Satoshi's wife stood casually in the air.

She also sat on a broom that whipped from time to time in the air. Her hair, as well as her eyes, were both blood red. Her skin was pretty pale white, and only enhanced the contrast between her hair and her eyes. Her face looked almost perfect if it weren't for a horizontal scar on her cheek.

She wore a tight black uniform and a black robe over it. She also wore a black cap tilted to the right on her head. If one were to look closer at her, one could see several emblems on her right chest. Every emblem except for one had mage runes depicted on them. The exception depicted a white eagle. 

In any case, neither Az nor his minion except for Satoshi knew about the rank she held.

"So this is the boy who brought my husband to his knees? You called me here from the Eastern Front just because of a child!?" the woman asked indignantly, looking disappointedly at Satoshi.

She immediately jumped down, not even half a meter away from Az. The woman held her broom with one hand and lightly touched Az's chin with the other. Her face was only a few centimeters away from Az.

Az had to look up at her, and a shiver ran down his spine as he looked into her eyes.

'Why can't I move??? It feels as if the woman sees every individual cell of my body. Help me, Ogron, please.'

"'Oh Satoshi, how can you lose to a Beginner Necromancer mage? If only you had trained with me in the army instead of spending all your time doing useless research," sighed Fuyuko, who was Satoshi's wife, while analyzing Az from head to toe.

Before Fuyuko could analyze any further, she noticed the existence of the three skeletons around her. Otaz stood behind her with his scythe blade pressed against her throat.

Ogron, on the other hand, stood to the right of Az while the tip of his spear pressed lightly against her ribcage.

Simaev quietly aimed with her bow at Fuyuko's heart while standing left to Az.

"One wrong move, and you'll die. You will now move five meters away from us slowly. Understood?" a calm Ogron ordered in a cold voice.

She just gulped in fear and nodded. Slowly she walked backward a few steps. Ogron glanced at Satoshi before instructing him to "...summon a barrier around Az. His survival must be guaranteed, at all costs."

"By your command chief," Satoshi replied while giving his wife an apologetic look.

She, on the other hand, just shrugged her shoulder and smiled.

"Now I understand why you lost. But well, against such elite warriors, even I would have lost," she replied with a laugh before her expression turned serious.

Fuyuko shifted her gaze from Satoshi to the tower, and a little girl immediately bent down under the window. "Mother is creepy. She sees everything," Hideka whispered, trembling.

Fuyuko began to smile and turned further to Az, "So young man. I have two questions for you, and if you can answer both of them, I will leave you alone."

Az had to swallow this time and replied with a smile, "I will try my best at answering your questions."

"So, young man. Why can I smell my daughter's scent on you?" she asked loud enough for even Hideka to hear. One could see how her veins were throbbing on her face and how she wanted to grab the young man by the collar.

Hideka just whispered, "Mama can not only see everything, but she can also smell everything."

"Ehm. Yeah, well, how should I put it? She hugged me, so maybe that's why you can smell her scent on me," Az stuttered ashamedly while not even daring to look into her condemning eyes.

"Hidekaaaaaa, is that true?" she asked loudly, and Hideka answered just as loudly, "YES!"

Fuyuko just nodded, and her expression slowly relaxed.

"Second question. Why did you turn my husband into one of your Minions, and how long will it be before I can see him again?" She asked while sitting relaxed on her broom again, swayed from time to time back and forth.

"That's two questions disguised as one, but alright," Az sighed before continuing. "I made him my Minion, so I could use him as my magic teacher, and that's it."

" Only as a magic teacher?" asked Fuyuko, with a puzzled look

.

"Yes, only as a magic teacher and maybe as my magic barrier summoner. He isn't really useful for anything else. I have three Minions who are superior to Satoshi in every area," Az replied, shaking his head before continuing:

"Only after he can't teach me anything else will I give him the right to decide for himself what he wants to do with the rest of his life."

She just nodded, sighing in relief, "Thank you for offering him a chance of redemption," while bowing to Az in gratitude.

"No, no, no, you don't have to bow to me," Az stuttered.

"Could I talk to my husband for a moment?" Fuyuko asked as she rose again.

"Of course, of course," Az replied calmly.

"Thank you," she replied and turned her attention to her husband Satoshi. Silently she walked towards him, and Satoshi sensed emotions, such as sadness and anger.

"Honey, I'm sorry..." but before Satoshi could finish his sentence, Fuyuko grabbed him by the collar of his coat and lifted him to eye level.

"Your words mean nothing..." the woman sternly replied while staring into his eye sockets where red flames glowed.

"Why did you act so stupidly? Why?" she asked angrily.

Her anger turned to sorrow within a few seconds.

"What am I supposed to do without you now," she whispered while dropping him to the ground.

"I can only be glad that you survived, despite your stupid action," she sighed while a single tear rolled down her face.

"Unfortunately, I am unable to express in words how much I regret my action," Satoshi whispered back as he slowly opened his arms.

"What am I going to do with Hideka now?" whispered Fuyuko as she slowly hugged her husband's cold body.

"I don't know. But hopefully, you won't fail as I did as a father," Satoshi sighed as he hugged his wife's warm body to him.

"I think I've been the worse parent between the two of us. You worked near your daughter instead of several hundred miles away. Our daughter could see your shadow from time to time, while she could only see me on holidays," Fuyuko whispered as more tears rolled down her face.

Satoshi merely smiled at the sight of his wife and wiped away her tears with his cold, bone fingers.

"We both failed as parents. But I hope you will at least take this chance and try to be a good parent," Satoshi whispered to her.

Fuyuko had to smile at his action before she whispered, "But how? You know very well that neither of us knows how to play a real parent."

She stopped for a moment to breathe before whispering further, "You know very well that I can't even have a short conversation with my daughter before getting stuck. Neither I nor you know her hobbies or anything else she does. I can only ask her how school is going for her before I get to a point where I don't even know what I could ask her."

Every single word Fuyuko uttered hit Satoshi hard.

"I don't know how we can fix it, but spending time with our daughter, is probably the first step in the right direction," Satoshi whispered while lightly pressing his forehead against hers.

He inhaled and exhaled deeply before continuing with, "You've seen how fragile life is and how fragile we can be. We both focused on our careers. We both used to whisper to ourselves: [I'll spend time with my daughter tomorrow but not today since I've got work to do]."

Slowly, even Satoshi had to cry, and he could see how ashamed his wife was. Her shame came from the truth he told her.

He paused for a moment, trying to get himself together, but instead of that, the crying between the parents just turned uglier.

"We've always… We've always postponed when we'll spend some time with our daughter. But how did it end?" he asked her and himself.

Satoshi felt only a wave of anger that he had suppressed till now.

"It ended mainly with me not being human anymore and having to leave," he told her with a painful chuckle.