Chapter 2
There didn't seem to be an end to the goblins.
No matter how many of the ugly, midget, green humanoids in loincloth with clubs the village defenders struck down that summer morning, more seemed to pop out of the forest. Their gnarls and incomprehensible shouts filled a hundred feet of grassland between the forest and the village's palisade walls. Arrows, bolts, and slingshot rocks rained down from the guard watchtowers behind the walls. The village's frontline—a mix of regular villagers in simple clothing with basic weapons like knives and pitchforks, and knights in silver armor with martial weapons like swords and two-handed hammers—slowly retreated back to the village gate, step by step.
Eighteen-year-old Kyro, however, was in the midst of the goblin horde like a kid in a ball pit. With a shortsword in each hand, he sliced through the little green men like a hot knife through butter. As Kyro cut through goblins, they exploded into onyx dust, vaporizing within a second.
Soon, most of the goblins determined Kyro was more of a threat than the villagers and turned their attention towards him. The enemies charged and swung their clubs, but Kyro danced around the attacks with ease. He moved so swiftly as he fought, his leather armor couldn't even be grazed from a single goblin club. His slashes moved so quickly, they looked like solid arcs of iron.
However, Kyro was starting to lose his breath. He noticed himself stumbling over thick clumps of dirt. Clubs were starting to graze him. The pain was more annoying than agonizing, but Kyro knew what it meant to 'die by a thousand cuts.' He deiced to start wading his way back to the village gate.
But just as he began putting his mind to it, a roar went up from the forest. Kyro glanced to see a hobgoblin, a goblin the size of a grizzly bear on its hind legs, trudging from the trees. Drool dripped down its thick lips. Its club was the base of a tree ripped from its roots. It bellowed in rage and the goblin horde cheered, happy to see their leader. Then the goblins continued their assault with renewed vigor.
It was now or never. If Kyro didn't kill that hobgoblin here and now, it would break down the village gate using its tree club as a battering ram. The goblins would flood into the village, destroy the homes, attack those who couldn't defend themselves, and worse.
Kyro whispered a spell. "Shadow Travel." Suddenly, the ground beneath Kyro turned black and Kyro sunk into it like diving into water. Now, Kyro was a shadow on the ground, traveling through the horde of confused goblins who had probably never seen magic before. But the hobgoblin wasn't fooled. It lowered its body into a defensive stance, eyeing the queer shadow zooming towards him. As Kyro the shadow was within five feet of the hobgoblin, the large monster roared and swung down its club, shaking the earth at its impact. Kyro, however, swerved around the impact and slipped behind the hobgoblin. The ground where the shadow was turned to black and Kyro leapt out of it like a fish jumping out of the water, positioned behind the monster.
Before the hobgoblin could recover its guard, Kyro slashed at the joints behind its knees. It roared in pain as it was forced to kneel on the ground, but Kyro was far from done. In one fluid motion, Kyro performed a vertical slash at the creature's elbow that helped carry its club. Its arm bent at an unnatural angle as the hobgoblin hollered again, craning its neck towards the sun. Then with a final swing, Kyro cut into its neck.
Its holler was cut short by its body exploding into onyx dust, vaporizing in a second. For a moment, there was a silence. The goblins looked at Kyro like he was the monster before screaming and fleeing back into the forest, running around Kyro. Kyro managed to cut a few more goblins dead before he turned to see a horde of tiny green men, shrinking into the distance.
Kyro bent to his knees, breathing heavily. Sweat dripped from his short, black hair. His tan skin was flecked with onyx monster dust. His leather armor had a few tears and scratches, but nothing requiring extensive repairs. His fingerless gloves with sleeves that reached his elbows crinkled as he twisted his arms to check they weren't sore. Satisfied that he was ok, he sheathed his swords into their scabbards, crossed on his back like an "X." Then he dragged his feet through the grass towards the village gates.
The scene wasn't welcoming. Some of the wall's planks were dented from thrown clubs that laid at the wall's feet. Two villagers and one knight laid still in the field. Villagers with stretchers rushed towards each one, passing Kyro without so much as a word. Kyro didn't mind. Normally, they'd applaud and praise how many monsters he slew, but today's monster attack on the village was the worst one Kyro had seen in years.
As Kyro passed through the village gates, he heard a trio of villagers talking in hush tones.
"How many people did we lose today?�� one asked.
"One knight and four villagers, more or less," the second said. "Heard someone lost their arm."
"We can't fight something like that again," muttered the third.
Before Kyro could think of what to do next, he heard from his side, "Kyro."
