Forgive || The Promised Neverland

➴ Chapter Two: Flower ➴

 << Even flowers have their thorns, didn't you know? >>

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It wasn't like the Geelan clan was new information. Both [Name] and Norman had known about the disparities in the demon society. With a reigning monarch like Queen Legravalima, disagreements and banishments were guaranteed. The Geelan clan had come up in [Name]'s conversations with the locals many times, some of them missing the former noble.

[Name] hadn't been sure if the Geelan clan was still alive - they had gone into banishment seven hundred years ago. Although, things such as the tiles that had taught the two leaders the ancient language suggested that this very base had been the former resident of the exiled clan. But they had long left the base, leaving the two to wonder where they had escaped.

Naturally, they tried to narrow it down. Cities, villages, and towns were already out of the question - so were the bases of the imperial soldiers. Then there were the areas that the average demon wouldn't enter and, the target had to be big enough to contain such enormous creatures. They'd narrowed it down to two forests - the one that [Name] frequently traveled through to enter the demon village and another closer to Grace Field Farm.

Underground shafts, caves, hidden villages, and forbidden areas wouldn't be big enough to house the Geelan clan, so they were off the list. It would've been different if these were purely wild demons, but they used to feed off of human meat. Because of that, even if they were banished to the wild, they would remain enormous.

"Can we trust this Gorian, though?" Norman questioned, interlacing his fingers over his desk. [Name] took a seat on one of the two sofas that faced a coffee table in front of him. She laid her folded cloak beside her and crossed one of her legs over the other.

"That is a good question," she hummed. "Even if we've worked on the demon disguise, there's still a possibility that he could've noticed that I was human. The vendors didn't, but inside an empty library, it would be easier to pick up my scent."

"Are you concerned about that?" Norman asked. His brows furrowed. The demon disguise was one of the riskier parts of his plan. They'd done their research when making it, but still, testing it out was more dangerous than he would've preferred. It'd had been four months since they used it in the wild - and nothing had happened to them yet.

But this had to be perfect. Norman couldn't allow any smudges in his painting, especially ones that endangered anyone within his care.

He was brought out of his tiny moment of panic by [Name]'s pondering hum. The girl was staring past Norman and to the map that lay behind him.

"Not particularly," she admitted, narrowing her eyes to get a better glimpse of the hand-drawn chart. "The other villagers view him as a nut and a weirdo. If he were to spread anything about me, I doubt it would do anything important. Besides, if Gorian knew about my identity before, he hasn't done anything. I don't think it's necessary to silence him just yet."

"Still, it's better to take precautions," Norman advised. "I trust your judgment, but this is a demon we're talking about. We don't want to take too many risks."

"I'm aware," [Name] replied. "Although... if the Geelan clan is there, we can use them as planned, rather than resorting to that. We don't know if it'll work on the nobles, after all."

"Clan or not, I still plan on using it," Norman said dryly. [Name] nodded.

"Of course," she said as if it were second nature. They've made amazing progress on devolving the devolution drug ever since February. However, it had yet to diminish humanoid demons to the point of wild creatures. Their test subjects had been the demon workers, kidnapped from their jobs.