(Haruka POV)

This was one of the most annoying and hectic days that I have had in a long time.

Most of it was due to the responsibilities that I took over from the Chaos lord while he took his “short” nap, but the other part was due to my little visitor, whom I was going to meet again right now. It was not like the small “lesson” I gave her earlier was anything stressful; it was actually quite therapeutic for all of about ten to twenty minutes until I found out why she acted like she did. After that was the stressful part about figuring out how I was going to teach her and break the news about the major problem that I found. None of that excuses what she did, though.

Not long after going through that in my head, I reached the door to the room that Raina was staying in and opened the door. On the other side was a sparse spare room with only a bed, a mirror, and a dresser. Laying on the bed was a silver-haired Kitsune whose fur was stained scarlet from her own blood, with multiple bandaged sword wounds across her body and a chunk missing from one of her ears. I was really going light on her, now that I see the aftermath. Although, I guess that was a good thing. Regardless I now need to talk with her.

Walking up to her bed, I formed a “chair” out of the surrounding void and sat down on the all too familiar and comfortable red cushion. I then rested my elbow on the gold and silver armrest and asked, “Are you finished with pretending to be asleep?”

My question got a twitch from the woman lying on the bed before she slowly opened her eyes and looked at me with a little bit of fear and respect. It seems like whopping her @*$ had an effect. She asked me, “Was all of that really necessary?”

I looked at her with a blank face after hearing that and countered, “Was the curse necessary?”

That caused her to flinch as she looked away from me before responding, “That was a mistake.”

Hearing this instantly caused me to want to punch her again, but I held it back and instead asked her, “Then why did you place it on her in the first place?”

It was at this moment that I saw genuine, complete fear cross her face for a second before she covered it up and explained, “I don’t know why I did that. Normally, I would have thought something like that through and not done anything, but for some reason, I did that impulsively without thinking. There was even the feeling of approval coming from Stephanie at that time, which made me feel like it was okay to do that.”

This was what I was hoping not to hear. It showed that at this point, the problem reached far deeper than what I knew. It was something that would not be easy to fix at this point, even if she completely abolished her cultivation base. This was going to take a lot of work to fix.

Calming down, I looked at her with a bit of pity before saying, “That was not approval that you felt.”

That caused her to whip her head around to me with a look of shock as she then asked with a deeper hint of fear, “What do you mean?!”

“That was not approval; that was acceptance after she tried and failed to warn you about what you were doing. Sadly, she is too enamored with cute things to bother fixing something like that if it goes wrong. Or in this case, try to make the cute thing stick around longer regardless of whether it is a good thing or not.” I slowly explain to the ever increasingly fearful woman. She then asked me rather shakily, “What are you t-trying to say?”

“I’m saying that something was interfering with not only the feelings transmitted through your divine link but also your thought process to make you think it was an impulsive decision.” It was now that I saw her slightly shaking in fear. I could understand why, as this would usually mean the presence of something like a heart demon or some other form of possession, but this was something far worse. However, I would not break this to her yet as I still had a question I needed to ask. “Now, why is it that you treat Vale like you do?”

That question seemed to be enough to cause Raina to stop shaking and finally take a breath before answering quietly, “I was only trying my best based off of the only example that I had.”

I froze at that answer. I was not ever informed about Raina's family situation on earth, but I at least knew about her situation on Asterion, and it was not good. The Imperial family never was, especially in a world with extraordinary power where anyone could inherit the throne. Combine that with a mother and a maternal family that only wants power, and you can see how Raina's childhood was like. Even when trying to do your best based on that, it will never be great.

I still held some hope, though, so I asked her, “Don’t you remember anything about your mother from Earth?”

She went strangely quiet after that, and I instantly knew that my worst fear in that aspect was realized. “My mother died when I was too young to remember, and besides that, I can hardly remember my time there outside of the military where a superior's word might as well be law. So long as you don’t get caught. That and have bad superiors.”

With all that said, I felt even more pity for her while saying under my breath, “Well, it seems like I got my work cut out for me.” I then got up and said to her, “Get some rest and heal up; I will be coming to get you in the morning. And you will need all the energy you can get.”

Vulthurtoor

Sorry for the later-than-promised upload. I fell asleep while writing this and then got caught by others, causing this to be posted later than I wished. I will still be posting a chapter on Tuesday before 1600 PST.

Besides that have a good Night/Day.