The Family in the Woods

As Zero sat atop his horse, he activated {Holy Strike}. His fist began glowing a bright white before he punched out in front of him, careful to avoid the horse.

The air rippled around Zero's fist and a blast of wind exploded outwards from the force of the attack.

"Pretty neat," Zero remarked.

"Wow!"

Harry, on the horse beside Zero, exclaimed.

"That's a Holy Skill!"

"Is there a problem?" Zero asked, confused.

"You don't know? Holy Skills are restricted from the public and are passed down to certain Demon Hunters!"

Harry paused for a moment.

"How did you learn it if you don't know that?"

"Oh, I bought it off of one of them for five silver," Zero responded.

Harry laughed.

"It's fine if you don't want to tell me."

Zero shrugged. He was being serious.

However, he took note that in the future he shouldn't wantonly show off his skills. Not everyone would be like Harry. Some would definitely question where he got some of his skills and may investigate further. That would be troublesome.

Zero then tried to activate {Demon Detection}, but nothing happened as he had expected. Why had that Demon Hunter used this skill on him?

Zero thought for a second, then realized.

Was it due to the succubus that he encountered the day before?

It looked like he had inadvertently rescued her from the fate of falling into that Demon Hunter's hands. She had surely long escaped from the town before he showed up.

"Help!" A yell suddenly came from the woods beside them. "Someone!"

Zero and Harry glanced at each other before they halted their horses.

"You stay here," Zero told Harry. "I'll go over and check it out."

He was worried that it might be dangerous. If it was a trap, Zero would be able to escape without harm. But with Harry by his side, he didn't want to take any chances. Therefore, it was safer to have Harry stay behind.

Zero carefully walked to the source of the sound, keeping a keen eye on his surroundings. He noticed that as he grew stronger, so did his sense for danger.

Activating {Camouflage} as he stepped closer, he investigated the scene. There was a middle-aged man trapped under a fallen tree, grimacing in pain. One of his arms was missing, a bandage wrapped around where it was supposed to be. The cloth was reddened by blood.

The man vainly struggled to push the tree off of himself with one arm, revealing his panicked state.

"Help!"

The man cried for help again, not knowing if anyone was listening.

He struggled to breathe, the tree having obviously heavily crushed his chest. The man coughed, specks of blood flying from his mouth.

Zero used {Inspect} on the man, just in case. Seeing that there were no problems, he stepped behind a tree and deactivated {Camouflage}.

He then walked out from the cover of the tree, finally revealing himself to the man.

The man, seeing Zero, was surprised. He had not expected someone to actually show up to his rescue. This was a somewhat secluded part of the road and travelers didn't usually pass by.

Tears soon quickly dropped from the man's eyes in relief.

"Please, call for help! I don't know how much longer I can hold on for!"

"It's fine," Zero replied. "I'm enough."

The man watched confusedly as Zero walked closer to him.

"Y-you don't think that you alone can lift this thing, right? This i- ah?"

Zero having used {Iron Skin} so much, had gained a greater control over the skill. Now he could control the amount of strength he wanted to exert with the skill, decreasing the MP consumption by a lot. He calculated the weight of the tree and used the skill only on his arms.

Zero lifted the tree and threw it aside. The tree crashed into the ground, breaking the tree in half and sending splinters flying.

He then quickly knelt beside the man and cast {Major Heal}, not wanting the man to suffer from crush syndrome.

"Thank you, thank you so much!" The man profusely thanked Zero as he concentrated on healing him.

The man's chest was restored to its original shape, but his arm remained missing.

"What were you doing out here alone?" Zero asked.

"My house is just a few miles up the road. I was hunting and I..."

The man's eyes suddenly rolled to the back of his head and his head limply fell to the ground.

Zero frowned and checked the man for any injuries that he might have missed, but found none. It turned out that the man had simply fainted from exhaustion due to his struggle against the tree.

Zero picked up the man with an arm and carried him back to Harry.

Harry was waiting worriedly for Zero, eyes darting around his surroundings.

"I'm back," Zero announced as he walked back onto the road.

Harry's eyes fell onto the unconscious man.

"Who's this..?"

"He was trapped under a fallen tree. He said his house is a few miles from here. Let's send him home first."

"Okay."

Zero was about to carry the man himself but then placed the man onto Harry's horse.

"You take care of him. You're the healer."

Harry speechlessly nodded in agreement.

The two plus a new addition to the party traveled along the road. Soon enough, they arrived at a spot on the road with a trail leading into the woods.

"I suppose this is it," Zero said as he led his horse onto the new path.

