BOOM!
The ground shook under Zerine’s feet while a blast of air buffeted them. For a moment, the sky was lit mid-day. The young spirits crowded around the older ones, making frightened sounds. The two C-rank spirits cooed reassuringly to them and patted many tiny heads. Meanwhile, Varino flew up on a cloud and looked to where the ball of fire had exploded.
“See anything!?” Zerine called to her.
Varino whistled in surprise. Then came a quick host of whistles and chimes as Varino began describing what she saw. She described how one of the hills had been hit. Evidently, the entire upper half of a hill was currently ablaze, while the meteors impact had leveled the forest surrounding the impact site. Then she went on a tangent as she excitedly gave a play-by-play of a fight between several flying lizards and some large monster.
Once Varino began talking about the fight, Zerine tuned out the spirit, while the others curiously listened on. Zerine was mainly debating about going to check out the impact area. Rocks that fell from the heavens often had rare materials or even rare magic connected to them. According to some books she read, beings who found such objects discovered whole concepts connected to themselves or made breakthroughs with their magic. And that was just the magic aspect. Depending on what they found, they could make some incredible things if the meteor brought rare materials with it.
But if there is such magic or materials, I bet the C-rank creatures or monsters would head towards it. Especially if that material or magic emitted energy, she thought. She truly struggled to decide whether to stay or go.
Varino drifted down and whistled to her.
“You know me too well,” Zerine teased, grinning up at the spirit.
Varino’s cloud drifted lower. Varino was lying on her stomach, peering down at Zerine. She grinned back at Zerine, chiming and burbling curiously.
“We could go, but-”
Excited chiming.
“Yes, I’m very curious because materials there could be precious if there are any. But the monkeys and other monsters could attack here while we are heading there,” Zerine replied.
Varino raised a transparent blue eyebrow and whistled.
“Are you trying to act like the devil on my shoulder or something?” Zerine replied, shaking her head.
Varino innocently chirped, but excitedly leaned forward over her cloud and whistled again.
“Yes, it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity, but-”
Varino chittered and trilled, waving her arms. At this point, her cloud was at eye level. The spirit grinned, knowing her argument was convincing.
“Just because it was a large explosion does not mean we will find any there. But the rest of your points make it tempting.”
Zerine was about to say more, but the water elemental spoke up. It spoke with burbles and splashing sounds. The spirit’s words made Zerine truly start considering their options.
“Alright, we have gone a little overboard with the traps and defenses since the monkeys. The monsters are also getting stronger because of the ambient magic and ley line doing gods know what, so this would be our best opportunity before it gets too dangerous,” Zerine said thoughtfully.
Kimi chittered, saying they were intrigued as well. Adding that, they would know if their traps had been set off so they could come back if that happened.
“Did you manege to make that thing you mentioned a few days ago that would alert the spirits if a trap was set off?” Zerine wondered.
Kimi chittered, bobbing up and down, before skittering off.
“Sooo that's a yes. I guess then we should go,” she said sighing. Varino cheered. “Right as the sky brightens in the morning. Not during the night. I am not willing to get jumped by nocturnal monsters of creatures looking for an easy prey,” Zerine said.
Varino cheered again, pumping her little fists in the air.
“Let's just hope the fires keep the creatures and monsters at bay and we don’t run into literally everything, also going to the impact site,” Zerine muttered as she went to prepare for a hike and to make sure her weapons were all ready.
***
Lucy and Alana had been busy the past week dealing with the ley line shift and all the monsters that followed. Lucy had checked in on Zerine once in a while and had sent word that the monsters would exceed the test parameters in at least a week.
The response she got back was simple: “do not interfere.”
When she insisted, the next message was clearer: “Zerine will have to a survive or break the crystal. Judgement is as much of a part of this test as fighting and survival techniques are.”
A statement that annoyed Lucy, but wasn’t a surprise to her sister.
“I told you they wouldn’t care. The test is to show the family what she can do. So, Zerine will simply have to be extremely careful. Maybe she could just stay in that camp of theirs for the rest of the test,” Alana said.
“Yeah, but there is a mana storm bearing down on them. That is…just insane,” Lucy said, drawing her sword as they reached their destination.
