The devil walked back on the path that she took to guard Dominic back to his village, she had a couple of thoughts back in her mind that swirled all the attention she had for her surroundings, she walked on and on just thinking about that story she read for the child in the most profound depth of that tomb for those unsung heroes

And soon enough, she found herself standing there right how she did hours earlier, her purple eyes were locked with the engravings that she once narrated, the devil lived alongside life itself, birthed side by side by light itself, she chuckled

To her it was ironic that dark would be born alongside light, she looked down as she wondered if she was really that dark deep inside considering what she had done today, but that would hardly outweigh the evil she did in the past

Crossing her arms, she looked up at the hole in the ceiling, rays of light sneaking in to bless the devil and the tomb with little illumination, though she was more comfortable in the dark

Lowering her eyes again and looking at the sarcophagus in front of her, the same one that presumably held the remains of Avalynn, that one demon that had its hatred swayed by that human woman

"Cassidy, Avalynn" The devil whispered to herself, narrowing her eyes in thought, locked with the engraving of a woman holding her hand for the demon

"All you did was for naught" She continued

"All of what you did hasn't changed the world one bit, one race survived and the other was extinguished" Pursing her lips she felt a tiny amount of sorrow birthed in her core, though she was too meddled in her own thoughts to ponder on where this new found empathy came from, nor did she pay any attention to her surroundings

"Have you finished your business with that child of man?" The Devil's lips parted slightly at the sound of that feminine voice behind her, turning her head over her shoulder to take a look at what was behind her, a person with a cloak over her body while its hood covered her head and hair, and her face was hidden by what was a mask in the shape of a fox, orange paint decorating that same white mask at the tip of the nose and at the core of the ears

"And who might you be?" The Devil asked while that mysterious woman only came closer

"I'm nobody, really" She said with a slight hint of slyness buried in her soft tone

"I'm nothing but a mere spirit of vengeance coming to take what is rightfully mine" She stood next to the devil's side and looked at her through that uncanny mask with no holes for the woman's eyes to look out of it

The devil tightened her crossed arms and looked very threateningly at the woman, to the point of bringing the latter to a soft chuckle

"Haha, I kid" She broke the unnerving silence between the two

"Well, one thing of what I said still stands true" She then added with a tiny tilt of her head

"Which is?" The Devil asked curiously, although she didn't have her hopes up as she could feel the smirk through the mask of that woman

"That is for me to know, and for you to find out" She responded to the inquiry given to her, though she could see that the devil wasn't very pleased with her presence, far from it as she looked very irritated

"Are you a human?" The Devil's curiosity had yet to be quenched with the vague answers that the veiled woman gave to her

"Hm" Though it seemed that question brought that same woman into a thought

"I was born a human, though I'm unsure whether I still am" She then shrugged to the Devil who didn't know whether the ''human'' was true to her words or not

"If you really are, then how come you are so unafraid of me?" The Devil asked the woman with much sincerity, though all that sincerity was quickly dismissed with the snicker that echoed throughout the tomb

"Please girl" The woman responded with a hand on her waist while the other was lifted to gesture with

"It'd be quite embarrassing for a woman like me to get scared at something that a child wasn't" That answer brought the Devil to a sigh as she wondered just what was up with humans these days

"Nevermind that" The devil's patience was running dry

"What brings you here?" She added to the woman

"Oh I'm just looking for somebody" The mysterious human responded, though that response made the devil face her with furrowed eyebrows as the woman in front of her know about Dominic, and if what she said about herself being a spirit of vengeance was true alongside her looking for somebody, then maybe...

"Heh" The woman scoffed cunningly at the sight of the intimidating Devil

"Calm down the person I'm looking for isn't you, nor is it your little protege" The human then looked elsewhere in uncertainty

"Or at least I don't think he is" She then crossed her arms in thought

"Wait, do you not know what the person you are looking for looks like?" The Devil relaxed with the confusion that she felt, putting one hand on her waist and shifting her weight on one foot

"Not quite" The woman answered, looking elsewhere in deep thought

"Not even a name?" She pressed on with her questions, though the woman merely shrugged as she looked back at the devil

"That's hardly believable" She told her as she crossed her arms while the human only chuckled

"It's complicated" She answered the devil who couldn't help but shake her head in disbelief

