The morning I was supposed to escort Erin I sleeply awaken to… Harvey’s old wrinkly face staring at me. Who let him in and why the hell is he here looking at me sleeping like a creepy old man... ?

(Harvey) “You’re finally awake Kuro, I knew you were slow to wake but this was worse than I had expected. I wanted to remind you.”

I already know what he’s going to say so I stop the doting old man for a moment.

“Got it, keep Erin safe until she get’s to Réunion right? Stop worrying so much, she’s a big girl now. Don’t tell me... you interrupted my beauty sleep with your wrinkly old face for that?”

Seriously, who wants to see your face first thing in the morning Harv, my day has already started off great…

“Yea, that’s what I came here for Kuro, she’s my only granddaughter. So of course, I want her to be safe. Also, you’re one to talk, anyone with eyeballs can tell you treat the little girl here like a daughter.”

Harvey begins to leave before I stop him again.

“At least stay for breakfast old man, you’re already here and our Chef makes delicious food.”

With a grin, I watch Harvey turn around and tell me.

(Harvey) “I’d love to, but I have a prior engagement with a pretty young girl named Erin. Oh and Kurogane, you’d have to be asleep for the next hundred years for that ugly mug of yours look presentable.”

This guy! I grab my pillow and fling it at him hitting the door as he exits. Next time the meals on him! I’ll make sure to eat a giant hole in his wallet! That’s what friends are for, right? After grabbing my things I set out to eat breakfast with the family.

Unfortunately, Lila isn’t feeling well so the rest of the family ate with me. It was fun eating with everyone as usual, our meals are loud and the servants usually eat with us with the exception of Sebas and Bastion.

No matter what we say, they will never join in saying it’s not appropriate. I could never understand that mentality, we’re all considered family so we eat together when we can. Spending time together with the entire family, is important. Most people don’t grasp this...until it’s too late.

My bottomless pit of a stomach somehow finishes all of the food that was placed on the table… Seriously how much can I eat? The table was full of food… I could probably put some “All You Can Eat Buffets” out of business.

Just food costs would make me go broke at this rate which apparently is not a problem for our family. The current chef, whom studied under none other than Sebas, actually made sure to pack me some sandwiches and a large portion of some pasta looking dish for the road. Just to be safe… I made sure there was meat in them.

The meeting point was the gates that exit towards the mountains, after doing a final check on all my things I see Erin trying to pry Harvey away from her. Harvey is hugging Erin his eyes filled with tears while she is pushing him away with her staff… my respect levels for Harvey took a sharp dive as I watched… truly a doting grandfather.

Once Erin notices that I arrived she started to beat Harvey away...literally… I hope I don’t get like that…Ever. Eventually separating herself, Erin runs towards me wearing a brown dress, shorts and a pink sun hat.

(Erin) “Shall we?”

I simply nod and we begin our journey. Under normal circumstances I should be able to reach Erin’s hometown in a few days, but the trip for a normal person is a week. I expected Erin to start complaining about having to walk so far but she never did. We were just talking about our families, from what she told me Harvey actually never approved of her Father.

Her father was a weak nobleman who never picked up a sword in his life, because of that Harvey deemed him unworthy of protecting his precious daughter. The two fell in love and ended up eloping to Réunion where he through his hard work became the Baron of the city due to his contributions. Her father was a loving person and Erin and her mother their lives were full of happiness.

(Erin) “Looks like it’s getting dark soon, should we set up camp?”

I had lost track of time while chatting with Erin and I can see the sun reaching the horizon. Well, worst case I can see at night so I can still make the camp. But Erin’s been walking all day, so it’s probably best to rest now. It didn’t take long to set up a fire and the tent next to a nearby tree, she then asked me something that surprised me. She looked at me with upturned eyes her face red with embarrassment.

(Erin) “Umm… Kuro… Can we umm… sleep together?”

Say what? … I heard that wrong… no way did she just say that.

