The mountain was steep and climbing up the ragged terrains did not look too safe in the inexperienced boy's eyes. Moreover, the older girl he has with him repeatedly groaned on the other hand. Her brows furrowed while her lone golden eye mentally dissected the tall mountain.
Previously, it was an empty space. A clear area without a remnant of a rock but just a field of grass and probably, if her memory served her right, a lake nearby. Stargazing on this side of the forest was the best and the fog was the thinnest here as well.
'So where did this tall piece of rock come from?!' she wondered. This would have been a fine, wide space to release her greedy cheat without reserves! That way, surrounding and examining this ignorant child would be a lot easier and faster!
To explain her dilemma, Celes Falon de Lin is a divine beast cultivator with a humongous spiritual aura of her dragonized beast form. A spirit of a 50-feet long dragon with golden eyes, long red horns, dirty white scales, black manes and red claws. In addition was her gigantic wings with a wide span almost as long as the spirit's body. Not exactly the prettiest beast but it is among the cruelest to lurk in this realm.
Celes had appeared like this in battles yet it was barely ever found out that it was her. Many only always saw her dragonized form as a miniature version of the beast flew out her tent and charged into battle as she grew bigger. And also, nobody is allowed to enter the commander's tent!
A nostalgic expression made Celes' face as she let out a small smile and her lone eye no longer glared at the mountain. She has come up with a solution!
But then, a boy's voice penetrated through her thoughts with his one question. "Where are we?"
She tilted her head as if to check the length and thickness of the mountain before her. Without looking at him, Celes answered as she patted his shoulder. "We're here."
"Oh I see."
"And seriously, it is a pretty nice sight here."
But being unable to comprehend what she meant, the boy only nodded despite his inner disagreement. Observing this 'friend' of his, she was dangerous and yet, silly.
"Say, how come that there's suddenly this pile of rock boulders here?" Celes voiced out without any intent of remembering anything. Worst case scenerio, Celes believed that since she couldn't think of any answers on the spot, heavens forbid she start making up her own stories to give an explanation.
On the other hand. . .
"Suddenly?" The little prince repeated. Her question had made him recall a folk lore about this type of event. "If you don't mind, this prince can give you a cent or two about this!"
"Ahuh, go on," Celes gestured him to continue with a straight look into his eyes that reflected him back in hers as she nodded. Such small action of hers made his heart flutter! Not in a romantic way but in a way that the young royal felt significant.
"Have you heard of the beast with a human's face, can talk like humans, have a beast's body and an eagle's wings?"
Celes grinned. "With a serpent for tail? And likes to eat humans? A sphinx!"
"Exactly!" his voice sounded happy but then, reality dawned into him. "Sphinx? Sphinx! They love children's flesh!"
And little did he know that a bigger monster stood next to him. 'This little boy's worries are really for nothing,' Celes wanted to say. A sphinx in general cannot be compared to a divine beast like her. It may as well be a glorious sacrifice for her cultivation and fulfilling her greedy cheat then that spiritual ocean to boot!
But Celes was not so kind to tell him this as a devilish grin surfaced. His worried face looked cute as his watery eyes looked downcast as if ready to cry. His small mouth pouted too. 'Ahhh? Too cute!'
"Come closer, I'll give you some protection spell," the girl told him . . . and without waiting, had pulled him towards her by his arm. A blush coloured his white, unblemished cheeks and burned his ears.
"Wha-what are you d-d-doing?" he stuttered. Yet his dillusion was going to be broken.
"This," she said and pinched his cheeks. 'How soft!'
"Ouch! S-stop! We have a matter on hand!" To him, this woman clearly does not understand the level of danger they are in!
Her tantalizing, golden eye was as nonchalant as ever when he directly gazed hers. She continued to pull on his cheeks and shook her head. "It's okay. Big sister will take care of the problem!"
'Kablaaag!' The ground shook for a bit as a hard and heavy object hit the ground. That 'problem' was now beside them, a smile on its face while its serpent tail hissed.
"Intruders! How dare you tresspass into my territory?"
Celes' eyes went wide, not in fright but in amusement when one went to the zoo for the first time . The boy thought that she had finally understood the danger but what came out of her mouth was different than expected.
"You can talk well. So then answer my question little sphinx," she stopped to look at it's androgynous face. If only the fog was not present and the day was brighter, it would have been easier to determine its gender just by checking if it had a rod underneath or breast on front. Anyway, judging from its weird voice, the sphinx sounded more like a high-pitched man. She continues, "You, have you bought this part of land and engraved your name on it? This is public property! Even dead bodies are here, there burials were free! How dare you!"
"You seem to not understand your position," it stated calmly.
"No, it is you. So right now, this great aunt will give you two options. Search for other place or play with me?" If the child was not here, Celes would have gladly added, 'To death.'
'But his balls may have shrunk back into his body due to this silly scare,' she thought. A supressed laugh escaped her lips.
Thinking that the girl really could care less and disrespected him as much, the sphinx let out a low growl. Unfortunately, there was no such thing as choices to make in front of a flesh-devouring sphinx. It steeled itself, ready to launch an attack.
"Heh?" Celes licked her lower lips to smirk. Because she was only a low level martial warrior, it was still a difficult feat to release her divine beast aura thus the reason for also being unable to at least control a bit of the cheat despite practicing while purifying those countless pits. But that does not mean Celes would be at its mercy!
"Hey prince, do you mind closing your eyes for a bit? I will give you another spiritual fruit to munch on later!"
