No trace

Mina found Jafar with other soldiers in the training ground.

She always had a hard time making Nemesis go to sleep without Luciana. She had made him drink buffalo milk that Luciana had requested only for him. She promised him that she would give him caramel delights if he drank his milk.

"Oh lord of hells...! " she groaned too tired of getting him to bed.

She gave up and took him out for a nighttime stroke around the fortress.

Luciana had forbidden her from taking him out of the fortress. However, he ran after looking at Leo who had just had dinner.

The wolf wagged its tail playfully and circled him. They strolled down the long flight of withered grey-stone steps and took the path that led to the training grounds. The night sky was clear without a hint of those merciless grey clouds. The stars looked like jewels shining in the dark veil with a half-moon in the center.

She saw men training in the training grounds.

-"Master is nowhere to be found. Strange? "

She hurried to her brother who stood at one corner supervising their training in his master's absence. Under normal circumstances, it was Ciaran who supervised them as a stand-in commander in place of Erebus.

"Brother!" she called out to him.

He turned back and saw Mina calling out to him.

"Big brother, your cute sister is calling for you." one of them began to mock him.

"You must want an extra course of master's special training." he rebuked him with a wicked grin.

-"He's commander's replica!" they all backed away instinctively.

He retreated to Mina after making Ciaran watch over them.

"What's going on?" he asked her as she stood glancing back at Ciaran.

"O-oh nothing in particular. I was walking by with the young master and saw you here," she explained about her sudden visit.

"By the way, I don't see master anywhere. Is he still with the lady?" she pondered about his whereabouts.

-"Hmm~ she's right he rarely stays with her this long." he smiled at his thoughts.

"Brother, you're grinning like a pervert. Please refrain from doing something like this in front of the young master." she bent down and covered the young boy's eyes.

"It seems like the young master might soon have a younger sibling," he claimed a possibility.

"Really?!" Mina asked with sheer excitement.

He nodded confidently.

"Will Nene be a big brother?" he asked I'm excitement.

-"His speech has cleared up. The lady has thought him well in a short time." he felt proud of Nemesis for being his master's son.

"Well yes, little lord. Hypothetically speaking."

"Hypopo-?" he tilted his head figuring out Jafar's catchword.

They both laughed at his unclear repetition of words.

"He still has ways to go." he ruffled his hair.

"Brother he's only three years old," Mina said defiantly.

He looked at him more closely.

"Mina... Tell me if I'm wrong." he frowned.

"What?" she asked suddenly flustered by his words.

"Doesn't he... Look like our master?"

"Are you for real?" she blatantly denied him.

"R-Really? But they do look alike," he confessed admittedly.

"Our young master looks more like his mother. Look at that mixture of white and black hair. He has big beautiful eyes like our lady's."

"But doesn't our lady have white hair and silver eyes?" he asked.

"She does so what does it matter? Both are his parents, after all. And something like this is common in many families. Our nephew has red eyes even though our sister has black and her husband has brown." she pointed it out for him.

"That does make sense." he accepted her justification.

They saw young Nemesis slowly getting drowsy.

"You should head back and put him to bed," he suggested as the last part of the night began to approach them.

"Yes, yes have a safe training," she wished him luck but he insisted on escorting them back to the third floor.

After he dressed back into his formal suit he hurried back to where she stood carrying the sleeping boy.

"You ought to hurry up. Look the young master's already asleep," she argued with him.

"I will watch out for it next time." he apologized as he cleaned his spectacles.

"You need a new set of those don't you?" she asked him concerned.

"They still work for me. I will have a new pair once I receive this month's pay." he convinced her.

"You said that the last time and ended up sending money back home." she asserted once again.

As they reached the flight of steps toward the third floor, he saw a manservant fly down.

"Take the young lord. Stay with him tonight. I don't think the master and his lady will be there for him tonight."

"Where are you going?" she called out to him.

"I remembered an urgent business I need to attend to. Go on without me. And be careful of strangers." he warned her and left it to chase after the servant.

"He can be weird at times." she shrugged and continued to climb the steps until she reached the young child's room.

She looked at the room with black doors and suddenly blushed.

"They must be making love with each other. Kyaaa~!" she squealed in her maiden excitement.

"The lady and the lord won't have to worry about their children. I am well prepared to take care of the new ones." she proclaimed determined to become a nanny to a new young lord or lady.

The last part of the night was ending. He concealed his presence as best as he could tailing after the servant.

He stopped ten meters behind him to detect him doing any suspicious activity. He was well aware of the limited number of servants who were only allowed access to the third and fourth floors.

He saw him turn left and soon followed him. The moment he felt that he had been fooled was when he ran into a dead end.

-"I've been fooled." he grimaced. There was no one found.

"He just vanished in thin air." he looked around and up in the ceiling taking off his glasses as his eyes turned deep red.

"No trace to be found." he realized that the perpetrator was not an ordinary individual.