Both Snow and Dairen stared at each other momentarily, unsure if they heard the door lock. For the door to close by itself wasn't a preset thing that the Dragon Express store had. It honestly boggled Snow's mind, making her wonder if Heather or Mr. Jay cast the spell or something to let her enter and then leave when she got the message.

"Did the door just…..lock?" Dairen asked, trying to get a confirmation in the hopes that he didn't hear things. He actually took the time to reach toward the door and push to open it. Instead, the door didn't budge, making Dairen look like a fool.

"It's locked." He stopped pushing and gave up entirely. "Is there some kind of magical contraption to lock the door?"

"No," said Snow. It would have made her life that much easier if they did have such a thing, but Mr. Jay was a scrooge, so spending on such expensive luxury was something he wouldn't quite want to afford. "We usually lock it with a key every night."

"No magic?"

"We still do things like normal people, you know." She chuckled. The thought of using magic every day for simple things was a luxury. If she could have all her apartment be using magic items all the time, she would either be rich or powerful.

"Even though magic is everywhere, it's not easy. One needs understanding and a power source to fuel magic. This is why most of the time, we have an item that naturally stores magic and uses it to replenish it constantly. Not everyone has a large amount of magic that they can feel it constantly. Usually, there aren't a lot of those types of people. Directing, controlling, and having a strong storage of magic in oneself limits what you can and can not do. Luckily for me, I have a natural affinity to it all, so it takes a bit of concentration. Plus, Mr. Jay is a penny pincher when it even comes to magic."

"Wow."

"Yea, I know. It's ridiculous."

Snow was thinking it over, trying to figure out who. As if on cue, a familiar scent finally hit her, instantly realizing who it was.

"It seems though Heather was the one who cast it for one time use." With a satisfied smile that she found the answer, she straightened up and turned to leave.

"Heather?"

"My friend. The one who yelled out loud to capture you…..ah." Realizing too late, she has temporarily forgotten about the last encounter. "I mean ...you know."

"It's fine. I understand completely." He chuckled at her, noticing that she was getting flustered. "I would have done the same if I was her. For some random stranger to walk in must have caught you by surprise. I would have wanted to chase the guy who would have wanted to keep all this a secret."

Snow was surprised at his conclusion. She had hoped he wouldn't catch on so quickly and assumed he was a bit slow. "Then….why are you still here. Most people would have run the other way and never looked back."

"Well…."For the first time, Dairen straightened up. He had a calm demeanor in his eyes that once again held a powerful, mysterious draw to them. "I just thought this was interesting and better than the normal world I live in."

Snow snapped out of her stupor, "you don't understand how dangerous the supernatural world is." Not entirely pleased with Dairen's reply. She started to walk towards Honeysuckle Boar restaurant, continuing on their quest for food. "You can easily die in seconds. There are too many things in this world that you wish you never saw."

Her own feelings started to erupt, trying to bring reason into this him, who saw this new part of the world as entertainment.

Dairen followed suit, quickly walking up next to her. "I know it isn't all butterflies and rainbows. You could say the same about humans in general. I just like to know what I am dealing with. This opened up a whole new possibilities that I have to think about and even learn."

"It's best you don't see them or know about them." Her voice was stern and cold. This was the truth. there were too many dark creatures in this world that did more harm than good. "Sometimes being ignorant about the whole situation is life-saving in the magical community. What you don't see, four-fifths of the time, they will not come out to harm you. Better yet, they will ignore you because you can't see them."

"How does that work?" Dairen was perplexed by her statement. "I would assume it's like if you stare into the abyss, the abyss will stare back at you kind of thing?"

"Yes. Most magical creatures stay hidden from view, especially from the Sleepers." But now that she thought about it, what was he anyway?

"Sorry to interrupt, what do you mean Sleepers? I keep hearing that word from you but don't quite understand. Would it be people who can't see the magical race considered Sleepers?"

"Yes. People who can't see them as well as people who can't use magic. An awakened is people who can do both, but there haven't been many instances where one could see..." Then it hit her, realizing what she had said. "Wait, can you use magic?"

