The metallic ringing continued to fill the nightly air from two different sources of blade clashing: Reginald and the scarred elven man, and Seran and Nadia. Through her tears, Brenda looked over to see her father being evenly matched by this unknown assailant, and Seran giving Nadia a good run for her skill, although it seemed like Nadia was going quite easy on him.
Seran, through huffs of aspiration, continued to press onward as his blade seemed to move on its own against the flurry of blows from Nadia's short sword. It seemed that Seran was still a novice with the skill and only adept at swordplay; however, this wasn't enough to handle an assassin level of skill, but in his mind, he had one goal: to protect Brenda with his life. With a heavy slash, Nadia put a little extra effort into the slash and broke through the instinct level that Seran was displaying, sending him flying into one of the carriages nearby.
Seran gasped for air as he hit the carriage with full force, flying through the door to land inside of what he recognized as Brenda's carriage. Struggling to get up, he heard the crunching of wood as he saw Nadia suddenly above him with a wide grin on her face. As he struggled to get to his sword, he let out a yelp of pain as Nadia's foot slammed against his right hand.
"Fun's over, Seran. It's not your fault, but you lack the skill to beat me." Nadia quickly turned the blade around to hold the hilt towards Seran, and in another quick motion, she bashed him in the forehead with the butt of the hilt. "I'm sorry, but I won't be killing you today." Nadia then turned to Brenda with a deep sigh, "Unfortunately, I cannot same the same for you."
Brenda's eyes widened and the tears she had for her mother transitioned to those for Seran. He had given his all for her, and that was all he could do. She let out a heavy sigh and stood upwards towards Nadia, holding out her hands towards the young elven woman.
"Oh?!" Nadia said with widened eyes and a smile, "Do you plan on fighting me too? I took you for a pushover," Nadia then pointed at her, "but look at you. I admire your resolve, but you don't understand a thing."
"I don't want to fight you, Nadia." Brenda shouted through welled up eyes, "I don't understand what we did, or why you all chose to attack us!"
"Oh! That's simple." Nadia said with a laugh, "It's because you are slave owners, and we are liberators!" Nadia then frowned and rubbed the hilt of her blade against the side of her head, "Although, I guess we failed them."
"Them?" Brenda raised an eyebrow in curiosity, "Who did you fail?"
Nadia sighed, "Well, considering that you are the nice type, you are not going to like what I am about to tell you, but we were holding the elves you brought with you aside so that they wouldn't be compelled to uphold their contracts. The guards, the chef, that old butler, and the other maid that was by your side all the time? They were all safe at first." Nadia sighed deeply as she shook her head, "Shame, I had grown to like her too."
Brenda's arms fell to her side in shock as her face dropped in despair. Shakingly, she looked towards Nadia with fear in her eyes, "What happened to Reau and Meriah? What happened to my friends?"
Nadia simply pointed to a tree beyond the fire-ring, one that had been obscured by the archers but close to the lightning blast that Claire had sent down. Around the tree, Brenda saw that the tree was untouched by the lightning, but there was a loosened rope hanging around the base of the tree that was also completely intact.
"That rope was tightened magically around that tree. One of our elven members gave their lives to make sure that it would be indestructible through a tier 2 spell. Your mother's spell didn't target the rope or the tree, but those attached to it. Disaster magic targets those she sees as enemies—your friends didn't even stand a chance."
"N—No…" Brenda's voice became strained as she instantly fell to her knees, and pain filled her heart. She had lost her mother and now her dear friends—she only had her Father and Seran left. Her spirit was broken; nonetheless, Nadia slowly began to walk up to her with the blade in hand.
"I really do feel sorry for you, Brenda Harenhart." Nadia said with a heavy sigh, "I really liked you too. You are too kind for this world. It's too cruel, and you have yet to see that—and what's worse, you won't get to."
As Nadia went to swing her blade down towards Brenda, a burst of air resounded through the air as Nadia felt a blunt force against her stomach, causing her to drop her blade before she was sent through the air to land meters away from Brenda, unconscious. Standing in front of Brenda with a silver aura, Seran's fist was glowing as he was breathing heavier and heavier, and his tattoo rapidly spread from his torso up to his neckline and his shoulders. Brenda instantly recognized the spell that Seran had cast on himself, and it was draining his mana very quickly.
"Seran, you—you used magic," Brenda said in a frantic voice as she rushed to him with tears in his eyes. "Please, Seran. Deactivate the spell. I can't have you die on me too!"
"Oh, my dear." A masculine voice came from behind her, "Living is for the strong, and it seems that you aren't meant for it." Brenda turned around in surprise to see the man that her father was fighting, and her father was nowhere in sight. The next thing that Brenda felt was the edge of a blade pierce through her torso between her breasts. She began to cough blood as she looked back upon Seran, who had a look of utmost despair on his face.
--
A few minutes ago:
Reginald grunted as he took a full forced swing against his blade, which sent him back a few feet. He shoved his sword in the ground to rest a bit as his eyes, in anger, fell upon the large elven man in front of him. This man's aura was strong, and Reginald knew it, which left him curious.
