“…You’re sure you want to leave? You’re welcome to stay here as long as you’d like.”

Paro offered one last time, but Din shook his head. Noticing that Din had no intention of changing his mind, Paro let out a sigh before reaching out his hand. Din grabbed his uncle’s hand and shook it.

“I wish you safe journey.”

Even with all Paro had done, I still felt bad for leaving him, but Din was determined to help me. And after what he had to do the previous day, the less time he spent in this village, the better.

-The weather was nice today. Even though the chilly air was still there, the sun shined brightly in the sky, making it an enjoyable walk. Paro lent Din a thick fur coat and some extra clothing for the trip. Din packed up his leather armor in his bag as it was too uncomfortable to walk long distance in. Along with his armor, Din was carrying a long cloak and a short sword inside the bag. For nourishment, he had canned soups and a canteen full of water.

We decided to get lunch at Teril as we passed through the village. Compared to Sebraten, Teril was a lot smaller and the buildings were a lot more worn down, but the people here were just as friendly.

Through the town, I saw the old man that had killed the wolf attacking Tal. He was wearing a gray fur scarf as he carried a brown bag over his shoulders.

It was around sunset when we reached the riverbed we had ended up at with Tal and Mun. Din and I decided to camp out for the night as the city was highly guarded overnight.

The dinner Din had ended up with was the bread with the red jelly on the inside. We found out later that the jelly was strawberry flavored. Din took small bites off the bread as he stared blankly near the fire.

“You shouldn’t stare at the fire like that,” I warned him.

Having his focus disturbed, Din turned towards me, “Sorry, there’s just a lot on my mind right now.”

“Like what?”

“I keep seeing it,” Din covered his eyes, “The man I killed. I’m trying so hard to forget, but I just can’t do it. Every time I try not to think about it, the same image pops up in my head. There wasn’t any reason for killing him like that. I still don’t get how I agreed to it so easily. I knew what it meant to stab him with that knife, but I still did it anyways.”

I couldn’t say anything. I agreed with him. It caught me off guard how easily he accepted Paro’s order. What drove Din to act like that?

“I can’t finish this.”

Din whispered as he wrapped the half-eaten bread in paper before putting it in his bag. He then kicked dirt over the fire he had set up. After putting out the fire, he spread out a blanket on the floor and laid on it.

Without another word, he had fallen asleep.

It wasn’t much, but I laid down next to him and watched over him. I didn’t feel the need to sleep so I just watched the partly cloudy sky through the trees. It was hard to see past the tree leaves, but it was enough to just lay there and think to myself.

As a Spirit, I still had no clue what my Wish could be. My only guess would be that I could turn into a ghost after dying, but I don’t remember doing any kind of ritual to activate the Wish.

Had I unconsciously done it? What had I done that could be considered a ritual?

As I was thinking to myself, a sudden voice almost made me shriek. It was Din.

“Hey, Lorelei?”

“What is it?”

Din seemed hesitant at first, but continued, “There’s a place I’d like you to visit tomorrow.”

“Aren’t we going to pass through Ravenwalt as quickly as we can so we can head to Newron?”

“It shouldn’t take too long. There’s a place that I need you to check for me. It’ll be crowded so I won’t be able to go in there, but as a ghost, you should be able to just go through without any trouble.”

“Where’d you want me to go?” I asked. I didn’t like the idea of spending too much time in Ravenwalt, but if it was something Din wanted that badly, then there was no helping it.

“There’s someone I want you to visit in the Ravenwalt hospital. You might’ve heard me when I was telling Uncle Paro this, but my mom is still in there. She’s been in a coma ever since that incident so you just need to check in to see if she’s still fine. I just want to make sure they didn’t do anything to her after finding out that I fought with the guards.”

I nodded, “I can do that for you, but you have to make sure to hide while I’m in there. I can’t really go asking people if they know where you are.”

“Thank you.”

With that, Din turned away from me and went back to sleep.

I see, all this time, he was worried for his mom.