As the group of three strolled through the village streets and alleys, they found more packs of goblins on their way.

“Since we’re all awakened now, whoever defeats a monster gets to kill it, okay?”

With those words from Roy, the trio slaughtered their way through the village. Whenever they found a pack of ten or fewer goblins, they immediately engaged in combat and killed them. By the time they reached their destination, they were soaked in blood.

“That’s David’s house, right?” Jack asked. The house had an awfully silent atmosphere. The clothes that should have been drying on the metal threads were thrown all over the ground. The baskets that aunty Louise and her children spent so much time weaving were broken and cut.

As the group inched closer, their hearts dropped to their stomachs. The door and the wall were completely destroyed and cracks spread all over the house. It was as if a tornado had passed by.

“No, fuck, don’t tell me…”

Robb immediately sprinted towards the house, with Jack following right after him. Roy, on the other hand, was shell-shocked. His eyes and mind were both blank, and he could barely push himself to walk toward the destroyed house.

As Jack reached the entrance to the house, he couldn’t help but ask, “Is everything alright?”

“Why don’t you come and take a look…” Robb replied with a heavy tone. The expression on his face was more horrified than anything he had ever shown in his life.

Jack looked behind Robb and he couldn’t help but kneel on the ground. His eyes widened in shock and his hand covered his mouth in an attempt to stop the outcoming vomit.

Roy slowly walked after the two and entered the house. He looked past Robb and over the kneeling Jack only to have his worst visions come to life in front of him.

Corpses. Corpses everywhere. David, or what was left of him, was thrown on the counter of the living room. He was missing a hand, and chunks of his face, and his stomach was open, bursting out with guts and blood. As for his legs, they were crushed beyond recognition. It was as if a thousand horses galloped over them.

Aunt Louise was decapitated, her head thrown in the middle of the floor. As for her body, Roy could see the rib cage poking out of the flesh at the side. Her stomach, intestines, and organs were half-eaten. As for her legs, only clean bones remained—white as snow without any blemishes.

Roy’s eyes streamed with searing tears. These were people that took care of him, fed him, and cleaned him in his time of need. He cherished and loved them. However, they were now just rotting corpses, food for devilish monsters that saw them like a human would see a rabbit or a chicken.

No one could say a thing. All of them were shocked beyond belief. Even the stoic Robb’s lips quivered and his hands shook. His eyes were looking down at the ground as if he could not bear to look at the corpses of the family any longer.

Jack bawled and wept tears. He looked around the house in shock before he dried his face and stepped out of the door.

Roy’s mind raced with every thought, every emotion: sadness, despair, regret, and mostly anger. His heart was filled with a rage that washed away any guilt he might have felt about killing the humanoid-looking monsters. Those were not humans, nor sickly green kids—they were demons, imps that came straight from hell.

"Should we bury them?" Robb's voice was hoarse and cracked. His throat was dry and the words barely came out of his mouth.

"Yeah, let's-" Roy was about to agree with his friend when the voice of reason stopped him dead in his tracks. He shook his head, "No, it's going to take hours. We need to check on the Jacobs too."

"So are we just gonna leave them like this?" Robb raised his voice. "I can't do that. I can't let them stay like this."

Roy calmed his emotions and cleared his thoughts, "Let's-Let's wrap them in cloth, and hide them somewhere deep inside. I don't want those fucking goblins to come in and eat them."

"Yeah, okay, let's do that," Robb nodded. He then looked back outside the house and shouted, "Jack, come in and help us."

The red-haired Jack took a few seconds before entering the house again. His hands were shivering from the stress, and his expression was confused, "What? What's going on?"

"Let's bring the sheets from the living room." Roy immediately walked toward the living room without waiting for a reply, his mind was a storm of thoughts and emotions and he could not handle a proper conversation at that moment.

Jack furrowed his eyebrows at Roy's statement before following after him and Robb without saying anything. It was not the time for a discussion.

Wool sheets covered the ground of the living room, and the three young men took them all. Their movements were numb and almost mechanical, as they put the mutilated bodies on the sheets and rolled them up. Roy felt a certain sense of detachment, as if he was but a spectator to his body that was doing its own thing. However, the stabbing pain that he felt deep in his heart was very much real.

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Finally, Roy closed David's hollow eyes before covering them too.

“You should have come with me,” Roy muttered. “We should have been together.”

Remembering David's smiling face as he rescued him from certain death, Roy felt his heart constrict as tightly as the thick yellow ropes that had bound him. They could have gone together. If David was with their group, he would not have died. Roy was sure of that.

"Don't torture yourself."

Roy looked to his side to find Robb tapping his shoulder. The two had already covered Louise's body and they were looking at him with concern.

Seeing his friends' worried expression, Roy forced the ugliest smile he could muster, "I'm fine. Don't worry about me."

Neither Robb nor Jack could respond to Roy's obvious lie. Seeing their facial expressions, Roy almost crumbled. He took a deep breath and looked around the dark house, mostly to avoid eye contact with his friends.

