Tag: Version 2

As Nihil’s group was making their way to the next town over, Stella and Lunam’s group headed toward the capital. Following the road around the walls, they reached the visitors’ entrance and lined up in one of the several queues that had formed. There were giant egg shaped objects dotted over the side of the slope up to the city. But before Lunam could speculate any further, a disturbance occurred ahead of them. It seemed that a non-human had tried to argue with the guards over the exorbitant fees.

“This could get expensive for us, so my sister and I should head in separately to you three – just in case they hold your relationship with us against you.” Stella suggested reasonably upon witnessing the fight.

Now that she wasn’t constantly around Nihil, her mood seemed to have finally calmed down. Noticing the change in her sister, Lunam let out a small sigh of relief and a smile spread across her crimson lips.

Reluctantly agreeing with their leader, Carl, Clark and Paul distanced themselves from the two ladies.

“Once we’re inside, we should leave selling the materials to those three while we go and meet Master.” Lunam suggested after the guys had left.

“We haven’t seen her in so long, I’ve really missed her.” Stella responded, indicating her agreement. “She did so much for us after everything that happened. I’d like to get her a present before we meet her.”

“That’s a good idea, we should have a look around the market on the way to her place.”

“Actually, I was thinking that we could use one of the magical beasts’ cores and make a charm for her. We could hire a mage to enchant it for us as well. It wouldn’t be as good as the high level ones that she could buy, but it would be more personal.” Stella suggested tentatively. She knew that it wouldn’t end up being anything that their master would even deign to look at if she saw it on a market stall, so Stella was nervous about how well this would work out.

“I think she’d appreciate that. But I think you should carve the enchantments. As a healer, you’ve learnt how to emit your internal energy and manipulate it. More than that, you can use that emitted energy to sense whatever it’s touching. You may not be able to directly use the core’s stored power, but you could theoretically direct it with your own – just as you do when you’re healing someone. It’s not something that anyone’s ever tried before, but it’s worth a shot.” Lunam encouraged her sister.

Their master was the one that taught the two of them how to cultivate, and dramatically increased their fighting skills enough for the two of them to survive on their own. She even taught Stella the healing arts of a cultivator, so this would be a good way to show how they’d developed since they last saw her.

“I’ll give it a go, but I may ruin the core …” Stella trailed off nervously.

“That’s fine. I’m sure the party would understand, and Master would probably just find it funny and still treasure the left over slag.” Lunam teased her sister with a laugh.

Stella let out a small laugh at her sister’s words, and found them to actually be somewhat comforting.

Just then, the two girls reached the main gates to the city. At first, the guards greeted them politely and were respectful as they asked them a series of questions.

“Good morning, girls.” A slightly older guard greeted them. “Were you planning on staying in Imber for long?”

“No thanks, we’re just passing through so we’d just like a visa for two or three days, please.” Lunam replied politely.

“The shortest visa we have is for a week, but you’re free to leave at any point during that week.” The man replied apologetically.

Is this another one of Crown Prince Pravus’ changes? Stella wondered angrily. This is basically robbery! Most visitors are adventurers and magicians that are only wanting to stay for a couple of days on their way somewhere else!

“That’s fine, then.” Lunam responded, somehow managing to hide her annoyance.

“Ok, I’ll need you to step into this scanner in order to put your species down on the visa.” The guard explained while gesturing to a strange looking device behind him.

The woman who’d spoken to Nihil before, probably hadn’t known about this machine. Because she was a permanent resident of the city, she just had to show her pass to the guards at a separate entrance and they would immediately let her in and out.

The scanner turned out to be the giant granite eggs that they saw before. It had a door on it’s side so the girls quickly deduced that they would have to step inside it. There were several next to each queue to prevent long lines from forming as people waited to be scanned before entering the city.

When they got closer to one of these eggs, they realised that the entire surface was covered in tiny inscription patterns that must have taken a very skilled enchanter a very long time in order to complete. These patterns were made up of fine veins of glistening beast cores that had been melted down and inset into the granite. The guard opened the doors leading into two of these eggs, and gestured that the girls should enter.

“Don’t worry, it wont hurt. All that will happen is that you’ll see a bright ring of light travel from the top of the egg down to the base. Once the light hits the bottom, the door will automatically open and you’ll be allowed out.” The man assured the two.

Nodding their heads in understanding, the two girls gingerly stepped inside their respective eggs. It turned out just as the guard had described it, and when the doors opened the sisters were even more nervous than before. Now the guards would know they weren’t human, so they knew that their attitudes would do a complete 180 from before.

“So you girls were mongrels, then?” The older guard spoke up in a completely different tone from before. He used the derogatory term for a half-breed, clearly showing his dislike for the two.

The gazes of all the guards present turned vicious and even lecherous as they took a second look at the two girls’ figures. They’re mongrels? They could be fun to play around with, then. It’s not like they’re human, so it’s not a problem to have our way with them.

These were that kinds of thoughts that almost all of the male guards were contemplating. However, some guards weren’t even slightly interested, as they thought that the girls were worse than animals – no matter how pretty they were.

“It’s even worse than that, sir.” A young boy chirped up from the back. He was sitting behind a screen that was flashing with the results that were being relayed back by all the eggs. “They’re half human.”

