They placed chains around my neck and forced me to follow along with those things on me. Altheras was furious the whole way, but despite how much She hated what these people had done, She still insisted that I just follow along and don’t cause much trouble… She says that I’ll be able to pass judgment on them later if I increase my Holy Power, so that the important thing was to stay alive.
After a few days of walking in this strange jungle, I was finally taken to some sort of camp. It didn’t look too different from the houses I used to see back in my world, since these were all rather simple, and were covered with different things to make them hard to notice in the forest.
They called this place a ‘base’, where their commander was supposed to be doing his work, but… This didn’t look at all like how my parents used to describe the living spaces of these sorts of important people… Something that even Altheras mocked right after they claimed we were there.
It was while being led further in that I noticed a strange house. It was not too different from the other ones, but it was surrounded by wires with spikes all over it… and beyond them, I saw people that looked not too different from everyone else, except for the way they were dressed, which were clothes I hadn’t seen before; nothing like the green ones that the people outside were wearing.
“I can’t believe they do this to children…” an older man whispered from behind the wires. “Sons’o bitches…”
I couldn’t help but widen my eyes in surprise. I thought that so far, all of these people were supposed to be on the same side, but it seems like that wasn’t the case… I wondered if they were going to throw me inside that place as well…
“Prisoners? Could they be criminals?” Altheras wondered, but I preferred not to say anything so people wouldn’t think anything strange about me talking to a Goddess that they couldn’t hear.
Soon after we entered another makeshift house. There was a man sitting behind a desk and a map displayed on a board behind him. On the desk there were several things that I hadn’t seen before, like black boxes with circles on them, small things that appeared to be books, and more of those black sticks with the strange shape.
“My Commander!” the man that forced me to come here loudly said, doing a rather stiff gesture with his hand to his head while standing as straight as possible. “We found this girl in the forest.”
The man eyed me with curiosity and surprise for a moment, before standing from his desk and walking over to have a better look at me. I couldn’t help but cower and take a step back, but the boy from before was standing behind me and pushed me forward with the stick in his hands.
“A foreigner?” the man pondered. “Do. You. Speak. English?”
I just looked back at him with both confusion and fear. I didn’t know what he was talking about, so I didn’t know what to say to him, since from the way he said that, it sounded like he was asking me if I could understand him…
“Yes. Tell him that you do,” Altheras said, so I nodded.
“Good. This will make things easier,” the man said, then tilted his head to the side as if he wanted to see something on my side. I cowered once more, and then was surprised when he stretched a hand to the side of my head. “What is this?”
I was paralyzed when he grabbed my ear and pulled on it. I could feel it get hot as he did that, but I just didn’t know what to do or what to say about this. I didn’t want to get killed, and Altheras has been saying that I had to stay alive, no matter what.
“Is this real?” the man then asked, turning his head to look at the man that led me here.
That man looked surprised and also narrowed his eyes to look at my ears. “Yes. She seems to have a deformity or something like that.”
The commander clicked his tongue and walked back to his desk. “That would explain why she was in the forest. Her family probably threw her away… Still, better to ask.” He then beckoned me with a finger. “Come here. I have a couple of questions for you.”
I fearfully walked closer and the man pulled out a pencil and a small book, something that I heard from my parents that only rich people had. After tapping one side of the pen a couple of times with this thumb, causing it to make a clicking sound, he turned his eyes to me.
“Name?” He asked.
“E-Eletha,” I whispered, and the man quickly moved the pen on the paper, leaving a black streak on it.
“Last name?” he asked this time.
“Dawnlight…”
The man frowned and looked at the lines on the paper. “Eletha Dawnlight? Is this really your name? Are you really sure you didn’t make it up?” He turned a questioning frown at me afterwards, but it really was my name, so I quickly nodded my head. His eyes lingered on me for a moment, and I swallowed. “Absolutely sure?”
“Y-yes, that’s the name that my parents gave me…” I said, feeling somewhat downcast after saying that, but the tension caused me to focus on the man.
“I’m going to believe you… so you’d better not be lying to me,” he said and closed the book. “Because that’s what I’m going to send out there for your ransom to your parents, and if nobody pays it, you’ll be stuck with us forever.”
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I tightened my lips for a moment when he said he was sending that to my parents. “My parents are dead.”
He looked surprised for a moment but then just shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. We’ll send it to your uncles, grandparents, cousins, and everyone related to you. They can sell their houses, cars, plots, and anything of value to aid the cause by paying for your rescue.”
“There’s no one else,” I quickly said, “I was alone with my parents, but… they were killed…”
“Killed, huh…?” the man said with a thoughtful expression, clicking his tongue once more after a moment. “Well, it doesn’t matter. The government is going to pay for it anyway.” He turned his eyes to the man who brought me here. “Take her away with the others.”
“Yes, my commander!” he answered, before pulling me by the chain outside the house and to another one, where I got locked down in a place that only had one hard bed.
* * *
The night came and after spending the afternoon in that place, I had time to think about my parents, and how lonely I was feeling in this place run by those strange people.
I hugged my knees and whispered. “Altheras… Can’t you help me?” There was a moment of silence from the Goddess, so I urged once more, turning my head to look up. “…Altheras?”
