As I stumbled out onto the main street, I could still hear the sounds of the brawl coming from inside of the hall. What I had taken to be only a moment’s display of anger and of rage had instead turned into a whirling sprawl of violence and of chaos, as the guards from the City of the Red Tower fought to protect their lives from the most wrathful members of the crowd. I could hear loud, crashing footsteps rushing towards me, as some of the guardsmen and women from the barracks of the town of Westfall came running in to help, and to try to restore some peace and order to the assembly. But by the time that the guards had arrived, most of the combatants were either dead or wounded, and the first two of the speakers had long since been rushed out of the back door to safety. Only the third had been unable to escape, and now laid dead on the floor of the stage, covered in so many cuts and wounds that it was almost impossible to recognize him, or to even discern that he had once been a human being at all.

It was that horrible thing that the guards from the town of Westfall were now stumbling into, as several of the younger members vomited onto the floor, and cries of disgust and confusion rose up from what remained of the crowd.

Then, I saw a certain woman rushing in towards the hall, and then recoiling again in horror. It took me just a moment to realize that woman was Praxa – the same woman that I had walked out through the farmlands with before.

In that dark, frightening moment, there was something soothing about seeing her, and knowing that she was there. Before I could find the strength to call out to her though, she noticed my own face in the crowd, and then came rushing towards me, as she asked me if I was alright, and what had happened.

I told her that I was okay, and that I wasn’t hurt at all. But I could still feel my body trembling, and I could tell how afraid I was right then.

I had started to think about what all of this would mean for the town of Westfall. But, before I could make any real headway on those thoughts, I saw the man in the red armor come running in through the streets, asking what all of the commotion was. A few moments later, he saw the sight of his old friend murdered upon the stage, and he heard from the guards what had taken place. Then, in a state of profound fury, born out of the utmost grief and sorrow, the man in the red armor let out an anguished cry, and began to march out of the town of Westfall, proclaiming as he went that the City of the Blue Tower would hear of this, and that not a soul would be left standing in this town when he was done with us.

I heard a few more cries rise up from the crowd after that, as several of the students jeered at the man in red, and yelled at him as he went.

In horror, Praxa and I just stood there, doing our best to take in the situation.

“This is awful,” I said at last. “We have to get out of here.”

She nodded.

“Yeah, we do,” she said, quietly. “I’ve never seen anything like this before… have you?”

“No,” I said, “never.”

“I knew that things were getting bad,” Praxa said. “But to murder a scholar in cold blood...”

Her words trailed off, slowly, as more cries and screams rose up from the crowds behind us.

As they did, I saw her turn her head around, then look back towards me with an expression of horror, and of sorrow.

“I really can’t believe that the students here would ever have done this.”

In that moment, I think that both of us wanted to get away from that place. So, I turned towards her, and looked her in the eye.

“Would you like to leave here for now,” I said, “and to take a walk with me?”

“Yeah, I really would,” she said. “Are you ready to go now?”

“I am.”

“Alright,” she said. “There’s a nice garden out by the residential districts, with a lot of beautifully crafted statues along the roads. So… would you like to head out that way, for now, and to walk around out there?”

“Yeah,” I said, “that sounds good, I think.”

Afterwards, the two of us turned around, and began to make our way further on ahead. Then, slowly, the last rumblings of the crowd started to fade out into silence, until it was just the two of us alone, walking through the largely abandoned streets and alleys.

“I was really hoping that something like this wouldn’t happen,” she said. “I’ve only been here for a few weeks now, but… I really like it here. I didn’t want to have to leave just yet, you know?”

“Yeah, I do. I don’t want to have to leave here yet, either, if I don’t have to.”

After a brief pause, I continued.

“How much longer do you think that we’ll be able to stay?”

“Well… probably about three weeks,” she said.

Then, she explained that the Blue Tower always gave three weeks worth of warning before it removed a town’s protection. So, no matter what, it seemed like we would have at least that much time to figure out what to do next.

But… after what had happened here today, it also seemed pretty likely that we wouldn’t have any more time than that. The City of the Blue Tower was devoted to the protection of the arts and the sciences, so we were sure not to get a very sympathetic hearing in a few days, when the man in the red armor came by to plead his case.

There was a slight pause then, as we thought about where we would go next, and what we would do.

“Do you have a home to go back to,” I asked, “or somewhere that you can return to?”

“No, I don’t,” she said, quietly. “I lost my parents when I was pretty young, and I haven’t really had a home since then. So… if things do start to get bad, then I don’t know where I’ll go, or what I’ll do, exactly.”

“What about you,” she asked, as she turned her head, and looked into my eyes. “Do you have a place to return to?”

“No… I don’t have a home, either,” I said. “So, if a war really is right on the verge of breaking out… then I’ll have a lot that I need to figure out, I guess.”

After that, there was a long, rather uncomfortable pause.

“I know that we probably shouldn’t talk about this…,” she said. “But, if there is another war that’s coming… then, which side would you be fighting on, exactly?”

“I would try not to fight on either side, honestly,” I said. “I still feel like I have a lot left to do in this world, and I doubt that I would be strong enough to make my way through a serious conflict.”

“But… if I did have to fight,” I continued, “then I would fight against the City of the Red Tower.”

After what I had seen so far, that seemed to be the only real option.

