How did they find me so quickly?! That was too quick! I need to run before I'm pincushioned! Hurry! Into the trees!

I fan out my wings and circulate heat into them as the sound of crunching footsteps draws nearer. Small flames flicker from between the crevices in my overlapping feathers. A prelude to a fiery escap-

"What in Escal have you been doing?! Chasing after adventurers and trying to set the sky on fire?! I've been worried to death! And it's not just me, everyone in the village is up in arm- Oh my... what happened?! Your stomach! Are you alright?"

A wrinkly hand comes into view and gently shifts my left wing so that a wrinkly face can better see the gruesome wound underneath. I dare not move a muscle.

"You've been shot!" the wrinkly face exclaims in disbelief, his voice hoarse and out of breathe "You pulled it out yourself? Who in Escal shot you? Here, hold still, I will heal it."

White light envelopes his wizened hand and flows towards my chest like a stream of glistening water, spreading around my whole body and pooling over the areas most damaged. It feels cool and soothing to the touch, not at all like what actual water feels like. Suddenly, all the cuts and bruises covering my body begin healing. Even the hole in my wing and ribs heal! Fast. Incredibly fast! Healing what would of taken hours and hours in the span of a second!

"Heal" the old man affirms sympathetically.

83 Health Restored

I can't believe I finally found him!

4 Bludgeoning Damage

"Bartlon!" I shout in relief, knocking the surprised man backwards with a flying headbutt-tackle to the arm "I've been looking for you since forever! Where were you? Are you hurt anywhere?! Where are the Shaggy Fluffs? Are they still chasing you? Don't worry, I will protect you from them! I can burn them! Stay behind me!"

I face the trees, elated by finding Bartlon but still focused. My eyes search the trees and plants, looking for the tell-tale signs of brown, fluffy shapes lurking in the shadows. How many might there be? Two? Three? Ten?! I'd better make sure that my belly is full of fire before they come charging in. Bartlon needs my help!

"Timber wolves? No, I haven't seen any, but that doesn't matter right now, what matters is the Guild! You scared the village half to death and they think you're an actual threat, they're up in arms! Before long, adventurers from strong Guilds will arrive here to look for you. And Heroes too! It won't be safe around here for much longer." Bartlon rumbles, rubbing his head-butted arm tenderly.

The sense of elation slowly leaks from me.

There are people looking for me? Well... I already know that there's at least one person hunting me, but now there's going to be a lot? That doesn't sound good. I think one is enough. And these 'Heroes', Bartlon said something about them before, but I don't really remember much. I think they're supposed to be scary.

"Are they going to try and kill me?" I ask warily, meeting Bartlon's eyes under a layer of wrinkles and seeing no humour in them.

He shifts uncomfortably and stares down at the dirt, somehwat disapointed.

"Yes" he confirms at last.

That doesn't seem very fair.

"There's nothing I can do about it!" Bartlon protests, as if hearing my thoughts "I would try to stop the Guild from attacking you, but nothing I say or do will help, it might even make your situation worse! I doubt there's anyone who would believe in a harmless friendly pheonix, no less an adventurer. Not even I would've believed it a day ago!"

"Then what if I flew over the angry humans right now and said sorry, even though I didn't do anything wrong. Then they would stop chasing after me, right? They would understand that I haven't done anything bad and leave me alone. Easy!" I chirp triumphantly.

Silly Bartlon, he didn't think of the obvious solution. Communication! That's why I'm such a genius. A brilliant pheonix with a brilliant brain to match!

"No" he states plainly, regretfully even "You might as well paint a target on your chest and run around naked if you were to do that. Nobody would wait long enough for any kind of talk before you're filled with arrows and magic. Everybody is wary and afraid. No, don't do that please."

Well that doesn't sound very fair either. And also, I would never fly around naked. I don't even think I could! I need my feathers to fly, and I would get cold without them too. Not to mention how exposed I would feel. I would rather die than do that.

"Let's head back then" Bartlon announces, leaning down to pick me up "Back to my home where I can think, and no flames along the way, people might see them, or a mage mig-

*Twis-dut*

Like a flash of lightning, an unseen arrow zips beneath Bartlon's hand and buries itself in the forest scruff next to his foot, wobbling violently. Bartlon gasps aloud and rips his hand away in alarm, stumbling backwards and almost falling to his bottom.

In the same moment, a person emerges from the shadow of a tree's trunk, holding a bow almost large as them self! Someone I recognize. It's the same person who I was following before, one of the two people who I mistakenly thought were Bartlon's friends. I remember because he's wrinkly like Bartlon too, only not quite as wrinkly, and with darker skin.

Although I don't remember him having a bow on him, especially one that big. Where did that come from?

"Step away from the pheonix or be shot" the man growls harshly as he points the gleaming arrow tip at my neck and pulls the bowstring to his lips.

The archer's simple movement seems to make time slow down to a crawl. Death squeezes my heart with a crushing grip. I feel a tangible sense of certainty in the moments to come. I see death reflecting in the shooter's posture and the arrow's shining tip. A dread stronger than when I stared directly down the gullet of a Shaggy Fluff. If this person was able to shoot me while I was flying around in the sky, then he won't miss when I'm on the ground. And he looks ready to fire. There's no possibility of survival. No flying away, no dodging, no blocking, no firing my own fire. I can't even bring myself to believe that I might miraculously survive a single shot! I feel death aiming right at me.

But, it doesn't stop me from from trying to move. Death is no stranger to me, not after dying several times already. I surge every speck of fire within me towards my wings. Everything. Hoping I might avoid the arrow if I try, despite how strangely hopeless any resistance feels.