“A human actually acted so slutty as to mate with an animal?” The first guard scathingly accused.

“Don’t talk about our mother that way!” Stella angrily rebuked them.

“Wait, you two are sisters?” The young analyser asked, even more disgusted than before. He then pointed at Lunam and revealed that she was half demon, while Stella was half elf.

Upon learning this, the guards who had been eyeing them up before all cooled down. Their disgust for the girls’ mother completely drowned out any lust that the guards may have had.

After enduring much heckling from all the guards that had been present, the two girls were finally allowed to enter the city. But this didn’t happen until after they had been charged an especially exorbitant fee for their visas due to the guards deliberately hiking up the price.

The sisters had held back their seething anger at the guards’ provocations as they knew that they would just have been arrested. The men were hoping that the girls would react.

* * *

The truth was that their mother hadn’t chosen to have them, but that hadn’t stopped the woman from caring deeply for her two girls. Stella and Lunam were actually half siblings, and yet both of them hated their fathers’ guts.

What had happened was that an evil group was looking for a successor, and they had taken a liking to a human woman called Sarah. They snatched her from her home and kept her locked up underground for 13 years. During that time they raped her and forced her to give birth to Lunam and Stella. Even after they got the heirs they’d wanted, they kept Sarah around to raise the two girls.

When Lunam reached the age of 10, she was taken away from her mother and forced to practice the evil techniques of the group. Stella was a later bloomer than her sister, so she didn’t get taken away until she was 11. It was at this time that the group murdered Sarah, accidentally letting the two girls see.

As they watched their mother’s death, the girls finally realised how evil the organisation was, and Lunam used her stealth abilities to cover their escape.

All throughout childhood, they had been brainwashed by the group and hadn’t realised just how much their mother had suffered due to the organisation. However the group never managed to rid the two girls of their love for their mother, so the sight of them mercilessly slaughtering Sarah shocked them into running away.

During the two years that Lunam had spent practising the evil arts in the organisation, she had found out that her stealth abilities were naturally much more advanced than any of the other practitioners in the the group. As such, if she didn’t wish to be detected, they would never be able to find her. She could also extend this ability to cover just one other person. This ability was the key to their escape.

After they ran away, they quickly ran out of food as they also hadn’t thought to grab any money before they’d left. As the were slowly starving to death in the slums of a border town between Avalon and Sheol, their future Master had ended up stumbling across them and decided to train them herself.

The two girls still didn’t know why their master had taken pity on them that day, but she’d fed them, given them a change of clothes, and offered them the chance to learn true cultivation under her tutelage. There was something about the woman that had reminded them of their mother, so they agreed and followed her back to the capital. Even just on the journey back, their master had never missed a single opportunity to teach the girls valuable lessons about how to survive in Axis.

* * *

After entering Imber, Stella and Lunam headed towards their agreed upon meeting place to wait for the 3 men from their group. This place was called the Ignorant Iguana’s Inn. It was the best budget inn in the entire city, so they had decided to stay there for the duration of their visit. Plus, the inn was also run by a friend of their master’s, so they could usually get an even better price for their rooms.

“Ah Stella! Lunam! It’s been so long! You girls have grown even prettier since I last saw you.” The proprietor, Hera, gushed as she rushed over to greet them and gave them a hug.

“Hera! You’re looking great, and business seems to be doing even better than before!” Stella replied, just as happy to see the woman.

Hearing her comment, Hera’s face turned somewhat solemn. “Unfortunately it’s not due to a good reason. With the Crown Prince’s outlook on non-human species, there aren’t that many inns willing to risk his displeasure by giving lodging to them. My place is one of the few that will actually accept them for the same price. The only places that can blatantly do this have to be like me and have strong backers that even the Royal Family can’t afford to offend.”

“How is that even legal? Doesn’t the Non-Aggression Pact prevent this kind of discrimination?” Stella asked in anger.

“Well, we still have the right to refuse customers. Otherwise we would be put in a tight spot if a difficult customer came by. Plus raising prices for different species is also not prohibited, so The Non-Aggression Pact would only be able to prevent this if it was possible to prove that species was the only reason they are being turned away …” Hera responded in frustration. This kind of oppression fell into a grey area in the rules of the pact.

Realising that what Hera said made some sense, Stella fell quiet and dropped her gaze to the ground in helplessness.

“How is Master doing?” Lunam spoke up at this point in order to change the subject.

“Aria is fine for now, but she’s facing some pretty heavy oppression from anyone affiliating themselves with the Crown Prince. I think her background in the Royal Guard has only made her rejection of the Prince’s doctrines all the more embarrassing for them.” Hera replied, worried for her friend.

“Master never has been one to mince her words – especially when the ones to piss her off are people in power.” Lunam replied helplessly.

After sorting out which rooms the five of them would be staying in, Stella and Lunam headed to the bar area to wait for the guys to show up.

“Miss Stella! Miss Lunam! I thought we went ahead. Sorry to keep you waiting.” Paul called out as they entered the inn, catching sight of the two girls at the bar.

“It’s fine, we managed to catch up with Hera while we waited, so it was fun.” Stella replied cheerfully.

