POV: Danny

The boy beside me as we took our steps into the cave of monsters intrigued me so. First off his skills were nothing that I have ever heard or read of before, and due to my father I have almost memorized every single skill in the world of Una. That would have been enough to make me want to investigate further, but there was even more to him than that. His emotions feel impossible to read, even with the level of skills I have. I am able to tell what half of his emotions are, but then there is this second side to him that feels very guarded. To be honest, I’m not even sure he is aware of that side of him. The nail on the coffin had to be that strange stat of his. When I first saw it I had to hold in my shock. I have never seen anyone with a difference in the stats they have available to level up. It has always been strength, agility, defense, stamina, and magic, but this boy had ANOTHER stat. As soon as I saw that I just knew I needed to figure out what was going on no matter what. It was why I was so persistent in going with him into the cave, even though I did tell the truth in the fact that he wouldn’t survive in the cave on those stats alone. He could have a hidden card I wasn’t aware of, and those skills of his were a worry as well.

“So Phobius.” I broke the silence a couple minutes after we entered the cave. “Do you even know what you’re walking into?”

“What do you mean?” He replied in his same cold tone.

“This cave. Do you even know what it is or how it came to be?” If he wasn’t aware of what he was walking into, he would’ve died if I hadn’t come along. These caves seem very safe at first with the monsters in the shallow parts being pretty weak, but there is a pretty quick change in strength once you reach the actual part of the cave.

“It's a hideout for monsters right?” He seemed fairly confident in his words.

“Sort of.” Looking him straight in the eyes I continued. “It is technically where monsters hide but there is a lot more to it than that. A long time ago when the war between humans and demons raged on, the demons were on the losing side of the battle. The very first demon king knew he was on the verge of defeat so in order to make sure the humans couldn’t dominate the entire world of Una he hid all four of his strongest weapons into the very depths of four select caves across the entire world. These four weapons came to be known as apparitions as rumor has it the demon king put part of his own soul into each of these weapons.”

“Are these weapons really so strong that they had to be hidden away?”

“Each weapon is said to be strong enough that a single person could take over an entire kingdom by themselves with one.”

“So how did the demons lose with weapons as strong as these?”

“That was due to the hero of the time. He was said to be the strongest hero in history, and with the support of his other comrades behind him, he was unbeatable. Each of these ‘saviors’ classes were made specifically to help the hero, and they continue to be.”

“So there is more than one hero?”

“Only one can exist at a time, but many heroes have been summoned throughout time.” Suddenly Phobius looked like he went deep into thought.

“So you're telling me, these apparitions or whatever are hidden in four caves across the world, and this cave is one of them?”

“Correct. Originally the demon king guarded the weapons with his strongest monsters he had available. However over time due to the large amount of mana that the weapons contain monsters were naturally drawn to the caves. Since it's been thousands of years since the weapons were originally placed, excess mana leaking from the weapons has been absorbed by the monsters in the cave.”

“So the monsters closer to the weapon are stronger than the ones farther away?”

“Yep!” I gave him a big smile. From his personality I was surprised by how perceptive he was. Carefully watching over his reactions, tone, and emotions throughout the conversation an even more interesting point came into play. One part of him was generally intrigued, but still seemed annoyed. Another side seemed to be angry, although because it was so guarded I could only feel a little of it. The anger must have been immense if it leaked through its own defense.

Suddenly Phobius stopped in his tracks, making me turn around to face him. “So, I need to know one thing before we continue.”

“It’s about the horns right?” Sensing what he was going to ask I explained beforehand. “I am what you would call a demon.”

“Hm…Alright.” He continued pacing forward, while I was frozen in place.

“W-Wait.” I stuttered while jogging to catch up to him. “That’s it?”

“What do you mean that’s it?”

“I thought humans hated and were terrified of demons.” The utter uninterest he had in my statement baffled me.

