6th Justar 1116, Solday.
Something… is ringing in my ear, a loud and piercing sound of white noise, I feel completely numb, not able to move. These are the only thoughts that are crossing my mind right now, as I lay bare.
"Hey? Judari?"
I feel nothing,
"Judari??"
I am. Nothing.
"Judari?!?"
It's as if-
"JUDARI!!!"
A veil of haze lingers over my eyes as a blurry cyan figure looms over me.
"What is it? Can't a working peep take a quick nap?" I say with a slight frown, begging to be turned a smile. As slowly, my vision starts to clear up. His sea blue skin shines slightly in my eye. I look as he unbinds his hair for a second, and ties it back in a rough tail, yet a lot of hair still sticks out as bangs, covering his pointy ears. He tries to fluff it out to make it seem like his hair has more volume, but still it falls flat.
"Dear Solan, we've only been here for half an hour, and you're already tired?"
"Yes, I am. You know how energous I am normally. It takes a lot out of me to, you know, keep appearances." I say, trying to find a new place to put my head in the grass.
"Energous isn't a word, and neither is lazy for us." Rito sternly says.
" 'Is for me, and right now I would rather stay asleep, than have to deal with these kinds of 'chores'."
"I know this isn't the most exciting thing ever, and we have done a lot of these 'chores' lately, but you know it's going be worth it." I look back to Rito as he tries to reason with me.
"Can't we for once do something exciting? This past year or so since we left home, we've done nothing entertaining."
"We've just bellowed about and done laundry for people, or for Solan's sake, planted damned fields in the upper class parts of Saint Castielon's, we aren't farmers yet they treated us as such. How about we go to Oresfall? I heard that it's a good place for aspiring Sigil Knights to be."
"Cleaning up the streets of that slum like we're destined too!" I smile weakly.
"I don't think we are experienced enough to deal with such a cesspool. Do you not remember Sentinel, you were so distracted by what the merchants were selling that you nearly lost all of our silver to some thief."
"Yeah yeah, keep blaming me for that, they were obviously both trying to scam me, like a full operation." I say with a smile. Rito sighs.
"Well why don't we just go back there then, and do bounties. I'm pretty certain we could catch more attention and gain good reputation for the Sigil Order-" Rito yanks me up from the ground.
"I swear to Solan, get moving." Rito says as his sea blue eyes stare daggers into mine.
"Alright alright, you convinced me, you don't gotta be an ass about it" I walk away annoyed.
Strolling around the small village, the small rustic buildings that populate the area stick out in my eyesight, held up by wooden framework and a beige sort of concrete that's used for walls. Some of the buildings seem to have obvious large scarring burn marks, and some houses even have small cracks and holes. I keep looking around the huts, and spot some small plants sprouting out of the ground. I bow down to inspect them a bit closer. 'A top covered with moss of some sorts, and underneath seems to be the actual plant, which is some sort of purple gourd, it even seems a bit hairy somehow.'
'Though it could be useful for future potions.' I think to myself as I pluck the mossy plants up from their roots, and I place them in my pouch. I look up from the newly uncovered roots, over to a Castellan woman, her blonde hair damped by the dust and shadows around her, while her pale skin is covered in dirt. She seems to be planting small seeds into the dirt. 'This would probably count as helping, right?'
I walk over to her and ask if she needs any help with the planting. She replies with a sigh and answers sure. I take my knees to the ground and I grab the small bag she was taking seeds out of, rustling it a bit. I take a couple of seeds in my hand. Placing the seeds slowly into the open soil.
"So… from what I can see by the state of this place, your village has been ravaged recently right? Do you perhaps know what people did it?" I ask, as she looks up in annoyance.
"I have no clue, but it wasn't a group or any of the sort. Was a single lone knight, armored in pitch black armor and helmet, it had a sort of sword that split in two at the base. And somehow that beast could light it's weapon ablaze with a burning blackened flame. What I remember most clearly, was the helmet it wore, straight out of a nightmare, with fangs embedded into the helm, I've never seen anything like it." She let's her tongue rest for a second.
"But honestly I don't think your skybound kind should be here at the moment." She says, with a slight snarl. "...I'll try to look into who could have attacked your village. I can hope next time the Order can get here quick enough to stop the-" I get cut off as a dry feeling travels down my throat.
