“State your name.”

Faced with unexpected events, Adeleine had trouble with speaking as her voice was caught in her throat. Just all of the sudden, this man had his sword on her neck, threateningly.

He had a royal red tailcoat patched with white starting from under his sleeves and extending to the back. Thin linings of gold accentuated the borders and the coat was held by two chains, keeping it in lock. Underneath was a waistcoat of a more darker shade, somewhat maroon and white long-sleeved shirt underneath it all. The top was paired with black trousers with boots reaching three-inches under his knees. Tied to his neck was a cravat and a gold brooch with green markings settling on his neck.

She met eyes with him and blinked. Her worries have been casted away taken by the sight in front of her. Fair skinned with a yellow-ish undertone paired with his silver-white hair that gave an ethereal glow under the rays of the blinding sun, a sight like of an angel.

His face tells otherwise, two bloody pools were shadowed under by the bangs of his unruly hair. He radiated an aura that gave off an unsettling feeling which had Adeleine’s hair standing on its ends.

If there is one thing she knows, is that her senses told her that she should proceed him with caution.

His earring, a silver ‘x’ shape, dangled and clinked as he cocked his head to the side. His red eyes looked down on her pathetic state.

“State your name,” he said once again in a lower but dangerous tone.

Adeleine had her trance snapped and her soul was brought back to the ground in an instant. She shivered at the sudden drop of temperature and coldness started seeping in her skin.

“A-adeleine Credon.”

The guy squinted his eyes without trust at the girl who was suspiciously wearing a dark brown cloak covered down to her ankle in the middle of a forest and who actually looks like she had just gone through a shady operation with her red-filled and smudged knee-length baby blue dress hidden underneath her cover.

Definitely looks suspicious.

“Remove your cloak.”

Upon hearing the request, or command, Adeleine had to do a check of possible scenarios in her head.

She cannot absolutely, positively, reveal her hair color here. It would only end in disaster!

But the man did not waste any second and without warning, hook his sheathed sword under her hood and with a flick of his wrist, the hood fell over behind her and revealed black tresses hidden underneath.

Adeleine barely had the time to react as her eyes grew wide with shock and fear as her only protection from prying eyes and talks of gossip, also from future harm such as this, fluttered behind her—her hood.

His eyes widened as he took a step back of precaution and moved into defensive stance that was hammered down to his instincts, his fingers inching to the hilt of his sword. The situation looks a little dangerous for Adeleine as the guy could easily kill her in a swoop of his blade, which she wouldn't want to actually happen.

She heard him muttering the word “black” as his expression went dark and within a flash, he had her arm twisted awkwardly behind her back and put some strain in her untrained muscles that had her yelping even without much pressure.

“Ow! Ow! Ow!”

It was too fast to follow for her eyes!

She tried moving but only was restricted by the red-eyed man holding her with a tight grip.

“What are you doing?! Let me go! “ she demanded while struggling her limbs out of the tight grip he has, also her current form isn't helping.

“Shut up,” he growled.

“I said let go!” she raised her foot out of frustration and slammed it down to his toes hard for his mishandling.

In contrast to her expectation, he still had his hold on her and even more worse, gripped her arms tighter as he pulled a rope from his back out of nowhere and started to tie her arms together.

“You—,” he hissed but didn't even manage to finish his statement when he tried to cover her mouth from constantly screaming but was bitten instead. She jerked her head backwards, headbumping him hard and quite painful on her part as her head throbbed.

Her vision swirled and the world appeared to be up-side-down and doubling but that did not stop her from cheering inwardly when he slightly loosened his grip and stumbled backwards.

Using this opportunity to her advantage, she regained her sense of balance and dashed however, didn’t even got ten steps away when she tripped on a tree root and her cheeks kissed the leafy ground.

Just her luck.

As much as she wanted to face palm at the wrong timing of her clumsiness, she can’t as she was pinned down by the same guy, hands on back and face squished.

“Stop struggling.” He growled, “or I’ll kill you.”

She gulped as a chill ran down her spine. Sure enough, even if she want to, her body isn’t willing to listen.

“Clandes!”

A loud voice came from a distance and three galloping horses were seen. The first arrived was a tall woman with straight scarlet red hair and bright amber orbs that left Adeleine gawking at the sight of the woman’s eyes reflecting shades between orange and yellow under the light of the sun. Her medium tan skin glistened with sweat as she tried to wipe it off with her sleeves.

“I told you to not set off by yourself.” She clicked her tongue in annoyance.

The girl with rose gold color hair, sitting behind her on the saddle, was hugging the taller woman tightly, hoping not to fall off. She threw her head back and gasped from the lack of air from when she buried her face in the woman's back. “I-I thought I was going to die.”

“That’s because you shouldn’t have buried your face like that,” the red-head woman answered.

“Sorry,” she mumbled.

“COMING THROUGH!”

Another voice tore throughout the open space and came another horse galloping at high speed. A boy with dirty blond locks was steadying his footing on top of the horse’s saddle, one which should not do. Unless, you want to die.

He jumped halfway through and ever so swiftly landed himself on the leafy floor with a few stumbles and to save himself from embarrassment, strike a heroic pose.