“That island is a strange place. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was ancient stuff there. It was, after all, where the ancestor found an artifact and several spirits ascended from. Or at least those are the legends,” Alana said, not bothering to pull her weapon out. They stepped out of the hovering wagon, which moved quickly away. The two women found themselves looking at a group of large A-rank monsters.
Three looming monsters made from stone and fire lumbered towards a town. The stone resembled obsidian, with red and green flames flaring from cracks in the monster’s stone skin.
“That is possible, but still a risk. A large mana storm sized risk,” Lucy said before vanishing in a flash of light.
Alana sighed. “We should be able to go back to the monitoring room after this mission. As long as the monsters slow down on the manifestations,” she muttered before joining her sister fighting the A-rank monsters.
***
As soon as the first bit of light hit the sky, Varino woke Zerine. After making a fruit and meet breakfast, Kimi and Zerine were ready for their trip. The spirits said farewell as the group moved into the forest. Zerine gave them a cheery wave, hoping that it wouldn’t be the last time they would see the spirits, but wasn’t certain. It would all come down to how long they spent exploring the impact site and how many monsters or creatures they encountered.
Varino landed lightly on her shoulder and chimed.
“Yeah, like day two all over again. Let's hope we find some goodies and little to no monsters,” Zerine said.
Kimi chittered as the spider landed on her other shoulder.
“Yep, you're right. I know that was hopeful thinking on the monster part,” Zerine said resigned.
There was a grinding sound that came from their left. Zerine turned her head, giving the purple evil puff ball a flat look.
“So, you're the first thing this morning, huh? How unfortunate for you,” she said, flicking a throwing knife infused with a bit of willpower. It blasted a hole through the puff ball before flying back to her hand.
“Welp, that monsterless morning was short-lived,” she said, casually cleaning the knife.
Varino burbled and pointed to the sky.
Zerine glanced, then did a double take. A group of flying lizards were harassing a large bat-like monster. At first Zerine thought the lizards were monsters and the bat thing as a creature. But no, they were the usual colorful feathered lizards that she grew up seeing. The bat-like thing, well, it was nightmare fuel once she got a good look at it.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
Four wings flapped with three fingers, which had powerful looking claws. A spiked tail swished and whipped at the lizards who dodge it. Mostly, those features wouldn’t be out of place on a normal creature, but the monster had four insect-like compound eyes and its mouth was a vertical slit in its chest. Where the mouth should have been was a circular hole that shot spikes of bone and flesh at the lizards.
As they watched the fight, a glint caught Zerine’s eye.
What was that? she thought, squinting.
There it was again, but this time Zerine saw where the glint had come from.
A dragonfly-like insect flitted about. It had a long slender body with four spikes that were its legs and six membrane wings that were transparent. The normal, colorful dragonfly body was shades of grey and black. It was around the size of a small bird, but Zerine saw the diamond shaped metal in the middle of the insect’s forehead. That tiny marking glinted as the Metal head moved once again. The Metal head’s mark was made of shiny copper, so they were F-rank. But simply seeing what was commonly known as a low rank scout made Zerine’s heart rate pick up.
“I don’t want to say we are in trouble, but we are going to run into it…big time,” Zerine said.
Varino chimed a question.
Zerine didn’t answer, but pointed at where the Metal head scout was. When Varino spotted the small scout, she cheeped in alarm.
Kimi chittered, uncertain why a small insect was a problem.
Varino chimed, explaining to the Runic spider as Zerine began a steady but fast jog she could keep going for a while. She intended to go to the impact site still, but their trip would be shorter than they had planned because she suspected there would be a group of Metal heads following that scout sooner than later.
Metal heads had different casts and breeds, all of which were tailored to specific roles. There were the scouts. Often known to be light, fast, and with the weakest of Metal head armor, which was still stronger than what many could make from normal metals. The scouts ranged from small flying creatures like the dragonfly or small spider-like monsters, and those were just the most common in that cast. Another cast was commonly called brutes. Large, heavily armored monsters. The most common amongst the brute cast were like gorillas, if a gorilla was covered in armor and could be the size of a truck. These types of brutes could have a range of appearances. For example, they could have anywhere between one or four eyes. The most notable aspect of a brute was that at F-rank they had been known to kill peak E or even D-rank creatures and monsters. There were other casts, but the scouts and brutes were the most common. She shuttered at the thought that they might encounter the other casts.
