“Hahahaha”

Lily’s loud voice was heard through the forest.

I couldn’t feel happier to see her smiling like that. She seemed so happy and the only thing I could think about was how cute she was.

Don’t think bad about me, falling in love with an NPC is very weird but this game just didn’t feel like a game in any sense.

Also I think what I was experiencing was similar to what happens when you have a crush on a character of a TV show, with the little difference that I was talking to this character and she interacted with me in a way too real level.

And I mean, she was so lovely and charming, is it really my fault?

Leaving that behind, we three kept walking and talking while heading to Lily’s home.

I still had her on my back because of the injury that monster made to her. Her little sister was walking by my side and grabbing my hand. “She’s adorable!” I said to myself every time she talked or did something.

In a certain moment Lily changed her tone a bit and asked me something.

“So, why do you want to defeat the castle? What’s your wish?”

“My wish?”

She was an NPC, I couldn’t tell her what I really wanted, which was defeating the game.

Without much time to think I came up with a simple response that wasn’t so much of a lie.

“I do it for fun! I think my life is very boring so I’m just doing this to have something to do.”

Lily kept quiet for a moment.

I found it strange that she didn’t give me an answer so I turned my head back to see what happened. Lily was almost crying and had an angry look. I rapidly put my head to the front again in a sign of shame. She then responded: “So when everyone literally kills themselves in order to make their wishes come true you just want to have some fun?”

I didn’t know what to answer and just looked down with in an “I’m sorry” pose.

“Sorry Shiro, I got mad out of nothing.”

“Don’t worry! I mean you should have your reasons. It’s true, that I’m being inconsiderate with the persons that give their lives in the castle. I know I can’t apologize to all those persons but at least I want to apologize to you: sorry.”

“Please don’t worry it was my fault for reacting like that.”

We didn’t talk for the rest of the trip. Fortunately we arrived in more or less 3 minutes.

The first thing I saw was a very fancy looking gate with a lot of ornamentation. Once we passed that an enormous and beautiful garden welcomed us it had a lot of different flowers and a bunch of trees shaped like animals and monsters. At the end of the garden there was a big medieval looking house that seemed very elegant. The path to the entrance was marked by a long, red carpet and 3 maids were cleaning the entrance when they saw us and ran right to us to attend Lily.

“Miss Draserch are you ok?”

“I’m ok, it’s just a little sprain, I’ll be good.”

“Of course you’re not, let me call you a doctor.”

“Don’t worry I’ll be good with some ice and rest.”

“I’m still calling the doctor.”

“Ah… ok. By the way Valeska, this guy is Shiro, he will be staying with us for 2 days, prepare a bed and proper clothes for him, because he seems like a homeless.”

I was about to give an answer to that but the truth is I did seem like a homeless.

“I’ll do it right away” Said the obedient maid.

The other maids took Lily off my back and took her to her room. They also invited me to get in and wait with Lily’s little sister in the hall.

It was a very big and fancy house, definitely something worth of a noble family.

“They have to be nobles if not, they’re some kind of drug dealers.” I thought.

“Do you like our house Shiro?” said the little girl.

“Yes, it’s so big I could get lost in here!”

“Haha yes, my favorite part is the lake, it’s just so beautiful! I like to watch it in the morning right when the sun is going out again.”

“It should be a very beautiful view, why don’t you take me there tomorrow?”

“Yes, I’ll do!”

We talked about some trivial things for a while until the maid from before came and told me that Lily wanted to see me.

Valeska, took use to Lily’s room which was located in the second floor.

Passing through the big stairs that connected the hall and the second floor, and then turning left, we found her room.

When we entered there were more people than I expected.

“Mom, dad, this is Shiro.”

“Ah! Nice to meet you” I said while doing a formal bow.

There were two more persons in the room who were Lily’s parents.

Her father was a big scary-looking guy with scars in his face and arms. He totally seemed like a veteran of war.

Her mother on the other side was a beautiful and very elegant lady that, in contrast to her husband, had a perfect and delicate white skin.

