Chapter 360 Celica's Story
Chapter 360 Celica's Story
-----
Apparently, my father and Shade went off at night and did all sorts of things! Honestly, I wish I could had been there to see them fight and be badass. But I am a little girl still, and weak, so I can't do much myself. Yeah I might be able to defeat some monsters but I am not even close to my parents in levels of power.
I guess my father reached the level of strength where he can pretty much do anything he wants to an extent, but even then, he still fears society as a whole. I guess you can only get so far with pure raw strength. Though, magic is convenient at the time of being stealthy. I bet Shade has a giant assortment of Spells that allow him to easily sneak inside places and everything else.
"So you were a former slave, Celica?" I wondered.
"Uguh…" Celica swallowed a bit of a potato when I asked that. Maybe I was a bit too rough with the question.
"A-Are you okay?" I asked desperately, but she drank a bit of water and got better.
"Yeah…" She sighed.
"Ah… Well." I said. I didn't really knew what to ask her. It might be better to just not rub salt on the wound.
"I was caught by bad guys…" Sighed Celica. "Mama too… Mister Teddy was taken away as well…"
"Eh? Really? Were you from some tribe?" I wondered. As Celica nodded.
"No… The city." She said.
"S-So you were just kidnaped in your own city by the same people that later sell slaves?! That's awful…" I sighed. "W-Well, we'll take good care of you here, so relax. My parents are super strong, and I am decently strong myself, I won't let anything lay a finger on you!"
"Thank you… Nobody had ever treated us… this nicely before…" Celica cried. "People is always awful… T-They always say my blue skin is ugly…"
"Did they? Well, they're all a bunch of idiots! Your blue skin is very pretty, like blueberries!" I said. "Do you like blueberries, Celica?"
"I-I do… Mama used to… pick them up at the forest…" She said. "They were sweet… Sniff… I miss mama…"
"…I am sure your mom will be rescued in its due time, don't worry… My parents are strong and reliable. Let's trust them in this one, okay?" I asked Celica.
"Hm! Mister Allan and Shade promised to me… To bring my mama back…" Celica said while feeling slightly hopeful.
"I was surprised when I learned my father is doing so many reckless things, but if he does them to help others, then I guess I can't help but feel prideful of having a father like him." I sighed. "You know? There's an orphanage with a lot of different children, some are like you too, with horns and different skin colors."
"Really?" Wondered Celica.
"Yeah, the people there is nice as well, and we are protecting them too. Want to come with me to go see them later? You'll have tons of fun, and nobody is going to laugh at you for your skin color, or your horns, or anything." I said.
"Other kids like me?" Wondered Celica. "Really?"
"Yeah! You've never met more like you?" I wondered.
"No…" Celica sighed. "W-When mama brought me to the plaza, people would look weird at me… They threw stones at my mama, and the other kids didn't liked me… They said I was ugly and that blue color wasn't natural for skin color… But mama is blue too… So why…"
"Sigh…"
People can really be awful sometimes. The resentment against demons is strong, even after the Demon King was killed. Even more now after the war where some of the demons that survived the war roam here, or their descendants, such as Celica and her mother. Perhaps her mother was a former soldier, a member of the ones that invaded the Gallatea continent.
"People can be really awful sometimes… The resentment of wars ferment hate towards anybody of that certain group, and they discriminate individuals that had little to do with their suffering… I am sure your mother was someone goodhearted if she raised such a cute girl like you. As I said before, those people are idiots and just biased, they can't really see the big picture. There's different people all over the world, discriminating because of skin color or because you got horns is stupid, we are all people at the end." I said with a smile, trying to cheer her up.
"Hmm… Mama said that she used to be part of war…" Sighed Celica. "She said she was forced to come here because her family was poor and they needed the money given to them by the Demon King."
"Money?" I wondered. Suddenly, I had a small flashback, recalling the memories I saw from Furoh. He was also recruited by the Demon King army through money. It seems that the Demon Continent has a lot of poverty, maybe even worse than Gallatea. People desperately sending part of their families so the rest of the family can survive with the money earned… doesn't sound so far-fetched to me.
"Yeah… But mom said she never killed any human. She hesitated and ended running away before joining the battle…" Celica said. "She said she had realized she was pregnant. Daddy is in the Demon Continent…"
"S-So she enlisted while being pregnant?" I asked.
"S-She didn't know…" Celica sighed.
Just what conditions were demons living on to send a young girl to war just for some pennies? Maybe… What her mother told her is not the complete truth. After all, you can't tell your daughter the entire truth, she probably sugar-coated the truth with some lies. Maybe things… are not as simple as that.
Whatever's the case, I don't have anything to do with Celica's mother story. I won't simply discriminate if she killed humans or not either.
"I'm sure your mother is very strong if she survived this long while raising you. Don't worry." I said. "We'll find her."
I hope…
-----