Red's story didn't take her too long to recount, and after she was done, I sighed and spoke up "Well, I might have bitten more than I can chew here. Red, do you have any more information about this Ravan family?"

"No, I know only rumours," she answered while shaking her head.

"I see" I muttered.

I was thinking our predicament over as I noticed Red waiver, she looked ready to fall asleep while standing. "You look like you need to get some sleep, let's set up one of these tents so you can rest inside. And I'll keep watch on these four while you do so."

Red still had an uncertain expression on her face, like she didn't trust me. I tried to reassure her, "I'm not sure how much of the conversation I had with the adventurers you heard, but I told them you are under my protection now. I intend to keep my word so while you are with me, you have nothing to fear, I'll do my best to protect you."

My words didn't seem to have much effect on her, she clearly still didn't trust me fully. But after a few seconds of contemplating, she gave me a short nod of acceptance. I think she might have been too tired to argue my point, so we began setting up one of the tents. While we worked on our task, asked her about something that had been bothering me for a while now. "So tell, why do you think Ravan's people won't come to this forest to look for you? I haven't come across anything that an army of soldiers wouldn't be able to deal with. So far only danger I have faced here have been some wolfs and lizard. They were bigger than I was expecting, but nothing that a group of experienced soldiers couldn't handle."

Red gave me a tired look before responding "I only know stories how no one who comes to this forest has never returned, nobody knows what happened to them, so people stopped exploring this place."

I let out another deep sigh of exasperation and grumbled under my breath, "Well that isn't much of a help in our current predicament, I guess we'll have to question those four even more after they wake up."

It only took us a little over fifteen minutes to get one of the tents set up. And after we were done, Red took one of the blankets and went inside. I, on the other hand, sat down and started nibbling on some the ration we got from Elena's group. As I was eating, I tried to figure out what my next course of action should be.

I came to the conclusion that I wasn't ready to leave this place, and face whatever this noble family was going to throw at us. I needed to get stronger before I tangling with them, but that shouldn't be too hard. I didn't get a level up from defeating Elena and her crew, so most likely I will have to kill whomever I fighting to get the experience. Now I have always been more pragmatic than emotional when it comes to death. If push comes to shove, I think I'll be able to do what is necessary. But until then, I'll be better of fighting monsters rather than people, to gain my experience points.

I didn't know what I should do with Elena and her group, I can't just let them go. If I do that and they manage to get back to civilisation, I'm sure they'll report back to their employer, and that could cause more trouble for me. If the rumours about this place were accurate, I could just let them go, and the forest would take care of them.

'Mira, what do you think I should do?' I inquired in my head.

Mira answered back to me almost instantly with, 'I will follow your lead, Master.'

'Thanks... But really Mira, do you not have an opinion on this matter? I don't want to just kill them off after I'm done with my questioning. And then there is the child, Red, I told them she is under my protection, but I have no idea how to take care of children.'

'Master, I don't think you need to worry too much about Red, she has demon blood in her and demon spawn are notoriously hard to kill. I'm sure you noticed her mana being deep red in colour instead of with like most living creatures. That red mana makes her a lot more resilient to physical and magical harm. It also enhances her speed and physical strength significantly. Same way as our combined mana will, eventually.' Mira informed me.

While pondering this, I thought inside my head. 'You know, when I was fighting Elena and her group earlier, I thought I was moving a bit faster than I ordinarily would be able to. But what you are saying, is that she will be able to take care of herself.'

Mira gave me what was almost like a mental nod, before saying, 'Yes Master, she will only get physically stronger as she grows older. But, if you insist on keeping her along, you do need to teach her how to control her mana.'

'Why is that?' I asked her

'The mana generation of half-demons is constant, and eventually if left untrained, it will grow to such extent that her human-half won't be able to contain it. People used to call this event 'the awakening' as it represented their demon blood awakening and taking control. This awakening usually happened during puberty, and if they were untrained, it causes them to go into a blood-fueled rampage.' She explained.

'Wait, wait, wait.' I stopped her before she could continue further, 'How am I supposed to teach her anything? I'm pretty new to this magic thing myself, I just control my own mana by pure instinct at this point. I doubt I can teach her that.'

Mira went quiet for a few seconds before responding with 'Hhm, that might be a problem Master. You could always try to make a contract with her, but that would require knowing her true-name.

'What do you mean with a contract?' I asked 'You don't mean like selling my soul to a demon kind of contract I hope.'

'No no Master, you can't bargain your soul for this contract since it already belongs to me. And I don't like sharing.'

She continued rambling about something else, but I could no longer hear her. I was completely stunned. 'WAIT! WHAT? I didn't sell my soul to you! Did I?'

She sounded eerily happy as she answered, 'Well you didn't really sell your soul as much as gave it to me Master, as I gave mine to you. I told you we are one now, it is not just our mana pools that are fusing together. But everything about us, our minds, mana, souls, feelings, even some of our personalities will eventually merge together. But that is beside the point Master, you can't bargain OUR soul to anyone. I don't want a third wheel.'

'And as I understand souls are rarely bargained in deals with demons. Usually, what they want is access to this plane, most of them just want to get out of the abyss and cause mayhem and such. But since Red is already here Master, you need to come up with something else to bargain for.' Mira informed me.

I took a few deep breaths to calm myself, before asking Mira for more answers, 'Okay let us drop this whole soul business for now, but we will have words about it later. What about this contract with Red, how will it help her?'

Mira answered with, 'When you make a deal with demons, you pay whatever price you are willing to pay, for something of theirs. Now it could be as simple as asking for them to do some task, but in this case, if you make a deal with Red for power or maybe mana. You could take some of her excess mana from her so it won't bottle up inside her and eventually cause her demonic side to awaken. I'm not sure if this will stop the whole process, but it should give you more time to teach her how to control her own mana.'

'So you basically want me to make Red into a mana battery for me?' I asked

'For US Master, make Red into a mana battery for us. I think this will help us to get stronger and it should help her in the process as well.'