Alice was calm. She did not understand why there was sich chaos inside the Fire Clan, but why should she care ?
Soon, she was, with Grimm and Sarah, on the same place where the whole Fire Clan watched Eloy adopt her.
Two men were standing, looking at each other with pure hatred. Alige could almost feel the killing intent in the air.
Beetween the two men, Eloy, the leader of the Fire Clan, was desesperatly trying to prevent the other two to rip each other apart.
"You two are warriors, not childs ! You're not going to fight for such a small thing !"
"A small thing ? Eloy, do you know what Yaotl did to me ?"
If the first man was angry, the second was calm. Very calm.
Yet, he seemed even more ready to kill than the other.
"Miquitzli said it, old... I mean, Eloy. He want to do a duel to the death with me. And I accepted, because I cannot allow a fool like him in the Clan any longer."
Eloy sighed.
For some reason, he couldn't stop the duel. Maybe his power over the Fire Clan wasn't as absolute as Alice thought.
However, Alice was curious about something else entierly.
"Sarah, do you know why these two guys are angry at each other ?" asked the Lightbringer.
"I have no clue, to be honest." replied Grimm.
"It's because Miquitzli made a child." declared Sarah.
"And ? I don't understand what's the problem with that ?", wondered Grimm, confused.
"The problem is the mother. She's from the Wind Clan. "
Apparently, that was enough for Grimm to understand everything. It was a bit harder for Alice, but she deduced that making baby with someone from another Clan was forbidden or something.
But in that case, why was Eloy trying to prevent Miquitzli's punishment ?
'Whatever', thought Alice.
While she was talking with Sarah and Grimm, the situation had slightly changed. Now, Eloy seemed to have given up his idea of preventing the duel, and was nowhere to be seen.
There was seemingly nothing he could do...
The people around Miquitzli and Yaotl also moved back, leaving empty a large area for the two men to battle in.
And, suddenly, everyone stopped talking.
Silence.
A scary one, with that many people respecting it.
Miquitzli broke it.
"Me, Miquitzli of the Fire Clan, challenge Yaotl of the Fire Clan to a duel to the death because of his horrendous defamations !"
"Me, Yaotl of the Fire Clan, accept this challenge. May the Sun help the one who is in the right."
Alice looked at the two fighter, trying to guess who was going to win. Yaotl was much more impressive because of his size and muscular build, while Miquitzli was probably not even eighteen and looked pretty normal.
But after the fight beetween Mirror and Brandon, Alice did not believe in appearance. Sometimes, the smaller one was the strongest.
Miquitzli asked to be given a spear, and Eloy accepted, giving him a very basic wooden spear. The warrior looked happy with it.
"What weapon do you want, Yaotl ?" asked Eloy after that.
"None. I don't need any to beat up this young fool."
There was a silence of almost thirty seconds after that. The level of disrespect Yaotl was showing towards his opponent was that unreal.
In the end, it's Yaotl who stopped this silence.
"Should we start then ?"
Miquitzli did not even give a reply, he simply thrust his spear towards Yaotl.
Alice thought that the attack was slow and sloppy, and that she could probably avoid it with the help of her Sixth Sense.
But Yaotl did not even avoid the spear. Instead, he caught it with his bare fist... and punched Miquitzli with his other hand.
The young fool let go of the spear, and two of his teeths fell on the ground.
The fight was already over, at this point.
Miquitzli tried to stand up, while Yaotl threw the spear in front of his ennemy's feets, giving it back.
"Now...Try again."
Miquitzli, after a few moments of struggle, managed to grab the spear, get up, and lunge at Yaotl again.
"Boring. Mirror could kill both of these guys with her eyes closed and her hands tied."
Thought Alice.
Perhaps even she was stronger than these two proud warriors.
They were humans, after all. They didn't have the blessing of a god, they didn't have Killer, they didn't have soul selling.
Yaotl might have impressed her if she met him before her journey in the City of Flowers, but now Alice could feel how weak he was.
He was just an human, after all. Not some mysterious Heart Eater, living reflection or infected giant. He was merely an human.
He couldn't even soul sell.
The more Alice stayed with the Fire Clan, the less she was afraid of it. Not because she trusted them, although she certainly did trust them more than the likes of Shapeshifter and Nikoletta, but because they weren't... special.
They were just normal human beings. And humans beings just weren't as scary as they once were in Alice's eyes.
Sure, someone like Yaotl could probably kill a little child with his bare hands, but he was nothing but a man. He wasn't the zombie of the son of a dead Lightbringer like Brandon, he wasn't a being capable of soul selling like Mirror, and probably wasn't even stronger than a Two-Mouth.
The only persons of the Fire Clan that Alice thought of as threat were Eloy, because the whole Clan obeyed his orders for the most part, and Grimm, because of he could soul sell.
Strangely, these two people were also the ones that helped Alice the most... and the young Lightbringer did not understand why.
Alice looked at the duel again, distracted by the sound of broken bones.
As expected, Miquitzli was getting beaten in a very one-sided manner. He kept standing up, but Yaotl was never injured, and soon, his opponent was too weak to hold his spear.
Too weak to stand up.
"You're... satisfied...Yaotl... ?"
"No."
Miquitzli laughed.
"Going... to... kill me... now ?"
"No."
And then, he just left.
"Where... are you going ?"
Yaotl stopped.
"I give you one hour. If you're still in this village in one hour, I will end your life."
"But the duel..."
Yaotl looked into the young man's eyes. It was like he was staring directly into his soul.
"Miquitzli... this world is ruled by the strong. Since I'm stronger than you, I makes the rules. And I decided to let you live. Now go... go to the Wind Clan. That is where you belong."
Alice yawned.
This was getting boring... and she was on a timer: she had to lift Isa's curse. The week she spent with Eloy and the Fire Clan wasn't useful in the slightest in that regard. She needed to find the next Golden Door, the next Room, as fast as possible. Until she found someone who knew the... geography ? of the Sky well enough to guide her in the Temple of Light.
Alice really wanted to avoid having the same fate as Brandon.
Maybe it was time, then. Time to go into the jungle.