Going Back Home

They stood in front of the house.

Layla walked towards the door and knocked on it.

It was about 2 am.

Salma and Adam stayed about 10 meters back.

Calvin, her grandfather opened the door.

Once he saw her, he froze for a second before embracing her with teary eyes.

"Layla! Oh my...Oh my god. We thought you..." He shouted as he hugged his granddaughter.

She was surprised by the reaction for a bit.

Last time she had seen him was only about two to three days ago. She didn't really miss him.

But of course, she had gone missing, not him.

If the roles were reversed, she would have been the one crying for sure.

"Hi. We're back." She said with a smiling face as she hugged her grandfather back.

Salma, seeing the reunion, ran towards them and hugged them too.

When he saw his other granddaughter safe and sound too, he cried even more.

Elizabeth, their grandmother, went down the stairs, wondering why there was so much noise coming from downstairs.

Of course, she too joined them with teary eyes.

Layla and Salma were both laughing as they saw their grandparents being so emotional.

But deep down, Salma wanted to cry.

She wanted to cry, because her grandparents were the only ones waiting for her return.

Adam watched them from a distance.

He didn't want to join them.

He also didn't want to leave them.

'Wonder if they thought this was my fault. I wouldn't blame them honestly...' Adam thought as he watched them.

Once the grandparents wiped their tears, they told Layla and Salma to come in.

"Wait, um. Adam is right there." Layla told them.

"Adam? Where?" Calvin said.

He could only see the darkness in front of him.

"Are you sure?" The grandfather asked.

'Oh.' Adam realized.

"Unequip the Dark Cloak. Python, stay here." He whispered.

Suddenly, Adam appeared in the middle of the darkness as he took 2 steps forward.

The grandparents still could only see a figure in the darkness, as Adam's Stealth Stat made him harder to notice.

"All of you, come in." Calvin said.

It was a rather cold welcome, but Adam didn't expect anything more than that.

They took in an abandoned boy, fed him and put a roof over his head, even though he had just gotten out of a Dungeon just liked many criminals and murderers did. And after staying with them for two to three days, the boy and their granddaughters went missing.

He was sure that the grandparents would blame it on him, especially since they didn't know how everything happened.

They all went towards the dining table where they had eaten together many times.

The grandparents sat at one end of the table, while Adam sat on the other end.

Salma randomly sat next to her grandmother.

Layla, noticing the cold atmosphere, sat next to Adam.

"Am glad you're all okay. What happened?" Calvin asked the three.

Layla told them everything, not leaving one detail. She told them about the gate that appeared randomly, about how Salma and Adam followed her. She told them about how they trained, about the monsters and everything else.

Salma sometimes added things to the conversation, especially when she wanted to describe how important and impressive she was.

Adam was mostly quiet.

Once Layla finished her explanation, Elizabeth hit her husband's thigh with her hand.

"Argh. What was that for?" He shouted.

She stood up and hugged Adam gently while thanking him for looking over her grandchildren.

"I really didn't do much. They quickly became more important than I was. You heard Layla. All I did was lie down when we arrived at the strongest enemy..." He said while looking down after she let go of him.

She put her hand on his head. Her eyes were full of tears that she did her best to hold back.

"Well, you didn't have to do anything. But, you still went in there to help them. You risked yourself for them. It must have been scary..."

Adam was still looking down. But he now was the one trying to hold back his tears.

"Th..thank you for protecting our granddaughters. I'm sorry I doubted you..." Calvin told him.

Adam raised his gaze.

Layla and Salma gave him wide smiles.

His face was expressionless, but tears were hanging by the side of his eyes.

"Thank you. But they would have been fine without me. They're very strong." Adam said.

"It sounds like without you, they would have stayed there for a while though. Layla even said they never would have thought about training inside there." Elizabeth said.

'We really aren't getting through to him.' She thought.

"I just helped out a bit." Adam told her weakly.

Layla quickly got annoyed.

She held his hand and squeezed it tightly.

She used a big portion of her strength.

It really hurt, so he did turn to face her immediately.

She talked once she had his full attention.

"You couldn't save your family. But you saved us. We wouldn't have made it out without you. I am sure that they are looking at you from heaven, and that they are very proud of you."

As soon as she said that, Layla stood up, grabbed her sister's hand and they both made their way to Layla's room.

Elizabeth put her hand and Adam's cheek and she smiled at him before going upstairs to her granddaughters.

She thought Adam needed some time alone, while the sisters needed company as they still hadn't talked about their parents.

Calvin and Adam were the only ones left at the table.

"Come boy, let's go outside." He told Adam as he stood up.

They made their way outside.

Calvin looked at the darkness in front of him as he took a cigarette out of his pocket.

Adam was looking down, not too sure about what the old man wanted.

"We thought they died, you know." Calvin said as he lit his cigarette.

Adam looked up at him.

"We really thought we had lost our granddaughters. First, I lost my son and my step-daughter, their parents. And now, my granddaughters. It was too much for us elders..."

