Chapter 8

Dawn breaks as the sun rises, Jasfu forced awake from the light beaming on her face. She stirs herself awake and rises from the bed, yawning with her arms in the air. Before she could even climb out of the bed, the door is pushed open and her gaze shifts to the person stepping inside. One of the pirate goons was bringing her a meal, something that is better than the gruel she used to eat. The entire ship has heard of her ordeal with the Soulless, and what happened when it took a piece of her soul.

As soon as she actually looks to the meal, she will notice it’s a simple meal, roasted cod with seagull eggs to start her morning. The toast was made to perfection, it’s a meal suitable for the captain of the ship. She is being given a greater treatment than before and she might enjoy it as time goes on. Without wasting any time, she is starting to eat her meal, showing she still has hunger in her to be able to eat the food presented.

“Dat’s good, you can still eat.” The pirate said to Jasfu.

“Shthill eath?” She asks with her mouth full of food in that moment.

“Yeah, those who have a piece of their souls taken by a Soulless usually can’t eat, they think food to be disgusting. But ye be eating yer food finely, so that part of the missing soul piece doesn’t affect ye.” He explains to the best of his details to her.

“Well, it’sh betther than the gruel.” She spoke with her mouth full of food, once more.

“Still eat up, cap’in will be wanting to see ye as soon as yeh finish. So, the rest of us can get that Soulless what did this to yeh.”

After that, he steps away and moves out of the room. Jasfu had almost forgotten that a piece of her soul was missing, until the pirate brought it up. Her hand is pressed against her chest, still feeling her heartbeat, at least she knows she’s still alive. Once her meal is finished, she makes her way through the corridors of the ship and straight to going above deck. Stepping into the light, she covers her eyes from the blinding brightness, and looks around the deck.

Mao stands at the stern of the ship, watching over the island they are moored at. His gaze shifts about, as though he is scanning the marshlands for the target. His attention snaps back to Jasfu as her presence makes him look towards her in that moment.

“Well, morning to ya lassie.” He speaks to her in a more formal manner than before.

“Um… yeah, good morning. So… is it around time to bring the Soulless in?” She asks him.

Mao turns back away from her, nodding his head and scanning the marshlands, once more. He doesn’t look towards her, not again. The choice she has made will be a dangerous one, and he fears that she will not know what she is in for with the decision.

“It is, I hope you understand what this means. You won’t feel whole again until you get that piece of your soul back.” He explains to her.

Jasfu knows what this means, any pain that Soulless will feel, she will feel in turn. She stands right beside him and decides to make small talk with him while they are waiting for the right one to be found.

“Can I get different clothes than a dress to wear? It feels really awkward.” She asks and states.

“Of course, what is it you want?” He asks her back,

“Just a shirt and shorts, something that won’t flow when I’m in a fight. I don’t need to worry about my clothes getting caught.”

“We’ll find something for you, then. Maybe some tights and a tunic.”

“That might work, but what about just the shirt and shorts, for now. Nothing fancy after all.”

“You don’t have a choice on this one, lass, I have been sent some clothing for you to wear. You’ll have to start wearing it right away and get used to it.”

“What? How? When? Who? Why?” She asks so many questions at once with only a single word for each.

“Someone that cares about you and the kid. That’s the who. The when was last night, while you slept. The why is, again, someone cares and wants to see you safe. The how is easy, transportation from the water and finally the what. Simple, it’s just something to keep you alive.”

With all that aside, Mao slides a chest towards Jasfu, letting her have her new clothing. It isn’t a small chest, showing to hold more than just the clothing Mao spoke of. It’s a simple box with the linings of the chest crested in gold and adorned in gems. Surprisingly, Mao didn’t take anything from it for himself. It can only mean the amount he’s being paid is worth more than what’s on the chest.

Kneeling, Jasfu opens the box, looking inside it and spotting the purple tights and the blue tunic. She pulls the tights from the chest and examines it closely. After a moment, she was pulling the tunic out, looking at it closely, and grabs a pair of boots as well as a belt to finish off the outfit. Her gaze soon shifts back inside the box, noticing something metallic in her view.

“There’s more?” She asks.