Sitting next to their leaders, the three men asked about their plans for selling the materials they’d managed to gather.

“Stella and I were planning on catching up with our master while we’re here. We also have some business we need to discuss with her, so it might take a while.” Lunam started to explain. “So, we were thinking that you three should handle selling the materials, while we head to our master’s place. You should know the correct prices to get for our materials, so you’ll be fine.”

“Besides, having half-breeds like us around may actually be detrimental to the amount we could sell them for.” Stella added, clearly irritated at the Prince’s conduct.

“Ok, we’ll do as you suggest.” Carl responded. The three of them were just as upset by the Prince as their leaders were, but they didn’t want to cause the girls any trouble by saying more than they should.

Handing over a bracelet, Lunam spoke up in explanation. “Here are all the materials we collected on the way here. The stuff we went into the ancient forest to gather is in a different storage ring, so you’re free to sell everything that is contained within this one.”

A storage ring was either a bracelet or ring that was made out of a magical beast’s core. It worked in much the same way as the bath’s enchanted gems Nihil and Ignis had encountered at the inn back in the ancient forest. The difference from those gems, was that storage rings had a much greater storage area. However, the trade back was that they were no longer insulated and so things would cool down overtime and perishables wouldn’t last very long.

This was a big part of the reason why Diei Noctis had decided to split into two groups – they wanted to make sure the meat and hides of the magical beasts they’d hunted didn’t spoil. They had also gathered a few medicinal herbs along the way, so time wasn’t really on their side. There were some storage rings that could stop time inside, but due to the special requirements for making them, each country probably only had 1 or 2 in total – let alone any individuals. These rings were known as ‘void-space’ rings.

Taking the bracelet, Paul tucked it into his jacket’s inner pocket. At this point, Stella excused herself from the group as she still had another question for Hera.

“You mentioned that some other inns were still accepting non-human clientele?” Stella started after locating the proprietress. “Just who would be powerful enough to prevent Avalon’s Royal Family from taking action against these inns?”

“No-one’s really sure about this. Some people say that it’s the Inter-Species Council, but I don’t believe they would have the time to spare for such a superficial move in someone else’s territory.” Hera mused. “If they were to do anything, they would gather evidence and then make a bigger move, directly invoking the Non-Aggression Pact. After all, that’s the limit of their authority outside of their own borders.”

“That may be true, but Avalon couldn’t afford to offend the Inter-Species Council even if they did overstep their power.” Stella pointed out. “But I do agree that this isn’t really their style. Since they’re also backing you, how do even you still not know? This all sounds kinda iffy.”

“They aren’t supporting me directly, and since they’re helping me, it seems a bit rude to investigate too deeply. I know enough that they’re not up to anything nefarious though.” She explained simply. “Some people are incorrectly assuming that the evil guild, Advorsus, is the one backing us so they can nab a few non-humans on the sly though. So we have a few people harassing us every day.”

“Advorsus!” Stella all but growled the guild’s name. Suddenly thinking of something, she spoke up again. “But they’re an internationally wanted terrorist organisation. There’d be no reason for Avalon to hold back if they were the ones pulling the strings. Why would people think of them now?”

“Well, you’re certainly right that there wouldn’t be any honourable reasons for them to hold back. However there are some that claim that Prince Pravus and Advorsus are working together behind the scenes.” Hera responded with a light laugh. “Well, I get the feeling that Prince Pravus is just trying to discredit us as much as possible since he can’t take any direct action. Though he seems to have incriminated himself at the same time. Incompetent fool.”

“If what you’ve just said turns out to be true, though and the Prince actually is working with -” Stella started, but Hera quickly interrupted.

“Stop, you shouldn’t say such things while you’re in the capital. You never know who may be listening.” She warned.

She’d only said as much as she had, because Aria was a dear friend of Hera’s and she’d watched as Stella and Lunam had grown up.

Sill seething, Stella worked on bringing her emotions back under control. Once she was calm again, she took her leave and returned to Lunam.

Just as she arrived, Paul, Carl and Clark were excusing themselves in order to start selling the materials they’d gathered. Sending the three off, the two sisters then headed to their room in order to prepare some things – not least of them being the enchantment of the magical beast core.

Emerging from the narrow stretch of trees lining the right hand side of the road, Nihil and Ignis were greeted by large open skies and farmland as far as their eyes could see.

The town they were headed towards was just over the nearest hill. That being said, it was over a day’s walk away so they wouldn’t reach the town for roughly another 2 days. Now that they’d exited the ancient forest, the towns and cities would all be 2-5 days away from each other by foot until they reached the rocky plains at Avalon’s shared border with Sheol.

The ruins were roughly 37,000km away so it would take almost two months to reach them on foot. Since they were adventurers, they wouldn’t use horses or other methods of transportation. After all, their destination wasn’t their only objective. They were also interested in the magical beasts that they could kill on their way. The average party could travel around 450km per day on foot, and Axis’ months all consisted of 50 days, each of which being 30 hours long.

If they’d been on their own, Nihil and Ignis would have been able to travel much faster so this slow pace was sure to annoy them. However, they couldn’t pass up the cover they’d receive from Diei Noctis. After all, the Royal Guard would expect them to have travelled much further by this time. In fact, they probably assumed that the men were already at Avalon’s borders at the edge of the Central Sea. The Guard must be frantically searching, hoping to catch the pair before they crossed the border.

