Shantal followed Esther into the next room, but Esther didn't lock the door, so she pushed the door and entered.

It can even be a bit cramped when there are three people in the room, and the single rooms in this hostel are not much larger than the third class cabins of a passenger ship, and are deliberately designed to save space.

Esther pulled everything on the table aside and sat down first, motioning for Shantal to sit on the other side of the vacancy.

Shantal sat down obediently, but because of his height and long legs, he couldn't retract his legs like Esther.

"You can put your feet on the edge of the bed, I don't mind." Esther said this in Intius.

Shantal looked at the bald man lying on the bed, breathing weakly, and subconsciously asked in Intidis, "Is he still alive?" ”

"Alive, but in ordinary people's terms, it's no different from death," Esther rubbed her right eyebrow in distress, "He's been parasitized by me long enough, he doesn't have much of an active self-consciousness, and his current state is similar to that of a puppet." ”

Shantar silently recited the word twice, "parasitic", which seemed not quite the same as the evil spirit possession he imagined:

"If you ......"

"Yes, if I tried to control you, you would be like that." Esther smiled and said, "I could choose to let your free will go, but that won't do me any good. It's like a driver driving a steam train, so generally it doesn't mess up the train, right? ”

Shantar was silent for two seconds, deciding to bring the topic back to safety: "What do you want to know?" I don't have any impression of you. ”

Esther's eyes darkened a little, "yes, Mary probably doesn't have any impression of me now...... Tell me about you, and I'll judge the truth myself. ”

Then the "sun" charm was still dancing between her fingers, and Shantal looked at the charm and spoke softly:

"I don't have to lie to you, it's my own fault that I recklessly ignored the dangers of tonight's operation. I don't know what exactly you want to hear. ”

Esther pointed to Shantal's neckline, "Your family? ”

The "thief" has a certain instinct for valuables, especially magical items with extraordinary properties, which makes it difficult for Esther not to be drawn to attention.

Shantal's expression tensed for a moment, and then relaxed:

"I'm not from Nas, that's obvious, my parents are from Intis. I don't remember my mother well anymore, she died when I was very young. My father said that I inherited her eyes, but the hair color followed my father's.

"I just heard my dad say how nice she was, beautiful, gentle and powerful, ha, it's disgusting to say that."

But when he said this, his expression was full of nostalgia, and behind the nostalgia there was even a faint hint of hatred and grief:

"Probably the deepest impression I have of my mother is her embrace. She had wheat field-like blonde hair, and I would hold on to her long hair in her arms, and my father would hold us tightly and hum a song that would quiet me, and the carriage would sway......

"I later learned that we were running for our lives during that time.

"My father was the 'purifier' of the Inquisition of the Eternal Sun Church, young, gifted, pious and ambitious, and he was only one step away from being promoted to six. He once wrote in his notes: 'Even if I still want to praise the sun and do not want to be ashamed of my brothers and sisters, I have lost the qualification to sing the praises of the sun'. ”

Esther no longer played with the spell, but let it lie quietly in the palm of her hand: "So this is your father's relic?" ”

Shantal's breath stagnated: "You ......"

Then the "Sun" charm was thrown by the other party, and he reacted quickly, catching it and holding it in his hand, feeling a calming warmth.

"I can feel your emotions, please go ahead, I shouldn't interrupt you." Although Esther's brows were slightly furrowed, her demeanor and tone were gentle, and she looked more vivid than her previous indifferent attitude.

Shantar cleared his throat:

"Well, I don't remember what happened at that time anymore, it was all inferred from my father's notes, my mother was originally an informant for his development, and he used to think that she was a wild extraordinary person who was involved in the incident.

"The lady who looks weak and gentle and beautiful will naturally receive his attention and protection, and it is in the process that my father and my mother fall in love.

"But my father didn't know it at the time, my mother ...... She, once he was. ”

This time, Esther's eyes gradually let go, and she looked at Shantar without saying a word, and then quickly turned her head again, digesting the too strange news.

Shantar rubbed his face and calmed down before continuing:

"My mother's sequence name is 'witch,' which means that no matter what gender the person who drank the potion, she would become female. And my father ...... I only found out about this after my mother became pregnant. ”

Esther had always had a bad feeling for the existence of the "witch", but it was based on the various evil acts she had been exposed to, and she had never known that there was such a strange thing in this way.

She nodded, "Of course your mother will hide this, but from my point of view, her purpose of approaching your father is not simple. ”

Shantal sighed:

"My father thought she was innocent, but she was actually the perpetrator, and the 'witches' were often behind the witch sect. But it was an accident that my mother was developed into an informant by my father...... She thought she would be dead if she was caught.