The red-head got off her saddle and stood in front of the crouched blond who was still in his pose. She raised her hand and unhesitatingly struck down his head hard.

“Just what are you doing?” the woman asked darkly.

“Ow!” the blond soothed the part where he got hit and looked up to the woman, slightly raising his voice, “Just what did you that for?!”

“Don’t you know you look stupid!”

“Ha! How could this handsome face look stupid?” then he pointed to himself.

“Stupidity really do come with personality,” she muttered in her breath and just enough for the boy to hear.

“Hey!”

The third horse came trotting with a curly green-head snorting and laughed. “You handsome? Where?”

If there is one thing Adeleine noticed, it was they sported all similar attire.

The blond rolled his emerald green eyes at them. “Uh, I don’t know. Maybe if you use your eyes, you can see it on my face?”

The green-head got of her horse and neared the blond with eyes squinted and hands cupped around like binoculars. “Ah there it is,” she then exclaimed.

He puffed his chest and proudly said, “Ha! I told you—”

But she wasn’t done and pushed past him. “There it is! What handsome mane you got there, Row,” she patted the horse’s snout as she addressed him which the animal neighed in satisfaction and left the blond boy jaw dropping.

“You… You traitors!” he glared at the woman and the green-head girl.

“Um, but I think it’s not nice to hit him though,” the girl with rose-gold hair whispered under her breath that had everyone’s attention turning to her that made her shrink even more.

“Aw, Bridget,” the blond turned to her with teary eyes. “You’re such an angel. I knew you were on my side.”

“Not so fast, you idiot head.” The woman smack his head again.

“Ack! What was that for then?! I ain’t doing anything wrong to you!”

“Yes, you did!” The tall woman glared down at him. “You let the monster away and now it’s your fault that we have to look for it.”

He turned away and grumbled, “But the monster has legs. Of course, it’ll run away.”

Before the woman could do anything else to reprimand the poor attacked boy, the attention was diverted to Adeleine when the green-head crouched down to her level.

“Who’s this?”

The girl was surprised to see marmalade eyes invading her vision.

“Hi! I’m Ria. Nice to meet you,” she chirped as she enthusiastically waved her hand.

“Black hair…” the woman muttered as she had her finger under her chin, thinking. “She definitely looks suspicious. A spy, maybe? And where are we exactly?”

Ria giggled. “We’re still in the forest, silly.”

“I can see that,” the woman deadpanned.

“Is that a B-class monster? It’s dead?!” the blond shrieked. “Is that a wrecked house?”

The boy had been screaming obvious things and it’s aggravating the red-head’s ears that’s what only left for him to scream was ‘Is that a human?’ and if he did…

“Is that—!”

“Silence!” the woman yelled and mercilessly smacked him again at the head.

“Ack!” he grasped his head as soon as he felt the pain. “Okay, I’ll stop.”

The woman’s attention then turned to their captive, who was now being pinned down by Clandes.

“Did you do all this?” she asked her and all the girl did was held her head down.

Silence reigned after and no one was able to speak.

It looked like war descended on this little space and astrea knows how much damage it caused! She may even have wiped an entire family out! That alone makes her want to flip the table and burn the whole country.

She stomped to where she was and grabbed her messy black hair upward.

“Did you do this?” she asked once again with her voice firmer than before. Turquoise blue eyes greeted her with emptiness and it disgusted her how much dried red liquid was smeared on her clothes like it was nothing.

With no response, she sent her foot towards her.

Crack!

The sound rung in their ears as the sickening sound echoed and a thump landed on the floor.

The girl made no move when she landed heavily on the ground and aimlessly stared at them.

“What the hell are letherians thinking?! They’re sick! Utter madness!” The woman cursed under her breath.

Adeleine can’t will her body to move as she laid on the floor. She really wanted to close her eyes and wish it all away. Wish she never left her mom, wished she never helped the boy, wished she was gone.

Pain shot through her whole body as if her spine was shocked by an electric chair. It was an unbearable pain.

“Just stop!” Bridget yelled with closed-eyes as she held the woman behind with her small body. “Just…stop, please.”

The tall woman could have easily swatted her off like a fly but she didn’t, instead she stopped as she was told to.

Clearing her mind and easing her fury, she kept quite for a second and walked to the saddles, opening the bags and grabbing thick ropes from inside. She tossed them to the others and said, “Tie her up.”

“Aye, ma’am, we’ll be done even before you could say poop!” Ria saluted and pulled Bridget to work.

“Make sure she doesn’t escape,” she added.

But what could Adeleine do? She couldn’t even move, how much more to escape?

Bridget and Ria hauled over Adeleine's body with a rather gentler approach compared to what happened just a while ago, but even so she still cannot get her body to move and had no energy to do so. She just went along with the two in a limp, not that she could do anything anyway.

“Hayden, Clandes,” she turned to the two boys. “You two scout the area.”

“Don’t order me around, barbarian.” he scoffed and walked away just to do as he was told, ironically.

The blond followed behind him with a snicker. “Barbarian,” he mocked with a laugh.

“You bastard. Say that again in my face and I'll rip your head off,” she warned and he scampered off, tailing the red-eyed guy. Her eye twitched and she mounted her horse with a stomp. “Let’s move on, people!”