"But that's enough about me" The woman continued as she locked eyes with her new acquaintance

"What are you doing here again? I thought you'd want to be with that child" She pressed onto the devil with a sly tilt of her head

"That's none of your business" The devil exclaimed with furrowed eyebrows and a calm yet very much so threatening tone

Though the mysterious woman only laughed

"I was just curious, friend" She then looked forward, forward and onto the engravings on the wall that displayed the story of both Avalynn, and Cassidy

"Besides" She then said

"You look very interested in whatever this is" The woman added, gesturing with her open hand at the story that the devil once read

The Devil looked at the engravings too, crossing her arms and narrowing her gaze

"I wasn't" She spoke up, winning the woman's attention for a couple of seconds before she looked back into the engraved stone

"Guess I was wrong" The woman muttered before stacking her hands and putting them forward

"I like it though" The words that she continued with however, made the Devil give her a side gaze

"It shows that goodness can be in everybody, and that races can band together for the greater good" The devil could tell that the woman was smiling with the way her tone of voice softened

"It's a nice thing to keep in mind when living in such a bleak world" She then took the Devil by surprise when she turned her head to face her

"Don't you think so?" She asked the devil next to her, who raised an eyebrow

"You're speaking about hopes and dreams, goodness and whatever, and you want the opinion about those things from an entity that is considered pure evil by your own race?" She said with confused eyes and raised eyebrows, the woman looked at the devil for no more than a split second before answering

"Why not" She said

"I-..." The Devil could only stutter to then let out an exhausted sigh

"Those things, the things you've said" She answered, looking at the uncanny fox eyes drawn on the mask of the woman

"They don't matter much to me, in all honesty, they're all just wishful thinking and fake hopes to get miserable people through their day" She spoke as bluntly as one could, looking back at the stone

"Like seriously, the people in that story worked so hard and what I'm guessing sacrificed their own lives for, ahem" She looked at the woman next to her and lifted her hands to put on quotation marks in the air

"The greater good" She continued

"And look now, they died because of what they believed, and did it change anything?" The masked woman was silent

"No, it didn't" But the devil continued

"One race died while the other prevailed, the weak gets consumed by the strong, it always has been like this, and in an everchanging world, only this will remain the true constant"

There was silence after that, dominating the air around the two as the fox woman looked back at the engraved stone to let out an exasperated sigh

"That's a sad way of looking at things" The devil was told, and she couldn't but shrug

"Then I guess I'm a sad little Devil" She responded to the woman who didn't speak for a second, until

"But are you really though?" She then looked at the devil who raised an eyebrow

"Because you don't really act like you believe anything of what you told me right now" She added on

"If you really did, why would such an evil entity like yourself bother to go out of her own way to save such a pathetic weakling of a child" The woman took to a much more mocking tone as she spoke

"..." The devil had no words, she never had done what she did today

"Isn't he weak after all? shouldn't the weak be consumed by the strong?" An evident smirk was underneath that fox mask

"But you came and saved him, not only that you also fed him and dressed him, you took time to make sure he was not only happy, but also having fun, just like a child should be" She added on

"Cassidy and Avalynn did the same, for not only their own race but for each other's races" She told the Devil with a sincere tone

"They gave people shelter and food, they gave them friends and a shoulder to lean on" She carried on

"But most importantly, they showed them that their birth doesn't define who they are" She looked deep into the uncertain eyes of the devil

"Especially, who they can be" She said with a voice seemingly enamored with what it voiced, her head turning back at that stone

"And you wouldn't believe how many people needed just that" She crossed her arms and smiled underneath her veil

"Just somebody to show them that in a world filled with misery, injustice and doubt" She looked back at the devil

"There were still people, human and demon alike, who fought to make this absurd world a better place, for you" She pointed at her

"For me" And then rested that same hand on her chest

"And for all of them too" To then gesture to all around her, to all the demons that were buried here

"You talk as if you were there with them at the time" The Devil asked her with crossed arms and slightly furrowed eyebrows, though the woman snickered as she looked at her

"Who said I wasn't"

That answer brought the devil to part her lips in surprise before she caught back her mental balance

"But that wouldn't make sense, humans don't live for that long, and these events happened so far back in the past" She said with both sincerity and curiosity

"Well, I did say that I'm unsure whether I'm still fully human" The woman shrugged