Zerine really didn’t want to face any brutes. Varino’s affinities would be effective, but the spirit wouldn’t be their primary target at first. Out of their group, Zerine would be the one most vulnerable and what the brutes would focus on because Varino and Kimi would be either out of reach or hidden in the case of Kimi.
As if it could feel Zerine’s worries, a scorpion monster scuttled into view. A shiny dark green exoskeleton and three stingers gave quite the impression. There were even glowing red eyes.
Zerine let out a breath of relief that it wasn’t a Metal head, but still…
“Not great,” Zerine muttered, preparing for a fight, while the others did the same.
Then another monster appeared that was gross to even look at. A floating ball of flesh with eyes all over it drifted over before attacking the scorpion, who attacked back with two of its stingers, creating bolts of poisonous green, while targeting them with their own green bolt.
Zerine and the others dodged, then scrambled, searching for cover. All three hid behind the same tree, which was when Zerine heard another right break out nearby. A strew blast of energy blasted apart several treetops. Meanwhile, the monsters were attacking one another, oblivious of the other fight.
Zerine pulled her bow and several arrows out intending to attack, monsters while they were distracted. But an aura washed over the area right before an attack obliterated the scorpion and eyeball. Blood and bits of exoskeleton splattered against a wind barrier Varino created.
“Weeell, there’s that,” Zerine said after a brief pause where all three stared where the monsters had just been.
Kimi chittered.
“Yeah,” Zerine said, still staring at the smoldering crater, that was the only sign that something had been there. “Let’s get the hell out of here before whatever attacked them goes for us,” she agreed, beginning to jog again.
She thought they were safely away when several more stray attacks made Zerine’s jog turned into a sprint. She kept that up till she was certain they were far away, then went back to her job.
It took most of the day to get to the edge of the impact site. During their trip, they had delt with some skirmishes with monsters, but avoided fights for the most part. They had helped a troop of monkeys, despite Kimi saying they should just leave them to their fate. But Zerine and Varino felt bad because the monkeys were fighting a panther-like monster that was giving the group quite a lot of trouble. It would jump in and out of shadows, but with Kimi’s magic and Zerine’s planning and instincts, they were able o trap the monster. The monkeys took the opportunity to finish it off. They didn’t stick around in case the monkeys wanted to continue their feud and moved to the still burning edge of the impact site.
Zerine peered at the burning forest.
“Varino, do you think you can protect us long enough to break through the part still burning?” Zerine wondered.
Varino peeped in affirmation.
“Perfect! we-”
Zerine was startled when Kimi created runes on Zeirne’ss poncho.
The spider clicked, which made Varino whistled, impressed.
“Thank you for the protection runes. How long have you been working on those?” Zerine wondered.
Kimi chittered.
“Since we met. Wow, well, let’s give it a test. You two ready?” Zerine wondered.
After the two nodded, Zerine took a breath and stepped into the burning forest. It was a rather simple trip, thanks to the runes and Varino’s magic. The spirit used her wind to keep smoke away, while used water to keep the temperature comfortable or clear burning patches in their way. They soon made it to the outer edge of the crater, which was...
Varino cooed in awe.
“Yeah, huge,” Zerine said.
Zerine starred in awe at what had been a hilltop, which was now a large crater. From the edge, Zerine couldn’t even see the middle. It appeared the meteor had smashed into some sort of cave system under the hill.
“Great, it’s underground,” Zerine muttered.
Varino chimed excitedly.
“Of course, you're excited. Kimi thoughts?”
Kimi clicked just as excited as Varino.
“Fine, buuut I am not walking down the crater. It looks really hot,” she said, peering at a still glowing red rock only a few feet away. “So, let’s find a cave entrance,” Zerine said.
After skirting the edge of the crater, they found a cave entrance tucked away near the burned remains of a large tree root. Zerine was thankful for the fact that it seemed fighting had broken out all around the burning part of the impact site, so it had been just them around the crater. Although she spotted that Metal head scout again before a group of flying lizards chased it.