Reaching in, she is suddenly shocked, forcing her to pull her hand back and shaking her hand from the jolt. She was looking down at the metal object she can see, but she can’t touch them.

“Yeah, but you can’t touch that until I cast a specific spell, one that will cancel the magic preventing you from reaching in there.” He explains in further detail.

“Okay, so just the tunic and tights, as well as the boots and belt.” She said.

She looks back towards the marshland, to see the pirates at work, and before she can rise to her feet, she was screaming in pain. It seems the pirates found the Soulless and when they heard her scream of pain and focused on capturing that one. They reached out with ropes tied into lassos to try and entangle it. They pull it out of the water with great effort, allowing Jasfu to see it in the light clearer than the night itself.

The rotting flesh on its body shows its length of decay, it was only in the water for a couple of years at the longest. The hair continued to grow, stretching down to the Soulless’ own knees. Its gender remains unknown, but the tattered and ragged clothing it has on shows that it used to be an adventurer. It tries to steal the souls of some pirates, but before it can inhale, a gag is placed on its mouth, to stop its attempts. The pirates drag it onto the ship, and then drag it down to the brig, to lock it away.

Jasfu shudders and shivers, watching the monster being dragged away from her and down to the belly of the ship, to be locked safely in the brig.

“Go and get changed, you’ll be trying again as soon as you’re dressed and prepared.” He stated.

With a nod of her head, Jasfu rises to her feet and carrying the clothing with her down to Wyvenia’s cabin. She is soon stopped before she can get there, looking towards the one that grabbed her shoulder.

“This way, you have your own cabin. And there’s a bunk for your brother when he’s returned to us.” The pirate said.

He shows her to a different cabin and a cabin she will, one day, share with her brother. She can’t wait to be reunited with her twin, so they can be together, again. Once the door to her new cabin closed, she wasted no time to get changed. The full body tights were pulled over herself, and the tunic slipped on after. The boots she wears extends to her knees and are cuffed downward, so it can hide the buckle. Her dagger is sheathed and placed on her belt, looking more prepared, this time.

“I’ll need water, but… I’ll also need to think more out there. Need to travel light and not be weighed down by too many things.” She says to herself in that moment.

She fills a single flask of water and attaches it to her belt, then moves towards the door and steps through the doorway, making her way back towards the top of the ship and steps back into the sunlight. With a deep breath, she approaches the edge of the ship and spreads her wings.

“I’m ready to try again.” She said towards Mao.

He nods his head and whistles out towards the island, for the pirates to get into position. Mao fastens the weighted ankle and wrist bands to their respected appendages. Once everything was prepared, she flies over to the desert, surprising all the pirates from her display. She could fly to the top of the mountain, but that would be cheating in her eyes. She takes in a deep breath and starts off on her journey around the deserted island. As soon as she starts, the sandstorm kicks up, forcing her to raise her hands to cover her eyes.

She takes a swig of water from the flask and slips it back down to her belt. With each step she grows more agitated. She was soon raising her right hand and starts to form a green glow around her hand. It is soon moved forward, forcing the sands to the side and showing her skill with magic, now. She never chanted a single word, just started to generate her own gust of wind around her to keep the sands out of her eyes and hair.

With each step in the desert, she feels her feet sinking into the sands, but that doesn’t deter her from her goal. Just like last time, one of the pirates leapt at her, unaware that she could see him perfectly fine by using the wind to blow the sands aside. Once he was inside the dome of wind, he was rushing in for an attack. This time Jasfu wasn’t in the mood for him and swiftly disposed of him with a single kick to his lower regions.

The man falls to his knees, with Mao grimacing a little from the strike and feeling sorry for the pirate. The pain he’s going through is a terrible pain no man should have to go through. She finally reaches the edge of the desert; the wind dome being drops, and she approaches the marshlands. This is the moment of truth, to see how the trauma from a day ago might affect her mentality. She takes in deep breaths, looking down at the marshland and stares at the dead and rotted trees. The rocks that are above the bubbling water and below, the rotting flesh of the Soulless.

“I can do this…” She mutters to herself.

