-Chapter 9- New….. Follower/Friend???

Hm? Awake already? Did I wake you up? Oh. The matrass felt like a rock, huh. Well, good that you are awake now. Want to hear more of my story? At least it’s a good way to pass time, right?

Okay let’s start. I will skip some things okay? Something around 5 years. It didn’t really happen much in that time. If I remember something important I will add it.

A bit more than 5 years passed after that incident. I was now 10 years old and the bumps on my forehead now really looked like small horns. My fringe couldn’t hide them anymore and I had warp a piece of cloth around my head like a bandana to make them less obvious. Lilika did see them though, but didn’t say anything about them. She just smiled. She probably already knew about my race. About the experiments, to which Lycus forced me. I did find out certain things.

One thing is magic can’t affect me, the reason I can’t evoke magic is I negate my own magic and if I touch a person I could render them unable to evoke magic, too. These were the first things, we found out. Lycus and I tried various methods to “create” new ways to use this. Something like changing the range of the “Anti-Magic-Shield”, as Lycus called it, or to reflect the magic attacks or to use “Zero-Magic-Infection “, which was just a fancy name for me touching another person an “seal” their magic, from further away.

I know the names are lame, but I was and still am too lazy to change them now. I sure don’t shout out some attack name when facing an enemy, like those transforming superheroes. Well, I couldn’t really attack someone either. The only thing I could hope for was for the enemy to get too annoyed by his magic not working on me and just runs off.

Imagine me just standing there and some magician, who shoots out one spell after another, without thinking to attack me physically. The most realistic situation, right?

So I was still useless in the magic department, but at least I couldn’t be affected by magic directly.

Cealius recovered from his despair from that day, as soon as he found out his situation was just temporary. He started to place the kids under his spell again, but the kids didn’t act differently in the time they were under no one’s control. I did get ambushed from time to time, but I could still run away. Well, sometimes I had to fight physically, which wasn’t really something I preferred to do. If I got beat down they would get creative what they should do with me and if I won they would complain to a priestess and these adults, not including Lilika, Adella and teacher S, already saw me as a spawn of evil, if they see beat up children they don’t even consider the kids to be the real culprits.

They always looked at me in such a way, but since that incident they were a lot more wary of me. They got more and more ridiculous. Everything bad, which occurred, was my fault. The kids blamed me for each and everything, too.

The vase broke? Zeki’s fault.

Someone got hurt? Zeki’s fault.

It’s raining? Zeki’s fault.

The funny thing is, the adults really tried to punish me for everything the children blamed me for. Of course, Lilika, Adella and teacher S wouldn’t let that happen in the end.

Alycia felt guilty for quite a long time, because of that incident. Every time she saw me she flinched and ran away. She didn’t have any friends after that incident either. She got openly bullied along with me, but she still tried to avoid me somehow. Sometimes she still looked at me as if she wants to join Lycus and me in these “experiments”.

Even after some years I wasn’t able to solve this problem. So I just had her stalk me. I didn’t like it, but doing something wouldn’t have resulted in something good either. I’m not some kind of pervert who likes being stared at.

Anyway, no one really cared for my new piece of cloth around my head or noticed the horns under it. I don’t have any idea how one could not see them. Maybe everyone knew and just played dumb. No, that’s unlikely. If they knew they probably would have thrown me out before one could even say “demon”.

But I am pretty sure Lilika saw my horns more than one time. I wasn’t sure if she just pretended to be ignorant or if she just didn’t care. Anyway, Lilika was a saint in each and every aspect.

I was sitting at the usual experiment place together with Lycus. Alycia was somewhere in the back, thinking I didn’t notice her.

“So what do you want to do now? We already tested everything and deemed my “ability” useless right? “, I rather wanted to develop my sword skills. I didn’t want to go out into the world with no means of protection after all. I got better with handling a sword, but I still couldn’t beat Lycus. I wasn’t really good nor bad. The best word to describe it would be average.

“No, there is still something left to test! Didn’t you listen today? “, usually he wouldn’t listen to the lectures at all. It’s a small miracle if he showed up to all the lessons. I wonder how teacher S thought about such a habit.