"What's your goal here?" Reginald shouted towards the man, who stopped walking just to laugh at the question.
"To kill you, of course." The elven man said bluntly, "After all, you are the main threat to what we are striving for."
"And that is?" Reginald said as he got back up and into a readied stance, still breathing heavily.
"A dead man isn't worth knowing that information." The elven man dashed forward with a large slash, which threw Reginald's blade to the side as the man delivered a kick to Reginald's torso, throwing him against the fire. Surprisingly, he bounced back against the firewall and back towards the elven man, but he's back became instantly seared from the licking undying flames.
The elven man continued to walk over and grabbed Reginald by his shirt, and slammed him hard in the torso before tossing him behind him to the ground. Reginald gave a loud coughing fit as he struggled to get back up. Unfortunately, just as he was about to stand, his legs buckled, and he fell to his knees.
Using his sword to raise himself, Reginald stood up shakily and held his sword out towards the elven man. "That's it. I'm finished with this fight." Reginald's purple aura began to flare up around him as he began to say, "Blade Magic: D—" As he was talking, the purple aura around him dissipated, leaving him utterly bewildered.
"Something the matter, Duke?" The elven man chortled toughly, "I thought you were finished with this fight?"
"What did you do to me?" Reginald said as he collapsed again to the ground. "Why can't I use my magic?" Reginald then felt his chest where the elven man had slammed him and felt the magical force of a growing tattoo. "Sealing magic." Reginald sighed deeply as he looked over to Brenda, who was about to be attacked as well. There was absolutely nothing he could do, and the look on his face told his assailant all he needed to know.
"Well, I've had fun here, haven't you?" The elven man said sternly as he walked over to Reginald's location and kicked away his blade. He then lifted Reginald by his shirt again and looked him over, "No matter what I do to you now, the injuries you have will surely kill you. Let's make your death seem somewhat natural, hm?"
"I don't understand." Reginald said with a haughty breath, "How is an elf this strong? This should be impossible."
"You'll never find out." The elven man chuckled as his aura flared dark red, and his muscles grew in size by ten-fold. He then propelled his hand holding Reginald behind his back and then thrust it forward through the opening of the fire-ring, jetting Reginald off into the far distance and beyond normal sight.
---
Seran looked upon Brenda as if his worst fear had come to life. Like when he saw his father, another loved one had been fatally wounded in front of him. He deactivated his spell instantly as he held her in his arms. He began shaking as his eyes fell on Brenda, who began coughing up blood as she tried to reach for Seran's face.
"Brenda! No, no, no, no no, no, no!" Seran started to scream out and began to shake harder as his grip tightened around her. He pulled her closer to his chest, and his eyes widened as Brenda whispered to him.
"S--Seran." Brenda coughed as blood rushed from her mouth, "I-I am scared. It's getting so cold."
"Brenda, please. I must do something! I have to try healing you." Seran said as he held out his hand towards Brenda, but she gripped his hand tightly with a sorrowful look in her eyes.
"No." Brenda said as tears flowed down her face, "D--Don't die too."
"If this is living, I don't want it!" Seran shouted out as tears fell down his face, "Even if it was short, I enjoyed living because--"
"I'm so sorry, Seran." Brenda cried as she began coughing more and more, "I am sorry th—that I ca-can't do this."
Brenda began coughing more and more as her eyelids began to close. The tears in her eyes began to slow their fall down her face as her breathing got softer and softer. With a final lurch forward, she used her remaining strength to attempt to wrap her hands around Seran in an embrace before her breathing stopped entirely.
Seran's eyes filled with tears as he sobbed loudly over Brenda's body. The feelings he felt were strange due to him barely knowing her, but he felt that she was right for his broken soul. He felt the truest of companions in Brenda, despite her humanity, and his hope had now died in front of him—in his arms. He was filled with the utmost despair of being unable to protect his one and only friend.
"Huh." A masculine voice said loudly as footsteps closed in on Seran, "To think she was able to talk for so long with this sword in her lungs. It's over now, anyway."
Seran's gaze turned from sorrow to a fit of newfound anger, one emotion he had never felt, as he gripped his sword's hilt enough to turn his knuckles even paler than before. He gently let Brenda's body onto the ground, and in a quick motion, he swung his sword up at the elven man. With a metal twang, Seran's sword was blocked by the man's fist, revealing a metallic sheen as he was wearing gloves with metal coatings.
"Oh? Your masters are dead, and you still wish to fight me?" The elven man said with a chuckle, "Quite the loyalty you have." The elven man coughed, "Sorry, had."
Seran let out a loud yell as he began slashing wildly at the man, who continued to block each blow with ease. The ringing of metal began to echo loudly throughout the forest as each strike got heavier and heavier. After a solid minute of swinging, Seran's speed slowly decreased before falling to his knees.
"You are a pathetic sight, aren't you? Stay in the dirt where you belong." The elven man spat towards Seran as he walked up to him and sent his right fist outward in a hook to knock Seran into the dirt beside Brenda's body. The elven man went and pulled the large blade out of Brenda's back, then he readied to slash down at Seran. Before the man could get the downward motion of the swing, an arrow glanced past his eyes, causing him to turn towards the direction of the shot.
