“H-hey, what’s wrong? Wake up,” a dark-haired child pushed Malak’s shoulders.

“Step aside,” Ezrel’s cold voice ordered as the child’s cat ears splayed backwards.

“W-who are you,” she asked with a hiss. “Don’t touch!”

She jumped in between them with her tail held high. Ezrel watched the small demi-human with calculating eyes. Softening his gaze, he smiled. “I’m a friend.”

The child frowned in confusion. Ezrel changed his facial expressions so quickly that she did not understand how he did it. Right now, he seemed sincere.

“Friend?” Her tail tightened around Malak's leg.

“Yes,” Ezrel gently answered. “Would you like to come? Your sister is welcome too,” he quickly added, sensing her hesitation.

“Why are you helping?” she whimpered.

“You’re my friend’s friend, aren’t you?”

The child hesitated once more. She clenched her dirty tunic as her back stiffened.

As he kindly pressed her for an answer, Ezrel observed her with a devious glint in his eye. “Aren’t you?”

=＾● ⋏ ●＾=

Malak gasped awake. Panting, he frenziedly looked around. After catching sight of Kian asleep, his anxiety and fear partially subsided. Taking a deep breath, Malak carefully sat up. He rested his head in his hands and closed his eyes. Nausea gradually faded away as flashes of his nightmare still haunted him.

Carefully, Malak left the sweaty sheets behind and headed to the kitchen. As the entire house slept, the moonlight filtering through the windows calmed him. Grabbing a glass, he filled it with cold water. Soothing his parched throat, Malak quickly finished his glass. Refilling it, he continued the cycle.

At one point, Malak kept staring blankly at the empty container. The first rays of the sunlight kissed his cheek. Barefoot, Malak walked into the destroyed flower garden. Guilt was added to his stormy mood as he absorbed the sight. A light red flash suddenly caught his attention. Malak blinked a few times, but the fog surrounding the house didn’t disappear. Carefully approaching it, he halted in front of it. With trembling fingers, he reached toward the red fog. Malak didn’t know what he was expecting, but his fingers went through it. There was no resistance. Using the only exit from the garden, the pink-eyed demon walked past the barrier.

He was engulfed in chaos and crushed under the magical pressure once he reached the other side. Among the distressed crowd, Malak turned around and face Ezrel’s house. From this side, it seemed abandoned and ravaged by the fight.

“The Lord is dead! The guards are going crazy, run!” a stranger shouted to no one in particular before disappearing into the crowd.

“Mom, where are you?” a child wailed as she hugged her toy in a corner.

“We are going to die! Nulundarar is invading!”

Unable to process the information, Malak walked further into the crowd, unaware of the shadow following him.

“Get out of the way!” a man roughly pushed him away.

Malak landed on the ground as the passerby ignored him. Unless he wanted to be trampled to death, he quickly got back to his feet. From afar, he caught a glimpse of the guards resisting Lord Rirdris’ men. Then Malak approached the scene without knowing why he did so. He hid behind a building and observed the fight unleashing under his eyes.

“Surrender, your Lord is dead!” shouted an armoured rider on horseback.

“Don’t you know the consequences of invading Acrilas?” the enemy’s commander answered in an equal tone.

The armoured rider snorted and pointed to the fountain. Water gushed from the architecture, but it didn't have the colours it should have had. It was dyed blood-red. Malak’s eyes trailed to the top of the architecture. At the top, the Acrilas Lord’s head rested on a pike.

Malak emptied the content of his stomach on the ground. Once again, he was overcome with sour and bitter tastes and puked. Dry heaving ensued as the decapitated head kept haunting him.

“Surrender and obey! If you do, your life will be spared,” the rider added as a good half of the enemy’s men threw their weapons to the ground.

“Anyone who surrenders will be sentenced to death! Fight!”

Unable to witness the fight anymore, Malak weakly walked away. With the last of the citizens gone, the streets were almost empty. Children were trampled, seriously injured citizens lay dead, and guard corpses littered the streets.

Malak knew fighting could not be avoided. Therefore, collateral damages were also bound to happen. However, it broke his heart to see innocents suffering. Once again, guilt overtook him. It was his fault. As he shared the same goals as Kian, they would also share the same sins. The blood of innocents stained his hands. Despite it, there was nothing he could do about it. He could only watch from the sidelines, protected and ignorant of the people’s suffering.

Nausea weighed heavily on his chest. Making his way back to the house, Malak refused to watch the atrocities in front of him. He refused to acknowledge the cries of pain filling his ears, the stench of blood stagnating the air, and the corpses blaming him for their deaths. His pace gradually increased until he was running.

He was only a few streets away from the house when Malak heard a desperate cry. He closed his eyes.

