a few seconds, and he debated on ringing again until he heard a shuffling sound get closer to the door.
As the door opened, he quickly prepared himself. The person who stepped outside had long, messy blonde hair and pointed ears. An elf. But he couldn't shake the feeling that he'd seen this person before. As she got a little closer, he realized she was an entire head taller than he was.
She looked down at him with an irritated expression.
"What do you want?"
"S-sorry. My mom noticed that you just moved in and wanted to give you this as a sort of welcome."
When she realized what he was holding, her expression softened into something more embarrassed.
"I-I see. Sorry if I came off as rude. I'm not a morning person."
He gave a nervous chuckle in response. "It's alright."
He held the tray out again, and she quickly accepted it with a nod of thanks.
Just before she closed the door, a flicker of realization sparked in his mind. Her face. Her posture. It was just like!-
"Wait!"
The door halted mid-close. "Is there a problem?"
"Are you.. By any chance, the person who saved my family from a blue dragon a month ago?"
…
"Excuse me?"
"When the merger first happened, my family was about to be attacked by a dragon. But before it could hurt us, an elf stopped it. She looked similar to you, so I wondered if... You were the one who saved us…"
As he reached the end of his sentence, his voice started to trail off, losing the confidence it had at the start. His cheeks flared up as heat rushed to his face, and he immediately regretted even opening his mouth.
'Am I going to come off as a racist if she isn't? Like, will she think I'm saying all elves look the same? This was stupid, why did I even say anything?'
Her silence didn't help alleviate his anxiety. Not one bit. She just looked at him with a blank expression that made it even worse, like he was just another human saying something weird. But if he wasn't imagining it, he swore that he saw her eyes widen just slightly.
"You must have the wrong person... I'm not exactly the fighting type, as you can probably tell." She gestured toward herself, the messy hair, the oversized hoodie, and the tired look of someone who had to use every ounce of willpower just to get out of bed.
"O-oh yeah, sorry... I just thought that—"
She cut him off with a raised hand and a softer voice. "It's alright, I understand why you'd want to make sure. No harm done." A faint smile followed, meant to ease his worries.
That did the trick as Raka felt the pressure in his chest loosen. He didn't even notice how stiff his shoulders were until now. "That's good then. I was worried I might have offended you somehow."
She chuckled, and the sound was lighter than he expected. "Well, it was nice meeting you then, uh... Sorry, what's your name?"
"Oh, I didn't introduce myself, did I?" He scratched the back of his head, suddenly sheepish. "I'm Raka. It's nice to meet you, Miss...?"
"Thalya."
"Alright then, Miss Thalya. I'll be going now. It was nice to meet you!"
She gave him one more smile. "It was nice to meet you too, Raka."
She stepped back inside her house and gently closed the door behind her with a soft click.
Raka stood there for another second or two, staring at the now-closed door, still processing the awkward encounter in his mind. Then, with a slow shake of his head, he turned around and headed back toward his home, still rubbing the back of his neck.
'Smooth. Real smooth. Great job, me,' he thought bitterly, barely holding back a groan. It wasn't every day that you could meet an elf face to face. And the moment he did, he made the encounter so awkward.
'And she was pretty too… Wait, no bad brain! Don't think stuff like that about your neighbor who you just met.'
He smacked the side of his head for even thinking of such things. He needed to do something else to get his mind back in order. Arriving at the front of his door, he twisted the handle and headed inside.
What he didn't notice was that Thalya hadn't walked far from the door at all.
…
…
…
Behind the closed curtain, she reached forward with careful fingers and pulled back a narrow gap in the fabric, just enough to peer through without being noticed. Her eyes followed Raka's every step with narrowed eyes as he disappeared back into his own house.
The faint smile she'd worn moments ago was gone entirely. Her features had hardened, her jaw clenched just slightly, and her brows furrowed in irritation that simmered beneath her otherwise calm exterior.
"Of all the things that could have happened," she muttered under her breath, her quiet voice sounding tense. "Of course, my neighbors are people who saw me use my powers. It's just my luck."
She looked at the bow that lay on her kitchen counter. Her hand instinctively went to grab it, but when she looked at the tray with an omelet inside. She took a deep breath and sighed, her clenched fists starting to relax.
"Ok, not a problem. He was completely fooled. I just need to make sure the rest fall for the act."
She walked past her bow and sat down on a chair. A tired expression was clear on her face. "If I don't, this would have all been for nothing…"