“Are they now?” He wouldn’t even look at me as he talked to me. Being told for my whole life that humans and demons would never be able to live together, made this just the more surprising. He wasn’t just trying to put on a front either, this was how he really felt.

What the hell is wrong with this boy?

“How far do we have to go until we run into some monsters?” He asked. We had already been walking for a couple minutes by this point, going downwards into the ground.

“I’m…not sure.”

“I thought you knew about these.” A hint of sarcasm in his voice.

“Each one is different, ok? The one I know of had a different layout. Why do you want to run into monsters anyway?”

“I want to get stronger.” Even in this pitch black cave, the only light source being the flame in my hand, he didn’t seem that scared.

“Why do you want to get stronger?” Interested, I continued to ask questions, but he didn’t reply at all this time. Just staring forward into the darkness, apparently ready to fight at any moment. “Alright then.”

After a couple more minutes of silence and the twist and turns of the cave we ran into the first monster.

POV: Phobius Barnes

This girl has given me good information, but I wish she would just be quiet.

Those few minutes of silence were a haven for me, as socializing with people was obviously not my forte. This whole time I’ve been trying to get IT to come out and give me some much needed answers but IT still refused to talk.

“There’s a monster up ahead.” The girl named Danny abruptly pointed out.

“Finally.” I sighed. Taking a second to focus, I surrounded my hand in mana as I did before, but this time it felt a lot weaker. Most likely because whatever IT is, abandoned me.

“It’s really weak, I can take it out with a snap of my fingers if you want.” She looked up at me, her fingers ready to snap.

“Let me do what I came here for.” I put it bluntly.

“Fine.” She groaned. As the monster came closer I could tell what it was. It definitely was what we would call a monster, it looked like a dog but had many spikes on it. Foaming from the mouth and with teeth longer than my fingers, the dog snarled.

“You’re victim number one.” I smirked as I started to stride towards it. The monster dog did the same then as if coordinated, we rushed towards each other. It pounced, it’s mouth headed right towards my head. Sensing danger I slide, narrowly avoiding its mouth, some of it’s drool getting on my face however.

“Disgusting.” I spit, and when I turned around the dog was already closing the distance. Letting out a battle cry, I made a fist using the hand I surrounded in mana and hurled it towards the dog's face. It didn’t have time to react and took the full force of my mana empowered punch sending it flying backward, drool and teeth hitting the ground as it went. With a loud crash it slammed into the cave’s wall, making a small impact crater with it.

“Not bad.” I chuckled.

“That was one of the weakest monsters here, by the way.” Danny chimed in.

“Wait, really?” I looked at her in shock, and not a moment later the dog pounced at me once again. Out of my peripheral vision I saw it lunge toward me and instinctively ducked.

“I’m surprised you dodged that.” Danny giggled.

“You knew it was alive?!” I basically screamed.

“Of course I did. You just said you wanted to do this on your own.”

“You are so annoying.” I spat. Pointing toward the dog currently staring at me, a few teeth noticeably missing, blood running down the side of its face, I exclaimed “And I’m gonna take my anger out on you.”

Without even having to think about it, my whole body started to surround itself in mana, just like it was with my hand. It was still nowhere near the level IT was able to accomplish but for just beginning it was something for me to be proud of. I put my hands up like a boxer would, mostly because the only fighting I had ever seen before was boxing clips online. The dog rushed towards me once again but this time it swung its claws at me. It was too fast for me to dodge so I put my guard up, and when the claws hit me I expected it to hurt a lot more.

Due to the mana it was only like a cat scratching my arms up. The cuts were deep enough to bleed, but just felt like a worse paper cut. I wound back my arm in response and hit the dog with a right hook, once again sending it flying but this time I wasn’t dumb enough to just stand back and see if it got back up. I ran as fast as I could after it, pouncing the moment it landed on the ground.

Repeatedly slamming my fist into its face over and over, with every hit the dog was looking more deformed. Blood splattering into the air with every hit, I could hear the bones in it’s head crack. For a good couple of seconds I continued like this, until I pulled up my right arm as high as it could and sent it flying down into the dog's head for one last hit.

