"You have to help me get stronger, Wyvern— no, Archwyrm."

The other me then proceeded to saw the monster's arm off and drank its blood.

"AHHHHH! IT HURTSSS!!! PLEASE STOP!"

Stabbed its eyes and gulped down the red liquid that gushed out from it.

"PLEASEEEE!! MOMMY HELP ME!!!"

Cut open its stomach for blood.

"SYLPH! ELEKTRA! UNDINE! LOU! SAVE ME!!!!"

It was then that the other me stopped what he was doing and wiped the blood on his lips. "Shut up with your futile pleas, they are already dead. I killed them."

"NOOO! YOU'RE LYING!!!"

Ignoring its— no... her cries once more, the other me continued with the disgusting act of his.

After an hour, the other me stopped, took out a high-grade recovery potion, smeared it all over her body and promptly left the basement.

I watched all of this unfold with blank eyes, not knowing what to make of... all this.

"Hic... da-ddy..." Glacia sobbed, making me wake up from my stupor.

"He can't hear you..." I said in an unusually soft voice, knowing full-well that she couldn't hear me either. "...Don't waste your energy and rest. He'll come back later, that's for sure."

Just like anyone would have expected, Glacia continued sobbing without even knowing that I was there, watching her.

"Wh- Why would you do this... I just want mommy and daddy to love each other again..."

"..."

"I want to play with you both like other kids..."

"..."

"I want to snuggle with both of you until I fall asleep..."

"..."

"I- I just want a normal life..."

As soon as Glacia muttered those words, the scenery around me changed again. This time, I was back at the restaurant.

However, something was weird. Glacia was sitting on my shoulder, looking at me with concern in her eyes. Not to mention, the annoying Marie was also staring at me with concern too, not using this chance to crash Arthur and Syl's dinner date.

"Wh- What are you looking at me for?" I spoke after much effort.

In response, Glacia raised that little hand of hers and wiped my cheeks. "Don't cry daddy!"

'Cry...? Am I really crying?'

But upon finally feeling the wet tears on my cheeks, I had to admit that I was really crying.

It was then that time seemingly stopped for me, and I decided to think deeply about what I had just seen.

'So Glacia's really a Wyrm... an Archwyrm at that...'

The other me probably found out about this fact 2 years from now. And when he did, he kidnapped her, kept her barely alive in the basement and slowly drained her blood to get stronger.

'Crazy bastard!'

Even I wasn't that cruel!

After thinking for a while, determination flashed in my eyes as I had decided on what I'd do now.

'Instead of a slow and painful death... I'll give her a quick one.'

Space mana agglomerated in my hand as I slowly brought it closer to her heart.

As I was about to make contact with her, however, my hand was stopped. Not by Marie, not by Araceli whose presence I had just noticed now, not even by Syl miraculously rushing to my location.

Instead, the one who stopped me was... myself.

'Wh- What's this? Why can't I!?'

I couldn't bring myself to kill her.

Not even when she was the variable that could very well destroy the whole world just by existing.

Not even when it would be the most sure-fire way to sour the relationship between Syl and me.

Was it because that I viewed her as a person now and not a monster? And that my trauma stopped me from doing anything since she was a child?

Or was it because of what I saw in the memories of that dark and damp basement full of screams of horror and pain?

Whatever the case was, it was true that my resolve had been shaken. So much so that I couldn't eliminate a variable when it was so defenseless in front of me.

'I- I need time to think!'

As such, I snapped my head toward Celi, who was staying in silence as she had been watching everything since god knows when.

"You..." I called out to her. "...Araceli, was it?"

"Y- Yes!" She stuttered as she straightened her back.

"Don't let the Elf or the little girl inside the main dinning area. It's Aryl's orders."

And with those words, I left the restaurant to find a quiet place.

Since Celi was literally untouchable, she could just block the door and everything would be fine.

Thus, I could leave without worrying much about anything.

***

Glacia stood still on her spot. Right now, she didn't care about her mother anymore, as she had just seen how sad her father was.

'Why is daddy sad?'

Although she had only really seen him twice, once when she first hatched, and another when aunt Krista showed her the picture, she was really happy when she could finally meet her father again after months.

However, her father burst into tears all of the suddenly and ran away.

She had thought that consoling him would work like when she did it with her mother, but it turned out to be not very effective.

But that didn't matter right now, as she had to find her father again immediately! Luckily for her, she had familiarized herself with his Mana earlier.

As Glacia glanced at the exit, she suddenly saw the big sis Elf from earlier staring at the doorway with a nervous gaze. It seemed that she wanted to find Glacia's father too.

"Big sis Elf!" Glacia shouted.

