14 Saria (3) - 13

After the sunrise fully broke, we wasted no more time and started getting ready for the long journey ahead.

Sari was still acting a little bit uncomfortable with me, but after the events of this morning, she was, at the very least, less wary of me now.

"Young Master, do you know where we're going?"

"To your village right?"

"..."

"Then let's get going. What are you waiting for?"

"N-nothing. I was just surprised."

With this, we started on our journey.

...

Over the course of several weeks, we traversed snow covered forest, frozen tundras, icy mountains, and finally, just pure ice, as flat as can be.

By now, my fur covered boots were utterly worn out as their felt bottoms were almost completely degraded.

Saria, on the other hand, had somehow kept the boots, that I had brought with me to give to her, in an almost pristine condition, just showing the control she had over her movements, at least in any cold landscape.

Now, you might be wondering how in all the 9 Circles of Hell did I keep up with a monster like Saria.

Well, it was simple really, I just used my skill to make my body lighter, to make my muscles more dense, and to make my body move faster.

I also used a kind of cheat that I had figured out from all the training back at the castle.

You see, although I couldn't permanently boost my physical strength with my skill, I could make it so that it grew quicker, and so, that was what I did.

So, all this traveling was also helping me train, as, the further I went with my body, the faster it grew.

Overall, it was an extremely efficient system, one that I exploited to its fullest.

So, currently, I was already able to keep up with Sari with only a minimal amount of help from my skill.

Anyways, right now, we were on the ice, and I was trying my luck at ice fishing.

You see, although we still had the rations that Char had given to me, it didn't mean that we could consume them carelessly, we had to save at least half of it for the return trip.

Looking aimlessly into the distance, I noticed some demonic beasts.

The only ones that could live this far north were complete monsters, or a beast like the thing in front of me, a polar bear like beast that had two heads and 8 limbs.

It was slowly lumbering in the distance, and, although I heightened my guard when I saw it, after encountering these beasts a few times, I knew that they would only attack if we truly provoked them, a lot like regular polar bears.

I looked back down at my fishing rod, and seeing that nothing was biting, and hadn't been biting for the past two hours, I sighed, and then reeled up my line before putting away my fishing rod.

You see, it was actually "night time" right now, but because we were so far north, the sun never set!

And so, I was standing, well, sitting guard over Sari's body right now, as she slept to her heart's content.

I mean, at first, she hadn't wanted me to look over her, and honestly, she probably didn't trust me, as she only slept ever so lightly during those first few nights we were together.

But by now, after several weeks, she had gotten used to my presence I guess, and so she slept soundly whilst I was near.

I, on the other hand, never actually needed to sleep.

Sure, I "slept" every night back at the castle, but, that was literally just to rest my exhaustion after the training of my mind, my body, and my skill to their limits.

You see, a special feature of the demon species was that they never needed to sleep unless they just wanted to regain some energy quickly.

Of course, I was expanding a lot of energy on this journey, but I always had enough intelligence left over to use my skill on myself and reset my body's energy level to its fullest level.

In the castle on the other hand, I was constantly using up all my intelligence every day to train, and also, I didn't want to make the others suspicious about me having awakened already with the "Demon" class.

Anyways, back to the present, after I put my fishing rod away, I shook Sari awake.

She woke up, and, not needing words to communicate with me, we each started packing up a part of our campsite.

Finally cleaning up the whole set-up without leaving a trace, we nodded to each other and set out once again.

Walking to warm up, and then transitioning into a slow jog, before starting a full-on sprint, we raced across the ice.

We ran for a few hours, before stopping to rest.

"Are we getting closer, Sari?"

"Yes, Young Master. It should be, at most, a couple more days of travel at this pace."

"And have you mentally prepared yourself yet?"

"N-not yet..."

"Well, I can't really help you with that, but remember, worst case scenario, your whole village might be dead."

"I know..."

With that, we concluded our rest period and started running again.

...

And, just like she had said, we arrived at Sari's village in two days.

Seeing the houses made of snow bricks in the distance, Sari completely emptied her tank as she used all her energy to get to her village as quickly as possible.

I kept running at my regular pace, as I knew that she would need some time to absorb the information and, well, emotional overload that she was bound to experience.

Taking my time, I arrived about 10 minutes after Sari had arrived.

And, well, seeing her lying brokenly on the ground whilst crying into her hands, I could already take a guess as to the state of the village.

Walking up to her, I sat down, propped her up against my body, and then embraced her in my puny, now 11 year old arms.

I held her, as she turned around and started fully sobbing into my chest.

"T-they're all dead..."

I stroked her head.

"Some of the children survived the attack *sniff*, but they couldn't *sniff* survive by themselves *sob*... and all committed suicide a few days later."

I rubbed her back to try and comfort her.

"I should have tried to escape the slave caravan! I should have..."

"It's not your fault, Sari... it's not your fault. You couldn't have done anything in the situation that you were in, so please, don't bear the entirety of the burden alone, leave some of it for me."

"But... Why? Why are you so good to me?" She asked, propping her head away from my chest with her arms whilst staring into my eyes with her own tear-stained ones.

"Because... You are my family." I said, whilst staring into her eyes, showing her how serious I was.

I tightened my embrace, and she was once again buried in my chest.

...

We stayed like that for a few hours.

That was, until we heard a childish voice resounding in this dead, frozen wasteland.

"Sister Saria! Is that you?"