Kylia shot her father a mean demeanor, to which her father responded with a blank stare and a smile. After a staring contest continued for a few more seconds, Kylia let out a sigh before rising to her feet. “If you insist, I guess I can get this thing started.” Taking a second to slide her phone into her side pocket, Kylia then rammed her hands down onto the table, nearly causing it to buckle under the weight of her strength. “Alright, listen here,” her words were filled with malice, “My father decided to drag my mom and me here for lemon cakes. I want to say that one more time. My father, one of the Nine Demon Lords of the freaking Underworld, dragged us here for lemon cakes. But not just lemon cakes, but to meet a human girl that he delights in mentally torturing. Oh, I’m sorry. He used the term “annoying”. My apologies. Point being, you, the human they call Harriett.”

“Me?” Harriett repeated out loud as her mind attempted to understand why so many people were picking on her tonight.

“Yes you, bashful human. You are the reason we are here. And for that, for dragging me away from my training. For bringing me up here and forcing me to play human for a night, a single night. Well… I just want you to know that from the bottom of my heart, when I become one of the new Demon Lords, that I would rather do anything else than to spend my days mentally connecting with a human who can’t even control her own magical power. I don’t even see why you humans try to control what you don’t understand in the first place.”

“Kylia! That’s quite enough,” Mrs. Infern declared. “Dear, please control your daughter.”

“What for?” Lord Aesir asked his wife. “In terms of training to become a demon lord, she’s passing with flying colors.”

“Dear,” Mrs. Infern said with a bit more firmness.

Lord Aesir lifted an eyebrow at her. However, Mrs. Infern’s stern gaze beaming upon him seemed to be churning a new thought process deep within the Demon Lord’s mind. Despite the notion of being kindred in any way most likely being against his very nature, Lord Aesir stood to his full height, drawing everyone’s gaze onto him. Surprisingly, Kylia’s intense facial impression switched to that of bewilderment with traces of fear. Lord Aesir crossed his arms and closed his eyes for a moment as he collected his thoughts before speaking. Then, with a nod of confirmation to himself, he opened his eyes, looked to Mr. and Mrs. Carefree, and bowed, drawing a gasp from Kylia.

“Though it pains me to do this, I must admit that the customs of your world do not fit me. However, I am not a demon lord without honor and respect. And for the respect you have shown my family and I tonight, please allow me to apologize for my daughter’s deprived and wretched words. I hope they do not sour any further transgressions of this night.”

The room was so silent that Harriett could hear her own heartbeat. She had no idea how to react. Should she speak? Should she get up and run? Or should she simply stare into space until someone else reacted? In the end, the last choice seemed to be the best choice and so she went with that.

However, Caroline Carefree was not above recognizing when a matter needed to be addressed with the utmost in care and understanding. “Now now, Lord Aesir, there is no need to apologize. After all, kids are kids for a reason, even if they are our own. And whether they are human, demons, or something else altogether, we parents will always love them, right? So why not forgive your daughter and let us dive into this food.”

“Your words are too kind to a demon lord such as myself, Mrs. Carefree.”

“Please, call me Caroline,” Mrs. Carefree added.

“My apologies once again, Caroline. But you are right. You would think that after your 7^th kid, a parent would be used to this kind of stuff. But then again, this is the first time I’ve ever been invited to a human dinner in all of my thousands of years. But a learning experience is a learning experience none the less. Let us consider the moment dropped.” And with that, Lord Aesir sat down before Sandra Infern politely nudged him in a way that told Harriett that Mrs. Infern was proud of how Lord Aesir had handled himself. The way Lord Aesir was handling himself seeme… quite unbecoming of a demon lord to Harriett. All the way back to their first encounter, Harriett had assumed that all a demon lord would want to do was the most evil and vile things one could imagine. However, so far, the evilest thing Harriett could remember Lord Aesir doing was the constant berating and annoyances he caused her every time he spoke in her mind. And so, once again, Harriett was left with utter confusion clouding her thoughts.

“Screw that,” Kylia sharply declared as she still continued to stand, her eyes glaring at her father. “You call yourself a demon lord? You, the 2^nd in command of the Lords of the Underworld, apologizing to a human? How weak of a display you put on for these people!”

“Kylia, careful with your words!” Mrs. Infern sternly stated.

“Why should I be?” Kylia fired back at her mother. “It isn’t like father is going to do anything about it. I mean, my siblings and I all see it. He’s changed. Sure, marrying a human in general was the first step, and even though I was born from that union, even I detest it slightly. But this, this whole masquerade at pretending to be human for… for… for sweets?!” Kylia pounded her right fist down on the table before opening it and creating a blue and cyan colored flame in her palm. “I’ve had it with this. I’m tired of playing human. I want to be me!” Kylia raised her right hand, flame and all, above her head and prepared, as far as Harriett could tell, to release enough flames to engulf the house.

Harriett’s mind began to flood with flashbacks to the grad student drowning incident. Her muscles tightened as stress and anxiety began to consume her, her breathing rate increased and her heart rate sped up. But a rogue thought of “look up” caused her to look about the table to see how everyone else was reacting.

Although it seemed to be in slow motion, Harriett saw many things starting to play out before her. Her parents were rising to their feet, their magical and/or spiritual energies beginning to gather in preparation to defend everyone from what was to come. To her left, Feron was sitting pleasantly, watching the moment unfold. Though Harriett was a bit taken back by his calm demeanor at first, her mind then reminded her that he had acted the same way before he had saved her and all of her old classmates from drowning many years ago and so, she knew that he was probably formulating a plan in his mind.

To her right, she saw Lord Aesir reaching out to his daughter with his left hand as his daughter’s flame grew larger and larger. Sandra Infern simply stood on and stared, her facial expression quite unphased by the whole scenario as if it was normal. And for the human mom of a half-demon lord, it most likely was.

And there, sitting still and doing nothing as always, was Harriett. Harriett didn’t understand why she couldn’t help as well. Her magical power was easily on the level of her parents and Lord Aesir’s combined. With but a thought and the will, she could muster up enough energy to stop Kylia too. But what if she did worse than that? What if her magic went out of control? What if she took it too far and instead of extinguishing Kylia’s fire, she extinguished her life as well? Would Lord Aesir ever forgive her for destroying one of his daughters? Would she be able to control her power enough to not hurt her parents, Mrs. Infern, or Feron as well?

Her mind swirled with thoughts as the moment around her continued to slow. What should she do? What could she try? Would it work? Would it work? Would it work? She couldn’t snap herself out of it. She couldn’t control her spiraling emotions. It was all too much for her to handle. She was just Harriett, a human girl who wanted to go to college and learn how to control who she was. She just wanted to wake up one day and not be scared of who she was. She just wanted one day to not cry about accidentally hurting someone.

That was all she could take of the moment at hand. Ignoring everything else that was happening around her, Harriett rose from her chair and ran, ran as fast as she could. Her mind was so lost that she didn’t even remember opening the door to her room and darting down to her bed. She didn’t care whether the house went up in flames or even if she died. She was scared, she was worried, and she wanted to cry. And so, with her world possibly about to end, she did just that.