CHAPTER 5: resemblance

before his gaze rested on me. After this his expression chanced to a wide grin.

Then Allenya spoke. I felt so empty. I wanted to cry, but I couldn't. everything just felt numb. I felt bad for feeling so much yet feeling so little and being unable to cry. It was like a large piece of myself was missing.

I no longer wanted to look at my home. I no longer wanted to be reminded of the fact that everything was gone.

So, I looked away. It did not help at all. The knowledge of my losses in the back of my head were enough to make me feel this way.

By this point I was desperate enough to talk myself.

"How long will it take until we arrive?"

Everyone seemed shocked by the fact that I had spoken. But none dared to answer.

Looking at the small group behind me I noticed a small detail that I wished I had not seen. Due to her shocked expression more of Elisa's face was revealed behind her brown hair. She had a little scar on the left side of her face. Allice had a scar on the same spot as Elisa. Now that I had seen it, I could no longer un see it. This made me only feel worse.

("Well at least my voice didn't shiver when talking in front of someone who resembles my sister so much.")

"A quarter of an hour."

A rough voice answered. Without looking I knew it was Gert. His voice matched his appearance perfectly.

Relieved that this long and painful walk would finally come to an end we marched forward.

The rest of the walk was less painful, given that my vision was now blocked by giant threes that each reached over thirty meters. And the sound of multiple animals was also a great distraction. The only thing that was slightly irritating was my tail. Since I obviously didn't have it for long, I had a terrible control over it.

I constantly kept hitting it against sticks and rocks that were sticking out the path. I tried lifting it of the ground however, I would eventually lose focus and it wold drag over the ground again ad inevitably hit it against another random stick or rock. But nothing could be bone about it, so I tried to ignore it for the rest of the walk.

As Gert said, we reached a wooden mansion in even less than fifteen minutes. The mansion was isolated by the height of the mountains and the gigantic forest surrounding it. Its dark outline drawn against the now orange glowing sky. Indicating that the sun was about to set. The first few stars could already been seen. Just a few glorious white spots hovering above all. It was such a beautiful sight, that for a moment, even if just for a moment, I forgot my losses.

("I would have liked to show this place to my family.")

With this thought, all the sadness returned.

I just stood there looking at the outline of the mansion. How the gigantic yet cold building stood there pridefully halfway on top of the mountain showed an eerie resemblance to the castle that I had grown to hate.

Then seemingly out of nowhere, Elisa swiftly walked towards the door of the mansion and knocked on the dark wooden door.

I touch that this was weird, since out of the four people that came to 'summon' me, she seemed the shyest. Both Gert and Allenya had exchanged a few words, but Elisa never spoke.

After she had knocked on the door, she took a few steps back and quietly waited.

It took a full minute, but eventually the door opened revealing the interior behind it. In the door opening stood an old man. His eyes were light blue. he had white hair like that of Allenya, but his skin was deadly pale and full of wrinkles. Non the less, the most noticeable part about him was that he was missing his right leg

He quickly looked around the group

"Yerald, we have brought the demon you requested, isn't it now time for our reward?"

Yerald didn't seem amused by her request and now shifted his gaze to her with a hateful expression.

"No, I still require your assistance."

Allenya frowned and said in a polite yet demanding tone.

"But we summoned and contracted this demon. For all we know he could have gone wild and slaughter us all. We placed our lives at risk to deliver one to you, don't tell me that it isn't worth something."

"Shut your mouth! How can I know if you won't betray me without the carrot and the stick? If I give you your reward now you will all run away, and I can't handle these things on my own."

"then hire a maid or butler. Buy a slave for my part. Just set Yohan free!"

Yerald was obviously starting to get angry.

"I if you keep questioning my orders than maybe your 'friend' will miss a few toes tomorrow!"

Allenya turned red and quietly shifted her gaze away from Yerald to look down at her feet.

This conversation showed a heavy resemblance with the situation in the castle. This made me instantly hate Yerald.

The others must have noticed my hateful glance directed at Yerald since they all took a step away from me. Even Yerald himself had noticed it, but now showed a sadistic smile.

"Please mighty demon, don't misjudge me over this minor inconvenience, why don't we head inside."

I slightly growled under my breath, but non the less I stepped inside.