The sunlight slowly covered the top of Limia castle while the people of the kingdom packed the streets. Each moving in either direction to their place of work or some other destination.
One mansion in particular, on the left side of the city, in an expansive garden, sat a woman. A noble, by her clothes, sat under the stone canopy of a gazebo. Her left hand held a red-covered book, and a tea cup was held between the index finger and thumb of her right hand. Her skin was extremely pale, but somehow the veins underneath didn't show. Her blood red eyes glittered and matched her complexion.
"How was he? Will he be of use?" She asked seemingly to no one.
"As he is now, he will be of no use. The 2 weaklings I prepared for him to fight were too much for him." A gentle breeze swept the garden, pushing the leaves of a bush a few feet away from the structure a bit to the side, revealing a rainbow colored eye and white hair.
"Hmm." She placed the tea cup on the table and used her now free hand to flip the page. "Did you get any leads in Tsige?"
"Not anything to lead us anywhere, but I did find a ring with some kind of aura. I can feel it pushing or erasing something, but don't know what." A hand came out from the bush holding a silver ring with a purple gem embedded in it. "Since I am not needed around here anymore, may I go back to Gritonia to 'save' more people?"
"Were the members of the church useful?"
"Ah… well, they did not arrive before we moved."
The woman held her chin as if deep in thought for a few seconds. "You may go." Her hand moved back to her teacup.
"Thank you, Master Muzan." A whisper is all that would have been a sign that someone else was there.
"Hmm," As she took a small sip, a loud BANG came from the back door of the mansion, followed by a girly shriek and fast-paced footsteps. She raised her gaze from her book to see a pale girl with dark hair so dark it sucked in the light and blood red eyes
"Mother!!! Can I- I wanna- I - I -" She ran up to the woman, trying to say something, but kept either running out of breath or stuttering.
"Stop and breathe, calm down." The young woman nodded and started taking big, slow breaths. "Now tell me where you have been? I haven't seen you since yesterday evening."
"Well, that is what I want to ask. Yesterday I went to see the hero of Limia kingdom train and level up. In the fight, she got hurt and was bleeding. Even at a distance, the smell reached me, and the smell was so captivating that my mouth was watering. If I stayed any longer, I would lose control. I hunted all night in the city trying to satiate the hunger." She paused and took a breath to prepare her nerves. "I know about the rule not choosing a side, but- but may I please join her party?!" Her voice turned into a squeak by the end.
The woman slowly closed the book and laid it down on the table. "You know my answer, so why even ask? Plus, you said it yourself, you would lose control when she bled."
"But- but what about sis? You let her roam free, and Lily hasn't appeared in over 15 years!" Her voice started taking on a whiny tone.
"You just answered the 'why'." She gave it a moment before answering. "Learn to get your urges under control, and I just might allow it."
"EEEKKK REALLY THEN I'M OFF!!" She ran back to the mansion just as the sun decided to start peeking over the mansion's roof and into the garden.
"She is still afraid of the sun…" She gave a small sigh and picked her book back up as the sun started to slowly illuminate her face. A small content smile adorned her face.
—
A large mansion in Lorel Union, a maid rushed to her mistress's office. Most of the residents and servants she passed by were women. Coming up to the office, she stopped in front of the door and took a breath. "Mistress, may I enter? I have a letter addressed to you, from Hashira of the Heavy Blade Zack."
"Enter!" Came the voice from inside, somehow a childish yet grown-up voice of a woman.
She entered the room and moved towards her mistress in short, rapid steps. Bowed at a 45-degree angle and outstretched her hands to hand over the letter, her thumbs and index fingers holding the top corners of the rectangle-shaped envelope. Handing over the letter, she retreated back to stand beside the door, still keeping her 45-degree bow with her eyes closed.
The sound of the paper envelope being ripped and the letter being taken out and unfolded. "Bring my daughters here." A minute or two of reading later, she ordered the maid.
They gave a deeper bow before turning and exiting the room. On her way to find one of the young mistresses, she found another maid to find and inform that she was wanted at her mother's office. They were easy to find if they were in their usual spots. She found the older one in the training yard practicing with her spear, approaching and giving her a bow. "Miss, your mother called for you and your sister. She is waiting at her office."
"Thank you, you may leave." Her spear stopped mid-thrust for a breath before her hands twirled the shaft, and she rested the butt of her spear on the floor. Seeing that the maid did not leave, she understood it was an urgent matter. The spear ended up on the weapons rack rather quickly. "Lead the way."
They found the younger sister on the way. She had a more mousy vibe than the older sister. Only the two sisters were allowed to enter.
When they entered, the older one sat on one of the chairs available while the younger stayed on her feet, staring at the floor.
"We are getting a very important guest soon, and I want either or both of you to have a child with him."
"WHAT!!! You want to pawn us off? Do we matter so little to you, Mother!?" The oldest jumped at the mention of the idea, while the younger one trembled but remained silent.