Julia, a fox beastkin in shining plate armor, stood at attention with her helmet beneath her left arm and a shield strapped to her right. (Beastkin were a race of humanoids with physical beast aspects. They typically had the eyes, ears, and tail of a beast such as a wolf or cat, but could often share more aspects like whiskers or claws.) Her tail resembled a red brush dipped in black paint and her ears, set atop of her head, stood like furry, limp tents. Her chest bore the insignia of a silver sword, and the sword strapped to her left side matched the logo. Her round shield was bigger than half her body. Although shorter by a foot, she looked slightly older than Kyro, with golden narrow eyes, light brown skin, and high cheekbones. Her red hair, twice as wide as her body, looked like an ostrich duster. "Reeve Carlok has ordered us to visit his manor house immediately."
Silver Knights were an order of warriors specialized in fighting monsters. Since they were funded by the Kingdom of Totacity, every recognized settlement had at least one while some like Meadow Village had a few. While most knights were stoic—they were there to do a job, not make friends—a few like Julia made an effort to get the know the villagers. She was friendly and approachable. Even the village kids went up to her to ask for scraps of food, which she sometimes kept in her pockets to give away. A few of the knights made Kyro nervous with their aggressive and authoritative language, but Julia could be anyone's friend given enough time. Assuming they weren't scoundrels.
Kyro sighed. He was really hoping to relax a little and recuperate after that fight. "What for?"
"An emergency quest," Julia informed. "Other than that, he didn't say."
The image of the cloaked figures with painted masks that often picked up his mother for a quest flashed in his head. Then that thought led to his mother. And that thought led to a tight feeling around Kyro's chest. He unconsciously held the pocket-dimensional ring fit snugly on his right ring finger.
His mother still hadn't returned since she left before the Spring Festival six years ago. Each time he thought of her or that night, regret poured into his thoughts. If only he acted better the last time he saw her and said he loved her. If only she would return home…
But Kyro shook away the thoughts. He had to focus on the here and now. If he lingered too much on regret, he'd start hating himself to the point of crying. "Ok. Let's go see the old man."
As Kyro turned to walk, Julia said softly, "And for what it's worth, good job today." She laid a fist over her heart in salute. Kyro smiled and nodded in thanks before walking through Meadow Village with Julia filed in line behind him.
Over the years, the village expanded to have over fifty houses, a few of them built with stone and clay roofs. Vines and wildflowers could still be seen from no matter where you looked within the village's walls. An opened gate to the east led to several acres of farmland, with a dozen barn houses lined up adjacently to each other. Many of the houses were inns, although many of them were empty of merchants now, thanks to the dangerous roads. In the village center, a marble statue of an all-too-familiar woman to Kyro stood fifteen feet tall, detailed so that her saggy hat, robes, and even the rings on each finger looked real. On the pedestal was a plaque that read:
DUANA, THE DARK WITCH
MEADOW VILLAGE, HOME TO THIS HEROINE,
DEDICATES THIS MONUMENT TO PRESERVE HER DEEDS
THAT SAVED COUNTLESS LIVES THROUGHOUT THE WORLD.
AS ALL GIVE SOME, SOME GIVE ALL.
As Kyro's path led him through the village center, he looked away from the statue. He couldn't look at it. If he did, it threatened to makes tears come out of him in time.
Julia noticed the movement and frowned. She had been garrisoned to Meadow Village a month ago. Everybody except Kyro looked up and smiled at the statue while he turned his head as if shielding himself from the sun. All she knew of Kyro was that he was an excellent fighter and she respected him for that. But she couldn't figure out why he seemed…ashamed to look at a renowned heroine. At first, she reasoned it was because Duana the Dark Witch was reported to have disappeared five years ago. The disappearance of such a righteous protector would make anyone depressed. But she sensed there was more to it than that. She didn't pry, however, curious as she was. She didn't want to make him feel uncomfortable.
Before they could leave the square, Kyro and Julia heard from behind them "Kyro!"
They both turned to see a group of kids run towards them with a mother carrying a baby walking behind. Kyro chuckled as they arrived at his feet. "Hey, guys. Staying out of trouble?"
"Kyro!" they chanted, ignoring his question. "Go invisible again! Show us!"
Kyro crossed his arms. "I don't know. Although my mana regenerates quickly, I don't want to waste it and end up needing it later."
Mana was the supernatural energy needed to perform magic.
"But you're the only spellcaster we know who's a shadowmancer!" one kid pressed.
