Edward and I sat down in front of our mother and father. Everyone looked incredibly tense. Then, in a nervous voice, my mother spoke:
"Emilia, from what we expect, there will be people aiming to kill you. This applies to you too, Edward," she said, lowering her voice a little.
couldn't quite grasp what they were talking about, but it seemed better than what I had initially feared. I always expect the worst—what a bad habit.
"You should explain more. It doesn't seem like they understand anything," my father said, his calm voice laced with worry.
"Do you really want to explain everything to them? It doesn't make much sense, but I suppose it's the only choice. Even though they're far too young to know," my mother replied.
"They can't be cautious about something they don't know, right? Am I wrong?" my father asked.
"No, you're not wrong, it's just that we shouldn't"
"I don't care if we break tradition this one time. It's for the sake of protecting Emilia and Edward. Besides, both of them are smarter than their age would suggest. I don't think they'll have any trouble understanding," my father said firmly.
"Alright, I'll explain everything now," my mother replied, her tone giving off a sense of resignation. Even in serious discussions, her original personality doesn't seem to change.
I couldn't make sense of the discussion between my parents, and it seemed that my brother didn't either, judging by the worried look on his face. Then, my mother finally spoke:
"Don't worry. All I'm going to explain is how the world works. But there's a tradition that this shouldn't be explained until you're at least ten years old."
I felt a little relieved, but not entirely. All the bad possibilities I had imagined were still lingering in my mind. However, my brother seemed completely relaxed by what she said. I don't understand how my father thinks he's smart; he's still so simpleminded.
"I need both of you to pay attention to everything I'm about to say, it's going to be important and you will need it. There are three main races in this world: humans, monsters, and demons. We, as humans, are considered to have the most balanced power. We're sentient beings, capable of thinking and reasoning, and our average lifespan is around 80 or 90 years. As for the beasts, they're all non-sentient creatures, like goblins, elves and dwarves. They act purely on instinct. You've likely seen many of them before, so you should have a basic understanding of them. What's unique about the beasts is that they come in hundreds of species, ranging from weak to extraordinarily powerful. Some are even nearly immortal. Every part of the world has its own unique types of beasts. Lastly, there are the demons. They're the worst. Though they're technically a type of beast, they possess intelligence like ours, making them incredibly dangerous. They relentlessly hunt humans and feed on their flesh and mana, though they don't need it to survive, it just makes them stronger. They're incredibly powerful. To make matters worse, they reproduce faster than humans and live for about 200 years. And for the danger I mentioned earlier, it's the demons. Demons have a habit of targeting and abducting human children with great potential, preventing them from becoming a future threat. Both of you are most likely considered prodigies, with the potential to amass an incredible amount of mana. Thankfully, our whole region has a barrier around it that prevents demons from entering. However, we still wanted to warn you because they're cunning and we don't know their full danger. Oh, I almost forgot to mention within each race, there are exceptional individuals with unique traits. For example, some humans live for hundreds of years, while others can take on monster-like features and even transform into them. But those cases are extremely rare, it's only caused by reproduction between humans and another race."
All of these informations were quite overwhelming. I wondered if Edward could even keep up with it all. I doubted he understood everything. But one question still lingered in my mind, so I asked:
"Mother, why didn't you want to tell us all this before? And why did you and Father always avoid discussing these things in front of us?"
I had noticed how, every time I encountered Father, he would start whispering things to Mother. For a while, I assumed it was marital stuff, but this explanation made a lot more sense now. Then, out of nowhere, Mother began laughing loudly before saying:
"As I thought, you're someone truly special! You noticed that! I can't believe you're still this young and possess all this smartness. But there was a small
misunderstanding, we didn't whisper about this, we only were whispering about one thing. Louis, could you do that thing ?"
My father nodded, and in that instant, I felt a sudden pain in my neck. My body grew heavy, and before I knew it, I passed out.