Vir roasted the last of the dried meat they had, then took out the dried bread given to them by the emperor's cousin this afternoon. At least, they would still have food for breakfast tomorrow morning, but not lunch.
"Hey!" Vir glanced at the little girl who was still standing in place. "Come, sit here. You must be hungry, right?"
Aira walked over to the campfire and sat down across from Vir.
"You know," the man said later as he looked at the slices of meat he was grilling. "I don't really believe in mystical things - no offense! For me, I can only believe in something if I see it with my own eyes."
Well, Aira thought. She had never heard of a Vulcher having that ability. If he could sense such supernatural things, Vir would definitely realize that he was the sky's chosen one with his purple aura.
"But," said the man. "I don't mind hearing or knowing things related to that kind of thing. You know?" He shrugged his shoulders. "It might make a good bedtime story. Well... to forget the bad things that happened to us, I guess."
"My mom," Aira said then.
Vir frowned and stopped chewing. "Your mom? What do you mean?"
"It was my mom who came to see me just now."
"What did you say?" The frown on Vir's forehead grew. "How is that possible? Isn't your mother dead? You told me that yourself last time."
The little girl just shrugged her shoulders in response to that question. After all, she herself also did not know the exact reason for her mother's appearance.
"I don't know..."
Vir let out a long sigh. "Oh, I'll never be able to understand with your abilities."
Yeah, he thought. The Asurries do have their own uniqueness even though it sounds impossible. And I will never be able to understand this.
"Never mind. Eat a lot," he said. "Tomorrow morning, after breakfast, we will set out straight away. The sooner we reach the Eastern Lands, the less hungry we will be."
So that night they rested there, in the middle of the former village of the Asurry which was once very famous for the unique abilities of their women as whisperers.
But Vir was not worried. For one reason or another, he was pretty sure that no beasts or dragons would dare come to the area. Besides, Aira had said earlier that they could rest in this area.
Maybe there was still something left in this dead area, Vir thought. Magic or other supernatural powers. He came to that conclusion after hearing Aira say that just now her mother had come to see her without Vir being able to see it other than the girl standing still.
The night was creeping up, Vir had fallen asleep by the campfire, while Aira was just lying down and had not slept at all. The starry night sky was another concern for the little girl.
She watched Vir's face as the man slept peacefully. Then she got up slowly and approached him.
She looked back at the man's face for a moment, then slowly reached for the unique black dagger on his right thigh. Aira was able to do that well without Vir noticing.
She watched the black dagger intently. The blue eyes were getting brighter as if refracting a bluish light like that of a firefly, and then the same thing happened to the dagger itself.
The black dagger made from the solid bone of the Black Dracael looked even shinier as Aira chanted an incantation in the ancient Asurry language.
Swoosh!
The black aura inside the dagger suddenly burst out violently, spinning and expanding rapidly, until it surrounded the area in a radius of several meters, and the little girl was the center point.
Meanwhile, Vir was still sound asleep without being disturbed in the slightest by the black aura from the dagger.
Slowly, Aira moved the dagger from her right hand to her left hand, then pointed the tip of the dagger at her right palm.
A thin bluish light appeared in Aira's palm, like an eight-cornered star carved inside a circle, rotating slowly counterclockwise, and the tip of the dagger was stuck right in the center of the octagonal star.
The nine-year-old girl winced as the tip of the dagger pierced deeper into her palm to draw blood.
Clap!
As the girl's blood was sucked into the dagger, the black aura swirling slowly around them suddenly disappeared, creating a gust of wind in all directions.
It was quiet, and very still.
Aira opened her eyes. Before her on her knees, an enormous dragon in the form of a puff of smoke and not very clear was looking down at her.
The little girl gulped. Those fiery red eyes seemed to stir her heart.
"You," she said. "The last alpha of your kind?"
From the slowly moving black smoke came a growling sound. Then the pair of fiery red eyes blinked once.
"I just wanted to make sure," Aira said, again. "Did you also sense the purple aura within that man?"
Again, the crimson eyes blinked once.
"Is that why you've been protecting him all this time?" Aira asked further. "From the other dragons?"
Again came the subtle growling sound of a puff of smoke forming a giant winged dragon.
"Thank you."
Swoosh!
Clap!
The puff of smoke that curled up in front of Aira simply disappeared. The conditions around the little girl returned to what they were before.
Aira gasped slightly, her hand trembling as she held the black dagger, while the wound on her right palm dried up quickly.
She glanced at the man. "Will you be able to change, Vir? Don't you realize that you are endowed with the heavens?"
Well, the man didn't seem bothered at all. And after that, Aira returned the black dagger to its sheath tied to Vir's right thigh.
She left the man as if nothing had happened there, then lay down on the other side of the campfire, gazing at the night sky for a while.
"Mom... the ancestors," Aira murmured half inaudibly as she looked up at a special constellation. "Will I be able to do this?" A drop of tears rolled down her temple.
The little girl took a deeper breath. And then closed her eyes to get some sleep.
Early in the morning, Vir and Aira had set out to leave the Asurry ancestral settlement after they had eaten the last of their dried bread.
They were moving northeast and getting closer to the coast. Vir suggested this because they had no more food. At least, if they were close to the sea, they could find one or two sea animals that could be used as food.
But of course, they had to be careful. Vir's experience had taught him that. The coastal area was the same as the desert area, there was always some kind of dragon hiding in the sand, or other wild creatures.
Although Vir was actually quite confident that his travel this time would be safe with the presence of Aira the last Asurry, nothing is impossible in this world, he thought.
So, being careful and alert was best, just as he had always been.
They finally arrived at the beach area. The condition of the beach was also the same as the mainland, there were no trees there, and everything looked quiet and dead, except for the waves crashing to the shore.
The sun was almost at its highest point, the weather was very hot this time, and it made them dehydrate more easily.
"Take it!" Vir tossed the leather pouch containing the drinking water to Aira. "Don't finish it, we don't know when we'll be able to get water."
Aira knew that, so she only drank a small amount of the water from the leather pouch. And she also noticed that Vir wasn't drinking the same water. The man preferred to drink redbrew.
But Vir had his reasons. If he also drank the water then Aira might get thirsty because the drinking water would run out faster.
"Wait here!"
Vir approached the edge of the sea, looking for something behind the rocks, while Aira sat resting on the cart, watching their surroundings.
What a contrast, she thought. The sea looked so blue and beautiful, while the land looked yellowish from drought, barren and arid.
Unfortunately, after searching for so long, Vir did not find a single sea animal that he could turn into food. His face and body drenched in sweat, he looked out to sea with his hands on his waist.
"Damn it!" he muttered. "I thought it was only on land, but it turns out that life in the sea is dying too!"