The blue sky was slowly overtaken by orange hue as Aiyana and I traversed the path back to my old home. It’d been a fun day all things considered. We’d spent most of the morning exploring the village and collecting various items we’d be needing in the future. I had fun learning about the ends and outs of the village from Aiyana, and she’d been eager to tell me everything. But, when we reached the center of the village she changed.

While the area had more dead bodies in it than any other place we visited, something about the place had scared her and I tried to find out what.

Then I saw him.

While his skin had taken on a light grey color and his hair was full of gunk, I remembered the man’s angular face and his unique eyes. He and his followers had been the ones that brought the ogres here. They were the reason that mom had died!!

“Are you okay?”

“Huh?”

Aiyana had tried to start up a conversation with me a few times now, but I’ve been too distracted to answer her. While her skin was a shade lighter and she didn’t have any light wrinkles, she and that man had the same eyes and cheekbones. If you saw them together, it would have been impossible not to see that they were related.

It’d been his fault, it just had to have been. A few weeks ago I heard him talking about ogres with his two partners a few weeks ago. If I’d told mom that day or just brought it up at anyti… No, No, he did it, he was to blame.

He had to be.

“Seriously, what's the matter? Do we need to stop and take a break?”

“How are you doing that?”

“Doing what?”

“Nevermind.”

It had been bothering me for a while now, but she always seemed to know what I was thinking at any given time. Even though I never said anything, she just seemed know whenever something was bothering me. Honestly, it was a little scary.

“Anyway, once we’re over that ridge up ahead our old house is just a little bit off the beaten path. We can camp out for there for the night and start collecting the food in the morning.”

There was something else I needed to do, but I should be able to take care of that once we reach the house.

“Geisai, why did you burn my father’s body?”

I was afraid she would ask me that. Why did that guy have to be her father? Given how she reacted once his body had been dealt with, Aiyana must have cared for him. If I told her the truth she might lash out again or even leave for good.

My feet stopped moving at the thought of that and it felt as if a stone, heavier than everything we had combined, fell into my stomach. I’d just found her, I didn’t want to lose her already.

I could try to lie but she’d just see through it like she does everything. No matter what I had to avoid doing anything that would make her leave.

“Geisai, answer me.”

Aiyana dug her heels it at peak of the ridge and made it clear she wasn’t moving another inch unless I could drag her along, but she’d hate me if I tried to do that.

“I-It looked like you were having a hard time of it. You kept saying that it was something that we needed to take care of before we left the village, yet you just stood there. When the torch was half burnt away, I-I realized that you couldn’t do what had to be done so I did it for you.”

“Is that… Is that true?”

I could only nod my when she asked me that question, the fear of the other reason coming out locking my mouth shut. If lying and the truth were out of the question, the only thing left was a half-truth. Afterall, nothing I said had been false, I just left out a few things.

For a while, Aiyana said nothing as she gave me a hard stare. The silence had become heavier than it had been before, a gentle breeze drew my attention to just how much sweat covered my back as I waited for her to do something, anything.

“...Thank you.”

“Huh?”

Aiyana’s voice was so quiet I could barely hear what she said.

“Thank you. I’m the older one, I should be doing the harder things, yet every time things get difficult you have to take care of it.”

For a moment Aiyana looked softer than she normally was, but it was only for a moment and she was back to normal after a quick shake of her head. She must have been really bothered by it the differences between if she revealed her vulnerable side so easily.

“Don’t worry about it. My mom say- said that everyone has things they’re good at and things they’re bad at. I can lift heavy things and carry a lot of stuff, but I had no idea what half the stuff we needed was until you told me about them. In fact, I wouldn’t have even known how to find them if it weren’t for your guidance.”

While bringing up mom caused a deep aching in my chest it was worth it if what I said made Aiyana feel better.

“R-Right. We’ve wasted enough time here, I want I don’t want to be out here when the sun sets.”

Without another word, Aiyana started moving again. For now, it seemed she was satisfied with my responses, but I’d better avoid mentioning that man as much as possible.

“By the way, why are you so strong anyway? I mean it's not a bad thing, it's just a little wield to see you do what you can do.”

