The Car Belle is inAbout a minute ago.

Belle has never considered herself the type to lose her composure. Not when Scarlet pulled those revenge ‘pranks’ on the bullies and left Arthur with the blame, not when she had to watch her mother again and again blame herself for her sister’s death, and certainly not in front of Arthur. Ever.

But now?

“Can you please focus on the fight!” Belle shouts at the man, or rather, boy in front of her. The guy must be at least four or five years her junior, a high school student at the oldest despite his clear superhuman feats and silver tail and eyes. And yet, he’s been fumbling about, seemingly mumbling to himself throughout the entire time he’s been fighting the zombie, completely ignoring how much work she’s putting in to shield the brat.

The kid just shouts back, “I’m trying to figure out what skill I should buy! Dad said my SP is importa-”

“Yeah, I don’t care!” Belle shouts, using her new Barrier skill that she got after contracting close to the beginning of this Demonic Assault to use in making another barrier appear in front of the level 29 zombie’s lazy attack. But all the barrier manages to do – once again – is hold for less than half a second before shattering, buying the kid only enough time to barely avoid it as Belle and Arthur stand behind the seats on the other end of the car from the two. “Deal with that later!”

“Damnit,” the kid says, stumbling slightly and landing on his rear before immediately scooting back again and getting up, barely avoiding the zombie’s follow up attack. “I don’t have any damned attack related skills! Cut me a break!”

Oh, for the love of all that is still nice in this damned world!

“Belle, maybe you shouldn’t distract him,” Arthur whispers to his girlfriend from right next to her. “He doesn’t look like he’s going to stop, so might as well let him get it over with faster without interrupting.”

Belle frowns before begrudgingly nodding her head and focusing solely on setting up barriers to give him extra time. But it’s very obvious that the kid isn’t a high level Guardian, nor does he have much if any combat experience.

She can’t help but glance at Arthur out of the corner of her eye, worried that he’ll end up hurt just because he decided to visit her to talk about her recent actions. Particularly forcing her father into bringing her to a Fracture. Which everyone was telling her not to do, but she just couldn’t think of Scarlet fighting the demons without her being able to do anything to help. But after almost missing a barrier, she focuses solely on the kid again.

In the end I ended up signing a contract anyways. Just not during that Fracture.

“Of course, you did,” her fae says with a pompous tone of voice, “the great and powerful prince Artemis has graced you with-”

Yeah, could you leave that spiel for later please? A little busy right now.

The fae snorts, showing its utter disdain as it retorts, “This great one wouldn’t have bothered contracting with you while you were having your hand held like a little princess in a castle.”

Says the prince.

Artemis doesn’t retort this time, leaving Belle to focus all of her attention on the kid. But even with her barriers, the kid ends up backed into a corner in one of the booths, having tripped into it and letting the zombie move to block his exit from the thing.

“Shit,” Belle mutters before standing up straighter and spreading her hands out, using the one skill that she quickly realized was a last ditch move in danger. And this skill causes a much more solid and physical barrier to appear around the zombie, locking it in place for a few seconds and allowing the silver eyed and tailed boy to climb over the seat and go back to the aisle again with a terrified look on his face.

Belle lets out a sigh of relief, only to grimace when she sees the massive amount of mana that skill cost her.

“I won’t be able to shield you much anymore!” she shouts to the kid, whose name she still doesn’t know. And the boy grimaces at that, his tail twitching slightly in the process. But he just gives her a thumbs up while still focusing on his skills store until he eventually says, “Screw it,” and after a second’s pause focuses on the demon again.

Did he finally buy something?

Her question is answered when she sees the boy raise his hands and create a flood of mist from them that then transforms into a copy of himself. The copy then runs up to the demon and begins distracting it as the boy himself runs to Belle and Arthur’s location, only to say, “I wasn’t able to get a single combat skill, and that thing is at least fifteen levels above me. No way I can fight it.”

Belle and Arthur just stare at him for a few seconds before the kid adds, “I vote we run.”

I’m gonna strangle him.

Right as the three begin to leave the booth though, the sound of the automatic door on the other side of the cart opening catches their attention. And when they turn to look, they find two people walking into the cart. One of them being very familiar to all three of them.

“Scarlet?” “Scarlet!” “She’s here?”

Belle, Arthur, and the boy all exclaim at once, only for both Arthur and Belle to glance at him with confused expressions on their faces. But their attention is retaken by the zombie when it shatters the barrier holding it in place.

Both Belle and Arthur’s eyes widen in fear as the zombie heads towards Scarlet and the other girl and right when they’re about to call out to her in warning, their friend – who Belle only now notices has the arm of a werewolf – rushes forward with a faint red mist leaking from her body before ripping out the throat of the zombie without much trouble. She then rushes over to them with a worried look on her face, completely ignoring the shock on their own.

“Are you both alright?!” she exclaims before coming to a stop in front of the three.

She just…

“Oh, well if this isn’t a surprise!” Artemis says, appearing in the air between the group and startling all of them. “To think I’d see my little brother here!”

Belle stares at her contracted fae with a confused expression on her face.

Little brother?