The Central Sea was entirely Arcadia’s territory. Anything that was on those waters would fall into their jurisdiction, and no other country could interfere without going through the council first.

Since the inter-species council was in charge of the Central Sea, it would make sense for Ignis and Nihil to head there to petition for intervention. The sea also happened to be much closer to them than the borders of Sheol. However, knowing that the Royal Guard would anticipate this, the two had decided to head to the ruins first.

This route would also end up with a much shorter journey at sea in order to reach the main island. This island was called the Black Isle, and the city at the centre was the capital of the entire country – Bule.

Despite the island’s ominous name, It was actually named for the onyx within the ground, literally making it black in colour. The citizens really embraced it, and they built most of their buildings out of the stone. It also had the added benefit of being a very valuable material for enchanting due to its purity, so they often sold it to the other countries for a decent price.

* * *

There were a few groups of people dotted here and there, making their way to or from the road leading to Imber. These groups would be merchants, travellers, and also other adventurers that had business in the capital. However due to the recent developments with the crown prince, there were far fewer non-humans as compared to previous years.

Picking a path that would navigate them through the farmland and take them to the village they were headed to, the group set off. Before long, a few magical beasts attacked the party, trampling through crop fields and vegetable patches that happened to get in their way. Luckily these magical beasts didn’t attack in groups, so they were quickly dispatched and dismantled. After these attacks, the group would help the farmers clean up the mess and apologise for the trouble. The farmers were normally understanding and forgiving, but there would always be a few grumpy people that couldn’t be pacified.

Magical beasts normally wouldn’t care about farmland and the weak farmers who tended the fields. However, if a large group of powerful cultors passed by, the nearby magical beats would get stirred up into a frenzy and attack the group without worrying about what happened to be in front of them.

During their journey, it soon became evident that, with the absence of their leaders, the group was much more subdued than usual. However Ignis soon cheered everyone up again by telling them many different stories of his past with Nihil. He even told them the story of when he’d first befriended Nihil.

* * *

Ignis was 10 years old when he first arrived at the same compound that Nihil was being kept in. Looking through the glass wall, for some reason Ignis was immediately intrigued by the defiant man before him. Since that day, Nihil’s appearance hadn’t changed at all – aside from perhaps coming across as much friendlier.

That day, Nihil had looked even more stoney faced than he did in recent days. Ignis had thought that Nihil’s indifferent golden eyes were hiding a deep-rooted sadness. No matter what happened to him Nihil never seemed to even register it, but Ignis still sensed that there was more to him than met the eye.

To a child of 10 years old, Nihil had always been mysterious and somewhat scary. However, that just made Ignis want to talk to him even more. Unfortunately no matter how often he’d approached the strange man, he’d always been shot down and told to go off and play by himself.

Back then, they’d all been referred to by numbers. Nihil’s number was zero, while Ignis’ was 1915. That being said, by the time Ignis arrived, there were only around 20 kids left in the compound. He hadn’t really understood the full implications of this at first, but as the years passed and the kids slowly vanished, he gradually understood what had happened to them. He also finally understood why Nihil had never once told him to play with the other kids.

It was when Ignis was 15 years old that something happened to change his relationship with Nihil. Ignis had been wandering around the small, walled garden. As always, he’d been wearing the shackles that were compulsory for all the incarcerated children to wear.

Ignis had noticed that the apples on the tree in the centre of the garden were ripe, and he’d wanted to pick one to eat. While he was within the branches, Ignis had seen Nihil sleeping in the shade not too far away from the tree the little boy had climbed. Surprised that he hadn’t sensed the man’s presence until then, Ignis jumped down from the tree and approached the stranger for a better look. Even with Nihil right in front of him, Ignis still couldn’t sense the guy at all.

Looking at Nihil’s face, Ignis noticed that the guy’s sad expression didn’t disappear even while he was sleeping. Just then Nihil’s eyes flickered as he woke up and saw the boy standing over him.

“Y-your eyes are a pretty colour.” Ignis awkwardly stuttered. He was embarrassed at being caught staring, and his brain stopped working for a few seconds.

Realising what he’d said, Ignis had blushed deeply and started rambling in a desperate attempt to explain what he meant. “I-it’s just that I haven’t seen that colour before – not that I remember my past before I came here. Are you a half-breed? Though most half-breeds take after just one parent … You have horns, but you also have a fox’s tail and elven ears. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone like you before -”

“You like my eye colour?” Nihil interrupted upon realising that the little boy in front of him wasn’t going to stop talking any time soon.

“Huh? Oh yeah, it’s super awesome. It’s almost as if they’re glowing.”

“Well, you’d be the first to think that way …” Nihil had muttered to himself.

Standing up, he tried to reenter the compound building. However Ignis was still standing right in front of him, so Nihil ended up tripping over the chain connecting his two shackles together.

Catching him, Ignis checked to see if Nihil was ok.

“Yeah, I’m fine. It was just a particularly rough day, is all.” Nihil replied, exhausted.

