Chapter 10: Protect

Quite swiftly, the Imp followed behind Avalin and Thomas as the two of them were walking through the large structure, while he was still attached to Avalin's hand for some reason.

He didn't know exactly why she grabbed his hand so suddenly, but the Imp didn't really mind. It helped him calm down a little, and it was just a pretty nice feeling overall. But soon enough, that 'Nice Feeling' became useless because he soon felt a sharp pain in the side of his body as the Imp flew away against a wall.

[-213 Health]

[Warning, you are low on health]

Confused, the Imp tried to figure out what was going on, but the world around him was just constantly moving for some reason, so he quickly closed his eyes in order to regain his composure slowly, before he heard Avalin's voice.

"James, what are you doing?!" She exclaimed, and as the door to the room that Avalin, Thomas, and the Imp just entered closed behind them, the red thing started moving toward him with loud stomping footsteps, although she suddenly stopped moving.

"Stop. Let me ask you, what are you doing exactly?" Thomas asked her loudly, and the Imp tried to continue listening in to the conversation, trying to pick up as much as possible from what they were saying.

"I'm trying to help him!" Avalin replied immediately and tried to continue making her way toward the Imp, but she seemed to be held back by someone, who the Imp assumed to be Thomas.

"Who is 'He'. James and I don't need help. And the Imp is an 'It', try to remember that."

"No, he-"

"Avalin, stop this. It's an Imp. It would probably kill you immediately if it had the chance to. It's a monster, a heartless, cruel monster. Don't try to pretend that it's an animal that can be trained." Thomas explained rather angrily, but Avalin simply seemed to stay quiet as she looked over at the Imp, who was still trying to listen in on everything and, as such, was simply laying there dizzily with his eyes closed.

"Alright, then let's test which of us is right." Avalin said and ripped herself away from Thomas before making her way toward the Imp and helping him up.

"We'll see what he does. It's possible to deactivate the function of Collars like he's wearing momentarily. Then, we'll try to see if he would attack me, or if he still wouldn't. If he does attack me, then we'll keep treating him like you want, which is like a walking rock without a heart. If he doesn't attack me, then you leave me alone and let me treat him like I want. We'll sell him to Zaragon either way, don't worry." Avalin said with her arms crossed angrily as she stared forward at the other two, who were just looking at each other for a moment.

"You realize that you're putting your life to risk in order to be able to treat an Imp better for a few days, right?" The Blue and Silver thing asked utterly astounded, and he was seemingly pretty surprised to see Avalin nod her head.

"Mhm, let's just get to it." She replied and brought the Imp to the center of the room before sitting down on the floor cross-legged in front of him, touching the collar with the tip of her finger before looking at the other two. "Ready? Well, tough luck, I'm deactivating it." Avalin said quite clearly before the Imp felt a slightly hot pain around his neck.

[The Effect of the Ownership Collar has been weakened considerably. Breakout Possible in 10 Minutes, 14 Seconds]

Immediately, the Imp was overcome with numerous confusing thoughts and emotions as he felt that he wasn't under the control of Avalin anymore, and it was just completely confused at what was going on or what it was supposed to do now. Was it supposed to go? Was it supposed to do something special for them? Were they waiting for something to happen?

Confused, the Imp tilted its head to the side at Avalin, because he had noticed that she often did so when trying to ask questions, and figured that it would be possible to get his thoughts across like this.

"Wat?" He asked, trying to use a word that he heard a little while ago and somewhat managed to keep the meaning in his mind before the Imp suddenly began to sniff the air. He was feeling so much more hungry all of a sudden, but at the very least, he wasn't tired or dizzy anymore, so that was good!

Immediately, the Imp tried to grab at its back to pull the bag in front of himself and then pushed his hand into the pile of meat that was still inside of it before pushing it into his mouth to keep himself fed, before he suddenly heard James and Thomas in the background.

"It's..." Thomas started confused, and immediately, James finished the sentence, "... eating..?" The two of them asked although the Imp added something else onto his workload while he was doing so.

Slowly, he turned around and stared at the two of them while grinding the meat into a paste in his mouth, before he slowly began to notice how good everything around him smelled just now. At first, the Imp thought it was just the meat in his bag, but after actually eating it, he noticed that it came from somewhere else, from directly in front of him. But despite smelling so good, it made him feel sick from the bottom of his stomach.

