Chapter 34

Chapter 34

Yuria just stared blankly. Cain was truly beyond her imagination.

How could you ruin the floor just by mopping it? If there is an object in front of you, shouldn’t it be obvious to avoid it or move it aside until you’re finished?

As Cain used the mop, everything that was in his way was roughly swept aside, often breaking from the force Cain had used, and the place became a mess eventually. Yuria was at a loss for words at how Cain made the house even dirtier than its previous dilapidated state caused by Fren’s awakening.

If I had known this would happen, I would have refused Cain’s help, no matter how sad he looked. At this point, Yuria wondered if he was doing it on purpose.

Without knowing Yuria’s heart, or being capable of interpreting the astonished, and sincerely befuddled expression painting Yuria’s face, Cain was looking at her with a proud expression after he had finished his work, like a little child waiting for compliments.

Yuria sighed deeply and called him. “…Cain.”

Yuria couldn’t be mad at him, he wanted to help her clean and had earnestly tried to do so, thus she endeavoured to let it go. She was just trying to pass time by cleaning waiting for Fren to wake up. That didn’t mean she wanted to clean and make things unnecessarily bothersome. Cain was looking at Yuria, his eyes twinkling with child-like innocence.

“You didn’t do it on purpose, did you?” At Yuria’s words, Cain tilted his head in confusion prompting Yuria to continue, “It’s not because you hate me, right?”

Then, his face stiffened revealing that he truly didn’t know why she was saying such things. “Not at all. If it pleases you, I’d be happy to pull out my heart for you,” Cain said, thinking that she would understand his sincerity if he showed her his beating heart whenever she looked at him.

“No, you don’t have to.” She had only said that earlier because she was dumbfounded by the situation.

“What a pity,” Cain lamented in deep regret.

In response, Yuria only sighed. Was it because he’s a demon? Cain’s bizarre behaviour seemed impossible to understand by human standards.

“…um, if you pull out your heart you’ll die.” Yuria said with a stern expression, worried that Cain might not even know about such a glaringly self-explanatory fact.

“You’re truly sweet.” Cain was moved by Yuria’s words of concern for his life. In the demon realm, death didn’t mean much. It was simply an act of showing one’s weakness. Therefore, among the demons, death was neither painful nor something to grieve about. Even if he tried to feel any emotion at the approach of death, there was only emptiness.

“…” Yuria found Cain’s way of thinking incomprehensible, and once again chose to brush aside his strange remarks. “Anyway, I think I will have to clean again.” Yuria spoke with a complicated expression while looking at the disastrous state of the house.

“Why’s that?” Cain queried, his facial features locked in an expression of discombobulation.

I’m sure I helped her clean up, why should she have to do it again? Cain glanced around the house. Well…

If it wasn’t his imagination, it looked oddly messy, but there was no dust on the floor and it was shiny thanks to the thorough scrubbing he’d done. Thus he concluded it was good enough.

Feeling that he was in the right, he proceeded to meekly confront Yuria, “That is… it isn’t… clean? It is.” Cain finished with a confident expression on his face, his perspective of the floor justified his stance on the matter. Yuria was silent while seeing his face, wondering how the hell she should explain things. Yes, the floor was swept and wiped, so if you look at the floor itself, you could say it’s clean.

But what about the rest? In the centre of the room, the main table had a leg broken and was leaning so any objects on it fell to the floor and shattered, the remains of these items as well as others were scattered all over the place.

“Anyway, I’ll do the rest of the cleaning,” Yuria replied.

“I’ll help–”

“No, I think it’ll be better if Cain stays still. If you want to help me, please stand by Fren’s side and watch his condition.” Yuria interrupted Cain, believing it would be better if it were Cain who checked Fren’s condition.

“…I get it.” Cain followed Yuria’s words with a displeased look on his face. It was still bothersome and heartbreaking for him to see her cleaning with those tiny, fragile hands, but it seemed like his attempts to help would only add more work.

As such, Yuria started cleaning the house, which was now messier than before. She worked hard to throw away the broken objects and returned the semi intact ones to their original place. That made the place cleaner, but Yuria wasn’t satisfied yet. Among the broken objects, there was glass, if she didn’t sweep the floor again, Fren could be injured by the remaining debris. Once removing the large pieces of glass in sight, Yuria would use a broom to sweep up the smaller shards; however, while picking the pieces of glass she cut herself.

“Ah,” Yuria lightly remarked, seeing more blood than anticipated. Perhaps it had pierced deeper than expected, large droplets of blood were dripping from her finger. Cain, who followed Yuria’s order and was checking on Fren, wasn’t paying attention to her, consequently only noticed Yuria was hurt once she was bleeding.

