"h.e.l.lo, Emma. What were you doing in the forest alone?" Princess Anna asked after the little girl told her name."Emma was waiting for her daddy. He went back to bring Mommy," replied Emma looking a bit sad.
"And where is your Mommy, Emma?" Princess Anna asked petting her head.
"I don"t know," replied Emma in a low voice. It looked like she was about to cry missing her parents so Princess Anna stopped there.
"Emma, is your village that way?" I asked pointing towards the direction of the village we were heading to.
Emma nodded replying "Yes" after which I said, "We are going towards your village so we will take you back to your parents".
"Hope her parents are there too."
A bright smile could be seen on Emma"s face when she heard that. Staying alone in the forest must have been scary for the little girl like her. Now that we know she is from the same village that we were heading to, we could take her there.
"Come here and have a seat. The breakfast is almost ready," said Nina calling her with a smile.
Emma sat near Marina. She was still uncomfortable with a group of strangers she just met. She was looking towards Nina who was preparing the omelet, probably because she was hungry.
"Look at this little lady, being patient, and waiting for the food to be prepared. Someone I know is so impatient when it comes to food," said Arica and looked towards Sistina.
"No, I am not. I am VERY patient," replied Sistina hastily. Sistina was trying hard to act like a grown-up in front of Emma.
"Yes yes, I know. I was talking about someone else I know," said Arica teasing her.
Emma looked happy after hearing about going back to her village so Ronald tried asking her some questions about the village.
"So, Emma. What do your parents do in the village?" Ronald asked with a friendly smile. A friendly smile was the first step in his negotiating techniques.
"Mommy milks the cows and daddy used to carry me in his back," replied Emma in a cheerful tone.
Ronald looked a bit disappointed but he responded to her with a smile. There was no way anyone could make a disappointed face to something said so cutely.
"Haha. Well, What else did you expect from a kid who is around 5 years old?," said Miss Lilith laughing.
"How many cows did you have Emma?" asked Princess Eliane looking interested. It looked like she likes little kids.
"There were 1, 2, 3, 4, 5... 5 cows and 1, 2... 2 horseys," said Emma counting her fingers.
"Oh, that"s great," replied Princess Eliane.
As we were talking, the breakfast was ready. Princesses helped Nina in serving the breakfast. While we were having our breakfast, Emma was eating a bit hastily so Marina told her to take it easy and chew her food properly.
After we finished having our breakfast, we folded the remaining camp loaded things back into the wagon. After everything was ready we resumed our journey. Emma fell asleep after traveling for around an hour.
We reached the plains in the afternoon and decided to have our lunch there. She was still asleep so we woke her up for lunch after it was ready.
We resumed our journey after Lunch. After traveling for around two hours, a small village could be seen far away. There were farmlands around the village and few houses could be seen at the center.
It was still afternoon when we reached the outskirts of the village. When we got inside the village, we noticed that it was awfully quiet.
Ronald got off the carriage and knocked on the door of one of the houses but no one answered. Everyone except Marina and Emma got off after Ronald and knocked at other houses. We didn"t get any response from any of the houses.
"I don"t think that will work. Let me show you a knocking technique that always works," said Miss Lilith and went towards the door of one of the houses and burst open the door with a kick. She went inside the house and I and Nina followed her.
Nina covered her mouth with her hands when she saw the sight inside. I myself felt like vomiting when I saw that. We got outside as soon as we saw that.
"What the heck was that?" I asked breathing heavily.
Inside there was a half-decayed corpse of an old man. His eyes were open but he definitely wasn"t alive. He was sitting in a chair and his hands were hanging down. His head was looking up towards the ceiling but there was no sign of any movement.
"It"s as I thought. Demons sucked the souls of the people here and left their bodies. The soulless bodies then turned into the ghouls," said Miss Lilith. She paused and looked towards the sun and continued, "It"s almost evening so we have no choice. They will wake up soon so we need to get as far as we can from the village. We can come back and bury them tomorrow after purification."
After she said that, we got back into the carriage and started traveling back towards the direction we came from. Ronald drove the carriage as fast as the horse could pull so we reached the forest before the nightfall.
Marina was telling Emma stories to make her feel better. We all were shaken up because this was our first-time encountering an undead. The only one unfazed in our group was Miss Lilith. Though there wasn"t any sign of movement, the sight of decaying human body itself was ugly.
"Sigh, how could I act like this when even Marina is acting like a grownup," I thought looking towards my hands that were shaking.
"Ronald, let"s get the camps ready. We also need to start preparing dinner," I said looking towards Ronald.
Nina looked towards me and said, "Y-yes, I will start preparing the dinner."
We had a monster warding light that Emma had with her when we found her. We took out the camps and the magic stove along with cooking ingredients. We lit the magic lights and started preparing the dinner and camps.
"Hey, did you hear that?," said Sistina looking towards the forest. She was good at sensing things from far away.
"Hear what?" Arica asked looking confused.
"It sounds like the footstep of people. It"s coming towards us," replied Sistina closing her eyes and listening carefully.
Two people came to sight between the trees far away. They were carrying a magic light so it was easy to notice them in the dark. It looked like they were coming near us so we stayed where we were.
As they approached closer, we heard a man"s voice saying, "Is anyone there? We are just villagers. We are looking for our daughter who is lost in the forest."
"Daddy, it"s my daddy. Daddy, I am here," Shouted Emma when she heard the voice.
The man and woman came running towards Emma and hugged her. They both had ear and tail like Emma"s. The man was in his 30s while the woman was probably in his late 20s.
The woman was crying saying, "thank G.o.d you are alive" while the man was regretting saying, "I shouldn"t have left you alone like that". We stayed behind without disturbing their reunion.
After their reunion was over, the man came to us and bowed saying, "I don"t know how to thank you all for saving my daughter".
Ronald replied for all of us saying, "There is no need to thank us. We just did what we thought was right. But, what happened?"
Next Chapter: What Happened