Alicia's arm was outstretched beyond the door of her home and trembling as she watched Aaron leave with Blue Hair as his travel companion.
In the course of their chat, she learned who Blue Hair was and the reason for which she came to visit.
Alicia found it very hard to believe that a member of the cabinet and stepped her revered feet into her household. As much as she felt privileged, she also feared.
Alicia worried for the safety of her son.
She couldn't fight nor did she have any strange powers of sorts to protect Aaron with. She simply watched, after much of her pleading failed, as Blue Hair took him along on the journey to the chieftain's palace.
A stream of tears rolled down from the corner of her eyes as she clasped her hands tightly and made a prayer to the heavens for her son's safety.
"Please be safe, Aaron dear," she cried, sniffling through her speech.
.
.
.
"Hey," Aaron called his companion's attention.
Blue Hair glanced his way and waited for him to say why he called her.
"We need to stop somewhere first. There's someone I need to follow me."
"The chieftain requested for only you and no one else," Blue Hair argued.
"She might as well get this person as an extra package."
Aaron and Blue Hair argued for minutes as they walked with neither of them refusing to give in to the other's request.
Eventually...
"Get ready, Elsa. You're coming with me."
Aaron won the argument and dragged Blue Hair with him to the Love Clinic to pick up his apprentice.
"Huh? To where master?" Elsa asked.
Aaron moved close to her. "To see the chieftain of course."
"Whaaat! No no no!" she cried out, immediately stepping away from Aaron and begging him to not go.
Aaron sighed. "What are you even afraid of? Didn't you say she devoured only men? It's not like you're a man."
As Aaron thought about it, it hit him to actually confirm and in an instant, he was so close to Elsa that their bodies felt each other's breath.
With her master's sudden approach, Elsa froze and her body stiffened like a corpse.
Aaron's eyes narrowed as he checked her out before glaring into her azure eyes to ask one simple question.
"Are you a man, Elsa?"
Meanwhile, Blue Hair was lost in thought having heard Elsa's opinion of the chieftain from Aaron's mouth.
"Devour men?" she thought, "What a blasphemous thing to say about my lady. Yuck! I wouldn't even allow her to have a taste of a man. Ugh! Awful!"
Elsa froze again and then blinked several times. She was left dumbfounded by her master's question.
"N-No... no! I'm a girl!" she blurted out, trying to move away from Aaron but couldn't since she was standing between a wall and her master.
Aaron pressed forward a bit more, glancing at her breasts and then her face which was washed red. He did it a couple of more times before stepping away.
"That's good then. Get ready, you have thirty minutes."
"Do we really have to wait for her?" Blue Hair inquired, already growing impatient.
"Yes."
The two of them waited a while for Elsa to get ready and after about an hour, Elsa stepped outside in her elegant red and black silk dress that showcased her youthful, feminine magnificence.
Aaron smiled and nodded at her. He was impressed especially since he had not seen her dress so formally before.
"You look elegant in that dress, Elsa," he complimented her.
Elsa rubbed her hands together and turned away, her ears tingling on hearing Aaron's words and her eyes darting away from his.
"Th-Thank you, master."
Blue Hair cleared her throat and interrupted the moment between master and apprentice.
"Yeah, right. We should get going."
.
.
.
They walked for long hours, going beyond Bambara Village up to a vast length that separated Bambara Village from another thorp inside the Crimson Melon town called the Herb Village.
Going to the chieftain's palace was more hectic than Aaron imagined.
"No wonder, she doesn't come around as often as I'd expected," Aaron thought after assessing the stress level of the journey so far, "even I wouldn't cross all these just to visit some villages, pfft!"
The three of them came upon the edge of a cliff with Blue Hair standing in front and pointing forward.
"We are here... King Elda's castle."
Aaron and Elsa approached much closer, looking at Blue Hair at the same time.
"Who's King Elda?" Elsa asked.
Blue Hair's veins popped and she turned to the redhead with fire in her eyes.
"That's my lady chieftain!" she barked like a crazed bitch.
"Uhm, wouldn't that be more like... Queen Elda? You said she was female, didn't you?" Aaron added.
Blue Hair's entire body twitched with rage. She couldn't believe the nerves of these two people.
Ahead of them was a castle with most of its structure covered by thick fog, that deterred a clear view of the place, but even with the foggy cover, there was one obvious characteristic of this place they were looking at.
It was big.
Aaron turned to Blue Hair, who was already crouched and drawing a circular pattern on the ground with her blood.
He had seen something similar a lot of times in his past life during his battles against mankind. "A magic circle?" Aaron thought.
"How are we going to get there?" Elsa asked. She was visibly worried because beyond the edge of a cliff was nothing but the space that separated them from the castle.
"I'm working on it. Please step back."
Aaron and Elsa heeded her instruction and moved back a few steps.
After a little time, Blue Hair was done with the pattern she was drawing and stepped back to join her companions.
It was a magic circle that was made up of three concentric circles with a star, bearing strange inscriptions between the circles.
Blue Hair closed her eyes, stretched out her bleeding palms and muttered incomprehensible words that she used to enchant the circle.
Within minutes, little cracks manifested within the pattern on the ground and rays of light shot up until they formed a whole.
By the time Blue Hair was done, Elsa and Aaron were gazing at a glowing pillar of light in front of them.
Elsa's jaw dropped. "Woahhh!"
She had never seen anything like that before. "What is that?"
"It's some kind of magic doorway, I presume," Aaron answered her, being very careful with his choice of words so he didn't reveal how much he really knew.
Blue Hair nodded, approving of Aaron's answer as they proceeded to enter the glowing pillar.
.
.
.
In an instant, they appeared inside the castle, thanks to Blue Hair's magic portal that transported them and Aaron stared at the environs of the castle with great admiration.
The place was bigger than he had imagined after viewing it from the cliff.
Much bigger and more refined with different species of flowers decorating the outside and adding a colourful lustre to the already magnificent structure.
The ground sparkled spotlessly and was layered with quality stone, something he could tell with a single glance.
King Elda was rich and it was evident that she was not shy about spending her money.
That was the kind of person Aaron liked. Now, he was interested in meeting this person.
Now, he wanted to know who she was. She had control of a wide network of information and was also very wealthy.
Aaron was certain that King Elda would be a vital piece to him in this world, whether as a pawn or an ally, he was yet to determine.
Seeing the chieftain's castle stirred up a hunger for affluence inside of him. A hunger to amass power and influence in this world.
The Incubus Lord already knew better than anyone the one language that the whole of mankind listened to...
The language of money.