“No wonder you were sleeping out here then.” Ignis commented sympathetically. “Right, I’ll walk you back to your room.”

“I can walk just fine on my own …”

“If you’re certain, then …” Ignis replied reluctantly. “I hope we can be friends from now on, though.”

“Huh? You want to be friends with me?” Nihil asked in shock. He was convinced he must have misheard the boy.

“Yeah. Do you not want to?”

“It’s not that I don’t -”

“Then it’s settled.” Ignis interrupted before Nihil could finish what he was going to say.

* * *

Naturally when he was telling this story, Ignis altered it slightly to fit the circumstances of two merchants’ children. As a result, none of the group noticed anything amiss with the story, and they even found it sweet. Some members found themselves warming up to Nihil slightly. However, most of them were more intrigued by Ignis’ strange personality of being so persistent.

At this point, the group reached a small woodland along the edge of their route. Since it was around midday, they decided to step inside to hide from the scorching sun for a minute, and to eat lunch while they were at it. Checking his supplies, Nihil realised that their stocks of food were very low. Looking around, he noticed that there were actually plenty of small animals and wild game in the area they were in.

Just as a low growl echoed throughout their surroundings, Ignis’ face grew serious. He could detect at least 13 magical beasts encircling them. They had stumbled across a pack of wolves.

“Nihil, there are 13 adults surrounding us, with their cubs hiding just behind them.” Ignis warned his friend after concentrating a bit harder.

“That’s a little troubling.” Nihil replied with a furrowed brow. “I’m not sure this group can take on that many opponents. Ignis, I’ll need your help here.”

“Got it.” Ignis declared after Nihil had explained the plan to him.

With perfect timing, the pack jumped and attacked the party of nine just as Nihil had finished explaining his plan to his friend.

“Now!” Archer shouted to the group. He had become the de facto leader in Stella and Lunam’s absence.

Archer was an older demon with greying hair, but he was still just as strong as he had been in his prime. His rich experience allowed him to lead this group with no problems, and his tactics in battle also left no room for doubt. Not even Nihil could often find fault with Archer’s cunning strategies.

After Archer shouted, Lucas, Alexis and Merry all opened fire with their long range weapons. Merry’s magical rifle was the most powerful, but the reload time was the slowest since she had to allow the rifle to charge between shots.

As the wolves drew nearer, she reached down into a pouch on her waist. Inside this pouch were several magical beast cores that she could slot into her gun. She hadn’t used these earlier because the rifle used a lot of the energy stored within the crystals, so she had to make sure that each one was used to maximum effect.

These wolves had an incredibly strong defence, so the rifle could only take one of them down after a couple of shots in the same area. Merry’s gun had the most powerful single attack of the entire party so it was needless to explain how the others were faring.

Lucas and Alexis were shooting their arrows at the wolves’ eyes in order to blind them. Even if they didn’t hit, the opponent was forced to look away from the party as they slipped behind trees to dodge the sharp projectiles.

Linley and Archer both worked together to limit their enemy’s movements further. They both shot out small dart-like objects into the trunks surrounding the group, forming a protective circle around them. Attached to these small darts were thin wires made from a spider-type magical beast’s webs. These threads were far stronger than any steel wires, and would serve to slow down the wolves’s advancement.

The attack style of these two was more suited to ambushes and assassinations, rather than a head on confrontation like this, so their options were severely limited. However, they weren’t defenceless, and their cultivations were among the highest in the Star and Moon adventurers. This meant that their hand-to-hand combat skills wouldn’t be lacking in comparison to the rest of the group.

Once the threads were all set up, the two demons fell back to the centre of the group while pulling out two short knives and taking up a defensive stance. They, along with Klaus and Claude, would perform hit and run attacks in order to keep their distance. The long range specialists would have the biggest affect on the outcome of this battle.

For this fight, Claude switched to an urumi as his normal whip wouldn’t deal as much damage in this kind of fight. An urumi was a sword that was made of super flexible steel, and could have a varying number of blades that were unbelievably sharp. He did have to sacrifice some of his reach, but as this had actually been his main weapon before joining Diei Noctis he was highly skilled at using the whip-like sword. His urumi had five blades, making it extremely difficult to master. However, it did mean that the amount of pain it dealt to an enemy was by no means small.

Noticing his choice of weapon, Nihil was impressed as it was one that required many years of constant practice in order to master.

“That weapon suits you better than the whip from before.” Nihil commented after watching his movements for a moment.

“This used to be my main weapon, so I’m not surprised.” Claude responded blithely.

Just then, the wolves managed to force their way through the threads protecting the group and started viciously attacking the party in fury. Blood dripped from their bodies in several places, and it was almost synced up with their drool, making for a rather terrifying scene.

Sensing something, the wolves all looked towards Nihil and broke off into two separate groups. Four of them headed towards Nihil, while the rest acted to keep the adventurers of Diei Noctis busy. Nihil had been standing a bit away from the group in order to keep out of their way, but now that had turned out to be a bad idea.

Looking at the adventurers, Nihil could see that they were all wondering why so many were heading towards him. They tried to stop the wolves, but the magical beasts’ defences were just too strong for them to be defeated in time.

Tch. I could easily take care of these few small fries, but that would mean displaying my magic to the group. Nihil thought in frustration. I guess I’ll just have to tell them some of the truth.