The boy's arms trembled as his fingers have subconsciously wrapped around her arm's sleeves. He tugged on her arm, refusing to separate from her side. His eyes were watery as he looked up but once meeting her expectant eye, he nodded. As scared as he was, the prince was easy to take care of. Celes rather felt luckier at the moment due to his conduct.
"Okay close your eyes and don't move out from this protection barrier that I will cast. If you do so, you'll be too unfortunate!"
"B-but," he mumbled, the young royal prince wanted to at least protest. The prince had never been provided a protection barrier. Instead, he was always with his guards! But Celes' priorities were already set. With a small hit at the side of his neck, the prince's eyes turned cloudy as he gradually lost his consciousness. Then the barrier was set.
When Celes turned to look at the sphinx, she expressed her gratitude. "Thanks for your courtesy. Because of this, you will have a swift, painless death. You would not even know when you died!" She laughed, her screws in the head started to loosen once more.
With just a flick of her left wrist, a Ji (halberd) fell onto the palm of her hands. Then Celes skillfully swung it around to test its weight and speed. After a couple of swings, her eyes began to examine the light-weight blade feeling that it was a little too light to be depended on. It turns out to be an ordinary looking Ji but upon looking thoroughly on the pole, a single column of gems have lined down. It pulsated like a real heart beat on her palms giving her a sense of familiarity as a divine beast. This gems were nowhere near ordinary! These blue jewel-like embedded stones were spiritual bones!
A spiritual bone was rarely found due to the rarity of the source itself, the sacred beasts. Such spiritual bones are only formed on sacred beasts with more than ten thousand years of cultivation. And these bones are strengthed the higher and the better the cultivation of the beast was thus becoming formidable and stronger. With such dense structure cultivated with the primordial spirit of the beast cultivator, it increases either defense and offense. In Celes' Ji, it was extracted and embedded on this weapon to make it lighter yet with a severe impact.
She stabbed through the air and swung it once more, clearly impressed upon slicing through the empty space. For some reason, Celes felt a sense of relief for being a younger divine beast, at the rank of a martial warrior cultivator.
The sphinx have had enough on the other hand, clearly unable to learn that the girl possessed a weapon forged from a sacred beast's bones. Not a word passed through his mouth before it walked towards its said prey who was currently distracted. Then when he noticed that she was having fun with her weapon, a roar left his mouth and lunged towards her.
'ROAR!'
"Prick!" Celes shouted back in annoyance. With her highly tempered body and the Ji, she had immediately blocked his claws whilst digging her feet into the ground.
"Finally, you're more self aware."
"You're too calm!"
"This is fine." Slowly while he distracted her with his claws, his serpent tail hissed as it crawled closer to her leg. Slowly and as stealthy as possible. The sphinx roared once more, opening its human mouth as wide as possible to reveal a set of overcrowding sharp, jagged teeth. It pressed its weight on the spear as it tried to lean closer, stretching its neck to aim its mouth towards Celes' small shoulders. The serpent itself was close to her robes by then. It was time to strike!
Unfortunately, Celes herself had her own plans. Her tempered body came with keener senses thus allowing her to notice the snake below. A smile drew her lips apart as her predictions were met upon fighting with such bird-brained creature with a poor excuse of a human head! Like any animal, it fought with what it thinks it has for a complete offense: its teeth, its claws, its tail and lastly, its weight. Since Celes had never initiated an attack nor did she leap up and down, its wings were folded close. Once the sphinx pressed its weight forward, Celes released the spear and ducked down.
A flick of her wrist then she was able to grab a random weapon from inside her dimensional storage. It was a gamble whether this plan should work, anyway, Celes believed that her well-tempered state can spare her life even if it fails. An axe was pulled out to her disappointment. 'There's not enough time or space to swing this but whatever, let's try!' A maniacal laughter escaped her lips making the fall sphinx furrow its brows as it dlowly fell to the ground on all fours while facing the bare back of her neck!
To be exact, it was like she had surrended as her face has not been lifted up from looking at the ground. It was as if she was toi exhausted from pushing against him! "Mine," the sphinx rejoiced with a calm statement. It was way too contrasting with the inhumane, ugly grin that literally pulled the corners of its mouth to reach his ears!
But Celes who looked more human than a divine beast also bore a crazy, maniacal smile revealing her unusually long canines. She ducked down and lowered herself closer to the ground because the girl needed space to swing the axe better and aim to its mouth better!
"Buyaka!!!!" She screamed upon turning her body to face the beast and then greeted it with a swift attack of a blade straight between its teeth. But the blade which had been an ordinary forged iron left to rust in the pit became too dull to split the sphinx's jaws apart.
"Unggggaaaahhhhhhhh!!!!"
Nevertheless, a blood curling wail satisfied Celes' disappointment. The jaws were still attached to the flesh but were loosely hanging as the beast screeched in pain.
She shook her head. "I told you it would be too abnormal to be so calm!"
"Unnggggaaaahhhhhh!"
"Hmmphh, as promised, I'll give you a quick painless death, hehehe!"
As if to increase the thrill for the harmed creature, she slowly moved closer and took her time. The axe laid limp on her hand as she suddenly leapt off the ground. The sphinx's eyes widened and in an attempt to escape her next attack, had spread its wings to fly backwards. Celes who was about to pound its head open with the dull blade responded by spinning her body and landed a heavy drop kick of a well-tempered state cultivator instead.
"Ungggaaaaahhhhh!"
"We can keep this going for as long as you want you know? So quick or play again?"