"Nem! We're back."

"Nem?"

"Nem, where are you?"

We couldn't find Nem anywhere in the house. He was scared to leave the house earlier, so we told him to stay inside. But now it seemed like he had left on his own.

"This is all my fault..."

I thought he would be fine in the house.

"No, Unnie. I should have stayed with him instead of going out."

Both of us were dejected.

"He couldn't have gone far. It's only been 10 minutes since we left. He should've just gone outside to see the town, right?"

Thea and Leaf stood up straight.

"Let's go and search for him."

"Let's ask Silas for help."

We went back to find Silas at the silver wolf merchants store.

"Silas, we need your help! It's urgent!"

"Yes, Miss Thea."

"Nem is gone! Send people out to find him."

"The kid? I'll dispatch my people immediately."

As Silas rushed to contact his people, an employee of his rushed in.

"Sir, I have a report. Oh, Miss Thea. Perfect timing! I have information for you."

"Information?"

"Yes. While patrolling just now, we saw the kid that you took in today in the forest. He was running towards something. We caught him but he wouldn't return with us and is resisting a lot."

"Lead the way, hurry."

"Yes, ma'am."

Leaf stayed behind and we left for the forest immediately. Following the man who came to make the report, we started to hear some shouts as we closed in on an area.

"Let me go!"

It was the voice of Nem, demanding to be let go. Moving through the trees and bushes, we quickly came up to Nem.

Nem was being held by a brown haired man. An employee of Silas. There was blood on the man's arms from being scratched at. It was not a lot, but it was visible.

Nem was moving around, trying to escape the man's grasp. But the man wouldn't budge at all. He firmly held on to Nem even though he was being hurt.

"Sir, you're here!"

Another man who was besides the brown hair man quickly approached us.

"What happened?"

I couldn't wait and immediately asked.

"Yes, ma'am. We captured the child since it seemed something was wrong. But he doesn't stop trying to escape. He keeps wanting to head into a particular direction."

I approached Nem who was still struggling.

"Nem, what's wrong?"

I stood in front of Nem and gently asked him. He looked towards me.

"I-I have to go."

"Where do you need to go? I'll bring you there."

"I don't know, but I have to go."

"Do you know the way? Are you sure you can lead me the place?"

"Yes, I know! I can definitely go there."

"I see. Silas."

"Yes, Miss Thea."

"You guys go back and take care of Leaf. I'll go with Nem here and figure out what happened."

"Yes? You'll go alone?"

"Yes I will, do you have a problem with that?"

"No no, that's not what I meant."

Silas's face was flustered.

"We'll be going then. Take care of Leaf."

The man who was holding Nem let him go.

"Good luck, Miss Thea."

Silas waved us goodbye and we left.

***

Me and Nem walked for a bit. Almost 15 minutes.

"Nem, where are you going? Can you tell me?"

I was following Nem silently. But I couldn't anymore and finally asked a question.

"I'm following the smell."

"A smell?"

"From there!"

As if Nem suddenly found a diamond in a mine, he ran towards a cave on the side of a hill.

"Nem stop!"

We didn't know what was in the cave, so Nem rushing in was extremely dangerous. But Nem didn't stop at my command.

"Float!"

I urged my mana to make Nem float. Nem, who was running, slowly felt his feet not hit the ground. With each step he took, the feedback he received when hitting the ground was reduced. Until, he hit the ground no more. And was floating in the air.

"Stop being in such a hurry. If you won't tell me what you are after, then I will go check it myself."

"No, don't stop me. I have to go."

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

I wasn't going to let Nem, who is just a child, go ahead of me. I could instinctively feel something. Inside the cave, there was danger. I didn't know what kind of danger there was, but something that could harm Nem was in there.

At moments like these, I wish there was a detection magic.

Leaving Nem floating in the air, I headed into the cave alone. The cave was dark, around 10m was the depth. The end was pure darkness. I casted a simple light orb spell.

"Light."

In an instant, the whole cave was lit up. The darkness disappeared and the end of the cave was before my eyes. And what was in front of me was appalling.

The body of a person. Cut into several pieces and sprawled over the floor.

A normal person would feel their stomach turn from the scene and immediately look away. But I was a strong person....

'I can do this!'