"Well if that little Order would have shown up I don't think the attack would have happened." She says looking down at her dusty hands and clothes.
I keep quiet not wanting to irritate her further. We finish planting the rest of the seeds, and she thanks me for the small help. As I was about to leave, she says.
"Now… could you and your Fischeran friend leave, your very presence invites evil…" I tense up ready to answer, as I feel a slight tug in my silver hip plate. A small girl was standing behind me.
"Hey there little lady, is something bothering you?" I ask her politely.
"M-my dad wanted me to ask yo-you, if you wou-uld you be able to g-get something new for his garden, he lost all our crops to the raid." She says looking me in the eyes.
"Some new seeds for crops huh, well hear this. I know that somewhere in either the desert or forest, there is something called a turnip."
"What is that?" She asks.
"It's a very hearty vegetable, and I bet, if your dad over there began growing it, you could feed this whole place in no time. So whenever I get the chance, I'm gonna bring some, that sound alright?" She nods quietly and runs back to her dad who's sitting disheveled at a table, next to what I could assume is their charred house. The girl jumps up and down with an ear to ear grin, and as her mouth moves, his eyes bright with light. He waves at me with a big smile. Though, from here, it looks like they aren't alone, like a shadow is trying to reach over, and grab ahold of them. But as quickly as I notice it, the shade fades away… It can't just be me seeing things, or even just feeling things, can it?
I look around the village, where seemingly everyone has settled into their own world again. I can't risk some evil letting loose on this town again, I have to act before it's too late.
I finally let my body move, as it's decided along with me to take action, I follow the shadow's lead behind the rows of houses, with a narrow space in between each building making it just possible for me to scurry through. Finally I arrive at the backside of the village, a desolate yet gorgeous area, only touched by the rarest of folks. Though I can still feel a force of malice emanating from here. I look to my right to where one of the forest's massive trees stands towering over the village. I feel something coming from it. I shakely follow my intuition, and though my higher self is screaming at me to abandon my self-set mission, I know in my heart and instincts that I am doing the right thing. I must be.
I pass the backsides of the houses like books in a library, speeding up my pace the closer to the tree I get. Till finally I reach the first root, nearly stumbling me over. I feel my heart failing me now, as my higher self did before as well, my very own reasoning wanting me to abandon. I can't, I won't allow myself to give up so easily. I press on and on, till finally, I'm at the very face of the tree. I feel it writhing with despair, a feeling I've felt so long ago just coming back to me now, a want to escape but no means to do so. Though how can a tree produce this feeling..?
I look closer to it, and see a faint light from the ground, so faint it would have to be as dark as it is under this canopy to even notice it. And not only is the light not spread out, it's coming from exactly in the middle of the massive tree's eye reaching size. The light is just contained here. I set my hand upon the tree, and to my shock, I feel it moving. It's just a piece of cloth imitating the tree's appearance. I push it gently aside, and to my eyes witness, the behind of cloth is a tiny cramped carved out room, settled with a lit candle and an ominous mirror.
I envelop myself into the den of sorrow, and walk inside. I take the last step inside, and what before felt like a reasonably cozy room turned a terror in seconds. As if the candles had been snuffed out, and the light being replaced with the ghostly glow of the mirror at the back of the wooden room. I reach out for it.
As if it calls to me…I feel a breath of sin on my neck, and as quickly I could feel my hairs raise, a dark armor-covered hand erupts from behind me. Clawing over my mouth and into my skin, holding me completely still and vulnerable. As I feel the cold steel of a sword setting its fangs at the tip of my neck's skin.
"What may a puny knight be doing in this lair, searching for clues to reach some justice?" The spikes from the metal fingertips of the shadow's hand nearly piercing my skin.
"My blade at your throat, and you at my mercy, what should fall upon you,Vind?" I try to jerk my head a bit away to get a look at the person behind me as they hold me down, finally I can just barely see the outline of a helmet. Like the mouth of a monster, a maw extends from the lower half of the helmet's structure, with four grotesque silver teeth implanted in the maw. Further beneath the fake monstrous mouth, lies a dark abyss of a metal wall, making one not able to see the thing behind the dark mask.