"Wait! Sanctuary!" Bartlon shouts at the same time that Bartlon's not-friend looses the arrow at me.

"Cinders!" I shout as the arrow leaves the bow.

"Vital Shot" the weathered man murmurs as he exhales.

In a single heartbeat. a shimmering, protective dome flickers to life around me, only to be met with a screaming arrow in the next instant, shattering both the dome as well as the arrow together with a clash. The wooden splinters scatter into the forest at high speed, going far and wide, whilst the remnants of the dome flake away and quickly dissipate into air as if they never existed. Then, belatedly, flames appear.

Cinders has reached Level 5 + 3 Affinity 9 Fire Damage

My wings don't so much as 'spray flames' as they... 'explode flames'.

Loudly.

*BANG*

Fire engulfs the world. Or maybe just my world... and a bit of Bartlon's world. The single flap, containing all the fire my body had to offer, flings me backwards with as much force as a kick to the belly. Giving me a great view of Bartlon and his fake friend reeling in shock, shielding their eyes from the expanding cone of searingly bright sparks. Thankfully, the fire doesn't spread far, and immediately snuffs itself out before anything, or anyone is set ablaze. Lucky! And it felt awesome too, that was a big flap, the biggest.

8 Falling Damage

"Ouch!" I squeak as my back slams into a trunk. Not so lucky.

"RAHHH BLOODY HELL!" the archer roars in fury, uncovering his eyes and blinking wildly at Bartlon and myself, struggling to refocus his vision.

"Wait!" Bartlon yells. scrambling over his feet and flailing his hands wildly in front of his face to grab the attention of the furious bowman, whilst being unable to see properly himself "Wait! You can't shoot! The pheonix is harmless! Don't! Please!"

The darkly tanned man snarls wordlessly and walks towards Bartlon with bow in hand. He mutters something and delivers a swift, almost too fast to see, jab to Bartlon's stomach, dropping the poor old man to the ground and making him gasp for air in agony. He steps around Bartlon's crumpled body and takes long strides towards me, dropping his large bow on the ground and drawing a pair of long, deadly-looking knifes from his hip. The burning look in his eyes could set water aflame.

"You can't take chances" the archer whispers to himself, flourishing his weapons and striding forth "I must kill it while I can. It's a threat."

"stop... you can't... murderer" Bartlon rasps from behind, trying to drag his body upright without success.

The archer does not slow.

An absence of emotion settles over my thoughts as death approaches once more. But it's not the knife wielding man who's moving towards me that I watch, my eyes are on Bartlon. I watch as Bartlon vomits weakly on his hands while crawling to a tree to help lift himself up. But it becomes clear that he was hit pretty hard, because the moment he begins to stand up, he crumples back down, cradling his stomach in obvious pain. So he tries again, this time using that magical, white, healing water to coat his belly, but he gets no further than before. He falls to the forest floor, covered in dirt and twigs and spittle, grimacing. Beaten by a single punch. And too far away to lend me any help like before.

.

It's not right. I cannot believe it.

Bartlon never hurt anyone. All he did was protect me from a single arrow! One that shouldn't have been shot at me in the first place! Not that I care about that anymore. Bartlon ended up getting hurt because of me. It's my fault. I didn't even consider that he might have been attacked by the archer, they're both humans after all! I thought that I would be the only one in danger! That was my mistake, and now Bartlon is suffering. My mistake, and the archer's mistake. Hitting Bartlon was wrong, he shouldn't have done that. Hitting me is ok, because I won't die, but hitting Bartlon is not ok. Bartlon did nothing wrong, he is a good person.

There's a word for what that archer did, that word is...

"Unforgivable" I chirp, feeling a trickling inferno stir to life in my soul.

The archer pauses, his step faltering. Or maybe it's more appropriate to call him a warrior now? A swordsman? A dagger-man? Either way, the light in his eye flickers as he meets mine. He tenses involuntarily, feeling an unspoken hate sweep over his senses, but he recovers stoicly with a grunt and takes a stance just a few meters away from me. Because he knows he can kill me easily.

"So you can speak then, I wasn't hearing things." he growls with mild surprise, bending his knees and reversing his grip on the knife in his right hand.

I ignore his words and smother my mind with righteous anger, letting instinct control what's left of my thoughts to drown out my helplessness. Forgotten are blankets and seeds, forgotten is Bartlon, forgotten is weakness, all that remains is the desire to destroy the human in front of me, the person who attacked both myself and my friend, unjustly. Anger takes over. Anger and something more.

A red haze seeps into my vision, painting the forest with the color of blood and fire, changing the otherwise pleasant afternoon into an infernal, hellish landscape of death. A perfect scene to match with the unbridled wrath sprinting throughout my body, pushing against my skin in attempts of escape. Emotions become strength. The fire in my chest is no longer a steady flame, but a swelling blaze, growing at the speed of thought, providing me with more heat and energy than I've ever experienced before! It's intoxicating. Overwhelming power! So much fire that I feel like I could burn down the entire Harou Tree if I wanted to! I never knew there was such strength hidden inside me, just waiting for me to tap into it. But the sensation is also terrifying, because I'm losing control.

Like a candle, the flame only exists because it consumes the wick. And somewhere in my muted thoughts, I fear exactly that happening, and beg for the fire to be extinguished. But the change is happening too fast, the sound of my voice is lost under the roars of my destructive heritage. I need to lose control, to burn myself. If it will make me stronger, then I will do it. Because I need the strength. Because I am weak, and this foe is not. Because I must avenge Bartlon.

Skill Unlocked: Immolation

Fire rushes into my brain, awakening the pheonix from its slumber.