After Surviving the Apocalypse, I Built a City in Another World novel Chapter 1519

Chapter 1519: Settling Down

The meeting ended a few hours before dusk, ending with the Lords paying for the recruits they brought in.

Like this, Alterra already recouped their costs just from the other territories’ spending. This did not even count the newcomers they managed to keep for themselves.

The rescue mission allowed them to help out their brethren, to strengthen their region, and to weaken the enemies. It could be said to be a resounding success.

The people involved would definitely be swimming in contribution points.

Anyway, the Lords were guests of the territory and were treated well. For this meeting, they were given rooms to stay in the Grand Hotel for free that night.

They were quite excited about this. The Grand Hotel was usually fully booked, so even if they visited before, they rarely succeeded in securing a room unless they reserved at least a week in advance.

When they went down, many of their cronies and others were waiting for them. Michael made the instruction to his people to just do what they wanted, and they’d just go home together.

So he wasn’t expecting anyone there.

It was still someone he didn’t expect!

She was standing right outside the Center, waiting on one of the benches.

"Brother!" she smiled, and Michael gaped like an idiot.

"Big Sister?!"

Michael’s right-hand man, Juno, was not there because he brought their newcomers directly to Bright Village. He also assumed Silvia and the rest would inform him as soon as they arrived.

However, when Silvia was reporting, she didn’t mention Misha’s name at all.

It had just become a habit for them to withhold some minor and possibly inconvenient information from Michael just to spite him. ¹

Misha ran to Michael’s arms, and the latter embraced his sister, unable to believe his eyes.

Otto had gone down just behind Michael and paused when he saw this. His blue eyes traced over Misha’s face and watched her soft expression closely.

For Raine, there was Quiro, who was waiting for her. Raine’s eyebrows rose. "Didn’t I say you can go around on your own?"

"I prefer being near you, milord," he said with a meaningful smile. "I’ll walk you to the Hotel."

Raine nodded, not seeing any issue with this. Before they could get too far, though, another voice sounded behind them. It was warm and gentle, and an overall lovely voice that people would like to hear more of.

"Lord Raine."

It was Lord Shiro. His guards were probably eating at some random restaurant or hanging around in some entertainment facility by now, and he was pretty much alone.

Raine’s eyes flickered a bit at the sight of him, and she nodded. "Lord Shiro."

The Shrao Lord looked at her and smiled, stepping forward. Unexpectedly, a body appeared to block them. It was her personal guard. Shiro heard he was a fire user.

Raine blinked and patted the man’s shoulder. "It’s fine, Quiro."

At this, the guard had no choice but to step back.

Shiro didn’t pay much attention to him, his eyes fixed on the Belluga Lord. "I’d like to invite you to dinner. Would you come with me?"

"Oh?"

"I admire your skills," he said. "And I believe we will learn a lot from each other."

Shiro had always wanted to be friends with other competent Lords. It was a learning experience and a very good alliance that would bring nothing but improvement to his home. However, he was technically an outsider in this region, and it was not easy for him to accomplish that.

For example, the reason he didn’t—and couldn’t—go to Michael because he was friends with Matthew. Although the blonde had yet to show hostility to him, the distance was definitely there.

On the other hand, he couldn’t get close to the Elders in Alterra either because one of the Elders was Matthew’s brother-in-law. Even if the other Elders didn’t have anything against him, they probably wouldn’t want to get too close to him to show respect to the late Matthew’s sister.

"Oh my..."

"Wait, the guard is handsome too! Gasp, a Love Triangle?!"

"Who cares," another said. "My fanfiction will be a hit!"

"Fool! You can’t publish them without their permission!"

"It’s for my personal enjoyment!"

The three were unaware of the passionate mumblings happening at a distance. The two men were still staring each other down, while Raine was confused, thinking of how to handle this.

Did she miss something? Did they cross paths before? She didn’t seem to remember...

Anyway, she naturally could not reject another Lord’s invite—a friendly one—without good reason. She didn’t have anything to do except go around and buy a few things, anyway.

"It’s fine, Quiro," she said, patting the man’s shoulder before looking at the other Lord. "I will go with you."

Like this, Quiro’s jaw clenched, but he had no choice but to step back a bit.

The two went to the restaurant in the hotel to eat, and entered a deep conversation about their own adventures as Lords, what they prioritized, and what they did to get where they were now.

"I’m sure you know of my awkward position," he said.

"They won’t hold it against you in a personal sense. Don’t worry," Raine said. "They are rational people. However, I do recommend that you apologize personally to Melissa."

"She will never forgive me," he said. It was not he who killed her brother directly, but he might as well have. And for what?

He wished he could stab Caine himself, but that bastard had long been eaten up by maggots.

Raine smiled, remembering some words Elias shared with her before, when she talked to him about what she was unable to do for Kimmy back then, and how much it ate her up inside. 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

"An apology is not the key to unlock forgiveness," she told him. "It is proof that you believe the door still matters."