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Yet I suppose, just like everything else, it was all routine by now. Including Ash\'s reaction. Life simply just goes on.

Yeah, like hell it does.

Ever since the incident, I had time to process, time to reflect. In this big empty labyrinth of a house, there were plenty of places to start pacing about, and pace about I did.

I remembered saying in a job interview once that there really wasn\'t anything special about me at all. Needless to say, I didn\'t get the job. It was a good job too. Maybe I should go back and try my luck again.

Who knows? Now if that \'anything special\' question pops back up again, I could just scoff away and proclaim with confidence, "Yeah, I\'m actually the lovechild of literally God. Hire me, please, or I\'ll smite you."

My mind ached and pound at such a revelation. It was just a simple six-word statement. Yet I just couldn\'t really… well, I just didn\'t want to accept that things were the way they were.

Leonardo and Terestra were my parents.

\'No!\', my mind would roar back at me. \'It\'s Michael and Lilith. Your average run-of-the-mill husband and wife.\'

Tossed in a text to both Mom and Dad, and even my sister for good measure and all I got to show for it was a message from the big man himself who is the least talkative of the bunch.

<<Will visit soon>>

It\'s been a couple of days since then and nothing. Ring-ring went the phone but no one would pick up. It\'s like I\'m deliberately being kept in the dark for some reason.

So until Dad arrives, I\'ll just have to make do for now. The same daily routine as always.

Shower, change, ready the meals at the downstairs dining table where chairs were drawn out for three, place the plates, take a seat, only to find out once again that there, including me, seated only two out of three.

I recalled asking Adalia once if vampires would feast on anything else besides blood. She said no back then. So imagine my surprise one Saturday night, when I saw her sitting at the dining table staring away at an empty plate.

"I would… like to try," she said.

Ever since then she\'ll diligently partake in all mealtimes. Breakfast, sometimes lunch, and always dinner.

So there we were, just us two, munching on scrambled eggs and ham. I wasn\'t a very good cook, but I try… I really do.

"I liked... the pancakes…" Adalia suddenly muttered.

Apparently, I didn\'t try hard enough.

"I don\'t know how to make pancakes, Adalia."

"I liked… Ria\'s… pancakes…"

"I\'m not Ria, Adalia."

"Cereal?"

"Cereal is…" I glanced at the vacant seat across from me. "Not for you."

Adalia never bothered to inquire who. She knew. That\'s why the rest of the meal was munched upon without another word from either of us.

You might wonder how on earth I could just sit there eating eggs and ham and drinking orange juice with the literal manifestation of my nightmares by my side and not feel the slightest shred of uneasiness or fear. Did I even have any problems with this arrangement? Well, from the outside looking in, it didn\'t seem like I did.

But I did. I definitely did.

Adalia definitely knew it too.

Though through first glances, she may come across as someone living life as if she was miles away from the present. Truth was, she was as keen as they come.

When she\'d speak, when she\'d eat, there would always be that bit of fang poking out of her lips and I\'d shudder. Anytime she\'d laid her hands flat in front of me, anytime she held something in them - those jagged edges, I could never tear away.

It\'s no wonder why she always had her hands curled into fists, why she never bites and always nibbled.

Consideration. She had plenty of it.

Part of me felt bad for it. Having her conceal the things that made her who she was at my expense. Still, there was that other part that couldn\'t help but feel grateful for it.

What a selfish prick that part was… really...

Even then, despite everything, when it came down to it, irrationality was still… very much irrational. She still terrified me to the bone.

I just try not to show it, and she tries not to show that she knows I don\'t show. But I know she doesn\'t show, and she knows that I know that she doesn\'t show.

That\'s why I always finished first. That\'s why the knife and fork in her hand would always tighten ever so slightly as I strode past her on my way to the kitchen sink.

"Thanks for… the food…" she\'d always mutter past sealed lips.

"You\'re welcome," I\'d always answer without a second glance her way.

Routine. Always Routine.

-------

It was already ten in the morning and still no sign of Ash descending down those steps. Tried to take my mind off it by cleaning for a bit, which, as it tends to do nowadays, just served to only exacerbate matters.

See, I would try to clean. I was actually not that bad at it. In fact, I\'d say I even prided myself on my standard of cleanliness. It\'s just that nowadays, I don\'t even have the opportunity to do so anymore.

By the time a new dawn arises, you\'d be hard-pressed to find a speck of dust anywhere in the house. All the usual suspects would already be accounted for by the time I had my turn with them.

Tabletops cleared, shelves dusted, windows wiped, floors swept, garbage thrown. Really, all I did today was wash the plates. I\'m diligent like that.

On the first day it happened, it took only thirty seconds of pondering to realize who dun did it.

The Elf-Knight from another world always aimed to please. That fact remains true even to this day. I just wish she would go about in a less convoluted manner. A simple smile, a bow, that was really all it would take to please me.

I just wish she knew that...

"Going… up?" Adalia\'s voice softly sounded.

Soft not because she was as meek as a mouse, soft because she was speaking from a distance, and why shouldn\'t she be?

It was bedtime time now. After all, my morning was her midnight and my breakfast was her dinner.

So I turned, midway up the staircase, glancing over at the scene of comfort. Adalia laid pretty snug on the couch there, she also had this habit of bundling her blankets up so that it looked like she was in a cocoon of fabric.

Adorable? Perhaps…

"Yeah," I said, nudging forward the tray I had in my hands. "Someone still hasn\'t eaten yet."

Adalia slowly nodded her head in understanding, and I thought that was that, but when I turned around to continued my ascent, she spoke again.

"Ash is… not very fond of me…" she said.

Didn\'t even bother stopping this time, I just kept trudging on.

"You know why," I answered back.

"Yes…"

"Goodnight, Adalia."

"Good… night… son… of…"

Fast asleep just as the second floor was reached. At this point, it was almost like clockwork.

Punctual, methodical, dutiful. Just like my next course of actions were.

A silver tray with the usual favorites, placed gently beside a closed door. Three soft knocks then my voice as normal as it could be.

"Food\'s by the door, Ash" I gave a sigh. "Try and eat this time…"

Usually, I\'d get no reply. Didn\'t know why I was expecting anything different this time. Just this once, though… it\'d be nice to hear something, anything.

Nothing.

I walked away.

Saw this coming, knew what lied ahead in front of me, the rock on the bridge or whatever the hell Ria called it… it was all within expectations. Still, just because you expect it to happen doesn\'t mean it\'ll make it any easier to sort out.

But I still see light at the end of the tunnel, the rainbow after the rain. I\'m confident Ash and I would get through this.

It was only a matter of time.

And time was something I had plenty to spare.

I wasn\'t just going to go twiddle my thumbs doing nothing. Not anymore.

Do you know how much mid-range second-hand laptops go for online? They\'re surprisingly cheap, actually.

And do you know how fast it takes to have one delivered to your doorstep? Once again, they don\'t take that long.

At the end of the hallway, I swung open my bedroom door, pressed a click, heard a click, and locked it. Didn\'t waste much time booting up the laptop to the desktop screen, wasted even less clicking open the icon I had tucked away in the corner.

Soon, a familiar orchestral melody came blaring at me from the laptop speakers, next was the soft yellow glow emitting from the display, a title card that glimmered three golden words.

<<Chronicles Of Asteria>>

The usual morning routine.

It was time to learn more about dear old Mommy and Daddy.