Duty

"What are you doing?" Luke was angry, but not really angry at Clare's behavior. He was just afraid that Clare would do something reckless like before..

"Just a small wound." Clare replied lowly.

"Not because of the wound. Your actions will summon other monsters. It's worse if a monster suddenly attacks you, you'll fall there." His words looked like threats, but they weren't. Luke only brings out what he knows.

Clare nodded in understanding. "Not anymore. I think this will only make Vrochis come faster. We don't have to linger."

"Your wound is still not fully healed. Don't do it again." Luke's voice was low and not angry anymore.

Clare watched Luke. She wondered if Luke would be honest about what happened that night. Clare still wonders what she's doing. Lately Vrochis hasn't bothered her anymore for a while, it's strange to Clare. Even though Vrochis didn't bother, Clare still couldn't calm down because of the incident.

"I want to ask you something, you answer honestly."

"What?"

"Promise me you'll be honest."

Luke looked at him suspiciously. Usually someone who asks to be honest first will ask something strange or a secret.

"I can't make promises."

"Just a small problem. Nothing to do with all of you, only to do with me." Clare urged.

"You want to ask about what happened that night?"

Clare was stunned. Apparently Luke had guessed what Clare was thinking. She nodded slowly and still looked at her cautiously.

"Nothing interesting. Just like when you fought back then."

"How was I so badly injured? I thought I was unconscious."

"You just went out of control and attacked Vrochis randomly. That's why you're so badly injured," Luke said. "Your control is still not good. Don't be ruled again."

Luke said honestly, but he didn't tell everything the same way Jules did. He couldn't say that Clare could fly and her strength was greater than the others. What was there was Clare asking more questions, couldn't help but Luke had to say it so Clare was silent.

"I saw someone then. I can't move my body, but my body moves on its own. Is that you?" Clare asked again in a low tone.

Luke just nodded slowly and turned his face to the forest below.

Clare heaved a sigh of relief and followed Luke's gaze, she felt that she had been answered even though she wasn't completely satisfied with the answer. However, she couldn't keep asking or they would think that Clare already knew everything.

"I won't remember it again, it was terrible," Clare said. "Jules said something about you."

"What did she say?"

Clare glanced at him. "I don't know I don't fully understand. I only caught one thing, she complained that you never did good to her and bullied her."

"That's because she's looking for trouble."

"Then she also said you were only nice to me," Clare said then chuckled. "That's a weird idea. If you are bad then the Professor will not be accepted. Sometimes I agree that you punish her for a while. Like when you seal the sentence, it's ridiculous." Clare chuckled at the memory of Jules talking nonsense and incoherently.

"But you protested to me."

"I'm too stupid. I realized I was stupid and naive and I couldn't change that. I don't know what happened and what she wanted to say, I just felt sorry for Jules that time. I'm hooked too. Jules says silly things every day even to everyone, you know how Gavin reacts when he hears that? He wanted to run away from Jules. I was wondering what she wanted to say."

"No need to ask."

Clare rolled her eyes at Luke. "Why? Besides, Jules won't say it anymore either. What's a secret? Jules knows your secret?"

"It's not a secret. But it can't be said yet."

Clare huffed in annoyance. "If it's not a secret why hide it? It's okay if I know if it's not a secret. You also don't have to lock the sentence like that. If it's a secret, I wouldn't want to know either. Everyone has their own secret. Since you said it wasn't a secret, I'll just ask Jules."

Clare turned to meet Jules but Luke grabbed her arm right away. Clare gasped, Luke clasped her arms in front of his chest. That makes their distance practically less than a meter or close. Clare found Luke's blue eyes that didn't have a cold stare or anything, just the opposite. Clare felt like her heart was out of place, she wasn't even breathing in shock!

"I won't allow it."

"Do I need permission? I just want to know what's bothering Jules. I want to help her."

"It was about me..." Luke paused for a moment to think about something. "The point is I didn't allow it."

Clare frowned. "You're no fun. No wonder Jules said you bullied her."

"I'm not bullying him, he's just feeling. You really care about your friend."

"Sure. I'm different from you."

"Who said I didn't care?"

"Aren't you like that? Maybe you only care about certain people, but I'm different," Clare said still in a low tone. "If you insist, I won't ask again. At least it has nothing to do with me, I can rest easy." Clare relented.

"That has something to do with you too." Luke wanted to say that. But he didn't want to and just kept quiet. He was afraid that Clare wouldn't accept it. Clare is different from other girls, she won't immediately accept someone just because of popularity. Although Clare looked mature, she never thought about anything related to men and women.

"Hmm...."