I tried to absorb anything I could from the lessons, but the magic lessons. I memorized some of the spells, but I couldn’t use them anyway so why bother to listen. If something has no use for your later life it’s useless to force yourself to ingrain it into your brain, or do you have another opinion on that?

Strangely enough Lycus showed a great interest in the magic lessons. The teacher seemed to behave differently towards the other students.

“No, I didn’t. What do you want to tell me with that? Do you want me to cause implosions again? I think I will receive the anger of the Forest god if I keep on destroying innocent trees, don’t you think? “, I leaned on a tree while letting out a long sigh. I gave up on keeping track of all the innocent plants, insects and trees I assaulted and brutally murdered.

“Oh, shall we try summon it? It would be interesting, right? I wonder if it’s a walking tree or a flower person… “, he began to draw various characters on the ground with a stick. The end result was a girl in a flower dress, which kind of looked like some type of fairy. It looked pretty normal, but it wouldn’t be one of Lycus drawings if there wasn’t something odd about it. The flower dress fairy had a chainsaw in her hand.

Yes she had a chainsaw. I have no idea where he got the idea or from where he knew that, but I didn’t know where he saw a lot of stuff he drew.

The other drawing was of a tall, muscular man in underwear, carrying around a tree. It was indeed a walking tree. Just not the way I imagined it.

“Lycus… I regret saying it, but what did you want to experiment……. “, watching him draw was much more painful in a way than the experiments Lycus made me do.

“Ah! You know~ wouldn’t it be interesting to put some of your Anti-magic into something? “, he referred to the technique of imbedding an object with an element. I explained that somewhere in the beginning, didn’t I?

I don’t really care if you forgot. Don’t look like that. If you forgot it it’s your problem…. Hey, don’t leave! Okay, okay I explain it…. Again………..

It’s actually pretty simple.

You infuse mana into the object and give this mana an attribute. It sounds easy, right?

There are some problems though. There are things who are easy to augment and then there are things who are really hard to augment. If you try to augment a sword for example, the difficulty of augmenting it would be in the middle field. Easy things would be bracelets and necklaces, if they are made out of bronze or iron.

Well, explaining it further would make this whole situation much more complicated than it already is. If I come to a point where the complicated things will be important I shall explain it then.

Satisfied? Good. Can I continue now or do you want me to turn this into an info dump even more, huh?

Okay….Great, now I forgot where I was.

……..

Oh yeah. I was telling you about the experiment with Lycus.

“And for what would I use such a thing. “, I couldn’t imagine for what I would need such a thing as an object with an anti-magic attribute. Foolish me.

“Dunno? Let’s try it! “, Lycus wanted to do something with that. He looked like that. If I consented to conduct this experiment, I believe he would have caused trouble.

Stupid me, why didn’t I consent. Lycus’ eyes sparkled, even though his lazy expression didn’t really change. “Come on, Zekki~! Aren’t we bound by Fate?”

“Oh? Wasn’t that “Des Tiny”? “, I asked jokingly, while trying to get away.

“Fate is his little sister!” ,he looked deadly serious.

“Oh so it’s a family of perverts?”, I tried to slowly move back into the forest to escape.

“It’s destifate! “, Lycus seemed to be content with this word. Don’t ask me where he got it, but I took the chance to run while he turned around to underline his important sentence with his arms on his back.

I know, running into the forest wasn’t one of my best ideas, but what can I say, I was stupid. It could have gone terribly wrong and some monster could have eaten me. Later I found out this forest was indeed dangerous for its poisonous plants. Some of them seemed to give of some gas. Hallucinogens and stuff.

It equalled a miracle I didn’t encounter such a thing……

Seriously I didn’t encounter anything dangerous ….. I did encounter something though.

I walked along some trees for some time, looking back every now and then to not get lost. I just walked a straight line, too, but the library incident made me learn my lesson. At one point I tried to look back for longer than just a quick look over the shoulder. At that moment of defencelessness I seemed to have bumped into someone, which followed in the sensation of cold metal against my throat.

Obviously I didn’t freak out.

Don’t look at me with those eyes. I am telling you the pure truth.

Over 5 years passed since the King and the Queen of the Demons tried to leave the tower to search for their son.