There was a warm feeling that filled my body momentarily, after which the Goddess spoke, “This is all that I can do for now, child. If you are to free yourself from this, you’ll have to use your own power, but… these people are strange to me. I don’t know what their powers are, and you must stay alive.”
So She could only give me a bit of power and nothing else… Still, as long as She’s watching over me, then I’m sure there will be a way out of here, so I softly smiled and buried my head in my knees.
As I was about to fall asleep, the door to this place suddenly opened, forcing my drowsiness to go away as I urgently looked at what happened. The man that led me here—the one that the boy called captain—was coming my way. I scrambled to the wall as I looked with fear at the man, but he just kept coming until he was already on top of me.
He grabbed me and started groping me in different places, making me really uncomfortable, so I pushed him away—or tried to. “Please stop!”
“Shut up. We’re going to do this, blondie, and you’re going to be a good girl and stay quiet, understand? Otherwise, I can’t say what might happen to you,” he threatened with his face an inch away from my ear.
“Do not allow him!” Altheras loudly said. “My chosen ones must not be tainted!”
After She said that, I started resisting as much as I could. However, the man was strong, and everything I tried just caused him to get more and more annoyed as he started grunting. Eventually, he punched me, and I fell to the side of the bed.
“I told you to be a good girl!” he loudly said, and I could hear the belt from his pants coming undone.
“Use my power, you must do so now. He can’t do this to you!” Altheras commanded, and I felt that warm feeling fill me once more. “I can’t risk—more power—I might lose the connection with—”
Her voice came as if it was being interrupted, but I understood what I had to do. Altheras, like my parents, was doing everything She could so that I could be okay, and I wasn’t going to throw it away. So while the man was still trying to get back on top of me, I gathered that power in my hands.
Without me realizing it, someone else had walked into the room. “What the—Stop that!”
I couldn’t see exactly who it was, but it sounded like the boy. While I was gathering that power in my hands, the boy jumped on the back of the man and started struggling with him to get him off me. But like me, the boy wasn’t strong enough to push him away, so the man managed to punch and hurt the boy. Still, the boy didn’t give up as even with a bloodied nose he jumped on top of the man and struggled once more.
By now, the power in my hand had gathered into a golden ball, and without thinking, I defended myself by pushing my hand to the man. A beam of golden light was fired, piercing the man and splitting his body in half… However, the same thing happened to the boy, who suffered the same fate as the man, where the top half of his body came down to the floor, lifeless.
“Oh no! What have I done!?” I shouted as I scrambled to help the boy, but as I grabbed his face, all I saw was his open mouth and eyes looking into nowhere. He died instantly.
“It’s okay, child. You did what you had to,” Altheras softly said, but I just shook my head and felt like crying for killing this innocent boy.
“B-but he was—he was just trying to help me!” I said, my tears falling on top of the boy’s face.
“And he shall be rewarded by Us for his actions. Eternal bliss and happiness will be given to him. You have My word,” Altheras said and I could feel myself feeling a bit better knowing that. “But you are not safe yet, get ready.”
Because of the loud noise and light that I caused with that spell, I could hear people shouting outside, and the sounds of footsteps coming closer. Soon after, people burst into the room. It was the commander, who saw me kneeling by the body of the boy first and then the body of the captain that lay somewhere close to it.
“W-what?” one of the men standing next to him asked, stunned at the scene that he walked into. “My commander, this is just like those demons we killed in the forest a few days ago! She’s of the same kind! We must kill her too!”
The man raised the weird black stick that they all carried and pointed the hole on one end to me. I widened my eyes, since despite not knowing what it did, I could easily guess that it was a weapon. However, I couldn't help but take notice of something else they mentioned.
“D-demons?” I asked, since they were probably the same ones that killed mom.
The commander quickly pushed the weapon down, causing the man to look confusedly at the commander. “Do you know those demons? What are they to you?”
I lowered my head and frowned. “Those things killed my mom.”
“Is that so…?” the commander said, after which he carefully walked my way.
“Sir!” the man by the door shouted, but the commander simply lifted his hand.
“If that was the case…” the commander said, lowering himself to look me in the eyes. “How about you join us? It’s clear that you don’t have a family anymore, and those powers of yours could be of great help to us,” he paused for a moment to just look at me. “You should know that we, the People’s Liberation Army, fight for the people—as the name implies. You can help us in helping the people of this nation, and together, we can rid this country of both corrupt people like that stupid captain, and those demons that killed your family. We’ll protect you, feed you, train you, and make sure that girls like you don’t have to suffer anymore. What do you say?”
I wasn’t sure about what he was suggesting. The whole thing had caused me to be in a moment of shock and panic, so I couldn’t fully understand what he was talking about, so I just looked back at him and his half-smile.
“You should accept,” Altheras said with a soft tone. “If they kill demons, then they’re our side as well. And if he’s going to both protect you and train you, then we couldn’t ask for more.”
Hearing Altheras say that, I quickly nodded my head. “Okay.”
The man widely smiled, standing up from where he was and stretching his hand to me. “Well then… Welcome to the People’s Liberation Army.”