Chapter 41: Reunion

"I still can't believe you actually have today planned out this well." Tiy conversed with Shry, while his hands stayed busy.
Since Shry and Tiy are still 10 years old, they aren't tall enough to help with most of the decorating and setup, so they were put on bush duty, tying snacks and other goodies onto the bushes around the area, creating a fun little game for everyone to play.
"What! How dare you not have faith in me?" Shry spoke in offense, defending himself bombastically from Tiy's blasphemic words.
"Huh!... Urg Yeah, what you did is amazing." Tiy showed a face of disgust at the beginning before retracting it and giving a genuine compliment, choosing to believe in his friend.
Hearing his friend's compliment, Shry acted natural, turning his head away from Tiy before producing a cheeky smile that he had been holding back.
"Hehe, thank you, Mr. Luftra, but I'll be taking all the praise today." Shry secretly muttered to himself.
In the midst of his own thoughts, Shry suddenly heard a familiar female voice calling out his name.
"Shry! I can't believe you actually put this all together; it looks spectacular." Rekka shouted as she ran to Shry, continuing to perpetuate the image Shry unintentionally fostered with his tricks and eccentricity.
"Why...? Why does everyone hate me...?" Shry said to himself sarcastically, secretly smiling seeing that Rekka and, by association, Ren came so early to help him.
Although Shry's voice was quiet, Tiy and Rekka actually heard what he was saying, each showing a different expression reflecting their personalities, expressing discomfort at what Shry said, until Shry threw in a curveballto trip them up.
"Welcome!" 
Shry's voice completely flipped to become incredibly enthusiastic as he invited Rekka to join them, holding up one of the ribbons after reaching his hand into the bag they had been drawing their materials from for the past hour.
Without even thinking, Rekka took the ribbon from Shry's hand, and not questioning it, she copied what the duo were doing, tying the goodies onto the bushes as well.
Seeing that Rekka will also be helping, Shry moved the bag of material in front of his lap, being considerate toward Rekka, who's generous enough to come help them.
"Where's Ren? Did he get torn apart from you by someone?" Shry asked, looking around and not seeing Ren anywhere near Rekka.
"He went to find Auntie Shelt; originally I was searching for her as well, but then I saw you!" Rekka answered, her smile faltering for a split moment before picking back up, hoping that no one noticed.
And luckily for her, no one did due to her immaculate talent to hide her emotions.
"That's strange, and also thank you for choosing me instead, hehe." Shry's smile beamed.
Besides helping Shry with his party, Ren and Rekka actually had an alternative motive for coming early.
They were actually here to talk to Shelt about Ren's experience; they don't really know what they were after, but they, or Ren at least, felt like he could gain some closure after his recently reopened mental wounds.
...
"You're the overseer of this Resonance Hall!" Estin's voice raised in surprise.
"Oh right, I remember now! You were the proctor during our resonance day; you're the reason that I got to meet Shry!" Yuwwe expressed gratefulness as the cloud shrouding her memory began to alleviate.
"Yeah... That was a truly unforgettable day" Hytile confirmed, muttering the last sentence under his breath, not sure if he should smile or not.
"Jeez, today is really packed with surprises, huh?" Estin spoke, her professional shell finally crumbled as surprise after surprise cracked it apart.
"You better be prepared for even more surprises, because even I'm getting a bit antsy today." Hytile half joked, giving out a small but very cohesive smile as he vaguely hinted that the big surprise will be something that could shake the world.
"Really... I'm not going to pry; it's clearly a surprise for that kid." Estin was curious but decided to politely hold off on asking, half scared of what she'll hear next, after she's heard about the many impossible feats this man and Shry had achieved.
During the past 10 minutes, Yuwwe, Estin, and Hytile had been walking all around the Resonance Hall, as Hytile thoroughly inspected everything he planned to make sure it was all up to his standards while also talking about his student with great delight, sometimes unintentionally leaking some of their projects, which shocked the two sisters, mainly Estin, endlessly since, as a doctor of her level, she had to have studied about the deep intricacies of Natural Node.