After they left for 3 weeks they got swiftly found by their close aid.

“My King and Queen, it is not favourable for you to search for the prince now. Please reconsider and think about your and the princes safety. As the situation was explained the young prince should still be alive and will be safe for another few years. If you still decide to leave I’d like to remind you of the possible consequence of destroying the demon race after being captured by the abominable celestials. Leave the search to the servants you send out. Let us return now. “

In a time of defencelessness such as this the demon race could not effort anymore weak spots. Like for example a king and a queen walking across the country without any safety measurements.

It seemed like the base on Giza still was untouched by the celestial forces, but this state of being would only be a question of time if the Queen and the King, who were the symbol of hope to the demons, got captured. Their well-being influenced the motivation of the crowed immensely.

The Queen continued to be restless and wanted to get her son back. The messengers, who were sent out didn’t come back and after 5 years of hiding in the shelter with the occasional loss of 3 people, who provided this shelter with necessities, they gathered their strength, but it was not yet time to venture out onto the land yet again.

There was still one figure which could foil their whole efforts. The young prince, Zeki, still was in the hands of some elves. There were still celestial forces looking for demons on Kendria. They were like hounds. When they smelled the blood of their prey they wouldn’t stop to take chase before the target is dead or rendered powerless.

The elves were worshipping the celestials like gods so if one such Celestial would decide to search that place the prince would be in imminent danger.

Risking to send out more forces could have tremendous consequences and the King and Queen obviously could not go out to search for him.

One night the Queen asked for their most trusted aide to meet her husband and her.

“Cheia, you served us for several years already. We both deem you as the most able subordinate we have at this point of time.”

The Queen stood next to the King placing one hand on his shoulder and wearing a faint smile as the King spoke to the kneeling Cheia.

“This mission is of utmost importance and requires a great amount of secrecy, as you will have to venture to the other side of this continent. As you have been informant our son is still in danger. If you don’t take this mission we don’t have any- “

As the king tried to continue the grip on his shoulder strengthened. “Dear, you seemed to have made a small mistake didn’t you? “, The Queen smiled with her eyes closed, not moving her head nor her hand.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“A-Ah that’s right, if you fail, it will have serious consequences as you can imagine. You can’t refuse, of course. Leave as soon as possible and report as soon as you found him. It should be possible with your magic. “

Cheia, who was kneeling on one knee and one fist touching the floor, made bowed shortly before she answered to the Kings order. “Understood. This Cheia shall not fail you.”

Her tied together blueish black hair fell over her shoulder and her straight fringe blocked the view to her eyes making it impossible to see her expression, though she didn’t change her expression often. It was always the same disciplined expression.

The King and the Queen were pleased by her words, even though Cheia did not have a choice in this matter but to obey.

She left shortly after this meeting with food rations and a short distance teleportation device.

After a few weeks she was able to reach the great Forest surrounding the temple Zeki was staying at. She occasionally saw a celestial conducting searches, but they were far more negligent.

Cheia heard this forest is home to many dangerous plants and animals. The poison of highest potency had its origins in this forest. The name of Gift Forest had unknown origins and many different interpretations.

Cheia wasn’t interested in such a thing. She made appropriate preparation to cross this forest without much trouble. Antidotes, mask and enough means to protect herself against cutting wounds.

Getting lost was not one of her concerns as she had enough experience to coordinate in unknown terrain. She was used as a means to scout enemies ever since she was brought to royal palace.

She planned for the trip to be 3 days at least. These plants confused her senses so she will have trouble noticing enemies and could fall victim to one of the hallucinogens some plants ejected. Her safety measurements might not have been enough to repel all the substances of this forest. If it wasn’t for that she would have traversed this forest much faster.

Without looking back she ran straight forward with short stops to mark some trees while being cautious of the fluids they ejected. While she was on such a stop she felt something bumping into her. It was not a tree or plant. It was small but not on the level of an animal, at least not an animal that would survive in this forest. Cheia didn’t notice any other animals either on her way.