The Devil was unsure to trust anything the woman in front of her said, hell at one point the devil had doubts that she was just hallucinating

"But then the demons went extinct, you failed haven't you?" She asked of the woman, who simply looked at the devil with a smile that the latter couldn't see

"Will you not answer me?" She inquired further

"No, I think it will be much better for you to see with your own eyes, one day" She told her

"One day, you will" The devil wasn't very convinced about that

"And then you'll owe me, and everyone here an apology" She said with a sly tone that even made the mask have a smirk, making the devil cross her arms sternly

"I doubt we'll meet again, foxy" The nickname made the mysterious woman laugh

"Life is much more unpredictable than you think, sad little devil" She told her alongside a sly wink

"You'll see" And then gave her a quite confident nod

"But never mind that, I think I've talked enough about me and them" She gestured to the engraved stone

"What about you" That same gesturing hand was pointed towards the devil

"Why are you here again?" She asked her, the devil looked elsewhere for a bit before looking back at the masked woman

"I wanted to bring something with me, but I don't think it's really possible" The mysterious woman tilted her head in curiosity as those words made her want to know quite more about what was behind the evil being next to her, though she wouldn't really agree on calling her evil

"Tell me, maybe I can help" She told the devil who looked at her for a couple of silent seconds, before speaking up

And surprisingly enough, the masked woman was of quite the help to the devil's request, and after both were done they left the tomb together, not before the veiled woman gave her respects to the buried fallen

Now, both were at the entrance of the cave, under the orange layer beaming from the sun setting down for the day

"I hope you'll find who you are looking for, human" The devil told her

"Me too" She responded to her

"Say hello to that child for me, he is such a sweetheart" She added on while the devil gave her a slow nod, the masked woman then bid her goodbyes as she walked away

"Do take care of him okay?" She stopped for one second to tell the devil her mind

"Of course" She replied to her while the other smiled under her mask

"Good, don't let my blessing go to waste" With a wave, she seemingly disappeared into thin air

The devil stood with many surprises written over her uncanny face, what blessing did the human mention

Her eyes widened as she remembered how much magic seeped from the child's eyes, and how he could see through the devil's invisible veil, was that the blessing that she spoke of? was all of this set up by that woman?

The devil smiled as she hugged the piece of paper she had in her hands, her chin was lifted while her purple eyes gazed onto the setting sun while her lips let through a soft whisper

"Thanks"

Whether or not it was her work, it didn't matter much to her

....

One day passed after the event that transpired between the devil and that mysterious woman, and just as promised the devil did keep her word and met up with Dominic on top of that same hill that she told him about, saying that he was happy to meet her again would be an understatement

After exchanging greetings, Dominic started telling the devil all about his day, how he woke up and played with a dog that would come around the village

"And then he wouldn't stop licking me until I ran away!" His words brought a chuckle out of the devil, both sitting down on the hill with the wind whistling past them

"Sounds as if you had a lot of fun with that animal" She told him, words neatly enrobed with a soft smile from his caretaker

"A lot" He responded

"But I think I have more fun when I'm with you" He said to her, bringing her to warmly laugh

"Well since you're being such a good child, I actually have something for you" Those words made the child's eyes lit up

"Really?! what is it?!" He exclaimed with excitement, so much that it worried the devil about how good of a gift it really was

"Oh uh, it's nothing much really" The devil chuckled as she unfolded a piece of paper she had hidden in her hand

"Any gift from you is a good gift" He told her, pushing away the devil's doubts about her upcoming acts as she handed him that one sheet of paper with a smile

Dominic took it off her hands as he then started reading the words that were written in such a fancy manner, he wasn't much of a good reader at all but he tried his best to read word by word

Though his eyes didn't widen because of the way the curvy words were written, oh no far from that it was the content that caught him by surprise

"This is!" His eyes were wide open while his lips were parted as he lifted his head to look right at the warmly smiling devil

"This is that story we found in that cave!" The sheer shock written all over his face brought the devil to soften her already gentle smile

"That, it is" She said with a slight tilt of her head

"I thought maybe you'd like it as a gift" She added on

"So now, you can keep it close to you, but people can also go to that cave and read it as well" The Devil continued with her gentle gaze and soft smile

"Just like you wanted, right?" Although she clearly looked like she was done saying her mind, the child couldn't move away from looking at her with sheer surprise

