She didn’t know how long she’d be in his life.
“Damn old boulder! You know better than to pry into someone else’s means like that!” Rei recalled the conversation she heard uncle Jeff and grandma Mira have, the night after Avaln tested his spear against that tree. She was used to hearing those two bicker back and forth, but that time grandma Mira’s disappointment was evident. “You could have invited disaster on us!”
The old man rebuffed. “What could a meager Nascent Essence realm do…” His words began full of confidence, but just like the air in his lungs, it abandoned him by the end of the phrase.
“I’ll tell you something that your life seems to have failed to teach you: the dead rarely know they were going to die.” Grandma Mira shook her head in disbelief. “You are lucky that fella has a kind heart. A less virtuous person would have killed you on the spot.”
Squinting his eyes, his fist met the table. “Still, I’m in the Tempered Essence realm. I can clean the floor with kids in his realm!”
Grandma Mira shook her head even widely. “Forget about beating him. It will take us nowhere with how tiny your skull seems to be. All this time I’ve put up with you because you knew where to draw the line, when to keep your word. If it wasn’t for Rei…”
“Little Ri’s been decei…”
By that time, she stopped listening. Rei knew the old smith meant well, despite his sharp words, but he just wasn’t able to see what she knew about Avaln. Master Avaln.
It was true she owed a life-saving grace to that young man, and it was her first time calling anyone Master, yet she knew instinctively she wasn’t wrong, for even if she referred to him as such, there wasn’t any subordination involved. In fact, one could say she did so precisely because he had always treated her like an equal…
Servitude out of one’s own free will, and reticently but kindly received.
Such had been her mother’s teachings, so many years ago.
However, she didn’t know how long she’d be in his life.
A month passed so fast…
She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but since that day inside the cave, after she felt that strange wind blowing in his direction, a feeling found nest in her gut. A certainty she couldn’t shake off, at first believing just part of her imagination.
But as they spent time together, she began to catch stray glimpses here and there; How he moved, one step after the other, with a certain weight behind them. It wasn’t like the many youths she met at Gale, who seemed to not know where their feet were taking them, so light, a stray breeze would send them off-path. No, Avaln meant every single one of them, intention evident even under her inexperienced scrutiny.
She also would catch how his purple gaze would sometimes get fixed in one direction, looking at something that wasn’t really there, or how he seemed to never waste a second, always darting from place to place, reading while eating, going out to train early every morning...
He made sure every breath counted for something. If someone were to tell her he trained in his sleep, she wouldn't even laugh.
The first day after receiving the modified demon boar spear, he warned the elders of how the whole side of Gale facing the mountain range should be off-limits, for he had placed traps. Of course, both Jeff and grandma Mira exchanged skeptical looks, as not even Rei knew when he had time to do so, to which Avaln just shrugged and told them they’d know his words were true in due time.
It seemed they didn’t put much effort in warning the villagers, for a week later a high-pitched scream came from the forest. There, they found a middle-aged man scared witless on the ground, with a demon boar in front. However, the beast wasn’t moving, and as uncle Jeff studied it, he realized it was frozen in place with a single stab wound in one of its eyes. Further search yielded the location of another four nearby beast corpses with the same conditions, the essence inside them slowly but surely returning to the world.
They didn’t dare loiter around, for fear of stepping on a trap themselves.
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After that, uncle Jeff and grandma Mira stopped doubting his words, and the former became specially amicable, as it seemed he had entertained the thought of venturing inside the forest himself. Rei could imagine the old smith shuddering at the possibility of him being frozen in one of those traps instead, fully aware now of what the sentence “You’ll know if what I say is true in due time.” meant.
Yes, Avaln was someone whose goal was far ahead, and for some reason, he was determined to reach it. Rei never inquired about it though, afraid of the answer, afraid of being right.
One night, a sound woke her up. When she got out of her Aunt’s house, she found grandma Mira staring in a direction that answered her conscious question.