She didn’t think twice before pulling out her knife form her belt and pointing it at her presumed enemy. What she saw was a small boy of maybe 9 or 10 years. He was dressed in a white robe with stains of unknown origin, brown patched up pants and a cloth around the head. His black hair barly reached to his shoulders, which were stiff. The eyes had the colours of golden and greenish blue. They stared at Cheia in fear.

She encountered kids capable of killing without mercy, but this child. The boy looked obviously scared, but he did not have a childish aspect to him.

“What is a child doing here? “, she did not move the dagger and stared at him unmoving.

“W-why are you holding a d-d-dagger against a child’s throat? “, the child laughed nervously but didn’t move an inch otherwise.

Cheia slowly moved back “Hold your hands out. “, she still directed her knife towards the kid.

He did as he was told and showed her two empty hands with some mud on them. “Now move back to the next tree, come on. “ Cheia’s tone of voice was calm yet quite forcefull. She didn’t have more time to mess around with some little kid. She didn’t want to kill the boy either.

Her orders were to act discretely and killing a small child wouldn’t be to her advantage.

“U-Uwah!”, while the boy tried to walk backwards he fell over his own foot and landed with his back on the ground. At impact a shining something fell out of his robe. It was hanging around his neck, but seemed to be hid in the robe before.

Cheia remembered something the Queen said to her before she left the tower. “If you are not sure who our child is, even though he should stand out like a kind word in a sentence of bitter remarks, we gave him a necklace with my families’ insignia on it.”

She nearly forgot about it. She did not think she wouldn’t recognize him.

Drawing closer to the boy again, who was still lying on the floor, trying to get up, she opened the robe a bit more while trying to inspect the necklace.

“O-oi! I-I don’t think that is legal! I-My body isn’t ready yet…”, the boy spurted nonsense while looking flustered all of a sudden and seemed rather disappointed when Cheia inspected the necklace. It was a splitting image of the insignia.

When the usually expressionless Cheia made an expression off surprise she ripped of the cloth warped around the boy’s forehead.

“E-Eh?” the boy had a stupid smile on his face.

What Cheia saw on his forehead were two, small, still growing horns. She should have noticed it sooner. The black hair should have made her suspicious at least.

Her expression relaxed again and she moved away from him, leaving the boy flabbergasted and at a loss of words over what occurred a few seconds before. Now sitting on her legs in front of the boy, who managed to sit up, she placed her hands on the floor.

“I am sorry for my insolence, your Highness. This Cheia is not worthy to look you in the eye!” she rose her head for a bit and then slammed it down on the ground, which formed a wound on her head.

She couldn’t bear the embarrassment of not recognizing her target, Zeki, who was still trying to comprehend the situation.

The first thing I saw was a knife against my throat then a hand, which connected to a girl. I couldn’t really tell what she was thinking from her face.

That’s creepy….

Yes, I am scared of stuff like that. Problem?

Anyway, her eyes were completely black similar to her silky, straight, bluish balck hair, which she bound together in a ponytail. It reached up to the middle of her back. On the sides of her head were two horns which grew backwards.

I could see every detail of her clothes and face, even though I was in such a situation. Is it normal to have such a degree of concentration on something like this in such a situation?

“What is a kid doing here?” she finally spoke something. Her voice was the same as her face. Without expression. Obviously I answered without any sign of fear!

“Why are you holding a knife against a child’s throat then? Huh?”

….What? I-I really said that!

There was no change in expression, but it seems like she was deeply impressed by my courage….. or she just thought about the best way to silence me. I had more time to look at her, while she was doing that. She wore black and grey clothes under light armour. There were various knifes on her belt and I bet she had many more weapons on her. She looked kind of like the type.

She slowly moved back still pointing the knife at me. “Hold your hands out.”

Why was she so suspicious of me at that time though? Weren’t we supposed to be allies? I’m not suspicious in the least, right?

….. Don’t answer that …. That was a rhetorical question….

I held out my hands. They were a bit dirty, but I was empty handed otherwise. This seemed to calm her down a bit. I thought I could talk to her now, but she wasn’t done yet.

“Now move back to that tree there, Come on. “, she waved her knife in the direction of a tree which was standing not so far behind me. I tried to walk slowly backwards not letting that girl out of my view.

