The King had received a rather worrying report from the Duke’s guard, just as he was about to have his supper. His calm face had changed to one of unease and anger upon finishing the letter.

“Damn that man!” He swore at Kyle.

He understood that the royal ancestor had instructed to keep clear of the hunter under most circumstances. Seeing that the man did nothing out of the ordinary, the King was happy to let him be. But, this time, his eldest son was the victim! He cursed the Duke inwardly. If Quin was not so infatuated with the Duke’s only daughter, things would not have come to this.

“I cannot send the royal guard. It will take far too long. I can only ask the royal ancestor.” He muttered to himself after thinking for some time.

The King opened the secret room in the back of his office after notifying that he was not to be disturbed.

*Creak*

As he descended the staircase leading to a secret chamber located below his study, he contemplated on what he should do about the situation.

If his son were to die because of this, he would not be able to stay silent on the matter. Earlier, he had his secret guards update him on the situation regarding Kyle’s family. It seemed that they were planning to leave the city and relocate elsewhere.

He pushed the thoughts aside as he stepped into the chamber and went straight to the table in the center of the room.

After activating the mana tool for communication with the royal ancestor, he nervously waited. The matter he wished to ask seemed rather trivial in the scheme of things. He did not know how the sole Demigod of the humans would react to his rather foolish request.

“Speak Silas, my child. It is not yet time for the scheduled meeting. What has happened?” An old yet kind voice transmitted from the mana tool calmed Silas Strand’s heart as he reorganized his thoughts.

“Royal ancestor, I have a personal favour to ask.”

“Oh?”

The King went on to explain his eldest child’s circumstances and appealed the Demigod to save the boy.

Contrary to his expectations, the old man was not angry after hearing the entirety of the matter, or at least what was written in the Duke’s letter and his own man’s investigations.

“Alright. It’s rather boring just circulating mana up on this mountain anyways. I’ll go take a look.”

The mana tool went silent, indicating that the other side has cut off the communication.

Silas breathed out a sigh of relief as he made his way back to his study.

‘Now, to deal with this wretched family.’ The King started making plans in his head as he headed out to have his meal.

***

Alex was dumbfounded. Never in his mind did he think that this rather popular maid, a few years older than him would confess to him. Well, it was basically a confession.

Having asked if she could stay with Alex at the academy as his personal maid, Liz blushed furiously as she stared hard at the floor, not daring to look up.

The occasional peek showed the master of the house, Kyle smirking while giving his wife a nudge and a stiff faced Alex. The older people looked at Liz with an ‘Oh my! It’s good to be young!’ expression while smiling.

“Um…” Alex found that he had nothing in response to this rather odd request. He had realised that while he would draw attention from the ladies at the academy, Amelia would fend off all attempted to approach him. As a result, he practically had no experience in dealing with the opposite sex.

Vanessa spoke up, breaking the awkward yet funny atmosphere. “Alright! Why not. I can’t rest easy leaving my dear brother all alone anyhow.” She covered her mouth and hid her laughter as she found Alex’s mental anguish amusing.

“Ok, that settles it. Back to whatever you were doing. Thank you everyone.” Kyle quickly concluded the meeting.

Alex still sat in the couch, unable to speak.

“Liz, come with me. Kaylee, sweetie, go with your father for a while. Mommy will be back in a bit.”

Kaylee went down obediently towards Kyle, climbing on his shoulder with surprising speed and agility.

Vanessa pulled Liz upstairs, not before giving a weird smile towards the still stunned Alex.

“Well, now that’s taken care off, let’s turn in early. I have to pack for the journey tomorrow and see some people tomorrow.” Kyle pretended to be tired and headed to the bathroom.

“Let’s go clean you up little girl. Time to sleep!”

Alex came back to his senses after everyone has left the room.

“Uh…guys? What about my opinion...”

His question met with silence as Alex headed towards his room with confused thoughts.

***

Trent Strand, the only living Demigod of the human side, was a specialist of the wind element. He speed was astonishing. He came to be known as the Divine Wind, probably due to the fact that his name was rather underwhelming.

The old man quickly left the mountain, heading towards the south of the city, riding the wind bouncing off the mountain.

It took less than ten minutes to reach the location described by his descendant. Upon, landing at the clearing near the woods, he saw half a dozen injured soldiers defending a young boy, trembling in fear, from a large number of what can only be seen as bandits and cutthroats.

There were nearly eighty of the rough looking and poorly armoured men, attempting to break the defence of the guards. Six men of similar attire lay at the feet of the soldiers, clearly not moving.

A quick scan with his spirit sense showed that they were no longer alive. The dead guards were accompanied by over thirty bandits

A small amount of fury began to rise within the calm heart of the old man. In this troubled world, under threat of a common terrifying enemy, people like these still exist to terrorise the common man. Something he could not forgive.

His arrival was unnoticed by the untrained thugs. The guards tensed up visibly by the arrival of an unknown person, who flew down from the sky. Despair filled their hearts as they cursed the foolish young prince, the cause of their woes.

The intruder moved behind a few men at the outer circle with silence. Swiping his hands horizontally, he relieved the heads from the bodies of over ten men.

The royal guards relaxed a little as they found that the old man was seemingly not their enemy, only to tense up once again after thinking that their chance of staying alive was now almost nil if he was hostile.

After having lost a third of their number, the bandits noticed the old man.

“Who are you?! Guys, he killed so many of us! Kill him!”

As the leader looking man yelled out, over twenty bandits left the guards and encircled the old man.

Only a silent stare greeted them before their heads were equally detached from the torsos by invisible wind blades. The bandits, barely strengthened by mana, making them lightly stronger than the common men, stood no chance against the angry Demigod.

Less than thirty seconds passed and there were fewer than twenty trembling bandits remaining.

Deterred by the display of headless bodies before them, and a silent demon standing amidst the rolling heads and blood covered ground, the bandits started to run off in random directions. All unity gone, replaced by fear and a desperate will to survive, none listened to the bandit leader’s orders as all thugs ran as if being hunted by the death god himself.

The Divine Wind did not pursue the fleeing mob as he felt that it was enough lesson for the remaining men. If they continued in this line of work, a gruesome end will be met eventually, or so he believed. He was no demon and he would not start acting like one just because a few good men died.

Trent Strand shifted his vision to the clearly frozen seven individuals. Even the crown prince, who had witnessed the scene in its entirety, was no longer trembling, scared stiff from the scene of carnage before him.

“Now then, my dear descendant, you have much to answer for.”

The words of the man whom seemed to be his rescuer did not bring any joy to the shaken boy.