8| Midnight Rendezvous

Nora felt chills all over.

'Why has the damned demon king not gone back yet? Why is he at her doorstep? I clearly heard him go back.'

Nora was terrified. Did Calix change his mind halfway and decided to kill her? She was tired of the mind games but she still had the will to live, so she spoke to stall for time.

"It's late Sir Calix. Shouldn't you be resting? Why are you here?"

"I was taking a walk to exercise since someone told me to go on a diet."

Damn it. Was this what it meant to fall into a grave that one dug themselves? Then he definitely heard her call him the demon king. Was she screwed?

Nora took a quick peek at Calix, only to find him leaning against the door with his arms crossed and looking at her with pure amusement. His long blue hair was now cropped short, neat and fashionable, which made his face look even more handsome.

Nora looked at him, startled. It was definitely amusing in his eyes! He was looking at her as if she was some interesting pet. It was the same look that her evil boss had when she wanted her to play some tricks to amuse her.

It seemed he found her interesting enough to not unalive her at the moment. Nora's expression immediately brightened. If the big boss wanted her to sing, she would sing, if he wanted her to dance, she would do that too, all in all, she would do whatever he asked her to in order to stay alive.

Calix's status immediately changed from enemy to employer in her mind.

Calix, who noticed that the little lady's gaze towards him had changed, felt a little uncomfortable, but he persevered through.

Nora also felt a little uncomfortable being stared at by her boss, so she started to think of ways to make him go away.

"I would invite you into the room for a chat, but since it is improper for a man and woman to be alone this late, I unfortunately can't. But you can't stay outside in the cold for long either…" She trailed off. It was obvious she was suggesting that he get the hell out of here in a polite way.

Calix's gaze on her cooled.

"What is there for others to doubt between a man and his savior? Then I will invite myself in," He said and came into her room, pushing her aside.

He promptly sat on a chair behind the table beside her bed, as if he owned the room. Nora's eyes twitched in anger, her lips pursed, but she couldn't do anything other than gritting her teeth.

He even had the gall to gesture to her to sit down in front of him.

She obediently sat down.

"I heard that you too were injured by a mid grade demon Lady Elynora," He asked, nonchalantly.

"Yes." Nora wanted to add that unlike his injuries, hers was real and not faked to scheme the protagonists.

"It seems that since the seal is about to be broken, demons of all grades are running amok," He raised his eyes and glanced at her lazily, then asked, "If we don't eliminate the demon king, the human realm won't have another peaceful day." Don't you agree?"

'Ah fuck. What did he want me to say?'

If she said she pitied the demon king, it would be an obvious lie in his ears, also ammunition for him to get rid of her using the protagonists, since she was a demon hunter and pitying the demon lord is tantamount to committing heresy.

She never expected him to self depreciate himself to ask this question.

So she chose the same method to answer.

"I am pretty weak. As you can see, I couldn't even handle a mid grade demon with a whole team. To be frank, I probably can't even handle a low grade demon on my own. So what does the return of the demon king have to do with me?"

He nodded in agreement at the answer.

"That is true." He then gave her a smile.

"I am also curious about who will slay the Demon King, aren't you?" He asked.

Nora wanted to bang her head against the damned table.

Why was he asking her these weird questions? She wanted to shed tears.

She thought about how to answer, then decided it didn't matter. It was not like she could win the favor of this man who hated everyone in the world equally, with no discrimination.

She was pondering how to answer the question when a yawn suddenly escaped her mouth.

Calix propped both his hands on the table and placed his chin on top of them.

"How about this? I'll leave if you answer." He tilted his head.

Nora decided to just go with the flow since he already knew that she knew and was just playing games with her.

"I hope that it will be you, since you seem so strong Sir Calix!" She said in a fake cheerful voice.

Calix gave her a look that seemed to say, 'Is that really the best you can do?'.

He glanced at her lightly and got up from the chair. His amusement had come to an end. He felt like hunting down some demons again, so he walked out the door without saying a word.

After he was gone, Nora just sat there without moving, comprehending what had just happened.

She had survived two encounters with the Demon King. She was not stupid to think that it was just a whim of his. It felt like she had something he deemed useful, and was keeping her alive for that. She didn't know what it was, but if she didn't find out soon, she would become his puppet and the novel would proceed to a dead end route.

She first decided to check if there was anything special with her flame of purification, but she was way too sleepy and the tiredness of the day was catching up to her after the adrenaline rush from meeting Calix faded.

'I'll leave the job to future me.'

Nora got up, walked to her bed, and quickly jumped under the sheets. She fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.