"Long time no see, Le Qi!" Achill gazed at the slender figure nearby and said with a smile, "Have you been doing well these past seven years...?"
"..." Le Qi stood with her head lowered, saying nothing. She gave no response at all, as though she had suddenly turned into a wooden post.
"To tell you the truth, I thought about coming back to visit you plenty of times over these seven years." Achill scratched his head awkwardly, then continued with a helpless look, "But unfortunately, every time I accidentally— ahem— got lost, I always ended up in the wrong place. Five years ago, in the second year after we parted, I finally managed to find the town where we used to live, only to learn that you'd left long before. I worried about you for ages after that..."
"Luckily, I ran into Mystogan from your Fairy Tail guild soon afterward, and that was how I learned you'd joined such a lively guild! Only then could I finally breathe a real sigh of relief. That old fossil of a guild master of yours might be utterly unreliable, but at least knowing where you were put my mind a little more at ease..." Achill took two gentle steps forward, slowly spread his arms, and said with a warm smile, "Come on. If you want to cry, throw yourself into my arms and cry all you like! Don't hold back. Think of it as the little bit of compensation I can offer you as an irresponsible big brother..." As he spoke, he moved to embrace Le Qi.
"Shy Wood—" Le Qi murmured with her head bowed.
"Huh?" Achill froze. Before he could say anything else, he suddenly felt a powerful surge of magic beneath his feet. Without time to think, he flipped