Chapter 258: Lieve.

"Idiot! What are you doing!" She screamed the moment Lee began to pour water on his head from a larger gourd to wash off the dirt and blood."There’s no pleasing you, is there?" Lee said without looking at her, "Was that the reason you were left on the rails?"

Only after voicing his thoughts he realized how mean he sounded, but she did start cursing him first. It did stop the endless flow of curses, though.

"So what if I was discarded! You heartless bastard! You want to die from thirst?!" She said. Her tone was hateful, not offended.

"What’s it to you?" Lee didn’t hide his annoyance, "Want me to throw you on the rails again?"

"Yes, please!" She actually sounded genuine, "Except it will take days for the next steamrunner to come! Thanks a bunch!"

Lee paused, processing the implications. Then he walked over to her, picked her up by her neck, ignoring the squirming, and began pouring the water on her head.

At first she kept cursing and shouting, but after few moments began to greedily drink. Lee stopped the abuse, and fed the water normally from the gourd, allowing her to slowly drink to her fullest.

It was mind-blowing that a normal girl, or rather – a young woman in her twenties could drink so much. She was half a head shorter than Lee, thin, almost bony, but that was likely due to having gone without food or water for a long time.

"Sthrrop, stop!" She suddenly pushed Lee away, "Stop wasting it! There are people suffering from thirst!"

Lee did intend to make a sarcastic remark but had to catch her when she stumbled and fell backward. Only then did he notice that her hands and feet were bound. More importantly, she was restrained in Nullite shackles! This person, this young woman was an elemental master!

"Someone really must hate you." Lee said, carefully putting her down.

Then he sat next to her, and said, "We’re strangers, and neither have a clue what the other has been through. What would you say if we start over? My name is Lee, nice to meet you!"

"Lieve Van ... My name is Lieve." She said, "Don’t try to befriend me. I ..."

"The word on the street is that I have no clue what friendship actually means." Lee interrupted her with a smirk. "I know what you’re doing." Lieve said, "You don’t need to talk nonsense to me."

"Actually, you’re right – I don’t." Lee agreed, "You’re not suicidal, you’re desperate. You didn’t try to commit suicide by getting run over by the ... what did you call that thing? A steamrunner. You passed out on the rails. If you really wanted to kill yourself, you would’ve blown up your extremities trying to get out of the shackles and died from blood loss. It’s not that hard."

"Smartass!" She snorted.

"I have my moments." Lee nodded, "But I don’t understand one thing. How did you get here? You surely weren’t thrown off a steamrunner!"

"Why do you think so?" Lieve asked.

"I doubt you have ever ridden one. Otherwise you would’ve known that you can’t get on it the way you are." Lee said, "Is it the hate? Do you hate someone so much you needed to survive? Stop! Sorry! I went too far."

"Sigh ... what can a kid like you know ..." She shook her head.

"You would be surprised." Lee grinned in return.

"Sorry I hit you earlier." Lieve said, "I didn’t mean to ..."

"Hahaha! That you did." Lee laughed, "But you have no clue how to fight. How did you even become an elemental master?"

"Does it matter?" She asked.

"You’re right!" Lee said, "I just arrived to Hollowreach, so you’ll have to explain everything I need to know about the place and guide me. So. Which way do we go?"

He got up and patted his pants. His forehead had stopped bleeding, but half of his face was still covered in blood, His clothing was dirty, but looking at him Lieve couldn’t understand why the guy was suddenly in a good mood.

***

Lee wasn’t happy to hear that all of Hollowreach looked like plain he had arrived at. There were nothing in this world apart from endless fields of gray. It actually did turn out to be another version of Ashland, and the only difference on the surface were the dark clouds which unfortunately never brought any rain.

As it turns out, the whole life happened underground, in the mining hubs. Those were basically large towns, populated by families of miners and shepherds. Right, shepherds.

While miners did what they normally do – mine, shepherds were herding peculiar creatures, varnhollows. They were inedible and unusable in any way, but unfortunately Lieve didn’t explain what they were about.

After Lee carried her over his shoulder for the rest of the day, she said she had enough, and would rather die than bump her head one more time on Lee’s butt. The suggestion to turn her the other way was met with a cold stare, and so was the option to sit on his shoulders.

The young madam turned out to have a temper worse than a princess. The only thing Lee could do was to give her some food before meditating through the night, in hopes she would go back to being normal in the morning.

Sadly, she didn’t.

Lee felt like giving her a good spanking, to set her straight, but it probably would only make things worse. Lieve’s well-being wasn’t really his responsibility, but he didn’t intend to let her die – even if she was being unreasonable.

"How far is the closest hub?" Lee asked.

"I have no idea." She stubbornly said.

"Alright, what if I leave you enough supplies and go get a cart or something?" He asked.

"You’ll get arrested the moment you show up anywhere." Lieve said, "Illegals are ruthlessly dealt with, and the moment you open your mouth, everyone will know you’re not a local. That is – if you have a chance to say anything. You’re clothing will give you away first."

While these weren’t good news, it wouldn’t be the first time Lee had to infiltrate a place in a risky fashion. To have a local guide would’ve been much better, though.

"What if I find a key?" He asked, pointing at Lieve’s feet.

"You’re kidding, right?" She answered with a shallow laugh, "Hollowreach doesn’t hold prisoners! There’s probably one key in the world! Unless you’re a master artificer, you can’t create a five-element key to unlock Nullite shackles."

"Wait, what?" It was first time Lee heard about it. In fact, after the fake prison-break in the Nethermoon sect, he never dealt with Nullite shackles.

"Not so smart, huh?" Lieve felt like she had won the first argument since they met, "It’s a lock that requires a five-element key, otherwise it’ll blow up my hands and feet."

"Huh ... let me see ..." Lee squatted down next to her, thought for a bit, and then cut off few strands of her hair. After lady Panello abused him, his own hasn’t grown longer than quarter of an inch.

"What are ..." She intended to angrily shout, but Lee interrupted.

"Sit still!" He ordered.

Then he folded her hair, spat on his fingers and rolled the stands into a thin, stiff twist. Then he repeated his command for her to stay silent another time, and slowly inserted the improvised lockpick in the keyhole of the shackles.

Seeing what Lee was about to do, Lieve held her breath, battling a moment of panic. Then she relaxed, as if accepting the inevitable faith, but was caught by surprise when nothing happened.

"Interesting!" Lee said, sitting down next to her, "The lock is so primitive that a child could pick it. All we need to do is to find a spatial spark."

"And what? Where do you intend to stuff it?" Lieve taunted, and for a moment Lee though he understood the person who shackled her and threw in the middle of nowhere. Her mood swings were hard to handle.