With a few steps back, Jasfu readies herself for her attempt to cross the marshland. With a head start, she leaps into the air, not even touching the water and lands on a distant rock. With the initial jump out of the way, she leaps to the next one, and the next. She bounds off trees to land on another rock, her leaps tiring her out, and the weight from the ankle bands and wrist bands didn’t help with her jumps. She continued, ensuring that she was getting to each location with ease.

Finally, when she reaches the end of the marshlands, she believed herself to be safe. Instead, one of the pirate’s leaps from a tree and swings a blade down at her. With a stumble back, she almost fell into the bog of water that holds the Soulless. She balances herself and glares at the pirate that attacked her.

“Hey, be careful, I almost fell inside!” She screams at him.

He only shrugged and chuckled, rushing in to attack Jasfu. The pirates all seemed to use the same fighting style, rush in and slash at the opponent. She simply moves off to the side and wonders how he feels about nearly falling into the water. Before he could, her Leviathan tail moves out and pulls him away from the edge of the bog. He’s soon slammed into the ground and Mao has noticed the change in her, instantly.

“That’s enough!” Mao shouts out, eyes on Jasfu in that moment.

“What? Why?” She shouts back.

“Because that piece of your soul that’s missing is your compassion for others. Look how you’ve hurt someone that wasn’t even trying to hurt you!”

Jasfu looks back towards the pirate she forced on the ground, seeing blood leaking from his arm, impaled on a stick. Without a care she shrugs her shoulders and looks back to Mao, staring at him in that moment.

“So, what, he was an enemy, we should never show compassion for the enemy!” She shouts at him.

“That’s where you’re wrong, compassion for the enemy is what gives us the ability to be BETTER than the monsters that are out there. Unless you want to be like the One-Armed Man!” He shouts back.

With the insult he has spewed, she was looking worried and soon flies back to the ship. She lands on the deck and looks him in the eyes, the man can see the worried look in her eyes.

“Is… is that true? Without that piece of soul, I might become like… like him?” She asks him.

“Yes, we need to put that soul piece where it belongs, inside you.” He answered her.

Mao was just trying to see what sort of effect that soul piece that went missing might have on her. And it seems to have made her more into a monster, which is not what they need. He needs to ensure she’s going to be able to keep her compassion. With a small nod of his head, he takes her down to the brig, a place where she’s used to being from her time as a prisoner on the ship. As soon as they enter the dimly lit room, the Soulless was soon rushing at the cage, reaching out for Jasfu, forcing her back.

“It wants the rest of your soul and won’t stop trying to suck it out of you, until it has the entire soul.” Mao explains to her.

“I… I know… I was hoping to save that for my fight with the One-Armed Man, but… I guess that’s not the case, now.” She explains, frowning deeply.

“Trust me, this will help in the long run. Your magic will be stronger, and you won’t have to do just a wind dome in the desert, but instead remove the entire sandstorm entirely.”

Jasfu looks back to Mao and soon nods her head, looking back to the Soulless and seeing it sucking at the air, trying to get her soul. The gag didn’t seem to last too long, but she doesn’t need it placed on its mouth. She was about to approach the Soulless, but Mao grabbed her shoulder, forcing her to stop in her tracks before she could.

“Don’t approach it directly, you need to think carefully, and suck the soul back out from it. When it tries to suck your soul, you will need to be ready to suck back against it. It means needing to use your wind magic to counter its soul drain.” Mao explains.

Jasfu keeps staring at the Soulless, even as it was trying to get what remains of her soul out of her. The small child nods her head and steps towards the bar, taking in a deep breath. As soon as she took another step forward, she felt the Soulless trying to rip her soul out. Before it could be extracted, she was inhaling, pulling her own soul back from the monster. The winds around them start to rage, using the innate magic inside her to increase her own inhalation.

She continues to inhale, pulling at the piece of her soul the Soulless had stolen. It felt the pulling of the soul it had gathered, trying to return to its host. It tries to fight back, to take the soul back harder, but Jasfu’s use of wind magic strengthened her lungs, allowing her to pull back from it. She never stops trying to pull the soul back, a small ball of light leaving the body of the Soulless. With more force, Jasfu pulls the piece of her soul into her own body, swallowing it and feeling complete.