Feeling the urge to spill my stomach contents, I gathered up my courage and looked at the body. I could tell from the face that it was a older woman. And from the head, you could tell it was a beast-woman.

There was a ring on the floor besides the woman. I didn't see any other object of interest, so I went to pick the ring up.

At that moment, there was a huge explosion in the cave.

***

Before the explosion in the cave. There was a man on a far away hill. From that hill, he could see the cave's location. The man was just sitting around doing nothing.

"Goddamn it, when is that kid gonna show up."

He was disgruntled.

"If only those two idiots caught him before, I wouldn't have to waste my time here."

This man was a member of the bone hound gang. He was in a trio with the other two people who were sent to chase after Nem.

He was waiting for Nem to follow the scent of his mother to the cave. He had planted explosives under the body and if someone got close to the body it would explode. He had planting a trap.

At this moment, he heard a large explosion come from the direction of the cave.

"Finally, now I can go back to report. The leader will be happy to know that the kid is dead."

As if the death of Nem was confirmed, the man quickly packed his things and left to report to the leader of the bone hound gang.

***

Nem was outside the cave, floating, when the cave exploded.

"NO!"

He got scared that Thea had died in that explosion. Then he started to blame himself.

'It's my fault. I made the nice lady die. I killed her.'

And Nem began to cry. Thinking he killed the lady who was nice to him.

What Nem failed to notice was the blue bubble around him that appeared right as the explosion went off. He was too focused on his guilty to notice the barrier. At that moment, Thea's voice was heard again.

"Don't cry, Nem."

"I'm sorry...I'm sorry."

Thea appeared from inside the explosion. Nem was still crying even though Thea was right in front of him. He could not believe that Thea was still alive.

"Stop crying, Nem."

Thea walked into the barrier and put her hands on Nem's face. Only now did Nem calm down.

"You-you're not dead?"

"Yes, Nem. An explosion like that can't kill me."

Nem was flabbergasted. He saw the explosion engulf Thea, so he didn't think there was any way she would have survived.

"I cast a shield on you and me right as the explosion went off."

Nem was sniffing his nose, trying to hold back his tears.

"Here. This is yours, right?"

I gave the ring I picked up to him.

"M-Mom's ring..."

As I thought so, the woman was related to Nem. She was Nem's mother.

"Let's go back, Nem."

"But my mom..."

"She's not there anymore. Let's go back now."

I didn't tell him anything more about his mother. There's no need to tell a small child what happened to his mother.

"...ok..."

With tears in his eyes flowing down, Nem softly agreed to go back. All along the way, my mood was sour. I figured out that they set a trap for Nem. It was obvious.

'Daring to kill a child.'

It made my blood boil.

***

We arrived back at the orphanage.

"Unnie, Nem!"

Leaf came to greet us at the door.

"Nem is already asleep?"

On the way back, Nem started to feel tired. It was expected. It was a tiring day for him after all. So I picked him up and he fell asleep on my shoulder.

He's sleeping very soundly it seems. I hope he gets only good sleeps from now on.

"Yes, he just fell asleep. I'll give him the room next to your, is that okay?"

"Of course. I have no problem."

After setting the sleeping Nem in the room, me and Leaf went and sat in the living room.

"Leaf. Tomorrow your training begins."

"My training?"

"You said you wanted to learn magic, didn't you?"

Hearing my words, Leaf's eyes lit up.

"Really?! Are you really going to teach me?"

"Of course, I said I will so I absolutely will."

"Yay!"

Leaf was jumping up and down in joy. She was clapping her hands. I could feel her excitement from her humming.

I was going to teach her, but it was not going to be this soon. I had planned to start in a few days when some of the training materials for magic classes would have arrived. But I decided that I had to begin earlier because there was a need for it.

First, there was the matter of protection. If I start with Leaf's training earlier, the better she will be able to protect herself and others around herself. Secondly, there is some training that doesn't need any teaching materials. It's what Leaf will be doing for the next few days.

"Thank you, Unnie."

Leaf, who was celebrating her upcoming lessons already, suddenly turned to me and said. Her face was flushed red from shyness. I don't think she had ever said words of appreciation to anyone ever before.