"Big sis? Me?" Marie pointed to herself, eyes wide open in bewilderment.

"Nn! Help me find daddy!"

"O- Okay!" Marie nodded as she put Glacia on her back and exited the restaurant.

Before she did though, she had to justify her actions to absolutely no one.

"I- I'm only doing this because that bastard Theodore was so depressed earlier that he looked like he ran away to kill himself, a- and my darling Arthur would be sad if his rival died!"

Although she didn't understand half of what the big sis Elf had just said, Glacia still nodded and clung onto her back with a smile.

***

As they exited the restaurant, Marie suddenly cursed.

"Shit, he's fast! I can't see him anymore. How can we find him?"

"I smell daddy's Mana!"

"You can?"

"Nn!"

Saying that, Glacia closed her eyes in concentration for a moment and started sniffing the air.

Marie, though weirded out by her actions, didn't say anything and let the child do what she wanted to do.

After a while, Glacia opened her eyes again and pointed toward the direction of the beach. "There!"

Although she was still skeptical, Marie still moved toward the beach.

"It's not like I have any better leads anyways." She muttered.

While they were on their way toward Theodore's location, Glacia suddenly asked. "Big sis Elf, how to make daddy not sad?"

"Hm?"

"I wiped his tears but... he still sad. Mommy is not sad when I wiped her tears."

Hearing this, Marie fell into thoughts. It would indeed be bad if they couldn't convince Theodore to not kill himself if they did manage to find him.

However, she couldn't think of anything as she didn't really know much about Theodore aside from 'He harmed my Arthur!'. Thus, she opted for deduction.

'That bastard like Sylvia, right...? Krista told me so. But why the fuck did he impregnate Eleanor then!?'

Sensing that her thoughts were straying from their original course, Marie quickly calmed down.

'Let's see, assuming that he likes Sylvia then he must like battling too, right? People similar to one another love each other, right? Just like me and my darling.'

Although she wasn't too sure about her deductions, it was still worth a shot. As such, she quickly answered.

"Battle him, and he will stop being sad."

"...?"

Seeing that Glacia was confused, Marie scratched the back of her head and sighed.

'Shit... how do I explain this to a child?'

"Umm... you uh... shoot spells at him?"

"Got it!" Glacia suddenly exclaimed. "So I play with him?"

"What—"

"Nn! It's simple! I need to play with him!"

Although she was still confused as to how Glacia could mistake 'shooting spells' for 'playing', Marie still decided to not say anything else and just continued making her way toward where Theodore was supposedly at.

'That child looks like she knows what she's doing anyways... maybe.'

***

It took a while, but they finally arrived at the beach.

And when the did, Glacia was surprised to see a colossal Wall of Fog far out in the sea spanning wider than her eyes could see. However, her focus on the Wall lasted for but a second, as she noticed her father standing there staring at the Wall soon after.

"Daddy!" She exclaimed as she jumped from Marie's back.

Surprised, Theodore immediately turned around. However, he was too late to react as Glacia had already clung to his leg once more.

"Don't be sad!" Glacia said as she gave her father a smile and took a few steps away from him.

Theodore, still surprised that Glacia managed to find him all the way over here, was speechless.

Still smiling, Glacia continued. "I'm going to play with you!"

"Wha—"

"Elektra! Zap!"

|Got it!|

A voice that only Glacia could hear rang out. And immediately following it was a chant.

A purple bolt of Lightning suddenly appeared and shot toward Theodore.

Theodore widened his eyes in surprise at this and dodged immediately. However, he could still feel searing pain on his left cheek as the bolt of Lightning grazed him.

"What the fuck...?" He muttered as he massaged the small burn on his left cheek. "H- How can a rank injure me?"

Glacia right now wasn't paying attention to what Theodore was saying. Instead, she was staring into thin air with an excited smile on her face.

Well... it was thin air to other people, but to Glacia, what she was seeing was a girl around 15cm in size floating in the air.

The girl had purple hair and eyes. Her neat clothes and round glasses gave off a scholarly vibe. Not that Glacia herself knew what a scholar was though.

Not knowing that she had just nearly killed her father, Glacia grabbed the purple-haired girl and hugged her.

"Wah! Thanks Elektra!"

The girl - Elektra gasped for breath as she tried to get out of Glacia's embrace.

|I- I get it! Now release me so that we can uhh play with your dad!|

"Nn! You're right!"

Releasing Elektra from her embrace, Glacia directed her attention toward her father again with a happy smile.

"Daddy! Let's play more!"

"Wait—"

Glacia didn't listen to her father and shouted. "Zap!"