Harry followed closely behind him, keeping the man from slipping off the horse.

Zero froze as an uneasy feeling began bubbling within his stomach. He didn't sense danger, but something else. Although he couldn't tell what this something was, it raised his vigilance.

A sturdy house slowly emerged in their view. The building had an aura of homeliness and looked to be carefully taken care of. There was a fence surrounding the house and a woman was seen working on the garden in the yard.

She looked to be around the same age as the man and had an infectious smile on her face as she hummed a song. Strands of blonde hair were matted to her forehead from sweat and her emerald green eyes glittered in the sun. Age couldn't take away from her beauty.

She noticed the two men approaching and hurried over, wiping her dirty hands on her apron.

"Can I help you two?" She asked. "My husband will be back soon; if he's who you're looking for."

The woman didn't know if the two had bad intentions so she mentioned that her husband was returning soon.

Zero pointed at the unconscious man slumped over on Harry's horse.

"Is that who you're talking about?"

The woman's face paled. She rushed over to the man's side, examining his condition.

"What happened to him? Is he okay?"

Her hand trembled as she reached out to her husband.

"He's fine now," Zero answered as he helped the man off the horse. "We found him in the woods."

The woman looked at him with a face full of questions.

Zero explained the situation to her, starting from when they heard his cry for help.

"If that's the case, thank you." The woman solemnly said as she bowed her head. "If you two weren't there..."

She shook her head.

"I don't even want to imagine what would have happened."

"No worries." Zero replied. "I'll bring him inside if that's okay with you."

The woman agreed and opened the front door to let them inside. Before Zero could take a step, the uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach suddenly grew in intensity, and along with that, the burning sensation of a stare.

Zero's eyes looked up at the top floor of the house where the gaze was coming from.

The top floor had several windows. Behind one of them, there was the gaunt, pale face of a man with sunken eye sockets staring at the group. He looked more skeleton than man, almost as if he wasn't human at all.

Zero was about to use {Inspect}, but the man soon disappeared from the window.

"Besides you and your husband, who else lives in your house?" Zero asked the woman.

"My son. But, he's..."

The woman let out a sigh.

At this time, the man slung over Zero's shoulder stirred, and slowly woke up.

"Huh? Where am I?"

"Sammy!"

The woman ran over to her husband, worriedly checking over him.

"Jan? How'd I get back home? I'm sure I was..."

The man then noticed that he was being carried by Zero.

"I'm fine now, you can let me down."

After the man was back on his own two feet, he cleared his throat.

"I believe we didn't meet under the best circumstances. I'm Samuel and this is my wife, Janna."

"I'm Zero and this is Harry."

"I have to thank you again," Samuel said. "To think I almost died out there today."

"We have to get going now," Zero interrupted before it became a full-blown conversation.

"Please, at least stay for a meal. It's the least I could do."

Zero, about to refuse, met Samuel's earnest eyes.

"If it's just a meal, then fine." Zero sighed.

Janna, hearing this, busied herself in the kitchen as Samuel chatted with the two. Zero, noticing a family portrait on the table, picked it up. It was of a happy family, a younger Samuel and Janna on both sides of an energetic-looking young man.

"Him in the middle, is he your son?"

Samuel's eyes grew gloomy at the mention of his son.

"Yes."

It was quite a contrast to the person that he had seen peering from the window earlier. The man in the picture was robust and had a spirited air about him.

"Looking at the gear on you two, you seem to be mercenaries?" Samuel suddenly asked.

"Correct."

Samuel was silent for a moment before he spoke.

"My son was a mercenary once, too."

He clenched his fist.

"My wife and I dissuaded him but he didn't listen. He told us that it would be fine."

Zero and Harry listened quietly.

"We should have tried to convince him harder. Even if he resented us for it, living a boring life is better than what he... became."

"What happened?" Zero questioned. "I saw a glimpse of him earlier. Is he suffering from some sort of disease?"

"He had an "accident" on one of his missions. He was kidnapped by a cult but eventually escaped."

"But he's not the same anymore. He's living in a constant state of paranoia, fear, and stress. There's also some other things that he refuses to tell us."

Samuel took a deep breath to calm himself down.

"How painful it is to know that my own child doesn't trust me enough to tell me what happened. It makes me feel as if I had failed as a father."

"We had to move to a secluded part of the woods after he kept breaking down around others. He constantly repeats that the cult is coming back after him."

"And also..."

Samuel stopped himself.

"Never mind."

Zero was still curious about one thing.

"Cult? What cult are you talking about?"

Samuel grit his teeth in hatred.

"My son told me that they call themselves the "White Light"."