“T..That’s….better.” I panted. Looking at my hand it was full of blood, and without even having to see myself I knew I had blood all over my body as well. My weak mana seemed to not be able to protect me from everything.

“Yikes.” Danny mumbled. “You need me to help clean you up?”

“W…W…What?” I stuttered in embarrassment.

“Yeah, I have skills that can clean you up right quick!” She bubbled.

“Oh. That’s what you meant.” I chuckled, self deprecatingly. I got off of the monster dog and stared down at it in amazement.

“I just did that.” I thought to myself. A grin couldn’t help but creep onto my face as I stared down at it.

“So is that a no?” Danny stared at me. “Because if I’m going to be honest, I would prefer you to be clean.”

“Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead and clean me.” I said.

“You gotta get rid of that mana first though.”

“Huh?” Looking down at my arms and legs I could still see that my black and red transparent ish mana was still all around me.

“Ah. Right.” I said and closed my eyes, focusing on making the mana disappear. Surely enough when I opened my eyes again, the mana was all gone. “I think I’m getting the hang of this.”

“Not bad for a human.” Danny walked up to me.

“Thanks I guess.” I replied. “Let’s keep going.”

----------------------------------------

The cave kept going downward, with some straight sections every once in a while. The temperature was cool so after battles against monsters it was easy to relax and take a small break. Surprisingly enough the deeper we went down the more light there was, the walls seemed to sparkle. There must have been some sort of stone in there that lit up the caves. Whatever it was, it made our journey downward a lot easier.

We encountered monsters once in a blue moon at the beginning, then as we kept going in the encounters started happening more and more often. An hour in we were encountering monsters every couple of minutes, but it was bright enough to where Danny didn’t need to use flames for us to see. Up to this point I was able to handle it myself as every monster we encountered was alone, we hadn’t seen a pack yet.

However that was about to change because right after I took out a beast that was about the same size and shape of a bear, a group of what looked like goblins walked towards us. They were small, with pretty large heads, and their skin was snot colored but what surprised me was how ripped they were. Whatever gym they went to must have been amazing. Carrying clubs that got larger the farther down it went forming a bulky shape, I knew this would be my hardest fight yet.

“I’m not sure you can take them.” Danny chimed in. “Two or three of them sure, but not a pack of seven.”

“At least let me try before counting me out.” I fought back.

“Be my guest.”

Cracking my neck, I surrounded my body in a layer of mana. I could still only make it pretty thin however compared to what I had before when IT was with me. Cursing IT in my head I started walking towards the group of goblins.

“Alright time to put my skills to the test. Foresight.” I spoke to myself. My head started to ache a bit but I could see what looked like a mirage of the goblins. I could see the goblins that were actually there but there was also a vision of them moving before they did. What I was seeing was about a second ahead of what was actually happening.

The first one was about to swing right at my stomach, without any back up from the others. Right before the goblin actually swung, I took a small leap backwards dodging the strike. At the same moment counter attacking with a back kick right to its head. The goblin fell to the ground lifeless. These things must not have very good defense. Which probably means they hit like a truck however.

I saw a mirage of two more goblins rushing me, allowing me to roll out of the way. My head was starting to hurt, most likely an overuse of my skill as I had been keeping it active for about ten seconds. Learning how to use these skills is going to be top priority for me right now.

With no other choice but to turn off the skill I turned around to see those same two goblins who just rushed me, right in front of my face.

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“SHIT!” I yelled, putting my arms up in a guard. They both swung their clubs at the same time, sending me flying backward. Landing on my back, I opened my eyes to see a different goblin right above me swinging its own club down. My eyes went wide as I rolled to the side, but I had the awareness to sweep the goblins legs making it fall to the ground. I jumped up and slammed my fist into its head, practically exploding its head like a bomb. With the thin layer of mana surrounding me I was able to keep myself clean thankfully.

