The night had grown deep. The town was so quiet at night — no voices, no footsteps, no weight of movement anywhere. Shine and the others had all fallen asleep. Now the dining table held only memories of what had happened there just moments before. Because the wall of Jhed's room was broken, cold air kept drifting in from outside.
Meanwhile, in another room, Nain slept alone. Daichi's house was truly quite large — it had five rooms. So much had happened in these two days, and yet Daichi's wife still hadn't come home. She was staying at a friend's place. No one knew what was going through her mind.
While Nain slept, the sound of her growling would slip out with her breathing. It came out so loudly that Shine and Daichi couldn't sleep properly. Jhed, though, was used to this kind of thing — back in his old world, where he used to live, the sound of traffic used to carry on late into the night. So her growling didn't bother him at all. Besides, he was exhausted. The moment he lay down on the bed, sleep had taken him instantly.
After the silence of the night, morning came. The sun had returned to the sky, spreading its light and greeting everyone with a hello.
Shine had woken up. Daichi had gotten up early and had already prepared breakfast for everyone.
"Good morning, Daichi," Shine said, sitting down in a chair.
"Good morning. Jhed and Nain aren't up yet?" he asked.
"Those two don't wake up early."
Daichi set the breakfast down on the dining table. It was warm, fresh off the stove.
Just then, the front door opened, and a woman walked in.
"'Preka,' you—" Daichi looked at her in astonishment. From the look on his face, it was clear she was his wife. And indeed, she was.
"What? Why are you so shocked? Like you don't even know me," Preka said, stepping inside the house.
She had put on quite a lot of makeup, and it clearly showed. Her hair was long, reaching all the way down to her knees. There were wrinkles beneath her eyes, but she still looked youthful — perhaps because of the makeup.
She came and sat down in the chair beside Shine.
"Give me some too. I'm starving."
"Yes, coming right up." Daichi quickly set breakfast down in front of her. Perhaps he was rather afraid of her.
Shine sat quietly, watching her.
"Oh, go on and eat. You're a guest here," Preka said, and began eating her own breakfast.
"Hmm." Shine smiled, nodded, and started eating too. He felt rather uncomfortable.
Come on, Jhed, hurry up. Being around this woman feels strange, Shine thought to himself.
"It's been a full eighteen years since a guest has come to our town."
"Oh, I see. So where had you gone?" Shine tried to make conversation.
"What can I even say — I left the house because I was fed up with him. He doesn't care about me at all. He's always working, always working. He has such a beautiful wife and never pays her any attention." Preka said quite a bit more than was needed.
She was glaring at Daichi with real anger. Poor Daichi looked frightened — or perhaps just trapped.
Seems like my question set her off. Come on, Jhed, hurry up — how can anyone sleep this long?
Meanwhile, in the other room, Silia had woken up. She lifted her head — and it knocked straight into the underside of the bed.
"Ouch... that really hurt. Oh right, I fell asleep under the bed. I don't even know when I dozed off."
That idiot went outside and never came back, she thought to herself.
Silia slowly crawled out from under the bed, looking around. Sunlight was falling on Jhed's face, but he showed no sign of waking up at all.
He left me here and is sleeping so peacefully himself. Let me just suck his blood right now. She climbed onto Jhed's chest and began to bite at his neck.
"Aaaa....!" Jhed let out a loud scream.
"Jhed—" Shine immediately shot up from his chair and ran toward Jhed's room.
"Whose voice was that?" Preka asked.