“Sister, don’t leave me!” the girl wailed. “Stop! Help!”

His heart ached from the pain in the child’s voice. However, Malak didn’t stop. He continued to run.

“Sister, sister!”

Malak's feet stopped without him noticing. He could only hear the vain cries for help. He stared at his trembling hands.

“Anka died because of you. She cried for help. Your mother did too. Will you run away again?” he asked himself coldly.

The images that haunted his sleep came back vividly. The urge to vomit seized Malak as he placed a hand on his mouth. With closed eyes, he took deep breaths.

“Don’t be a coward. Help her!”

Invisible hands pushed Malak to return to his steps. He reached the crying child who was clinging to her sister. The latter had been seriously wounded by a sword impaled through her stomach. Her dirty tunic was soaked with blood. It even dripped onto the ground. Gathering his courage, Malak approached the dark-haired siblings.

“You worthless shit,” a male demon spat at them. “Rot here for all I care,” he roared before grabbing the little girl by the arm.

“Let go!” she hissed as the slave trader slapped her.

“Shut up! If you don’t behave, you’ll end up in a brothel,” he warned before being bitten by her. The man cried out and let go of the child. He grabbed his bleeding arm with hate burning in his eyes. “That’s it. Die!”

He pushed her down and straddled her. With his overwhelming size, he easily kept her pinned down. Before she could resist, the slave trader strangled her. Her feet trashed around, her small arms tried to push the man away.

“Trash, just die already.”

From behind, Malak picked up a large stone that was blasted away by magic. Silently making his way behind the slave trader, Malak lifted the stone above his head before letting it fall on his victim’s head. A loud cracking noise echoed in Malak’s ears as the body lifelessly fell to the ground. Panting, he refused to look at it. Instead, he focused all his attention on the little girl on the floor.

“Are you okay?” Malak gently asked, glad his voice wasn't shaking.

After regaining her breath, she nodded with tears in her eyes. Malak helped her stand up. Once, I turned my attention to her sister, the girl turned around and barred her teeth at me. With her hands outstretched, she was ready to defend herself and her injured sister. When Malak looked closer, he saw the black ears poking through her dirty, ruffled hair. Her slave collar rested upon her neck, and his eyes trailed down to it.

“Don’t be afraid. I can help her,” Malak slowly crouched down.

The child never took her eyes away from the demon. In refusal, she kept shaking her head. “Don’t touch!”

Malak bit his lower lip. He carefully thought about his next words. “I can heal your sister,” he softly answered. “I’ll make those chains disappear too.”

She hesitated before looking at her dying sister. In the oversized tunic, her frail body was visible. Her collar bones poked out even under the thick collar. She wrapped her tail around her leg as if trying to comfort herself.

“R-really? You’re not lying?”

“I promise,” Malak extended his pinky toward her.

She looked at his finger with a frown. Tilting her head cutely, she didn’t lower her arms. Although her nose twitched as if she was sniffing him, she kept looking at him.

“What’s your name?”

“Heal her.”

Malak nodded and shifted his gaze at the injured sister. “Could you step aside, please?”

Hesitantly, the child lowered her small arms and moved away from her sister. Malak carefully approached them as he examined the sister. She was sweating and barely breathing. Her pulse was too weak because of the blood loss. Thankfully, the weapon wasn’t pulled out. Had it been, she would have lost her life. After examining it, Malak bit his lower lip.

“I’ll need your help,” Malak turned to the little girl. “You’ll need to pull out the sword for me.”

She stared at him wide-eyed before switching her gaze to the weapon. Malak patiently waited as she processed the information. With a whimper, she shook her head.

“Trust me, I can heal her. But I need your help,” the demon tried to convince her. “Your sister needs you. Be brave for her.”

Slowly extending his hands, Malak grabbed the child’s small hands. He placed it on the pommel of the sword. For a moment, he thought she was going to hyperventilate and faint. Instead, she swallowed her tears and nodded.

“Slowly pull it out,” Malak guided with his hands hovering on top of the wound. His hands glowed warmly as the girl pulled the steel out. “Slower,” he repeated, and she obeyed.

As the steel was ripped out, the wound began to heal with Malak's magic. The process was slow and tiring. With her vital organs being damaged, the healing required an enormous amount of energy. Halfway through, sweat dripped down his forehead. Once he was done, Malak panted with fatigue as her arms shook uncontrollably.

“It’s done,” he whispered as the child discarded the weapon and reached for her sister.

Malak had trouble breathing. His vision blackened, dangerously. He shook his head and blinked multiple times, but in vain. Struggling, Malak sat with his back to the stone wall. In spite of waving his trembling fingers in front of his eyes, he was unable to see them clearly.

“This is not good,” Malak whispered to himself.