The Tenderness Inside of You

Prologue : Where are you...

Before you started: Hi everyone, welcome~ This is the second book(Act3) of the "Memory perished". There are many settings continued from the "Memory perished". So, if you get confused, read "Memory perished" first~ Thank you for your time and understanding (>^ω^<)

I hate myself, like a coward. I thought I was finally free from the chain, from the instincts I was born of. However, why I am so weak? Why can I still feel the existence of him? He is so far away, like he is avoiding me or something. I'm tired of fighting with myself, my cruel instincts, just...

I wanna survive...

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As the twilight starts to hide her face, letting the dim light gently fade. A lost deer were strolling around the forest, trying to find the way to go out the pine tree forest. He didn't know how long he had lost in the misty forest, he should just walking pass by, but when he smelled the aroma of the honey fruitage flicking by the zephyr, he couldn't help it.

The lost deer's ear perked up as he had sensed something is following him. He tilted his head and glancing around, confused. He hurried up his pace suspiciously. The misty forest might have taken him over. He needs to get out of the woods as soon as possible.

Like everyone and every animal who have entered the forest, none of them could find its way out until the next morning. The lost deer speeded up his pace even faster, running blindly. He had failed to escape from the forest before the dark enveloped the misty forest like others. He just keeps running. Fear had taken over him effortlessly, he just running endlessly, until...

The horrified deer fell onto the ground, and its velocity keeps forcing him forward, wallowing. The defeated deer try to stand up but fall onto the ground again. He can't see anything but darkness embracing the lost deer. The night of the forest had come, quietly.

Suddenly, the lost deer's ears twitched as he heard some noise from nearby, a sound like the movement of thick liquid, getting louder and louder from his direction. The flustered deer gives pressure to his legs, wants to get up desperately but be stumbled by the stick and falls again. He tried to stand up but he couldn't, he had used out all of his strength, and this is his end, he thought. The desperate deer relaxed his muscle laying onto the cold and wet surface, allowing the unknown creature do as its pleased.

The noise is gone, but the lost deer didn't move. He knows the creature is in front of him. He gasped in shock as the coldness running under his spine as the liquid creature starts to winding his leg slowly. The horrified deer shivered as his abdomen is swallowed by the unknown liquid creature, moaning in agony. Out of all expected, the creature stopped his motion. The lost deer feel he couldn't holding his eyes open anymore, getting tired and tired. His mind told him he needs to rest, he needs to rest so desperately. All of the horror and unevenness just flowed away, like they had never been there. Before the mingled feeling deer could even realize, he had succumbed to the pull of slumber.

The dark liquid form of creature leaves its target, slowly forming a silhouette of a figure in the darkness. Minutes passed by, the thick gloomy liquid is nowhere to found but an ebony hedgehog lying on the ground, opening his eyelid arduously. He pulled himself up with his elbow and glancing around, noticing the unconscious deer laying beside him. His eyes widened in shock and disbelief, looking down at his shaking hand and clenches it in anger. The black liquid leaks out from his fist, dropping down onto the ground, and the striped hedgehog didn't care. His eyes moisturized, so many emotions going through his head like it's going to explode right away and mostly, guilt.

He had done it, he had done it again.

His instincts, he, had done it again.

The self-blaming hedgehog curls up against the trunk of a sequoia tightly, didn't want to let anyone seeing him. He had done something unforgivable again, rather his cruel instincts or himself, HE had done it again, sucking other's energy again. The gentle moonlight scattering around the misty forest with a gentle breeze, accompanied by an anguished sob echoing around the woods. Suffering by his piteous destiny others won't even look at.

Why...

I just want to end this...

No one would save me...

I don't want to do this anymore.

Where, where are you...