Demon's Protégé

Intentional

It took me a day and a half to keep myself hidden as I carefully drive back and forth from the mansion and the city next to Preston to buy necessities for my prolonged and unplanned stay. I can’t really use electricity in the property since I could not risk someone seeing the lights if I open them at night, so I just have to rely on the flashlight and a few blankets. The water still runs inside so cleaning up became easy. The food were stocked up in the car and I can only need a few things like a change of clothes. This felt like camping all of a sudden… But this does not really feel so good at all considering that I had to climb and cross over the gates every time I leave. It was such hassle but this was better than being not anywhere near Nari. Though, I still could not find the time to contact her yet and I’m not pretty sure if she finally heard what happened to me the other day.

I should probably send her a message later on so that I can check on her. I don’t really trust that woman who called herself the mayor. She might even do something to her…

Hudson had given me another clue about the town when I called him yesterday. I had given him an update and provided him a detail of the mayor and he told me that the woman was actually a former casino owner in Las Vegas. She has been out of the grid for years now and had been since unheard of for so long.

She might be also one of the reasons why the town was not known to the public. I suddenly remembered the policeman I had met one time on the night I came here during that thunderstorm. That guy knew about the town and he even recommended me to the place. Maybe, if I try to appeal to the officials of the vicinity they can provide me more of the details. But that can be very risky too…

The mayor might have connections. Though I can still try, I will just have to look for that police guy while I keep on tracking things down here. He can actually be one of the keys in unsolving this town’s mystery after all.

 The next day, I decided to trespass my way in by walking down the route from the woods towards the direction of the town to meet Nari again. She was scheduled tonight at the pub and she would most probably be out by two in the morning. If I wait while I hide behind the dark bushes beside the establishment, I can see her again and tell her what had happened. Maybe, I can also try to persuade her to escape from here. I chose to wear the black clothes I just bought a while ago from the flea market I had passed by when I drove to the other city from here. This will be a good way to conceal my presence from anyone in the dark. For some reason, this totally felt like I was some kind of a creepy stalker.

But then, I had no other choice. When I came out through the back door of the mansion, I was pretty stunned to realize that the town was practically almost half a mile away from where I was. And I was going to get there by strolling through the woods. I already knew it was not going to be easy, but seeing now the entire thing and how risky it was to go there, I suddenly felt quite queasy and anxious.

This was crazy.

I was really going to go such length just to get to see Nari. I’m really an i***t.

I started to carry the backpack I had organized and began to tread down the rocky path leading to the opening tunnel of trees and tall weeds. It was broad daylight, but it was pretty much dimmer when I finally entered the forest. I could even hear crickets and birds chirping and it actually reminded me of those sound effects I usually hear from the movies. It suddenly felt like I was in some kind of a thriller horror movie and Jason Vhoores could actually show up anytime now. But then, who was I kidding?

This was no time to scare myself. I really had to rush and get to the city before night comes.

I stopped midway when I felt the sweat pouring all over my body. My clothes had started sticking to my skin and I was already panting hard. I was down to my second bottle of water. I don’t know why I had to even put an effort on wearing such a heat-inducting fabric in the middle of the intense heat of noon. But this was practically a good idea when I thought of it as some kind of camouflage. I just didn’t think through about walking in it during the day.

There was not much to see around the forest,I had realized. I just had trusted my hunches and the compass I had in my phone. I was actually doing all of this impulsively, knowing that the risk of being truly lost in the woods might happen to me. But then, I remembered that day when I first heard Nari, I was blind but I had managed to get through. Though it had ended with a lot of trouble of searching for me afterwards, but it still had me bravely facing the darkness ahead of me just trusting the voice I was hearing.

If blindness did not stop me to walk into this route, then surely at this point, there’s nothing else that could back me down anymore.

The sky had turned orange with purple haze by the time I had finally reached end of the forest. I could even recognized the looks of the buildings from afar when I stopped on a tall bush behind a tree. I had managed to reach the middle of the village where there were less houses and only a couple of stores and empty roads. If I turn right from here, I would be reaching the pub. But checking the time, it was still too early before the place opens up.

I decided to spend the remaining hours resting behind the bushes while keeping a lookout on anyone that might actually find me there. Seriously, acting like this made me stand out more but there was no turning back now.

Luckily the hours went on and the dawn broke in with no one noticing me from where I settled behind the trees. Watching the scene took on as I waited, I just soon noticed how there were only a few residents going around the town. The shops didn’t really attract too many customers and there were only a couple of passersby that had walked on the sidewalks the whole time. I even saw a total of three small cars that had driven down the road. Other than those stuffs, it was all just quiet and deserted. It almost felt like a ghost town and it had me wondering where the hell the people who lived here were going to. And there weren’t any young people around. The only teenager I had ever really seen to exist here since the night I had stumbled into this place was the young Henry. And there was little Brian although he was the only kid I had actually met who lived in this place.

Everyone else were almost just the same age as I am or were older. It was weird, and it was like the population in this place does not even reach half of a hundred. This town just got even more suspicious and creepier as I finally realized all these little details.  And now that I had noticed it, there were not really much to see in this town aside from a few houses and couple of local stores surrounding the roads.