"Cool your fire. I want either of you or both to have a kid with him and marry him into the family. He is a Nouzen and a Crimson." She explained.
"So he is a mongrel? But those families already laid claim, or if he is the child of someone important, they must have placed a seal on him."
"Not quite, he was sent on a collection mission to wasteland, never came back. I helped him disappear and become someone from a far-off branch of the family living in Tsige. Their respective families don't even know they are alive or have a child."
"Then you want him to join our family to protect him?"
"Yes, that is part of it, but not the main reason."
"Which is?... Oh, your magic." The older one had the realization first.
"Yes, and that's why I want him in the family." I doubt he is as eccentric as your father was, so I cannot offer myself, but you two." Her eyes roam over her two daughters, the older not even in her mid-20s but already exuding a MILF vibe, and the younger one with a timid but full body, then down at herself. Seeing a flat plain, short limbs, and no hips made her scrunch her face.
"Fubuki, Maia, this is important enough that I am willing to think of stepping down and make either of you the next head of the family." She finished the meeting with them in a grave, low tone of voice.
—
In the rundown area of Tsige, people in white clothes and silver armor were looking around in a broken building that resembled a church.
"Anyone found anything?" The man in the most luxurious armor asked from a makeshift wooden chair assembled from the broken wooden seats lying around.
"No, Sir. Whoever raided the place only left broken wood and dried blood. Even the bodies are gone." One of the women replied while moving the broken planks that formed piles.
"Search for a while longer before we move on to the tavern that was attacked." He rested his chin on his hands
A group of armed men entered the building, dragging in 2 women and 1 girl, all 3 of them demi-humans. Some kind of dog demis. All 3 of them were pushed to the floor in front of the man sitting down. Groans of pain and whimpers of fear came out of them. "We found these things huddling around in the alley near here."
"And?" Was the reply he got in a very uninterested tone.
"Uh-w-well they might know what happened or have some clues to it." The man leading the group that dragged the girls stuttered and tried to sound confident.
"HA!!! They are just a bunch of dirty demis. Too stupid." He stood up, took out it his sword, and sheathed it inside the chest of the oldest woman of the trio. "To even know one of them died."
"MOM!!!!!!!!" Both of the girls quickly moved to hug the dying older woman as the man removed the sword from her chest.
"Oh, I guess they did…. Huh, miracles happen. They were wasted on these two tho." He walked around the dying body and lifted the sword to the neck of the youngest one. "What happened here that night?"
The oldest of the 2 could stop tears coming out and her body trembling as she saw the other girl's fear in her tear-filled eyes.
Getting tired of waiting for an answer, to make her answer quicker her moved the sword enough to cut into the girl's neck, making blood ooze out of her and down the blade of his sword.
Seeing the blood making a mess on the girl's neck made her panic. "A-a-a man c-came to this building that night. There must have been more people inside waiting. A-a fight broke out, and the man managed to run out of the building and ran away, but the ones who attacked followed him."
"What did they look like?"
"I-a- a there was one with four arms and and a-a-a… I don't know." Her eyes bounced between the girls and the man's face.
"Hmph." He removed the sword from her neck and removed the blood with a quick swipe of the air before sheathing it.
"Let's go." A woman leaning on the broken frame of the entrance urged. Her golden hair was tied in a ponytail, and a bow was firmly held in her delicate-looking hands.
Clearly displeased by one of his subordinates giving orders, he turned to her. "Shut up." He looked around once more before walking out of the building and ordering, "Let's go," in a grave voice.
"That's what I said," the woman muttered.
The two demi-humans were left there sobbing and hugging each other while the corpse of the last one cooled at their feet.
—
Some days back-
Rin and Obito rode on a carriage they managed to hail and hop on for a ride to Tsige. They decided to accept an escort mission to make some money while they traveled back.
They were not the only ones who had accepted the escort quest. Three other adventurers were there escorting the carriage that belonged to a merchant company, considering all the produce riding in the second carriage.
They decided to leave early in order to arrive at their destination in the afternoon. With the sun not yet up and the groginess from waking up early, the sound of wooden wheels rolling on stone and the horse's hooves clomping against the floor was all the sound taking space in the cold air of the morning; not even the horses were neighing.
The wooden seats under them felt extremely uncomfortable from the bumpy ride. There were no big rocks or holes in the road made of neatly arranged rectangle-shaped stones, but wooden wheels rolling over hard surfaces did not give a smooth ride, especially if the seats were made of pure wood.
Confusion ran wild in their minds and was apparent on their faces when they looked at each other as the carriage came to an abrupt stop.
"Obito! Come out!!" As soon as he heard the voice, he felt like an ice cube slid down from the base of his neck down to his tailbone.
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Word Count 2144
Thanks for reading this bit
If there are any grammatical errors, let me know by commenting on the paragraph.
Thank you guys. I appreciate your reading so far
Gonna update more rarely from now on but more than once a year... hopefully.