Spellcasters—people who could cast magic—could cast any type of magic such as fire or water, but most spellcasters had an affinity for a certain type. A spellcaster with an affinity for shadow magic was called a 'shadowmancer'.
"Mm...I don't know," Kyro said.
The kids mixed up different pleas from "Come on!" to "Pleeeeease!"
Alas, he sighed and spoke the spell: "Invisibility." Within a second, his body turned from opaque to see-through.
The kids 'ooh'ed and 'aah'ed. "Cool!" said one kid. "Now, if you could just come to my house, my mom hid the cinnamon roll on the—"
"Oh, no!" Kyro appeared before the children. "I'm not getting involved with any of that. Sorry."
"Aww!" the kid complained. "You're no fun!"
Julia was happily watching the kids trying to convince Kyro to steal a cinnamon roll when a voice to her side yelled, "Wah! Wah!"
She turned to see the matron woman with a baby in her arms. The baby's arms reached towards the beastkin's pointy fox ears atop her head. "I'm sorry," the mother said. "It's his first time seeing a beastkin and I guess he wants to feel your ears. Is that ok?"
The beastkin's eyes widened as her tail shot up, her tail hair as prickly as a cactus. In beastkin culture, to touch one's animal aspects like the ears or tail was often a romantic gesture like kissing the lips. However, Julia knew most humans weren't knowledgeable about beastkin culture and customs. It was likely the mother didn't know what she was asking Julia to do and Julia knew the baby's intentions were innocent. Her cheeks blushed as she lowered her chin and pressed her index fingers together. "O-ok."
Julia watched the baby's tiny fingers reach above her head until she felt the fur from her ears tingle. It felt no different than someone touching the rest of her hair, though her heart pounded. She had only began to calm down and relax when she felt a pair of hands grasp her tail.
"Eep!" Julia jumped and turned to see that a few of the kids had snuck up behind her.
"It's so fluffy!" one of them said with wide, excited eyes, caressing her tail. "I want to be a wolf beastkin!"
"She's a fox beastkin, you dummy!" another said. "Wolves' tails are rougher. Hers is smooth." That kid looked up to Julia with a polite smile. "I love your tail, miss knight! May I pet it, too?"
"Uh, sure," Julia stammered, trying as hard as she could not to look embarrassed. "Gently, please."
Soon, each kid began taking turns stroking her tail. The minute felt like an hour to Julia, but the mother eventually called out, "Alright kids, we need to keep moving! Say 'bye!'"
"Bye!" the kids said to Kyro and Julia before turning and rushing off. Kyro smiled and waved goodbye. He watched as some of the kids crowded around the mother, who took as many kids by the hand as she could. Kyro's chest ached as he focused on the youngest one's hand around the woman's index finger.
When the kids and mother turned around a house and out of sight, he just noticed how red in the face Julia was. Kyro wasn't the best at reading people's expressions, but he at least knew her expression was of embarrassment. "Uh, I wouldn't worry about that one kid who mistook you for the wolf breed," he assured Julia. "You're tail looks very smooth to me."
"Thank you," Julia said quietly, now certain Kyro clearly misunderstood why she was embarrassed. "Let's move on, shall we?"
Finally, they arrived at the Meadow Village Manor. The two-storied house looked like one typically found in the cities, with cobblestone walls and a red-brick roof. Sitting adjacently to normal village houses, it looked like something of a capital building, the ones anyone could see and clearly know it was important. Two Silver Knights stood guard, flanking the front double doors. When they spotted Kyro and Julia, they stepped aside without so much as turning their heads to greet them. They remained at attention as Julia opened the door for Kyro and the two went on in.
The inside looked just as sophisticated on the inside as it did on the outside, with polished wood floors and plaster walls. A chandelier dangled above the doors from the ceiling of the second floor. The entry room smelled of old papers and wood, along with the burning candles placed on dressers along the room and the square windows letting in sunlight. A stairway with fancy railings led up to the second floor, leading into different rooms.
To the immediate right was an office room with its double doors open. Inside, sitting at a desk with two chairs before it, was a middle-aged man with thinning grey hair and small spectacles. His fuzzy button-up suit contained a handkerchief in its chest pocket and a royal charter insignia clip pinned to the pocket. The insignia was of a butterfly resting itself on a broad leaf.
As Kyro and Julia entered the room, the man looked up from a pile of papers scattered across his desk. "Ah, good," he said as he resumed looking over his papers. "Have a seat, Kyro. And would you mind having a seat as well, Lady Julia? And close the door behind you, would you?"
