The other back at the camp continued to rest, and as it got dark, Dak started to prepare everything for the fire. He couldn’t help himself but think about his party.

Even though Vyria and Truelip have similar personalities, it somehow seems Truelip and Stela are getting along a lot better…

Dak and Dalia were the perfect defensive group along with Vyria’s support they were confident in themselves but were still on guard just in case. As the night came closer the rest of the party came back from their search empty handed. It was already dusk, so Dak decided to start the fire and sat down with two small rocks before Vyria just went up to him and placed her hand on his to stop him before she pointed her other hand at the twigs and leaves set inside the fire enclosure.

“Embers, yet to breath, eager to live, come forth to dance till your last light shines no more, [Wilf Fire]!”

As she said her incantation, unlike how Truelip simply said the spell name, the twigs lit up as a fire started to burn on them.

“You didn’t need to waste mana on that. Wouldn’t it have been better to save it just in case?” Dak asked her as he looked directly into her eyes.

Vyria let go of his hand as she replied to his question “It saves us time, plus it’s not like it matters for small spells like that. I even put less mana into it.”

“Is that why it didn’t set the surrounding foliage ablaze like it usually does?” Dak asked jokingly, but Vyria frowned at the remark and turned around to go continue reading her book. Uncertain of what she thought about it he hesitated to continue the conversation as to not get her mad at him and decided to leave it at that.

After everyone ate dinner on the campfire, they all sat down or laid somewhere – Dak, Dali and Vyria on logs, as Dalia were simply listening on the others’ conversation and of course Vyria was with her book; Lana and Stela were on their sleeping bags and lastly Truelip on the ground further to side and away from the rest, laying sideways, with her head rested on her arm, one leg stretched, while the other bent, knee in the air and her other arm rested on her thigh.

Dak yawns as he was roasting some small pieces of leftover food on the campfire.

“I know it’s night time, but isn’t it a bit early to be that tired already?” Lana teasingly asked as she laid down on her bag.

“It’s hard staying up when the entire atmosphere is so dark…” he responded.

“What are we to say, considering we spent all day running around while you were just sitting here…” she continues, slightly aggravated.

“Well just because I get sleepy earlier doesn’t mean I’ll sleep in like you~” he said cheekily in response.

“The stars usually keep me awake at night. Maybe they can help you?” Stela says holding her legs with her hands while gazing at said stars above, uncharacteristically calm.

“You really like watching them, don’t you?” Vyria asks, trying her hardest to start a conversation with Stela

“Yes, doesn’t it make you think of all the other worlds that exist out there? I like making up stories for each and every one of them, no matter how big or small, all different like the quirks and personality of a real person.”

Not knowing how exactly to respond Vyria says with a slightly uneasy voice “I think I understand what you mean. It reminds me of all the astronomy and astrotheurgy books I have read… How every little thing is given purpose… a name and personality…”

Stela was thinking of stopping her mid-sentence by saying that’s not something you can just understand, meaning it more as a statement, but was indecisive of whether to say it at all and in the end decided not to, since it did sound unintentionally harsh. In turn, she merely remained silent, now she was the one who didn’t know how to respond.

“I didn’t know you were quite the dreamer Stela.” Lana interrupted the silence - Truelip’s old friend.

“I guess…” she said slightly smiling, as she looked down from the stars, for the first down during this conversation, towards Lana.

The fire’s crackling, orchestrated with the crickets’ night serenade were breaking the peaceful night, as everyone was happy that they were together there at that moment. Despite the convo having ended, it lingered in their thought and kept them all warm inside despite it not having been smooth. As if on queue Truelip broke the silence.

“So how did you guys get here?”

Everyone else just stared at her, silence returning, as they didn’t know what to answer as all of them were purposefully ignoring the topic in front of her. After a few moments on wondering what to tell them Lana, Dallia and Stela just turned their gaze to the ground.

“So you remembered…?” Dak asked trying to distract the others.

“Yes.”

Thinking about it they all assumed that she herself probably won’t want to talk about it and moreover probably asked them so she herself can cope with it. After all, that’s how it was with all of them. Nevertheless, even with that mindset, they couldn’t pull themselves through to answer her. Stela was the first one to break the silence.

“Well I don’t really have a problem with answering, but there really isn’t much to say… Back in my homeland where I lived, it was full of elves, all living alongside nature and friends to the wildlife. Though some aristocrat idiots wanted to expand their kingdom into our forest and when they met resistance they said that we were cultists or something and defying their gods and decided to set the forests on fire, specifically our cities which were on the trees. Apparently, they were gonna build cities in their place, so burning a small portion in order to get all of us out was pretty good for them… And that’s how I ended up here.”

“I see.” Truelip replied in a shallow way as she continued to look at all of them waiting for the next person to begin.

