Little Star

Chapter Twelve

I present to you....the doll (more or less)

Frankenstein's POV (so who saw that coming?)

Things had become so different for me in recent times, starting from four years ago. The first major change to have hit my life had occurred more than eight hundred and twenty years ago when I first met Master and swore allegiance to him, believing that I would be at peace after that. Of course I wasn't because for some reason, Master suddenly vanished without a trace and Lukedonia proved to be utterly incompetent in finding him, though I didn't do any better at that job. It would have still been too stifling to continue living in Lukedonia without Master, and so I returned to the human world; doing things here and there which allowed me to amass an impressive amount of wealth over the centuries. None of that wealth, however, eased the loneliness that always kept gnawing at me.

Until four years ago, when I found a little baby girl left on my doorstep.

I had never intended to keep her. I had never intended to change my mind about letting the foster system keep her. But she decided that she wanted me to be her father, and I was not able to bring myself to say no to those big red eyes of hers. At the time, I had been suspicious about the colour of her eyes but she hadn't possessed the aura of a noble and nobles weren't the type to abandon their children on humans' doorsteps. And so I decided to make little Aramina mine. It didn't take me long to fall in love with her, and though she could never replace the gaping hole in my heart which had been created because of Master's absence, she was still such a beautiful remedy. I couldn't bare to even think about living without my sweet little daughter now, even if she wasn't my daughter by blood. Blood ties didn't matter in our bond. I was the one who had raised her and loved her, and so I would always be her father.

Then a few months ago, the gaping hole in my heart had also been filled because Master returned, though I had been disappointed when he told me that he felt the slightest hint of a noble's aura from Aramina and that if a noble in Lukedonia truly was her parent, they would be able to fully recognize her if they met her. That had made me feel possessive and insecure at the same time; possessive because Aramina was mine and insecure because I didn't want to lose what was mine. She was such a sweet and obedient child who very diligently learned everything I taught her. She was even quite sharp for her age, which had been proven when she had said that she was able to feel M-21, Takeo and Tao's auras. Despite all the ties they'd previously had with the Union, she still welcomed them with open arms and gave them the positions of her big brothers. I couldn't have been more proud of her.

She had even done the same for Seira and Regis, who I'd slightly been terrified to see at first from the fear that they had come to take her away, but they didn't even realize who she was until much later. Then the realization came, and my fear only amplified. I knew I was being selfish when I openly supported Aramina's own inhibitions about returning to Lukedonia, and Master too later reprimanded me for that. But being as generous and understanding as he was, he never forced me or Aramina to rush to Lukedonia if she wasn't ready. Everything had been running smoothly once Seira and Regis, then Gejutel too, agreed to keep quiet about Aramina. Well, Gejutel kept quiet about both her and Master because Master had personally requested him for that.

And then Rael Kertia came along.

Honestly, how was that hyperactive little ball of fire even related to Ragar? When I encountered the older son and the current clan leader, Rajak, during our fight here in Lukedonia which had occurred only a while ago, I had been able to believe that he was most certainly Ragar's son. But Rael? Good gracious. The apple fell too far from the tree in his case. But he was still my late best friend's son which was why I decided to go easy on him during our fight back in Korea, until he made the mistake of kidnapping my child. Or, Karias Blerster's child.