Heyoo, sorry about about the missed chapter. I have been seriously busy here and didn't have the time to write a chapter. Good news is that Monday is free for me so I will release another chapter on Monday.

Enjoy

Chapter 26: Fallen Leaves

As they looked at the young lady who had just walked out from the isolated farm house, a touch of surprise flashed in everyone's eyes. Nalser's gaze only sharpened as he looked over at her and just said in a low voice, “Hmm, isolated farm house, clothing nearly in pieces and there are also a lot of visible bruises and cuts on her. This is somewhat different from the situation I had in mind.”

The young lady had long, light brown hair, and deep brown eyes. Her clothing was tattered and ragged. Her body was slim and skin was pale. This wasn't jade pale like she was a fairy but more like malnutrition. Her chest was developed but there was still a bit of room left before they were something that man could hold firmly in his hands.

Xi also nodded his head with a serious expression. 90% of the time a Asura Flame Holder or a Nuwa Flame Holder appeared, it was from a decent clan or family. Even if it was just a merchant's child from a Minor World, the merchant was still some kind of a powerhouse or had extreme wealth and connections.

It wasn't set in stone that Holder's only come from well off families but nearly always they have led a decent life before. A situation such as this was one of the few exceptions.

Xi only shook his head and sighed inwardly, “One of them comes from a major powerhouse in the Realm but due to certain circumstances had to live his life on a battlefield in the middle of nowhere. The other one seems like an isolated farm girl who was born as an illegitimate child for a lord. Truly an oddball pairing.”

As he thought that, he turned towards Nalser and asked, “So, what will we do now? Just go over and explain the situation or not?” Nalser just had an awkward smile on. He remembered that their whole trip here, they had been arguing on how to approach her. Xi had just said to go and tell her the whole story. Nalser's immediate answer was, “Who in their right mind would believe that?”

His point of view was that if he randomly went and told her the story, she would look at him like he was delusional. The discussions lasted for days until Mei was fed up with the arguing and reprimanded them saying, “Make the decision when we get there! We can't make any plans without even seeing what she looks like or how her personality may be.” This had shut the two of them up and they continued the journey without arguing.

Now however, the question had been raised again. “We still have time. Let's just observe for a bit” As Nalser said that, Xi and Mei nodded their heads. In their opinion this was the best course of action they could take. If worst comes to worst, they will just appear when the Flame awakens.

Like that they decided to just observe for a few days and maybe figure out her circumstances or her bearing. They looked for a small inn to stay at. The town wasn't large by all means but it wasn't a complete farming village either. They had managed to find a place to stay quite easily.

Nalser decided to get a bit familiar with the town and see that maybe there is some information about her going around. As he went out, he visited various kinds of shops and bought some things that he needed for his experiments. Currently he was sitting in a tavern and drinking ale, he had learned that his towns name is “Falling Leaves” and that their speciality is making ale.

When Nalser asked about the girl in a roundabout way, the people present had an ugly face on. Seeing this, Nalser was startled for a bit before one of the people at his table started speaking, “In that farm house lives the town majors, third daughter and her daughter. Their circumstances are complicated.” Nalser sized up the man for a second and saw that he was like a bear and was wearing adventurer garb. He had a long scar running over his left eye and his head was bald.

He continued, “Well, you see 15 years ago, the heir to this Province Leader came to town and the idiot Mayor wanted to suck up to him. He prepared all kinds of feasts and did everything the young lord asked. When the young lord wanted a woman to warm his bed for the night, he immediately offered up her third daughter to him. The third daughter looked really beautiful at that time and there was no shortage of young men trying to court her. She wasn't haughty or anything but when he heard that she was offered up like that, she declined. In the evening she was practically bound up and delivered to the young masters room but who could have guessed that the young master was extremely sadistic. He got offended that she hadn't jumped to his bed at first order and that night was like Hell to her. In the morning, when the young master had already left, a maid found her tied to the bed, she had gashing wounds all over her body and she had been violated in every humanly and inhumanly way possible.”

