Vol 1 CH Extra 2 (2/2)
My house had burned to the ground—e tent
I think I
“Hey, did you hear that voice?”
An olderover in my direction
“Raphtalia, you were screa”
“Was I?”
I needed to smile If I didn’t, it would worry the rest of them
“I’m fine! It was just a bad dream”
“Okay… well… don’t overdo it”
“I’h”
Father Mother
I’ my best, I promise…
The nextwe decided to leave the completely destroyed houses the way they were for now and focus on repairing houses that we could live in sooner
We also put soraves for the bodies that had washed up on shore
The adults were all focused on rebuilding the town, and all the children were doing what they could to help
But ere getting worried about the food supplies They ht not hold out
We had discussed sending fishi+ng boats out to get h, and we decided it best to save that for later
“What now…”
We all counted the survivors
There was only one quarter of the village left alive
Even still, one of the older men said that we had made out as well as he could have hoped for
“It’s just like Raphtalia said We are all still alive”
“Yeah!”
What I hadn’t known then was that all our efforts were going to be tossed aside mercilessly
“Hey! What are you doing?!”
There were soe, and they were pointing their swords at a group of adults
“Hey!”
“Who are you guys?!”
“Ahahah! I’d heard that there were still some demi-humans alive here Guess it was true!”
“Yeah, and this area isn’t protected We could probably ood money!”
“Yeah! Argh!”
One of the older men stepped forward and yelled at the attackers
“The lord of these lands will never forgive you for this behavior! There are castle knights still in the area too!”
The nasty-looking men all smiled at once
“What do we care if your dead lord gets mad? And besides…”
Swipe! It happened quicker than I could see It happened before I could understand as going on
The old man’s stomach was split open One of the bad men had cut him with his sword
“What the…”
“Ahaha!”
“Can’t you tell? We are the castle knights!”
“They haven’t figured it out yet, have they, Boss?”
“Nope!”
“AHAHAHAHAHA!”
The old man fell over in a pool of blood He didn’t even twitch
The pool of blood was spreading Soon it was at my toes
“Ah! AHHHHHHHHH!”
Suddenly everyone was panicking I didn’t knohat to do, so I ran
“Don’t let them escape! Kill the old ones! We can sell the women and children, so don’t run them down!”
I can’t really remember what happened next
“Noooooo!”
“Calm down! Take that!”
“Ugh…”
Someone had a hold on
A week passed I continued having dreams of my parents’ deaths
They caught me, and sold me into slavery
The first owner seemed nice He just wanted me to act as a servant, but then he sold me, and I still don’t knohy
The next one…
“Take that!”
“Ugh…”
Why? Why did they treat me this way?
He was a fat man and looked like a bad e house, in a town I’d never heard of There were anih… Apparently this ht me
Every day, whenever he felt like it, he would hangin chains and beat me with a whip He hitme
Whenever I tried to stop him, or tried to protest, the slave curse onme crazy
But I wasn’t going to give up
I’d bare it, for e that hadn’t made it
So I wouldn’t give up
“Raphtalia…” Cough
“It’s okay… It’s okay We’ll e”
When I reunited with Rifana, she was already sick Even still, theher
“Yes… We… We’ll… make it…”
What did this man want from us? Did he just think it was fun to beat us with a whip?
“Ha! Why are you still having dreams of a better life?”
Slap! He hit ain, and I felt blood trickle down my back
I felt tears well up at the pain
“Yes! Scream from the pain!”
“Ahhh!”
After that point, things got worse He started to torture me
I was finally free, and ragged, but I crawled over the o take care of Rifana
He brought us an awful stinking bowl of soup It tasted like mud It was our only food for the day
“Huff… Huff…”
I slowly fed it to Rifana That was one more day of life for her
It would be okay We had tofor us
“Hold on… I swear I’ll help you”
There were latticed iron bars that ran almost to the floor I realized that if I took a rock fro out the foundation under the bars, then we’d be able to wriggle under them and escape! It just had to work
“Thank you”
“Yes! We’ll ain!”
My mother and father had told me to take care of everyone
The other villagers were sure to save us
Sadeena would definitely rally the others to coh
“You… remember that…day? Raph…ta…lia…”
Rifana was shi+vering She was stretching out her hand to the ceiling
“You re?”