Then the father talked: “So… You are Shiro. Thank you for saving my daughters; I don’t know how to properly thank you.”

It seemed like Lily told them everything.

“Ah, don’t worry about that, I did it because I wanted.”

“Well, let us at least thank you by making your stay as comfortable as possible. If you need something, don’t worry to ask.”

“Thank you.”

In that moment Lily’s mom interrupted: “We haven’t introduced ourselves yet: my name is Dahlia Draserch de Galdric and my husband is Igor Drasech de Galdric. Nice to meet you Shiro.”

“I also haven’t introduced! My name is Shiro Kurokawa. Thank you for taking care of me!”

“You haven’t eaten right? You must be really hungry! We already ate but I’m gonna bring you something to eat. Also, please don’t get too full because I want to make a special dinner for you guys to celebrate.”

“Yay! Mom’s special dinner is great!” said the little girl.

“Thank you for your hospitality.”

Mr. and Miss Draserch both left the room and in a matter of seconds Miss Draserch brought us a lot of food. I thought it was gonna be nothing but fortunately it wasn’t like that because I was starving.

We ate and had a good talk when Mr. Draserch entered the room and told me to “get ready” because he was going to test my skill with the sword.

“My daughter told me you’re a good fighter, I hope she isn’t lying”

“Ehmm…”

“Don’t worry dad! He’s strong!” said Lily while interrupting me.

With the situation out of my hands we soon found ourselves in the backyard ready to pick up a weapon and fight.

I was nervous but actually very excited; this was an opportunity to seize myself against a veteran.

I thought that I could learn a lot from that experience and so I did.

I picked the katana-like sword and instantly got a response from Mr. Draserch: “Light and fast right? Interesting.”

I looked to Mr. Draserch and he had a big longsword that he held with his two hands.

We were done with the weapon selection and were ready to fight.

There was a rectangle painted in the grass with the same size of the one in Academia.

“This must be some kind of sport.” I thought.

The maid, Valeska, was going to be the coach. She stepped out of the rectangle and told us that the fighting started at three.

“One…”

“Two…”

“Three!” I heard her say when my opponent rushed to attack me, I barely dodged the powerful attack. This guy was serious.

I hurried to counter attack but he, I don’t know how, avoided the attack. I recovered my position but he went for everything again and attacked me. He threw a bunch of attacks and I could only parry.

Then, I saw a hole in his defense and ended his attack.

I was the one attacking now but he was very good. He parried every time I tried to hit him.

In just a second he found a hole in my defense and attacked me, I couldn’t parry that time and he won.

In just a second he counterattacked and won. This was other level.

He said “interesting” and was about to leave until...

“Could we fight one more time sir? I this was a great fight but not large enough. Could we?”

“Hmm, you have guts. Ok, one more fight.”

And so we fought one more time but lost awfully. I asked him once again, and he accepted.

He always defeated me and I kept asking him for “one more”. I never rejected as it seemed he was having fun too.

And we fought the whole afternoon until I couldn’t fight more. I was exhausted and incredibly, Mr. Draserch wasn’t.

“Hm, good fight kid. Go take a bath, change your clothes and I’ll see you at dinner.”

After that Valeska took me to my room.

“Wow this is a big room!” I said while astonished by the bedroom I was going to sleep in.

“I’m glad it is of your like sir. The bathroom is right there and I left your clothes on top of your bed, please make me know if there is anything you dislike.”

“Thank you, I will.”

“If that’s everything then I leave.”

Just as she said, she left the room immediately.

“Dang, this is one hell of a room! And it has its own bathroom! This is amazing.”

I was all sweaty and smelled really bad. Of course! I hadn’t taken a bath since I arrived!

Once again I remembered it was just a game and told to myself “do I really need to take a bath?”. I proceeded to smell myself and hell yes I needed one.

“Sh*t’s so realistic I’m starting to doubt about some things.”

“Anyway, let’s just take the bath, eat and I’ll think about this later.”