As soon as her task was done, Mao pushes her out of the way and thrusts his own dagger into its skull. Another dagger is pulled from his belt and moved to slice its head off the Soulless’ body. It drops to the ground, and he opens the cage, to take the head from the brig and off the ship. Jasfu tries to follow, but Mao moved with inhuman speed that she lost sight of him before she could leave the brig. As soon as she makes it above deck, Mao was standing at the banister of the ship, having thrown the head overboard.

“Why did you do that?” She asks him.

“Because there’s no way to kill a Soulless, even stabbing it in the skull and removing the head from the body won’t kill it. It will keep trying to get a soul. So, the only thing to do is remove the head and toss it away from the body. It can’t do harm, now.” He explains to her. “All right, time for you to get back to it. Go to where you were before I pulled you away from the course.”

With a nod, Jasfu spreads her wings, looking down at where the pirate was, before she flew away. A frown is on her face, saddened to see that she did that to someone, and lands down near her last placement. With a small nod of her head, she was about to walk into the jungle, but stopped. She never noticed it before, but she has, now. There was a machete close by, stuck inside a stump. She approaches the stump and pulls the weapon from it, struggling to do so. With the new weapon in hand, she treks into the jungle.

The vines hang off the trees, with thickets of trees and fern plants blocking Jasfu’s path. She swipes at the ferns with her machete, slicing them down one by one. Vines are ripped down from some of the trees and used to help her along the path she takes. Her eyes dart around the jungle, the trees rustling and shaking with leaves falling towards the ground. She has the sense that someone is following her in the treetops, but she can’t prove it until they come down. For the moment, she trudges on, wiping sweat from her forehead with the heat being close to the desert.

“What kind of island is this? How can a jungle, a desert and a swamp be so close to one another?” She asks no one in particular.

She continues onward, striking at the plants, until something stops her. A vine wraps around her wrist, and she looks to what it’s attached to. Following the vine, she sees a person that isn’t a pirate holding on to the vine. The man doesn’t wear much for clothing, only the leaves from the trees around his waist in a skirt like fashion and bones of animals on his wrists and chest. His body is covered in mud, as well as various body paints that he has made from different leaves, berries and other foliage in the area. His face is hidden by a single skull, the skull of a rat that might have been as large as Jasfu is.

Tugging on the vine, she tries to get him to release her, but instead he leaps forward. With high pitched battle cry, the man pulls out a stone dagger and aims to slash at Jasfu. Having fought the pirates, she thought this would be easy to dodge the incoming attack, grinning confidently. Leaping back, she is suddenly struck with a painful realization. There was two of them. One of these natives of the island stabbed her calf, forcing her to fall backward and tumble.

The one still holding on to the vine lands on top of her, smashing his knee into her abdomen forcing her to cough out a breath of air. It takes her a couple of seconds, but she recomposes herself and pushes herself to her feet. Looking at the two men and taking in deep breaths, she’s caught off guard by the two of them.

“W-What do you two think you’re doing? This is meant to be training, isn’t it?” She asks them both.

The two only look at one another, then back to the girl. They suddenly rush forward, one slashing down with the dagger and forcing her to step backward, the other holding the wrist that holds her machete. He pulls on it and moves around behind her. With the aid of the dagger, he’s climbing the tree rapidly and pulls the vine to tug it to her neck. With the tug and pull, she hangs there, her neck wrapped by the vine and coughs into the air.

The one still on the ground rushes forward, stone dagger lunged out, aiming right for her heart. Jasfu could just see her life flashing before her very eyes, what a short life she has lived.

No, I can’t die here, I need to be reunited with my brother. I need to keep going. I need to… need to… TAKE THEM DOWN!

Just before the dagger is plunged into her heart, her tail lunges forth and penetrates the man’s chest. The boney tip of the tail is seen protruding from his back, forcing him to fall forward. Jasfu’s body moves, and she clings to the tree and turns herself around. With the speed of a mad wolf, she starts to climb the tree towards the man that was choking her moments ago. Her hands slam into the bark, fingernails used to claw at the tree as she makes her way to the target. As soon as she makes it, he didn’t get a chance.

