Chereads / Lysaria the dark / Chapter 3 - Ceremony 3

Chapter 3 - Ceremony 3

Chapter 3

Falling on the hard ground Lysaria felt a weight on her back, She rolled and pushed the assailant off her. She looked into the face of a snarling coyote, The predator didn't let her get prepared leaping forward and grabbing her foot with its teeth.

The coyote shook its head and pulled her ankle making any attempt to stand futile. Reaching for her stick she grasped for the weapon, The coyote stopped pulling and bit again sinking long sharp teeth into her leg. Gasping She almost dropped her stick, grasping her weapon with both hands she stabbed her essence charged stick into the coyote's face.

Lysaria stabbed as many times as possible trying to make the pain stop, the coyote didn't care, every time she tried to sit the coyote pulled on her leg making her fall on her back. She struck wildly doing her best to finish off the animal.

She struggled over and over trying to sit put to where she could stab the vicious animal. Each time it let go she got in a good poke at its face, the tug of war kept on. She kicked the mutt in the face and sat up before stabbing her essence powered stick through its front leg.

After catching the animal off guard she thrust her stick in the eye of the coyote to finish it off. Gasping for breath she lay back on the ground, the warm rush of essence filled her body fixing the damage to her damaged ankle. Lysaria couldn't believe the pain of being attacked, it was only pushed away by the rush of getting essence.

The only reason she was able to think straight was the essence felt as good as the bites felt bad. Lysaria lay on her back looking into the sky, That had been far too close. She climbed to her feet and looked around wanting to find her way back to the safe zone.

After looking around Lysaria realized that she had no idea which way to go. All of her hunting had been in random directions, the sun was setting and she could only guess how bad night might be. Maybe if she walked towards the looming mountain she could find a cave to spend the night. Her guardian had warned her to not be out at night, the more dangerous animals and even monsters came out of hiding at night.

In the forest, she walked between trees avoiding dense bushes by following an animal trail. Lysaria looked from the lengthening shadows to the setting sun wondering how she would make it through the night. Nervously looking around she stumbled on a root light take me" the root was invisible in the low light of the forest.

Walking back along her trail she held her stick protectively in front of her. She had the suspicion that she was being watched, no matter where she looked nothing could be seen. Catching sight of movement behind a bush, something large with rippling fur.

Backing away she focused on the spot noticing her essence was beating wildly, good it must have been her mind tricking her. Her essence was racing so fast she was getting dizzy causing her hands to shake on the weapon. Whoof whoof a low deep huff drifted from the bushes ahead, Every instinct she had was telling her to run. She couldn't decide where to go the sound was bouncing around.

unable to stand the tension anymore Lysaria said," come out! I can see you.!" The branches in front of her started cracking exposing rippling fur a massive head and long teeth, her whole body trembled and shook. The bear charged her batt aside her stick and tackled her to the ground before holding her down and using its massive jaws to tear into her unprotected throat.

Lysaria awoke back in the safe zone surrounded by the other people uncontrollably shaking. She wrapped her arms around herself and rocked back and forth. That had been awful why had she went so far from the safe zone by herself. She had got overconfident after earning 90 essences and felt like she could survive on her own. Angry with herself Lysaria vowed to not let herself get so overconfident again.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, A soft voice whispered "You're alright, your safe now don't worry." She pushed away from the hand," don't touch me, I, I, I just need a moment." She rocked herself from side to side. She soother herself saying" it's alright, it's over, Its alright no more bear." she got a look at her essence vessel, somehow she now had 150 essences.

The chosen of the light said, "the first death is always hard, and if I'm being honest it doesn't get easier you just learn to push away the memories of pain. The only upside to death is the arbitrator rewards those who die with essence as recovering from the pain is a trial too."

Lysaria opened her eyes and look up into the eyes of 4 people around her each looking concerned and sympathetic. The chosen of the light smiled and strolled back over to her seat before falling back onto her chair and pulling out a large book. Lysaria wondered where she kept getting those from as nowhere could she see a bag or container to hold the large book.

Her mind kept wandering changing from anything other than claws, fur and teeth. She said," I'm not going to let the essence go to my head, why did I keep going for more."