Cain frowned as he approached Yuria. “Tsk.” A wound on such a tiny, slender finger was unacceptable. Cain instinctively grabbed Yuria’s finger and brought it towards his lips. The red blood flowing down her white finger was seductive enough in itself. It was then-

“Don’t touch Yuri!” A sharp voice rang out. Fren, who had just regained consciousness, was viciously glaring at Cain with a threatening expression on his face. Fren’s energy reacted to his emotions and having just finished his awakening, he was shedding more energy than before.

“Fren!” Astonished that Fren had regained consciousness, Yuria ignored the alarm she felt at Cain’s sudden action. She ran to Fren, any pain felt was forgotten. Fren’s return to consciousness fully occupied Yuria’s thoughts.

“Fren, are you okay?” Yuria urgently asked.

Others wouldn’t have been able to approach Fren so easily because of the energy that was violently circling around him, its target Cain, but Yuria was an exception. This was due to Fren’s extreme care to not to hurt Yuria, but even if that wasn’t the case, the demon’s energy seemed not to hurt Yuria.

“Fren okay now.” Fren spoke as he naturally buried his face in Yuria’s arms, keeping his fierce gaze glued to Cain.

“Are you hurt anywhere?” Yuria, asked kindly, still not convinced by his response. Fren smiled and nodded, reconfirming that he really was okay.

“Yuri, why is that bas-…er… why is it here?” Fren, who hesitated several times to choose an appropriate word, asked with a gloomy expression. The bloody gaze that had been piercing Cain a while ago was overshadowed with one of faked fear. Fren made a face as if he was afraid to die.

“That… person helped Fren.” Yuria reasoned, at Yuria’s words, Fren sealed his mouth, truly displeased by the current situation. Cain’s help seemed to have helped him to regain consciousness, but he was not grateful in the slightest. Fortunately, Cain didn’t seem to want to take Yuri away while he was unconscious, nonetheless to Fren, Cain was still a criminal with a past record he needed to be vigilant of.

Fren looked at Yuria with wide eyes as he spoke,”Fren hates it.”

Yuria pondered for a moment about how she should react to Fren’s words. Cain was Fren’s biological father, just because Fren had a new family didn’t mean their relationship was gone. As such, intervening between the two was something to do with caution, but even so, it made her heartbroken to think Fren could hate Cain, his own father, like that.

“Can I ask why you hate it?” Yuria asked carefully.

“Because. He made Fren sick. And Yuri cry.” That alone was enough reason for Fren to dislike Cain.

“I see. Cain was bad.” Yuria meekly affirmed Fren’s words and gently stroked his hair. Hearing this Fren put on a satisfied face, and Cain’s face, who was listening quietly, contorted.

“That brat is spoiled,” Cain said with an indifferent, but sharp gaze. Fren quietly pretended not to listen to Cain, spurring Cain on, “And too young,” Cain coldly added, clicking his tongue.

“Fren little. So have to stay with Yuri.” Previously, Fren would have shouted if he was called young, but this time, he didn’t care. He realised from his awakening, during which he achieved spiritual growth but not physical growth, that being young could help him at times.

“Ha.” Cain was dumbfounded.

Fren’s somewhat refined aura made it clear that he had grown up. On that subject, Cain found it funny to see him pretending to act as if he was still a child. Of the three awakenings he would soon complete, he had only accomplished the first. If the first awakening was completed properly, it would be the same as becoming a teenager by human standards. The growth of the body will come along with time so it wasn’t a big deal, but Cain disliked how Fren pretended to still be a child. Even more so if the intention was to win Yuria’s heart.

Fren, who ignored Cain’s sneer, pretended to be afraid of him and dug deeper into Yuria’s arms while trembling. Just like that, Yuria’s fierce gaze turned to Cain, who in return stared at Fren with contempt.

“Yuri, I’m scared of that. Tell it to go. This is Yuri and Fren’s house.” Fren said with his face in Yuria’s arms, looking pitifully up at her.

“Kid, it’s too early to be relieved after just one awakening.”

“…What do you mean?” Before Fren could react to Cain’s words, Yuria asked urgently.

“Exactly what I said. There are still other awakenings that the kid has to go through. Besides, this awakening wasn’t normal. So I don’t know what will happen next.”

It was a mixture of lies and facts. From the moment the first awakening was finished, the young demon could no longer grow without the help of an adult demon. However, this was the human world, not the demon world, it was not known what variables such a difference would bring. Of course, the variables didn’t necessarily have to affect the awakenings in a bad way, but Cain intentionally implied that to create a reason to stay with Yuria. That way, even with the brat’s opposition, she won’t let him leave.

“So, kid. If you want to survive and do well, you’d better just accept my help.” Fren’s face distorted at Cain’s words, who acted as if he had won, but Cain wasn’t finished just yet, “I’m looking forward to our relationship, son.”

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