As I said, I took a very long bath and got myself clean. “I haven’t smelled so good since I arrived”.

I got out of the bathroom and dressed myself.

“Ah, finally some proper clothes, I was tired of using that weird-looking gown”.

It was simple but definitely better than what I was wearing.

It was a white, long-sleeved shirt and a pair of black pants. They also got me some brown shoes.

After getting dressed I got out of the room and headed to the dining room.

Getting down the stairs and turning to the left I found the dining room.

An aura of happiness and joy immediately overflowed my insides as I entered the room. Everyone was talking and laughing while waiting for my presence to be there.

When they found out I was already there, Mr. Draserch invited me to sit on the big table in the middle of the room: “Come here boy, there’s no need to be shy”.

“Oh, yes. Thank you sir”, I responded.

It was a rectangular table that had 8 chairs, with 3 on each of the longest sides and 1 on each of the short ones.

Mr. Draserch was on one of the long side and Lily with her sister on the other site.

I was about to sit on the chair that was alone when I heard Lily saying: “C’mon Shiro, are you still afraid of me? Come sit here!”

With a nervous and shy tone of voice I answered to her with a plain and simple “Yes”.

“The food is almost done! Wait a little longer please!” said the kind voice of Miss Draserch.

“Yay! I’m starving!” responded the cute little girl.

I started to feel more relaxed as everyone kept talking and telling jokes. Even though I didn’t understand most of them as they were related to things of the world I still don’t know.

Then Mr. Draserch reminded me about the practice we had in the backyard: “It was a great fight over there wasn’t it?”

I got excited out of a sudden and responded very enthusiastic: “Yes! I can’t believe you’re so strong! I’ve never fought someone like you!”

“You know? You’re not so bad. I actually had some troubles defending!”

“Seriously? Thanks! But unfortunately I didn’t have any chance to defeat you!”

“That’s because I have a lot of experience! I don’t want to brag but I actually got to the 30th level of the castle!”

“30 level?...”

“Yes! I could have done a couple more but it was too dangerous and I had a family to prot…”

I stopped listening. He was incredibly strong and yet he didn’t even make it to the half.

“That means I need to have more than 3 times his strength to make it…” I said in my mind.

“What happened Shiro? Are you ok?” said Lily.

“Ah, yes. I just got lost in my thoughts for a moment haha…”

“You’re very weird you know?”

“Hahaha yes…”

Then, Miss Draserch voice interrupted us by putting the food in the table.

“Wow! This is a lot!” I said unconsciously with a very happy voice.

“Please don’t hold yourselves and eat a lot!” said Miss Draserch to all of us.

I grabbed the spoon, filled it with food and placed it into my mouth.

Normally, I’m too shy to try to be the center of attention but that time I couldn’t hold myself.

“This is delicious!” I screamed all over the place.

“Haha I knew you’d like it” said Lily.

I didn’t even know what I was eating but it was really really good. Just by tasting it you knew it was made with tons of love.

Everyone continued to eat and talk when suddenly I got spaced out and a tear dropped from my eye.

Without being able to hold myself I started to cry.

Rapidly, Lily made the first reaction: “Shiro are you ok? Why are you crying?”

Everyone in the table stared at me with a worried look in their eyes while waiting for my answer.

I was still crying, but I smiled and told them sorry.

“I’m sorry I… I don’t know why this happened… I… feel so happy right now yet so sad…”

“You miss your family don’t you?” said Miss Draserch.

When she said it I realized that was exactly what was happening.

“I haven’t being able to see them in so long and I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to see them again.”

Just as I said that, I felt how two tiny little arms hugged the lower part of my leg.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll see them again!” said the little girl.

“Thank you.” I sincerely said to her.

After that Lily and everyone hugged me with the love I hadn’t felt since I got here.

“It’s totally ok to cry Shiro. Don’t worry about us and if you feel like it, cry as much as you want” said the very kind-hearted Mr. Draserch.

As if he used magic when he said that, I started to cry for a good while, worrying about nothing, simply crying.