Three essences stared down at her their long hair and green skin glimmered softly beneath the night sky, One with handsome features held out his hand. She hesitantly took the hand and let him pull her up. He said, "I'm Dakar nice to meet you, would you like to join our team, you must be really brave to have gone out into the world all by yourself."

Slack-jawed Lysaria couldn't speak, this Dakar had asked so many questions she couldn't decide which one to answer. She said, "I would say I am more of an idiot than I am brave, trust me you do not want to fight a giant bear all on your own." The other two Essences with him didn't introduce themselves Lysaria Said, "Nice to meet you I'm Lysaria, what are your names.? "

Dakar brought his hand to his face," soo sorry, I totally forgot about introducing them. This is Thana and Hectar they are my friends, we helped each other hunt today and seem to get along." Lysaria said, "So your names are Hectar and Thana, I hope you don't blame me if I forget them, I'm kind of terrible at remembering people's names."

Lysaria stared up she could see his long hair blowing in the night breeze resting against his back, He said" When we go hunting for essence in the morning Would you like to join us?" Her heart skipped a beat Lysaria said," sure I will give it a try, it can't be worse than hunting alone." She couldn't see them well but they seemed nice, Lysaria sat up on the smooth floor and made sure she wasn't injured, just because she felt fine didn't erase the night's memories.

She could see different groups on the platform, 3 groups in all and the biggest had 5 members, with the smallest group only 2 members. Lysaria said," we need a plan with our group none of the smaller animals will be a challenge, we must go and find coyotes or even wolves." She shuddered to suggest bears the memories were still too fresh.

the sun peaked over the horizon bringing a red tinge to the sky, she rather liked sunrises they always made her cheerful, especially since the sun rose so infrequently back home. She got a good look at each of her new friends, Dakar with his long white hair free in the wind dangling to his waist with broad shoulders and toned arms and vibrant hazel eyes, he was tall almost as tall as Lysaria herself.

Thana had equally long golden hair that glowed in the morning light glittering every time the wind pushed her hair around. The woman was tall with corded muscle, Her athletic body and a face that made Lysarias jaw drop, how could someone look so perfect, with those full lips and bright blue eyes.

She looked away towards the next inline feeling embarrassed. she had been staring and hoping none of them noticed her red cheeks. After the angel of a woman, Hectar seemed very original for an essence, with shoulder-length brown hair and a thin but corded frame, however, his eyes showed a glint of intelligence.

Dakar the cheerful one, Thana the perfect one and Hectar the short one. Smiling to herself, she complimented her brilliant strategy to remember their names. Dakar walked towards the edge of the barrier he said," Let's go get some essence" he was followed by Thana and the pursuing Hectar.

She thought to herself as long as we don't go hunting bears I can do this, Trudging from the platform she followed her new team in the opposite direction of last time. Dakar said," we found canyon while hunting yesterday and I think it will be a great place to find some animals and maybe some monsters." Lysaria said," Monsters I thought those were dangerous?" Dakar said," That means we get more essence for killing them."

Thana said," don't worry, with all of us we can take some monsters." Dakar smiled he said," If we think it's getting too dangerous we can always leave or even ring our bells." Lysaria went quiet and followed behind the group, at least she would be the last one attacked if they ran into a monster.

following along a path the group entered a canopy of the trees, now she could find herself a new stick to stab things. Passing under the towering trees she found a branch much longer than she was tall, that would be helpful if she fought a bear again. Lysaria channelled her essence and was surprised, her essence easily cut through the branch and even cut the ground behind it.

Having 150 essence was a huge difference, She held out her hand point at a nearby tree. Her entire group was stopped now watching her antics. Lysaria pushed essence out of her hand and yelped, a small ball of essence shot towards the tree and cut a small hole the size of her finger into the bark.

Dakar waltzed over and dug his finger in the hole, He said "you are so amazing, how did you do that? I can't make my essence do more than cut a leaf. Dakar said," those monsters are going to be easy to take down with you on our team if we run into a challenge that involves our intelligence you can leave that to us."