She observed an arm guard in her hand that shoots out dart-like projectiles. It is both inconspicuous and small enough to fit inside a sleeve. After a couple of tries, she smiled and turns to the owner. "I'll buy it."
After paying, she heads to the next shop but takes a look around the marketplace to see many excited faces. A solar eclipse is coming. In Teluka, it is an auspicious day for the locals, a day that celebrates the joining of the sun and moon. Astronomy is not something that Amy studies. It is more of Alabaster's specialty considering his extensive study on time travel.
Teluka is a nexus of knowledge compared to the rest of the world and there is so much she wants that she might even want to stay here forever. The people are friendly and welcoming, and the island itself is prosperous. This place is more of a fairy tale than the rest of the islands after everything she has been through during this expedition.
Professor Wyatt and his colleagues have been discussing on their discoveries and their goals on Teluka so their stay will be long. She will be looking for a place to train after the festival is over.
She suddenly felt a strange presence behind her and looked to see standing innocently behind her; a white dog. It had long white fur and fluffy tail, a cute snout and appearance and it is big enough to be a hunting dog. Looking closely, there is a big of light pink in the underbelly and inside its legs. There is a variant from her original world but cannot recall the name of said animal. The reason why the dog's presence is so strange is because she has never felt this before. It is not ominous or dangerous but still unusual just the same.
It seems that its presence isn't noticed by her alone, but it brought a crowd's attention. They stare at the dog with amazement.
An extremely excited child tug on his mother's sleeve while pointing at it, "Mom, it's a Fire Dog!"
"Oh my! How lucky for us to see one today before the festival." Another spectator said.
A fire dog?
Amy pulled out a book she bought earlier out of her spatial ring and skim through the pages.
A fire dog is an exceptionally rare magical creature that doesn't originate on the mortal plane and originates from the Dark Realm. It appears like a typical white Samoyed, but its distinguished features are a light pink fur inside its legs and underbelly. It is known to travel between realms and were said to be the dogs of Heaven that served the angels. They appear in the mortal realm only on an eclipse. However, in the event that they chose their master, they will follow that person and their will even if there is no verbal command nor training to the very end. They cannot be bound by magic or physically restraint. They pose no problem as they do not interfere in the mortal realm. It is unknown what the qualification to own a fire dog is but previous rulers of Teluka with loyal fire dogs were reputed to become benevolent.
Since that dog seems to be staring at her, it seems it is choosing her as its master. She puts the book away and stared at it a bit longer to study it.
Truth is that Amy really likes dogs. But she couldn't keep them because Viola is afraid of them. Back when Alina still lived in her family mansion, she found and tamed two hellhounds. In addition to martial arts, Alina also taught her how to tame and train dogs, even the seemingly untamable hellhounds. The reason why hellhounds are allowed on the premises are because these dogs have been tamed when they were puppies and separated from the mansion. These dogs on the other hand aren't so she can't bring them along, not to mention that it will be dangerous to have one around since they are mythical even among others in the same category.
She turned around to walk away but the look of the onlookers show that the dog is definitely following her. She turned around and there are now two fire dogs. Uneasy, she turned away and speed walk. Forget about shopping, she needs to get out of here. She has no time for this. Everything she planned today would be ruined.
She could hear barking, and the people remarked. She turned around again and this time, she is staring at five of them. She then dashed away with the dogs close at her tail. They are extremely fast, so she jumped onto the roof of a building before running away.
*
"AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!"
Everyone was falling into what looks like a bottomless pit and everything just stopped. The sensation of falling is gone, and he felt like he's back on solid ground.
Theseus sat on the ground and realized that he's separated from everyone. Using his gravity manipulation, he made himself float and fly to look around. He wishes he has Violet's sixth sense; it would've gotten him a lay of the area. He felt something heavy in his pocket and pulled out the scrying orb. He was in a hurry and accidentally took it with him.
"I wonder if it works."
If it works, that means that there is a signal and that means that contacting the outside world is possible. After tapping it, the orb begins to glitch violently before it transition to the view of the sky.
*
Amy had to stop. She ran away from civilization and even teleported to the ship as a last resort, yet they still managed to follow her. She decided to accept her fate and keep the dogs. She stayed outside the deck with the view of the sky to rest and pet the dogs while sitting on a lawn chair. Despite the name, they are not exactly associated with fire element. The reason they are called fire dogs is because they eat fire. That is their only sustenance.
She sighs as she watched the dogs look up to the sky. The eclipse will start in a few hours. Checking if the final preparations are complete, she grabbed on a pair of protective glasses when she noticed a loud static sound, stirring the dogs awake.
She teleported to the secret room where the scrying ball begins to focus and the first thing she could see is Theseus's frantic face.
"Oh, my gods! It worked."
Surprised, she took the scrying ball in her hand. "Theseus? What is going on?"
How is this possible?