Zerine stood in the cave entrance and began questioning if she had lost her damn mind. She had fought to get here, walked through literal fire, and now was preparing to head into a pitch-black cave who could contain gods know what.
The cave was a large hole made form dark stone and had enough room for at least three people to walk side by side. Just seeing it made her imagination fill her head with images of small, dangerous insect monsters. she resisted the urge to shutter.
Kimi clicked, saying they would go ahead and check the cave. With a light leap, the spider land in front of Zerine. Kimi waved its forelegs and clicked again, saying they should wait there, then turned away and headed into the cave. The shades of green that painted the outline of Kimi flickered then vanish making it so all Zerine could see were the faint glow of the spider’s eyes.
“Did you know Kimi could do that?” Zerine muttered to Varino.
Varino chimed and shrugged.
“What do you mean, of course?”
Varino whistled and patted Zerine’s shoulder.
“I've gotten to know Kimi just as much as you, but I didn’t focus on magic that didn’t seem useful during a fight. I guess I will ask more specific questions next time. Or you could have told me.”
Varino cheeped.
“I know your magic! I-…” Zerine closed her mouth and eyed the spirit, who was acting very innocent giving Zerine puppy dog eyes. Zerine's gaze narrowed. “Are you holding out on me?”
Varino waved a hand giggling before she trilled and whistled.
“Hmm, now you're teasing me. You know when we get back home, I want to see you duel one of those dummies all out.”
Varino chimed happily, saying she would gladly blow up a dummy or two. They always made great fiery explosions.
After that they chatted about magic, while also keeping an eye out for creatures, but they could hear fights that had only seemed to get more intense if Varino’s observations on the distant mana were to be believed. Kimi came back after ten minutes with an excited clicking, waving their forelegs as the spider sprinted out of the cave.
“I take it you found something, and no monsters...right?” Zerine wondered.
Kimi did a little hop and clicked, which made Varino go “oooh” intrigued.
Without any more words, they followed the excited spider into the cave. Zerine pulled out a glowstone, which gave off a warm orange light. She only needed it for a few minutes of walking before cracks let in the cave’s roof let in thin beams of light. Eventually, they reached the crater, which made Zerine’s eye go wide.
No wonder why Kimi was excited, she thought.
The cave opened up to the carter, which had created a massive chamber. Zerine tried to peer up through a large hole in the roof to see the surface, but couldn’t from their vantage point. A beam of light came from above, filtering through the hole and was angled off from the center of space. What had captured the attention of the three was a strange multicolored flame, or flames? The flames’ colors danced on the cave walls and despite the flame’s size, the space didn’t feel overly hot.
As Zerine watched, entranced by the flame, she thought she saw movement within it, but wasn’t certain. A moment later, it proved to be true, as several colorful balls of fire suddenly popped out of the flame and fitted about the space before zipping back to the flame.
To her instincts, she felt as if many little balls of fire made up the one large flame, and they were curious? How did she know the flames were curious, you ask? She did not know, but was simply going with her gut. She moved towards the flame, which startled Varino, who chirped in surprise, wondering why she was heading towards a magical flame? Before Zerine could reply, the fire exploded into a spiraling stream of color and flame. It reminded Zerine of a rainbow, but made out of fire, so more awesome. The sight took her breath away at its beauty.
Varino chimed happily and zoomed up on a cloud flying up in the middle of the spiral, completely forgetting about her concern moments ago. Seeing how excited Varino was made Zerine relax. If her instincts didn’t leave her on edge and Varino was happy, then they weren’t in trouble…hopefully.
“I swear if these fire spirits get added to our group, I’ll…there are no words, it just seems to be our lives as of late,” Zerine muttered to Kimi, who was on her shoulder. The spider blinked curiously at her. “You have no idea what I said, do you?”
Kimi made their shrugging gestures, and she sighed.
Varino’s burbling, tinkling laugh made Zerine smile. That was a good sign for interacting with the hopefully not hostile fire spirits.
The spiraling mass of fire suddenly wove itself into a knot before there was high pitched…
POP!
And now floating in the middle of the space with a delighted Varino zooming around it, was not a fire sprit…not at all.
“Ho-ly shit,” Zerine whispered.