Just as he was about to unleash his magic on the beasts, Claude suddenly appeared before Nihil. The demon was covered in cuts and lacerations, but he still stood his ground and protected Nihil with a determined look on his face.

“I know you’d be fine even if I didn’t get involved, but that would mean showing everyone that you’re not as simple as you lead them to believe.” Claude muttered to Nihil under his breath. “I wouldn’t want to be around when Stella found out.”

“Haha … no, I wouldn’t either.” Nihil responded with a small laugh.

In this way, Claude was able to hold off the four wolves for just long enough for Ignis’s mission to be completed.

“Hey! Jackasses!” A shout echoed out from a distance away. “I have your cubs here!”

At this new voice, the wolves stopped attacking for a moment and turned to look in the direction it was coming from. Naturally this was Ignis, who’d disappeared unnoticed right at the beginning of the fight. In his arms, he was holding a cub that was desperately struggling to get free. The others were drugged and lying on the floor, asleep.

Seeing their cubs in such a situation, the wolves tried to head back to save them, growling in anger and panic, but the adventurers didn’t let this chance go. They unleashed a barrage of attacks and didn’t stop until every last one was dead.

Before, they’d had to worry about defending so they couldn’t attack with their full power, as that required time to muster. However, when the wolves had been distracted, they had completely lowered their guard against the group of adventurers, giving them time to prepare their attacks.

In the end, each individual wolf was less powerful than each of the adventurers, it was just that the wolves’ defence was tough to beat when they had their guard up. That, combined with their numbers, was what helped them to take out much stronger prey.

Now that the battle was over, Linley and Archer took care of the cubs. They weren’t old enough to have cores yet, but if left alone they would definitely seek revenge and become a pain to the group.

Nihil and Ignis exchanged pained looks at this cruel necessity, but they ultimately didn’t prevent the cubs’ deaths. Seeing this look, Claude wondered why the two were so soft. It wasn’t like the creatures had any intelligence. They also actively sought out people in order to devour their refined energy.

Nihil and Ignis weren’t so naive as to think that killing magical beasts wasn’t necessary, it was just that they didn’t like taking the lives of such young creatures. These cubs were, for all intents and purposes, still innocent, so slaughtering them like this seemed just a little bit wrong to them. However, they didn’t stop the group because they knew that this way of thinking would only serve to get people killed.

The only reason the magic beasts hadn’t been completely wiped out, was because in a way people relied on them to survive. All the different magical items used their cores in order to function, and so naturally most infrastructure was also dependant on beast cores to continue working. This, combined with the beasts’ incredible fertility, kept the species around. Besides, even small villages these days had walls to prevent incursions from magical beasts, and they tended to ignore the farmers outside of the perimeter. As such, the death count due to the beasts’ activity was actually very low in comparison to many other causes of death.

The next morning everyone got ready after eating a huge breakfast. As it turned out, Ignis didn’t have to worry about his friend as Nihil seemed completely recovered after just a couple of hours of rest, so he’d still been able to cook their food.

There were subtle bags under Nihil’s eyes that Ignis didn’t fail to miss, however no one else appeared to notice them. Even if they did see them they didn’t mention it, so neither of the two men brought up the subject either.

Nihil noticed Claude giving him curious glances throughout the meal, but didn’t bother to ask why. The two newcomers could already tell that Claude was the type of person to directly confront someone if he had a legitimate problem with them, so Nihil assumed that the half-demon’s behaviour had something to do with the discomforting aura that surrounded and continued to distance the golden-eyed man from the rest of the group.

Of everyone in Diei Noctis, Nihil actually liked Claude the best. He had a simple and honest nature, and yet he wasn’t nearly as touchy as Stella so Nihil found his personality rather refreshing. Actually, in a way Claude reminded Nihil of Ignis.

The village they’d been in before had only been a small one that was situated within a clearing of the ancient forest. All of the trees in this forest were at least 1,000 years old, so their widths and heights were staggering to behold for the first time. However, these trees were still tiny in comparison to the ones all over in Alfheim – the elven country.

Alfheim was a country on the other side of the Central Sea, and the forest that covered their entire land was even older than Avalon’s. There the youngest tree was 10,000 years old, and not even the entire party linking hands could fully encircle its trunk. Within Alfheim’s forest, there were many elven towns among the branches and they had rope bridges that traversed from tree to tree. Anyone with a fear of heights would give these towns a wide berth. However, the ground had a far greater number of magical beasts than any other country due to the dense world’s energy generated by the ancient trees. As such, the country was no place for the weak.

Soon they reached the end of the forest. Stepping out of the trees, the group was greeted by strong sunlight that took a few seconds to get used to after the dim green of the forest. Blinking rapidly, the group’s eyes finally adjusted and they saw a busy road running parallel to the forest’s edge. There was a line of normal sized trees running along the other side of the road, causing the disparity between the sizes to become all the more obvious. This was the road that led to Avalon’s capital, Imber, and the capital would be their first stop before heading to Sheol.

