13 In a Forest
After Noel had 'subdued' Cerberus, they were greeted with the same golden fireworks and victory fanfare. A crystal ball had then surfaced from the floor on top of a purple pedestal along with a golden treasure chest embedded with numerous kind of gemstones. They didn't need to ask what it was for Schädel had taken the initiative to explain.
「That is the ownership crystal of the dungeon, Young Miss and Young Master. To claim ownership of the dungeon, just simply put your hand on top of the crystal. It doesn't matter if you're wearing gloves or not, Young Master.」
Noel then pulled back the hand that was about to take off his white gloves. While Luna was rummaging through the treasure chest that had appeared as their reward, Noel brought his hand on top of the crystal with Cerberus sticking close to him and Tsu'ro tugging his coat in fear of the hellhound.
「Oh yeah, by the way, Young Master. Only those who are in contact with the crystal will be safely teleported outside of the dungeon. As for those who aren't, they'll be teleported somewhere random on the continent.」
"Wait, what?" It was at that moment, Cerberus slightly nudged Noel, causing his hand that was in front of the crystal to touch it. A bluish-white light then engulfed the set of demon, goblin, and dog before whisking them away to the entrance of the dungeon.
Immediately after, another light swallowed Luna and Schädel together.
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「Woof!」
"..."
"Not again!"
And thus they fell on the ground again. Elder Gan'dalf was actually at the front entrance waiting for them. When he saw the fearsome creature first fall out, he was inwardly scared. But when he saw that Noel and Tsu'ro came out long after, he put back on an indifferent expression.
"Welcome back, Lord Greed."
"I won't even ask on how you found out."
"I'll answer you anyway. It's because, in our family, we have an eternal servitude contract with you and Lord Envy which is... for some reason not here?"
"I'll tell you later."
Although that only happened an entire day due to the goblin villagers raising havoc after seeing Cerberus.
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In a forest filled trees similar to beeches, elms, oaks, and scot pines spread throughout the gigantic forest. Although the colors were still dull. all the vegetation in the area had faint silver and black lines on them.
Somewhere in that forest, was a meadow. The meadow was on top of a cliff with spikes beneath it. The cliff was strange because it wasn't grey like the dirt found in the Demon Plane. It was made even more unique due to only the top part of the cliff being the abnormal earthen color and the rest being the grey most demon would be familiar too.
As for the meadow, its flowers were all pure-white lilies. They were all in full bloom and had verdant green leaves glistening in the sun. In the middle of all that, was a girl with as hair as white as the lilies petals.
She was in a sitting kneel and there was a black eyepatch in her right hand. Her pair of heterochromatic eyes. Her left gold eye seemed to see through all impurities and her right blue eye seemed to only be able to see the world in a cold light.
Her black dress only drew attention to itself in the midst of all the white flowers. And then Luna could hear two voices coming nearer to her location. One of them seemed to belong to a feminine voice that was about the same age as her brother and weirdly had a motherly or elder sister feeling to it.
The other one belonged to a boy about the same age as the other one and had either a trace of weariness from the trip it took to get them here or just boredom.
It didn't take long before two silhouettes had come into her sights. It was just as she had expected, a female and a male.
The girl had wavy golden hair that reached until her shoulders and gentle green eyes. She had the same white skin and pointed ears every demon naturally had and a dark green tail with a leaf-shaped tip.
Another thing noteworthy was the size of her chest. It bounced slightly every time she took a step forward and she had one of her arms supporting the melons.
The boy had black hair in a long messy hairstyle and had silver cross earrings pierced into his pale pointed ears. He had blood red eyes with vertical pupils and slightly pale skin. He had a tail that was black in color and had a heart-shaped tip with red lines lining it.
"I'm so excited, Little Eli. I can't wait to see the white lilies here. I've only mostly seen black lilies here instead, ara, ara."
"Master Ilaria, please stop calling me 'Little Eli.' It makes me sound girlish."
"Ara, ara... Then I guess I'll just go back to calling you, Little Leo..."
"As much as I want you to get rid of the 'Little', it's better than being called a girly name."
"Anyway, Little Leo, the meadow should be... Ara, ara!"
"Hmm? What is it, Master?"
The two had finally recognized Luna's existence and had shock written in their faces. There were traces of confusion on Ilaria's face while Elio's had a motley of different things shown on his face.
There were relief, sorrow, elation, regret and many others in that one face of his. Luna felt familiar towards the boy. As if she had met him many times in the past. And at the exact same time, the three all said.
"""Who are you?"""