"One question still bothers me... Aren't the Resonance Halls supposed to have extremely strict rules? How can you do this? I relate to the experiment part, but this is just a party" Estin interrogated, finally dropping the question that was on her mind since the beginning.
Hearing that question, Hytile and his habit of over-elaborating began to flare, ready to unleash a storm of information on Estin. Stopping in place as he got ready to tell Estin about the system of the overseers and Resonance Halls, Hytile's thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a young girl's voice.
"Em... I'll go look for Shry now. Thank you, Mr. Luftra, for touring us around." Yuwwe finally spoke up, bringing attention to herself before she left.
Yuwwe had been feeling a bit left out during their tour, especially when the two adults began discussing stuff she doesn't understand. 
So, now that the conversation seemed to have receded, opening the perfect opportunity for her to extricate herself from the group so she can go meet with her friend of many surprises. 
"Oh! Sorry for holding you up, go ahead! He's really excited to see you." Hytile apologized and egged her on, giving her a boost in determination as she set out to find her friend.
With that over with, Estin suddenly felt a tingle, as her instincts began to tell her that something crazy was about to occur, or more specifically, a crazy piece of information.
...
"Yo, how's it going, Tiy, Shry?" A girl the same age as Shry and Tiy announced her presence as she approached the two friends and a 16-year-old teenage girl she didn't know.
The 10-year-old girl had wavy burgundy blonde hair and sky blue eyes. The girl wore simple attire that's more cool-looking than pretty; she had on a burgundy short-sleeve shirt, and as for her pants, she wore clean and clear long black pants that are so dark you can barely see the creases.
"Hey Cydel! We're just about finished," Shry answered jovially, revealing the name of the girl, a friend that semi-left Shry's group.
Ever since the Resonance Day, Tiy and Cydel had maintained a healthy rivalry with each other, each pushing the other to break their limits.
But as Shry's friends began to leave him, leaving Tiy and Cydel as the only friends that remained, Cydel started unconsciously to drift apart, not really because of Shry, but because of her rivalry with Tiy. 
"Let's duel later; get yourself ready, because I have a new sequence, heheh" Tiy challenges Cydel, chuckling with arrogance.
"Yeah! Fight me too!" Shry interrupted with a clearly fake battle cry.
"Bring it on! I can take both of you at the same time." Cydel's smile turned slightly savage as she accepted both of her friend's challenges.
As a musk of dark stormy cloud began to rise in between the three, mainly Tiy and Cydel. 
Quickly, as they were fired up, Shry and Tiy stopped what they were doing and faced Cydel.
"Eh?" Rekka uttered cutely as she watched Shry and Tiy leave, leaving her alone and forgotten about.
...
"And so, this party is actually a way for us to celebrate Shry; we even have some other overseers attending today as well" Hytile, facing Estin, finally got to the point of Estin's question after delivering a bunch of exposition she didn't ask for. 
Immediately after Kanum ended his explanation, he felt a small tug on his pants, causing him to instinctively turn to the source of that sensation.
Hytile found Shry behind him along with two other kids, politely waiting for him to finish his conversation before they, or more specifically Shry, present him with an odd request.
Quickly, he excused himself from his conversation and knelt down to Shry's level. 
Used to his student's antics by now, Hytile, whenever Shry is in a scenario like this one, will always squat down, predicting that Shry will be whispering something to him at some point like the sneaky fellow he is.
"Mr. Luftra, can you supervise our three-way duel? We can test out the new disks" Shry asked his mentor with familiarity, as well as raising a bargaining chip.
Surprised by Shry's request, Hytile took a moment to think about it before he stood back up and answered Shry's request.
"Great, this'll be the perfect example of what we're researching," Hytile said to Estin, with a voice that sounded grateful for the turn of events.
"Let's go to the back of the Resonance Hall; we have a testing field there," Hytile continued, raising his thumb and presumably pointing to the back of the Resonance Hall.
"Uhh... Why do you have a testing field..." Estin asked, her eyes twitching, having had another preconceived notion be shattered.
Without saying anything, Hytile just continued on his way with Shry leading the flock, only briefly turning around to beckon for Estin to join them.
"Hey! Wait for me!" Suddenly, a little girl's voice called out, her voice sounding shaky as she ran.
