“Where were you?!” the sound of a strong slap on Ahri’s face made him grip his sword tightly.

 It was always like that whenever Ahri comes home late. Her mother would beat her and tell her how stupid and useless she was. At first, Ahri would reason out why she arrives late which was she had to do extra work in her part-time job to have money for her projects but then the treatment she receives was still the same. Her mother will call her a liar and just beat her even more. Ahri has gone deaf and numb of all of it for years so whenever it happens she just decided to just keep shut and apologize. She would wash the dishes before going to her room and sleep her aching body and exhaustion.

Her mother had treated her like trash when her father left them seven years ago. Her mother wasn’t able to accept it and hated her. Ahri thought that maybe half of the reason was she resembled her dad a lot. Yes, she hated her dad but she hated her mom the most. She was supposed to comfort her, to love her and support her.

They have a business, a small convenience store where her mom take all away the income and used it for all her vices. She doesn’t give Ahri any and call her useless because she doesn’t help in their store. She had to work somewhere else to support herself for her education.

One evening, her mother was drunk and kept on hitting and kicking her anywhere on her body.

He could see that the demon that was behind her mom was getting stronger and the guardian who was battling it was having a hard time. A demon suddenly appeared beside Ahri, muffling something to her. He immediately jumped at it and battled it. He was furious, even more when he saw her looking at the knife, “Don’t do it!” he yelled and heard the demon laughed loudly. “She’s weak. She’ll do it”

“No. She won’t!” he charged in a flash and slashed the demon in half; it exploded, turned into ash and scattered into the air. He turned to the guardian who was battling the demon who almost possessed Ahri’s mother. He wanted to help but his duty was to protect Ahri only.

Finally, her mother stopped hitting her but Ahri dragged herself to where the knife was. “Please don’t do it” he begged though he completely knew choices are still made by humans. He could only keep the hurt and pity to himself seeing blood on her lip and her cheek swollen again.

She cried when her mother left and sat at the corner, leaning her battered body on their kitchen’s counter.

It was obvious, she was slowly giving up on her life; he could see how lifeless her eyes have become, a complete opposite of how they were when she was a kid. Her smile which he rare