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That day was a perfectly normal morning in Mondstadt. The sun is shining bright and the wind breezy. Harumasa brewed himself a cup of coffee to start perfectly fine day. He bit into his finely toasted bread. Everything is peaceful.
Until it wasn’t.
A shortened screaming can be heard from the fifth company training ground. Harumasa personally thinks that the clipped voice at the end of the screams adds to its charm, truly.
If only it wasn’t the circumstance behind it.
Harumasa closed his eyes in momentary contemplation. Should he be there? Does he want to be there? Why is his childhood friend slash vice-captain so early for training anyway.
Another clipped scream, accompanied by sound of bullets being fired. And then another scream. And sound of rushed footsteps, like that of prey running away from an apex predator.
All concerning sounds, depending on who you asked. But to Harumasa, the most concerning is the sound of Lohen’s silent laughing.
Harumasa sighed and stood up from his dinner table. Curse sense of responsibility.
In no time at all he arrived at the training ground.
Harumasa see the chaos before him and his smile momentarily lagged on his face.
In the training field, the vice-captain is looking calm while he ran, with a placating smile and an apple on his head. In front of him, a group of new recruits is holding crossbows and guns, loaded with dummy ammunition, running away from Lohen in sheer terror, snots, sweats, and tears covering their faces.
Together, the rag tag group run around the training ground in circles. Harumasa held back an exasperated sigh and pinched his nose bridge as he reached out his hand casually and caught his vice-captain’s robe, stopping him on his track.
“Vice-Captain,” he said ominously, a smile still plastered to his face. His voice is as chilling as Lohen’s cryo enhanced strikes, “What are you doing?”
“Ah, Harumasa! I am training the new recruits,” Lohen said, with face full of pretend innocence and his voice laced with thinly veiled fervor.
“They seemed so enthusiastic of this training method,” Lohen looked at the stumbling group of new recruits at the other edge of the field with glee, “right?”
The new recruits looked terrified to their core and nodded.
Harumasa gaze intensified on them, his eyes narrowing with suspicion.
The new recruits’ group, looking at the vice-captain right hand man golden eyes, nodded even more furiously.
“Say that they truly like it, but what is the point of this training? Running around like headless chicken won’t help them with their formation, I fear,” Harumasa said in rebuke. “Also, why do you still have an apple on your head? Isn’t that for stationary target practice?”
“Why its practice to hit moving pursuers while having me covering the rear for escape drills, of course!”
Lohen face is devoid of any ounce of guilt as he said this. Harumasa had the urge to nail him to the ground with his bow, but that would be waste of arrow and the perfectly nice uniform on Lohen’s body.
As Harumasa ponder upon whether to abandon the poor newcomers or help them himself, Lohen cut him to the chase, “Come to think of it, hitting moving targets is your specialty right, Ha-ru-ma-sa~”
Harumasa back chilled as he saw Lohen determined knowing smile. He knows there is no refusing him when his vice-captain is like this. Just redirecting.
Thankfully it won’t be his problem, “I mean, I am kind of busy you know, who would be doing all the paperwork now that Captain is in the middle of retiring and the magnificent vice-captain who would rather forge signatures?”
Lohen scratched his head and looked away from Harumasa’ s golden irises. He whistled as he pretends to observe some random tree and blowing bubblegum.
Before he can pull out Mika’s stolen handbook to look at recent hilichurl sighting site and go on his merry way, Harumasa pulled the trigger.
“Why don’t you do it with senior knights instead then? I think Robert would like it, considering how his experience with the Wild Hunt escape on the expedition.”
The vice-captain eyes shines with recognition, “Oh right, why didn’t I think of it!”
“Robert!”
His eyes veered over to the passing by Robert.
Robert, who just got name called, straightened so badly he almost fell on his face while shouting,“HIiieeek!!!! Yes!”
And so, the chase began anew.
‘Sorry Robert’, Harumasa muttered in his heart. ‘It’s definitely not because I wanna skip practice with Lohen myself!’
As he exited the training ground to the sound of his coworker Robert’s pleading scream, Harumasa sipped his now cold coffee and mulled if he should just resign tomorrow.
Around him, more and more knights are entering their squad’s training ground and looked in horror at fifth’s company training session.
Amongst the sound of Roberts’ screams and Lohen eerie laugh Harumasa stopped slightly in his tracks before beelining his way back to the fifth company office.
Yeah, maybe not tomorrow. But he is definitely getting a sick leave!
Fuck responsibility!
The very next day, on the Grandmaster’s desk, a very creative sick leave form was on top of the desk.
The form was duly forgotten, for the applicant was once again woken up from his dreams by his childhood friend reigns of terror in the training field.
Truly, karma—Deputy Chief.