Reaching the road, they started to follow it into the city. However, it would still take most of the day before they finally reached the city’s walls. The large party attracted a lot of attention from the other travellers, but everyone soon looked away when they realised that the group was from the Adventurers’ Guild. Adventurers were well respected for the materials they gather by risking their lives, so no one wanted to accidentally offend one of them.

“Maybe we should split up into smaller groups in order to draw less attention. I get the feeling that we’re making people uncomfortable.” Paul suggested awkwardly.

“You’re probably right.” Linley responded with a small sigh. “Let’s split into groups of 3 or 4. It’s not like we’ll get lost while we’re following this road.”

In the end, the groups were organised as such: Alexis, Merry, Lunam and Stella; Paul, Linley, Carl and Clark; Archer, Klaus, and Lucas; and the last group consisted of Nihil, Ignis and Claude.

No one had any objections to Linley’s suggested groups, so they all parted ways and tried to merge with the crowd better than before. Nihil was surprised that Linley had noticed he was more comfortable around Claude than the rest of the group, but he was glad for it all the same. It seemed that Ignis was no longer the only one who was capable of reading Nihil’s moods.

“Umm … there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you all morning, but I didn’t get a chance to pull you away from the group.” Claude spoke up after they had put some distance between them and the rest of the party.

“Oh? Well we’re not with them now …” Ignis replied, genuinely confused.

Nihil had an idea of where this was going, but he didn’t stop Claude from asking his questions. He didn’t see any distrust or evil intentions in his eyes, so Nihil had decided to try trusting this man.

“Last night I was on my way back from taking a leak, when I noticed a glowing from between the trees …” Claude started. At this point Ignis had caught on to what was about to be said, and his eyes widened in panic as he desperately tried to come up with a reasonable explanation.

“As you can imagine, I was worried about what it was, so I headed towards it cautiously, and I saw you two. Your back was to me, Nihil, so I plainly saw your tail and the flame you created with magic. I also saw you eating it, Ignis … I guess what I want to know is why you guys are keeping your abilities from the group. If Miss Stella knew, then I’m sure she wouldn’t be so antagonistic towards you, Nihil.”

Ignis was shocked by the last sentence. Claude didn’t seem to be affected by Nihil’s negative aura, and was genuinely concerned for him. This revelation immediately made Ignis relax his guard, and he was truly happy that Nihil was finally making more friends. He decided to leave the choice of what to tell Claude up to Nihil.

“I’m afraid that Stella’s attitude wouldn’t be swayed so easily. The truth is that at least part of her aggression towards me is due to my special constitution. I have a negative aura around me that sets people on edge whenever they’re too close to me. It’s not something that I can control either.” Nihil explained expressionlessly, but his sorrow was still evident in his voice.

“I see … but why do you have such an aura? It’s not like you’re a bad person, after all.” Claude replied confidently.

“Hah, how are you so confident of that?” Nihil laughed rhetorically before continuing with his explanation. “It’s because I wasn’t born in a ‘normal’ way, and people can instinctually sense that about me so they get uncomfortable in my presence.”

“Does this have something to do with your tail? Come to think of it, why can’t we see it normally? Are you constantly using magic to hide it?”

“Not quite, my belt is enchanted to camouflage it. The only reason you could see it last night is because I was using all of my mental energy to create that especially dense flame you saw. As a result, I didn’t have enough concentration to spare to direct some more energy into the belt.” Nihil neatly dodged the question of his origin. He didn’t like talking about it after all.

“Oh! That makes sense. But wouldn’t a belt like that be expensive due to its unconventional nature? Why do you need to go to such lengths? It’s not like tails are an uncommon sight after all – most half-breeds can’t hide their tails and ears.”

“It wasn’t exactly expensive for us though … since Nihil was the one who created and inscribed it. He also enchanted his hat to -” Ignis started to respond, but then suddenly stopped as he realised that he was giving too much information again.

Hearing his friend’s words and seeing his worried expression, Nihil just rolled his eyes and smiled. He then slowly reached up and removed his hat from his head. Claude was curious as he watched Nihil’s actions, but soon his eyes lit up in shock and understanding. He then quickly turned his head to the others around, but soon realised that they hadn’t noticed anything unusual.

“So that’s what the enchantment on your hat hides. But how come no one else sees them?” Claude asked in confusion.

“Just before taking my hat off, I set up an illusion so that they wouldn’t see anything more than us walking along as we talk.” Nihil explained truthfully.

Underneath his hat, Nihil had a beautiful pair of obsidian horns that seemed to absorb all the surrounding light. However, there was something wrong with them. They were broken stubs that looked like they had previously been much, much longer. There were also a couple of other changes that Claude didn’t fail to notice. The first being that Nihil’s ears had lengthened to resemble those of elves’, and the second was that the boy’s pupils had stretched into slits like a cat’s. However, the horns were the most eye catching of the three.

“What happened to your horns? With their jagged edges, they look like something snapped them off!” Claude was understandably shocked, horns were among the strongest and densest known materials, so snapping them would take an incredible amount of force. This was especially true the darker they were, and Nihil’s were the darkest he’d ever seen. In fact, logically the man’s skull should have been the first of the two to give way.

“That I’m not sure about. I’ve had trouble remembering some things about my past. But I do know that they used to be much larger than most demons’. In a way, they’re easier to manage like this.”