“Want to go take a look?” She asked Rei, a knowing smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. Rei nodded, and grandma Mira instructed her to get closer with a gesture. Soon, a mantle of Essence she was barely aware of surrounded them both. “Stick to me, just like when you were little. Or else he’ll probably sense you.”
Rei lifted an eyebrow as they made their way into the forest. “But isn’t Master just a Nascent Essence realm adventurer?”
“Not you too. That old boulder is a bad influence.” The elderly woman’s tone held some disappointment, yet there was also kindness mixed in between. “He is indeed just at the peak of the Nascent Essence realm, but he is also anything but ordinary. Almost gave me a heart attack when I met him.”
“Master did?”
Mira nodded. “For a moment I thought the brat had seen through me.” She smiled ruefully. “Then I realized he had just seen a bit more than most. Even more than my little Dan.”
A ghostly claw clenched Rei’s heart at that name, and she knew the elderly woman felt the same. “I miss him too, grandma.”
The elderly woman patted the delicate hand she held between hers, nodding to herself. “I’m just glad you are safe.” Mira then faced forward, further nodding as if reigniting her will. “He is just up ahead… but… what is this?”
As she wondered out loud, they reached the place Jeff had guided them to almost a month ago, and what they saw there, left them speechless.
Bark against grass, countless trees had been felled; Some, splintered at their trunk; Others, cut cleanly in half; And the rest were a black chalk, corroded by the demonic Essence that came most probably from the demon boar spear... yet Mira never knew a beast so weak could possess such a rich essence. Sure, the power was at the Nascent realm, but even inside a realm there were myriads of levels in the Essence’s purity, and that one was at the peak.
She feared the worst.
The demonic attribute was incredibly invasive, and could corrode the Essence of creatures in contact with it. One of the reasons the barrier around the mountain range existed at all was precisely to prevent the thick demonic Essence within from ever getting out.
“Grandma… is Master ok?” Rei asked with a weak voice.
A few breaths passed, and so did her fear as she saw how Mira’s features eased up into an amused smile. “That little brat… “ She said, almost shaking her head in disbelief. “He took control of the demonic Essence.”
Rei opened her eyes in surprise, and her gaze, as if attracted by yearning, finally found Avaln’s naked back, heaving up and down, sweat defining muscle under the bright light of the moon. Her breathing lost its calm at the sight, then it finally dawned on her. The sound she heard must have been the trees being felled, one by one…
The scene in front of her was the result of just one night.
With an ivory flourish, the spear found a more comfortable grip in his hand as he stood straight once again, no longer panting nor in a stance. Rei hadn’t realized, but in the course of a month Avaln seemed to have grown taller, and the lines on his body told stories about the strength beneath the skin.
A memory came to her mind, and replayed the firmness of his arms around her as she cried her grief out.
Mira, in the meantime, took a gander at her, then subtly coughed. “We… should go.”
Rei nodded, her rosy cheeks barely hidden by the darkness, her eyes avoiding any contact.
Later that morning, inside grandma Mira’s home, she rested against the window, watching the first rays of sunlight rising through the forest, still too dim to completely dispel the darkness, but just strong enough to mix a pale blue.
Behind, the elderly woman approached with a certain deference not many could see from her. “Are you thinking about telling him?”
Rei cast her gaze downward, not turning around. “Yes… but no.”
“Why?” Asked the person who was her guardian.
“I’m afraid.”
“Of what?”
Rei sighed and met the grey eyes of Mira, the Mistbearer. “Master is like a young bird learning to fly... “There was a hint of reproach in her pale blue as she spoke, for she knew her guardian was quite aware of her feelings. “I’m afraid his wings would break beneath a weight he shouldn’t have to carry.”
The elderly woman nodded, her mask as just a grandma close to her heart. “It is for the best.”
Rei faced the sunrise once again. She didn’t know how long she’d be in his life... but as she placed a hand over her chest, a gentle smile blossomed on her delicate features.