*In the current Lord's palace*
*****
"Has the message been passed to him?" The current lord of Tekoa asked the servant kneeling before him.
"Yes, my lord! They are already aware of it and he had agreed to it," the servant replied.
"Very good, you may go!" The Lord said and the servant stood up and left after bowing again. "Who does he think he is? Tsk! I will make sure that he doesn't live to tell the story of his life!" The Lord grunted with an angry look.
"My lord," an elder walked into the hall and bowed before him.
"What is it, first elder?" The lord asked the old man demon.
"My lord, my spies reported to me that the young demon left the city earlier this noon. His whereabouts are still unknown," the elder replied.
"Why couldn't they follow him?" The lord asked him.
"My lord, his flying beast is too fast. My spies were unable to follow him," the elder replied.
"Hmmm," the lord sighed and stared into space. "Where could he be going? Is he taking me for granted?" He mumbled.
"My lord, since he is not around, why don't we use this opportunity to strike?" The elder asked him.
The Lord turned and gazed at him. "What do you mean?" He asked the elder.
"His palace members have no one to protect them, we should go and take all of them back as slaves. What do you say?" The elder replied.
The Lord thought about what the elder said for a while — it wasn't so much of a good idea but there was sense in it.
"Take the best of our strong demons and go and capture all of them alive. Make sure that you don't kill any of them, do you hear me?" The Lord said to the elder.
"Yes, my lord!" The elder replied and left immediately.
"Hmmm, I want to see what you are capable of doing," the lord mumbled and began to laugh.
*Alex's palace*
****
When Alex left, everyone returned to their apartment but Emilia remained in the main hall. She stood at the window and gazed into the dark sky, the moon was up but because it wasn't full moon yet, it couldn't produce enough light in the dark.
Her thoughts wandered to Alex and she could not help but worry about his safety. The worst thing that could happen to them was something happening to Alex in the cold mountain.
While she was clouded by her negative thoughts, Chase ran into the hall, panting and with sweats covering his face.
"Big sister!" He called, jolting her.
Seeing his expression, her heart skipped. "What is it? Why are you like this?" She asked him.
"There are demons a mile away from the palace. They are making their way toward this place," Chase replied, still panting.
"What! They are aware that Master is not around, this is the current lord's doing," Emilia said with a worried look.
"What should we do?" Chase asked her.
Emilia tried to calm herself down, this wasn't time for her to panic so she thought for a while and came up with a plan.
"Gather everyone else here right now except for Tilia and Kia. Hide them somewhere!" She ordered him.
"Are you sure about this?" Chase asked her, not understanding what she wanted to do.
"Yes. Be quick about it!" She replied and he nodded and hurried off. The moment he was gone, Emilia began to pace around the hall, she looked extremely worried and she began to wish that Alex was around. She has never taken care of matters that are as serious as this one so her fears were understandable... Still, she needed to be calm.
Soon, Chase returned with everyone else except for Kia and Tilia who he had carefully hidden in an underground room.
"Big sister, everyone is here," he said to her and as soon as those words left his mouth, the demon guards barged into the hall followed by the elder.
"Where is your master?" The elder asked as he walked to the front.
"Our Master isn't here but I am the acting leader. What do you want from us and why are the guards here?" Emilia replied.
"Per the lord's order, everyone is under arrest!" The elder said and signaled the guards to surround them.
"What for? What crime did we commit?" Emilia asked him but he ignored her completely.
"I am not going anywhere!" Lidia said and made to summon her sword but Emilia glanced at her and made signs to stop.
"Trying to fight back will do you no good," the elder said to Lidia and she scoffed and looked elsewhere. If not for Emilia, dealing with a bunch of guards is nothing to her. "Take them!" The elder ordered the guards and they jumped into action and began to push everyone out of the hall.
"When Master returns, he will wipe all you bunch of old farts!" One of Kia's little sisters yelled as they were being pushed away.
"I dare you to say that again!" The elder grunted while glaring at her.
"I said when master—" the girl made to talk but...
"Lily, shhh!" Her mother cautioned her and she had no choice but to eye the elder and look away.
"When we get to the palace, I will tell the lord to shut that little mouth of yours, hmph!" The elder mumbled angrily at the girl.
Soon, they arrived at the current lord's palace and the lord ordered them to be thrown into the dungeon with no food or water, he didn't want to see them because he would obviously get angry just merely seeing them. According to him, no one will come out of the dungeon alive unless their Master returns from wherever he went and saves them, and the only way to save them is by having a battle with him.
He was still unaware of the fact that the group was lacking two members— Tilia and Kia.
-----------------
It was already morning and Alex was gone for hours, he was unaware of the problem at home.
"The temperature had dramatically changed," he noted as he got to a particular point.
Just as he finished speaking, a wild wind came from the opposite direction and swept over them, and the flying beast cried out as he flew some distance away from their original spot. When they tried to get themselves, another wind came up against them again.
"It seems we've reached the cold mountain," Alex said. It was the only reason for the wild wind and the change in the temperature. "Little guy, you must carry me to the top of the mountain, that's all I ask from you," he said to the flying beast who made weird sounds. "Don't worry, you won't die," Alex said, patting it on the back.
The flying beast knew his job, and even though he didn't want to sacrifice his life for someone who was not his owner, he wouldn't forget the words of his owner—Emilia. "You must help him with everything you have and must obey his orders!" It was a stern order from his owner and master, and it was something he couldn't disobey.
As such, he shook his head and braced himself for what was to come, there was a rising tide of wind and he was certain that things would go bad so he waited patiently until the tide was near them, then he jumped forward, thankfully, Alex was tightly holding unto him or he would have fallen.
The tide was powerful, even the flying beast with all its largeness could barely control himself in the air, and soon, they were seen descending. But he wasn't going to let the tide toss and throw him however it wanted, he braced himself again and began to flap his wings with all his strength. When he had gone up into the air again, he dashed forward and began to swirl as he moved toward the mountain.
A series of tides rose to stop them but the flying beast kept scaling through until they finally reached the mountain top but something happened.
A very dark cloud appeared and clouded their vision, so much that none of them could see through it, not even Alex with all his demon eyes. Because of poor vision, the flying beast mistakenly slammed his head on a large tree and he lost his balance and began to fall to the ground. Alex couldn't jump down either and so the two of them fell all the way from the high mountain down to the ground.
Alex opened his eyes after a while and the first thing his eyes caught was the far sky and the tall mountain he had fallen from. He grunted and rubbed his head as he got up, he looked around and saw that the flying beast was still alive and in good shape, but the only problem was that he had reduced in size and had become a small bird.