Orion's Herald
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Chapter 38: Do you think you've seen it all?
🕑 Added 2024-12-24 14:43:48 +0000 UTCThe woman chuckled, seemingly finding her reaction funny, as she pulled a scroll from her robe. “Relax little one, you may think me a Glademoore, but I left my family long ago. So, in a way, I can understand your situation.”
Sure you do.
Emela shuffled further away from Nyx, making sure there was a good distance between them. If this woman attacked—and there was no guarantee she wouldn’t—it would be best to avoid both of them getting taken out at the same time.
The woman sighed, tapping the scroll on her palm as she appeared to be contemplating something. The sobs from the surrounding people continued, and Emela resisted the urge to look. This woman was in the Core Formation realm. And If things went south, the cries of a few mortals would be the least of her worries.
“Take this,” the woman said, throwing the scroll to Emela. It whipped through the air, clattering to the ground at her feet. Emela didn’t look at it. The woman shrugged. “If you decide to accept, ask for Acalla. I know what you are going through, young one, trust me.”
With that, the woman launched into the air, cracking the cobblestone. She leapt from shattered stall to shattered stall, making her way to the center of the festival.
“Wasn’t she part of the Phoenix company?” Nyx said, reaching down to pick up the scroll.
“She had the robes of a member. She must be someone with some rank if she’s in the Core Formation realm.” Emela said, directing her attention into the distance, to the center of the festival.
There, a larger version of the creatures she and Nyx had been fighting, stood, tentacles whipping around as it fought back the encroaching groups of Mana Cultivators. The air shook with violent roars as the feeling of wrongness it gave off spread all the way over here. It was truly something that didn’t belong, but she couldn’t figure out why.
Maybe there will be something in the family library about what these things are.
“Do you think the others are alright?” Nyx asked, sliding the scroll into her pocket and turning to Emela. She bunched her black brows as her blue eyes squinted towards the beast. “You don’t think they were anywhere near that creature, do you?”
Emela shook her head—she didn’t know and wouldn’t unless she went over there herself. The groans from a nearby stall carried on the wind. Her heart grew heavier with every pained cry, but she set her jaw and focused on the beast. She needed to get stronger, or she would end up like these people one day. Alone and weak, dying in a way that was out of her control—that was not what she wanted, that was not freedom.
“Come on, Nyx?” Emela said, walking down the path. Her footsteps echoed off the cobblestone as she moved gracefully towards the center. Another reason she couldn’t waste time on these people. First, she had to make sure her friends were alright.
Nyx nodded, trailing behind silently.
——
Wymon frowned as he knelt on the cobblestone. One hand at his hip whilst the other hung at his side, twitching—he really wanted to take a swig. Just one small sip from his waterskin and everything would be alright.
“He got away again, sir,” Ana said weakly from his side. The woman lay on the ground, her back propped up against a shattered box that was now a mostly pile of broken wood. Blood trickled from the side of her mouth as she looked off to the beast that dominated the horizon.
“Yeah, he did, lucky fool. I almost had him, too.” Wymon said, looking back at her, and resting a hand on her shoulder, “Are you going to be alright?”
“Sorry, sir, it’s my fault. If I had been a bit more capable, we would have caught him,” she said, letting out a cough, splattering blood onto her dark red robes. Her gaze moved from the horizon and focused on him. “I’m sorry.”
“That’s not what I asked.” Wymon shook his head and put his hand into his robes, feeling for a pill—why were these children always so difficult and headstrong? His fingers brushed across a smooth, round surface. The texture sent a wave of relief through him. He had one. Pulling his hand back, a red pill clutched between his fingers, he frowned at Ana. “Open your mouth.”
The girl groaned, weakly opening her mouth, barely enough to fit the pill. Wymon popped it in and watched as she swallowed with a gulp. A few seconds later, her skin took on a red hue. Sweat droplets pooled on her forehead before tracing a long line down her face and dripping off her chin. It had worked—he’d need to make sure he got a few more pills when they returned to base.
“How are you feeling now?” He asked, shuffling forward and rummaging around some rubble. He’d seen something just now that looked like a talisman, but he couldn’t be sure. There were a lot of talisman stalls around the festival.
“Much better, thank you, sir,” she said, letting out a breath. Wood cracked and shifted beneath her as she adjusted herself. He threw a glance over his shoulder and raised a hand to stop her. “What’s wrong, sir?”
“One, I’m looking for something, and two. You just ate a recovery pill. You know what happens when you push yourself too hard.” He turned back to the debris in front of him and continued rooting around. Wood chunks and cloth soaked in liquid, with chunks of food sticking to them, shuffled around as he spent a few more seconds searching. Eventually, he sighed. Accepting the fact that it must have just been a trick of the eye—he really needed to get some proper sleep.
“Did you find what you were looking for?” Ana said, grunting as she got to her feet. Splinters of wood clattered to the ground as she stepped over, crunching debris beneath her boots.
“No, annoyingly not.” Wymon dusted his hands off, pushing off the ground, and clambering to his feet with a grunt. “But it doesn’t matter much. We have more important things to worry about.”
Ana looked away from him, her brown eyes moving to the enormous creature in the distance as she let out a shaky breath. “How did they even manage to summon a void beast? Especially a rank 4 at that?”
“I don’t know, but I guess that’s why Draken was so intent on stopping us from catching his little friend.”
