Chapter 34 - A Father's Problems (Unknown Demon POV)
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I digged out of the tunnel, the soft dirt, moved by the wind and rain of the week before, falling behind me as the rays of Sel hit my face. The makeshift tunnel apparently ended in one of the shallow valleys that steeply went down the mountain that were common on the dragon peaks.
I turned around and extended one of my clawed hands inside the tunnel, reaching for the soft, pale blue hand of Nekana. She caught one of my large fingers and pulled herself out of the hole.
Soon she was standing next to me, the silvery light of the first moon dancing on her young blue face while her black leather armor seemed to absorb any light that dared come near to it. She unfurled her bat-like wings, before stretching them along with her arms, legs and tail.
“Are you sure we managed to get to the other side? It doesn’t look that different,” she asked me, looking around at the rocks and grass that surrounded us.
“Nature doesn’t care for humans and demons, Nekana. What were you expecting?”
“I don’t know, maybe those horse and cow things roaming around?”
“Stop being dumb. Not even the humans are so stupid to raise livestock near the Dragon Peaks.”
I probably sounded angry to her, again, for as soon as I finished speaking she said, in a feeble voice, with her eyes cast down, “sorry, sir.”
As always, not knowing what to say to the girl, who wasn’t even out of her teens yet, to cheer her up and clear the misunderstanding, I just ignored the sadness in her eyes and said, “let’s go, I want to reach the plains before dawn. I don’t want the humans to find us here,” before starting to march south.
Using the shadows in our favor to make sure no human patrol could spot us, we slowly descended the mountain. For hours nothing but the wind, grass, rocks and Sel kept us company as we went down the mountainside until we came out of the valley into a large opening, where the many small streams that flowed at the bottom of the shallow valleys merged in a lake, before dividing again in dozens of little streams that formed just as many valleys. The first rays of Nen of the season hit us when we entered the opening and we both turned to see the second moon resting on the dark sea.
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“It’s beautiful,” Nekana said, almost in a whisper, next to me.
“We have to move, we are too exposed here,” I said, resuming the march.
“Yes,” she said, hurrying behind me.
We kept walking from a valley to another as we descended the Dragon Peaks, slowly small bushes and pine trees started appearing on the wild slopes of the mountain.
Our march was suddenly interrupted by a screeching sound and a flash of light. I raised my head to see a griffon spiraling down enveloped in flames as three other griffons flew from a dragon. I pushed Nekana between some low trees and hid there with her, watching as the griffon crashed only a few dozens of meters from us.
From the flames the figure of a burning human rose and, with undying determination, started crawling towards the small stream. Soon he reached it and threw himself in the freezing cold water.
I motioned Nekana to move while keeping herself to the trees to remain hidden and started walking.
As walked away from the scene of the crash we heard a loud gasp for air and turned around to see the almost unrecognizable human on the riverbank, still half submerged in the water. He reached for his belt and took something, only to start shouting soon after as he threw a broken and empty flask at the ground in front of him.
As the human shouted I saw Nekana clutching a dagger in her hands, hatred, caused by the lie I told her may years before, in her eyes. I put an hand on her shoulder, which startled her and made her turn my way. I stared deep into her eyes before shaking my head and forcing her to resume the march.
After almost another hour had passed she stepped in front of me and said, “why did you stop me?”
I slapped her and said, “it was useless and risky, and you know it. If you can’t control your hatred you’d better return home now.”
“How can I? Those beasts killed my pa-”
I interrupter her shouting with another slap and said, “it’s the last time I’m going to say this, if you can’t control you hatred you better return home.You knew what the mission entitled.”
She looked at me, her eyes damp, before nodding and saying, “sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.”
“Good, let’s go now,” I said and started marching again.
We finally reached the forest at the foot of the Dragon Peaks as dawn was approaching. We entered and stopped just behind the border of the forest and I said to Nekana, “we should turn into our disguises now that we are still unseen.”
She just nodded before activating the racial skill that succubi shared with vampires, morphing into a plain looking human girl, meanwhile I activated several mind magic spells on me so that I looked like an old male human in old traveler clothing from the outside.
As I watched the young half succubus taking some plain traveling clothes out of her bag only one thought crossed my mind.
(I wished she’d call me father at least once.)