"Wake up."

A sinister voice. A woman?

The words faded like a sinking rock beneath the ocean's surface.

I open my eyes. It's pitch black.

I try to move my arms, but as I pull, my arms are stopped.

*Clank*

Chains?

As I'm bending forward, my hands are bound together as they are hanging above my head.

"Where...am I?"

A bright light is surrounding me, but the place is so pitch black, I can't see more than a meter forward. Nothing to see nor hear. Is this a room? Or an open area?

Hanging by my arms in the silence, I begin to hear something that sounds like faint footsteps in the near distance, produced by barefoot feet stepping on tiles.

The footsteps are getting closer and closer until finally.... the bright light that was once surrounding me is now gone and sinister smile appears directly before my face.

In an instant, the smile disappears, and words written in white, floating where the face once appeared, remain.

"I am waiting."

It gives the impression of someone impatient.

Cries can be heard, and a bright light appears before me, starting with a tiny circle, then expanding far enough to blind me, forcing me to shut my eyes in order to protect them.

A few seconds, I open them again to see what happened.

As I open them, I saw feet before me, the rest of the leg extends beneath my head, the person's boots look awfully familiar. I am laying on Lena.

I look up to see her face, but what I witness surpasses my expectations.

It is Lena, looking down at me. Gauged out eyes and the skin torn of only on the left side of her face, leaving the other half hanging down while droplets of blood start falling, ending up crashing on my face.

My heart starts beating so hard I can almost feel it in my throat. My breathing becomes unstable, as if my lung capacity is a quarter of what it used to be.

As I try to get up from her, an arm grips one of her shoulders from behind, I know that charcoal hand too well....

Finally, it's head appears over Lena's body. It's not the same demon we encountered earlier.

It reaches its hand over Lena, all the way to me.

"No! Stay back!" I yell at it as I cover my face with my arms and shake while I shut my eyes and fear is consuming me whole.

The demon doesn't stop, instead it starts calling out to me with a sinister, distorted voice.

"Yuuna.... Yuuuuuna...What's wrong? Don't be afraid..."

I start yelling even louder.

It extends its arm all the way to my face.

"Yuuna! Calm down!"

Something is wrapping around me, as if I am being hugged. Is it the demon? No...It isn't the demon. This feels like a human body. Soft, slim, and fragile...

I open my eyes.

I'm being hugged very tightly, as if being restrained. The purple hair of an annual flower, it's Lena again, but this time she's just fine.

I look over her shoulder. Charlotte is gazing at me with a worried, almost scared expression.

"Everything is alright now."

I'm being stroked on the head. Was what I've seen earlier just a dream? Or rather, a sequence of dreams?

My breathing stabilizes and my heart begins to once again pulse at a regular rate.

It seems the dream wasn't the only place where I've been freaking out.

While I'm being held, I look around as the dark grey ceiling and walls aren't familiar.

Lena notices.

"We are inside the shelter. We are safe here."

A big spacious room with lamps hanging from the grey ceiling, glowing like fireflies in the midnight darkness. The room is filled with citizens.

I begin to recall everything that happened to us and lean onto Lena's shoulder as my head becomes light once again.

"Where's...Hidiku with Enmei?"

Lena diverts her eyes from me and looks behind me. I look in the same direction when I spot them, sitting at the stone wall. They aren't doing well at all, but nobody would if they were in their situation.

As I look at them, I attempt to get up, but Lena knows exactly what my intentions are and grabs my arm.

"Wait...let them have some time alone."

I look back at her and the serious expression she's wearing. Without saying a single word in response, I sit down before her while looking at the ground.

"It doesn't feel real to me. We were all together just earlier today, but now..."

Charlotte walks up to me, pats me once and sits right next to me.

"Don't think too much about it. Just take your time and let it sink in properly."

I nod. My two older sisters look pretty calm compared to me. Is it because they are older? Am I just mentally weaker?

***

"Hey...Enmei."

Hidiku quietly mumbles as if he is talking to himself. Enmei hears him and replies.

"What?"

"She isn't coming back...is she."

Enmei shakes his head in denial

"She isn't."

Hidiku asks one more question.

"You think...there's a way to bring her back?" He already knows the answer, yet he still craves for that tiny glimmer of hope that immediately gets extinguished.

"Don't be stupid..."

Knights start coming down the stairway on the other side of the shelter.

There is many of them, but there is one that looks important, standing before the rest. He looks like he's in his fifties, he must have experience.

*Ahem*

The person I just spoke of clears his throat and with his deep voice he yells.

"Attention please!"

His wish is granted.

"I am Alan Nil, the general of our current army. The situation outside has been cleared, but despite that fact, I must ask you to remain here for a bit longer as the clean-up crew is going through with their job. Meanwhile, I would like to ask everyone to separate into two groups."

Two of the knights that came down step forward with a reserve of few metres between each other.

The general extends his hand to the soldier standing on his right, with his palm facing upwards.

"Everyone that is of age fifteen to forty, with the exception of pregnant women, teachers or anyone gravely ill, please stand before this knight."

He extends his arm to the other soldier.

