After 3 weeks of training in the forest.
"Good, keep it up. Izumi your front is open. Ken, your right knee can be kicked to break your joint, so lean forward and bend it making it stronger. That's it, left, now right." Shin was instructing Ken and Izumi how to do hand to hand combat and the scene looked like if they were dancing as they jumped from from one tree top to another.
"Good enough. We will stop here for now. Let's have lunch and I will let you both relax for a while and then we will restart the training." Shin was sweating after taking on the two of them. Unlike the starting days of their training, Ken and Izumi started making it harder and harder for Shin to hold both of them off at the same time.
"The best time of a day, lunch. Let's eat fast, I am starving." Ken sat down as he rolled his sleeves and started roasting some meat and placed some wild fruits they found in the jungle. Ken and Izumi underwent the same kind of training for getting lunch till three days ago. Ken and Izumi started solving Shin's tracks and where he hid the food much faster than the first day. Finally, Shin determined that they no longer needed to undergo the training.
After the training Ken and Izumi were able track down any kind of animal just by looking at the tracks and got very good at hunting and gathering food. They always sparred with each other in the morning and ran in the evening. Shin started training them and teaching them different things in the afternoons since the last three days.
The trio finished up their lunch within 15 minutes and rested on the grass as usual.
"Eating and Training. These are the only thing we have been doing for a while now. I thought you said the situation was grave. Then why are we wasting our time here training in the woods? While we train here, the people we are supposed to protect will pay with their lives just because we aren't doing our job." Izumi bursted out of nowhere. Shin and Ken didn't expect Izumi to be thinking about all of this.
Shin sighed as he heard her and said"What if the 'help' dies before it could help all of them because of their inability." This sentence shut Izumi up.
"Just wait a while longer. Train for now. Bring out your spirit Izumi." Shin straightened his back as he stood up slowly.
Izumi's eagle spirit came out and started flying freely over them. The eagle spirit which looked like a hatchling grew up very fast as Izumi improved her control over her internal energy and her energy circulation. The eagle spirit grew up to be around 60 cm in height and had wings which stretched to around 2 meters.
"Practise reconnaissance. Tell her to fly as fast and far as she can away from you." Izumi nodded her head and ordered her spirit to do as Shin said. The eagle flew up all of a sudden releasing strong gusts of winds as she reached the clouds.
"Eagles are prideful creatures, don't forget that. When it rains all the birds take cover in their nest or under the trees or buildings but the eagles fly over the clouds to avoid rain. That's their attitude and don't forget that they will stay loyal as long as you treat them well." Izumi nodded her head as she witnessed an eagle's view as she saw through her spirit's eyes.
"Shin…" Ken called out to Shin slowly.
"When will I become an A-Rank? I have been training with you all this time and kept up with Izumi, right?"
"Under normal circumstances, people wouldn't be able to achieve so easily what you achieved in these few weeks. There is a history for your blood and that is the reason why you can adapt so fast to using your energy." Shin placed a hand on one of Ken's shoulders as he said those words.
"It won't be long Ken, it won't. But on the day you become an A-Rank, that day you might find yourself in a position you didn't expect to be and you better be trained to face the situation. You will know soon enough what I am talking about." Shin's pupils constricted to become small and sharp as he looked at him seriously.
"Take out your katana, we are going to practice while Izumi trains with her spirit." Shin took out his dual swords and started to train him.
The three went on with their usual training till the evening and had their evening run. Izumi and Ken could now go as fast as 60 mph at the moment. Ken and Izumi had their dinner along with Shin and returned to their tents while Shin sat down on the grassy plain as he gazed at the stars and opened his shelt.
Shin took out the bracelet that he gave Evelyn years ago and looked at it intently before diverting his gaze back to the stars as he said "What are you doing? What is it that's keeping you away from me?"
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Thousands of miles away in the southern part of the world, a beautiful girl with brown hair which fell to her waist and was no older than Izumi knocked the doors of a small house that lied in a small village deep in the southern forest.
A very old woman who looked as if she was in her eighties opened the door and had a startled face on her as soon as she saw the woman in front of her "I didn't expect to see you again."
"Why? Because I am supposed to be dead." The girl took off her hood and let her hair out gently.
"Come in, little Eve." The old woman looked around to make sure none have witnessed seeing her have a visitor.
"I am guessing you have a very strong reason to be here…Fifth guardian, Evelyn." The older woman had a very serious look on her face as she sat down on a chair and looked intently at her guest.
"Yes, I do. You are the only person alive who can tell me what I need to know since my master, the previous fifth guardian died an year ago leaving me untrained and didn't tell me everything I needed to know. I need to know something grandma Lin, after all you are my master's master and also his predecessor." Evelyn stared at the old woman and said those words as she held her old wrinkled hands in her's and knelt before her.
"You don't have Akaiitou with you anymore. You want to know her resting place, am I right?" The old woman gazed at her with a warm smile.
"Yes." Evelyn nodded in agreement as she tightened her grip on Lin's hands.
"Her resting place is deep in the mountains of the west. No one had been there before as she was always passed down from one guardian to another. I heard her say it was a beautiful spot with a garden of different kind of flowers. But be careful, it would have been nice if the Shadow guardian was alive to be here with you on your journey." Lin frowned as she said those words. Not everyone knew the relationship between Shin and Evelyn but grandma Lin had quite some reliable sources who would inform her everything even if she was at the world's end.
"He is still alive grandma Lin, I gave him half my energy when he was about to die. Even though he always circulated dark energy, he didn't have anything dark left in him but the light energy that circulated in his heart and brain. It was as if he was stripped of his dark energy. I made sure that he would be okay." Evelyn smiled as she remembered the last time she saw Shin, lying on the ground after he sealed Arnus Edios and his army.
"What?! Then why isn't he here?" Lin was shocked to hear the truth and her shock was visible in her wide eyes.
"Because I am not allowed to meet him right now. It's going to be a while before we meet again." Evelyn bit her lips trying to suppress her emotions.
"Why, my dear?" Lin asked gently as her eyes witnessed the pain in Evelyn's heart.
"Because the king and the sixth Shadow ordered me to, before they died." Evelyn forced a smile on her face but her eyes gave away her pain.