I’d been in the Mayor’s home before. Since our village wasn’t big enough to have a town hall or community center, the Mayor and his wife often liked to host dinner parties and festivals for important days and occasions. Though most of the parties would be held outside, the kids would usually go inside the house where they would be easier to watch.

I hadn’t been young enough to be considered a kid for a while, but I at least remembered the Mayor’s house well enough to know that he’d changed some things.

For one, there was a plush red carpet that extended from the entrance, to the living room, where the Mayor was standing. If that wasn’t strange enough, inside what should have been the living room, was a long dining table that the Mayor usually only took out for his parties for seating the pregnant, elderly, or whoever else couldn’t stand for long times for whatever reason. It seated twelve comfortably, and looked ridiculous, being set up indoors.

“Oh?” he said. “I wasn’t expecting guests. Please, do come in!”

I had to hand it to him, though. The Mayor was a pretty good actor. If I didn’t know that his voice was usually an octave lower, I would’ve never guessed that something was wrong.

The Mayor had set up an assortment of pastries and drinks set up along the table and he motioned Ryuji to sit down.

“Come now, Lena and friend. I wouldn’t be a good host if I didn’t at least offer a drink or a snack. Feel free to eat as much as you want.”

Looking down at the assortment, unless Otherworlders could somehow consume ten times the amount that an average human could, it was impossible that we would make a dent on the feast of pastries laid out before us. It was like a feast meant for a king, if feasts were made exclusively of tea snacks and cookies.

It was that moment that I realized what the Mayor was doing. Was he literally trying to treat Ryuji like a King? Was it because of what I said to Bran?

“Uh, it’s okay,” Ryuji said. “I’m not actually that hungry.”

“Oh,” the Mayor said. “Then is there anything else I could do for you? Anything at all?”

“Actually there is!” Ryuji said. “Is there anything like an adventurer’s guild here in this village?”

The Mayor smiled. After I counted about ten seconds of him staring blankly at Ryuji, I realized he was employing the same tactic that I’d been using until now. Ignoring anything he didn’t understand. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like it worked when he tried to ignore a question that was asked directly to him.

“Umm,” Ryuji said, breaking the silence. “Did you hear me?”

“Oh?” The Mayor shoved his pinky in his ears. “I’m sorry, sir. It seems like my hearing’s been going bad. Old age. What did you say again?”

“I asked if there’s anything like an adventurer’s guild in the village.”

It didn’t seem like the Mayor understood completely that ignoring the question wouldn’t work a second time.

With the Mayor’s uselessness becoming more clear to me with each passing second, I didn’t hesitate to jump in before the silence became stale.

"A guild? Like a worker's guild? I wasn't aware that being an adventurer was considered a profession. I always thought it was more a lifestyle. But I guess it might be a bit different in the country you’re from,” I added quickly, once I saw the slightest hints of surprise entering Ryuji’s face.

“Ah, yeah. Yeah, adventurer’s guilds are pretty common where I’m from,” he said, accepting the excuse I handed him. “You guys really don’t have them?”

From how disappointed he sounded, I wished I could say we did, but it would just be too difficult of a lie to keep up long-term.

“No, sorry,” I said, wincing internally and bracing myself for magical destruction, in case he decided to shoot the messenger, who in this case was me. After a moment of thought, I inched towards the Mayor, deciding I could use him as a distraction if necessary. Unfortunately, he noticed and inched slowly away from me at the same pace. Bastard.

“Maybe it’s called something different?” Ryuji asked. “In my home, adventurers were brave people who were willing to do any task, no matter how dangerous or difficult it was.”

Surprisingly, the description did happen to match a lifestyle that was somewhat common in this world. Unfortunately, ‘homeless vagrant who does odd jobs for cash’ was probably a much less glamourous title than one he was searching for. I supposed ‘mercenary’ was an alternative name for that, but those were just the murderous flavour of homeless vagrants, and I preferred if we didn’t plant the idea of killing for a living into a man who was more than capable of it.

Now that the Mayor was standing across the table, having had ample time to scoot as far away from me as possible, I could see his face clearly. I saw his gears turn in his mind, and his eyes widen as he realized the same thing that I did. Except he seemed to be a lot happier about it.

“Actually, we do have something-”

“To go!” I said quickly, cutting him off as fast as possible. Though I had no way of knowing, I had a gut feeling that the Mayor was about to suggest that Ryuji’s dream job in his world was the equivalent of a homeless murderer in ours, and I didn’t want to be here when it happened.

“Something to go to!” I repeated, clarifying myself.

Ryuji and the Mayor stared blankly at me.

“I have something that I needed to do! I need to leave!” I said, clarifying myself properly on the third attempt. I hoped.

From the horrified look on the Mayor’s face as he realized I was about to leave him alone with Ryuji, I felt like I’d done a pretty good job of making myself clear. I let out an internal sigh of relief, mouthing a silent thank you to the Mayor. Though Ryuji was looking at me, I was surprised he didn’t notice the sound of the Mayor’s clothes flapping frantically as he shook his head violently.