However, the more he looked around, the more something in his mind did not click. His eyes kept scanning the room for a few more seconds, before they suddenly lightened up, "Where are the kids?"

Jack raised an eyebrow, "What? The kids?"

"Yeah, Dustin and Claire," As Roy kept looking around, his mind cleared out and regained its sharpness.

"Let's look around," Robb made his way deeper into the house, "Dustin! Claire! Where are you?"

The trio of friends went through every room shouting the names of the two siblings. While it was hard to do a thorough search in the dark house without any lit torch, they still meticulously combed every corner and every drawer.

Finally, they reached the master bedroom where uncle David and Aunt Louise used to sleep. While screaming the kids’ names, they entered the room.

Roy went down to look under the master bed, only to see a knife coming straight for his face.

“Brother Roy?” The knife stopped right in front of the young man’s nose. Behind it was a small little girl that held onto her sleeping little brother. Her whole body was shivering, even the hand with which she was holding the knife, but she bit her lip and didn’t cry.

Roy’s eyes softened as he looked at the young girl. “Claire, I’m so glad. Come here, it’s safe now.”

Claire pushed her little brother forward for Roy to hold first before she crawled out from under the bed. As she stood up, she took a deep breath and tried to appear strong and dependable. However, just as her eyes locked with Roy, her tough image immediately broke and she bawled out torrents of tears.

Roy opened his arms and Claire immediately went in and hugged him.

“Mom… Dad… They…” The little girl’s throat was closing up and she was hiccuping after every word, but her voice stabbed deeper into Roy’s heart than any goblin’s dagger or sword.

Roy tightened his hug in a soft voice, “It’s okay now, you’re going to be safe now. You’re both going to be safe now, I promise.”

Claire sniffed up her tears and nodded at Roy’s words.

Roy cleaned the tears off the little girl’s face and smiled at her. “Let’s go to uncle Roger’s place, okay? It’s gonna be safe there.”

Claire continued nodding her head, “Okay.”

Just that one word took so much energy for her to utter, and Roy knew that. Just as the little girl was about to move, her legs wobbled and she fell to the ground. Roy kneeled down and carried her like a princess.

“Mom, Dad?”

Roy’s heart clenched as he looked at Dustin who slowly opened his eyes. He was still groggy and the only words he could pronounce were those two before he fell back asleep.

Jack went to the little kid and carried him in his arms, and then the group went down the stairs. As Roy walked out of the house, he looked down only to see that Claire had already fallen asleep. His heart hurt as he stared at the little kid who only had her little brother left in this world.

Roy then looked at the covered corpses of David and Louise. I’ll come back for you. I'll make sure you're properly buried. With that one promise, the group walked back to Roger’s house. The way back was silent with only the sound of rain as a backdrop to the cacophony in their hearts. For some reason, it felt as if the cloud had picked up momentum and the rainfall had become harsher than before. Soon, the dirt road became mud, making it harder to move. The only silver lining was that the harsher rain washed away the blood on the boys’ bodies and clothes, effectively offering them a cold bath.

When they knocked, Alfonse was the one to open the door. Seeing their somber faces, he couldn’t help but ask, “What happened?”

The words got stuck in Roy’s throat, but he managed to muster up a response. “Th-the David family. They’re… they're dead.”

Hearing the shocking news, Alfonse’s eyes widened before he closed them in disappointment. At the end of the day, this was also a possibility—one that was weighing on their mind all the time but hoped it would never occur.

The three entered the house along with the little boy Dustin who was still sleeping on top of Jack’s chest.

Roger, who heard the news, looked at the three brothers and the young siblings, before muttering, “He was a good man.” He paused for a second before continuing with a stronger voice. “The Davids, they were good people. They were always benevolent to us, always generous, and never did they do us any harm or talk bad about us… We’re going to take care of the kids, I’m sure David would have done the same to us if our roles were reversed.”

Roy nodded at Roger’s words before handing him Claire.

“Thank you…” He lightly muttered.

“What are you saying?” Roger chuckled. “We’re the ones who should be thanking you. You’re the one going out and risking your lives, the only thing we’re doing is making sure you have a safe place to come back to.”

Roy and his two brothers silently made their way toward the rest of the group.

“What happened?” Fred asked, which was met with an immediate “shh” and a death glare from Alfonse.

The mood was heavy, and no one wanted to say a word. Even young Jaimie was just looking around confused before he too looked down at the ground and stayed silent.

In the meantime, Roy’s head was ringing with stray thoughts and emotions. Could he have saved the Davids if they had gone to their house immediately? Was he too safe with his routing and detours? Should he have taken more risks?

Those thoughts kept swarming his brain and clouding both his mind and heart. However, in the end, he reached only one conclusion.

“We have to become stronger.” Roy’s words cut through the deafening silence.

“All of us, we have to become so strong that we can defend everyone. That’s the only way to do this shit.”