"The rest of you that remain, please stand here."

As I am separated with Hidiku from the rest of our group, I am confused. I don't understand what is going on, but it's not just me. Everyone around looks or sounds worried. I have a bad feeling about this.

The general runs through the two groups with his gaze.

"That is good enough."

He slightly turns his head to see the soldiers behind him with at least a single eye.

"If you may."

The nearest knight replies with "Yes, sir" and they place themselves between the two groups.

Alan clears his throat once again.

"Now then. We will be taking the group with everyone of the age fifteen to forty. You will enrol in the military in the town of Liz and serve the people of our land in order to defend humanity."

He looks at one of the soldiers before him.

"Please, proceed."

They pull out their weapons and begin moving everyone from the group out of the shelter.

Descending into chaos, everyone starts pushing around, trying to get out as they don't want to be suddenly separated from their families and those that don't have any left try to save their lives.

Some of the children are too young to understand what is happening and thus they stay standing still, with a confused look on their face or they begin to cry as they are scared of everyone panicking. I also try to get to the other group as Hidiku follows my lead, we don't want to be separated again.

Lena is looking around with worry on her face when I spot her and call out. She notices me and tries to get close, extending her arm over the soldiers creating a wall between us, attempting to stop the group from running.

Extending my hand to Lena's, I want to take it, but I get pushed onto the ground by one of the guarding soldiers.

"Yuuna!" Hidiku turns around as I'm sitting on the ground behind him, but he averts his gaze as Lena starts calling out to us while being pushed back.

"Hidiku! Your sister is in our basement! Take care of Yun-Yun for me!"

Lena yells in a hurry with little time to convey her message before she gets forced out of the shelter.

Standing in front of the crowd, we looked at her with concern in complete silence.

The shelter gate has shut.

My mind gives in at this point. I should be crying, or perhaps chase after them, but nothing is happening. Yet I manage to let out a few silent words with a trembling voice as.

"God has abandoned us."

"They are being taken to an entirely different town.... did the people outside of the district also have to face this?"

I look at Hidiku standing next to me. Looking down on the ground with an empty gaze, seemingly not perceiving his surroundings. I hold his hand firmly as I speak with a soft voice showing sadness.

"Come, let's go get Himarin."

We open the gate and set foot into the nearly destroyed town.

The sky is filled with grey.

Everything crumbling, families mourning their loved ones, children looking for their parents. There are some lucky ones that are able to reunite with their family in one peace.

I envy them...

Building after building. We walk through the destroyed town, around what used to be our academy and even further until we finally arrive to where I used to live, Hidiku's was somewhat further back but it can be seen from here.

As expected, our homes are no longer here.

I catch a glimpse of something moving with the corner of my eye and investigate it. It's a member of the clean-up crew, a pitch-black coat covering their whole body and a mask with a long bird like beak covering their face. Unable to tell if it's a male or a female, I look at the person taking care of the leftovers as a crow that's about to feast on a corpse.

I approach them to ask if our parents are on the list of deceased, but I didn't get the answer I was looking for.

A male voice comes through the black mask. It is deep.

"My apologies, there were very few corpses that were recognisable. If your parents aren't on this list, then they most likely are one of them."

I lower my head. It is another thing I expected but it still doesn't make me feel any better.

He places his hand on it.

"Child, do you have a home to go back to?"

I shake my head in denial.

"There is an orphanage at the district's entrance. Stay there for the time being."

He walks off to the next corpse.

I go back to where Hidiku is waiting for me as he asks how it went.

I shake my head once more.

Hidiku hits the wall he's standing next to with the site of his fist.

"Damn it! Why did it have to end up like this? If only I was stronger. If only...."

His teeth are grinding against each other as his eyebrows are in a triangular like shape and wrinkles appear on his forehead. The frustration is very apparent.

I grab one of my arms as it's hanging down while looking at the ground and my bangs cover my face.

"It's not your fault, it's nobody's.... we weren't ready, not even some of our best knights could handle it."

He walks up to me, grabs me beneath my collar with both of his hands and lifts me so I can reach the ground only with the tip of my feet. Then proceeds to yell into my face.

"Oh yeah? And why is that? The military is not ready to fight a demon? Then they clearly weren't preparing in the first place! So it has to be some-"

He puts a sudden halt to his complaining as he looks at me as if he is seeing something unexpected.

The expression on my face was clear as the blue oceans. The moment he grabbed my collar, fear took over me. Hidiku is someone that wouldn't even hurt a fly and now he suddenly gets physical with me. I'm scared... As I'm staring directly at him, my eyes start shaking and become watery, but I don't let out a single tear.

Hidiku puts me back down.

"Sorry..."

I look back at the ground, again having my bangs cover my eyes as I wipe them with my arm and sniff. Then I walk off to where my house used to stand and locate the drop door to the basement.

I try to open it but it's unusually heavy, is it jammed? I place my palm on it; it's freezing.

Hidiku sees I'm struggling and tries, but he also struggles so I assist him.

It finally opens and sudden freezing temperatures hit us. As we step down the stairs, we witness another unexpected thing.

