As the sun rises on a new day, I am meditating.
The golden glow of the sun against the backdrop from the east extended my shadow west.
Isla does not disturb me watching me glorifying my figure and imprinting it in her memories.
After I found my resolve last night, I felt a shift inside myself.
Filling my body up with mana and letting it absorb it in every cell I feel impurities being let out.
I notice a black tendril seeping out of my brain and out of my mouth and nose, its tarlike gummy substance oozed out of my ears last.
I immediately feel as if a weight has been lifted off my shoulders.
I cleanse my face with mana and bury the impurities.
My connection with my body and mana core was clearer than ever before.
It felt like I had imbued my mind with energy.
My resolve to find the answer to my fate was reaffirmed.
No matter what form I am in whether it is an ant or the Buddha I will never let anything stop me, my heartbeat loudly.
I think back to my fight with the wolves and how I lost control due to my fear.
'If I fought them now with this mindset, I wouldn't have sustained so many injuries' I thought.
I continue to meditate, going over the battle and visualizing what I would do differently.
I open my eyes to see Isla staring at me.
"What is it"? I asked her.
"Why did you kill those men so cruelly"? she asked me.
I stop for a moment and think of Khalil Gibran.
"It was evil and cruel of me" I pause before continuing "What is evil but good tortured by its own hunger and thirst"?
She was silent for a while before asking me "So are those men that wanted to take us back hungry and thirsty"?
I chuckle at this "Yes Isla, they were good men who were hungry and thirsty even though they were full".
She nods her head, I know she does not understand but she does not have to, not yet at least.
Leaving the area after sending the bodies deep underground we head north along the road.
A short sword on my left hip and a dagger hanging behind me on my waist from another belt, our leather packs on our back looking like full duffels.
Isla traded her short sword for one that was in better shape along with a dagger mimicking my apparel.
Standish's short sword is long gone it was rusty and ready to snap I think me overusing my mana had a lot to do with it.
Spotting the village in front of us it extended north as far as the eye could see and west even further.
'This isn't a village it's a small city I sigh internally. Coming closer to the gates we notice a big crowd about forty to fifty people waiting on the side some sitting and some laying down.
Terra's and Olim's were standing on either side of the gate with way more Olim than Terra's some young and some old.
One thing they all had in common was there were people both dressed in dirty rags, some even injured and staring daggers at each other, I walk up to the guard.
"Excuse me sir may I please go into the Village" the guard looks at me, a confused look on his face.
Not only my manners but my armor and weapons did not match my age or the fact that I was also half Olim.
Standish was taught manners in case he met nobles, but the man rarely exercised them.
"The gates will open in four days" I thank him before turning around and he stops me. "Hey kid makes sure to hunt some game and bring some hides, so you can sell it inside and get some stones".
I thank him again, noticing the covetous eyes on me and Isla I ask the young guard "What about fighting out here"?
"No combat inside the town unless in designated zones but it's your job to keep yourself safe out here" the man replied again very professionally, you can tell her takes pride in his work.
We leave not wanting to be around this environment, knowing full well how hate festers thinking about the divide in social class on earth.
Not long after we leave a group, three Terrans get up and follow in our direction.
We walk back to the forest line and enter it; the group shortly follows behind.
They find us waiting for them not far into the forest.
"Good boy, you noticed us.
Go ahead and drop your weapons and your armor and leave, if you leave quietly, you might have a chance to enter the town".
The man was tall about six feet the other two behind him leering at Isla were short and plump and the others short and skinny all of them with brown hair and brown eyes with light skin and a small nose.
I was more surprised they didn't bring more; we stand still not making a single movement.
"Your funeral kid"! He grabbed his one-handed sword along with the other two they begin to run towards us. I rush forward quickly; the leader of this group does not have a chance to stop.
Stopping behind him a wound on his femoral artery appeared, he fell to his knees clenching his inner thigh.
The lunge and roll position me close to the plump one I slash across his ribs and while he howls in pain I follow by impaling his chest leaving the lone survivor and the half dead bleeding out, it looked like one fluid movement.
"Same rules as last time," I said as I wipe the blood from my short sword and turn to walk away.
The man is frozen stiff but sees Isla draw her short sword and rush him.
This man is a lot more skilled than the one she fought before.
He parries her obvious strikes, and all his moves are deadly aiming at her vitals.
Although Isla is young, she has been training with me for almost a year every day as we both taught our bodies swordsmanship from the Kingdom of Terra.
She timed her counterstrikes accurately; she used her sword to shove the flat of the man's sword to the right when he was executing a downward swing.
She leaned to her left and brought her sword to her right shoulder and pressed it against his exposed armpit.
She exerted pressure and finished through with an upward slash taking the man's arm. Before he could scream, he had his chest pierced from the back.
Putting away the smoked meat I walk over to her "Good job".
The bloodlust she exuded a moment ago dissipated replaced with a proud smile.
We do not light a fire at night and move around after we hunt; at night we keep ourselves warm by meditating.
Instead of absorbing mana, I manipulate a tiny strand of energy and slowly inject it into my brain like I would when I mask my energy.
I only let a bit out while regulating the output with my inner core.
I gather it at the back of my brain responsible for the images, letting it follow a path through my occipital lobe and reach the optic chiasma, allowing it to flood my eyes gently.
When I open my eyes, I am astonished because I can see mana.
It is little wisps of haze and some of the strands are milky white.
I look at Isla and I can see the mana being absorbed into her body with every exhale not inhale.
I look at the sky and along with white clouds, I see milky white and hazy clouds up above… amazing. 'But why is my mana shimmering but the world's mana is not' I ask myself.
I send a tendril of mana out and it looks like a shimmering thick substance.
'Interesting' I think to myself.
I got this Idea from Mislin the Sylph, her eyes were sparkling.
I remembered how in my old life as a fish I found it easy to see because of a film covering my eyes if I were to look directly at things outside the water my vision would be skewed.
The sylph used mana to go against evolution occupying the land, 'amazing' I thought to myself.
I did not want to try this earlier unlike a little mana throughout my whole brain condensing it at a certain point would probably blow a part of it up.
Good thing I had some test subjects.
The following day we head to the gate everyone looks at us differently this time.
We came back, the others did not.
This was the kind of world this was, the strong ate the weak and the weak ate each other.