However, the smile that the devil had soon was snatched away from her uncanny face as she noticed the child's lips purse while his chin shivered, his eyes welled with tears as he kept those same drowned eyes locked with the devil's own

"W-what's wrong?" She said with the softest tone her worried self could give as she leaned towards Dominic to put a comforting arm around him

"I'm s-sorry" He could barely speak the words he wanted to say, the Devil no matter how clueless she was still tried to console him

"Hey it's okay, there's no need to be sorry for anything" She spoke up with furrowed in worry eyebrows

"No, it's not, I lied to you" He replied, though she didn't give one care whether he told her one lie or a hundred, seeing him like this made her feel like the heart she didn't have was imploding and eating itself

"Don't worry, I'm sure it was nothing to be worried about" She kept comforting him, since for her, nothing mattered over the child between her arms

The Devil gave Dominic all the time in the world to stop his sudden crying, she didn't ask for what he lied about, she only asked for his well-being and how he felt, even going to fetch some water for the child from how much he cried

After much time Dominic and the Devil herself were seated down under the shade of a tree, and when he felt better he asked of her

"Are you not going to ask what was the lie?"

The Devil turned to look at him with a gentle smile

"I don't really mind" She told him

"Whether you lied to me or not doesn't really matter to me, what matters is your happiness" The honeyed words that came out of the devil were genuine, but that was the thing that really bothered Dominic

"This is why I don't ever want to lie to you again" He said with pursed lips that seemed to want to cry again, but this time the child was stronger than his feelings

"Because you're so nice to me" The child added while the Devil softened her already gentle smile, putting her arm behind his head to pat the child and gently ruffle his hair

"It's okay" She muttered

"Can I tell you then?" The child looked with meek eyes at the smiling devil who gently nodded her head

"I don't really have parents anymore" He said with a lowered head, it was such a little innocent white lie that didn't hurt either him, nor the devil

But that attitude was exactly why the devil was so hell-bent on being by the child's side

"Or at least I don't have a father" He continued

"He died a year ago" Dominic then lifted his head to look at the curious Devil

"What happened to him?" She asked

"He died in battle, he was a soldier" He couldn't keep his eyes on her for much longer

"Everybody called him a hero" The child whispered

"But all his death did was leave me and mom alone" He furrowed his eyebrows soon after those words

"And it was so hard for her, she had to become a hunter just so she can put food on the table" He added, The Devil had a tiny smile on her face as she attracted the child's attention with her reply

"She sounds like a strong woman" She told him, who smiled back at her

"The strongest!" He said

"She was a really strong adventurer before she married dad, but she gave up on her job after I was born" The child continued while the Devil tilted her head to the side with her smile only widening

"Sacrificing her career for her child, she's a strong and good woman" She said with a soft tone to the child that couldn't agree more with his furious nodding

Though he then leaned against the devil and stayed silent for a bit

"I miss her sometimes" All the positive talk about his mother made the devil forget that it seemed that he lost her too, though he doesn't seem to be sure of it for some reason

"Where is she?" She asked him

"I don't know" He told her

"One day she went hunting just like she does, but she never came back" He then looked up at the Devil

"It's been two months, I think" Those words made her slightly widen her uncanny eyes

"And you've lived alone for that long?" She inquired, receiving a slow nod as a reply

"Yeah, but it's hard because the other adults and the other boys aren't nice to me" The Devil furrowed her eyebrows and thought maybe she should go back to her cruel ways for a bit, though it only took the child's gaze on her to push those thoughts aside, instead, she harbored a gentle look

"You're a strong child" The compliment made him smile warmly

"Thank you" But then the Devil thought of something

"Well, since you said all of that..." She looked at him and locked eyes with his own brown ones, as his tiny head tilted to the side in curiosity

"What do you think about coming with me to explore the world?" She offered to him, an offer that made him widen his little innocent eyes and part his lips from surprise

"Really?" He said with a tone bordering a whisper, the Devil smiled and tilted her head gently

"I wouldn't want anybody else by my side"

Her words prompted the child to look uncertain as he moved his eyes away for a moment

"But..." He murmured

"What if my mother comes back, and doesn't find me" He then looked at his caretaker with those words

"Look Dominic" She brought him closer to herself with her arm around him

"Your mother sounds like the person who loves you so so much, right?" She asked of him with a worried look, he replied with a nod