Just as I was getting up to continue fighting I got bludgeoned in the back of the head, slamming my whole body onto the rock ground. The air got knocked out of my lungs and as I flipped onto the back I saw three goblins staring me down, clubs high in the air. I put my guard up prepared for the worst, but before I ever got hit.

“Hellflare.” Danny said from a distance away. A large flame shot out towards the goblins and I, but I didn’t get hit in the slightest. The heat still felt unbelievably hot but not even a single scorch was on my body.

After her attack was over I sat up and saw that not just the goblins above me but also the rest of their pack was gone. Well to be more accurate their heads were gone without a single trace, their bodies on the ground and without their heads blood started to pour out of their necks. Even their blood was a disgusting pee colored yellow.

“Damn.” I clicked my tongue out of frustration that I could take them out. I was able to defeat all the rest of the monsters pretty easily, although there were some close calls. Defeating a bear to getting beat by a bunch of midgets, how fun.

“I tooooold yooou.” Danny half said, half sung, walking up to me. She extended her hand to me but I just ignored her and stood up on my own. This girl was seriously getting on my nerves, even though I knew for a fact she was right.

“Yeah, yeah.” I sighed. “You were right.” I didn’t even have to look at her to know she had a giant grin on her face. Even though she was getting on my nerves quite a bit, there was this strange sense of familiarity that I had back when I was with Phillip, Kathy, and Vanlleope. As soon as I thought that however I felt an anger swell up within me, remembering what happened.

“Hey.” A hand touched my shoulder making me jump. “EEEK!” Turning around it was just Danny, I mean who else would it be. She had a concerned and surprised face.

“Hm?” I just stared at her, completely out of it.

“You ok?” She seemed genuinely worried, but my heart still wasn’t willing to believe it quite yet. Taking a second to regain my composure I responded.

“Fine.” My bluntness returned in full force. There was no way I was telling her anything about my past or what I had gone through.

“You have a lot of grief.” A motherly tone filled her voice.

“What the hell do you know?!” My volume was starting to rise.

“I. I’m sorry.” She shrank back, her hand slowly lowering.

How the hell did she figure that out? Just intuition or some skill? Her flames were insane, it would be safe to assume she has a bunch of others as well. Without knowing the skills and abilities of this world I have to play it safe.

“Let’s just take a break. I’m not in the mood to keep going.” I sat down against the wall and closed my eyes.

“If that’s what you want.” Danny said, her tone the flattest I heard it been since meeting her. She sat down on the other side of cave walls, which was a good 20 yards away. She must feel bad about what she said. She had her hands wrapped around her knees and her head buried into her legs, basically she was sitting against the wall curled up into a ball.

Whenever I saw something like this happen at school, someone upset or even crying, I would just ignore it. It never hurt my conscience either knowing that someone was upset and I did nothing to help. In fact I felt better that way, not having to get mixed in with other people's business. Doing that only led to more trouble and problems, something I actively avoided. So why is it bothering me now, the fact that this girl I barely met a couple hours ago is pouting over something I said. It doesn’t make any sense.

“This is why I hate socializing.” I mumbled.

Maybe you should go try to calm her down.

“IT, is that you?” I said a little too loudly.

Just speak in your own head for right now.

Where have you been, you little shit?!

That doesn’t matter. You should just take my advice.

It does matter! Plus why should I take your advice when you have just left me alone for a couple hours.

What you’re feeling is a kinship.

Kinship? What am I, a dog?

She is someone you should get along with. Get her to trust you by all means necessary.

Why, though?

You’ll do it if you want to stay alive, and especially if you want to get revenge for what happened to you.

Visions of getting tortured, getting yelled at, and of the people I would call family dying ran through my head. Anger clouded my mind, but quickly disappeared when the visions did.

If you open up to her, you won’t regret it.

Why are you giving me advice? Also this is a weird thing for someone to say who just wanted to kill humans so badly.

