Bermuda [bl]

Leonardo's twisted lips stiffened for a moment. Soon, instead of erasing the bitter smile, he narrowed his eyes and glared at Hugo. As if trying to understand the meaning of his words, Hugo spoke as if confirming his action,

"Andreas was off guard at that time. So if you had attacked with your full strength, as I know you, he wouldn't have just had broken bones, but his entire arm would have been torn off, and he would have been seriously injured. But now that he has received treatment, he's walking around just fine with only a cast. They say once the bones are set, it won't interfere with his activities."

Leonardo remained silent for a while, just staring at him. After a moment, he opened his mouth with a snort,

"Are you trying to say that I deliberately controlled my strength?"

At his question, Hugo lightly nodded his head.

"That's how it looked to me."

"..."

"When I put you in the transport cage in Frost Territory, you fought back and injured me under my eye, but then you immediately became docile."

Leonardo didn't say anything. At that, Hugo began to list what he had felt as if to prove his point,

"Also, in the Imperial Capital, you aimed all your long-range attacks only at the ice wall. And when people were in danger, you blew away the entire ice wall with strong magic. It means you deliberately didn't use it even though you could use that much mana from the beginning."

Hugo looked straight at Leonardo.

"You said I had no killing intent toward you, but it was the same for you. I also didn't feel any killing intent from you that would really make you kill me."

Taking one step closer to the bars, Hugo grabbed the bars with his hand and looked down at Leonardo's face in front of him, saying,

"You had no intention of harming us, the people, from the beginning."

At the confident words, Leonardo's Adam's apple slowly moved.

His eyes looking at Hugo gradually reddened with bloodshot whites as if some change of heart had occurred. Behind the deep breaths to calm his excitement, his shoulders rose and fell, and his slightly trembling breathing circled in the quiet place.

Leonardo didn't deny Hugo's words. Instead, he raised the handcuffs on his wrists and said,

"If you know, let me out of here. You're the Commander, so you should be able to do that much."

Hugo blinked his eyes slowly a few times. Leonardo's greatly subdued momentum and his choked voice were affirming everything he had said, causing a whirlwind of emotions.

"...Because I'm the Commander, I set a condition to let you out."

"What condition?"

At his question, Hugo briefly recalled the conversations that had taken place in the Grand Conference Hall.

'I will go. To the peninsula, with Leonardo Blaine.'

'You've made the right decision.'

'However, I have a condition.'

'...A condition?'

When he first faced the guy, Hugo thought he was really a dangerous being with uncontrollable and destructive mana.

However, after arriving at the Imperial Capital and seeing his actions, he thought that although the guy had disobeyed the military's orders in the past, he wasn't a villain who would harm people without reason.

His desire to protect the child in the square at that time, and his statement that it was his own matter, were clearly his true feelings.

Facing those true feelings, Hugo's thoughts about Leonardo were completely shaken.

'After completing this task, please allow Leonardo Blaine to be released.'

Looking back at the noisy atmosphere of the Grand Conference Hall after his remark, Hugo focused again on the guy in front of him.

The guy who said he was the only one who could protect himself. When he heard those words that flashed for a moment, Hugo thought that the guy's strength and arrogance were like a shield to protect himself.

The various expectations, greed, praise, and fear surrounding him with his powerful mana. The excessive distrust that arose from the surroundings that demanded sacrifice by flaunting that strength.

The guy didn't trust others much. Just like how he himself had been in the past.

Was this what Abraham Langaster meant when he said that Leonardo and he were similar?

For the first time, seriously reflecting on Abraham's words, Hugo said to Leonardo,

"The Council's prestige is at stake in this Elder Millie Peninsula subjugation. It's a problem everyone has been eager to solve for a long time. Leonardo, if you contribute to solving this, they will forgive everything that happened in the Imperial Capital, release you, and never seek you out again. That's the condition I set. Isn't it a good condition for you too?"

At Hugo's words, Leonardo's eyes widened. His gaze also changed a little.

As he said, if he could permanently escape the Council's pursuit that had plagued him for three years, it would be the best condition for him.

However, that was only for a moment. Leonardo looked at Hugo suspiciously as if discerning the truth of his words. After extracting his mana, it didn't seem like the Council would let him go so easily. Rather, it could be a matter of being dragged into another task.

"..."

But when he met those jewel-like blue eyes, he somehow felt there was no falsehood in them.

Leonardo asked again in a low voice, narrowing his brows,

"Is that true?"

"Yes."

"Can you really swear that if I help you this time, you will never seek me out again?"

At the voice filled with a sense of desperation, Hugo looked at the brilliant golden eyes, smiled slightly, and answered,

"I swear on the name of Agrizendro."

At that solemn voice, Leonardo blankly stared at him. The weight of his words, even putting his own name on the line, was quite significant.

Hugo deeply inserted his arm through the bars separating him and Leonardo. Then, he held out his hand in front of him.

Leonardo alternately looked at the large hand extended to him and Hugo. After pondering until the very end, he slowly grasped the hand and gazed into the other's eyes.

The light seeping through the small window stretched long and shimmered at the feet of the two.

The golden eyes shining as if holding the sun and the blue eyes draped as if holding the sky met, completely filled with each other.

* * *

"Agrizendro, get me out of this prison. I'll behave."

Hugo, who had promised Leonardo to let him go if he followed the subjugation team and solved the problem on the peninsula, turned back at the sound of his voice calling him when he was about to leave.

"I'm sorry to say this, but there are still many people who are wary of you. Just stay put for about a day. I'll get you out then."

Leonardo sat on the prison floor with the most pitiful expression and looked up at Hugo. However, perhaps because it didn't work well on the other person who was like ice, he spoke clearly once again with a kind face,

"What's the difference between getting me out now and later? I don't want to stay here."

"I'll get you out tomorrow."

As Agrizendro, who had spoken firmly, was about to leave, Leonardo pouted his lips and muttered as if to make him hear,

"But... that guy keeps telling me to do it with him."

His fingertips pointed to a prisoner in the left diagonal direction.

That prisoner had been knocked unconscious by an unknown blow earlier and had been quietly crumpled up after receiving a mental shock.

But suddenly, the Commander had come to the underground prison and was talking to the guy he had been eagerly messing with. The prisoner, who had been sticking to the wall and watching the two with his instincts, soon realized that he was Leonardo Blaine and covered his mouth with both hands, holding his breath as much as possible.

The obscene words and actions he had done to him flashed through his mind in an instant. Suddenly, at Leonardo's action of pointing at him with his finger, the prisoner was startled, turned pale, and stammered,

"No, that, that's—."

He hurriedly tried to make an excuse, but when the surroundings suddenly became cold and a bone-chilling chill crept up, his tongue stiffened, and he couldn't continue speaking. Trembling and slowly raising his head, there stood the Council's Kazad, fiercely looking down at him with blue eyes shining as if to freeze everything.

"You still haven't come to your senses."

A terrifying shadow loomed over his head, and a spine-chilling, murderous voice pierced his ears. For a moment, unable to move with his breath caught in his throat, the prisoner hurriedly lowered his eyes in fear of wetting himself. Beyond the long, outstretched legs, he could see the face of the blond-haired guy in the opposite cell.

Leonardo, who had completely washed away the pitiful expression as if he had never done it, grinned at the prisoner and stuck out his red tongue as if mocking him. Then, he raised his middle finger and made a gesture of cutting it off with his other hand.