Dinner with the Magic Lieutenant

Ruby sat by the window, looking at the scenery outside. She began to reminisce about what had happened in the past. Her grandparents who treated her so kindly and took care of her since young. She was incredibly grateful to them. She never had expected them leaving her so soon. Just by the thought of the last sight of them would be their corpse killed her a little inside. Tears fell from her eyes and she wiped them off with a handkerchief she had.

"I miss them..." murmured Ruby to herself.

At that moment, someone knocked at the door. "Hey! I forgot to mention that we have a welcome dinner tonight! Get ready and we are leaving soon!" mentioned Harith from the other side of the door. Ruby replied with an 'okay' and went to her closet to find clothes to change into. She took her black and red hooded dress and went towards the shower.

After half an hour, she went out towards Harith's office to find him. She knocked the door and entered. His office was big. There were shelves of books around the room by the walls. There in the middle was Harith's long desk for work. Books and stationeries were scattered around the desk which was filled with piles and piles of paperworks.

On the chair was Harith, asleep, his arms were folded on the table and his head was on them. His energy was sucked out of completing the paperworks for the Empire since he was in charge with a lot of things. Ruby looked at Harith's sleeping face and thought to herself, "He really looks like a wolf... But he doesn't have the same ambience that they radiate..." She lifted her finger and poked Harith's face.

He woke up instantly and lifted his head. "Did you knock before you come in? Be sure to do it next time..." said Harith in a sleepy manner. "I did!" said Ruby. "Ah knock louder next time then," he replied while getting up from his seat. He grabbed his greyish white jacket that he hanged at the clothes rack and said "Let's go."

They headed out of the castle and towards a gigantic hotel at the central of Empire Moniyan. The hotel had close to hundred floors and was beautifully decorated with flowers, chandeliers and other items. As soon as they reached, they were picked up by a butler who was waiting outside for them.

"This way please," said the butler as he guided them towards the dining lounge. The food was already prepared and on the table. Except for them, there were other people there as well. Everyone welcomed Ruby with an open heart and she was glad that they accepted her as one of them.

She sat down by a table next to Harith and began eating the food that was already prepared there. Her eyes glowed with happiness and her hands trembled with delight. She had never tasted such good food before in her life. The best dishes in her village was fish. Even fishes were incredibly expensive since people had to hunt them at the edge of Dark Forest which brought great risks of meeting wolves.

In addition to her starving for several days, her appetite became much larger and thus she ate tons and tons. She had a great time there indeed. Soon enough, the clock struck the bell and it was time to head back.

After bidding farewell to everyone, they went back towards the castle together. Harith reminded her of waking up early tomorrow and that they would be heading out for a mission. Ruby nodded her head and went back to her room. She packed her things properly, changed into a much more comfortable clothes, laid her scythe by her bed and went to sleep.

That night, Ruby had a nightmare again. The scene where the wolves attacked her grandparents kept replaying in her head which kept scaring her awake. She woke up constantly in the middle of the night with tears rolling down from her cheeks.

The next morning came back swooping quick. She got up and washed her face. Looking into the mirror, she saw some dark circles around her eyes and that her face was quite puffy. Nonetheless, she ignored them, changed into her red hood and white dress before heading towards Harith's office to get instructions.

She knocked the door much harder than she did the other time so that Harith had no reason to complain again and entered the room. Harith was sorting out several paperworks and those piles of papers that were on his desk were gone. Perhaps he stayed up for the night to finish everything?

"Ah you are here! Catch this and eat up," said Harith as he threw a packet of sandwich towards her. "Our mission today is actually quite big and shouldn't actually be taken by newcomers but I have believes in your abilities by seeing how we fought the other day," he continued. "Mmmnn.."said Ruby as she munched on the sandwich.

"It's like this. One of our member known as Nana had gone missing. Recently, she was helping to deliver a parcel before we lost contact with her. Nana is our support and we need her back safe and sound desperately," said Harith seriously. Ruby looked at him and said "Sure! Leave it to me!"

He let out a smirk and handed her some documents. "Here are her recent locations and perhaps you could get some clue from there," said Harith. Ruby opened the documents and skimmed through the details.

She closed them back and mentioned that she was ready to go anytime. "I have great expectations out of you!" exclaimed Harith. She nodded and smiled before exiting the office. Harith turned, walked to his seat and sat down.

"Time to get all these done so I could go out of the castle once again! I'm so tired of doing these paperwork constantly!" said Harith with a sigh. He looked out of the big window behind him and saw Ruby running out of the castle. "Heh... I don't know how she got down so quick but this is going to be interesting," said Harith with a smile