Mark stared at the explanation for everything. He read it again. And again. ‘I need to gather more believers to evolve and the stronger they are, the better. I also need to figure out a way to attain more TITLES and DIVINE Names. Fro now I need to increase my skills. I also have to find out what would happen if I use Source Energy instead of Astral Essence for my skill. I’ll do it when the rain stops.’
‘What is wrong with his rain? It’s not normal. From the memories I got, there was never a rain like this. Maybe it might rain lightly for days but not this heavily and this one seems like it could go on for days.’
Mark pondered on the cause for such rain, but he couldn’t come up with any feasible explanation. To the time he tried the things he saw in Aileen’s memory. How she shaped fire to create many things and the one where she froze things with heat manipulation. He moved around the cave, freezing different rocks or melting some of them, creating a molten lava. When he increased the heat using Source Energy, the maximum temperature increased exponentially.
He tried different skills like fireball, flamethrower, fire spear, flame arrow and other until the voice told him he had learned them.
[Skills: ENERGY EYE, Spontaneous Combustion, Fireball, Flamethrower, Fire Spear, Flame Arrow, Flame Shield, Heat Manipulation]
A day has passed since he started to experiment with magic and the sun was shining through the thick green forest leaves. Delighted by the sun after so many days of rain, Mark went out of the cave, going around the forest until he reached a colossal mountain with its top piercing through the clouds. The mountain stretched longer than he could see.
‘These must be the Misty mountains. They are big. They might be bigger than Everest. And they stretch out to the ocean.’ He thought. ‘There is a human settlement beyond these mountains. I could go there unlike the other, the poison in the forest did nothing to me. I’m sure the poison in the mountain and beyond won’t do me any damage either. But what human can accept me like this…whatever this is?’
That thought made him depressed. He might not be able to talk to others like normal beings. He got away with pretending with the foxes, but the humans might not be easily fouled. ‘They might see me as a demon or something. I need to find a way to turn into a human. Even if it’s only temporary.’
So he started to explore the mountains.
*****
Aileen was taking a stroll in the morning light. After days of continuous rain, it was finally sunny. Wearing a comfortable red robe and a black leather gloves, she enjoyed the peace the morning breeze brought her. The wind was chilly so, she sometimes shivered slightly but mostly the sun was comforting, especially after their disaster mission.
She saw as Cintra’s husband ran towards his home. ‘Glad he is alright,’ she thought. He was carrying something she couldn’t identify from the distance. She thought of giving him help to carry, but he was already out of sight by the time she had made her decision.
She passed by the stable, heard the horses neighing. So, she went in, started to pet each one. When she reached the last stall, it was empty. She looked around and counted them again and again. There was one horse missing. She thought someone must have taken it to ride it in the sun. She didn’t think much of it and went on with her stroll.
She reached one of the gates of the village. There she saw Rurik sharpening his ax, getting ready to go out to the woods again. He was so focused he didn’t notice anyone that approached him.
She stood behind him, staring as he sharpened his ax. The sound of the ax as he grinds it against the whetstone was rhythmic. ‘He should have been a blacksmith.’
“Hello, Rurik.”
She saw as he dived forward and roll. He raised his ax to his face level, with one knee on the ground. The shock in his eye as he stared at her with a wide eye in realization of who she was it amused her. She almost laughed as he scrambled and clumsily stood up.
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“Luminary, what bring you here?” he give a slight bow as he said that.
“I was taking a stroll and ended up here. And I’m glad that I did. I have something to ask you?”
He gave her a nod.
“I wanted to ask you if you are sure it was a Nightshroud pup and not some other animal.”
“I might have forgotten many things, but the Nightshrouds wolf pack is not one of them, especially their howls. You may not remember it since you were a kid, and you were grieving, but I remember it vividly when they attacked our previous town.” His claws dug into his knees as if to anchor himself to the present. “I still have nightmares about it. I remember their howl. I remember seeing one of them ripped my parents apart slowly while I hid like a coward, shaking, and shitting and pissing myself. I remember the scream of my parents as the beasts enjoyed their flesh and their agony like it was some kind of delicacy for them.” He was trembling violently when he recall that memory. “I was lucky that a Luminary came and burned that DAMNED beast; otherwise, I would have died.” He clenched his hand so much blood was dripping down to the ground. He looked up and stared straight at her eyes with a barely contained rage, not at her, but at himself.
