Chapter 4 - Meeting

Chapter 4 - Meeting

—

Alexius

—

What the hell was I doing? One second, I was hiding behind the trees; the next, I was swinging at bandits like a lunatic.

Let me recount what just happened.

I hid behind a tree, observing the three bandits, when I noticed a girl strolling casually towards the bandits. I prayed with my heart to Lumira, praying that she wouldn’t be noticed. Of course, my prayers went unanswered, just like they always had, and the bandits spotted her.

I wanted to help her, but I would be in a 3v1 situation. There was no way I was winning that fight with a rusty dagger. Yeah, just like this, stay still, don’t move, don’t do it, and just let her walk away. This was her fault for traveling by herself in the first place.

The two bandits with daggers emerged from the forest, and the girl finally noticed them. She screamed as she stumbled and fell on her butt. I gave myself an imaginary face palm as I watched.

The third bandit stepped out from the shadows. He had a completely different atmosphere compared to the other two marauding moron. He was dead silent and focused, like a wolf stalking its prey. He skillfully pulled an arrow from his quiver, making nearly no noise at all as he nocked it with precision. The string tightened as his cold eyes locked onto the girl.

He was probably aiming to wound the girl by hitting her on the leg to prevent her from escaping. Poor girl, I’m so sorry, but there was nothing I could do in this situation to help.

Hey! What are you doing? Why are my legs moving…STOP!

My legs refused to listen, and I began sprinting towards the bandit at full speed. Hell, not just my legs, my whole body stopped listening to me as if I had been possessed. My throat opened unconsciously, and a war cry escaped.

“HYAAA!”

The bandit froze, startled by the sudden roar. He turned swiftly and released the tension in his fingers. The arrow whistled, cutting through the air as it grazed me. My heart pounded in my chest so loudly that I barely even registered it. But I didn’t stop, I kept charging at him like a raging bull.

Before the bandit could react, I slammed into him, and, with brutal accuracy, my dagger drove into his heart. He staggered, stumbled backwards, and dropped his bow as his chest transformed into a fountain of blood.

He was already a dead man, but I wasn’t finished. A strange, indescribable rage boiled in my blood, so I charged once again, this time plunging the dagger into his neck before twisting it.

“Glrrrk…chhhk…” the bandit gurgled as he choked in his own blood.

“Boss!” one of the bandits cried, but I ignored him.

I kicked the convulsing bandit away and focused my attention on the other two.

One gawked at me, too hesitant to attack, while the other charged with his dagger. I don’t consider myself particularly skilled, but my years of experience as a Valorian guard kicked in.

He lunged at me, and his dagger was on a clear trajectory to pierce my abdomen. I twisted my torso in response, barely evading the dagger, and grabbed his dagger arm. Then, with a yank, I sent him tumbling towards me. That was when my dagger drove into him.

Blood sprayed across my face as he collapsed. He desperately clawed at his neck, trying to stop the bleeding, but it was futile. The third bandit stood frozen, lost in the carnage that had just occurred. I gave him an intimidating glance before he finally fled.

For a moment, I just stood there, my chest heaving, and my brain still processing the corpses at my feet. A sanguine liquid dripped from my daggers, and only then did I realize I was drenched in a crimson dye. Warm, and kind of sticky, blood, their blood!

And yet, I didn’t feel guilty. Not even a little. The rage that had consumed me a moment ago vanished, and an eerie calm replaced it.

Then I remembered…the girl!. I spun around and spotted her a few meters away. Her eyes weren’t on the corpses, or the blood… they were on me.

I wiped the blood from my face with the back of my sleeve and forced myself to approach.

“Are you…ok?” I asked, my voice softer than expected.

And then, in the most deadpan voice imaginable, she replied, “Yeah.”

Relief washed over me, then immediately transformed into frustration.

“What were you even thinking?” I snapped, sharper than intended.

“Are you an idiot!? Wandering through the forest by yourself, do you have a death wish? Do you have any idea how close that was?”

I felt a pang of guilt for raising my voice at her, but, strangely enough, she didn’t flinch, and she didn’t run. Even with all this blood on me.

—

Melanie

—

What a moron.

Just as I was about to set my trap, the fourth bandit burst out of hiding in a frenzied charge, ambushing the bow bandit and killing him with reckless precision. He was strangely skilled, though he looked young, and my thoughts were validated when he easily dispatched the next bandit.

Then, his gaze shifted to me. The boy…no, that wasn’t right. He fought like something else, a beast, perhaps. His movements were wild and unpolished, but effective. Blood ran down his arms, across his face, and dripped from his daggers.

I quietly formed an ice shard, roughly the size of a hand, and hid it behind my back. I knew that he probably acted to save me, but he was clearly far more dangerous than the bandits; he killed without hesitation, he killed without guilt, but there was no trace of satisfaction in it either.

When he finally met my gaze, his voice was unexpectedly soft,

“Are you…ok?”

I nearly laughed. Did he expect me to let my guard down because he put on a soft tone? His appearance is anything but gentle; in fact, if anything, he looks more like a bandit than the ones who just fell.

He seemed about my age, maybe 15 or 16? He was lean and not heavily muscular, like someone who had once trained but maybe given up halfway. His dirty blond hair was unkept, and hair strands fell across his face.

His eyes were a yellow-orange mix. I could see a mix of exhaustion and fire inside of it. The exhaustion of someone who had given up, but the fire of someone still refusing to surrender.

I’m not sure exactly how to respond to him, so I said the only thing I could,

“Yeah.”

Relief flickered across his face for a second, and then he snapped. Just like that, his anger flared suddenly, and his voice became sharp like a whip,

“What were you even thinking? Are you an idiot!? Wandering through the forest by yourself, do you have a death wish?”

Heat rushed to my cheeks.

“Excuse me? Me, the idiot? You are the idiot who jumped at the bandits!”

This blood-soaked lunatic barges into my trap, ruins it, and nearly gets stabbed in the process, and now he’s lecturing me?

Part of me wanted to thank him. Yes, he had indeed risked himself in some strange, reckless way, but gratitude didn’t erase the fact that he looked shady as hell.

~ End of chapter ~