“Ah is that so?” Ryuji said, sighing out loud.

“Oh no no,” the Mayor said. “I’m sure you can stay for just a few more moments, Lena.”

“Sorry,” I said, suddenly aware of the fact that I didn’t know his name, even though he apparently remembered mine. It reminded me of the fact that the Mayor wasn’t usually a bumbling idiot, and that he deserved to be honoured after he inevitably committed accidental suicide via Ryuji. “Thanks for having me, but I got to go.”

The Mayor looked to be near tears. The person causing his tears smiled awkwardly, not noticing the Mayor’s distress whatsoever, and rubbed the back of his head.

“Ah that’s a shame,” he said. “Well it’s been a pleasure, Mayor, but I guess we have to be heading out now.”

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It took me a few seconds to realize what Ryuji had said.

“You’re going too?” the Mayor asked, his tears slowly turning into ones of hope.

“Yeah,” Ryuji said, rubbing his head. “I feel a little bad about leaving Lena. It’s dangerous out there for a lady like her to walk alone.”

The Mayor opened his mouth, as if to protest out of pride, knowing that our village was one of the safest in the county, but for the first time since we’d come, his common sense prevailed.

“Well, it was a pleasure to meet you, Mr…” he trailed off when he realized he didn’t actually know Ryuji’s name.

“The name’s Ryuji Nightblade,” he said, with a wide smile. “Remember the name. I’ll be the best adventurer in the world one day.”

Ignoring the fact that I still wasn’t completely sure about what an adventurer was, I walked outside, hoping he wouldn’t follow me.

But he did.

“So,” Ryuji said, oblivious to my suffering. “What did you want to do again?”

I wanted to cry. I wanted to shove him to the Mayor and force him to take responsibility for Ryuji. I wanted to tell him that he didn’t need to come along, or at least ask him why he automatically assumed he was invited, but more than anything, I didn’t want to risk upsetting him.

"I needed to do something at home," I lied. "My dad needed help moving some meat." A part of me was horrified that I’d just doomed my parents into interacting with Ryuji, but I was starting to realize just how bad I was under pressure.

Plus, the childish part of me just wanted to see my parents. Have them deal with the terrifying Otherworlder for me while I buried myself under the covers, like I was five again, trying to trying to hide from thunder and lightning.

"Moving meat?" Ryuji asked. “Why would you do that?”

“My dad’s a butcher,” I said. “The village isn’t big enough that he needs more than just himself working the shop most times, but I help out whenever he needs me.”

“Oh,” he said. “That’s cool.”

Once again, I made sure to walk ahead of Ryuji, both to lead the way and to give my face a break from having to fake a smile constantly. With Ryuji outside of my field of vision, the fact that I couldn’t see his reaction made me constantly on edge. Just judging from his voice, he sounded a little distracted.

Looking around, I noticed on the way that the streets of my village were oddly empty, with a distinct lack of open windows and children playing underfoot. It seemed that news had already reached this far, but I was a little annoyed that they were making it so obvious. Was this the reason he sounded distracted?

I opened my mouth. I wanted to say something, anything to draw his attention back to me, so he wouldn’t notice the strange emptiness of the streets, but the words died in my throat. I couldn’t help it. Even if was just pure bad luck, I knew the responsibility had been given to me to keep Ryuji from snapping and killing us all. Even so, I couldn’t help but want to pretend like I didn’t exist, in the wild hope that he’d somehow forget about me.

So I kept quiet. We didn’t have much further to walk anyways.

My house was a bit separated from the other houses, since my grandparents had built the house knowing that it would be used as a butchery. Animal blood was a scent that I no longer noticed, but they had built the house a bit further from the other houses so that our neighbours wouldn’t be forced to live with the smell. There was a large stretch of road where there weren’t any more empty houses to look at, but Ryuji still kept silent.

By the time we reached my house, I was sweating, prepared to cry from how tense the silence between us had gotten. I was still too scared to look back at Ryuji, afraid to see an angry scowl on his face after I’d unknowingly offended him in some way, so I just didn’t look back. The only thing I could do was to silently pray that everything was alright.

The front door to my house was the customer’s entrance, which I rarely used, but I didn’t want to lead Ryuji into the part of my home where I slept in, for obvious reasons. It led to a small foyer, where a large counter separated the room from the rest of the house.

Sitting at the other side of the counter was Dad.

Though he was well-liked in the village, Dad was a big guy and the sight of him usually scared the more skittish of the village kids. I didn’t blame them, knowing that the combination of his resting scowl and the permanent animal blood stains smeared on a majority of his clothes made his appearance a bit scary to anyone who wasn’t used to him. I could tell he was nervous. He only ever crossed his arms when he was uncomfortable.