"I don't know?"

"Maybe your powers are just blossoming…..have you felt any weird stirring in your guts or some

strange instances that have been happening around you that you can't explain?"

"Yes. You." He bluntly replied, catching Snow off guard. The semi blunt response wasn't something she had expected at all. "Everything around you has been different. This whole magical society has become something interesting since I met you."

Snow sighed. "That's not what I meant." She scrunched up her brows.

"Well, it's the truth. There are a lot of new things happening around you that I want to know more.

This world is different, almost like a... game." He went silent.

Snow thought over what he had said. This was a good thing that he didn't just run away. Maybe she could capsize on it and probably bring him in more into the inner workings of the magical society, so she could keep him close for the next three days. She felt like it was the best option she got.

"Fine. Follow me and learn well. I don't like repeating things more than once." Snow replied, actually hoping a bit that he would be disinterested if she said that, but he wasn't. His eyes sparkled, even a broad smile plastered on his face from ear-to-ear.

"This world is divided into three dimensions: the living, the dead, and the middle of the two. Right now, in the world of the living, people like the Awakened can use the power of the world. Constantly recycling its energy, in a circular motion. The magical creatures are all experts at harnessing magic and know that humans are dangerous creatures that hunt their kind for power. So, they have all adapted quickly to hide from the world in a different pocket of dimension. It's between life and death. You can say this is the middle ground, or another word for it is the 3rd dimension."

"Such a place like that exist?"

"Yes. That is where the Dragon Express is situated as well."

"Then what about the dead dimension? How does one even get close to it?"

"The first question comes down to do you believe in souls?"

Dairen thought it over, he wasn't so sure how to answer that.

"Well, to give you a heads up death is another transition into one plane to another. When you pass away, you go to the Gods you serve and either get reincarnated or stay with the Gods."

"I see." Contemplating on what he learned.

Where do you think demons and dark spirits even come from? Imagination?"

"I assumed in the past it was all fairytale." said Dairen, then he realized what Snow said about Demons. "wait, there are demons out there?"

"Yes." Snow nodded, knowing full well that it might be scaring him, but she wanted him to be scared.

The reason was simple: for him to turn back and leave the magical community.

Dairen was flabbergasted. It wasn't an everyday occurrence where one would learn such a dangerous being would exist. "I didn't think of that."

"Like I said, it's a dangerous world. Most of the magical community is riddled with dark entities and creatures."

They arrived in front of the Honeysuckle Boar restaurant.

When Snow reached up and opened the door, she asked Dairen. "Does all this scare you?" She momentarily stopped to take a good look at his reactions. Hoping that her words were getting to him. She could see how he was engrossed in her explanation.

Eventually, he finally replied. "Yes and no."

"How so?"

"Yes, such a thought is scary to meet these demons and dark spirits." He replied. "But, all this information is good to know, so I know what or who to stay away from."

What he said was true, knowing about them could help in staying away from them but randomly pulled in a magical situation was a completely different thing. Even Snow knew that one wrong move cost her life.

"Plus, you'll teach me a bit on how to protect myself, right?"

Snow gave up in trying to scare him anymore. For some reason, he was just not falling into her tactics. Maybe she wasn't stressing how bad this could go, or perhaps he was just that dim-witted to not get the hint that this was dangerous. She just didn't know.

"We will see." She replied and headed in.

Inside the restaurant, they were a large number of people waiting in line. Snow and Dairen stood and waited for their turn. They didn't talk much about the topic and instead thought of what to eat.

Snow bought a Super Ham Sandwich deluxe meal, while Dairen took the Wild Wild West meal, which she found the name amusing. They found a seat next to the window where they got a clear view of the Dragon Express store.

Sitting down, she placed her tray on the table. Next, she took out her phone from her pocket and read through her inbox. So far, there weren't many text messages from anyone she knew.

She quickly typed in a few words, asking why she sent the text message. A few more, she sent a letter to the other employee and Mr. Jay himself and placed down her phone next to her food.

