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My bold statement left my parents, Aquarina, and her parents, rather surprised. I'm pretty sure they didn't think I was thinking about this the whole time. They honestly believed I simply forgot or something, or I was trying to forget about this and move on. However, what they told me changed my perspective a bit. I wanted to change things a bit and do what they couldn't do themselves.
"Kill the demons?" father asked.
"Certainly, we hadn't thought about this entire thing through… you two are heroes, this means the Demon King will soon emerge… in other words…" mother soon added.
"Another war, indeed… we thought that we would be left alone for now, but the attack the girls received half a month ago… the forces of the demons are trying to slay them before everything begins…" father murmured.
"But Sylph, you can't simply decide that. Despite all the things… the demons keep emerging and a new Demon King will be born, given the task to kill the heroes… if you don't kill them, will you let yourself be killed?" Shade asked.
Aquarina looked at me worriedly after that.
"No… I… I won't! I will fight, of course. I will fight those that are not good enough of my companionship... As for the rest? All the demon people you speak about? What about them?" I asked.
"So that's what you mean…" mother said.
"So, you've decided. You want to help the demons? Do you… intend to speak with them and mingle with them one day? You do know how their societies are so different from ours, right? But even with that, you still want to?" father asked.
"I do… I don't want them to be massacred anymore… but for that, I need strength. Also… I want to do it to learn more, I will one day travel the world and learn more… and you can't stop me… even after what happened against Hell… I still want to explore the world outside…" I told them.
"I see… well, we can't go against the dreams of our daughter…" father replied.
"You might change the world as we know it one day, Sylphy… your abilities and the will you possess… I'm very proud of having such a daughter," mother said soon after.
"But! You're not doing it anytime soon! We aren't bad parents you know?" father said all of a sudden.
"Eh?!"
"Indeed! We won't let you wander as a kid anywhere you want! You're going to grow stronger before our tutelage, to the point we'll be sure that you won't be in grave danger at every corner of the world…!" mother agreed with father, adding those words.
"Oh… of course. I wasn't going to go out by myself and do whatever I want… yet," I clarified.
"Then again, what you want to do is not something that's new, my daughter," father told me.
"Oh? Is… there someone else helping the demons?" I asked.
"Indeed… although we selfishly decided not to help them… There are others that did so. Our old companion, the one that survived with us, the Hero of Gray Soul, is one of them. He's a strong Dark Magic wielder and Necromancer…" mother told me.
"Ahh…"
"Maybe one day we could introduce him to you… there's actually a "resistance" or something like that, a group of humans and demons in the Demon Continent that are slowly fighting for the demons to regain part of their land against the Kingdom Alliance of Gallatea that had completely taken over the Demon Continent… those last remnants are fighting arduously… surviving as much as they can with the help of our friend," father said.
"Of course, the sole thought of throwing my beloved daughter into such a hellhole is making me go crazy but… I know you're a stubborn little girl… at the very least, stay with us until you've grown strong enough to travel the world by yourself, alright?" mother said with a sigh.
"Sure… I will. Thank you… t-this isn't just an empty dream. It's something I really thought about… I want to know both perspectives, not just the Demon Continent. I want to explore Gallatea… and the other continents, too, even the one where mother comes from," I said.
"Oh… I see. The Atlanta Continent… perhaps we could one day go there… I planned on enlisting you into a magic academy there. After all, your talent as a Sorcerer needs to be polished by many different magicians there. Only the two of us won't do," mother said soon after.
"Ohh… T-Traveling to another continent?" I asked in excitement.
"But that's for the future. You're still too young to be able to enter… Plus we also have to prepare you well enough for it. Ah. This was supposed to be a surprise, but I guess we ended up spoiling it," father said in response with a light chuckle.
Apparently, my parents had planned for me to go to the Atlanta Continent, the home of the elves. They planned to head there to meet my mother's family and also enlist myself into a magic academy with all sorts of amazing magicians! T-This… even for me, this felt overwhelming!
But I guess it's a given for me, as a kid, to go to an academy at some point and learn more about magic and this world. As my parents said, only them teaching me wouldn't be enough. I need to be taught by many different figures about the things I don't know. They want my entire talent as a Sorcerer with Triple S-Grade Talent to bloom, and for that, many mentors are required… I guess.
"I-I also want to go! I will stay with Sylphy… anywhere…" Aquarina said.
"A-Aquarina?!" Shade said in slight confusion.
"You too? But…" Nepheline muttered.
From the looks of it, they had different plans for her… but she was stubbornly waving her head. She didn't want to do what her parents planned for her and wanted to stick with me… I felt a bit responsible for this, but I didn't want her to diss her parent's plans for her like this…
However, as much as I would have wanted to reject her… I couldn't go against those eyes filled with conviction.
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