[A title claimed by the leadership of a rebellious group, their true identities are yet unknown.]

I slept horribly that night, largely due to the ground being rough and uneven. It was made up slightly by us being allowed to sleep in until almost two hours after sunrise. Oroske explained to us the previous night that we were doing it that way because it wouldn’t really matter at the end of the day. “We’d have to leave long before sunrise if we wanted to make it from Fyrun to Al’din in a single day and get back on track,” he had said, “And I don’t want to put everyone through nearly twenty hours of straight walking in a single day, nor do I want to have to navigate this forest while it’s dark out.” So we stayed here for a while longer.

My tent had Jarou and I, accompanied by Jyn and Leren, as well as two others I hadn’t been properly introduced to until our tent assignments had been made. The two girls were sisters, though they had very different occupations. One was a bounty hunter, and the other worked as a guard under Terib’s family. The younger one, the bounty hunter, had pitch black, frizzy hair that she didn’t even attempt to style, and was named Yulra Zenshi. Her sister, Gai Zenshi, was only two years older, and had the same amber eyes and dark hair, but her’s was well kept and straight.

“What do your names mean?” I asked before we had gone to bed. I had heard ‘Gai’ before, but not ‘Yulra,’ and I was keen on learning more Alten.

“You don’t even know the words for sun and moon?” Gai was shocked. “They’re pretty common names, especially Gai. Parents apparently love to name their kid after the sun.” She explained after I defended myself, asking how I was supposed to know.

“So Gai is sun, Yulra is moon?” I asked to confirm, to which both of them nodded, “Alright, what about Zenshi?”

The two of them looked at each other and shrugged. Yulra responded, “No clue. Mom never told us, if she even knows.”

“It is supposed to be a really old family name, though.” Gai said, “I’m sure there’s someone out there who knows. Just never really cared to find out, y’know?”

I just shrugged. I was always under the impression the meaning of names was important and something people usually found out about. Though perhaps some people, such as Nadred and Oroske, just thought it was cool to know what your name meant.

I ended up being the last one in the tent to wake up. Jarou, Leren, Jyn, and Gai were all already outside chatting with the rest of the group, while Yulra had stayed behind. She was reading a small book that would almost fit in my pockets, and fanning herself with her free hand. “What’re you reading?” I asked as I sat up.

“It’s a fantasy book,” She said after she sighed, looking up at me with a mildly annoyed expression, “The author survived a trip to the Ashen Realm, and used his experiences there to write it. It takes place in a world without magic, without gods, all that stuff. It’s fascinating to see what they think a world like that would be like.”

“Sounds interesting,” I said while stretching, having stood up while she spoke. “Haven’t really had a chance to read any books, but maybe I’ll check it out sometime.” I donned my cloak, “The Ashen Realm, huh? That’s where the Half-Demon tribes came from, right? Terrai, I think it was called.”

“The very one. I’m surprised you know the Ashen Realm’s old name, but not what Gai and Yulra mean.”

“My knowledge is pretty scattered. Blame my teacher,” I chuckled and shrugged, “Still, I didn’t know you could actually travel to the Ashen Realm. That’s pretty cool, I’d be interested to see what things are like there.”

“Good luck getting there,” she said bluntly, “The Guardians themselves control who gets to travel there. Or at least, they do for official trips. Occasionally, gutsy people will make the journey undocumented, which means preparing a travel vessel on their own, and sailing there without any sort of guide or protection. The Guardians are reluctant to let people go out there, and usually the only people that get to go are seasoned researchers and historians, accompanied by veteran soldiers.”

I was going to say something else, when suddenly a commotion started outside. We heard a bunch of people chattering excitedly, and running past the tent. We followed them out, pushing our way to the front of the crowd. We saw Oroske facing towards the Demon Lord, who seemed like she just returned.

“I was hoping you’d entertain me, Tsumi.” She said, brandishing a long sword with a jagged, black blade. “I’d like to make a deal. Your kind are eager to make deals, right?”

Oroske stood his ground, arms folded. “I’ll hear you out, but no promises.”

“I beat you, I get my place in this village back, and you leave.”

He laughed, “Fine, fine. And when I win, you and yours will leave this village alone for the rest of your lives.”

She grinned devilishly and launched herself at him with impressive speed. I was able to tell she’d immediately started using Acceleration, and at a much higher level than I was capable of reaching. That didn’t stop me from using it myself so I could see the fight even a little more clearly. Oroske activated his Acceleration to match her speed just before she reached him, still having not budged or even unfolded his arms. When the tip of her blade was mere inches from his body, he quickly and effortlessly stepped to the side. Because she was mid-air, she was unable to react and change course to catch him.