"Then they had me, and my father, who took on the role of 'father', began to do everything in his power to hide my mother's traces, to hide my existence but to take care of us with all his might.

"At first my mother was able to hide me with her, but as I grew up, they made up their minds to leave Trier and go to remote villages in the south. As long as I can find a place where no one knows them, I can grow up in the sun freely.

"That way, they can live a peaceful life, just as an ordinary couple, and not as extraordinary people who betray the organization.

"But that's just their overly optimistic wish."

Shantar clenched the Sun Emblem in his hand, and his dark brown eyes became even more gloomy:

"The Witch Cult controls the Extraordinary not only with potion recipes and materials, but also with blood and hair, a curse that cannot be avoided no matter where you flee.

"Within three days of my parents taking me away from Trier, my mother's condition deteriorated and her body quickly weakened. In just a few days, my mother became seriously ill, mentally weakened and trance-like, and was at risk of losing control at any moment.

But at that time, she couldn't even eat or drink, let alone give up her own life...... So she begged my father to kill her.

"She didn't want to get out of control, and she didn't want to be a monster and let my father and I see her ugly side."

Esther's fingers drew a circle lightly in the palm of her hand, but in the role of a listener, seeing that Shantal closed her mouth tightly and her face was gloomy, she tentatively pushed:

"Your father took note of it, too?"

"Well, I too, I found out when I read his notes."

Shantal raised his hand, put down the neckline that was pulled to his chin to cover the Adam's apple, and took out a pair of rings that were strung together, the golden one was normal, and the black ring revealed an ominous aura no matter how you looked at it:

"When my mother died, my father buried her on the top of a hill overlooking a wheat field, because she said she liked the golden color of the sun on the wheat field, which reminded her of the feeling of leaning on my father's shoulder and listening to him sing.

"This ring became the only relic that my father took with him, it was originally silver, but it seemed to absorb my mother's extraordinary properties. My father wrote in his notes that this was the last thought she could leave to him.

"This golden ring, of course, belongs to my father. They can't go into the church, they can't let the holy sun witness their love, they can only secretly promise each other a sincere heart in this way. ”

Esther glanced at the ring that Shantar was hanging around her neck: "It seems to have words engraved on it." ”

"The black one is 'My Sunshine' and the gold one is 'My Salvation'. If you want me to say, these two people were carried away by love, so they were stupid enough to go together and become terrible parents. ”

Esther tugged at the corners of her mouth, she could hear the genuine grief in Shantal's words, and she couldn't debunk the child's longing for his parents that was far greater than his resentment.

However, she did know why Shantal had become the way she was, even though she was a man, she looked like a woman - the extraordinary properties of the "witch" combined with the ring became a magical item, but the negative effect of this thing was to partially change the body form of the bearer.

"And then your father fled overseas?"

Shantar nodded:

"The goal of his and my mother's plan is Byam, which is more dangerous than going to the Southland. But the Rorsted Islands are home to the Church of the Storm, an enemy of the Church of the Eternal Sun, which is a good hiding place for my father.

"We have been adrift at sea for a while, and I have a part of the impression that every day when I wake up and see the sea, life is quite boring. It was at that time that my father began to teach me literacy, in addition to the basic Rune, as well as Guhemian and Fursack.

"He's not a bad teacher, but we don't have a lot of time. I only got him right if I said the right words to get him back. Out of a child's dependence on his father and fear of the outside world, I learned quickly. ”

"Your father ......," Esther paused, "didn't he teach you about the negative effects of magical items?" ”

Shantar shook his head and rubbed the two rings preciously:

"My father left only his notes and his connections, from which I learned about the extraordinary world and his past. A cultist of the Eternal Sun ran into the territory of the Church of the Storm, not to mention that he was an extraordinary.

"He hooked up with pirates in Byam, found a market for the Extraordinary Underground, infiltrated it to help them with some work, sell finished charms or accept employment from others.

"Because of his pathway abilities, the Sun Waters and Charms he made were very popular with pirates. We had a relatively quiet time, going back and forth between Baiam and Naas, and I was working on the docks for some odd men, while he walked among the dangerous ones, and took me in all kinds of teachings.

"It wasn't a bad life, we had some of our savings in our spare time, and we went fishing together at sea, and I learned to sing with him, and I listened to him tell stories about his past in Trier, especially the scenes of his love affair with my mother, which he could repeat all day.

"Until my father was betrayed, and in the investigation of the substitute punisher, his identity as a heretic was completely exposed."

Shantar's smile was more like a crying face:

"How can anyone be so stupid as to be surrounded by others and still praise the sun loudly?"

(End of chapter)