“I don’t know. For as long as I can remember, I’ve always been strong. My mom used to say that she was afraid I would never walk because I didn’t stand on my own until I was four, but my earliest memory was of her teaching me how to left rotten eggs without breaking them.”

I wish I had more to say but all I had to go on was what my mom used to say about my body. The first time I managed to move all the eggs from one basket into was really fun because mom made beef stew that night and because it meant I wouldn’t have to spend the day washing off rotten egg yolk.

My skin began to itch for some reason, and when I looked up I saw Aiyana was openly staring at my face.

“So they do that when you’re happy.”

“What does what?”

“Nothing. So which way are we going now?”

There was something she was hiding but it didn’t seem to matter.

“Follow me. Once w⎯“

“Geisai, why’d yo⎯ ah.”

I grabbed a hold of Aiyana and ran into a denser section of the forest. However, we were still too visible so I dumped everything into the bush and dragged Aiyana behind the largest tree I could find.

“Geisai, what’s wrong?”

“Sheesh. Listen.”

While a bit reluctant, Aiyana closed her eyes and took in her surroundings. As concentrated I started to pick up the sound of footsteps and foliage parting. There were at least three of them and they were heading in the direction we'd just been heading.

“... certain that it was the Darh’ki?”

So they were people then, probably other survivors, but what were they doing out here. Unless…

“He could have been such a nice boy, too bad he turned out to be a monster. My Reina can’t be associated with someone that doesn’t even know how to treat a lady.”

“Haah… Enough, Selina. Jericho, I may be old but I know Darh’ki when I see one. The pair said they were heading towards the shack, has there been any strange movement around the area since we’ve been gone?”

So two of the three were the ones we left back in the village and the other person was one of their companions. It seems like they managed to catch up to us.

“The children haven’t seen anything, and the others have been scouring the forest for other food staches. We thought something happened when you two didn’t show up yesterday, so we were trying to secure resources before we went searching.”

“That’s good, but we need to tighten our patrol. That Darh’ki is different from the normal kind and it's going to take everything we have to deal with it once it reveals itself. Hav... “

Their voices began to fade into the distance, yet neither Aiyana or moved for a couple of minutes. Only after I could no longer hear their footsteps did pull myself away from the tree we hid behind.

“We shouldn’t have spent so long gathering supplies. Not only have those two caught up with us, they managed to warn their allies that we were coming.”

Aiyana’s expression had turned dark after she said that. She must have felt guilty about that, but it wasn’t her fault.

“Geisai, do you know anything about hunting?”

“A little, but not enough to do it correctly.”

While I’d seen mom set up traps and kill the animals that wandered too close to our home, I don’t think I ever saw her do much beyond that.

“Without that food, we won’t last that long.”

Aiyana began pacing back and forth while muttering to herself.

“Aiyana, I know where the food staches are, it doesn’t seem that they’ve found all of them yet.”

“We can’t trust that. As far as we know, they could have found all of the staches and haven’t realized it. How long will it take to reach the cave from here?”

“A day in a half if we keep traveling through the night.”

Aiyana thought it over for a bit longer before she spoke up again.

“Geisai, we’re gonna need that food, even if it only last us long enough to learn how to acquire more of it on our own. While I’m sure that those people haven’t done anything wrong, that food is rightfully yours to begin with.”

What she was saying made sense so I nodded my head and waited for her to continue.

“So, this is what we’re gonna do. We’ll drop everything off at the cave and then rest for a day. That way we’ll be well rested and they’ll be on edge from waiting for us to show up when we sneak back here. We’re not gonna take all of it but we're gonna get our fair share of the food.”

“How are we gonna do that?”

“I’m working on the how right now, and I’ll have an answer in a few days, but we have our goal set.”

That wasn’t a lot to go off of, but I just have to trust her.

“Alright. Follow me. It’s a bit of a winding path to reach the cave so stay close behind me.”

There was a slight pain in my palms as I hardened my resolve. If anything happens I’ll take care of it. No matter what I wouldn’t run away.

Never again.