She isn’t a human.

Fine. I get it. If this backfires though I swear I will make you pay some way.

I got up and slowly walked over to her, being careful not to make any noise. Not sure exactly where to sit, I sat against the wall 5 yards or so away from her. She had yet to look up at all, still curled up into a ball. With the way her horns were, I couldn’t deny that she looked a little cute.

“So um.” As I struggled to get my voice out, I noticed the slight change in her posture. The way her body shifted my direction slightly, her ear now visible. At least I knew that I had her attention.

This is such a pain.

Just do it.

Jesus, fine!

“Did I upset you?” Was the first thing that came to my head.

“Upset me?” Her voice was quiet, but I could still hear the surprise in her tone.

“Yeah, I must have done something wrong to make you pout.” She curled more into a ball after that sentence, a sign that I was headed in the wrong direction.

“I thought I upset you.” Maybe I was headed in the right direction after all. I didn’t understand people in general, so how was I supposed to know what a female demon was feeling at that moment. Due to my skill I had the smallest of inklings of how she was feeling but that was it. Not like that helped at all.

“Upset me?” I echoed her past response. Thinking back to the conversation beforehand, I did raise my voice some didn’t I? I tend to get the tone of voice whenever anyone tries to talk to me too much, but this was the first time in a while I raised my voice. However she did touch on a sensitive subject so you can’t blame me.

“I’m sorry.” Danny looked super upset, I think I even saw tears start to form in her eyes. Unless she had some insane skills and acting lessons that let her fool me this much, I don’t think this was an act, but who knows in a fantasy world.

“Shit.” I mumbled to myself as I slid over to her slowly but surely. Making sure not to be closer than a couple feet away from her, I did my best to transform my thoughts into words.

“Alright look.” With a large sigh, I marched on into battle. “I’m not good at talking to people. I think that much is self-evident. So I don’t really know how to do these type of things.” Danny turned her head toward me and peeked up ever so slightly, to where I could barely see her eyes and they did have tears in them.

Might as well just put all my trust into IT and if it kills me IT dies as well.

“I’m sorry I raised my voice at you, it kinda just happened. You were starting to touch on a sensitive subject that I don’t really feel comfortable talking about yet.”

“I…didn’t realize.” Danny whispered in a volume I could barely make out. “To be honest…I don’t really know how to talk to people either. Well, humans that is.”

“Then I guess we have that in common.” I gave her a grin, and in response it almost looked like her eyes sparkled. Must have been the lighting. “I don’t know how to talk to humans either. Or demons, I guess.” I chuckled, rubbing the back of my head. “This is the most I’ve talked to a single person this much in quite a while.”

“Really?” She fully lifted her head and stared at me. Stray tears rolled down her cheeks as she did.

“Yeah, so I apologize in advance for anything I may say or do that's weird. I’ll try not to bother you too much.”

“Bother me all you want!” She scooted over to me quickly, never breaking eye contact.

“Um. What?” I stared at her with disbelief. Does she even know what that sounds like? After a few seconds her cheeks went red and she quickly turned away.

“Wait! I…I didn’t mean it like that!” Her hands were covering her face, but even while she was turned away I could see how much of a tomato her cheeks looked. I couldn’t help but laugh at the cute way this supposed demon was acting. Honestly if it wasn’t for the horns, I would’ve never guessed she was anything other than human.

“Are you making fun of me?” Danny’s cheeks were puffed out as she turned to face me. Now that I was actually looking at her rather than averting my eyes constantly, I could see how cute she looked with everything she did.

“Don’t worry I’m not. Your pouting is just kind of cute.” I said, still laughing. Her face went even redder when I said that and she playfully punched me on the shoulder.

“Meanie.” She pouted.

“I’m sorry, alright.” After regaining my composure I continued. “Look, my point is that there are some things that I’m not ready to share right now. That doesn’t mean if you make a mistake I’m going to be upset with you or anything. I won’t deny that you annoy me but you haven’t upset me.” Danny glared at me again after that last remark.

