Marked Ones: Advent of the Demon Prince

After a few days of walking through the forest, the party eventually made it to the main village at the center of a few dozen hunting and logging camps. The road to the place was rather clear since the village served as a sort of stockpile zone for the various camps to deposit their materials and then send out in large shipments all at once.

Thanks to that, and also probably because the other party that came through here specialized in clearing roads, the trip was rather uneventful. The only thing they ran into were common animals. The few monsters Lucius did detect were rather far from the road and did not seem interested in coming close to it. Because of that, they had simply camped right on the road itself for the sake of convenience.

Rena had noticed that Lucius still took the time to vanish into the woods throughout their resting periods and before they went to bed to try and train. He made sure to find locations far enough away from the group that any monsters attracted to the noise he made did not manage to stumble upon his resting allies.

Rena could not help but admire her lover. He was always so strong willed and even when stuck at the Novice Rank, he still persevered and fought. Now that he was Beginner, he was much stronger and finally learned that he was capable of ranking up, where it almost seemed impossible before.

All in all, this trip was extremely productive both for his physical growth and their own personal one. These happy thoughts filled her mind all the way until they reached the village and met with the other party on the quest. When she saw who appeared to be the leader of said party, her face immediately frowned and her mood soured.

It was a tall, young man with red hair and green eyes. He was much larger than when she last saw him, both in height and muscle mass, but she recognized his familiar features anywhere.

"Simon." Rena grumbled.

"Oh? You know each other?" Jen asked, genuinely curious why seeing this person named Simon made Rena upset.

"I would say so. That is Simon von Petra, Rena's older cousin." Lucius answered.

The boy had no expression on his face as if he had no opinion of Simon whatsoever. At first, she was shocked by this, but then remembered that she never saw or heard of Lucius interacting with Simon. Lucius did interact with Simon's younger brother Thomas, and rather intimately at that. However, Simon was not Thomas, so Lucius did not care about him one way or the other.

"Well that will make working with each other so much easier!" Jen said happily, then saw that Rena's face turned even more sour. "Or maybe not…"

Simon stepped forward, leaving his group behind. He approached Rena slowly, causing Lucius to step in front of her and put his hand on his machete. While he did not have an opinion of Simon, he was still a member of the Petra family and he could easily have been one of the ones that hated Rena.

Simon stopped and looked at Lucius for a moment. "Lucius right? The bodyguard that my cousin hired after he murdered two of my other cousins and then attempted to kill my brother?"

Lucius said nothing, but neither did his body posture change. He simply remained and stared down the much larger young man. Rena instinctively stepped up closer to Lucius and cradled herself into his back.

The action sparked a strange look in Simon's face. "I see. So, from bodyguard to boyfriend, eh? Well there's no way for you to marry into the family, so I'm not sure what you want to achieve."

"I don't care for the Petra family, Simon. Only for Rena." Lucius' sudden confession made Rena blush shyly for a moment.

Simon chuckled, then stepped back and bowed. "Rena, Lucius, I am sorry if any of my behavior made you uncomfortable, and I wish for us to start fresh. You should know that I have renounced my name. I am no longer Simon von Petra, simply Simon the humble adventurer."

"You did? Why, Simon?" Rena gasped.

"Well, I am not in the running for heir, but even so, I fell in love with the adventuring life. This is more my style, fighting monsters, partying with my friends… bedding exotic women." At the last part Simon laughed, joined in by a few of his party members, save for the female scout.

Lucius had known the scout was watching them, but he was able to tell she was an adventurer right away. After all, the scent of Lelvern was basically ingrained in her being now.

"Aren't you only a little older than me, Simon? Have you no propriety?"

"Haha! Who needs propriety in this life of adventure! I could die at any moment, hell a stray arrow from a goblin could end me here and now. Why not live life as it was meant to be lived!" Simon smiled at the party. "Anyway, come!

We have a small house that was given to us as a base of operations, a little crowded with all of us, but if we send Lucius and our scout, Zira to keep an eye out on the green bastards, we should have enough room."

Lucius squeezed Rena's hand momentarily and then darted off into the woods. The scout named Zira widened her eyes in surprise and took off after him. It seemed she was going to try and compete with Lucius on who can get the most information the fastest.

"Ha, poor Zira… she's one of the best scouts I have ever seen, but I've known your boyfriend for many years and he's grown strong. If that's really the case, I have no doubt he will win whatever competition those two loners cooked up in their heads." Simon continued to laugh and guided everyone to the empty house they had been using.

Rena felt slightly out of sorts, having not expected to meet one of her cousins out this far in the woods. Even more surprising than that, was the fact that he had also renounced the family name. He could have kept his status as a noble and lived quite comfortably. He was also a rather handsome man, so he would basically have the pick of the cream of the crop amongst the other noble ladies.

However, he truly seemed happy this way and she could not blame him. In fact, he seemed to be living a version of the life that she, herself, desired. A life separated from the requirements of nobility and from the pressures of the political strive among their own family.