(Erin) “W-w-w-wait! I didn’t mean it like that!”

And what do you mean by that… please elaborate. While I raise an eyebrow and stare at Erin she starts punching me repeatedly. Depending on her answer I may end up sleeping at the top of this tree...the VERY top.

(Erin) “I meant sleep together with you as a Dragon… Lilly told me a dragon’s belly is better than any pillow, in fact it’s so comfortable that you could sleep anywhere! And… I’m just curious if it’s true or not.”

Ah… that little girl is causing me trouble even out here.

“Erin… I understand now so can you stop hitting me? It doesn’t even hurt…”

Since it’s come to this I humor Erin and let her use my stomach as a pillow while in my dragon form.

The next morning I open my eyes and see the smoke from the fire that was burning last night. Well, the first day was nice and eventless. I should probably see if Erin’s awake yet. Moving my head over to look at her I see Erin laying comfortably against my stomach with her mouth...wide open…drooling.

The contrast between how Erin is usually and right now is just… too much. I try my best to hold back my laughter and accidently wake up Erin. It doesn’t seem like she’s a morning person so she slowly looks over to me and tilts her head. She must be unaware of why I sound like I’m holding back my laughter right now. She starts to rub her eyes and then I could see it on her face… she just noticed she was drooling last night and quickly covers her face rubbing it off.

At this point I’ve bursted out laughing causing her to stand up and kick me in the stomach. Of course, she forgot how hard the scales of a dragon is and ends up hurting her foot! Oh my god this girl is too much!

Unable to hold my laughter I end up transforming back into a human and roll back and forth laughing uncontrollably. After packing up all the camping supplies and eating a light breakfast we continued our journey. After we walked for a while I noticed… she hasn’t said a word since yesterday… I’m in trouble huh.

The rest of the day was uneventful other than me seemingly talking to myself until dusk. Just like the day before I set up camp and eat dinner with the currently mute Erin. Too my surprise when we were about to go to sleep I see Erin point to where I had set up her blanket. I guess I make that good of a pillow, enough that even if she’s mad she wants me to do it. In order to not make her any more angry I change back and lay down and go to sleep.

The next morning Erin had this time looked like she tried to cover her mouth with her blanket by wrapping it around her. From the looks of it, it slipped off and there is now a dried pool of drool on her blanket. You would figure at this point… I’d learn from my mistakes, but apparently I’m unable to. I’m sure you can guess what happened next… sometimes I forget the power of a woman scorned.

As a result I spend the next two days talking to myself during the day, and Erin’s personal pillow at night. That was until we reached the forest on the other side of the mountain range. After we had entered I noticed that that was a slight mist…? Maybe the temperature here is causing this… no it’s too sunny for that, this isn’t a normal mist.

My fears were justified as we continued through the forest the mist became thicker and thicker turning into a fog. My vision became impaired to the point I grabbed onto Erin’s hand to make sure we wouldn’t get separated. Wait… Erin’s been through here before maybe this is normal for this forest?

“Erin… is there usually a thick fog in this forest?”

Her voice shaking from fear tells me it’s not. Great… someone or something made this fog appear, and obviously doesn’t want us to see them. There can only be a few reasons I can think of for that, one they don’t want anyone to know who they are or where they’re going. Two… they don’t want us to see them coming.

I’m not one that likes to have the initiative taken from me and decide to set up a trap in cause there’s someone or something hunting us. Near the roadside I set up our camp like usual and set up a fire and use my bags of powdered sugar to make it look like we’re sleeping inside the tent. I then drag Erin farther into the forest far enough that we won’t be noticed even if they strike first and look for us.

“Erin, we’re going to climb up this tree here and wait and see if someone or something is trying to attack us.”

I’m then interrupted by Erin,

(Erin) “You go first Kuro, I’ll climb after you.”

… she’s still mad isn’t she.

“No Erin… I need you to go first so you can stay on a higher branch in case something tries to climb up the tree. That way it’ll run into me first.”