As the [Lightning bolt] approached him, Theodore rolled on the ground and dodged it again. Sensing that Glacia wouldn't stop 'playing' with him any time soon, Theodore hurriedly agglomerated Lightning mana and ionized the air around him.

It was then that Glacia shouted again.

"Zap!"

This time, however, Theodore didn't rush out of the way. Instead, he stood in his spot and merely stared at the approaching bolt of Lightning with unwavering eyes.

As the [Lighting bolt] was mere inches away from him, it suddenly bended around him and struck the ground behind him.

Seeing this, Theodore heaved a sigh of relief. "Haaah... it really worked."

He then continued to stand still in his spot while occasionally re-ionizing the air around him to counter Glacia's seemingly endless stream of [Lighting bolts].

Glacia continued shooting spells with a happy smile on her face. "Wahhh! It's fun!"

Elektra, the one who was actually casting the spells, was also having fun, but not in the same way as Glacia.

|Interesting...| The Lightning spirit muttered. |...He saw through the nature of my spells immediately. Since I needed to create actual Lightnings instead of condensed electricity to even have it move several meters away from Glacia, the spell will take the path of least resistance on its own.|

Her eyes then lit up. |I want to study this Halfling more! I will take him back to the [Spirit realm] and torture him for his knowledg—|

"Elektra!"

Before the Lightning spirit could finish her scary sentence, Glacia suddenly hugged her.

|Wh- What are you doing? Don't you want to play with your dad anymore?|

"I want to play but... daddy's not having fun!"

Hearing this, Elektra turned to look at Theodore who had a very bored look on his face as he was waiting for Glacia's Mana to run out.

|Hmm... my Lightning spells won't work on him so you should ask Sylph.|

"But she doesn't play with me anymore after you came!"

Elektra wanted to say that it wasn't really her fault, and it was just that Glacia could only summon one spirit at a time with her current power so Sylph had to go back to the [Spirit realm] to make space for Elektra herself.

However, she knew that Glacia wouldn't understand what she would say so she decided to explain it in very simple terms.

|Umm... you need to learn how to feel Wind mana again.|

"But how?"

|Ask that Elf over there. I can sense that she's really proficient in Wind magic.|

Hearing this, Glacia turned to look at Marie, who was watching her 'playtime' with Theodore with her arms crossed.

"Big sis Elf!" Glacia shouted as she ran back to Marie. "Teach me Wind magic!"

"Huh?" Marie finally took her attention away from Theodore and stared at Glacia in confusion. "Why?"

"Elektra told me to!"

Marie answered despite still being confused. "I can't. I don't even know how I use spells in the first place. It's uhhh... instinct, I guess."

"S- So Sylph won't play with me anymore...?"

As Glacia was about to burst into tears, Elektra suddenly flew up to her face and hurriedly spoke. |W- Wait! Tell the Elf to cast a Wind spell. You're the one blessed by the Spirit queen so you should be able to figure it out by yourself!|

Nodding and stopping her tears from flowing out, Glacia turned toward Marie again.

"Big sis Elf! Can you cast a spell?"

"What for?"

"Elektra said so!"

Though very, very much confused, Marie still complied with the adorable girl's request and pointed her finger toward Theodore.

Torrents of sharp gale suddenly flew toward Theodore, who hurriedly dodged out of the way in response.

Staring at the large gashes on the sandy ground below him, Theodore cursed.

"WHAT THE FUCK MARIE? DID YOU WANT TO KILL ME OR SOMETHING!?"

Marie promptly ignored Theodore and turned toward Glacia again.

"Alright, I casted a spell. Now what are you going to do?"

In response, Glacia closed her eyes in concentration and sniffed the residual Mana of Marie's spell.

'Mmm... Wind mana... wavy~'

As soon as she finished her thoughts, Glacia could feel Elektra disappearing. She immediately shot her eyes open and scanned her surroundings.

"Elektra! Where did you go?"

But she soon stopped her gaze on a particular spirit that had just replaced Elektra.

|Eh? Where am I?| The spirit spoke as she looked around in confusion. |I swear I was just in my house a few minutes ago. What happened—|

"SYLPH!" Glacia exclaimed as she dashed toward the spirit - Sylph, interrupting her sentence.

Sylph, who had just noticed Glacia, similarly widened her eyes in surprise and flew toward Glacia.

|Little Cia~!|

With Sylph now in her embrace, Glacia smiled. "I missed you Sylph!"

|Is that so~? I thought you abandoned me for Elektra?|

"No way! You're my best friend!"

Chuckling, Sylph spoke up again. |So what did you call me here for? Oh oh! Are we going to play with your mom again?|

"No—" Glacia shook her head with a smile. "—We'll play with daddy!"

|Y- Your dad...?| Sylph muttered with an unusually serious face.