"She wouldn't ever want you to stay with those bad people waiting for her, especially for so long" She added

"She would only want you to be happy, right?" The child still had an unsure glimpse in his eyes, taking in a deep breath, he however, decided that it was time to do something

"Can I at least stay one week?" He said

"Just one week, and if she doesn't come back, I'll leave with you" He finished his words with slightly furrowed eyebrows

"That's a big boy answer" She told him as he had a giggle while her ever dark yet so soft hand went through his hair, the Devil looked away and wondered just how long this week will be

"Uhm... lady angel?" Though his uncertain tone made her look at him again with a slightly arched eyebrow

"How many days are in a week again?" The look of slight shame and ignorance on his face made the devil laugh out loud

For that entire week, for each day of it, the two met up together from dawn to sunset, and each day would the child ask of his caretaker to read him the story elegantly written on that piece of paper to him, he loved it ever so much, and when the devil asked of him who he liked the most it didn't take long for Dominic to answer

It was Avalynn, that one demon that did so much evil towards his own race, yet for some reason, she was his favourite person in that little story, maybe because she took on the path to becoming a better person?

The Devil didn't really ask, for her as long as he was enjoying her telling the tale of old, it was enough

Each day passed on like that, all the way until the seventh day, the final day

And for this day, Dominic didn't come

The Devil was surprised, and then worried, but then thought to herself, did his mother actually come?

For a second, she didn't want to go to his village, she just wanted the boy to be happy in his life, maybe the happiest he would be was with his biological mother, a woman of his own race, not an entity that was in its true nature to be evil, whether she liked it, or not

But no, she didn't idle, she couldn't, her heart worried too much for the child, he never came late, he always showed up right on time and would never leave the Devil by herself

Right?

And so she went there, with her heart aching and her worries gnawing at that same heart she didn't possess

She found something that surprised her with quite the shock, knights

And not just any knight, knights of the four gods, squires and the like belonging to that church so infamous for intolerance of anything that didn't belong to the four gods, anything supernatural that didn't belong to their faction was illegal at best, and heresy at worst

But that didn't matter to her, because she could tear through them and rip them to shreds if she would ever desire to, but she didn't want to cause such havoc near Dominic's home village, but why were there so many around the village, that was what she really wanted to know about

Sneaking between the patrols wasn't much of a challenge to the Devil as none could even see through her veil of invisibility, only one person ever could

Yet where is that person?

She looked on and on around the outskirts of the village as to her, maybe he was on his way, or maybe the knights forced the villagers to stay at home, the latter seemed more logical to her and with that thought in mind she made a beeline right towards the village itself, and soon enough she could see smoke coming up from the village itself through the tall trees that blocked the sky, and that made her quicken her pace as fast as she could

The smell that soon enrobed her wasn't a pleasing one, and the closer she was, the worse it got

Yet when she arrived, her face lost all emotion except hard shock and disbelief, she realized her true fears of the knights setting the village ablaze weren't true

They only set a cross ablaze, a cross to burn heretics on

....

Fae immediately snapped back to the real world in an instant as she looked at that same devil she looked through her eyes for so long

The Devil wasn't angry, she wasn't sad, the face she harbored in that split second felt like a hollow shell, empty and bereft of any feeling, she gently slid her hands down Fae's cheeks

"Want to know the worst of it all?" She gave Fae a tiny smile

"Dominic just wanted to spread that story we found together to the people in his village" Her eyes soon looked down, away from Fae's own widened eyes

"He just wanted to tell everybody that demons weren't all that bad" She added, her voice breaking in the middle of that sentence, on her knees with her hands curling into fists

"That boy just wanted to praise the unsung heroes, those demons that helped the humans so much" Tears soon started welling up in her purple eyes, Fae was speechless and even more so as seeing an entity so uncanny, so evil looking, shed tears for a human child

"But they thought of him as a heretic, and they told the church of what Dominic was saying" The Devil could barely speak right with the feelings that went through her

"And when they came and found that piece of paper" She raised her head and looked at Fae with a drowned-in despair face

"The piece of paper I gave him" She furrowed her eyebrows and the tears only increased

"It was written in a manner no child could write, they thought that he was being controlled by a demon or whatever" The Devil shook her head in disbelief at the absurd