Erin looks at me shocked and throws a slap at me?!? The heck woman? Her punches don’t hurt but she has one mean slap.

(Erin) “You pervert! You just want to look up my d-d-d-dress while I’m climbing.”

We don’t have time for this so I grab onto Erin and start jumping from branch to branch climbing the tree while she is unleashing her flurry of painless attacks. After I find a good sturdy branch I sit her down and tell her to stay put and not make any noise unless something is attacking her and go down a few branches and lay in wait.

It feels like hours have passed and the fog is just getting thicker and thicker, to the point all I can see right now is the area around the campfire. Damn… I should have just carried her and ran out of the forest but now the fog’s too thick to do that. As I continue to wait, the worst has seemed to pass, the fog slowly starts growing thinner and thinner.

Alright… safe…? I then hear the sound of something rustling in the bushes below us, dammit! This fog dulled my senses too much! Drawing my short sword I begin to descend from the tree until I see it. It was a horse, it’s skin as white as fresh snow, it’s mane had an almost majestic feel to it and on it’s head… a horn?

This is ridiculous! I mean I know this is a fantasy world with Elves, Dwarves, Dragons and Demons but a Unicorn!? Well hopefully the legends from my world are accurate and it’s harmless. As I begin to sheath my sword I hear a loud crack and scream from above me.

Oh crap! Erin! The branch from under her had broke and she was falling at an alarming rate I barely had enough time to jump towards her and grab her to try to cushion her fall.

Falling through the sky I wait for the moment of impact that… never comes? Holding onto Erin I look around and there seems to be a thin membrane covering us and we’re slowly descending to the ground? Was it Erin… who did this… no she’s clearly too flustered right now to have casting a spell like this… was it the Unicorn?

Once our slowed decent reaches ground level we were put into the ground on our feet. My gaze meets the Unicorn and it starts to… talk to me?

(Unicorn) “Young Lad, I thank you for saving my benefactor, I know not if you can understand me, regardless. May we meet again.”

And it trots off into the fog… Ok…I must have gone mad.. I just thought the Unicorn just talked to me. Yes, definitely just a figment of my imagination… yes, let’s just forget this ever happened. Thankfully after this run in, Erin started to talk again making the remaining portion of the trip a lot easier.

I remained on pillow duty at night and at most get a kick to the shins for my teasing. Since we’ve run into quite a bit of excitement already I’m sure that’s all entirety as we enter the city of Réunion.

Once we passed the gates Erin’s demeanor changed, she became much more excited and started giving me a mini tour while we walked to her house. She had also mentioned that she would give me a proper tour tomorrow afternoon before lunch. When we reached her house, and by house she meant Estate… her home puts Lila’s to shame! Especially the yard, it’s huge!

While I was mesmerized by the vastness of her front yard I see two muscular figures armed with spears running towards us. Really? NOW you guys come to interfer? Drawing my short sword I run forward to intercept the their attacks. The moment of impact I could feel my hands going numb with each strike, not good! I need to get Erin out of her and turn to tell her to run while I hold them back.

At that moment I could see another figure running towards Erin. I quickly turn around and run towards Erin stabbing my sword into the ground I use it to increase my speed to jump kick the figure into the nearby wall. I then grab Erin and lead her towards the door..

“Run! I’ll hold them off!”

I reach into my bag and pull out two daggers. This is bad I can’t get to my short sword in time and I have my hands full defending against them and keeping Erin safe.

(Erin) “Stop this nonsense Father! Both of you also, Big brother Aiden and Big brother Gavin!”

...Is the entire family overprotective of Erin!?! I thought Harvey was bad! And did no one think of, I don’t know… WARNING me that something like this might happen!?! With a sigh I put my daggers away and pick up and sheath my sword. Why didn’t I think this possibility… oh yea that’s because no one told me she had twin older brothers who took after their grandfather! Alright, I changed my mind I’m charging that bastard Harvey when I get home.