Hearing a familiar voice call out his name, Shry immediately stopped; the people following him followed suit.
"Hey Yuwwe!" Shry greeted 
Turning to his left, Shry immediately found a familiar face, and after he greeted her, without any warning, he began running, forcing Yuwwe to run after him.
"C'mon! I've been going around trying to find you, and this is how you repay me!" Yuwwe yelled in opposition but in the end was forced to run after Shry.
"I guess that's the... birthday boy?" Caught up in the moment, Estin mistakenly blurted.
"Yup, come on now, even your little sister is joining us." Kanum unconsciously accepted the birthday statement, caught up by the birthday energy the party emanated.
Hytile and the group that Shry led were left behind as he ran, still stunned by Shry's sudden sprint.
...
"DANG IT, WHERE ARE WE GOING?!" Yuwwe's screams didn't make it far as her voice drifted away by the opposing wind currents.
Right after that, Shry stopped running, stopping right in front of a large patch of dirt, affirming that this was the mentioned testing ground, barren of grass because of their many incidents related to fire, as signs of charred spots on the dirt display the frequency they deal with fire.
"Oh hey Yuwwe, I didn't see you coming." Shry said, purposefully contradicting himself.
"Hah, you! Hah, why are you..." Yuwwe barely got out her words as she greedily gasped for air, finally getting a chance to rest after running all the way there.
Feeling bad that he tricked Yuwwe, Shry wandered towards her, sparing her already depleting energy.
Shry sat down on the grass and patted the patch next to him, beckoning Yuwwe to sit with him.
"I'm sorry," Shry apologized amidst a giggle, both serious and joking at the same time.
"Hmmmf, you told me the wrong time," Yuwwe aggressively hmphed, arguing about a whole different thing from their current topic, clearly glossing over Shry's trick. 
"I wanted you to come early so we can hang out longer." Looking into the sky, Shry voiced out his reason in a rare sincere voice.
After that, somehow, despite Shry's eccentric nature, the duo just sat together on the grass in a comfortable silence as they waited for the rest to arrive.
...
"Shry! Get up, no slacking!" Tiy yelled immediately as soon as he caught up.
Instantly after Shry heard Tiy's provocation, his whole demeanor warped and switched back to his normal eccentric self.
"No way! I'm already prepared!" Shry arrogantly rebuked, pulling out a handful of coin-sized disks.
Creeping up from behind Tiy, Hytile appeared like a shadow, his visage growing more and more ominous as he approached.
"You didn't bring any of the new disks, did you?" Hytile's deadpan voice rang out as an imaginary chill wrapped around Shry.
However, seemingly unaffected by the illusory chill wrapping around him, Shry just scratched the back of his head and boldly looked into Hytile's eyes before responding.
"Nope! I will go back and get them..." Shry said as he got into a running stance, seconds away from going into a full sprint.
Before Shry could escape, though, Hytile casually stepped in his way, his face immediately turning into a defeated one.
"Stop, stop, I have them here..." Hytile said in a soft voice amidst a sigh.
When Shry separated from the group, Hytile came to realize something, so, following his intuition, he went into the registration building/current storage room and immediately found the two disks that should've been missing.
After Hytile's reveal, Shry, who was just about to sprint, stopped halfway through and began falling like a tilting tree.
"Thank you so much, Mr. Luftra" Shry expressed his gratitude while still lying on the ground after falling.
Seeing what happened to Shry, Hytile couldn't stay angry for long, especially after Shry's comical tumble.
...
Before Shry could even try to pick himself back up, Tiy and Yuwwe quickly ran to him in order to support him. 
As both of them got to Shry, because they had no coordination, both of them had a different next course of action.
Yuwwe wanted to sit Shry down so he could rest off the trauma from falling, while on the other end, Tiy went a different approach, as he went to carry Shry with his shoulders.
"Ahh, I have always wanted to duplicate," Shry said sarcastically as he was being pulled apart by Yuwwe and Tiy.
Finally noticing each other's actions, Tiy and Yuwwe both let go at the same time, causing Shry to fall again.
*Oh shoot!* Both Yuwwe and Tiy said at the same time, both going into action to save Shry from falling again.