"I could with such ease let my splintered blade pierce your throat and let a fall of blood spill on the pristine grass below us." The deep wretched voice speaks again, though through the nasally coarse voice, I feel like I hear a second person speaking. And as they do, they slightly loosen their grip on my lips.
"What… What do you want." I speak with not a question, but a statement.
"Nothing but an end." The person speaks, as they turn their head around, seeming like they didn't mean to respond to my question.
"However to my despair, my elder requests for your survival." They slowly slip the blade away from my throat, and tucks it behind their back.
"Though, you could be a pain and tell people of this encounter." They hold me in the same locked position, as they start to drag me back out into the forest, slowly gliding along the back of the houses, till finally my eyes come back upon the girl from before.
"What are you gonna do, kill me in front of the town?" I say with snark, with their metallic fingertips quickly fastening around my mouth again, making sure I dont scream.
"Putting an end to your life isn't a desire for now. Though I observed, and saw your willingness to help a poor child in need. And as you bore of a knight crave to act valiant in the face of despair. I will let yet another rampage out on this town, if you speak whispers of our meet. And most importantly, I'll slaughter that child, in front of your weary eyes."
"And to your knowledge, If you attempt in any regard to let people know of anything I've said, I will know." They pull their blade out once more, and I finally get a good look at the monstrous sword. A full sword of silvered metal, split at the bottom to extend out into two razor sharp pincers, with small engravings picturing horrific acts of violence and hate littered all across the blade's surface.
Like a gust of wind, the blade set ablaze with fire. But it wasn't any ordinary flame, it was pitch black like the night sky, and within the black flames stood a lesser but equally horrifying sun-white scorching inferno.
"Like this eternal black flame, I will forever be implanted into your soul, burning on an endless source of vitriol from my hate. This won't be the last time we meet, Onyx." Finally I feel my arms coming loose from the grip, and immediately I reach for my blade and turn around ready to swing my steel. But in the split second I feel my momentum stop, I see the end of the monster's boot. Just barely for a second I see the light, and then, black.
"Judari?" I hear a drowned voice saying, while finally getting feeling back in my bones. I slowly peel my eyes open. Feeling the slight breeze of the forest graze my skin.
"Are you taking another nap?" Rito looks down at me, with a disappointed expression and a raised eyebrow..
"Y–yeah… I did." I avoid his eyes, looking to the side as Rito lets out a sigh.
"Hey it's fine, I saw you helped some folks, you've done enough." I see Rito extend his hands towards me, as I grab it back, letting him pull me up in a swift motion.
"I think we've been here long enough anyway, being here doesn't bring the best of memories."
"What do you mean?" I ask.
"I don't know… I'm just a bit dizzy, I feel like there's some energy messing with my head, do you know what I mean?" Rito says.
"Kind of, I guess we're both not too well in our head right now." I let out a shining smile.
"Now come on, let's get out of this town." Rito says as we slowly walk in between the houses, and out into the village center and then off into the forest ground. The massive canopies spreading kilometers above us, covering us in shadows.
"Wait Rito, now that I think about it, you never told me the name of the town, you just said it would be a good place to do some simple tasks." I ask.
"It's called Alana." Rito says, a monotone pitch laid in his words.
"Oh, okay… Hey what's up, you've seemed a bit tense since we got to... Alana was it?" I ask Rito.
"It's nothing, just some stuff on my mind." A slight pause forms.
"You know, you said something before, about these 'chores' we've been doing. Well, I suppose it's about time we try something new." My eyes light up by Rito's comment.
"I think going to Sentinel would be a fantastic idea!" Rito softly yells.
"Finally! I'm so ready!" I shout loud enough for the forest to echo back.
"Hey calm down. Anyhow, I heard from the merchant assigned to Alana, that Sentinel over this year we've been gone, has gotten even more rotten to its core. Mainly with small time bandits and such. So this would be a perfect way for the Order to catch their eyes onto us again. " Rito explains.
"I guess so. But, I was just a little bored back there. Are you sure we are able to handle that place, we did just pass through there last time."
"I think we have grown enough since then, and besides, we have eachothers back right."
"Of course we do. Though we do maybe have to take a slight shortcut through the forest if we want to reach all the way there in time." Rito says as we looks out into the darkening forest. And as we slightly let the sound fall to the ground and flatten, a small rustle bells towards us. Quickly increasing in loudness.