“So I didn’t mess up?”

“What do you mean mess up?” The way she phrased all of her questions and statements confused the hell out of me. It always seemed like there was this piece of a puzzle missing.

“Well, I don’t think I’m quite ready to share either.” She gave me a smile that seemed more genuine than all of her reactions so far, a smile that couldn’t help but make me feel a bit flustered.

“Uh…Yeah.” I stuttered out. “Maybe one day I will be ready to share my stuff with you.” Standing up I took a second to stretch then looked back down at her and extended my hand. “And maybe one day you will be ready to share that stuff with me.”

Danny took her hand in mine and I pulled her up off the ground. “Yeah. One day.” She echoed, as if confirming those words to herself. “It’s a promise.” That smile she just gave a few seconds ago came back, a smile that in those moments felt like my kryptonite.

“That smile needs to be toned down though.” I mumbled to myself.

“Huh?”

“Nothing.” I quickly moved on. “Shall we get going?”

“Yeah.” She took the lead once again, skipping forward into depths of the ca

----------------------------------------

“On your left!”

“Shit!” I rolled forward, barely avoiding the giant sword bearing down on me. The skeleton knight was relentless with it’s attacks, there was a good chance this was actually a knight at one point and it’s body still remembers all of its moves.

Me and Danny are surrounded, what is the move here?

After another few hours of exploration in the depths of the cave, multiple forks in the road arrived, sections to where it was so small it felt like I would suffocate, and constant ambushes from monsters made me already super tired. The monsters were ambushing us quicker and quicker as we went down, but the strength of the monsters hasn’t improved significantly. Our major problem was the amount of monsters there were. Packs of monsters were the only thing coming after us now, we fought so much I couldn’t even remember the last time we fought a singular enemy.

“More are surrounding us Danny!”

“I know that!” Even though I kept bugging her about our situation, she seemed to be hiding something from me.

“If you have something to get us out of this I would implore you to use it!” I get that we weren’t friends or even trusted each other yet but she was not worried for her own life. She was biting her lower lip as if she was heavy in thought. I could feel confliction from her emotions, so I knew she was hiding something from me.

“Look,” I insisted, “I know we aren’t friends or even on trustworthy status between us but I beg of you whatever you’re hiding and don’t want to show me, I can keep a secret. Hell I don’t even have anyone to tell in the first place.” Two knights swung their swords straight at my head, forcing me to lean backward as much as possible without falling over. They ended up cutting each other’s head off, reducing their numbers by maybe three percent, if we’re lucky.

Should I take over?

No, you shut up!

“You promise not to be scared of me?” Danny whimpered. She held one hand over her heart while firing hellflares with the other.

Scared of her? What does she mean?

“Scared? What do you mean?” I was completely lost.

“JUST PROMISE!” Yelling at the top of her lungs, I saw a tear roll down her cheek.

“I promise, ok. I only have a basic physical enhancement for combat, everything else is almost worthless in this scenario. I’m on my last leg here Danny! So no matter what you do, I won’t be scared of you.” My body was covered in cuts, thankfully none hit any vital spots so I was holding on, but I was getting overwhelmed fast.

“Ok…but just remember, you promised.” She held both arms out in front of her and closed her eyes. A surge of mana exploded out of her, sending all of the skeleton knights in her immediate vicinity flying. It was a mixture of color, black and red.

Just like my mana.

Her hair started flowing everywhere, unable to stay still in the barrage of wind around her. Then her blood red horns started to grow in size. The horns on her head were already pretty noticeable when you looked at her but now her horns grew at least double in size. That wasn’t it though, out of her back black wings that looked just like a bat’s started to grow. They grew and grew until she looked like she was about to take off and fly away.

She suddenly opened her eyes and they were glowing a blood red color. I’m starting to notice a pattern here.

