"....____?" A whisper ushered out of the young girl's mouth. Sitting in the middle of the road, she could feel the roughness of the asphalt concrete.

The van's front was stained with blood.

The young girl couldn't see anything else besides her severely bleeding friend next to her. Unable to even move her body as most of her bones were broken from the impact.

The girl's eyes filled with tears, she clumsy scrambled over to her dying friend. Not even taking notice of the blood flowing from her friend's wound, staining the road beneath her.

Her hands trembled as she reached out to check her friend's condition. Once again, she whispered, "____?"

There was no answer. Until suddenly, she saw her friend opening her eyes weakly. "Es...Esto.." She couldn't even say her name properly.

"Ye..Yes?" Her words stuttered. In all her life, she had never stuttered once.

"Li..Live…" That was what she said, and the last word she had heard uttered from her friend's mouth.

The only person who reached out to become friends with her as her peers thought of her as eccentric, the one who taught her morals and kept her company all the time. Her best friend.

And she died. All because of her…?

If only she had noticed that the van was coming straight at her, maybe it wouldn't be like this now.

But alas, it was.

And that day, that was the day her only friend died. Her dying words left an imprint on her. Her death severely traumatized her, causing her to have a shock, cutting off the memories she had with her friend.

Entirely. To save her from the mental breakdown she would have received if it were to stay.

________________

"Urgh..." Estorea's eyes fluttered open. "My head hurts... Ow...." She whined softly as she forced herself to sit up.

Rubbing the side of her head, she checked out her surroundings. She was in an extravagant guest room and was lying down on the sofa.

She got up carefully, stabilizing herself and made a beeline to the two wooden double doors which seemed to be the exit.

Without hesitation, she pushed it open and got greeted by an elegant and sophisticated looking maid. "Please follow me, Miss." She said.

Estorea nodded, and the maid led her down the fancy hall, there were countless priceless paintings and objects. It seems this kingdom was extremely wealthy considering they could put such precious things in the hallways as decorations.

Soon, they reached another pair of wooden doors, the maid walked up to it and gave three light knocks. "This servant has brought your majesty's guest here." And then went to stand by the side of the door as it swung open.

Estorea headed inside, and the door shut behind her. She took a good look around the room.

It was a large study room, with two bookcases lining the side of the room, filled to the brim with books.

A sofa and coffee table was seen in the upper middle and a huge desk was seen beyond the sofa.

There was an arc window behind the desk, sunlight streaming through it.

"Done admiring my study?" A deep, baritone voice interrupted her thoughts.

Estorea turned to look at the direction of the voice and saw a handsome young man.

He had pale white blonde hair, ruby red eyes and light neutral skin colour. His hair was tied up into a low ponytail and he had a lazy smile on his face.

______

"How do I look? Handsome? Sexy?" He asked, leaning back against his chair.

"Uh, I guess you look handsome?" Estorea answered, unsure. She didn't really know what was 'handsome'.

He pouted, "You can't just guess I look handsome!"

Estorea had an awkward look on her face, her lips were in a thin straight line as she shrugged. "I don't know. Anyway, you must be Kieran right? Was Azura your alias?"

Kieran grinned and clapped his hands, a sarcastic tone, "Wow! I would have never guessed that!"

Estorea's eyebrows twitched, "I think it would be rude to assume, don't you think so?" She said, walking towards the sofa and taking a seat.

"Hmm, I guess so..." Kieran muttered.

He was quiet for a while before he sprang back to his original mood. "Oh yes! Our original purpose." He looked at the guard at the entry door. "Mastu, would you mind going out for a while?"

The guard bowed slightly and went outside, giving the two of them some privacy.

"Well, we're alone. Now... Why did you ask for a private place?" Kieran questioned.

Estorea smiled, "Simple, you want to invade and conquer Oscilar, am I right?"

"Indeed so, what does that have to do with this? Did you come here to just confirm and then go running back to your kingdom to complain?"

Estorea shook her head, "Of course not. In fact..."

She looked straight into Kieran's eyes. "I'm here to ruin that country."

Kieran dropped the fountain pen he was spinning. "What?" He narrowed his eyes at Estorea's words.

He was taking her seriously now, he rested his cheek on his fist, "You want to ruin your own country? Why on earth would you do that?"

"That... is something you will not understand."

"Try me. I've seen and heard all kinds of crazy things before." He challenged me.

However, Estorea firmly shook her head, this topic was much more wild than the ones he encountered.

"Sorry, no can do. That's the only thing you can't find out."

He frowned slightly, "If that is so, I shall not force you. It does not seem to hold any important information from what I can see."

The frown on his face disappeared, replaced by a friendly smile. "So you want to ruin your country and have me collaborate with you in order to do so, how can I trust you this isn't all a scam?"

"Since you are not an isolated kingdom like ours, naturally, you will have more advanced items that deal with magic, am I right? Do you have something called a 'magic contract'?"

Kieran raised an eyebrow, "How lucky, in fact we do. And this is the first time you heard of it... I know this item isn't available nor is it made in your kingdom as it is originally from the Yuijin Empire, where did you get this information from?"

"Ah..." Estorea didn't know what exactly to say. It's not like she can lie, because it was obvious this guy would immediately see it through due to his high intelligence. "I just heard something like that in stories..." She decided to say.

It was true, she did learn what a magic contract was from the novels she read.

"From stories? That's rather peculiar. But you're not lying..." He mumbled.

Kieran then stood up from his chair, he slid open his drawer and pulled out a rolled-up parchment tied with a red ribbon.

He tugged on the ribbon and it started to glow and evaporated into red sparkles as the paper gradually began to unroll itself, flattening themselves to its original state, having no signs that it had been rolled up.

Estorea had never seen anything like it and couldn't help but stare as she watched the simple transformation.

"You done staring?" Kieran asked, as he walked towards her and placed the paper on the table.

Estorea blinked and nodded, she then took a look at the paper and started to read it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Partner A is the host.

Partner B is the one proposing the contract.

This is a 50/50 magic contract. So whatever one partner has to do, the other has to follow and comply.

Both cannot betray or reveal any information on their given proposal to others, and if they shall do so, they will die.

Partner B cannot lie and deceive Partner A and must stay truthful at all times.

Partner A must also do the same as Partner B and cannot lie or deceive either.

Both partners cannot withhold any information relating to their proposal and just reveal everything unless irrelevant which the contract will judge.

This contract will end once the proposal is finished.

Sighed,

Partner A, Kieran Uraytix

Partner B ________

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"It's legitimate. I already signed my name down. Now it's left to you." He informed Estorea, gesturing to the contract paper.

"Wait, you're just signing a contract like this!? This involves a death penalty, you know!"

"I can tell your being serious and you are not lying in wanting to help me invade Oscilar and conquer it, so I shall also take it seriously, no?"

Estorea couldn't say anything to that but she bit her lip, "I see. Do you have a pen I can borrow?"

"Here." He tossed a pen to her and she caught it. She quickly signed her name down.

Just then, the paper started to glow and a sentence appeared at the bottom of the paper.

Estorea gulped, 'It's now or never...'

She lifted her head and held out her hand, "Cheers to our partnership?"

Kieran smirked, and took it. "My pleasure working with you, Estorea Trix."