"W-what was that?" I ask, clutching my sword.
"I don't know, but be ready." Rito scans the area with sword already in hand, I mirror him and start to look out.
As the rustle stops, a stomp-like sound emerges from its ashes. A door-creak like growl churns behind me. As a long muscle-bound arm covered in grim dark-green straight greasy fur appears from my right side. With bit's and pieces torn off, beneath showing peach red flesh. The forearms of the beast arms are ripped off, and show the chalk bone underneath. It sinks it's massive talons into the soil. I look up to see a creature of unbeft position.
A head like a deer skull, with dark cavernous eyes that light with a green flame. It slowly tilts its maw down towards me and Rito, dwarfing us with just its head. The creature puffs out a breath from its skulled nose. And just as it does, the maw of the titan opens wide. Long multiple sets of small razor-sharp teeth become present, some even seem more dug into the mouth than to be growing. I quickly catch a glimpse of Rito's face, as sobbing teeth of the beast jaw cross over Rito's hair with long tendrils of green goo dripping from its mouth. The running drool just nearing landing upon his head, a sudden flash of gold explodes across my left side, as the searing sound of a bolt rips through the air, striking the creature's skulled head with thunder.
I look to where the bolt had originated from, as a squadron of six shining silver knights step forward from the shadows of the forest, in the middle of the squadron stands a high-headed woman, with fiery crimson hair tied in a tail at the back of her head. She's wearing the same silver armor as the rest around her, though strips of orange cloth with images of crosses displayed cover the metal below. In her right hand lies a steaming blade. Amidst the scene, she seems to be eating a white puff, munching on it as the creature at our feet tilts its head towards the knights.
"Seems we've got an Alk on our hands soldiers, at the ready with your blades!" She yells as immediately all the swords being held by the knights around her are carried up in the air. She puts the puff away in a sack on the side of her hip.
"Betram and Alex, conjure an ice wall! Lloyd and Fredrick, prepare to run out at cut at the ankles with flame! And Orisino ready a thunder charge like mine before, It should stun the beast."
"Then exactly what are you doing, Officer Serena?" The knight referred to as Alex asks.
"I'll cleave its head off, of course." Her lips form into a mischievous grin, each side of her lips tugging deeply, as her squadron let out a sigh, though still following her commands, the now positioned knights each take a stance.
The knights in the front sling their swords to the ground. A small second passes, and like a piece of stage play, a massive wall of ice emerges. All the frost crashing into itself to cover the whole group. I take Rito by the arm to get slightly away from the scene, hiding away in the bushes. The beast growls behind its musky teeth, as it leaps across onto it. Clawing at it with such ferocity, tearing small bits of ice and snowflakes off.
"Create an opening in the ice, and let Orsino shoot the charge!" As soon as the words leave the Officer's mouth, a small spiral forms in the center of the wall, in mere seconds it expands to the size of a person's body. The knight Orsino steps in front of the troupe, and in a swift motion, flings his thunderous sword straight up, his sword buzzes, and within seconds a bolt of thunder shaped in the figure of a spear, was volleyed into its jaw. The creature's whole body riddles with small currents of gold electric strings, as it tumbles off the frosted shield, desperately trying to claw back up with the last of its working muscle.
"Fredrick, Lloyd!" Officer Serena yells, the command setting directly into the feet of the back row, as they rush out with their blades ablaze. Quickly they get to its bent legs, each knight perform a slash to the ankles of the monster, and in one swift move, the creature falls completely.
"Break the shield and seize formation!" The whole squadron dissolves as the creature is left paralyzed. Officer Serena takes her blade, and much like the knight Orsino, the metal begins a buzz, though along with the simmering thunder stewing deep within the blade, the subtle light of glowing flame emits from the steel. The two forces, combustion and energy, melding into each other to form a maelstrom of thunder-crackling flames.
Officer Serena forwards her arm out, preparing an execution of the creature. In one split of a second, a large circular slash had gone by, and connected to the forest ground. The beast's head falls to the ground, red black blood spills from the neck and skull, onto the pristine grass.
"Great work everybody, this carcass should fetch well." She says to the knights around her, as they begin to drag the carts they had brung over to the corpse with slow pace. The Officer pays no attention to her squadron however, and fishes for something in the small sack hanging off her hip. She takes up the same small white puff and starts gnawing upon the softness. Though in her wandering eyes, she suddenly locks eyes with me and Rito in the bush.
