The dry leaves crunched under her boots as she walked through the dark woods, her hands clasped behind her head while her tail swayed slowly behind her. The night air had grown cool hours after the Gate clear, but she didn't seem to notice the chill.
"Have you ever seen something like that before?" The demon girl asked, tilting her head back to look at the canopy.
"No," the boy replied, stepping over a fallen branch, "it was completely strange and unexpected."
"Do you think it has to do with him?" he asked.
"It has to be," she said, her tail twitching in the dark, "there is really no other way to explain it."
She kept walking, her mind still replaying the bizarre phenomenon they had witnessed. The boy didn't press her for more details, just keeping his hands in his pockets while he followed her down the winding path.
The trail eventually dipped toward a low ridge overlooking a quiet clearing where the faint, warm glow of a campfire flickered between the trees.
