Previously
"Really?" I looked at the very happy-feeling force of chi around my hands. They were singing songs and praises about me—more specifically, the body of Willow—when I figured out why chi and Willow were so compatible. One was the greatest and purest healer of all time whereas the other was the purest energy of all. A match made in heaven.
I wanted to test the power of chi. "You said I could fortify defenses or enhance attacks?" The chi in dantian started to rev up as the aura around my hands started to grow denser, more concentrated.
Ivanka sighed. "So impatient." Then, she teleported away. I only took a deep breath in and asked the training grounds to summon them again.
With hands glaring a bright white aura and eyes of determination, I stared down the familiar pair of shadow knights and supports. "We meet again." Then, with a battle cry of excitement and joy, I leapt into battle.
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Meanwhile,
Honeywood Village, One Month After The Attack
Elm's eyes snapped open. And, the first thing she did after waking up from what felt like a year's worth of sleep, was to scan her surroundings, searching for one person only. But as her eyes looked over the scrabbles drawn on the wall, the mirror where she did her brother's hair, the empty bed beside her and the singular window that allowed for the moon to shine through and therefore, allowed the childish hand symbol-shadows her brother always did every night, she realized that she was back in her room.
But more importantly, where was her brother?
"Nngh," She let out a soft groan. An influx of memories rushed into her head. She slowly started to remember everything, from the attack of the demons on the village, from her battle with that vampire scum, then her battle near the Church, and finally her fight against her mortal enemy who basically violated her beloved brother in front of her.
Anger. But as quick as the burst of anger appeared, it disappeared just as quick, a testament to her mastery over her emotions when she sensed the number of strong, holy people stationed outside her house before her heart throbbed wildly. She calmed it down with a quick breath in through her nose and felt the edges of a new power overcome her.
Then, it happened. She felt like she had broken through, shattered some sort of wall as information of his new power filled her brain. Chi. Martial Arts. What it could do. And yet, it wasn't enough.
"Hm." Elm grunted as a fiery, silvery white aura blazed around her hands. But, her constitution as the Celestial Hero took over as her newfound power was forcefully raised to its limits as the aura spread all over her body, cloaking her in silvery white chi.
It felt warm and homely which only reminded her of her beloved brother. Images of how he had been violated played over and over again in her head. The past incarnations of her whispered at how disappointing she was by letting him slip through her fingertips like that, not to mention by their mortal enemy.
But her mind wasn't so weak as to succumb to them. She waved a hand, dissipating those mournful thoughts and simply focused on the matter at hand. It was amazing what the constitution of the Celestial Hero provided for it's wielders; one of which calmed her down whenever any other emotion disturbed her tranquility, forcing down any other feelings from anger to joy, envy to pride. A curse as much as it was a gift.
"Willow."
She remembered again why she loved him so much to the point of obsession. Ever since she was born, she had always been an odd case. Her parents in this lifetime simply attributed it to her uniqueness and showered her with ordinary parental love but she knew that in their hearts, her father sometimes wondered the secret to her strength and her mother often wondered why she didn't cry at birth.
Her hand drifted to her heart. It still beat slowly, methodically but since Willow was now gone, she felt like it was empty again. His smiles that could thaw an ice giant's heart, his scent that could attract butterflies from continents away, his ocean eyes that drew you the more you stared; everything that ever made her feel, was taken away from her, again. How many times has this been now?
Elm had kept a secret, guarded it well that not even the source of all evil scum figured her out. She had kept the secret hidden in a box inside her, with only two people holding the key–her and Willow. A secret treasure box that would fully unlock the monster inside her and grant her power beyond something as simple as a Celestial Hero, an accursed power she had created herself in exchange for her emotions. If she used the key and opened the box, unlocking her secret, her emotions would truly die this time, unable to feel anything even from her beloved brother.
"Summon."
An old key, antique like the ages long gone, covered with cracks and rust appeared before her, summoned from her soul; so different to the shining, golden key Willow possessed.
She had to make a choice now. If she unlocked it now, all the pain suffered from her first incarnation to the current her, would rush in all at once and if she wasn't careful it could even leave her consumed, empty like a blank slate. And even if she did manage to survive it, she'd still have her emotions robbed empty.
Her fingers slid across the antique box. Should she open it or not? She closed her eyes and opened her mind, searching for any traces that Willow or the Demon Scum might have left. She picked up the trails of energy and found them, most concentrated in the square where they had fought, sensing a distinct miasma that appeared to swallow every light in the world and a jumble of the most pure thing she could ever sense, then the trails stopped there, vanished all of a sudden but she remembered it to be due to the cause of the spatial portal the Demon Scum had used for their escape.
Elm remembered how rushed the portal was and realized that they must have settled somewhere close before teleporting away again.
She focused all of her senses in the town, looking for more clues but there wasn't anything out of the ordinary, no trail she hadn't picked up before. Meaning, she could scratch the recovering town of Honeywood out of her search list for the time being. So, instead she concentrated and extended her senses, manipulating it masterfully with the help of her new power of chi despite just awakening it a couple moments ago and used it to wash over the neighboring Mystical Woods.
The Mystical Woods was a dangerous place with a lot of history behind it to the point it's roots traced back to the age of the gods or so, the priest from the church said. What a backwater village was doing so close to such a dangerous place was beyond her.
There were four main circles the village and external adventurers had marked for ease of memory. The edges, the outer circle, the inner circle and the singular point.
She started from the edges. Nothing more than a couple of weak animals, both domesticated and wild. There were also a few kids playing around, chasing each other with sticks and branches that must have fallen to the ground.
Elm extended her reach further in. By now, she was tickling along the edges of the outer circle and other than a couple low grade monsters, there was nothing to worry about and unfortunately for her, nothing belonging to her beloved brother. So, she went further in and this time, she had reached around the center of the outer circle where a pack of monsters were settled in, such as the Earth Wolves or the goblins.
Then, she went into the inner circle. Here, she could feel a number of monsters around the strength of the vampire trash she had killed. There weren't any packs in the inner circle, just high-grade, singular strong monsters who were either sleeping or fighting each other for territory. She didn't explore too much, only focusing on the matter at hand which was scanning for any traces of the Demon Scum or her brother. She didn't find any but something was odd. When she checked out the monsters that were fighting for territory, some of the monsters were way, way too far from their natural habitats, like how a Silverback Ape King, a monster who lived around the edges before Singular Point was challenging a Swamp Ooze, a monster who lived in the southern edges of the inner circle. When she followed their movement patterns and traced them back, she realized that they all pointed to the edges of the singular point, as if the monsters who lived near Singular Point had run away from whatever had appeared there.
Perfect.
Her senses creeped into the edges of Singular Point but then, something pushed her senses back as her eyes were forced open. Information seeped into her brain.
'Don't seek any further.'