“Do you think Peter is alright?”
Wymon sighed, his gaze drifting to some shifting rubble. A piece fell off the moving pile. One, then another, then another. Till, eventually, a man clawed out of the small hill of debris, letting out a triumphant shout—Wymon could only imagine what that must’ve felt like, to finally be free. Ana looked at Wymon, raising a brow as her brown eyes scanned him. He sighed. “Yeah, he can be a bit dense at times. But the boy is alert and has a good head on his shoulders. If things got crazy, I have no doubt he would have gotten out of there.”
Ana sighed, lowering her head, and bringing a finger to her lip. Wymon shrugged. She was thinking about the wrong thing. As a member of the Claw group, they had a job to do, and the first thing was to get these citizens out of the area—the Phoenix Company had just been dealt a blow. Now was the time for damage control.
“Ana, go help that man over there,” Wymon said, pointing at the man who had just freed himself from the rubble. “I’ll sweep the streets, getting others out. We need to move these people away from the center festival.”
“Yes sir,” the girl said nodding, shaking loose a strand of blond hair, which she quickly placed behind her ear. She then strode away, crunching wood under her feet, as she moved towards the man.
Okay, first, I should probably look for those lightly wounded—
A loud crash stalled his thoughts as a small void creature smashed through the wreckage of a stall a few feet down the path. It lashed about, jerking, tentacles flailing, as it tried to get something—no, someone off its back. Wymon’s eyes went wide at the sight as he tried to process what he was seeing. For a moment he’d thought it was a Core Formation mana cultivator, but no—they wouldn’t have even taken a moment to defeat a creature like that.
He continued to watch as the girl, ginger hair whipping around, kept delivering blow after blow to the creature’s back, dodging from side to side every time a tentacle got close to taking her out. Wymon’s mouth hung agape. His tongue almost fell out of his mouth. That shouldn’t be possible. The speed at which those tentacles moved even gave him some trouble.
He reached for the mana armaments—twin fire blades forged by the company’s Curlian smiths—that hung at his side. This person was definitely proving to be a challenge for the creature, but she was hardly doing enough damage to it. He’d have to get involved now or risk others getting hurt.
It’s just not my day today. All I wanted to do was have a drink and go to sleep. Yet here I am.
Wymon held back a yawn, kicking off from the ground, the cobblestone blurring beneath him as he closed the gap between him and the creature. The girl, a high-level Mana-Cultivator most likely, continued to pummel the beast. But a jerk from the creature slamming its hind legs onto the cobblestone sent her falling off of it.
The fall was unnatural. It was like watching a cat drop off a table, but it knew how to organise its body mid-fall. The girl dodged another tentacle, aiming for her chest, and whipped out with a kick as the beast paw barreled towards her, knocking it back.
Who is this child? Is she a noble perhaps, but no Flamelight heirs were said to be in the area today?
Wymon skidded to a stop, boots scraping against the ground, before he used the momentum to launch into the air, slicing at tentacles that came his way. The blades sliced through the thick meat. Cooking the flesh, causing the stink of sulfur to explode through the air. The beast roared, rasing back on its hind legs as he land with a soft thud onto the cobblestone.
“Get back!” He yelled, sparing a glance at the girl. But paused as he noticed her eyes—they flickered with an iridescent white light, not natural in the slightest. His body moved on his own, raising his twin blades and a force exploded into them, knocking him back.
He flipped through the air, sliding to a stop on the stone. The girl weaved through the beast’s tentacles, delivering ineffective blow after ineffective blow. The beast continued to lash out, screeching as its attacks failed to find its mark. Its attacks would never land. Those eyes—he’d seen them only once before.
But if she has what I think, she most likely isn’t a high level Mana Cultvator, she is probably not even a noble.
No noble wore rags like that. Those were the clothes of someone who lived in the slum. And if she was a slum dweller, this could be a huge opportunity. He shot forward as the beast raised its paw to slam down on the girl.
She wouldn’t need the help, but it was time to end this fight. The beast’s paw fell. He swivelled to the right, boots scraping along the cobblestone before he launched off the ground, delivering two quick strikes. The first sunk into the side of the creature’s paw, sizzling flesh. The second slammed near the top of its leg, causing the creature to let out a roar.
A tentacle whipped out, slamming towards him. He dug the dagger in deeper, gripping its handle and pulling himself forward as the beast reeled back. Wrenching the dagger free, he swivelled into the air, launching back down and puncturing the beast’s head with the blades.
He pulled on the mana inside him, willing it into his weapons. Fire erupted from the puncture wounds, as flames poured from the Wymon’s blades into the creature’s skull, searing whatever was in there and releasing the stink of sulfur. The beast’s body shook, and he kicked off its head, flipping through the air and landing on the cobblestone as the creature collapsed to the ground. Dead.
His chest heaved, rising and falling, as he held his swords out in front of him. The girl, ginger hair fluttering in the gentle breeze, glanced at him. The chaotic call of the true horror at the center of the festival was but a distant din. Wymon paid it no mind as he lowered his daggers and approached the girl.
I can only hope she is receptive.
Comments
Leonardo Phipps
Nah. That was my fault. Thanks for the spot.
Casual Ham
"wouldn’t. It" should be "wouldn't—It" and "Did you fined" should be "Did you find". Also, "delt a blow" should probably be "dealt" (unless it's different in UK english)