"But..."

Calvin didn't let him finish his sentence. He was still staring at the darkness.

"But maybe I didn't lose them? Maybe they will come back? Son, even the three of you made it back before them. They've been in there for more than a week now. It would be a miracle if they came back, but I've made my peace with the eventuality that they may not come back. Still, I pray for their return every day. I started praying for Layla and Salma too. And they came back. Of course, we didn't know if they had gone into one of those Dungeon Gates or they had gotten lost or whatever else could have happened. We looked for them everywhere and yet..."

He took a pause for a moment. It was a forced pause, as Calvin could feel tears coming once more.

"We...we had no idea what to do..." He said.

Adam lowered his gaze once again. He felt sad for the old man.

"But..th...thanks to you ... they came back. They got in there, and you followed them. Even though the three of you aren't related by blood, you still followed them."

Adam thought that the natural reaction was to follow them in there. He actually felt a bit guilty for hesitating before going inside the Dungeon Gate.

Tears started flowing. The old man started crying.

"I'm...I'm...I'm not even sure I would have had the courage...to follow them in there..."

Adam looked at Calvin.

"I wonder...you know... I wonder if I would have followed them..."

Adam's heart ached at Calvin's words.

"I want to believe that I would have. But the truth is that, I have no idea..."

"I hesitated before following them..." Adam said weakly.

Calvin looked at him with a surprised expression.

"Well, it's no wonder. I'm talking about following my own grandchildren. You went in there for people you only knew for a couple of days. I thank you a lot. That was very courageous of you."

"I was pretty scared... I'm not sure if that counts as courage."

Calvin got down on one knee and held Adam's shoulders. He stared into his eyes.

"That's what courage is, boy. You were scared. Just like anybody else would have been. You have gone through horrible things. And horrible things could have happened once again. And yet, you decided to face it head-on, instead of cowering away. I can only hope to act the way you did the day I will have to. You did a very brave thing. Being fearless isn't the same as being courageous. The whole virtue associated with courage comes from facing that fear."

Adam's body shook. Tears came to his eyes.

'The virtue... of courage..' Adam thought

He smiled as he wiped his tears.

'...I wonder if this is what having a good father feels like.' Adam asked himself.

"Well, you heard Layla. You're going to have to start training, you know. Can't sit down and smoke all day." Adam chuckled as he wiped his tears.

Calvin smiled at Adam's reply.

"I hope you will help me protect them." The old man said.

"I'll do my best."

Meanwhile, Elizabeth and her granddaughters were sitting on Layla's bed.

Initially, Salma had cried once her grandmother talked about the former's parents.

But she cried much less than she usually did.

Not only that, but after a while, she couldn't talk about her parents without smiling.

The other two found it very weird but didn't want to ask about it.

Eventually, Salma realized that she wasn't crying anymore. She realized that she smiled every time she talked about them.

"That's weird. I can't stop smiling when thinking about Mom and Dad." Salma said as she brought her hands to her face.

"Yeah. We noticed. Are you okay?" Layla asked.

"Yes... I think... I think it's because of what you said earlier."

"What did I say?"

"It made me think a bit. Since there are Gods and stuff, then Heaven definitely exists right? So, they're either okay, or in Heaven." Salma said while looking at the ceiling.

Elizabeth teared up while listening to her granddaughter.

Layla paused for a bit. She had told Adam that his family members were in Heaven, but she had only said that to cheer him up. Somehow, she hadn't made the connection between the existence of Gods and the existence of Heaven.

Layla and Elizabeth raised their heads to the ceiling too.

Each one was thinking about something different.

'So if Heaven exists... By that logic, then Hell exists too huh?' Layla wondered.

'They grow up so fast. Just a few days ago Salma was a crybaby, and Layla was a pretty difficult child. You'd be proud of them, for sure.' Elizabeth thought.

After a bit, Salma broke the silence.

"I'm going to see if Adam is okay." She said that, but knew he was okay. She got off the bed and went out of the room.

The other two slowly followed her.

Salma went downstairs and found no one. But she already knew where they were. Not only that, but because of how close they were, Salma could even picture exactly what they were doing.

She got out and looked at Calvin and Adam.

A bit later, the other two followed.

They found Adam giving directions to Calvin, as the old man was trying to hold a giant sword.

The old man's face was dyed red.

"More than three minutes on the first try? I could barely hold onto it for 30 seconds the first time." Adam said with a smile. He was amazed at the old man's strength.

Elizabeth found the scene extremely strange and held a shocked expression.

Salma turned to look at her sister.

The two of them started laughing out loud at the same time.

Calvin let go of the sword out of surprise while Adam scratched his head in embarassement.

Elizabeth got closer to Calvin.

"Honey... You're going to throw out your back."

The five of them laughed together.

Adam's heart ached a bit more after seeing all of them together.

"Let's go in." Calvin said with a smile.

They walked inside.

Adam looked a bit at the darkness outside, before coming in.

'Is this... home?