Before he could even try anything against her, he feels the boney ridges of her dragon wing slide along his chest. Her wings flap, one of flame, no longer just looking like flames, the other a dragon’s wing with bones protruding along the spines. Jasfu flies herself a little higher above the tree and moves to rush back down to the ground. The island native leans back, to ensure his own safety and not be struck by the flaming wing that was aimed towards him. Jasfu's dive has her plummet back to the ground. She keeps diving and turns to try and get at the island native. While diving, something strikes against her back, forcing her to fall down to the ground.

The island native takes this chance to flee, to get away from the enraged girl that killed his friend. Once she recollects herself, Jasfu pushes herself to her feet and spots the one that had struck her.

“Jasfu, lassie, calm down!” The pirate shouts down at her.

Jasfu looks up at him, pushing herself off the ground to fly at him. Her tail is soon moved to try and lunge at him, aimed for his jugular, but she’s soon struck down, once more. This time, the culprit is very clear, Mao was holding her down with his right foot. Her tail is lunged at him, but he grabs it, and glares down at Jasfu.

“You know, you’re a lot of trouble, but keeping you alive will keep me alive.” He says.

With one final motion, he slams his foot down on her face, knocking her out in an instant. Once she collapses, he picks her body up, carrying her back to the ship. This was just day two of training, and everything that could possibly go wrong, has.

♂___________________________________________________________________♀

Gaslyrok sleeps peacefully throughout the night, until morning arises. Once it does, he’s awakened by a sudden kick to his abdomen and forced down to fall on the ground. Groaning, and holding his stomach, Gaslyrok looks to see who had done it. Of course, it would be Mako that has disturbed his sleep in such a rude fashion.

“Get up, back to training. You’re with me first, today.” Mako barks.

Last time, he had to go to the Screeching Darkness for his first part of training, but today he’s with Mako. Did something happen to change the schedule? Or does his schedule change every day? He really didn’t know, but for now, he was making his way to the training hall and looking over the weapons. Just like last time, he grabs the pair of training daggers, holding them in his grasp and soon looking back towards Mako.

As soon as his eyes were on the shark man, they grew wide with fear. Mako was charging at him, forcing him to leap out of the way from the attack, nearly hit from the large man that moved like a freight train. His instincts are quick to kick in, lunging himself towards Mako, pulling his right hand back to aim the training dagger at the man’s back. To his surprise, he connected with the back of the large man, but was unprepared for what came next.

A large impact smashes into the side of his face, Mako elbowing him in the face and sending him down to the ground forced to land on his back. A groan is released and he’s pushing himself to his feet. Before he could get off the ground, Mako slams his knee into Gaslyrok’s chest, forcing him to cry in pain from the sudden impact.

“Come on, you have to do better than that! If I was the One-Armed Man, you would be DEAD!” Mako shouts.

Tears rolling down his face, Gaslyrok simply looks towards Mako, shaking his head to the statement made. The small child starts to push himself to his feet, coughing a few more times, spitting blood from his mouth and wiping it off his lips.

“I don’t… want to hurt you, though… I don’t wanna hurt anyone…” He says, “I wish there was a way to defeat him without fighting.”

His hand on his chest, clutching it from the pain he was feeling, one eye shut as he keeps staring at Mako. The man was soon bursting into laughter and taking a small step towards Gaslyrok, patting him on the head.

“Kid, there is no way to defeat that man without fighting.” He says.

After those words, the knee is brought up to connect with Gaslyrok. Instead of connecting with the abdomen, the knee connects with Gaslyrok’s right hand, the left still over his chest. This was a surprise to Mako, as he didn’t think Gaslyrok had the energy to even put up much of a defense. It wasn’t much, pain coursed through his hand, but at least he lessened the pain to his abdomen.

“Why are you doing this?” Gaslyrok asks.

“Because you need to learn to defend yourself, you can’t keep relying on others your entire life. What if something happens where you and your sister are separated from one another, again?” Mako states and asks.

“Then I would have no choice….”

“Exactly, now back to the tra- “Mako was interrupted from a smack to his face from Gaslyrok’s tail.