As Julia closed the door, Kyro took in the room. The navy-blue carpet over the floor frayed in random parts. The bookshelves that almost touched the ceiling were stuffed with books, some with dust and some unaligned. Behind the old man, a shield and a pair of two-handed swords crossed at an "X" were mounted on the wall. The thick, carpet-like blinds of each window were left ajar, barely letting in sunlight. Another ceiling chandelier lit up the rest of the room.
This was where Kyro learned most of everything he knew about the world, from magic to history and to simple mathematics. The frays in the carpet were the outcome of him trying to teleport knives using 'Shadow Travel' and messing up. Many of the books without dust on them were due to Kyro's readings yesterday. Although the room smelled as old as the reeve himself, Kyro could hardly notice the scent.
Kyro came out of his memories when Julia passed him, sitting down on the edge of the chair with her back straight. She placed a fist over her heart in salute. "Reeve Carlok."
Kyro took his seat in turn. "What's up now, old man?"
Julia's eyes widened for a moment. Kyro was close enough to the reeve to address him like that?
Carlok's blue eyes narrowed as he put his papers aside, folded his hands, and looked at Kyro. "I'd appreciate some respect in front of other people."
Kyro moaned. "You called me, Reeve Carlok?"
"Yes, I did." Carlock stretched his jaw. "I've had my share of reports about the goblin attack within the hour, but I'd like to hear your intake on it. How bad is it?"
Kyro replayed the fight in his head. "Had I not been careful, I could've been overwhelmed."
"And that speaks for itself." Carlok sighed as he leaned his forehead against his hand. "Pretty bad. Almost perilous. Which is why I've called you both here today." He looked between Kyro and Julia. "I'm sending you two to Darkwood Village."
Darkwood Villiage was fifteen miles north of Meadow Village, connected by a dirt road. Assuming there weren't any delays, the trip would roughly take half a day.
Carlok continued. "As I'm sure you're both aware, Meadow Village is the most southern settlement in the kingdom. Grasslands stretch for ninety miles from here to the continent's southern peninsula, all of it uninhabited by people. The village was constructed in hopes that more villages would be built through the grasslands until one was built near the sea. This would have given the kingdom access to a waterway, which I'm sure I don't need to explain how significant that is.
"However, when King Ysel took the throne thirty years ago, he cancelled the project, believing it couldn't be done. If King Ysel was still on the throne today, even I would've seen this settlement inconsequential and would have suggested to abandon the village today in hopes of eventually seeking shelter in Elysia, the kingdom's capital. However, he was assassinated two years ago, and now Queen Elenor is in power, who is very enticed by the thought of completing the project.
"Now, as this village has potential significance to the kingdom again, I plan to defend it. But I fear our current manpower won't be enough should we suffer another attack as bad as this morning. So, I'm having you two send word to Darkwood Village to send whatever help they can." He turned towards the two. Kyro looked bored out of his mind while Julia still sat at attention. "Questions?"
Julia rose her hand. "Sir, why just the two of us? Wouldn't our safety and chances of success be better if we had, perhaps, another knight or two?"
"As for Kyro, who should be paying more attention…" Carlok glared at Kyro.
Kyro sighed as he straightened up. "I can't be blamed for being bored when being told stuff I already know."
"…he's an excellent shadowmancer," Carlok continued. "The magic he can do doesn't so much as cause damage and destruction but serves as something of a utility belt. I can trust no one else to be safer than him. And as for you, Lady Julia, you are of the Silver Knights, a faction that is highly regarded and gives you a sense of righteous authority upon first impressions. Not only that, but I'm certain there are other Silver Knights garrisoned at Darkwood Village. Although you are a private within the faction, having any rank is better than no rank when trying to persuade someone, I believe. And finally, I've seen you fight, Lady Julia. You have a very defensive fighting style, giving the phrase 'a good defense is the best offense' some merit."
Julia beamed with pride. It felt nice for her to be recognized, even when she wasn't trying to be noticed. "Thank you, sir."
Carlok nodded with a smile. "And as for sending more people, I don't feel it would be wise. Yes, the village has other spellcasters and knights, but there's also the village's defense to think about. I feel you two alone are enough to be persuasive and capable to defend yourselves if you run into any trouble, saving me resources to help with the village's defense."
Carlok narrowed his eyes at Kyro. "And I suspect you don't have any questions?"
Kyro shook his head. He was grumpy he wouldn't be given time to rest, but understood the situation enough to not voice his displeasure.
"Then both of you are dismissed," Carlok concluded. "Please leave as soon as possible."