Even so, his face didn’t betray anything, his naturally stiff expression working out in his favour.

“Hi dad!” I yelled a bit too loud and waving a bit too wildly.

“Daughter,” he said. “How are you?”

Terrified and scared out of my mind. “Great!” I said instead.

He locked eyes with me and nodded.

In that moment, I couldn’t help but feel real hope. My dad always had my back, and I knew that if anyone could get me out of this situation, it was him.

Growing up with him, I had learned that even though most people assumed he was stoic from how monotone his voice was and how little his face moved, my dad was far from expressionless. It was in the minor details, and most importantly his eyes, where I’d learned to read his emotions. Staring into them now, I could tell that he was scared, and that all he wanted to do was to run away from the monster stalking me, but that he wouldn’t. His eyes promised to keep me safe.

I couldn’t help it. I cried.

Thankfully, it wasn’t loud. I felt the tears running down my cheeks, but I also felt a genuine smile spread across my lips.

“Hello, sir,” Ryuji said from behind me. My smile fell somewhat as I was reminded of why I was so scared in the first place. He was still trailing behind me, so I was confident that he hadn’t seen my tears, but I wiped them away as quickly as I could.

My dad broke eye contact with me to face the threat.

“Hello, young man,” he said.

“It’s nice to meet you, sir. My name is Ryuji Nightblade.”

“I am Hal,” my dad replied. “Would you like to purchase some meats?”

“Umm, no. I was just here to help Lena. She said she had some chores to do,” Ryuji said, sounding uncertain.

My dad raised an eyebrow, an intentional gesture since he usually wasn’t expressive enough to let his surprise show so obviously. “Why would you want to do that? No. You’re here to purchase some meat. You look like a traveler of sorts. Come in. I’ll show you some jerky you can purchase for cheap. Good for the road.”

“I don’t-“

“I insist. Even if you have no money, I’m not so cruel-hearted to let you leave without at least a sample. As I tell all my customers, the first purchase comes free.”

I wasn’t sure whether it was a good idea to be so pushy, especially with such a nonsensical claim. I was about to lose faith in my dad’s abilities, until Ryuji spoke up.

“O-oh. That’s nice of you. I guess it wouldn’t hurt.”

My dad nodded, as if expecting nothing else. In reality, I could see the bright flash of relief in his eyes as he turned to me. “As for you, young lady. Your mother has been searching for you all day. Why don’t you go into the house and see what she wants.”

For a second, I wanted to stay. I knew how stressful it was to be in the presence of an Otherworlder, and a part of me just didn’t want to subject my dad to dealing with it on his own. The larger part of me just wanted out.

“Alright. I’ll go see what mom wants,” I said, practically running forward, a bounce in my step. I still felt bad about leaving my dad to deal with this on his own but I was too relieved to care.

But when my dad’s eyes widened almost imperceptibly, with a flash of anger and fear, I couldn’t help but freeze in place. With how stoic he usually was, the slight motion of is brow was the equivalent of a normal man letting out a sharp gasp.

I stayed in place and watched his eyes dart wildly between me and Ryuji, who was still standing behind me, but he said nothing.

Eventually I tried to move again, but the look on his face gave me pause. He looked like he was about to cry. Thankfully, Ryuji didn’t seem to notice, which made sense since my dad had only slightly furrowed his brow. I searched my dad’s face, asking for any sort of explanation, and he seemed to register my silent question because he nodded.

“Excuse me for one second.”

By the time he disappeared into the door leading into the rest of our house, I couldn’t wipe the shock from my face. I hadn’t had much faith in Bran or the Mayor, but the fact that my own father had abandoned me to deal with this monster on my own was like a punch in the gut.

Before I could consider shouting at him, Ryuji spoke up.

“Well. He seemed nice.”

I quickly wiped my sleeve across my eyes in case there were still tears there before I turned back around to face him.

“Yeah, I guess.”

Before I could actually badmouth him like I'd planned, my dad popped back out from behind the door, making me take back all of the nasty things I was about to say about his receding hairline.

“I am back,” he said, sounding slightly out of breath, for some reason. “Lena, your mother is waiting. She wishes to speak to you.”

Something about the way he said that put my teeth on edge, but I was so eager to leave the room that I didn’t think twice about it. I nodded and almost ran towards the door, not even bothering to say bye to Ryuji. It probably wasn’t the best idea to be rude for no reason, but I could feel myself nearing the breaking point, and I didn’t want to interact with him for a second longer than I had to.

Bending down underneath the counter to reach the back, I saw my dad wince at the action, but he said nothing as I pushed my way into our house.

I jumped at the sight of my mother hiding right behind the door, tears flowing freely as she held her hand over her mouth, as if she were physically holding back a scream. At the sight of me, her knees buckled from underneath her and she sank slowly to the ground.

I rushed over to her side to help her up before her words made me pause.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “This is all my fault.”