"Oi! Who are you two bums!" A panic sets into my joints, as I quickly leave the comfort of the bush.
"Travelers! Just passing through the forest."
The officer walks closer to us, as the rest of the Sigil patrol are handling the massive corpse of the beast, dragging it across the wet grass beneath us, and onto a creaky wagon.
"So, what are two 'travelers' doing here, traversing through the whole damned forest?"
"We don't have enough silver for a ferry ticket, and we are on our way to Sentinel." Rito answers as we step out of the bush. The officer would ponder for a second.
"Hmpf, fair enough. Those tickets are plain robbery, instigated by those bastards in Aurelonift. Oh, and by any chance you two have seen any Ashiin carrying around a greatsword recently, we've gotten word that an Abyss Walker with bright red hair and tanned skin was roaming 'round. Would be very helpful if you had any intelligence on the matter."
"I wish we could help, but no, we haven't seen anything." Rito says, as slowly the light on the forest ground grows dimmer.
"Hmpf, alright then, I'll wish you two a good journey." She smiles, eating her white puff.
"Wait, is there perhaps some place you or your crew knows where we could rest for the night?" I ask, as the officer would look up to the canopy.
"I suppose it is getting dark, well I can recommend a small inn close by, it's owned by this sweet lady and her partner, it's quite the cozy cabin-stead. Everything is home-made, even their beer." Officer Serena says, as she fully consumes the white puff and gulps it down, leaving only slight dust behind on her metal gauntlet.
"Head towards the base of that Lêr Krieg tree, and you'll quickly have eye on the inn." She points behind our backs toward a massive trunk. Her squadron stands behind, eager for orders.
"When you get there, would you greet them for us, they might as well know we sent you." A wink is sent our way, as they shift back into their militaristic mind-set, troopering around like an ant colony at work.
"Will do." Rito half-attempts a salute, but shakes it down to a nod, as we slowly traverse away from the squadron. Their bellows of laughter and sound fading away as we contend with the nature of the forest more and more.
"Judari, I've just realized." Rito says cutting down a enlarged spread root of the nearby gargantuan tree
"Those people were Sigil Knights…" He states the obvious, and here I thought I was the oblivious of us.
"Yes? Your point being?"
"That 'they' were Sigil Knights, and they can enact such… fantastical showcases of elemental prowess!"
"I can tell the thesaurus in the library helped you get that sentence across, hm?" Rito disregards my allegation with a swing of his ponytail and a single high pitched hm.
"I've of course read about the practices Sigil Knights perform to have elements be real, but I honestly thought the books were exaggerating in size and display. Is that really what we are striving for?" Rito looks at me, a twitch at the end of his lips.
"Well isn't that why we're out here, striving for the top, no matter the struggle."
"I suppose so, maybe it'll come easier than we'd think."
"Than you'd think, you mean?" I give a playful smirk, as an amber light of mellow makes its way into my field of vision.
"Whatever you say, Visyn to Solan for granting us these elements. Can you imagine how Gaia would look if we didn't have these tools at our exploit?"
"It'd be a much more mundane s'pouse, but I'm no historian nor ancient king with a blade at my throat, so my guess is as good as yours."
"I've only seen sigilry practiced once, which was… Y'know, that day?" Rito says, as he kicks a darkened rock to the side with his, hurling it deep in the forest's tall grass.
"Yeah… You probably saw some 'fantastical showcase' of the elements then." I nudge my elbow with slight force into his upper arm. Rito shrugs.
"I saw some flames, not much else." He gives a weak smile.
"Mainly from your father, he was quite the dragon."
"I'm sure he was, if only the old man could move a limb." I force a smile, and Rito tries.
"Though we'll be even more draconic than he ever was, right!" I smile, and he smiles back. As I step across a root, my feet feel the touch of a cold flat stone. I rip my eyes away from Rito's cerulean inked eyes, up along the bouldered path ahead and to the prominent standing inn. Though standing out, it still is tucked away and hugged by moss and the nature of the forest, with hanging vines and tree branches leaned upon every surface of the already wooden structure.