Speaking this far, anger was evident in everyone's eyes. They had all tried to court her before and for her to end up in such a tragic state was unbearable. There were actually some people who went to the Province Leaders doorstep to find trouble and demand justice for how that demon had ravaged her but all of them ended up disappearing. Nalser's eyes were also cold when he heard the story.

Although he didn't remember his father and mother much, he knew that scum like the Mayor were the lowest possible lifeforms. To curry a favour, he offered up her daughter to a Devil.

Just as Nalser was about to saying something, the man continued in a very angry tone, “And that isn't all. When the Mayor saw her state and realized that he couldn't use her anymore, he cast her aside to that farmhouse to fend for herself. He even started oppressing the people who went to help her in that farmhouse.” The man with the scar stopped talking and took a huge gulp of ale.

Nalser asked in a serious voice, “Then the little lady of the house is a child born from that night?” Nalser was already 90% certain that the girl was the child born from that night. Hearing the question, everyone's faces showed a tinge of sadness as one of the men opened his mouth again, “No, she is the child of an adventurer. The adventurer and the third daughter were akin to childhood sweethearts. When the adventurer learned of what had happened, he flew into a fit of rage and nearly killed the Mayor. After wards, he stayed by the third daughter side and the little lady of the house is his daughter. But about 4 years back, during a job, he lost his life.”

It was clear that everyone here knew that adventurer and him dying was a blow to everyone here. After wards, Nalser chatted a bit more with the men and gathered all types of information. When the tavern started dying out, Nalser also decided to head back to the inn. When he reached his room, he bumped into Xi and Mei. He invited them in and told the story behind the farmhouse.

Hearing this both Xi and Mei wanted to go and kill the Mayor and that Provinsial bastard themselves. Nalser said in a cold tone, “If you guys move out, yea you can kill them but it will cause unnecessary trouble for us at the moment.” He had also learned that the Mayors family member often come to harass the mother daughter pair so it wasn't like they didn't have nay chances to thoroughly humiliate them.

“Well, my plan as of now is this, We will keep watch over her and every time someone tries to harass her, we will “educate” the little bastards.” As Nalser said that an evil smile spread on his face and both Xi and Mei understood that, what those bastards are going to go through is going to be Hell. They had gotten a good grasp at Nalser's personality over the trip and understood very well, he might seem cold and unsociable but once you get inside his ring, even a dealing with a king, as an enemy, wouldn't be a problem to him.

“Well, that being said, in all honesty I am quite bothered by this and well, I'll just keep an eye on the during the night. During the day, it is your turn.” Xi and Mei understood what he meant. However, Xi couldn't help but jab at him, “Well, of course you can have then night watch. A healthy and vigorous young man should really like to watch beautiful young lady sleeping.”

Hearing this, Mei just hit Xi on the head and started reprimanding him, “You old ghost, it's obvious that we are in this predicament because of you. I can't leave you unattended or I would have gone during there during the night.” Nalser just sighed to this, he knew that the old man wasn't a pervert or anything but he just like to mess around a lot.

However Mei had misunderstood him as a pervert and never left him unattended anywhere, where young ladies were involved. Nalser just took the sleeping Curo and carefully trekked over the rooftops.

He had learned on how to gather Mana onto the bottom of his legs so he could run vertically on a wall or stand in the ceiling. He remembered seeing some anime as a child where people rand across water and such. But the main point for this technique was that gathering Mana there, he could actually lighten his steps and muffle the sound. In his opinion, this was more advantageous that running vertically on a cliff.

As he reached the little isolated farm house, he sat down near a window in the darkest corner of the yard. As he sat down, he started sending Mana out in waves. He created a dome with a 50 meter radius. In this dome, he could feel everything that was happening, like he was just watching it happened.

As he spread out his dome, he realized that the mother and daughter were currently sleeping. He also discovered that the mother's breathing was very ragged and her body seemed extremely frail like she was poisoned. As Nalser was thinking about the condition of her mothers body, he suddenly felt that 7 people entered his Dome. “Well, seems like they aren't here to wish for sweet dreams.”

With that, he slowly stood up.