Tale of Discovery

Chapter 23: Unexpected Advent

When we finally got back to the camp, we found Joijiro and Misa still playing with their PSPs.

They shut their PSPs off before approaching us.

"We will do night watch in pairs," Nao announces,

"First off, the guys sleep for four hours. When you wake up, take our spots and watch till morning."

Misa moves to her seat and starts playing her game, while Joijiro directly goes into our tent to rest. As I'm about to follow him inside, I feel a tug on my arm. I stop and turn around.

"Here have this.", Nao says as she hands me her music player with the headphones.

"Keep it.", she continues.

Hm? She wants me to keep her music player? Why?

"Don't ask any questions and just go.", she states.

I nod in response and put the music player and the headphones in my pocket.

Nao then turns around and wants to head to where Misa is, but before she can take a step, I startle her by swiftly and gently hug her from behind. I don't give her a chance to say anything as I casually kiss her cheek before I let her go and go into the tent.

Once inside, I see Joijiro who's already fast asleep. Taking the spot beside him, I pull out the music player from my pocket and put on the headphones. I select a song with an interesting title and lie down on the futon next to Joijiro's.

------

Where am I and when did I get here. I am eating rice. My body is doing it subconsciously and I have no control over it whatsoever.

I see Ayumi sitting on her seat across from me, eating her dinner merrily. I take a look around and notice that it's the old house we used to live in.

Then, I notice the presence of someone that shouldn't be here. A gray-haired guy that seems to be older than both of us.

His face is unrecognizable, but I have a feeling that if I focus hard enough I will be able to discern it.

"Otosaka." I hear someone call out me. Before I can look around, everything goes dark as I hear, "Wake up, it's our turn now.

------

As I gradually open my eyes, Joijiro's face comes into my sight. Beside him is Nao who is keenly staring at me.

A dream again... Who is the gray-haired guy? Why can't I recognize him?

My thoughts don't last long as Joijiro says,

"Come on. Let's not make them wait any further."

Oh right! Now is our turn to night watch.

Joijiro and I head out, while Yusa, who seems to have returned to controlling her body, heads into the girls' tent with Nao.

------

So bored...

We have been keeping watch for a while now, but nothing remarkable has occurred. Not like I was expecting something to happen anyways.

Suddenly, I sense some familiar energy burst out in the direction of the forest. Alarmed, I look at the direction it came from and focus my eyes as much as I can.

Nothing. I don't see anything. I want to activate Paragon's Eyes, but I remember that Joijiro is near me. Speaking of him, he doesn't seem to have noticed anything as he continues to game on his PSP.

"I think I heard something," I say to Joijiro in a calm tone,

"I will go check it out, while you stay here and keep guard. Don't do anything unnecessary while I'm away.", I continue.

As soon as he replies with "roger", I immediately dash into the forest and move towards where I felt the energy earlier.

Noticing something within my sight, I instantly come to a stop and take a look.

Damn. Am I seriously seeing this or am I hallucinating?

There, lying on the soil is an unconscious naked girl that seems to be around eight years old. I just hope this isn't what I think it is...

I take a look around to see if random men dressed in black and blue uniforms will appear out of nowhere before I approach the little girl.

The girl is of short stature and has pale-blonde hair. I take a look at her body, and once I'm sure that there aren't any signs of revolting acts, I let out a sigh of relief.

Focusing my hearing, I hear her rhythmic breathing along with her heartbeats. I slowly approach her and crouch down beside her, gently nudge her and call out,

"Hey, wake up."

She doesn't react at first, but after I repeat doing so a couple of times, her eyelids twitch slightly before she opens them.

In the beginning, the girl takes a look at the surroundings. She then turns my way, smiles and says,

"I've arrived, Father."

Not again... I feel like I'm being trolled by someone or something.

The girl then lifts herself up from the ground, gets on her feet, and then looks down at her body through her blue eyes.

She raises her left arm and snaps her fingers. All of a sudden, a bright red light covers all of her body. The moment the light goes away, she's no longer naked.

She now has a luxurious-looking black and red dress that seems to be made of silk that covers almost her whole body. Underneath the dress, she has white stockings on, and her legs have black platform shoes on. The frilly dress combined with the black and red victorian day-cap she has on her head make her look extremely /a/XmmU3Y8)

I want to ask her in regards to her identity, but I hear footsteps behind me and Joijiro's voice asking,

"Oi! Are you okay? Did something happen?"

I look behind me and see Joijiro standing there looking at me. I turn back around and look at where the girl was, but I don't find her there anymore...