What? Dein was suddenly stuck in place, still trying to process the information. After a short moment, he blurted.
"What? Why? Weren't you supposed to take care of this place?"
Inwardly, Dein was already cursing over and over again. After all, this sudden turn out of event was unaccounted for, it was bad, really bad! If Clay won't be here then how the hell is he supposed to convince him?
His plan was crumbling.
Of course, just because his plan was crumbling doesn't mean it's all over. Even if Clay leave he could just persuade the other guy. Only, the problem with that however, was that Klen – the new guy – hates monsters and isn't naive nor stupid. And even if Dein tried using Klen's temper to provoke him into opening the cage he doubt it would work since like he saw earlier, Klen is nowhere near stupid.
Finally, Clay's voice reached his ears again.
"That's true, but now that the monster there is fully asleep, the priestess said that we should change place so Klen can watch over you"
Dein clicked his tongue silently. It seems that the priestess really does consider Dein with high regard to even think of guarding him with a much more experienced guard than Clay.
As much as it "flatters" him really is starting to get annoying.
Much more because Dein still has no idea what this lord and this priestess wants from him.
Dein gritted his teeth but after a while of pondering he just sigh.
'So… what now?'
He stole a glance at Clay's face. To be honest, Dein wasn't really the guy you could trust when reading people's expression. However today, seeing Clay's face, Dein is a hundred percent sure he got it perfectly right, after all, Clay only wore a disappointed expression on his young face.
He was neither sad, jealous, nor angry. Instead he was just disappointed. Disappointed that he won't be able to talk to the special monster in front of him anymore, other than that, there was nothing. He probably doesn't even know nor care how much this sudden change would affect Dein's future.
Dein sigh again, looking grim as his finger scratch the wood below him.
'This just makes things more complicated…'
As he thought that, Clay spoke one more time with a sigh of his own and a smile.
"Well then Dein, I hope you take care. Klen might get angry pretty easily but he takes his job seriously. If the priestess says it, he won't hesitate to do it."
Well, isn't that good to know. If the priestess doesn't want Dein to die then Klen would probably also do his best to make sure he doesn't die.
And Dein might actually feel relief from that if only it wasn't so ominous!
Finally, he stood up and faced Clay before telling him.
"I guess that's the case then, I hope you take too"
With that, Clay turn around and soon dissapeared from his view. Then, Dein heard a sigh coming from beside him as the little girl ran towards one end of their cage to watch Clay walk off.
Dein meanwhile, did not bother following her as he could already see Clay walking away from their hanging prison as well as Klen who stole a distainful glance at their cage before seemingly clicking his tongue and followed Clay.
Seeing that, Dein's already slit mouth formed a smile and his eyes catch a glimpse of the burning sun shining above everything.
He have two and a half days left and now that Clay's gone, Dein is bound to get busy.
'Busy waiting that is…'
*****
After the earlier conversation, Dein had spent the rest of the day doing nothing… just watching the sun and nothing more.
At the same time, the little girl also seemed to have loss interest in conversation that Dein even thought she dissapeared. To his dismay however, the imaginary kid he's seeing somehow seems to always just be a few steps behind him.
At first, the thought sends shiver down Dein's spine and he even start considering if he should ask questions to the little girl again to try and learn something about her or maybe even try doing some experiment to her but after pondering it for a good while he decided to change his mind.
His reasons of course was because Dein was warry of whatever truth the little girl might give him and at the same time he's afraid of what would happen if the girl suddenly became hostile towards him because of his actions.
It'll be too unfortunate if that happens since fighting something you cannot even understand and being unable to run away from it would simply be unbearable.
Not impossible but unbearable.
'Well, to me it'll definitely be impossible'
Considering that Dein still doesn't have any experience on a real fight – much more because he doesn't even have any weapons at hand – fighting the little girl – if she ever turned out to be a strong adversary – or anyone at all, would be tantamount to suicide.
So Dein wished to avoid a fight at all cost…
'Though I doubt I could do that…'
Dein sighed. Watching the sun slowly dissapeared from the horizon. Finally, he stood up, taking the leaves that had once been used as a cover for his food from the wooden floor before tucking them inside his shirt.
Outside, he saw the guy again, Klen, who unlike Clay, always seems to watch him from afar.
Klen had been like that since he'd came back after leaving with Clay when their conversation ended this morning. He had been silently watching Dein's cage from every different angle.
Of course, Dein is doing the same to him but from time to time Klen would go inside the further forest but just when Dein thought he'd left he would just find him again minutes later watching him from a different place.
At first Dein was weirded out by it, after all just what kind of person could moved that fast and circle around his cage without getting noticed but as it turns out Klen really is just good at maneuvering his way around this forest, as least that's the conclusion Dein come up with and he believe that it was the truth.
This time, just like before, Klen could be seen sitting on one of the tree branches, silent but visibly observing him.
Seeing this, Dein made a motion and waved at him, as if saying I can see you too.
That of course… has no reason, Dein just feels like waving.
After that he sat down on the same seat he always sat on whenever he's talking to Clay or just pondering around, waiting for the day to pass.
He tapped his finger on the wooden floor before scratching it.
Then he catch a glimpse of Klen climbing off the tree he had been sitting on just moments ago… seconds later, he dissapeared.
Looking around, Dein started counting.
1…
21…
40…
62…
Finally he saw it, the subtle image of Klen appearing somewhere dozens of meters away from him in a new direction.
'three minutes…'
It took Klen roughly three minutes to sneak around and find a new place to observe Dein.
And in tomorrow night, in that three minutes… Dein would try to escape this harrowing cage.