The White Hair

1 - The Boy

"Hey brat, wake up! How dare you dozing off on this day!"
The boy's head was kicked, and bounced off to the wall. He groaned as his head filled with pain as the guard who woke him up forced him to stand and dragged him by force to walk while his hands and his legs shackled to a room that stained by blood. The guard then sat the boy on a chair and tied him up with another shackles. Then, he spat on the boy's face.
"Sit down and be obedient you dog. Don't dare you to ran away."
The guard left the room, leaving the boy with a dumbfounded face, because today is indeed different from his usual routine each early morning. By when he woke up, he was already thrown to this room along with a scientist smiling bringing along a lot of thing to experiment on him. Although he suffered everyday, his body never grown weak and never got hungry, he thought maybe due to the experiment.
The guard talked to a woman in a lab coat, then leaving after cursing the boy for dirtying his hand every morning, making the boy wondered why don't he asks for other people to drag him here, not that he mind that though.
The woman entered the room, stiffened because of the stench of the boy emitting, then took a distance and make a chair from nowhere, from her maguc. The boy surprised seeing a chair from nowhere, because he never saw any magic before he was 'abducted' to this experiment, that makes him delusioning about him to be a grand magician ar a sword saint. Remembering that itched him to slap his past self to have such a useless delusions.
The woman then took some paper from nowhere, and read the content aloud.
"Subject number 1."
“...”
"Code name 'Erst'."
“...”
"Have neither mana nor talent for sword."
"..."
"Well," the woman threw the papers to her left that makes the paper scrambled on the floor.
"What you want to do now?"
"... What?"
He dumbfounded once again hearing those words directed to him.
"I mean, hey, after you went all the time wasting on this experiment, as a subject unfortunately, suffering through all those torture, don’t you have a single thing you want to do? Then, i sincerely ask. What you want to do?"
"... Insane? Grudge, emperor."
His words were a mess because he did never talk because he was not allowed to and never listened to those scientist's conversation because his ear were closed by a something he doesn't understand what it is from the start of the experiment, right from he was six years old, until now, fifteen years old. Insanely amount of time for not to talk and to hear. What he doesn't understand that he was able to hear this morning, that he noticed when the woman talks to him. So, his words were a bit mixed of a child's tone while his body were a teenager.
The woman sighed and muttering something that he can't hear. Then she makes a firm expression and said,
"Well, of course! The emperor. You hold a grudge for him that you are in this state for this many years? Almost ten years you have been confined in this experiment. Even though you only have a white hair, this damned kingdom make that fact to use those who have them to be tortured and thrown to this place to be a subject test. So, i think, i change the question. How, you able to do that?”
Upon hearing this question, the boy surprised, as she can guess his intention of what he want to say despite his lack of vocabulary, and what she asks in the end because he certainly didn’t know what to do.
“... No answer? Well, it’s time for me to shine! Hey, how about joining the demon side?”
“..!”
He dumbfounded, what the hell is this woman say?
“Hey, why such a stupid face? Well, i think you don’t have any prior plan. So, what you think?”
“... Who, you?”
“Aha! This brat a clever one, aren’t you? Well, to be honest, i'm a spy whom sent by the demon army. The name's H'kalla. Just call me Kal.”
Then the woman’s shining bright that the boy’s eyes were hurt. When the light's gone, the woman's skin darkened a bit and from her forehead grows a horn right in the middle of her forehead. The boy stupified, and said,
“... Why, me?”
“Hmm, to be honest, i think you are the most sane one amongst those experiment subjects. If that doesn’t convince you, well, for no reason, i think? Well it’s fun if the one i choose turns out to be the best. Just call it an instinct.”
“...”
It is true, considering how he lives his life all this time. Whenever he fought another subject test, although he can’t a single voice, he was certain that another test subjects can only scream whenever they fought. Not that he doesn’t though, so he saw the scientists laughed whenever they fought.
“... So that doesn’t convince you huh?”
“... Continue. How?”
“Oho! Straight to the point. I like this one. You decided right?”
“... Not, answering.”
“Ah, yes. The answer. Hmm, i'm sorry. Nothing i can do right now. First i must contact my superior in the demon army, and then at least, tomorrow is the quickest i can answer you, whether i can took you outta here or not. Let’s hope i can.”
The woman stand and the chair crumbled. Her appearance reverted back to her human appearance, and then collecting the papers she thrown down.
“Well boy, how do i call you?”
“... Don't, remember, one. Pick, one, me.”
“Hmm, a name huh? ... How about your code name, 'Erst'?”
“Not, bad.”
“Then, see ya tomorrow.”
The woman left the room, leaving the boy behind lost in thought. The woman smiled, as she found a treasure inside the room. The boy sighed, today is going to be another tough day.

---

In the woman’s room, she took an artifact that shaped like a normal notebook and then opened it. That artifact is indeed a communication device. It works simply like a chat, you write something on the book, then the other side that have the artifact too will get the notebook written with what you wrote with a shining words when given, the sign when receiving the message. The advantage using this artifact is indeed hard to detect. The downside is, well, waste of paper and money. But that is no problem for the demon side, their advantage is a lot of resource to make artifacts like that. Then, the woman took a pen and write on the artifact.
‘Kar, you there?’
A minute later the answer arrived.
‘Yes, i do. What? Any problem on that side?’
'Actually, a bit. I have got a contact from the 'Mana User'.’
'Hmm, indeed it is rare to find even in demon realm. But to think it appears on the human side...’
‘Have you forgotten it is harder to find them in human realm because they haven't noticed their talent even a bit?’
‘Oh, now you mention it. I forgot that their existence is recorded on the demon realm for decades ago. Even in the demon side, they appeared at least once a year. Why haven’t they noticed yet?’
‘Well, those existence is usually called 'Manaless' or 'The Demon Child', which is intriguing me at how they treat those existence because they are different from them. While another humans do have mana circulated all over their body, 'Manaless’ uses mana from the nature so in their body barely contain any mana. Well, they don’t want to be overlapped maybe? So they discriminated them and isolated their existence.’
‘Back to the topic, what you want to do?’
'The 'Mana User' have given his consent to join our side. Can you give your consent?’
The answer didn’t came for a few minute. The woman, Kal, finally bored that she’s laying on her bed bringing the 'notebook' and her pen. Then, the answer came after half a hour.
'The higher ups have given their consent. Bring him to this side as fast as possible.’
‘Roger.’
The woman smiled and put the artifact back on her desk.