—–

The day went on peacefully and I actually managed to nap until tomorrow, when I woke up it was already early in the morning and Emeraldine and Partner already had dinner last night and ended cuddling at each of my sides in the bed. Lucifer was sleeping in the couch at the side.

Through this week they had been taking turns to sleep at my side, but it seems that these two ended taking Lucifer’s place and he didn’t seem to mind, sleeping in the large couch at the side… this made me feel a bit bad, I also want to spoil my grumpy old dragon a bit.

I sneaked outside of the bed through becoming phantom, sneaking away from the physical bed, and arriving at the floor below, where I found that Lucifer was already awake, as an Undead, he seemed to be always kind of awake, and when we sleep is that we purposely turn off most of our thoughts, like a long meditation, but unlike sleeping, we are always perfectly aware of all our surroundings.

Partner has changed thought, now that she is a Lesser Vampire, she had gained several “life-like” traits, which seem to give her a sleep more akin to living beings, the typical sleep that vampires take that let them sleep for centuries without even being woken up at all, so she got a very heavy sleep after she began to slowly turn into a Vampiric being.

After she drank the blood of the Vampires we killed, she finally became a Lesser type of Vampire, and gained a lot of their strengths and weaknesses, such as sunlight, holy light, fire, and so on more than before…

As of now she had already developed Sunlight Resistance, although we are still in the process of making her learn Fire or Light Resistance, it is a bit sad because I don’t want to set her on fire or something, I really don’t want that! So she is asking the fire ghost brothers to help her build fire resistance, although she can regenerate wounds quickly, they don’t seem to like it either… but she forces them to help her anyways.

I think she also asks Emeraldine to bathe her in holy light, which must hurt a lot as well, I guess Partner is really a hard worker by trying to mitigate her big weaknesses… Meanwhile, I guess my two weaknesses are Life and Light/Holy Light, the complete opposites of what I am.

But thanks to my Elemental Resistance Skill and Great Magic Resistance Skill, I am able to mitigate a lot of the damage I receive, even then, my weakness still hits me strong… It is something we have to deal with, I guess…

Anyways, going back to reality, Lucifer’s eyes opened as he looked at me with curiosity.

“Hm? What is it? I was enjoying my nap… Let me sleep some more. Since we arrived here that I can finally relax…” he said.

“Come on, come with me, I want to spend some time with you.” I said.

“Sigh…”

Lucifer slowly stood up out of the couch, moving away the blankets he was covering himself, and followed me from behind.

“Spend time with me?” he asked. “We always are together anyways.”

“Yeah, but alone, the two of us.” I said. “You’re my second ever companion, you know? So I like to spend time with you, there’s nothing wrong with that!”

“…I know.”

Lucifer had been quite melancholic through this week, more than the common level of depression that he always has. Mostly because of seeing the people frozen in here, and how it has been impossible to free them no matter what method we tried to use.

We slowly walked around the castle and we reached a terrace area that led us to the outside world, where we could see the rest of the town, there was some people awake at these hours, cooking a large pot of stew outside, some were grilling meat, and even fish they caught in a nearby river.

Another group of goblins and people were together peeling off the fur of a large polar bear they seem to have caught, it is good fur.

“How have you feel lately?” I asked.

“I… I am okay now…” said Lucifer. “You don’t have to worry so much about me.”

“But I do… I am worried about everyone… But you, Emeraldine, and Partner are more important to me, so I have to pay extra attention to detail.” I said.

“…”

Lucifer looked into the outside world, his eyes seemed a bit sleepy, but also held a strong sorrow that he always tried to mask with his expressionlessness.

I hugged him from behind, as he was taller than me, his figure seemed big like a pillar, it even blocked the light.

“You hold on too many emotions sometimes.” I said. “I want to tell you that you can open up more to me.”

“…You say that but when I do, you escape from me.” He sighed.

“Eh? But that other time you were trying to kiss me! That’s going a bit too far, you know? There are other ways to do it…” I said. “Also weren’t you married? I don’t know but I feel bad when I think about it… I feel like by kissing you… I am doing something wrong…”

“Ah…”

Lucifer looked at me with a bit of melancholy, as he looked down.

“Yeah… I was once married, almost a thousand years ago… I still love her, but she’s long gone…” sighed Lucifer. “You’re the first person I’ve met that gives me the feelings that she once gave to me.”

“Lucifer…” I sighed, as I smiled back at him.

“Maybe I might seem like I am sad all the time.” He sighed. “But when I am with you, I sometimes feel like my heart is lighter, and I feel more relaxed.”

“…”

“Maria… I… I love you.” He said. “I… Sorry, I shouldn’t had said that out of nowhere…”

“No, it’s fine… Dummy…” I sighed. “I think it’s pretty obvious already, but I also love you.”

“…Really?”

“Yep.”

Lucifer raised his eyebrows, as his pale face slowly began to grow redder.

—–