Throughout most of her enjoyable lunch, she would take long looks at the storefront in the hopes she would see a familiar face, but so far, no one came by. Even her phone did not buzz, making her wonder what was going on for then to not reply.

"Do you have any idea when they will come by?" Dairen asked. He was finished with his food and took a sip right after. "We been sitting here for thirty minutes; maybe something urgent has come up."

"It is a possibility…."

"What are you thinking about doing now?"

Snow took a bite out of her sandwich, savoring every little bit as she washed it down with Apple juice. She then placed the drink down and took a good look at Dairen.

"The question is, what are you going to do? Don't you have things to do?"

"Not really, except for buying a phone."

"Don't you have a home? A family to go too?"

"Both my parents passed away when I was in high school, and I was sent to live with my grandmother. She too passed away recently as well, so I don't have a family to go back to at Earth; being here is fine with me. Plus, I am an only child, so there really isn't anything left for me." A tinge of pain was heard from Dairen's tone of voice, but he covered it up quickly.

"I'm sorry for bringing up the past." Snow felt terrible for bringing up such a topic. She knew the pain of loss and understood him well.

"It's fine. That was a year ago. Now, I'm just wandering from place to place. Plus, for one month, I have a vacation leave from work, but somehow I ended up this world." He smiled.

"What do you work?"

"Well, it's a bit difficult to explain. I get paid for commission for photography and other side jobs,

which brings in quite a good amount of work. Other than that, you can say I get contracted out in

the entertainment business in the movie industry." Dairen pushed aside his food and folded his hand in front of him. "Now enough about me. What about you?"

"Me?" Snow eyed the last bit of her sandwich and guzzled it down with a drink. "They're really not many interesting things about my life."

"What are you talking about, you live in between danger and magic. That's exciting in itself."

"Danger isn't exciting. Working at the Dragon Express is dangerous for sure. Pushing paperwork around isn't the only thing we do. Sometimes the Hunter will bring live creatures, making our jobs difficult. There were quite a few times when we got injured and almost died to one." She shuddered, just thinking about it. "As a reception, we need to keep track of up-to-date creature hunts that customers send to us daily, stockpile on ingredients for weapons, and store them away so we can package them off and sell them. Other times, we have annoying hunters who yell about how difficult it was for them to capture. Then they want a higher payment from it." She sighed.

Those types of hunters irked her. Increasing the payment for the kill wasn't possible when the set amount of bounty was already set. Suddenly, giving away more money wasn't Mr. Jay's motto.

"We have brawls to put down and many more. Two hundred years ago, the place was a bar. Now, alcohol is prohibited because of that."

"That's still interesting, though. It seems your life isn't boring."

"Boring is better than excitement. Trust me on this. Going through this every day is a headache."

"Let's say it's boring. What would you be doing if you have lost that job?"

Snow thought it over. She never really thought of the whole thing of what to do next after her job if she lost it. It wasn't a job she hated, honestly it was unique and different from the Sleepers type of jobs that they had.

"I was debating on doing magical animal rescue works."

"Really?" Dairen was surprised; the answer was utterly left field from what he had expected.

"Yes, traveling the world is something I would love to do. But because of the job, I only get a one month break every year. So, I spend the time to go out on such trips."

"That's quite fascinating."

"Helping endangered magical creatures is something worth doing." Her voice was lite with passion.

"Did you know that the Hippocampus that lives in the Famous Ying River has been pushed back from Chion's explosive industrial population? The main reason is because of the contaminated river beds that are caused by the Sleepers. We have to go down to the river to purify the waters at least once a year, which we sanction of a special zone for them."

"No. Do tell." He was fascinated by the words that painted the pictures of her adventures. Crossing his hands, he leaned forward.

"It isn't just the river Hippocampus that are considered in danger but the Kilins that are being hunted for their magical pelts and horns. We do have a certain list of endangered species not to hunt as well as dangerous species that overpopulate and destroys the habitat around civilizations."

"Wait, is there a difference between the river Hippocampus and a regular Hippocampus?"

