Netori: Stealing The Hero's Party!

Moments after heading upstairs and settling inside a handful of rooms, Raven finally decided to ask Reina more about exactly what she'd been talking to Meowri about. Walking into her room, he made sure to shut the door behind him. From what little he could make sense of, it was already obvious that she didn't want too many people knowing about whatever it was that they were talking about.

"Sorry, but I have to know what's happening." Sitting on the edge of her bed, her eyes gazing down at her fingers, Reina ignored Raven's presence in her room where she'd requested to be left alone for a moment. "If you're traveling with us, I need to know if anything from your past is gonna bite us in the ass if we continue together."

Lifting her head, Reina stared blankly at Raven. Her mind, still consumed by her mother's death, she couldn't think straight much less form a single word. Even now, she remembered her as a whore–one that threw her body to anyone with enough gold in their pockets. Her father was no different, a young pirate at the time consumed by his lust.

"That bitch…" Gathering her courage, Reina finally spoke up. "She wanted to drop me, but my father insisted on keeping me in her belly. All she cared for was gold so he managed somehow by looting and plunder, but even then the moment I was born, she abandoned me like trash."n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

A story of abandonment far too familiar to the mage, it reminded him of his situation as well as what little he'd read in Athenia's gospel. Holding his hand forward in care, he began moving closer to the upset blacksmith. Shaking her head, however, she made him stop where he stood for she was teetering at the edge of frustration and anger.

"She…" Taking a long and deep breath, she heaved a sigh and lowered her head. Staring at the ground, Reina tried to let her anger steam out of her body but for whatever reason, despite the abandonment and what else she'd done, she couldn't not feel sorry for what had happened to her mother. "That bitch, she got me drunk the last time we met."

Glancing up at Raven again, she held her hand up towards him and gestured for him to stay where he was and not move an inch. Nodding back at her in response to her non-verbal request, Raven stood still with no signs of him trying to move just yet.

"After that." Once she felt comfortable again, Reina continued with the story about how her mother drugged her the last night that they'd met.

To this day she remembers the night as vivid as a nightmare at the edge of daybreak. The touch of her mother's bare skin, and the creepy feeling of her lips, made every strand of hair on her body spark up straight. Squeezing her arms and then down between her legs, she remembered her mother tying a strapon against her hips before coercing her to do the worst thing a parent could do to their child.

And to what end? Was it her way of portraying her depraved love for a child that she'd abandoned? No, not in the least for when Reina came to her senses the coming evening, she couldn't find her mother anywhere and her gold had gone missing alongside her.

"And that bitch cat told everyone about what happened that night…" Shaking her head, Reina turned her head towards the door. "I left soon after to spare myself the embarrassment. There, now you know everything, leave me alone."

The mage knew that he shouldn't leave her, not in a time as sensitive as this. However, what was he supposed to do or say? That was a mystery to him as well. Reluctant he turned around to leave Reina alone, although stopping by the door after opening it, he turned around to look at her once more.

"Hey, don't do anything stupid, okay?" Forcing a smile, Reina nodded.

"I'm not gonna kill myself over that whore, don't worry," she said with a light chuckle, obviously meant to lighten the mood but it didn't.

Nodding back at her once she was done laughing, Raven turned to the hallway and finally left her alone. As the door was shut, the smile on Reina's face disappeared in an instant. In its place came a flood of tears washing down an emotionless face.

She had no living family, none; and although when her father and her mother had been alive, she never truly loved them, their absence was chipping away at her heart.

"Fucking hell…" Wiping her tears and the snort, she shook her head violently. Trying not to think too much, she glanced around the room and through its pinkish glow in the dark found a cabinet inside which she knew was exactly what she needed at the moment. "That should help me put this night behind."

Getting off the bed, she walked closer to the cabinet and took out a vial full of medicine. From what she remembered, the room they were in was laced with luxury to the extent that could be provided on an island, and the medicine was not some hallucinogen but rather a drug that helped with sleeping.

Taking out the familiar capsule, Reina swallowed it quickly and returned to bed. Laying face first into the pillow, she waited and waited until finally her mind was empty and every inch of her body had loosened entirely. Not long after, she found herself dreaming a lucid dream, one in which her family wasn't as messed up as it was in reality.

'Curse you two for ever meeting each other…' Cursing her parents in her dream for conceiving her, Reina wished that she was never born from the union of a whore and an idiotic young pirate of a father. But reality could not be changed, and thus she cried her heart out in the dreams and swore to forget about her father as well as her mother.

And while she struggled with her demons, there were plenty of others in that inn fighting against their own. The most notable of which were Amedith and Liliyana, although the witch hunter was about to help them forget about their troubles with an explosive distraction.