"Not only did you take me into your home, give me food and water. And my own room to sleep in. But you're even teaching me magic."

"It's nothing much, Leaf."

"No, Unnie. You've done a lot for me. Is-is there anything I can do for you?"

I put my hand on Leaf and slowly brush her hair.

"Leaf, you're a very smart child."

"I am? I don't think I'm that-"

"You are a smart child, okay. And I want you to live a long and happy life. There's no need for you to thank me."

"but still-"

"Okay, how about you do this one thing for me?"

"Yes, anything!"

"Try your best at learning in the future."

"Of course!"

"That's all you need to do. Did you finish reading the book?"

"Uhm..."

Leaf's face turned red once again and she looked away. Why would that be?

'It can't be...'

"You can't read?"

"...sorry."

"What were you doing earlier then?"

"Oh that...it had nice pictures to look at..."

'Well, she is a child.'

"Seems I will also have to teach you how to read and write."

I smiled at Leaf. It wasn't really a tedious task. I welcomed the challenge of teaching.

"Well...I wonder if you'll be thankful to me starting tomorrow."

"What do you mean, Unnie?"

"Hehehehe..."

"W-what training are we doing?"

"You'll love it."

"I'll love it? But what is it?"

"It's a secret."

"What?! Please tell me."

"Not gonna happen."

***

The night went by fast. The three of us at the orphanage slept soundly while Silas and his people went after the people from the bone hound gang.

In the morning, it was time for Leaf's training. At the back of the orphanage, there was a big space. A part of it was going to be for my herb farm. And the rest was going to be a play area.

"Alright Leaf, run!"

"Run?"

"Yes, that's your training."

"Ok."

Nem and I were sitting at the side. I brought two chairs outside just for this. Around four minutes later, Leaf was panting while running around the edge of the backyard. She had such terrible stamina. Just a few minutes of running made her exhausted.

"H-how long....?"

Leaf asked through her breath.

"For however long you can."

"What..."

"Good luck."

"...Unnie...."

Leaf kept running. Her body was covered in sweat and her face was starting to become red, but she still kept running. Honestly, I had expected her to stop very early.

After ten whole minutes of running, Leaf still did not stop yet. So, I ordered her to stop.

"Alright Leaf, that's enough. Stop running."

"...but...I can....still...."

Leaf didn't want to give up just yet.

"Come here already, or you're not learning magic."

Leaf immediately had a burst of energy and rushed to in front of me.

"Well done, Leaf. You ran for 10 minutes whole."

"But...why do I need to run?"

"Because you're too brittle."

"If I'm too brittle, I can't learn magic?"

"Exactly. You need a strong body to handle mana with. A fit body means a lot."

"How so?"

"Well, first thing. The body is a vessel for containing mana. A healthy body is able to hold much more mana. By training your body, you become more...aware of your body. This makes your mana control better."

"So are you really strong?"

"Me? Well...not really."

"Unnie, why are you making me run so much then?"

"Well, it doesn't hurt for you to be healthy. Now, rest up. You're doing more running in a bit."

After resting up, Leaf was once again ready to run.

"Ok, don't run too fast. Just go at a nice pace and take deep breaths."

"Ok, Unnie."

Leaf started to run again. And behind her was Nem who wanted to run with Leaf. Leaf quickly started to lose her speed but Nem wasn't even slightly tired. He had a steady breath and ran at the same speed as before.

He didn't run faster than Leaf and followed behind her at all times. It felt like to me that Nem was enjoying simply following behind Leaf.

Just five minutes of running later, Leaf stopped running.

"Alright, children. Come, let's have breakfast now. And, well done today Leaf."

The children washed their faces and had breakfast. Then it was time to teach them how to read and write.

"You already have great speaking skills, Leaf."

"T-thank you, Unnie."

Leaf's face blushed at the compliment given to her.

"How about you, Nem? Are your speaking skills good?"

Nem shook his head. I smiled and patted his head.

"It's alright, there's plenty of time to learn. You're only eight this year. Let's try our best, okay?"

Nem vigorously nodded his head. Very enthusiastic to learn.

"Okay, let's start our lesson."

I tried to teach them the basics, but it didn't work too well. The lesson ended with not much being done. In the afternoon, Su arrived to talk about her employment at my garden.