I realized Oroske must have accelerated further than the Demon Lord, as even after she landed, he easily sidestepped and dodged each and every one of her swings. Finally, after what would have seemed to any other spectator as only about six or seven seconds, but to the two of them seemed more like thirty or fourty, and to me seemed like about fifteen, there was a short break in the vicious string of attacks. Oroske had jumped back a fair ways and put some distance between them.

After quickly catching her breath, the Demon Lord went on the offensive again. Where her previous barrage was devoid of magic based attacks, this one was almost exclusively magic attacks. My focus on my Acceleration lasted long enough for me to see that Oroske was defending with little waves of orun and jarou magic. But I didn’t need Acceleration to see that he was still standing still, and barely moving his arms to defend. He continued to effortlessly block all of her attacks for a couple minutes from an un-accelerated perspective, which meant that from his perspective it would have been several minutes. I was amazed he was able to retain his focus for that long.

Suddenly the impossible to follow barrage of magic attacks stopped, with a rock of jarou flying from Oroske, hitting the Demon Lord square in the forehead with a loud crack. It broke her poise and she fell back a single step. Her focus broke and her Acceleration fell off, the only energy I sensed from her was just sheer rage. She stepped forward with the foot that moved backwards previously. “Why won’t you take this seriously?!” She screamed the familiar phrase.

“You really want me to?” Oroske projected his voice loudly. She was silent, but still clearly angry. He took that silence as a yes. He extended a hand out and closed his eyes. The air pressure around us suddenly changed, becoming much lighter. I could tell the pressure change was largely due to him bringing in an immense amount of aether. Water began to rise at his feet, circling around his body and arm. He slowly opened his eyes, and whispered the word “Serpent.” The water around him jumped off of his body behind him, and formed into a massive, snake-like body. After the water collected into the main body, the snake was massive. Once all of the water was there, it lunged forward, crashing into the Demon Lord. It hit her at a diagonal angle, from in front and above, and threw her body to the ground with incredible force. She was then subjected to the pressure of the water falling on her directly for nearly a full minute. By the end of it, due to the diagonal angle, she had also been dragged a few feet through the dirt, creating a sizable crater.

He clapped his hands together and began walking towards her. “That shouldn’t have killed you, but it should have shown you how big the difference between us is.” She began to push herself up, struggling as her arms shook under her own weight. “I’m impressed you’re conscious. I’ll give you that,” he said when he reached her, still on her butt, leaning on her hands. He lifted her up by her cloak, and looked into her mask, cracked from the stone and water he’d thrown at her. He was able to get a small glimpse of her face, and gave a small smile. He didn’t use any magic to throw her over his shoulder, letting her fall flat on her back. He turned around to face her, standing just above her head. “Do you yield?”

“I do,” she struggled to even get the words out.

“Good. Now get the hell out of here, and pray I never see you again.” His voice was cold and merciless.

She struggled to her feet, and limped into the forest.

Once she was out of sight, Oroske turned back around, and was back to his usual self. “Alright crew, we leave in an hour. Start getting ready.”

“That was awesome!” I said as he approached, “Will I get to the point where I can do things like that?”

“Probably,” He said, “I imagine you’ll probably even go further than I can. Sorry, I need to sit down for a moment.” He walked over to one of the more structurally sound buildings, sitting on the ground and leaning against it.

“I’m surprised you’re that exhausted from just that,” Kared said when she walked over.

“It’s only because I didn’t get much sleep last night.” He defended himself, “I’ll be alright, just need a moment to rest.”

“You got a look at her face, didn’t you?” She asked, “Any leads on her actual identity?”

“None. I only really saw one of her eyes, and a little bit of her skin. Her skin is on the darker side, and her eyes are a very plain red. I couldn’t see anything really special about her.”

“Interesting. Well, we already have a fair amount of information on her and her group. That should be more than enough to really get the ball rolling on a proper investigation.”

There wasn’t a whole lot to do for the hour between then and when we left, so I mostly killed time talking with a couple of locals. Yulra, Jyn, and I ended up listening to an older woman’s tale of her and her late wife during their prime, and the adventures they went on. It ended up being cut short by Oroske coming to collect us, informing us that it was time to leave. The lady told us to come back sometime to hear the rest of the story.

Kalen saw us off, and told us a quicker way in and out of the forest, drawing on the map we’d received in Ish’din. From there, we journeyed to Fyrun without any issue. Which made for a boring trip that felt like it dragged on forever.