“But don’t they hurt? I can’t even imagine the pain I’d be feeling if my horns were broken like that.”

“If you live with something for long enough, you get used to it eventually.” That was all Nihil would say on the subject.

Upon hearing this Claude and Ignis shared a concerned look for their friend, but they ultimately didn’t say anything. They knew that there was nothing they could do to help him.

Putting his cap back on, Nihil lowered the illusion barrier and sped up his pace slightly. Clearly the conversation was over for now. Taking the hint, Ignis and Claude quickly followed him.

Just then someone nearby called out to Claude and grabbed his arm.

“I should warn you that the guards at the gate won’t be too welcoming to anyone who’s not human.” The woman warned in concern. “You’re an adventurer so you’ll be let into the capital, but the guards won’t be too pleasant about it.”

“Huh? That wasn’t the case when I visited last year, though.” Claude replied in confusion.

“I thought you might not know, did you guys travel through the ancient forest from Kuk?” At Claude’s nod, the woman continued. “About six months ago, Crown Prince Pravus took over control of Imber’s security and governance in preparation for his duties as king. Since his father is occupied with managing the rest of the country, the prince has been left to his own devices and he started making his loathing towards other species much more evident. Obviously that made the guards at the gate try to curry his favour by also giving other species a hard time.”

“That sounds about right …” Ignis muttered under his breath with a dark expression.

Hearing his words, Claude gave the two men beside him a strange look but ultimately decided not to ask. Luckily the lady didn’t seem to hear, so she carried on explaining the situation to the guys.

“Since you’re an adventurer you’ll be allowed to enter, but the fee will be much higher than for humans. There will also be an additional fee when you leave and for the duration of your stay.”

“That’s really pushing the limits of the Non-Aggression Pact.” Nihil commented derisively.

“That’s what I think too! The Non-Aggression Pact might not specifically prohibit this sort of discrimination, but it still goes against everything it stands for.” The woman seemed to have a personal reason for such strong antipathy towards this new atmosphere. “Sorry for my outburst, my husband is a dwarf so I know first hand just how difficult and outrageous the guards have become under Prince Pravus’s control. It’s got to the point where finding a job is even difficult for such a skilled blacksmith as my husband. I’m actually on my way back into the city to let my family know that I’ve managed to secure us a new home in a relatively nearby village.”

“Thank you for letting us know. By the way, how can they tell what species someone is? Do they just go by appearance and miss a lot of half-breeds and the mysterious beasts in human form? Or do they actively scan people for their species?” Nihil spoke up in concern for himself and Ignis.

“Oh that! I’m not quite sure … I guess they have some sort of scanner? But I’ve never seen it. I just know that they don’t miss even the people who look to be human.” The woman speculated. She’d never thought about it before, but the boy did bring up a good point.

“Thank you for the warning, I hope you and your family can make a more comfortable life for yourselves in your new home.” Ignis spoke up, letting the woman rush ahead to see her family again.

“We need to find the others to let them know of this change. We may be able to get better prices for our materials here, but with all those additional fees it might not turn up more profit for us in the long run.” Claude commented after she’d disappeared from their view. “Most of our group isn’t human after all …”

“That sounds like a good idea.” Nihil spoke up, but something in his voice seemed off.

After rounding everyone up, Claude explained to the group about the current situation.

“It’s up to Miss Stella and Miss Lunam to decide what to do. Since we’re here already, it would take less time if we go, but we’d probably end up with less profit in the end …” Claude laid out the options after he’d finished explaining everything.

“My sister and I need to make a stop to see someone inside the capital, so we don’t really have a choice in the matter …” Stella answered in frustration.

“Well, how about this? Ignis and I were thinking it might be testing fate a bit for us to head right into the Royal Guard’s headquarters, so we and some of your group can stay behind here and limit the cost of entering the capital that way.” Nihil spoke up, quickly coming up with a reason for him and Ignis to avoid the scan at the entrance.

“That’s a point, we could do that.” Claude responded before Stella could jump down the guy’s throat. “If we head toward the next town on the way to the ruins, we could resupply and meet up there. That way we would probably even end up saving time.”

“That’s true …” Lunam mused. She then seemed to suddenly reach a decision. “Right, that’s what we’ll do then. Stella, Carl, Clark and Paul will enter the capital with me, while the rest of you should all go on ahead to the next town.”

“Hu~h?” Alexis whined half-jokingly. “And I was so looking forward to finally sleeping in a proper bed tonight as well … now it will be another few days at least.”

“It can’t be helped …” Linley responded, resigning himself to the trek ahead. “That prince is considerably shortsighted … if he pushes his luck too much, he’ll have the council breathing down his neck.”

“From the sounds of the douchebag, I would really like to see him knocked down a peg or two, though.” Paul piped in angrily. He may have been human, but most of his friends weren’t so he really couldn’t abide the prince’s behaviour – perhaps even more so because he was human.

Having decided on a plan, the group went their separate ways. After all, there was no point in just standing at the side of the road talking to each other.

Nihil and Ignis were just glad to have managed to avoid the scan by the guards. They’d been passing themselves off as human this entire time, and explaining themselves now would only be a hassle that was also likely to draw the Royal Guard’s attention.