With a grin on his face, Mako smashes his fist into the small boy’s head, forcing him down on the ground. No more words were spoken, just Mako punching Gaslyrok in the face repeatedly, breaking his nose and leaving bruises around his eyes. With each impact, Gaslyrok grows angrier, trying to fight the rage that grows. He was getting close to breaking, and he was going to be past the point of no return.

With no other way to defend himself, he was soon releasing his gathered energy, releasing his proper form, forcing Mako to go flying backwards. This time, the release came with a different look. Unlike the calmed appearance Gaslyrok held before, this one looked more bestial and feral. His tail had spines sticking out at points where the bones in the tail are, before the joints that they are connected to. His dragon wing held spines, just like the tail, giving the wing a more razor edge like appearance. The phoenix wing turned into pure fire, making his feathers no longer be visible. The fox ears took on a more ruffled appearance, showing how feral the boy became.

Hunched over, Gaslyrok was taking on a more animal like posture, hands used as fore legs, while his actual legs are used for a more hind leg effect. Before Mako could even blink, Gaslyrok was on him, digging his clawed fingernails into the flesh of the man, forcing a cry of pain from him. The attacks didn’t stop, Gaslyrok leaping and aiming to connect with Mako. His wings and tail are used to help with the damages being dealt. The flames burning Mako, while the razor-sharp wings leave deeper cuts. The tail drags along flesh, forcing Mako down to the ground soon enough.

Spotting this weakness, Gaslyrok was soon leaping away, to open a gap between them, aiming for the kill, to eliminate the man in an instant. He rushed forth, aiming his clawed hand towards the man's heart, to end the battle, but is forced back when he hits a hidden wall. He bounces back, rolling on the floor before stopping and shaking his head. Delfina walks towards the fight, erecting three more magical walls around Gaslyrok and looking towards Mako soon after.

“I thought Leviathan told you to take it easy on him. Not to force him into Rage Mode.” She said towards Mako.

“I wasn’t trying to force him into a Rage, I was trying to get him to tap into that survival instinct. Kill or be killed.” Mako answers back.

“Well, you certainly got him to tap into something. I’ve seen Rage before, but never as an animalistic variation.”

Delfina takes the time to examine Gaslyrok, while he circles the barriers she placed. He leaps at the barriers, to try and find a way out, but nothing seems to work. Scratching, clawing, leaping, nothing worked. That was, until he remembered he could fly. His wings spread open, and he was aiming for the gap in the ceiling. Before he could even get too high, Delfina erected a fifth barrier, keeping him trapped inside the box.

“I wonder if his brother was the same way when he tapped into Rage.” She said.

“No, he wasn’t, but that’s because Gaslyrok and Jasfu are different. They have something else inside them, not just the chimeric forms they hold.” Leviathan says, walking down the bleachers to join the others.

“Something else? Like what?” Delfina asks.

“I’ll tell you, but only when he calms down. He’ll need to hear it, as well. Maybe we’ll need to tell his sister at the same time. We’ll have to reunite them a lot sooner than I wanted to.” Leviathan explains.

Gaslyrok keeps trying to attack the barrier but is thrown off and sent backwards. After many attempts he was too tired to keep going. He falls down, unconscious and his body reverting back to its natural state. Once asleep, Delfina lowers the barrier where Leviathan moves to pick him up.

In an unconscious state, Gaslyrok has a strange dream. He sees a creature, a being that holds the head of a fox. The left half of the body is that of a dragon, the right half being that of a phoenix. The bottom half of the creature is that of a Leviathan, no legs on the creature that stands before Gaslyrok. It appears to be ten meters tall, but that’s only in a dream like state.

“WHY HAVE YOU USED ME?” The creature speaks, with no movements of the maw.

“I… I didn’t… what’s going on? Who are you?” Gaslyrok asks.

“WHO I AM MATTERS NOT, THE FACT YOU USED MY POWERS IS WHAT I WANT TO KNOW!” The creature speaks back.

“I… I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He answers back. “How can I use a power I know nothing about?”

“THEN HOW DID YOU USE MY POWER TO HELP YOU? HOW DID YOU USE ME?”

“I don’t know. What’s going on? I just want to see my sister again.”

“YOU HAVE A SISTER? AH… YESSS… THE OTHER ONE. THE ONE WITH MY OTHER HALF…”

“Your other half, you mean… like a brother or a sister of your own?”