Not noticing this, Glacia nodded and pointed toward her father.

As Sylph's gaze rested on Theodore, her eyes suddenly turned unfathomably cold. However, she soon fell into confusion as she noticed something.

|Hm...? He's different from last time. I should kill him just to be safe but... little Cia and the Spirit queen would hate me if I did so...|

Sylph then turned her attention toward Glacia again. |Little Cia, do you love you dad?|

"Nn!"

Hearing Glacia's instant answer that contained no hint of hesitation, Sylph sighed. |How complicated... she still wants the same thing this time...|

She then gave Glacia a smile. |Then I'll make sure your wish is fulfilled this time around.|

After Sylph's chant, nothing really happened. Well... nothing except for the fact that both Theodore and Marie could see Sylph now, and they were now looking at her with startled gazes.

Marie was the first to recover from her surprise.

"A- A spirit!? That can't be, there's only 3 Elementalists in the entire continent with one belonging to the Kingdom at that! You're telling me that Eleanor's kid is one!?"

Theodore woke up from his stupor a few seconds later than Marie. And when he did, he couldn't help but to mutter in understanding.

"I see now, so that's why she could hurt me. She's an Elementalist that borrow spirits' power."

Not caring about how much confusion her sudden appearance had brought, Sylph spoke with a cold voice.

|Theodore Gray...|

Startled that a spirit knew his name, Theodore stuttered as he pointed at himself. "M- Me...?"

|You betrayed little Cia's trust before. If you dare to do it now, I'll k—|

"LITTLE DRAGON! HERE YOU ARE!"

Sylph's weird sentence was interrupted by a loud shout that belonged to Lyn, who had just arrived at the scene.

Before anyone could do anything, Lyn dashed toward Glacia, hugged her, and turned toward the direction of the hotel.

"I almost forgot that I'm supposed to look after you today. Let's go home before your mom finds out about this!"

Lyn was so scared of Sylvia, in fact, that she didn't even notice Theodore's presence.

"But daddy—"

"No nope you can do anything you want later. I don't want your mom to get mad at me!"

Lyn and Glacia turned into a bolt of Lightning that shot toward the direction of the hotel. However, the bolt could only travel the distance of a few meters before it dispersed.

As such, Lyn had to recast the spell several times until they could get back to the hotel.

Due to Lyn guarding the door and not letting Glacia out of the room again, Glacia could only pout as she hugged Sylph on her fluffy bed.

'Today was fun...' Glacia thought. '...I'll play with you again soon, daddy.'

***

I stared at the direction where the Saintess of Lightning - Lyn Blitz had just taken Glacia to and fell in thoughts.

'Who would have known that she's an Elementalist?'

To be honest, I should have taken the hint when the other me listed the name of the spirits.

Speaking of spirits, I found the Wind spirit - Sylph to be extremely weird.

'She speaks as if she knew me. And she said that I betrayed Glacia's trust...? What? This is only the second time I've met her...'

As of right now, I didn't have enough information to speculate on so I could only put this question at the back of my mind and focus on the situation at hand.

And that was...

"See you! Go back to the restaurant if you want, everything's finished by now."

After those words, I used [Splice] and dashed back to the restaurant, leaving a very confused Marie behind at the beach.

...

As soon as I arrived near the restaurant, I stopped for a moment to cast the illusion magic on myself again. Taking a piece of broken glass from a nearby trashcan, I looked into the reflection.

"Yep, perfect. I'm Aryl again."

Throwing the glass shard back, I continued dashing toward the restaurant. And when I did, I noticed Celi standing in front of the door as if she was waiting for me.

"Aryl!" She shouted as soon as she noticed me. "Lady Sylvia Ecertold and Hero Arthur Kilvillain had gone home!"

"Is that so?" I nodded. "Did anything unexpected happen?"

"No. Eileen successfully made them do everything you listed on the paper... except for kissing."

Unknowingly, I heaved a sigh of relief upon hearing Celi's words.

"If it's just that then it's fine. We can consider this a mission success."

"Right... but Aryl, can I ask something?"

'What's with her expression? Why is she suddenly so serious?'

However, I just brushed it off to me overthinking about things gave her permission to ask.

"Go ahead."

"Is your real name... Theodore?"

***

After the very, very uncomfortable dinner ended, Sylvia left the restaurant with Arthur following right behind her.

As soon as they got far enough from it, Sylvia suddenly spun around and extended her hand out to Arthur.

"Let's forget about this awkward dinner, shall we?"

Arthur heaved a sigh of relief and immediately shook her hands.

"Agreed. I'd rather kill Void fiends than experience this again."