"And after that..." She tightened her fists as hard as she could

"After that, you saw it with your own eyes" And she didn't have anything to say more after that, Fae looked down as well, narrowing her already narrowed eyes from sleep deprivation

"What did you do then?" She asked of the Devil as she locked eyes with her yet again

"I killed them all" She replied with widened, insane eyes

"The villagers, the knights" The Devil said

"The adults, the children" Her eyebrows furrowed

"I killed all of them, and I would do it again if I could" She told Fae

"If a child like Dominic can't have a chance at life, none of them will" She looked at the woman's eyes for silent seconds before she scoffed

"It's all my fault anyway..." She then whispered and looked away, down at the ground

"If I didn't meet him, if I didn't stay so close to him, maybe things would have gone different" The Devil said

"Maybe" Fae replied

"But would the kid really want that?" She added on to the devil, attracting her attention

"He loves you a lot, and I'm sure he would never have wanted a life without a path that would collide with yours" The Devil raised a corner of her uncanny lips into a tiny smirk

"Though the children of that village didn't deserve what you did to them" Fae told the Devil who furrowed her eyebrows at Fae

"If the church didn't start the killing, nothing would have happened" She answered Fae

"Right but you only made it worse, I don't care about the adults but kids are still kids" Fae pressed on, and for split second it seemed the Devil agreed, in a way drenched in guilt

"That's all so fucked" Fae ran a hand down her face as she couldn't believe what happened, all of it was so absurd

"Just wait..." The Devil suddenly said, attracting Fae's brown eyes

"All of this was because of the four gods, one day I'll kill them and I'll end it for good" Fae wasn't really sure that was the best remedy for this religious madness but...

"Do you even know of a way to reach them?" She asked of the Devil and she smiled

"Why should I tell you?" She replied

"You don't deserve anything to know, you as a person would be the only reason my way to godhood could ever fail" She continued

"I should kill you, if anything"

Fae looked at the Devil with ever-so-serious eyes

"I'm going to say this for the last fucking time, okay?" She told the Devil

"I do not give a single care, whether you kill the gods or not, all I want is ask them a couple of questions, that is all, their fate after that is all yours "She told the devil that had her face still wet from her own tears, she smirked to Fae however

"Then you have no reason to leave me alive no? we want different things from the same gods" She told Fae who looked at the devil with her slightly furrowed brow and frown

"I don't really want to kill you, nor do I want to kill anybody" Fae said, looking away for a second

"And after what I've seen through your eyes, I want to kill you even less" She then looked at the Devil

"That's why I want to ask of you" The Devil tilted her head to the side in curiosity

"How about we reach the gods together, and after I talk with them, you can do whatever you want to them, I couldn't care less" her words made the evil in front of her part her lips in surprise

"..." She didn't know what to say

"That kid wouldn't want you to be killing random folk, nor would he want you to stay in a cave, miserable by yourself" The Devil had her expression soften slightly

"I have no idea how to even get to the gods to begin with, and you would be very helpful, and I promise not to get in your way at the end" Fae reached a hand towards the Devil

The latter looked at her right in her brown eyes for a silent second before gently shaking Fae's soft hand

"After all I did, you're not really scared of me, are you?" She asked of Fae, who then had a tiny smile on her face

"It'd be quite embarrassing for a woman like me to get scared at something that a child wasn't" She answered her inquiry

An answer that made the Devil chuckle a little bit

"Ah, I should probably let your little ghost friend out" She told Fae as she pointed at her chest with her hand, to then slightly touch it, and as soon as she did

Yuna came out to stand tall beside Fae, her blade was sheathed but what was more dangerous than that was her lethal gaze right on the smirking Devil

"FAE!" The one that was called turned her head over her shoulder to see Yulia calling out to her as she was running towards her, and right behind her was Claude, the sight of the two made Fae smile slightly

"You!" Yulia had her blade raised and pointed right at the Devil

"Yes, me" She spoke with a mocking tone, tilting her head to the side

"Did you miss me already?" She said with a faked gasp

"I'm so touched"

Yulia was furious, and she was one step into "touching" the Devil with her rapier, a touch that would go right through the heart she didn't have

"Hey take it easy all of you" Fae got up and stood between the devil and her other friends as she explained to them who their new partner was going to be

