The Return of the Beloved Son

The Capital

The wheels of The Portable Pub turned, rolling over he bumpy terrain of the dirt road leading towards the mansion. Ken rested in the back of the carriage, still unconscious, while Oki watched over him. Driving the carriage was the blue haired battle maid, Rem. Next to her, riding in the passenger seat was the little librarian known as Beatrice. The ride to the Capital would only take at most 6 hours. They had reached the Roswaal Mansion's remains before Ken woke up again.

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Rubbing his head, Ken was confused when the carriage wasn't moving. We there already?

Noticing that Oki wasn't around, Ken wondered if he was outside. The bright sun blinded him when he opened the tarp's flap. Ken shielded his eyes until they adjusted to the brightness, blinking when they did. His shoes crunched the ground when he jumped out, looking around he saw he was in a clearing surrounded by trees, lots of trees.

Stretching, Ken looked over to see Oki, not far from the carriage, his back to him. Ken began jogging towards him, wondering where they were. Upon closer inspection of the clearing, Ken saw a dried out fountain, hedges, and dust everywhere. No....ashes.

Ken slowed down to a walk, shuffling over to a pile of ashes Ken felt something hard. Kicking aside some of the ashes, Ken found what looked like an old rag. Upon inspection, Ken found a burnt human skull under the cloth.

"Ahh!" Startled, Ken fell back onto his butt. His hand landed on what felt like a small stick Ken held it up to see what it was. Is this....a bone?

"Eh! Ah!" Quickly realizing he was in a pile of bones, Ken scrambled to get out of it, fear taking over him, "Oh fuck, fuck, fuck. Fuck me." The crunching and snapping of bones was the result of Ken trying to escape.

Finally out of the mess, Ken noticed he was covered in ashes of the dead and frantically patted himself down until a small amount was left that he couldn't remove. Looking at the bones, Ken noticed it was a pile of at least 15 burnt skeletons and almost fainted. This...this is wrong. "Is this how the cult handle their dead?" There was no doubt that these were the bodies of the fallen cultists who died to Ram.

Ken backed away from the pile and bumped into something large. Turning around, Ken saw that it was Oki. "Oh thank go-." Oki put a finger to his own lips to shush Ken then pointed ahead.

A few feet from them, on the ground, was Rem. She was on her knees, in front of her was a curved witch cultist sword, imbedded into the soil. Rem removed a purple ribbon from the sword, faded from being in the sun for so many months. Ken didn't understand the meaning of the ribbon until Rem discarded her pink ribbon and replaced it with the purple one. It must be Ram's.

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Rem didn't cry. Her sister may be gone, but she wouldn't let it be in vain. While, she wanted to fulfill her promise to her sister they made together to kill all of the witch cultists, Rem was finally coming to terms that there were simply too many. That dream was too large for her to fulfill in one lifetime. If she could barely take out three of them during her encounter with them a few days ago what chance would she have against a whole community of them? There were just too many for her to take on. But she still wanted to take down as many as she could before settling down with Subaru and living a quiet life. They took almost everything from her so she wanted to take down just as many as them.

Ken never felt the sadness of losing someone he cared about, so he couldn't relate to Rem's sadness. While Rem never wanted to see her sister die first, Ken couldn't wait for his father to die. It was an evil thought, but Ken thought his father was an evil man who cared about nothing but himself. Looking at the carriage, he realized how selfish he had become, like his father. He was so caught up in what was best for himself, that he yelled at Rem for a simple request, he called his best friend names whenever he did something wrong, and he kept pushing people away when they got too close to him. The worst part was he had no problem with that. Ken never regretted making his mistakes, made no effort to correct them, only letting them stay unaddressed. Just like his deadbeat father.