“I don’t think Lana and I wanna talk about it really… sorry…” Dak said with a sad grimace, as he looked at Lana whom herself was just looking down at the ground not even listening anymore.

“Sorry for asking.” She sounded like she was gonna trail off, but ended quickly.

“Then I guess, I’ll go next…” Vyria continued “There wasn’t anything special in my life… in fact it was quite ordinary. No adventure or thrill or anything, but I didn’t really crave much. I mean it was fun thinking about all those fantasy stories… But it’ not like I would have traded my normal life for it. I was actually drawing art back then… But here in this city specifically that’s not profitable… Though I was told when I get stronger or find an escort if I venture out further away from the city I could find one where it is profitable. Magic really wasn’t a thing in my past life either… Sure it would have probably been fun to have some… But since I needed a way to defend myself I decided to learn magic here… It was something that sounded cool and I was interested in… so yeah. By the way how come you don’t need incantation for your magic, but only can use the name? I thought only high level mages could do that or do you use a different type of magic?”

“I do use a different type, but I still need incantations for high level spells. It’s just that the type of magic I use focuses on fine control so for example if I decide to not go all out I use up less mana and thus don’t need the full incantation, but only the part for the purpose.”

“I see…”

After a few moments of silence, Dallia spoke up “Back in the city where I was under the archbishop, we worshipped Aeucheles… He would grant us his protection, but…” She trailed off, not finishing her sentence. “Even now I can still feel his protection and can use the miracles he has granted me… Though it feels weird when I use them… as if… there’s an interference…”

“I’m sure he won’t betray your beliefs.” Truelip replied with an uncharacteristic smile to her. Though faint and barely visible, it changed her presence entirely. It’s like her entire face lit up and her features became even more mesmerising as her entire face gave off an aura that soothed. Though it quickly subsided and became even less visible, probably from the stares all of them were giving her.

Stela, surprisingly enough, was the first one to look away, looking down, as she blushed from the notion of how she was staring at her. Seconds later she got up terrified and screamed.

“LIZARD!?!”

Everyone quickly grabbed their weapon and stiffened their bodies on guard, except Truelip, assuming that a lizardman is attacking them seeing as Stela was supposed to listen for anyone that nears them.

“Where is he?” Dak hurriedly asked her.

“There, there, get it away!” she yelled out as she pointed towards the ground and screamed.

Looking at said ground they could see a small lizard that had unearthed from under a rock to seek the warm fire in the night.

Everyone tiredly lowered their guard and sighed, slowly going back to their previous poser ignoring her as she continued to scream in terror.

“Get it away! It’s disgusting!”

Quickly Vyria responded “Hey, what do you mean disgusting?? Why do you hate them so much…?” as she donned a serious and sad expression thinking about the harsh words.

Lana following her question as she looked at Stela “Yeah, you’re a forest elf, aren’t you supposed to love all forest animals…?”

“Forest animals are cute and fuzzy! Lizards are scaly, cold and so gross to touch!” Stela responds to both of them at the same time, before she continued “How do you even like them? Don’t you like to experiment on them or something with your magic and potions? She directs her attention to Vyria expecting an answer.

“We don’t experiment on them! We experiment on rats! How can you even compare the two…”

“You can’t fool me! I’ve been to mage classes! It’s full of creepy, smelly, scaly… scary monsters!” Stela trails of midway trying her hardest to describe the horrors that plague her memories, but finds the memories easier than she does the words for them.

After hearing her silly explanation after a few moments Dak snorts and starts laughing followed by Lana, with Dalia giving a slight smile before Vyria finally giving in and changing her serious grimace about her scaly friends to also slightly laughing at the matter. After a few moments, everyone calmed back down to normal and started yawning one after the other before deciding it’s time to go to sleep so obviously they had a choice to make.

“So who’s going to be on watch duty first?” Dak asks everyone with a slightly serious tone.

“I don’t mind being first” Truelip responds almost instantly, with Lana at the background pouting since she didn’t want her sleep interrupted and was hoping to be first.

“Are you sure? Will you be able to hold out the tiredness? It’s not a problem if someone else goes instead.” He asked to reassure.

“Yes, I can also use magic to stay up slightly longer so it won’t be a problem for me to be first.”

“Okay, but be sure to wake us up the moment you start feeling sleepy or something happens… You’ll also have to keep the fire going till then.”

“That’s okay. Be sure to rest well while you sleep.”

And with that everyone else went to sleep in their sleeping bags, Stela at first gazing at the stars, but falling asleep first and cuddling in her blanket like a baby. Truelip went to the West part of the clearing, in the direction of the Orcs, and sat down in front of a tree, laying her back against it. That way if someone did come from that direction they won’t see her and think everyone’s sleeping and hopefully get slightly careless, or so was the plan. Every little advantage she could get mattered, especially when it was at no cost like this.