New Life : A Second Chance

Watching her shocked face, with the hot chocolate dripping a bit at the side of her mouth, he laughed softly. He certainly was going to miss this. He had to admit, teasing Sayuri had been kinda fun even though he didn\'t do it often.

"Wha-" Sayuri began, when Kyle interrupted her, raising a hand up.

"It\'s one of the rules in the test, actually," Kyle said, "If a target is chosen, that said target is ... get ready for this ... part of the ninja family as well."

"After all, what will happen should you fail in the mission and the target found out about our hidden world?" Kyle pointed out.

Sayuri groaned, hiding her face in her hands, "Oh gosh. That\'s so obvious!! Why didn\'t I think of that?!"

"Because you never thought you\'d fail," Kyle said, "And even if you did fail, you never considered the possibility that I\'d find out about it."

She sighed, her head still in her hands, "This is so embarrassing. So you knew the whole time?"

"Well, yeah," Kyle said, "Part of the test was to see if you could actually remain hidden. I\'m one of the assessors, after all."

Sayuri was mortified.

To think that she had once been so arrogant as to dismiss Kyle as a useless rich kid when he was actually part of the ninja clan as well. For him to be an assessor meant that his skills were higher than hers.

It was another face-slap, but not as hard as it would have been. It only served as a reminder to her to never judge a book by its cover ... and that there will always be a higher mountain.

Didn\'t mean she wasn\'t still feeling bad about it, though.

Kyle took her hands in his, and forced them open, to reveal her face. He looked at her closely, bringing his face near to hers and tilted his head a bit, smiling gently.

"You are good, Sayuri," Kyle said, and she could hear the sincerity in his voice. He wasn\'t just saying it. He truly meant it.

Sayuri was touched.

"I wanted to tell you that personally before I left," Kyle said seriously.

He let her hands go and she sat back, not caring to admit that having his face so close to her just now had affected her a bit. She hadn\'t noticed it before, but he also smelt nice.

She couldn\'t identify the smell, though. It was just ... nice ...

"Where are you going?" Sayuri asked, shaking her head, "Is it a ninja mission?"

Kyle shook his head, "No. Personal mission. I\'ve decided that it\'s time for me, to do something for me."

"I\'ve lived my whole life for others, so this time, I\'m going to be selfish a bit," Kyle said.

Sayuri nodded in understanding.

The past few months here gave her a sense of liberation that she hadn\'t had before. However, unlike Kyle, she couldn\'t afford to just leave it all behind on a whim.

"Grandmaster told me to tell you that you can stay and finish your schooling here if you want," Kyle said.

"What? Really?" Sayuri said in surprise.

"Yes," Kyle replied, "It\'s only another two and a half more years after all. The company isn\'t going anywhere and it\'s not like you\'re disconnected from the ninja world. Though you are to report to my Master at least once every two months."

"Er, why is that? Are you part of the Koga Clan as well?"

"Heck no," Kyle answered with a laugh, "We\'re not even a clan. There\'s just me and Master Kato now. Father and your Grandfather seem to be very close friends, so he asked Father to take care of you should you decide to stay."

"Ah, so it\'s just an informal thing," Sayuri said in understanding, "Like visiting family."

"Yeah, though in this case, it\'s a Ninja family," Kyle replied.

"I heard about the Kato clan. There\'s really just the two of you left?"

"Well, not really. There are many side branches but no direct descendant of pure blood," Kyle said.

In the ninja world, \'pure blood\' meant that the person wasn\'t associated with any other ninja clan and did not mean he had to be blood-related. Since Kyle had no ties with any ninja clan, he is considered a \'pure blood\', even though he was adopted.

"It\'s a pity. The clan used to be so huge," Sayuri said with a sigh.

The Kato clan was one of the clans she admired during her studies.

"No plans to revive it?" she asked curiously.

"Well, I don\'t quite think I can repopulate the entire clan all by myself," Kyle said with a straight face.

"Why not?" Sayuri answered, with an equally straight face, "It\'s not like you\'re the one who\'s going to be carrying the babies. All you need is 100 concubines and within one generation, the clan will be huge again."

Looking at Kyle up and down, "And I doubt you\'re going to find it difficult to find that 100 concubines."

Kyle gave a slow, sexy smile and leaned closer to her, asking, "So, are you going to be one of those 100 concubines?"

Sayuri snorted and pushed him away "You wish. Stop using that Seduction Art on me. Won\'t work."

Kyle snapped his fingers, "It was worth a try."

"So many things make sense now!" Sayuri said as she got up to go to the kitchen. Getting a hand towel and wetting it, she proceeded to wipe the sticky stain on the table.

"Such as?"

"The way you could disappear so quickly whenever Sarah came into view," Sayuri said.

"Ah, yes. Sarah," Kyle grimaced.

"Are you going to see her before you go?"

Kyle stared at Sayuri, hardly believing that she had asked that.