Towards the afternoon the boys went to Taiyo. The giant stone walls welcomed the pilgrims again and the busy streets surrounded their hearing. It was quite different from the quiet secluded villa on Earth. Perhaps even Iruk missed this bustle.

  "Okay... What's for lunch?" Natsu asked as soon as he crossed the threshold of their home.

  "What? Now you're here!" I shot him a look.

  "I'm hungry too." Fuyu announced, preferring to look around the house as if he hadn't even uttered the sentence.

  I growled angrily and stormed off to my room.

  "Stupid vampires. I don't even have time to unpack and they're already asking me for something." I muttered to myself.

  "We heard you." The boys said in chorus.

  Ugh, Kenji wasn't here. Kenji had rented an apartment in town during rehearsals, so he went to see if the apartment was still available. His apartment was closer to the castle where the nobles live. When I asked Kenji how much the rent was, I couldn't believe my ears. It was 300,000 yen. The yen here had the same name as our currency on Earth, but looked quite different in appearance, but even here 300,000 is a large sum. Kenji didn't mention how he came up with such a large sum to be able to pay rent for it, but that was our mysterious Kenji. After I unpacked everything and changed into a comfortable shirt and pants, I started to go visit Kenji. I admit, I was curious about his apartment.

  "Irukoooooo, I'm hungry." The whiny tone of a hungry Natsuo reached my room.

  "Right. Right. I'm going to go cook something now." I yelled back.

  ?????????????????????

  After lunch I set off to see Kenji, hoping to explore the city more. The streets were narrow and high. The smells of spices, food, perfume and other various things wafted through the air. All kinds of people walked around me. Women, men, children. Adults or old. People who were just walking around like me or those who were in a hurry. I may not have been a total fan of busy streets, but today I welcomed it. Solitude in the woods is nice, but going out among the people now and then won't kill anyone either.

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  The street began to widen until I came upon a square. From there, as Kenji had instructed, I was to turn right and go to the next street. I looked at the fountain where the children were playing. It was a sunny day again and the children were frolicking in the water. The weather never seems to change here. I thought to myself.

  I was walking down an alley when I heard a girl screaming from a side street. There was a girl about 17 years old and a bunch of pretty slimy guys around her. They definitely didn't have good intentions with this girl. I had to stop it.

  "Hey!" I shouted, drawing attention to myself.

  It was obvious they weren't normal people. Their mouths were watering and their eyes were bloodshot. They smelled pretty bad from a long distance away.

  "Who are you? You smell awful." I asked, waving my hand in front of my nose to get some fresh air.

  "We be ghouls."

  Ghouls? Where have I heard that before. I couldn't think too much because the three guys lunged at me.

  "Fireball!"

  Two of them dodged, luckily the third one didn't. It hit him and he burst into flames. His screaming was unbearable, it was ear-splitting. But it wasn't long before he passed out from the pain and then burned up. The redhead just clamped her mouth shut in disbelief and pressed herself harder against the wall.

  "So now there are only two left." I said to myself.

  They were already close to me. I had to think fast.

  "Landslide."

  The ground beneath them began to sink, and they with it. The ground swallowed them whole and then returned to normal. I watched for a while to see if anything was wrong, but nothing. I finally looked up to the girl and was able to look at her.

  She had beautiful fiery orange hair that was waist length. She was about the same height as me. There was a glint of fear in her green eyes, but also relief. I stepped closer to her.

  "Are you okay?" I gently touched her slim hand.

  "Yes I am. Thank you. If it weren't for you, I'd be dead." She blurted out and hugged me.

  Wow! I didn't see that coming. I stood with my arms outstretched, waiting for her to pull away. I'm a hero after all.

  "You want a ride? I'm going to see my friend who lives down the street."

  "Yes, I'd love to. We share the same road."

  "Okay. Otherwise, I'm Iruka." And he held out his hand to her.

  She squeezed it gently and shook it.

  "I'm Dylia." She replied, smiling a little.

  I returned her smile and walked back to the main street with her. Suddenly there were people walking by again and we merged with them. I left Dylia and went to Kenji.