“Yes… yes!”
I grabbed her hand and squeezed it hard
I reiven us hope
I
But those days were gone
So I had to bring them back It was up to me
Cough! Cough!
Three days passed
I could hear his footsteps co close
“Raphtalia…” Cough!
The horrible tioing to be fine
I slid a pile of wet straw over the hole I was chipping away under the bars
“…”
Rifana wasn’t answering me
“Rifana?”
The man opened the door to the stable where she was and touched her
“Guess she’s dead Ugh, what a pain”
He lifted her body roughly by the shoulder and muttered to himself
Rifana hung there, her eyes empty and cold
“damn, and it was almost time to return her too This is a breach of contract!”
Then he kicked her body, like she was just a toy
I didn’t know it at the time, but I found out later Apparently there was a class of people that entertained the them
That’s ere, just slaves sold to satisfy that man’s personal whims
“Heee?!”
What? What? Rifana?
No… It couldn’t be
I reached out a shaky hand to touch her
She was so cold, so cold! I couldn’t believe it
No… Rifana!
I was sad, angry, terrified… hopeless
I had soinside of me
Why? Rifana hadn’t done anything wrong!
“It’s because you won’t stop crying at night! She couldn’t get any sleep! This is YOUR fault!”
“No… Ugh…” Sniff… “Rifana…”
The er than usual that day
But I kept my eyes locked on Rifana the whole time, and I couldn’t even feel the pain
“Oh hey, you’re always e, aren’t you?”
“…”
I didn’t have to answer hi for me
“Apparently that village was destroyed a while ago Here’s proof”
He held out a crystal ball
A beae of the village on the wall
It orse than the village I knew It was destroyed, and there wasn’t anyone there
The flag was tattered and burnt, and the ground was littered with bones
“Oh yeah, I heard you saying that you were the person who supported everyone in that village Apparently everyone left it to rot and ran away”
“Ah…”
The man flashed a smile He had never seenthis
“Ug… Ugh… Wahhhh!”
So inside me snapped
I couldn’t do it anymore
My e to me, but there was no one left
Then what should I do?
There was nothing left for me
“Cry! Cry harder!”
The pain was so intense I thought I would go crazy
The drea to rot my brain
They were of the last tiot even worse
I was a bad kid because I hadn’t saved the village They hoped I never sht to live
They kept whispering: Die… Die…
They were… right I would never sain
I didn’t want to
Because I… Because I broke my promise…
The man finally sold me
Either that or the tiame
“This is horrible This is way under what she’s worth damn”
“C’e of death I can’t use her in this condition, so I’ to have to subtract lost time from the price”
“I understand Yes”
A fat ht e me
What would my next owner be like?
“I’m sure she could have been treated a little better…”
The nener gave me medicine and food
Cough! Cough!
“I don’t think she will last very long”
The owner said as he put e
So… I finally wasn’t worth anything to anyone
My parents were gone, andme to die
It hurt I wanted to die I wanted it to be quick
I don’t kno h the bars of e Many people came and went
And then…
“This is about the cheapest I can offer you”
The slave trader had brought a young e
“The one on the right has a genetic disease He’s a rabbit The one in the middle has panic attacks and is a raccoon, and the last one is a mixed-breed lizard man
“They all have their share of problems”
The youngaze for a minute
His eyes were sharp enough to kill He looked angry
I gasped
His eyes wandered to the other two slaves His eyes were scary
He was filled with hate, more hate than the man that whipped me
It looked like he hated the whole world
If he bought me, I’d probably die in a day or two…
“She has panic attacks in the night She’s a lot of trouble…”
Were they talking about me? I couldn’t tell
But in the end, the young ht me
The spell to register as a slave always hurt I hated it
But I was sure this would be my last owner
Because I… I didn’t have much time left
A little while later, the nener gave me a knife and made me kill a monster
It was so scary, but if I didn’t do it, the curse on my chest burned
We left the weapon shop, and
He was going to yell at me! I shook my head; I wanted to tell him that I was fine I was fine! So don’t be mad at me! Don’t whip me!