“Holy shit.” Was all I could get out. I was stunned because even though she looked the same, she looked so different. She looked like a mixture of a demon and a vampire. My chest started to pound, and I suddenly felt the feeling of nostalgia. Was that my feelings or?

“Hellflare.” She reached her hands up to the sky as much as possible and when she did she started to float. Then little balls of flames started to appear right below the ceiling, but they didn’t stay small for long. They grew and grew and grew until they were close to the size of a small car. Dramatically dropping her arms down she yelled out one word. “Bombard!”

The flames flew down at her target, the skeleton knights, and on impact exploded. Each one of the ball of flames was basically a bomb. Every impact rumbled the cave to where I felt like the ceiling was going to collapse at any moment. The bombard went on for a little more than 10 seconds and at the end of it there was nothing but ash surrounding me.

“God that’s hot.” I didn't even know if I was talking about the explosions or Danny. She gently floated back down to the ground, not looking me in the eyes once she did.

“Umm.” She played with her fingers in a very kawaii way as she stared at the ground. “Uhh…”

I walked up to her slowly, kneeled down, then stared at her straight in her eyes. The glowing red was still there but slowly fading away.

“Hey there.” I smiled, one of the very few non forced smiles I had these past few years. She tried to look away but I followed her gaze with my own. “What? You expect me to be screaming my head off, saying you look like a monster?”

“Maybe.” She sniffled, clearly distraught about the whole scenario.

“Well.” I looked down at myself and dramatically rubbed my face with my hands. “I don’t think I’m screaming, am I?” This garnered a little smirk but went away almost immediately.

“I…didn’t want to show you this.”

“Why not?” Using the calmest voice I could muster, I did my best to make her relax a little. I can’t even remember the last time I talked like this but this girl has made me talk like this two times already in one day. What is wrong with my emotions? They are a mess.

“C…Cause you would get scared. Then…run away from me.” Tears were starting to flow down her cheek at a faster rate.

“I’m not running though.” Every single reason she was going to make, I was going to shoot it down with my own.

“But others…”

“Others?” I echoed.

“They ran away from me screaming, without even seeing this side of me. They ran just because of my horns.” She put her hand on her horns and rubbed them softly. “Everyone called me a monster. Hideous. No matter where I went.”

She had clearly gone through a lot to get here, there was no doubt about that. I must have been the first living being to not run just at the sight of her. No wonder she didn’t want to show me this, it is quite a lot to take in after all. I don’t know why, but in my heart I feel a sense of nostalgia. Could this be IT’s emotions? If it is, does that mean what I’m feeling isn’t me? NO, it does NOT matter. All I know is I have to be there for her, whether it’s my feelings or not.

“I don’t know.” I rubbed the back of my head, not believing I was about to say this. “I think you look…pretty good.”

Her head peaked up and she stared at me straight in the eyes. Tears started to roll down even more, but I knew it wasn’t because she was sad.

“Really?” She whimpered, constantly rubbing her eyes to try and make the tears go away. It wasn’t working in the slightest however.

“Yeah.” I chuckled. “Really. You should take that to heart too, I’m pretty sure you’re the first person who’s not family that I told that to.” Her eyes grew, and she wasn’t even trying to stop the tears anymore.

“WAAH!” She cried, and jumped onto me. The sudden weight made me also topple over but I caught her in my arms. “I’ve been…so lonely…for so long.” Sniffling between every other word, she poured her feelings out to me.

Slowly I put my arms around her and patted her on the head. Feeling like saying anything would ruin the moment, I stayed silent and just held her in my arms letting her get everything out that she needed to. With her head on my chest I had to lean my head back not to get poked in the eye by her horns which made the position a bit uncomfortable, but this feeling I had. It was one I had never experienced before, and logically I knew that a lot of it wasn’t my feelings. The feeling of needing to protect and watch over her, to be there for her, they were probably all just IT, but who knows maybe those feelings will become my own one day. After all nothing is impossible, right?