In the afternoon of the same day,

"Father, drink this."

An emotional voice was heard from inside a polished wooden room.

A girl with eyes brimming with emotion propped the head of a man in a miserable state lying on a bed upward as she opened the lid of a potion bottle.

Without waiting any longer, she shoved the mouth of the vial into the man's mouth without letting him speak.

"Ugh!"

The middle-aged man, missing one of his arms, let out a grunt as the fluorescent green liquid, thick and sour, trickled down his throat and into his stomach.

Soon after, with extreme difficulty, he could consume the entire contents of the small bottle.

"M-my daughter, where did you get the potion?"

With a broken voice and no energy, the man struggled to open his eyes to look at his daughter.

"Hehe~, this morning I met a rather kind adventurer who gave me a lot of money for your old sword. And even though I spent all my savings from last month, I got a potion that was sold to me at not too high a price."

The girl named Emily smiled brightly. Her face, which looked like she hadn't had time for a good bath in a long time, was pale from running in a hurry searching for a potion.

Still, her face was brimming with emotion and happiness at having been of help to her father in her hard work of forging weapons and armor on her own. Although in the end, she earned more money with the sword her father used...

"My daughter, it's not the first time I've told you. Don't be so gullible with people you barely know. What if someone has bad intentions toward you? Cough-". The man coughed furiously, unable to conclude his words.

"Father, stop talking!".

"I'm sorry, my daughter. Your father can no longer protect you...". The man struggled to raise his hand and said in a tone of regret.

What the man detested most was his inability, for, in this pitiful status, he would no longer be able to protect his lively daughter, who did not know the true nature of the beings of this world.

He deeply regretted having spoiled the girl in front of him when she was still a child. However, what could he do? Emily had lost her mother at a young age, so the middle-aged man cared for his daughter and spoiled her so much that she would forget the void left by her mother.

However, that choice made his daughter quite naive, and even after she turned 15, she still didn't understand how the world worked and how cruel a person can be.

"Don't push yourself too hard! Get some rest and get well soon, Father."

Panicked, Emily grabbed the man's outstretched, almost stark hand to stop and stop straining.

The man with a pale skin tone, with barely visible flesh, stretched the corners of his lips upward in an attempt to smile and somehow clear his daughter's worries. However...

*Cough! *Cough! *Cough!

The man's face became much paler than it already was as he began to cough up puffs of blood. It felt like all his organs were being destroyed and burned inside.

It was excruciatingly painful, so his sight was slowly going out of focus.

"Father, what happened?! Father, answer me!"

Seeing the miserable state of the man in the bed, Emily panicked. She didn't know what to do. The sobs gave way to uncontainable crying.

"Why isn't the potion working! It's the best potion I could find, please, it's working...". In desperation, she grabbed a damp towel to wipe the blood dripping from the corners of the man's lips.

The potion should have worked on this weak kind of poison; it was what the potion seller had said...

"I can't take it anymore..." Were the man's last words as his eyelids closed, slipping into unconsciousness.

"P-please don't scare me like that, Father. It's not funny." Pleaded the girl with tears dripping incessantly from her red eyes full of pain and sadness.

Apparently, the healing potion she bought with all her savings, instead of having improved her father's sickly state, had made the poison her father was poisoned with when he was still an adventurer even worse.

She could only watch with tears in her eyes and an aching heart the suffering of her father.

"W-what will I do when you are gone, father? Don't do this to me."

She ran inside the room to prepare cold water and a clean towel. It was the only thing she had...

She sat back down at the head of the bed, wet the towel with cold water, and placed it on the man's forehead.

"Why exactly does my father have to suffer so much?" She asked and squeezed her father's frail hand tightly between her two palms.

The more she saw her father's condition worsening by the minute, the more the girl's heart was wrung with grief. She felt a cold air rush through her anxious heart that throbbed incessantly.

"What can I do?"

She prayed with all her willpower and rested her forehead on her unconscious father's fist.

What could he do at that moment?

She didn't know.

All her money was used to buy the potion, which worsened the situation. Time at this point was crucial, but there was nothing she could do to get more money, let alone a good potion.

She hated being useless. She hated it...

Moments ago, she was floating gracefully in happiness as she trusted that her father would get better after much effort, yet now there was nothing but sadness flooding her.

Minutes passed, and her father seemed to be paler. Although unconscious, his expression was wrinkled from the immense pain he felt.

At this point, Emily no longer knew what course of action to take next.

They had no relatives. To make matters worse, after her father was incapacitated and poisoned in the dungeon, they were coldly cast out of the "Family" they had joined.

They had no one who could lend them a hand when needed.

*Cough!

"F-father... I'm so sorry, because of me, you... sniff...".

Small, crystalline tears steeped in sadness slid over the pale man below; it seemed as if his life hung on a frayed thread that would not bear the weight and break at any moment.

The coldness emanating from the man's skin was transmitted through Emily's sweaty, trembling palms.

"Why am I so useless? When you need me most, the less I can do for you...".

"Cough-."

"Father!"

The man's eyes snapped open, revealing two eyes covered with red, throbbing veins as if they would explode at any moment. The man's body in Emily's arms writhed painfully as he grunted low.

The man took one last look at his beloved daughter, and his body lost its few remaining strength... The man's ragged breathing stopped along with his heart. A tear of blood rolled down his cheeks.

"F-father... no, please, tell me this isn't real...".

Emily's eyes trembled along with her whole body. Her heart sank as she felt her father leave this world, leaving her alone forever...

She couldn't believe it, or rather, she didn't want to accept reality, even though the truth was right under her nose.

Her father was dead...

Reality hit Emily.

The girl's throat went dry, and she felt her world shatter like a mirror and crumble in front of her eyes for a moment.

It was suffocating.

For a moment, she didn't know how to react or what to say.

"Father!"