And there was one thing that popped into his head at that moment. The Imp managed to figure out what it actually was called not too long ago. It was an 'Imp'. He somehow knew that already, but now he managed to connect this knowledge to an actual word.

The Imp also knew what these three things were called, even if he didn't know what they actually were.

And at last, the Imp also knew what this emotion that he felt toward the two of them was called, and what the emotion he felt toward Avalin was called. All of a sudden, now that the Imp was allowed to think and do freely, he seemed to have knowledge that he didn't have before, although that just regarded his speech for the most part.

Slowly, the Imp swallowed the meat in his mouth and stared at the two things in front of him with pure anger in his eyes, before slowly beginning to speak, "Imp... hate... James..." He muttered as he looked at the black thing with a cold stare, and his sight turned over toward the blue thing next, "Imp... hate... Thomas..." The Imp added, and confused, both James and Thomas looked at each other, trying to figure out what was going on, before the young monster turned around and looked at Avalin next.

"Imp... No Hate... Avalin... Imp... Like Avalin..." The Imp said as he looked at the red thing and then stepped closer toward her. For a moment, James seemed to want to step forward and stop him but was held back by Thomas.

And then, just when the Imp stood in front of Avalin, he turned back around and once more stared at Thomas and James. "James... Thomas... Bad... Imp... Protect Avalin..." After a few moments, the Imp understood what he actually just said, although he himself didn't know that he thought like this before speaking.

But it seemed like at least one of the two bad things had something against that. "The hell are you fucking talking about, you shitty little shitter?!" James yelled out as he began to walk toward the Imp with determination, but before he could actually reach him, Avalin stood up and stepped in front of the monster.

"Stop it, James." She told him with anger in her eyes, but James simply pushed her to the side. "No, I won't stop it. And do you know why? Because you're insane, Avalin." James replied, and before he could do anything to defend himself, the Black thing kicked the Imp in the stomach. Or at least he tried, but the meat-bag was still in the front of his body, so he didn't really take any damage from the kick itself, even if the Imp did hurt himself from the impact when he tripped backward.

Without hesitation, James stood above the Imp and slowly raised his foot over his face, but now, he was stopped by even Thomas. "James, I agree that Avalin's insane for treating the Imp like that, but we can still make a lot of money by selling it, and we need a lot of money, remember?" The blue thing explained to James, who just continued staring down at the Imp before clicking his tongue and turning away angrily, just walking toward the door without any hesitation.

"And now to you, Avalin. You won. Treat it however you want, James and I will stay out of it, but if you even for a moment hesitate in the decision to sell it, you're out. Got it?" Thomas told her and stepped into the center of the room, only turning his head toward Avalin.

"Now get out of here. We'll get going by sunrise so that we can actually cross the lake before dusk." Thomas said commandingly, and Avalin stood up with a nod and made her way out of the room, pulling the Imp behind her, while the Imp just started staring at the things in the notification that were constantly changing. They didn't seem to be letters, so he didn't really know what he was supposed to think of these.

In the first place, it was weird that they were changing at different paces to each other. But most of the 'things' were completely the same now, and only one of them was slightly different and was still changing.

But soon enough, Avalin interrupted the Imp and squatted down in front of him, mumbling something to herself as she began to fidget with the Imp's collar.

[The Effect of the Ownership Collar has been reinstated. You have managed to break through the effect immensely. It is is now possible to break out of the control within 12 hours, 23 Minutes, 11 Seconds]

All of a sudden, the things that were changing once more changed to be completely different! It startled the Imp a little bit, but at the very least, it was now able to actually figure out what they were and why they were changing.

But for now, the Imp kept following behind Avalin again and stuffed some more meat into his mouth, because he was feeling really hungry again. And so, Avalin and the Imp made their way up the stairs inside of this building, and entered a small room, before Avalin closed the door behind them and tiredly collapsed on the bed, pressing her arm against her eyes without thinking of what was going on around her.

And just then, it seemed to be the Imp's perfect chance. There was something that he wanted to do for a while now, but Thomas and James always looked at him angrily whenever the Imp got too close to Avalin.

Slowly and quietly, the Imp stepped through the room toward Avalin and extended his hand toward her with a mischievous smile.