Sigh…
He just sighed
Was he angry?
He just walked off and broughtfood there
I think I had seen the shop in town before
“I’ll have the cheapest lunch you’ve got, and she’ll have the kid’s ”
“What?!”
I had been gazing, envious, at what that other kid had been eating Then ht it for me? I couldn’t believe my own ears
Everyone outside of e was supposed to be evil, weren’t they?
“Wh…Why?”
“Hm?”
“You looked like you wanted to eat it What’s the proble else?”
I shook my head
“Why are you feeding me?”
Because, ever since I’d become a slave, no one had treated me this way
“I already told you You looked like you wanted to eat that”
“But…”
“Just eat it I need you to be healthy If you stay skinny like that, you’re just going to die”
Die…? I would die I was sure to die… Just like Rifana I’d die of the same disease
“Here you are”
The waitress set a big, elaborateout of it
What I had been envious of, only minutes before, I now had for my own I hesitated I bet that when I went to eat it, the young h at me
“Aren’t you going to eat?”
He looked at me, confused
“Can I?”
“Yeah, hurry up”
Yes He would probably destroy it all I slowly reached my hand out
I looked quickly over at him
He didn’t look like he was going to do anything I touched the food
I pulled the little flag out and felt like I’d acco, I didn’t need anything froe I felt like it was the very sa, the one that we’d lost
I held tight to the flag as I ate the food It was so delicious that I found tears strea down my cheeks
If I cried, he’d yell athim notice
“Is it good?”
“Yes!”
No! I’d accidentally answered him, and he’d seen that I was happy He would punish me for sure
“Good”
That’s all he said I couldn’t understand
I held tight to the flag I felt like it was filled with… so
Coiven us, it was very small and very cheap, but it felt like it contained all that I’d lost It felt like it wantedimportant
I turned to the young man
He looked just as angry as ever, but so was different
What was it? His face and voice were so scary, but was he really a nice person?
I had so many doubts
A lot happened that day He gave me medicine, and made me walk to all kinds of places
But there was one major difference
The drea me was different
“Raphtalia…”
My parents were standing on top of the cliff
“Father! Mother!”
I ran to theht
I wanted to see them I wanted to stay with them
I shouldn’t I knew that I shouldn’t, not in front of the my eyes
“It’s okay… It’s okay…”
“Don’t cry Be strong”
“Ugh… But…”
I kept crying, and my parents just held me and rubbed my head
“We are alatching over you”
“Yes Please, be happy”
“But…”
“You’ll be okay with him…”
Then I woke up
I couldn’t believe it My neas holdingmy head
He wasn’t a bad person He wouldn’t play with me, wouldn’t hurt me
He was cluood person
He didn’t have any ht me food, and prioritized my equipment over his own
Then, I finally found out who he really was
His eyes were dark and filled with hatred and sadness
He was violent, angry and vulgar He was scary
But he understood pain, and at his heart he was kind
Yes, he was the person that Rifana and I longed for… the shi+eld Hero
The shi+eld Hero bought s
I had lost everything, but noas surrounded by treasures
“Hee, Hee…”
The Hero gave , and I siven me
There was the ball There was the broken knife There were lots of things But the
And there were
I felt healthier, better, and stronger
“Here, eat up”
“Okay!”
Rifana, can you hear me?
I’ with the shi+eld Hero
You’d never believe it
I had a dreaood one
Rifana, she was standing right in front ofthat had happened We talked about all kinds of things
“Raphtalia, keep your chin up!”
“I will”
“Lucky you! Fighting with the shi+eld Hero!”
“Heh, heh… Jealous?”
“Ahaha! A little!”
Inat me
“I’ out for you”
“I know”
“Let’s go back to our village, where the flag is”
“Yes! I’ll see you there!”
I hoped thatme from wherever they were I wanted them to see me rebuild it all
I wanted strength I wanted to be strong enough to take care of the bad people that wanted to hurt us
The world was so cruel and hard It was filled with darkness and evil, but I wasn’t going to give up
I didn’t want to lose anyone else
I’ll get stronger, enough to protect my parents, to protect Rifana Yes, to protect Mr Naofumi
I could do it And so I continue on