The whole basement is covered in ice.

"What is this?"

Hidiku asks curiously as he's looking around the beautiful crystals made of ice.

"It's Charlotte's magic....so her body doesn't rot away."

Both of us become sad as neither of us would like to say or hear that about our beloved.

We continue walking through the basement and locate the stone table Himarin is laying on. She's completely frozen and even more thoughts I never wanted come up. What if I break something off? I don't want to do this...

I try to slowly slide my hand beneath her, but she's completely stuck to the table.

"We can't move her like this."

If only there was something to melt the ice with.

I look down at my palm as sudden realization strikes me. I can generate heat with my ability.

While Hidiku is looking around for something that would help, I heat Himarin up just enough to be able to lift her.

"Here, I found this."

Hidiku acquired an old stretcher we had stored here. Exactly what we need.

We gently place her on it and carry her out to the big field behind our house. All of us like it there and I love to lay down beneath the cherry blossom too.

Trying to climb the small hill with the cherry blossom, the grey sky suddenly starts rumbling.

"Looks like it's going to rain soon. Let's put her down beneath the tree." And as Hidiku suggests, we do exactly that.

I'm catching my breath and wiping off the sweat as it wasn't easy to carry her up the hill when Hidiku heads back to where we came from.

"I will go get something to dig up a hole with."

Without a reply, I sit down next to Himarin.

"What is it like to be dead? Is it just a dreamless nap you never wake up from? Or is there something more to it?"

I think back to the moment when Himarin transferred something to me right before passing away.

"Just what was that?"

As I mumble to myself about the ideas that I can't help but think about, I get another idea and walk down the hill.

Hidiku climbs back up, holding a shovel. He doesn't see me and so he looks around until he locates me.

I'm sitting down in the field of flowers, collecting them to make a wreath.

Hidiku smiles and starts digging a hole next to the tree.

After some time, I start feeling a weird sensation. My uncovered body parts start feeling a sudden decrease of temperature and wetness while my covered parts only feel a light impact of something falling on me. It is slowing starting to rain.

I pick up my wreath and start running back, up the hill where Hidiku is about to finish digging.

It's pouring hard.

"Ready?"

He looks at me casually.

I nod and descend to get Himarin off the ground as the cherry blossom shields us from the rain.

Putting her into the newly dug hole, we slowly start realizing this is our last time seeing her. It really gets to Hidiku.

The emotions make him cry for her one last time. I'm not good with comforting people, but I still try by gently hugging him from behind as diminutive tears come down my face. But... is he really the one I'm trying to comfort?

It takes a few minutes for him to regain his composure after which he starts throwing the previously dug up dirt back into the hole.

A few rocks we found around were placed on top instead of a gravestone with Himarin's name engraved on one of them by Hidiku.

I kneel and put down my wreath before the pile of rocks.

"What now?" I question our options.

"We will have to find a place to stay."

In that moment, I remember the clean-up crew member I spoke with earlier today.

"The orphanage? We don't have many other options."

He takes a few seconds to think about it, then walks off down the hill.

"That's probably the best option for the time being."

The orphanage we are headed to is almost at the border of our district and the rest of the town, so it got out of the disaster unscathed. I guess that's good news for all the people that lost their homes and families, like us.

As we are closing in on the orphanage's entrance, Hidiku spots a person leaning on the wall next to the doorway.

"He looks shady.... maybe we should wait for him to leave first."

I look at the man Hidiku described as "shady". He is too far for me to see him properly, but as I try to focus on him harder, it gets easier to see what he looks like; Short brown hair, a short beard, a filthy cape, as if freshly bathed in mud, covering his body and bondages over his left eye. Somewhat taller and more muscular than Hidiku. He's in his thirties.

I sigh.

"That's him alright."

Confused Hidiku looks at me.

"Try looking closer."

He does a few steps forward until he can finally see.

"Oh.... Yeah, let's not go there."

Yeah, that's the reaction I've been expecting. You see, that shady guy over there is our uncle. Or more specifically, my mom's older brother. His name is Ben and he pretty much annoys both of, if not all of us.

As we turn around and head back to avoid him, unfortunately, he notices the two familiar figures walking away from him and begins to call out to us. But nobody can hear him, or so he thinks.

He halts for a moment. Then out of nowhere, he appears right next to me and slams my back with his palm.

"WHAT'S UP"

I grab his arm and swing it over my head from behind dragging him along with it and smacking him into the ground. Then I point at him.

"Don't ever touch me again....YOU FILTHY HOBO!".

The uncle stays on the ground for a few good seconds, then picks himself up as if nothing happened, sweeps off the dirt on him and shrugs.

"I see you are still the same..."

Hidiku sighs and crosses his arms.

"So...what do you want from us?"

In response, Ben grins, wipes the area beneath his nose and points at us as we stand next to each other.

"I'm taking you two lovebirds to my secret hideout deep in the woods!!!"

Suddenly, as if someone took the air out of our lungs and our hearts failed us, we are standing motionless, looking at uncle Ben with a serious look that's hiding our severe confusion.

"....Huh."