"Yes, just like the freshwater dolphins, there are Hippocampus that live in freshwater. Most Hippocampus live in the vast ocean, but certain breeds had changed their nature and shifted their living habitat. The River Hippocampus looks almost identical to the regular ones, but they have a slight difference."

"That is?"

"Their mane and features. They look like Oriental dragons: the River hippos have long manes and curly whiskers. Their dragon scales are more greenish than blue. While the ones that live in the ocean are bluish-green and with shorter mane with no whiskers."

"That's quite a change in description from one to another."

"Not too much, in my opinion."

"Then what are Kilins? I have never heard about those creatures before."

Snow thought over how to describe them. Out of the many fantastical creatures, she found the Kilins in Chion to be fascinating.

"They are like a mix between a dragon and a deer. Large straight branches like antlers, fiery flame-like mane that are more like water than fire. They have green dragon scales and a bit of dragon-like faces. Honestly, the Kilin is a more Eastern origin of a Western unicorn. They are known for their healing qualities."

"Chion does have some fascinating creatures." Dairen was immersed in what Snow had stated. It was the first time to hear such mythical creatures that he had never heard about, especially learning that they exist made him excited.

"There are many different types of creatures around the world, most of the mythical creatures in each country creatures are real. And just like their description you find on the internet, they are quite spot on."

"So, you stated the Dragon Express guild hunts down dangerous creatures. What kind?"

Snow reached over as she took a sip of her drink. "Mostly dark, chaotic creatures. Many dark spirits and even demons. Also, controlled hunting on magical creature hunts. It's not an easy job keeping the hunters in line. There has been a lot of black market hunting, in which we also go in and infiltrate to squash for species preservation."

"Don't you have family here?"

"Not in this state. Most are in a different country, and only a handful of lives in the states."

"Siblings?"

"Just one. A sister."

Snow realized that she was spilling her guts out to this man, she quickly changed the subject. She took a glance towards the direction of the Dragon Express, hoping to catch someone who was going back to opening the store.

Suddenly, the once toned out voice of the new cast blasted through her ears, casting her attention.

"Last night, at 10:44 pm, the apartment resident of Sunburn, Atlantis, a male was found dead in their home, murdered. Police had stated that this was possibly a robbery gone wrong as valuable has been stolen."

Snow turned towards the TV as the word murder caught her attention. With a sharp gasp, her chest felt compressed and unusually tight. It was as if her stomach was making her make loops and even felt nervous. The apartment that was shown was precisely the area where she was last night.

Such memory was unforgettable, especially when she remembers the exact factory building that she saw the reporter was standing in front of next to the apartment where the murder took place.

Even though she had a glimpse of the dead man on the ground, she remembered the face. The same sharp sneaky nose, dirt blond curly hair, and even the mole under his left eye, without the slash mark on his face.

She gulped, sweat forming on her hands and her back. The thought of last night's was brought up as clear as day. If she didn't know any better, this whole incident was becoming a trauma. Shaking her head, she cleared her mind and steady herself. There was no way she was going to let such memory take hold of her. She wasn't going to allow it.

The reporter drowned on and on, but Snow mind was tuning out her voice out. Her eyes glazed over, thinking about everything.

"Snow." Darren's voice called out. "Snow?"

Snow realized she was zoning out way too often these past few days.

"Sorry, I was overthinking again."

"You sure?"

No. Not really. Snow thought.

The temporary confidence she brought up was fading away. All she could do was push away such thoughts and straighten herself and lie again. At the rate she was going, she was becoming a habitual liar. Such an idea wasn't something she liked.

"Yes." She nodded. With a push of her chair, while getting up, scraping sound of metal against the marble floor rang out. "Let's go."

"Go? Where?" Dairen asked, confused. "Are they here?"

Snow shook her head. "You'll see."

Dairen wasn't sure where she wanted to go. Honestly, Snow wasn't one hundred percent sure about the place that Heather was there. Either way, she wasn't picking up the phone when she attempted to call her or reply to her text message.

"We are going to find a friend."