Father went to buy milk

While Ashy was deep in thought, he walked for hours without noticing how the sun set already and the world had fallen into lightless darkness. Now that he could more or less see in the dark, he didn't feel the absence of the sun. It was the same for the cold of the night.

He stopped in front of a huge wall.

"Hey, Ashy~"

"Hmm?"

"Climb there."

"Why?"

"I sense multiple living souls."

Ashy nodded and began to climb the ladders of a watchtower that was glued to the huge walls. Elissa's voice was serious unlike usual, so he listened to her.

"Woah…" Ashy was shocked. The city was bigger than he expected, the huge walls weren't the border of the city but a structure to part the city into two. And, the streets were filled with undead in this part of the city.

"Oh, are they the ones?" Ashy whispered as he crouched immediately, just sticking out his eyes to look at the group of people that was coming towards here while battling with the undead.

"Yes. They are stronger than I thought."

That is what Ashy thought so too. The group was continuously killing and decapitating undead one after another. In just a moment, about a hundred undead were unable to move forward, some of them turned to ash while the rest of them lost their legs and arms. Regardless, the number of undead didn't feel like decreased at all. There were too many of them.

Some of the group members were even able to kill the undead, which was something Ashy still didn't know how.

"Maybe because of their weapon?" Ashy thought out before shaking his head.

'Whatever. I should join them in one way or another, and with that, I can learn more about this world. Although Elissa acts warm and playful, she doesn't trust me enough to give me the method to kill the undead.'

With that, Ashy continued to observe the group while thinking of ways to join them.

'I can just show myself and request to join them. I will appear suspicious but I don't think they will kill me. I have my shadow, albeit less corporal than before, unlike Elissa, so they wouldn't kill me but watch over me and ask some questions. However, with my appearance as a child, I can act like I don't know much about anything and it wouldn't be a lie as I really don't know anything.'

Living in this empty city with Elissa was out of the question. He wanted to live with humans in safety and learn about this world.

'As a part doppelganger, I can superficially change my appearance to one of them however I can't mimic their behaviors and personality traits. They are tall too, I think I won't be able to make myself taller that much, at most ten to twenty centimeters.'

Ashy somehow knew how he could change into someone else, it was to take a part of them, even a drop of blood was enough. However, even with that, he wasn't a full doppelganger and he didn't have the experience of becoming double of someone. So, this wasn't an option either.

Ashy decided to fish out some information from Elissa.

"Hey, can people somehow feel you are not a human?"

"Nope~ at least not the weak ones."

"What about your non-existent shadow?"

"That is easy, all darkness creatures like me except undead don't have shadows in the beginning. But if they are strong enough, they can create themselves a shadow to blend among the humans. That is when the fun begins~"

"...what about my shadow? It was deeper before but now it is the same as the non-living's shadow."

"That is alright~ all pure creatures have deeper shadows but when they are blessed with the grace of darkness, your shadow becomes shallower."

Ashy was confused. Didn't this mean that he was an enemy in the eyes of other people?

However before he asked, Elissa answered as if she expected what was going on in his mind.

"To fight against us, humans blessed themselves with darkness, so their shadow is the same as yours. Isn't it funny to see them 'taint' themselves~?"

Ashy nodded with a smile. This was good, no, amazing news. This meant that although they would be suspicious of him, they wouldn't immediately see him as an enemy.

Ashy silently lifted Elissa's head and put it on the walls. With the corner of his lips reaching to his ears, he pinched her cheeks.

"Thank you."

"Oh~ now you know my value."

"Yes yes." Ashy grabbed Elissa's hair and lifted her before whispering. "Let's not meet again, sister~"

"Wha—!?"

Before Elissa completed her sentence, Ashy hurled her from her hair as much as he could. She flew in the air like a ball and disappeared from Ashy's sight.

"That felt good. I should have done it earlier." With a refreshed smile, Ashy continued to watch the group as they were about to reach the safe part of the city.

Then he climbed down from the tower and watched them from the gates. Learning the crucial information he needed.

"Push forward a little bit more! Sever their limbs! Don't bother to pierce their hearts!"

***

Back to the time when Ashy tried out the way to kill the undead.

He was now surrounded by the black armored people, who were woken up by the shout of the gray-haired old woman. They were holding their weapons tight with magical lanterns tied to their belts.

"Drop your weapon and raise your hands!"

Ashy did as he was told. Although leaving his precious dagger made him feel naked, the dagger wasn't going to help against these strong guys.

After seeing this, the armored guys loosened their grip on their weapons.

"State your name," The gray-haired old woman stepped forward with her palm resting on the bottom of the hilt.

"Ashl—, It is Ashy."

"Ashy? That is a unique name you got there. How old are you?" The old woman took a grandmotherly approach.

"I don't know,"

"Is that so? Then are you alone? Don't you have a mother and father?"

"I have a father." Ashy nodded like a child.

"Then can you lead us to him?"

"I can't."

"Why?"

"Because I don't know where he is but I am sure he will come back."

"Why do you think so?" The old woman's voice cracked a little.

"Because he said he was going to buy milk and come back."

"..."

"Milk must be hard to find I guess."

"..."

"Do you know where to find milk, grandma?"

"...enough."

The old woman's voice returned to its original tone.

"You will be coming with us. We can't leave a child all alone here." The old woman said before throwing handcuffs to Ashy. "Wear this and lead us."

Ashy obediently wore the handcuffs. Immediately, he felt like something in himself stopped moving. Fortunately, it wasn't his heart or lungs.

'In the worst-case scenario, I can use my claws, right?'