“So, yeah princess, I am certain it was a Nightshroud pup.”
Aileen shifted beside him, her gaze softening. “You were just a boy…”
He shook his head sharply, not letting her finish whatever excuse she was coming up to comfort him. He had heard it many times, but it still doesn’t change what happened. “I should have done something.” The words came out as a hoarse rasp, filled with a mixture of shame and rage. “I stayed there, hidden like a coward, while they…” his breath hitched, and he pressed the heel of his paw into his eye, as if that would stop the flood of memories. A tense silence hung between them, the only sound the howl of the wild wind.
Then she leaned forward, resting a hand gently on his arm. “It’s not your fault.” Her eyes flickered with guilt when she said that.
He yanked his arm back as if burned. “You don’t know what it’s like!” he snapped, his voice rough with barely suppressed emotions. His heart hammered painfully in his chest. The air felt too thick. And her eyes—those eyes.
He shot to his feet, his hand trembling as if he was still that boy beneath the floorboards. “How could you understand?” his voice wavered between anger and fear.
Her expression flickered—surprise, maybe even guilt—but she remained standing, her hands folded in her laps. “You think I don’t?” she asked, and in her mind she thought, ‘I understand more than anyone.’
He pressed a hand against his chest, feeling the sharp edge of panic rising. “You—” his voice broke. He clenched his fists, claws biting into his palms until the pain grounded him. “It’s just…” he looked at her eyes but immediately diverted his eyes elsewhere.
He stepped back, as if needing distance from her, too closed and she might transform, become one of them, jaws snapping and fangs bared.
“You’re not that helpless boy anymore,” Aileen whispered, her voice quiet but shaky.
He closed his eyes, breath shuddering, trying to hold himself together. But the past never left. It gnawed at his insides like those beasts that had torn through his family—merciless and endless.
Finally, he let out a low, broken sigh. “Maybe not. And I don’t know if I’ll ever stop feeling like I am. But this time when they come, I’ll be ready. This time it’ll be different. Because this time they will be the ones to scream.”
*****
While he was looking around the mountains, the sunlight started to dim slowly. He looked up and saw dark clouds gathering overhead. ‘What the fuck is wrong with this weather?’
It hadn’t been that long since it had stopped raining… maybe a few hours. And now it seems it was going to rain again. It looks like it was going to be a heavy rain. More than the previous one.
‘It almost feels like it is targeting me, but why? It doesn’t matter for now…I need to find another cave. I can’t afford to lose more energy points because of the rain.’
Luckily, he found a cave amidst the mountains a little after it started to rain. So, he didn’t lose too much energy points.
After a day of staying inside the cave, the rain stopped. He went out to explore more, but after a few hours, it rained again. The pattern repeated itself again. And again. It rained when he was out and stopped when he hid. So he chose one of the caves around the mountains. And stayed there.
To pass the time, he started to practice magic. To learn new skills or to be proficient in those he already knew. During one of those practices, the wall of the cave crumbled because of an explosion from his magic. It opened up a passageway down. The way down was dark, with him being the only source of light. But he went down that path and after sometime he saw a light ahead.
When he emerged, he saw a group of five short people with wide shoulders and thick arms talking among themselves in a language he didn’t understand. ‘Are they Dwarfs? They seemed to be arguing about something.’ After some heated argument, the leader of the group, or who seemed to be the leader, took the lead to go near the lava that was flowing like a river.
He spoke some words he didn’t understand and threw something into the lava. Nothing happened for about a minute. When Mark was confused as to why they would do such things, the lava parted ways as a figure rose from underneath. The figure, at least ten feet tall, was made of lava. Its skin is made of blackened rock, with lava flowing through its hot, orange-red veins, and had wings of smoke and flame, with a whip made of pure fire extended from its hand into the lava beneath.