The Devil was looking right at Fae's face while the others voiced out their opinions quite clearly that they'd rather travel with an animal than the devil, of course, they all did but Claude, though that didn't mean he was with the idea either

She looked at Fae and her smile couldn't stop growing, she reminded her of a person dear in her heart and that thought alone drenched the tears that would have come out

"Well I have no idea of how to go back to my world and the only people who could have that knowledge would be the gods" Fae exclaimed

"I'm sorry but she's coming" Fae then looked at the Devil

"What's so funny?" She asked of her as the Devil snickered and tilted her head to the side

"Nothing" She replied, Fae sighed

"Well as you can see nobody really likes you" Fae gestured to all her other companions

"So I hope you'll behave in our travels, alright?" She asked yet again, and the devil nodded

"And also, you can't really travel with us looking like that" Fae gestured at the form the Devil took, her original form, and the one that would scare any ordinary human, well, any human with some semblance of self-preservation

"I understand" Though she didn't know what form she should take

The Devil looked aside until her gaze fell onto the grave of Dominic, and just like that an idea came to her head as her uncanny lips formed a smile

Her skin turned into a young snow-white color, her body took to a young woman's physique, a young and strong one at that, her hair turned to a shade of pinkish red while her eyes changed to a human's eyes with the color of a deep purple

Though there was a slight problem, and it was that the form she took was one with no clothes, both Yulia and Yuna immediately put their hands on the vision port of Claude's helmet as he himself let out a soft snicker, more so because he could see through Yuna's spectral hand

"Stop fucking around" Fae said with a sigh as she put a hand on her waist

As the devil looked down at her body she realized what Fae meant

"Woops, I'm so clumsy" She said in a soft tone but in reality, she was just taunting the rest with her smirk and mocking voice

Soon enough a dress that the devil saw the women in that village wear appeared that sheltered her white skin from the others' uncomfortable gaze and Fae's angry one, though for some reason the appearance the devil took was familiar to Fae, it reminded her of some of the things she witnessed through the Devil's eyes

"And look, I know you don't really have a name but you'll need one, talking with you is already hard and it'll only be harder" Fae told her, the Devil snickered and looked away for a second, thinking, but she already thought of one as soon as she took that appearance

"Avalynn" She whispered and then looked at Fae with the gentlest smile she saw her have

"My name is Avalynn, it is so nice to meet you, Fae"

Fae smiled back at her as she then helped her up as the group got a new unexpected member added to their growing party and soon enough the rest went on to dismantle their small camp and pack their things

Though Avalynn and Fae stayed behind, the former went on to do something she wanted to do before leaving while Fae was seated down in front of the grave of Dominic

"You were a good kid" Fae whispered, his fate was such a tragic one to her, and his grave had flowers that long went bad

She put her hand in her pocket and brought out a tiny white flower stained in blood, it was that flower she picked from the field of flowers that she and Yuna rested at in the empire of blades

That flower held so much emotional sentiment to Fae, but...

"You need this more than me" She gently rested that blood-stained flower on the grave

The gods of this world weren't much of gods to Fae from the things she's seen so far, and she was an atheist through and through, but for that moment she closed her eyes and took a deep breath

"To whatever god still cares" She whispered and then continued her prayer inside of her heart

"That's very kind of you" A voice beside Fae spoke up, spooking her a tiny bit but she wanted to finish her prayer first

And when she did, she looked back at Avalynn seated next to her with a couple of flowers she picked

"Dominic would have loved this kind of flower" And she put those same flowers down, next to the flower Fae put

"Thank you" She gave a grateful nod to Fae who replied with a small smile

"He's probably in a better place, don't worry too much about him" Fae said as she then snickered

"Hell, anything is a better place than this world" Avalynn agreed with a nod as she gave an ever-so-soft giggle

"Okay" Avalynn then spoke up as she got herself on her feet

"Let's go then, Fae" She told her with a hand reached out to help her get up

"We have so much until we reach the gods" Fae looked at her with a tiny smile before accepting her hand

She was right, they had a lot meeting them up forward, but the companionship Fae felt between her and the others was far more than enough for anything ahead

As the devil walked behind Fae, she couldn't stop smiling, no matter how much she didn't want it, being beside her new friend was very nostalgic for times she couldn't experience again, and for that, it made the heart she did possess melt