“SOMETHING LIKE THAT… IT IS THE OTHER HALF THAT IS WHAT MAKES US WHOLE.”

“So, you have another half inside my sister… and you’re inside me, but… who are you?”

“I AM A BEING THAT HAS EXISTANCE SINCE THE BEGINNING OF TIME. BUT I SENSE YOU WILL BE LEARNING MORE ON THAT SOON ENOUGH. FOR NOW, WE MUST PART. BUT USE MY POWER AGAIN, AND I WON’T BE AS LENIENT.”

Before Gaslyrok could even say anything else, he feels himself floating in the darkness, while still in his dream like state. Left there in the darkness, he floats, pulling his knees to his chest and wrapping his arms around his thighs. He had nothing else to do, no one else to talk to, just stuck in the loneliness of his dream in that moment.

“How did I fall asleep? What was that thing talking about? What is happening outside this dream?” He asks.

“I DO NOT KNOW, BUT IF YOU WANT TO KNOW FOR SURE, WAKE UP.” The creature replies.

“How do I wa- “

“WAKE UP NOW!”

As if it was ordered, Gaslyrok’s eyes suddenly open wide and looks directly towards the sky, or in this case the top of the ocean. What he sees upon awakening is a great ball of fire, almost like the sun far above their heads. He wiggles himself from Leviathan’s arms and gets himself back on the ground.

“The… the sky, there’s something happening in the sky!” He shouts,

While pointing to the sea Gaslyrok felt it, a pang in his head as he closed his eyes. His sister was involved in the fire that is above. He might not feel her pain, but he can certainly feel the danger she is in, and he needs to get back to her. Gathering the energies around him, he was getting ready to release his full form, before Leviathan stopped him. A hand on his shoulder and he gestures towards Delfina and the, now, restored Mako.

"We'll go with you, these two, believe it or not, will be your retainers." Leviathan explained.

"But next time you go berserk, kid, make sure to leave most of my blood inside my body. Delfina had a hell of a time patching me together with her healing magic." Mako stated in a calm tone.

"You asked for it, next time, don't be so critical." Delfina interjected. "And before we go to the surface, you need to put something else on." Delfina holds out a set of clothing for Gaslyrok, the same purple tights his sister is wearing, but a red tunic instead of a blue one, and even the same boots and belt.

"Go and get changed, when you're ready, we'll all swim back to the surface, together.” Leviathan said.

And as if on instinct, Gaslyrok runs off to a more private location, to get changed into the tights, tunic and boots. Just like with his sister, the boots are buckled and reach his knees. Once changed into his new clothing, belt strapped tight to keep his tunic in place, he was moving to meet Delfina, Mako and Leviathan.

"There, now you look more like a little warrior, and Delfina has something for you, as well." Leviathan said.

"I noticed you preferred to use the training daggers, one for each hand, so I had our blacksmith make these for you." She said towards him.

Delfina kneels down before Gaslyrok, unrolling a cloth to produce a pair of simple daggers. They were best for starting adventurers, and good for when he needs to actually fight. The daggers are ten inches long, one of the daggers is curved with a flat end, to act as a more defensive style and for back hand combat and provides no guard. The other dagger is straight, until the point where the two sides curve into each other and has a guard that curves into the blade, to lock a weapon between the guard and the bladed weapon, itself. With a look of amazement on his face, he accepts the weapons and attaches the sheaths on each side of his belt.

"That's better, an adorable little warrior." Delfina states and rises back to her own feet. "Come now, we must be going. The rest of your lessons will have to be on the go."

Leviathan leads the others towards the barrier wall, where the water and the city itself are met. As soon as he reaches into the water, an orca swims towards them, ready to provide them with a faster travel to the surface of the water.

"Come, we must get going, now. We have wasted too much time, and who knows what's happening above." He said, holding a handout towards Gaslyrok. reaching out, his tail forms, once more, preparing him for the travel through the water. He climbs above the orca, and clings tightly to Leviathan, as Mako and Delfina climb on shortly after. With a flick of its tail, the orca rises them to the surface of the sea as swiftly as it can, to check on the explosion from the surface of the water.