Almost the moment that I said those words, I felt the mood really start to relax, as Praxa began to walk a little bit closer towards my side.

“I had thought that you would say that,” she said, smiling, “but... it still makes me really happy to hear that from you. There aren’t a lot of humans who would take up arms against the Red Tower, so I had been worried that you and I would be on opposite sides of the war.”

As I learned from what she said next, it seemed that the City of the Red Tower was something like the capital of the human race, and that nearly 97-98% of all of the human beings who would fight in the coming war were expected to be on its side – all of the humans save the ones in the City of the Blue Tower, in other words.

I hadn’t known that was how things were. But, still…

“… that doesn’t matter to me at all,” I said. “I don’t think that humans are any better than non-humans, honestly. If anything, from what I’ve seen, it seems like they might even be a little worse. So that doesn’t bother me, really.”

At that response, Praxa broke into a large smile, as her cat ears gently wiggled atop her head.

“I’ve never met a human who didn’t look down on us non-humans as their inferior,” she said. “And to suggest that we might actually be better… well.”

She looked me in the eye, as she began to grin.

“Where did you say that you were from again, William?”

“Didn’t I tell you that I’m a traveler,” I said with a grin.

After that, the two of us talked in a lot more of a loose, relaxed manner.

We hadn’t forgotten about what had just happened, or about how much trouble was likely to be ahead of us. But still, being able to enjoy each other’s company in this way… well. It really helped to make all of those things seem so far away. For now, it was just me and this young woman, walking through the streets together, joking and laughing, as we talked lightly about whatever came to mind, and about what the future might hold in store.

Of course, we weren’t trying to run away from the truth. We were only resting for a moment, before we started to figure out what we were going to have to do next. After a few minutes, though, that more serious strand of the conversation came back up again, as we paused in silence, and thought once more about all that had taken place, and what was now so likely to occur.

“Are you going to stay in the town of Westfall for any longer, William,” Praxa asked. “Or… or are you thinking of leaving, and of moving on?”

“I’m going to stay,” I said, “At least for a little while longer.”

“Okay,” she said. “Well… if you do end up deciding to leave…

“… tell me beforehand, okay?”

“Okay,” I said. “And if you decide to leave… then, you tell me too, alright?”

“Alright,” she said. “I will… I promise.”

There was a brief pause. And, then…

“I don’t know if you would be interested, but… I was going to head out to the dungeons tomorrow, and to go exploring,” she said. “I know that you’re a lower level than me, but… would you like to come out there anyway, and to spend the day training with me?”

I saw her blush, just a little. Still, she didn’t take back her words, or retreat at all from what she had said.

I almost wanted to blush, too. But instead, I managed to keep my composure for the moment, and to get out a few words in reply.

“I’d love to,” I said. “How about we meet out by the gates tomorrow morning, and then go from there?”

“Okay,” she said, with a surprisingly radiant, and cheerful smile. “I can’t wait.”

After that, there was a warm, comfortable silence, as a gentle sense of peace began to break through the heaviness that had been in the air. Then, we started to talk about a lot of different things – about our pasts, and about some of our memories of our parents, and about the friends that we had had – as we each tried to use the warmth of each other’s company to thaw away at the fear and the sorrow that each of us had been feeling in our hearts.

About half an hour later, we had managed to put ourselves into considerably better spirits, as we made our way back out towards the large, wooden gate, right near where Praxa’s barracks were located.

I think that at that point, each of us were a little exhausted, after everything that had happened. So, we agreed once again to meet up tomorrow morning, and to head back out into the dungeons. Then, we said our goodbyes for the day, as we waved each other farewell, and headed back towards our respective homes.

The whole way back, I thought about her quite a lot, and about the debate, and about the man in the red armor, and about everything that had taken place.

I still didn’t know what I was going to do, exactly, or how it was going to be possible to survive this.

I knew that these tensions were likely to explode into a war at any moment, and I knew how bad that might really be. That book of history that I’d read the night before had claimed that almost 50% of the youth had died in the last Great War, with even more being injured… and given my low level, I knew that my death would be almost certain if I got caught up in all of that.

But…

Right then, I felt… okay, somehow. Somehow, I had the feeling that I was going to manage to make it through this okay, if I put everything that I had into surviving – even if I didn’t know exactly how everything would manage to work out.

That feeling wasn’t really all that reasonable, of course.

But right then – in that moment – I was really in no spirit to resist. And so I let myself enjoy that somewhat artificial feeling of contentment, as my mind began to spin through plans for how I might be able to survive.

At any rate, after what seemed like a much longer walk home than usual, I made it back to the little house in the woods, and knocked on the front of the door. Almost at once, I heard small feet running across the floorboards, as a satisfying “click” rang out through the forest, and the door flung open.

The first thing that I saw, of course, was Aaron and Lily.

Then, as I glanced inside of the house, I took in a most unexpected sight.

In the little chair in the corner of the room, there was now an old man, with long, white hair, and a brown robe that went almost down to the floor.

That man seemed almost as surprised to see me as I was to see him… but after a few moments, he stood up, and introduced himself to me as Roger, a former member of the Guild of Knights.

It took me a couple of seconds to realize what had just happened.

But once I did, I felt all of my fear washing out from my body, as a sense of profound joy and contentment sprung up from deep within.

After almost four and a half days, it seemed that the owner of the house had at last managed to return.