Both of their gazes were fixed on the figure who had just arrived, Jules. Jules smiled mockingly especially at Luke and gave him a mischievous look. However, he immediately remembered his goal and immediately grabbed Clare's other arm.

"Sorry to be a mosquito. But I have more important needs or I'll die by them," Jules said to them both then glanced at Luke. "It's okay you don't come, I just want Clare."

Before Clare could answer, Jules immediately grabbed Clare's arm while Luke immediately let go of Clare's grip. Luke just watched the two girls leave and turned towards the shady forest and sighed.

Jules continued to pull Clare towards the car where her friends were. During that time, Clare was not given the chance to ask questions at all. After leaving Luke earlier, Clare realized that her heart felt like it was beating faster than before and it was making it hard for her to speak. Plus Jules pulled it like this.

Before arriving at the gathering, Jules suddenly stopped as if thinking about something then turned to look at Clare curiously.

Jules asked. "What did he tell you?"

"Who?"

"Luke. What are you two talking about?" Jules wondered how things were going.

Clare stared at her blankly and remembered that she had decided not to ask again about something Luke was hiding.

"It is nothing. I'm just asking what happened that night."

"There are more? You guys look really close, did he say something?" Jules was excited like a child. Of course it made Clare confused what happened to the girl in front of her.

Clare shook her head slowly. "He just gave an answer. Also a clarification that he wasn't bullying you. I was defending you at the time."

Jules snickered and grumbled incoherently. "Taken by someone's child, stupid!"

"What? Who was taken?"

Jules was surprised at Clare's mumbling. "Oh no. You know what? Luke wants something that's hard to come by, even though I told him to hurry up and get it, but he's so boring. I wanted to tell people to help, but he refused. He also refused to help me and bullied me!"

"Was that what Luke meant?" Clar mumbled.

"What did he actually say?"

"I thought it was a secret so he forbade me to ask you. You know more and I don't know."

"Secret?" Then Jules smiled mockingly and nodded in understanding. "You're still a kid, you don't understand anything."

Clare stared at her blankly and ignored what Jules just said, she didn't understand! They both resumed their journey and met their friends in the car.

Five humans were already around the car, Zoya and Blaire leaned against the side of the car chatting happily while Louis sat in front of the car with his cell phone. Eryk was in the car while Xavier was looking around the car.

It was Clare and Jules' turn, they approached the five humans, watching their activities before Jules finally shouted.

"Hey! I'm back! Look, she's back in one piece!" Jules shouted like that making all eyes turn to her.

"What's this?" Clare asked.

"You'll find out later." Jules grinned and led Clare to the car.

Louis got out of the car and walked over to them. "You're taking too long. Can you not waste time?"

Jules chuckled. "You think finding that person is as easy as finding a house on the outskirts of the city! I don't understand what you're proposing myself, so I'm walking around thinking about it."

"Where's Luke?" Eryk's head popped out of the car window. He didn't see Luke, of course wondering.

"Oh, him. Didn't he already know? It's not necessary," said Louis. "Just have Clare, it'll be all right. I'm too lazy to deal with him."

"What's going on?" Clare asked in a daze. Here, she was the one who didn't know the most.

"It would be better if we follow Vrochis' steps. We wait for Vrochis to come to Clare, then Clare lures him to this place. I just hope it's not night because it will be so troublesome. If he comes at night, we ignore and wait until noon. We make plans according to each task. Like I was around the woods on guard while Jules was around the hotel." Louis explained.

"Ignoring Vrochis," Clare muttered. "You think that's easy?"

Louis sighed. "Sure it's hard. That's why Blaire and Zoya have to be with you. You know how Vrochis pulled you that night into the forbidden forest?"

"How about you guys?" Clare asked.

"As usual, Louis and I were assigned outside to monitor. Xavier will be the only guy in the hotel as for Luke, I don't know what kind of problem he has outside. But he wasn't out for long either." Eryk replied.

"Me?" Jules felt neglected.

Louis chuckled. "Aren't you around the hotel? Around the hotel, but outside."

"Clare will monitor all movements from the inside. Since the tracer on Vrochis's body is released, we don't know where it is and must be careful. Blaire and Xavier will figure out how to track him down based on the DNA we have stored." Eryk continued.

Xavier spoke. "Now everyone has got their share of work. Zoya has booked a hotel for us. We're leaving now."

"Luke?" Clare asked. She no longer saw any sign of Luke around here.

"No need to think about it. I don't know what he's doing, so just ignore it. He told me beforehand and will be back tonight." Xavier replied as everyone got into the car.

Louis took over the steering wheel and next to him was Clare. The rest were in the same place as before and they went straight to the urban area.