Nature's Guardians (Lezlie)

The shadow creatures had stopped chasing us after we entered the village, and started looking at us viciously right behind the wooden walls of the village.

As our legs were shaking, we finally took the last breath we could take and started looking back nervously. It was as long as we stayed up much stronger, our legs, which felt like they had come into a thin shape, were gathering the pain of our entire body to a point at that moment, causing us to look back in excitement and fall into thoughts. And of course, the fact that the creatures were chasing us at that moment was not the only thing, but that Ryuu left us for a moment was another thing that deeply affected us all. For some reason, Ryuu and the shadow creatures could not enter the village, they could only wait at the entrance. Dozens of them were passing by the village, but they were only heading in the direction where Ryuu was going.

Along with the fact that we heard dozens of footsteps, it was quite scary for so many creatures to target Ryuu at once. He had been trying to save us all this time by himself, and he had stayed behind, and mysteriously was stopped in front of the door. At the moment when we all felt most secure, he became a prisoner of the mysterious force that attracted him, pulled back by an incredible amount of force, and when the situation was about to be solved, it became more confused too.

It was a rare situation, where we were able to see the tension of a leader, which caused us all to try to save him at that moment and created this desire in us.

However, he had prevented this himself too. And didn't want us to get even closer.

Of course, I would have wanted, we all would have, for him to come with us. But because of this, it was inevitable now. There was a reason why he was nervous enough that we had to look for a way to save him, as he was being chased. But there was also a reason why he protected us too.

We were only able to presume what could happen, since it was impossible to even for Ryuu to face all these creatures alone. That's why we were so worried about him.

After he had given us only the map, he had left us with no explanation at all on what he wanted us to do with it. Whether it would be his want of rescue or something deeper.

Would he be able to get out of there?

*I guess there is no way."

We then decided to stick to the plan that he said, that was for the good of all of us.

After all, sooner or later we would not have found a way to save him without solving the complicated situation we were in at that moment. We firstly had to realize what kind of danger pulled us in, just after escaping from one.

*What is this place?*

It was this tightly guarded village that we looked at for minutes while we ran.

It was a mysterious region that came so far away that our lives were racing and saved while it did begin to become visible, and so on had appeared under our feet. It was a heavily guarded area behind barbed wire fences, and a tent-filled area where silence reigned. As if knowing what kind of information lies behind it was another problem, it was also unclear when the people who founded this place would show up. It was a very old tribe camp, so deserted that we had the impression that no person had set foot here for many years.

Ryuu also said that, if we were going to stay here, we had to meet him in the nearest town by noon tomorrow. He had left us with little information, but that quickly got out of my mind too. For some reason, the place seemed quite familiar. With its scent and sounds covering our location, just from the back of the forest, it was like a nostalgia that I have never lived or felt before.

It was like I had been here before, but never had a memory to relate why it was so familiar.

"Will this place protect us until tomorrow?" Looking around, Mila said as she got off Shou's back,

Babu replied just then, nervously as before,

"More importantly, where are we?"

We were afraid that one question would break away from the other and make us even more confused inside questions of many more. Looking for answers to our questions, we were trying to think of something logical during the time we were waiting there.

"Huh?"

But before long, footsteps began to rise from the interior of the village and from behind the tents in front of us.

"I guess they saw us."

A dozen footsteps, started to approach us from beyond even an area that our eyes could see, and leaving us once again in a state of question and anxiety. We didn't know how to react. After all, we had trespassed here and we had no information about who it belonged. And at that moment we were there, we didn't know what they were going to do to us.

And the footsteps that came, at last, had already reached us before long. As we had expected, a dozen men were in front of us. Some had spears in their hands, and some had torches. And their unchanging stone-like expressions on their faces, and the eyebrows they were frowning at in a frightening way, made them a little more frightening too.

*But, wait for a second....."

But while we were thinking about the footsteps that were coming toward us, I realized that I didn't notice something the first time we were there.

The arrangements around it were starting to look very familiar to me. It was exactly like the environment where people from the sorcerer lineage were located, and usually prepared any kind of settlement that they usually did.

So the hassle that was rising around us, went quickly and made me not think of it less by the second.

"They are finally here." said Hiroshi, as he got ready to pull out his gun, with his hand above it,

As they got much closer, I also realized that the clothes they wore were similar to the clothes of my people, which was very similar to what my people wore. Or so it seemed to me.

"Stand back. They probably do not have any nice words for intruders like us."

The people in front of us came quite close and pointed their spears toward us, while one of them shouted loudly,

"Outsiders! Drop your weapons and surrender!"