If she wasn’t that expressionless she would have been exactly my type. She looked like my age, too. Well, my former age of 18… But still I had weird thoughts about her with various kind of expression. That would have really made a whole difference.

Just when I was thinking that I tripped on something. It seems like Miss Floor got jealous, heh? I landed on my back and stayed there. I think I fell on some type of root, because it hurt more than I expected. After a short time I felt a hand on my chest. It was a cold hand. A hand was under my robe on my chest.

I looked up and saw that girl opening up part of my robe. I wondered if she heard my thoughts back then, but this was a little forced wasn’t it? Reverse rape isn’t a good thing. Furthermore I was 10. This is illegal, right? I wonder, if there was such a law in this world?

I still don’t know what the laws in this world are anyway… It feels kind of lawless…

“O-oi! I-I don’t think that is legal! I-My body isn’t ready yet…” I wouldn’t have minded if she continued though, but she didn’t. She merely looked at the pendant attached to my necklace. Having expectations is a bad thing huh? It hurts… No, these are no tears….

I saw another expression on her face. She had her eyes widened and her mouth had a ^ form. This seemed to be her surprised face. After she inspected the pendant for some time she removed my cloth, which I wore around my head.

She seriously didn’t realize I was one of her kind. She was some kind of idiot. Well, on the same scale as the people from the shrine. Even if I don’t like to say it, but Konrad seems to be the most observant of them. I had a hunch Lilika and S know about my race, but that had yet to be confirmed.

After she saw my horns she moved back from me. “Eh?” I had a stupid expression on my face as she was sitting on her legs in front of me. She placed her hands in front of her.

“I am sorry for my insolence, your Highness. This Cheia is not worthy to look you in the eye!” She said in a loud voice.

…..

Yes I am a Highness. Bow in front of me you, peasant.

Haa… Doesn’t fit me at all.

After she said that she rose her head and hit the floor with it.

I saw blood coming from her forehead. There is a line to just being stupid, but this is ridiculous.

“Eh. Ah. No. Ehm. You’re- You’re bleeding. Wait Highness? And your name is Ch-Cheia, hahaha, a good name, hahaha.” Zeki.exe has stopped functioning please close and restart.

Cheia didn’t move from that spot, didn’t rise her head or say anything about the things I said. “E-Ehm… I f-forgive you I guess? You, you can rise your head.” This was something one had to get used to. I never ordered anybody ever, so this situation was feeling off.

“You are too kind, Your Highness, to forgive someone such as I. This Cheia is shall now make preparations for the way back. Please meet me at the same place tomorrow. I shall take my leave now to report to their royal majesties.” After I allowed her to move again she prepared to stand up and move away without explaining anything.

“Ah, HEY! Wait! Would you mind explaining what this is all about before disappearing again?” This person was as bad as Lycus… just in another way. They both let me lose my cool. I hate when that happens. Control over ones emotions is the basics of living a good life after all.

“Time is of essence. The danger is coming closer. I beg you for pardon, but I can just say you are Prince Zeki Devana and I am here to take you back to your parents.” With that she disappeared.

I mean it she just disappeared……..

You say that isn’t so important?

……. Well, wasn’t the information kind of obvious after all this?

I kind of miss her. You know what, after I am done with you I will pay her a visit.

Well, see you later. Get a good rest and try not to do stupid things again. You think I didn’t notice the missing spoons and knifes? I manage this whole place after all, so bye now.

Behind one of the trees, in the great forest surrounding one of Ione’s temples, there stood one boy. Simply standing there and listens.

He saw a girl and a familiar little boy. He heard every single word.

The boy followed the other boy to this place. It had no reason he just did it and now he was here, listening.

A few minutes before he listened to the High priestess. She said Celestials would come to inspect this place.

“This will be interesting”, said the boy before running away

Authors note:

Hey!

Sorry for the later chapter but… something kept me from writing. :D

Anyways like always~

If you find grammatical or writing errors please write them in the comments. If you have suggestions or criticism please write them in the comments, too. If you just liked my story the comments is the place where you can tell me that.

Always good to boost my minuscular self-confidence.

And Thank you all very much for reading this story of mine :D

And until next time //waves