"That's enough." Another voice, one familiar to Seran, said loudly. Stepping out of the underbrush and moving towards the fire was the elven man that Seran and Brenda had met in the field. His bow was already nocked with another arrow, and it was pointed at the larger elven man.
"Re'if." The larger elven man squinted as he looked towards the other. "Did you forget our job here, or do I need to remind you?"
"I think I need to remind you," Re'if said with a similar gaze as he moved his hand over one of the arrows outside of the fire-ring, and as he did so, the fire-ring instantly faded from around the area. Re'if continued to move forward until he was two meters away from the larger elven man, "The point of this mission was to free the elves and slay the masters."
"Are you blind?" The larger elven man chuckled as he put his blade to the side, "We have done just that."
"At the cost of many of our allies and the slaves we freed." Re'if said with a raised eyebrow, and he lowered his bow as he pointed towards many of the spots where the elves outside the ring had perished, "Haven't we lost enough already?"
"What are the lives of multiple elves to three humans, anyway?" The larger elven man spat on the ground next to Brenda's body, "Honestly, I am surprised any of you are alive, to begin with."
"You are surprised?" Re'if said with widened eyes as he raised his bow again, "What do you mean? Did you think we were all going to die?"
"All but me," The larger elven man said with a large grin, "and I intend to keep it that way."
Re'if looked at his boss with a straight face and gave a heavy sigh. "I had figured that we'd experience some bad luck considering the job, but I didn't think the bad luck would be planned."
"Re'if, you are just a tool, just like all the other elves in this world. Nothing changes and no human will see you differently. That's just the fate of the world all of the filthy elves were born into—"
The man was interrupted by a sudden pain on the right side of his face as Seran had grabbed the blade that Nadia had dropped by Brenda's body and with a swift spin from the dirt, he pushed himself into the air while slashing upwards towards the elven man. As the elven man grabbed the right side of his face, he realized that Seran had cut off his ear, and a clear mist came over the man as his face began to change. The scar across his face began to fade, and his skin began to become more colored as his ear changed from pointed to rounded.
"What is the meaning of this?" Re'if questioned loudly as he took a step back, realizing that his boss began to change form to appear that of a tall human male.
"You damn jagged bastard!" The man yelled out as he turned to Seran, and in a motion faster than Re'if or Seran could see, the man brought his leg back and kicked Seran's stomach with enough force to send him into one of the carriages, completely shattering the side of it. Struggling for air, Seran began to gasp before falling unconscious.
"It seems that my secret's out." The man said as he turned to Re'if while cracking his knuckles, "Well, no matter. This changes nothing. I bet you are curious about everything right now."
"Obviously!" Re'if readied the bow with the aim dead set on the man's forehead.
"Let me explain then." The man sighed as he turned the hilt of his giant sword over in his right hand, completely not looking at the oncoming threat as a dangerous scenario. He cleared his throat as he said, "You see, the idea was to have the precious Harenharts die to the group of free elves in order to raise the threat against minority groups that had escaped the Raugan Escapade, like yourself and your brother hiding in the tree-line like the coward that he is. "
"How dare you—"
The man continued to talk, ignoring that comment from Re'if, "You see, these elves are becoming quite the issue in the capital cities, and of course, the death of a war hero will not be taken kindly by the public. Kind of a good scenario for the royals too. They hated that a commoner rose to their status because of a war. Call it two birds with one stone, if you will?"
Re'if continued to hold his bow out towards the man with a squinted, yet focused gaze, "Why are you telling me all of this?"
"Hold on—" The man held up his hand, "I'm not done." He then pointed at his face as he began to speak in a mocking tone, "You see, there was a leader of the group that managed to get away from the Capial Royal Army when they arrived from a magical distress call from the Harenharts. This leader was an elven man with a large scar across his face, and he was quite the challenge to fight; however, it does prove an issue that an elf was able to take on a human, especially a powerful one so the army plans on branding this elf as a high-value target."
The man sighed as he pointed over to where Seran's unconscious body was, "I had planned to make him that scapegoat, but—" The man stopped his speech as he disappeared from Re'if's sight before Re'if screamed out in pain as he felt his face slashed and blood splatter into the air. A voice behind the pained elf said loudly, "You'll do just fine, Re'if. I made sure not to cut your eye. After all, you need to be as much of a threat as possible for the story to work."
"You'll pay for this," Re'if said as he held his face with blood streaming through his fingers onto the ground. "I'll make sure you are punished for your crimes."
"I don't see how." The man laughed loudly as he began to walk away slowly, "No one will believe an elf anyways." The man continued to laugh as he raised his hand, and with a flash of light, the man disappeared.
Re'if fell to the ground as he dropped his bow to rip his shirt and quickly wrap it around his head. The last thing he saw before falling unconscious was Rasul running towards him with a look of worry on his face.
-------------------End of the Book of Brenda------------------