Taken Away

"So... now what?" Kies asked. Tonahl told him to find the archive and he did. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to do now. He had many questions he wanted to ask but first, he needed to know the reason why Tonahl had told him to find the archive. Well, that and also the fact that the demon next to him was very impatient and probably wouldn't tolerate him asking too many questions.

"Do you despise humans?" Arc asked Kies out of nowhere.

"What?" Kies was caught off guard by the question. He wasn't sure of how to answer it. He knew very little of anything and even after he learned that his race was done in by the humans, he didn't feel any hostility towards them. Neither did he feel any hostility towards the demon next to him either even though she almost killed him a few days ago. And then it occurred to him. 'What happened to my emotions?'

Why wasn't he able to feel anything anymore? What had happened? Kies tried to recall the things that happened to him. Was it because of the magic circle from before? No, it was before that. He didn't feel any hostility towards Ammine when she took him. He should've felt fear or hate when that happened. When was it then? Kies frantically searched his memories for when it might have happened.

"What's wrong? It's an easy question. Don't tell me you still have a sweet spot for them despite what they did to your kind." Ammine said coldly.

"I don't feel anything..." Kies said confusingly. What was going on with him? Whatever it was, he knew that Tonahl had something to do with it.

"What do you mean?" Ammine asked. She had no idea what Kies was trying to say.

Kies pinched himself to see if everything was real. He felt nothing. There was no pain. "What's going on?"

"The seal," said Arc.

"What did you say?" asked Kies.

"You had four seals placed on you. Each one restricted something to hide that you are an Aeos. The first seal restricts the natural growth of your crystal and lets you feel emotions so that you can blend in as a human. The second and third seals prevent you from gathering magic with your core and using it. The fourth seal ties you to your current body, making it so that you cannot switch to a new body," Arc explained.

Kies didn't understand much of what Arc had said but he got the gist of it. "You're saying that all those seals that were put on me were to make me human?"

"Yes. The Aeos were on the verge of annihilation and so they decided to seal you, as you were Stormcaller's direct clone, and have you live among the humans until the time was right."

"And what do you want me to do?" Kies asked, already well aware of the answer.

"As they have done to us. The annihilation of the human race."

***

Nina barged into the mansion, surprising a servant and making him drop the plates that he was carrying. Luckily, another servant next to him caught them in time before they hit the ground.

"Ah! Lady Trevan, you startled me."

"Sorry," Nina hastily apologized to the two servants and ran into the dining room where he found his mother and father both eating dinner.

"Something of the matter Nina?" Rene asked in a concerned tone seeing that Nina was breathing heavily.

Nina ran up to her father and hugged him. "I thought that you were still at the Silver Halls," she told him.

"Oh. Don't worry, I am well aware of what is going on. Siegfried told me before they announced the rebellion so that I would have time to leave. You don't have to worry about it."

Nina let go of her father and asked, "Has Kies come home yet?" She was scared of the answer. She really hoped that nothing happened to Kies during the battle.

"About that..." Nina saw her parents' expression change and her heart dropped. "He's alive."

Nina's heart sprang right back up. Her worst nightmare didn't come true. "Where is he then?"

Her father and mother looked at each other. They were unsure of how to tell her the news.

"You see..." her mother tried to find some way to break the news to her without alarming her, but after seeing that there was no good way to say it, she sighed and directly told her what happened. "It seems that Kies was taken away by the demons."

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