Its roof curving with such warmness and wimsey, that it invites my eyes to gaze. And the orange light reminding me oh so much of home. A sign hung by rope on a stick in front of the entrance.
'Humsi & Laima's Inn and Deer-Stall.' It spelt on the wrinkled plank sign, with fluttering hearts and antlers carved into the wood.
"Would you look at that, they even got deer here, seems we'll have a nice ride tomorrow." I say.
"If we have the silver for it that is." Rito passes me a smirk, as I pass back a shrug, the amber light of the inn raining softly upon us with warmth. We push ourselves indoors to the tiny lobby of the inn, its walls and furniture being much like the outside, twisted with a pinch of whimsy. Vases litter the far walls, with various wild bouquets and flowers lining the room with colors and vibrancy, emanating from the petals.
"O'greetings, how may I accustom you?" A whistled wrinkled lady sat at a bark covered table, a glass of ink at her side with a pile of papers and keys to different rooms. I peered across the stacks and stacks of paper, the only pieces of information that caught my eyes were huge numbers, seeming to be laid out in a currency format. Though while I distractedly stood idle, Rito had already moved along the conversation.
"So two rooms for two young travelers? That sounds about something we can do." The lady spoke, as she moved a pen along a new paper.
"We have a room for two in the lower parts of the inn, would that be of interest?" She asks, as I already begin drawing on our shared silver sack.
"It would, but how much silver does such a room cost?"
"About two-hundred silver." She smiles with glee, as I feel our silver pack's empty room.
"And, how much for a room suited for one?" I ask, making sense of the amount of silver we have left with my sweating hand.
"About eighty silver for one of our smaller rooms here."
"Would you please give my friend and I a moment?" She nods with a shining smile, as I begin a whisper.
"Rito, we barely have enough silver to afford a ferry ticket, how are we going to afford this?" He ponders for a second.
"How much silver do we have?"
"About one hundred and twenty eight." Rito looks me in the eyes, and I nod. We raise ourselves up to meet the inn-clerk's eyes.
We walk up the light staircase made of carved wood, each step sounding a creak from beneath my feet. The walls seem dark in tint, with claw marks lining down along the halls. Small lanterns of gluttonous amber lights shine dimly from their dark metal cages along the narrow staircase. Finally we are let along the hallway, still tight and point as a needle, we walk along till we reach the room that matches the number on our key. Rito cranks the handle down, the dim light spilling out of the awaited room. My eyes lock upon the single bed in the tiny enclosement, a verdant sheet lays on top of the scratched framework. And to the far left I look upon, a chair.
"Oh thank the gods." My breath finally lets out, if I hadn't let it out I might've turned fully purple.
"Thank Solan, oh he gifts us as always." Rito says, his eyes already peeing across the room with relief and rest, though he looks back at me with quickness.
"Who takes the chair?" He asks, as I look forward, with slight ponder laid upon me.
"I'll… take the chair… I'm the one who spent the largest sum of our silver."
"On?" Rito asks with a tugged on smirk.
"Stupid trinkets and things." I admit, even fiddling my empty pockets for the items I had spent so much silver on.
"What comes around goes around." Rito smiles, as he sets himself at the foot of the bed he had claim over.
"Just because I'm sleeping on the bed, doesn't mean you can't join me for a prayer." I sling my slight baggage off to the ground, and join Rito on the floor. Quickly shaping my hands into the image of an explosion. As we begin a low murmur.
"Solan, bound by thy chains of Order, restrict thy self in any sort, in an endless wander across a blank beach, I am chained to you my god, a world of hurt I neigh hath to see. Visyn." We end, the prayer bringing a slight little drop to Rito's face. I give him a hearty clap on the back, igniting his eyes again.
"Good night Judari." Rito says, quickly slithering into the bed and under the itchy looking green sheets.
"Good night." I say, walking but a second to reach the eldened chair.
It reeks of old people, in a nice way. I seat myself, my eyes awake and open to the encircling darkness. Is… that a person, standing in the shadows. A scratch rails along the window pane, a creak sounds from the inn, and a breath sighs. No… no, my mind is playing tricks on me, that's my own breath, there is nothing but me and Rito, no one… else. But that ugly shadow of a… face. No, it's all in my head. And I'm sure of it, everything is quiet, and nothing, is here.