Faced with the tide of curses outside the door, Shane's expression didn't change. He simply reached back and shoved.
Bang.
As the door slammed shut, those hateful eyes were cut off from view.
Then he lifted a hand. Several planks materialized out of thin air and sealed every window in the cabin with airtight precision.
The already dim room sank into deeper darkness.
Only a thin smear of sunset leaked through the cracks between boards, making the air feel even more oppressive.
"Uh…"
With their familiar home suddenly sealed and dark, the breathing inside instantly grew faster.
Lisanna and Elfman instinctively tightened their grip on their sticks and swallowed hard.
The mage at the doorway looked about their age.
But in the dark, the strange pressure he radiated felt even more terrifying than the villagers outside.
"Lisanna. Elfman. Step back."
The girl who'd been silent up until now finally spoke.
"But, Mira…" Lisanna's voice trembled with tears.
"Step back."
Mira forcefully blocked the two behind her.
Her left hand pressed against her right arm beneath the cloak. Her whole body was taut like a drawn bow, as if she could tear away the covering at any moment and fight to the death.
"What are you trying to do?"
Mira stared at the boy standing in the shadows, her voice sharp and guarded.
"Relax. I just don't want those noisy idiots outside interrupting our conversation."
Shane's voice came from the darkness.
"Oh—by the way, do you have a lamp? It's too dark in here. Darkness makes people anxious."
"Aren't you here to exterminate demons?" Mira shot back coldly. "We have nothing to talk about."
"Wow, you're hard to talk to…"
Not getting the response he wanted, Shane scratched his head in frustration.
"Fine. I'll do it myself."
The moment the words left his mouth—
With a faint crackling burn, two tiny scarlet flames ignited without warning in his eyes.
Two pupils lit with karmic fire glowed in the darkness like a beast's gaze in the night, instantly illuminating the cramped cabin—
and throwing the cloaked girl's face into view.
Even in a situation this miserable, it was a face that still made people catch their breath.
Snow-white long hair hung a bit messy. Her cheeks were thin and pale from malnutrition.
Yet her eyes—soft brown with a faint blue tint—made up for it, carrying a fragile, shattered beauty.
"Your name is Mira. The short-haired one is Lisanna. And the big guy is Elfman—right?"
Using the light from his burning eyes, Shane pointed at them and asked, genuinely puzzled:
"I'm curious…"
"Even if ignorant people slap a label on you, why would you yourselves default to calling her a 'demon' too?"
"We don't think Mira is a demon!"
Lisanna and Elfman shouted back, panic overriding even their fear of the fire in Shane's eyes.
"Oh?"
Seeing the conversation finally moving in a useful direction, Shane nodded faintly.
Asking questions really did control the pace better than answering them.
He ignored the two younger ones and turned his gaze to the white-haired girl, whose expression had subtly shifted.
Hiding yourself that tightly… and the way you reacted… Yeah. She's the one.
Shane rubbed his chin, studying her.
"So what do you think about being called a 'demon'?"
Mira was silent for a moment.
Then she lowered her head and gave a self-mocking smile.
"They're not wrong… I'm not really human anymore."
"Huh?"
Shane's eyebrows jumped. He hadn't expected her to accept it.
But then he understood.
Girls could be delicate and sensitive—especially at that age, when other people's attitudes and judgments cut deeper than they should.
In an environment where the whole village constantly points at you and calls you a monster, a demon…
Over time, doubting yourself—thinking maybe I really am a monster—was almost inevitable.
If it were Erza… she'd probably encourage her, Shane thought.
So he tried to imitate the upright, earnest way the red-haired girl spoke, meeting Mira's eyes head-on.
"No. I think you're overthinking it."
"You look like a perfectly normal girl to me. If there's anything 'special'… maybe your hair color is just rare?"
He felt that wasn't strong enough, so he added:
"And, uh… you're pretty."
It was true. Her pale face with silver hair really did give her a glass-like, breakable beauty.
But Mira wasn't comforted at all.
To her, it sounded like the mage the villagers had paid was mocking her on purpose.
"Normal?"
She let out a cold laugh, her expression darkening instantly.
"If you see this… and you can still say that…"
Whoosh!
She yanked out the right hand she'd kept hidden beneath her cloak.
The arm beneath should have been slender and pale.
Instead it was a nightmare.
The whole limb looked like dried, cracked bark—skin a sickly dark green-blue, studded with countless raised purple crystal-like nodules.
Grotesque. Ugly. Inhuman.
"Hah…"
Lisanna turned her face away, unable to bear it.
Every time outsiders saw her sister's arm, they screamed—or threw stones.
People always met what they couldn't understand with the greatest malice.
And Mira had endured it all in silence… until she started believing it too: that someone with such a disgusting arm, someone who brought such misfortune to her family, shouldn't exist—must be a demon.
But—
There was no scream. No disgust.
Lisanna turned back, confused, and saw Shane looking at the "demon arm" with an extremely strange expression—almost… curiosity.
And then, to the siblings' utter shock—
He reached out. Bent a finger. And tapped the purple crystals.
Ding. Ding.
The crisp sound echoed through the dead-silent room.
"Yep. Pretty good hardness," Shane commented.
"W-Wait!"
Mira jolted back as if electrocuted, yanking her arm behind her. Her face looked like she'd seen a ghost.
"What—what is that reaction?! You're not scared?! That's a demon's arm!"
"Scared? Why would I be scared?"
Shane pulled back the hand he'd used to "inspect" it.
He remembered being just as jumpy about everything when he'd first encountered magic last year.
He almost laughed—but held it in. Laughing in front of three people this emotionally wrecked would be way too flippant.
He cleared his throat and tried to look serious.
"This isn't something to be afraid of. It's Take Over—a type of magic."
"Magic?" Mira froze.
"Yeah."
With his hands behind his back, Shane showed off the "knowledge" he'd built up over these past months.
"You're not a demon, and you haven't become a monster."
"You just—because of some trigger—took in a demon's power into your body, and that gave you the ability to use it."
He watched their faces, waiting for their reactions.
"Take… Take Over magic?"
Elfman muttered in disbelief. "Really? Mira isn't a demon? It's just… magic?"
"Idiot."
Shane couldn't help himself—he knocked the big guy on the head.
"What kind of little brother believes outsiders over his own sister and thinks she's a demon?"
"Ow!"
Elfman clutched his head. It hurt—but joy surged up in his chest.
Why is this guy suddenly acting so familiar…? Lisanna thought, bewildered.
But she also realized: this weird mage probably wasn't on the villagers' side.
"This is great!"
She lunged forward and hugged Mira around the waist, teary-eyed.
"This is great, Mira! I knew you were fine! You're a mage! That's so cool!"
But—
Unlike her excited siblings, Mira—the one at the center—still looked bleak.
"Magic or demon… whatever."
She stared down at her grotesque right arm, eyes full of disgust.
"This kind of power that makes you less than human… I don't want it!"
Watching her spiral deeper into that corner, Shane felt a wave of irritation.
He glanced at Lisanna and Elfman, whose faces were full of worry but who clearly didn't know how to reach her.
Unpleasant. Really unpleasant.
Shane hated people like this more than anything—twisted up in their own pain, indecisive, drowning in self-pity.
He stepped forward.
In Mira's startled eyes, he grabbed the cloak and yanked it off her head, forcing her fully into the firelight.
"How you see yourself, I don't care."
"But at the very least—don't drag other people down into your tragedy."
~~~
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