The creature's gaze locked with ours, its crimson eyes gleaming with predatory intent. It crouched low, muscles coiled like steel springs, ready to unleash a burst of lethal speed. Its tension charged the air like lightning. My heart began to pound as fast as it could to power the quivering muscles in my arms and legs. I noticed its trajectory off to my left, and there was space.

One second passed. I had at least two seconds to move out of the way before I was hit, or else I would be gnawed into a pulp.

I inhaled deeply. My lungs swelled with the forest's damp air. I held my breath and braced myself. I felt the ground's resistance against my boots, and my muscles tensed to the brink of agony. With all my might, I brought my body to its feet and launched myself off the ground to my immediate right.

Two seconds passed. Woosh — the creature's blur of black fur brushed against my side. The mass flew past me like an arrow. I looked down at the spot where Aria was lying. I had to make sure she was safe from this onslaught. Her body — it was — it was now obscured by fur, and long, shining black claws were viciously slashing away at her face.

Get the hell off of her! Get the hell off my sister!

I let out a guttural roar of desperation and grabbed my pocket knife with my sweaty palms. I held the knife with both hands, one behind the hilt and one around the handle. One hand to guide, the other to puncture. I lunged towards the creature to stab its hind. I pierced the blade through the air with all the speed I could muster, aiming dead center into the mass before me. If I used the pheon cap in my belt, I could poison my blade, but it was too risky. It had to die now.

It hit. I felt the knife dig deep into the back of the creature, its pelt like thick leather. I twisted deep into it, the resistance of the flesh twisting back against me. Each time the mass of flesh fought back, I twisted harder, and the bones in my wrist were pushed to the breaking point.

You let go of my sister, now!

I pushed even deeper, and the creature shook the trees as it let out a howl. The handle of the knife entered the open wound. I pulled the blade out of the enemy with all my remaining strength and lifted my arm high. My hands came down with all my body weight and stabbed again into the creature's back. I then finally collapsed onto the forest floor, along with my target.

The weight crushed my body, pinning my blade into the mud and cutting my arm. My bruised-up muscles flailed helplessly while I tried to escape its weight. The creature's screams and hissing grew quieter, its movement more subtle. It was only after a few moments I realized I was pinned under the weight of a dying body. A corpse. My purple cloak was stained red. We had just about — barely — won.

Aria pulled me out by my legs from under the pile of dying fur. I was freed from the corpse. Aria collapsed backward, letting go of my legs and splashing into a mix of ripped-up fur and spots of blood. She was lying on her back, her clothes were torn up, and the side of her face was bleeding. "A-Aria!" I had to catch my breath. My lungs emptied of oxygen. "Are you okay?"

She looked up at the sky, her face bleak. "I — I don't have a snarky comment. That was horrifying." she blinked.

I looked back at the creature; the front of its neck was cut open, and a knife pierced both its front and back. It had a pool of blood surrounding it. It appeared like Aria was stabbing and slicing just as aggressively — no, more aggressively than even I was. That was just one of them, too. I had to be prepared.

I approached the creature's body and pulled out the two blades stuck deep into its fur. I crouched down and parted the black hair across its body; that strange purple moss was buried deep between the strands of black hair. The creature had scars and lacerations all over itself but purposefully rubbed its body over trees covered with moss when injured. Curious. I grabbed some purple moss from my leather bag and hesitantly pressed it into the cut across my arm. The pain began to soothe, and it felt cold to the touch. It wasn't a healing reagent. All regenerative reagents I knew of require powerful catalysts and activators. But it was likely a pain-soothing moss. I'll call it 'friendly moss.'

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"Here, Aria try this." I grabbed some purple moss and approached her. She looked amused for a moment, wondering if it was a strange food. Then amusement turned to concern as I brought it closer to the wound across her face.

"Ouch — Twel! I'm surprised you dealt with this so well, but I don't need —" Aria bit her lip. She paused briefly, and the soothing effects began, "T-Thanks, good job. I'll blame any side-effects on you, though."

"See! You're already making your signature comments again." I sat beside her and helped her up, "Where are you hurt?"

"I'm not hurt that badly," she pointed across her body. "I sliced its neck early." she played around with the floor's sediment while she explained. "I kept its neck at bay, which stopped me from being gnawled. I think that's what saved my life." Aria looked over, noticing I was holding both knives. She hastily took her knife back off me and put it into her pocket.

"Should we continue walking?" I looked at her with matched exhaustion.

"Twel. I'm sleepy. Please — I can't. I think we're safe enough now." Aria collapsed back onto the floor, letting out a yawn.

I looked around. We were thirsty but, more importantly, tired, and the sun was beginning to set. I don't know if our fight had attracted more creatures, but what could we do? Aria needed rest, and we could easily reach the river with renewed energy. Ideally, I would've created a warm fire, cooked the creature into a hearty stew, and then feasted before bed. But with a lack of energy, this wasn't a good plan. Besides, lighting a big fire in this part of the forest practically asked to be attacked.

I rubbed more friendly moss across Aria. I tried to help reduce her pain; it worked better than nothing, and as time moved, she began to smile more. Occasionally, I popped an amberberry out of my leather bag and fed it to her. She ate them without complaints and asked for one after another. We lost our first battle, but this was our first victory. Take that universe, our scores at 1 - 1.

A few hours passed, and we began to set up camp. I went back to the berry bush and found my precious book. I cleared the ground of shrubbery and made a clean platform to rest on. I positioned our sleeping location a few trees deep from the corpse. I found a dip in the terrain between two fallen trees. It was surprisingly concealed and made a good location for rest. Aria had used her remaining strength to gather more berries, which wasn't surprising. They were juicy enough to quench our thirst for now. After a hard day's work, the light faded too dim to do any productive work, and we lay side by side.

I took off my huge purple capelet and unbuttoned my sprawling cloak. I used it as a blanket over the top of us and wrapped it tight around us. We needed all the warmth we could get, so I cuddled tight into her. It was a bit embarrassing, but survival was survival, and we just sliced up a beast together using only pocket knives. We had other concerns.

"If someone attacks us while we're sleeping, it's your fault Aria, since you're so sleepy." I nuzzled into her, and my voice mumbled through her clothing.

"— Mmph. Then we'll just die again." Aria shrugged.

"You —! You have no, absolutely no idea what would happen if either of us die! Don't ever risk your life, you hear me?"

"Be quiet Twel. Let's not pull the attention of another beast if you don't want to die." Aria yawned.

Only crickets could be heard, the forest symphony silenced by the night.

"— Hey. What's our goal?" I asked.

"What? I don't know. Water and shelter, I guess." Aria replied.

"Sure, water. But what then? Do we find civilization again? Are we alone, and if not, what then? Just live our lives working in a forest community?"

Aria didn't reply. She must be falling asleep by now, and we were both exhausted. I played with the bound book in my hands more before flipping it over and placing it under my head as a makeshift pillow, "I want to figure out what's in this book. I want to find out what the hell this necklace is." I grasped my necklace, wiping droplets of dried blood off it. "I want to find out if we're just insane or if we just somehow survived hell itself. I want to know Aria. Don't you want to know?"

"What's the point if everyone's dead anyway."

I shook my head and grasped my necklace tighter, "Maybe everyone's alive."

"The world could be turning to chaos, Twel. Then what, just watch everyone die again?"

"I want to try at least," I looked up into the sky. Moonlight fell upon us, and stars were dappled across the night.

"No," Aria said. She turned back around, rubbing the friendly moss I gave her against her neck. "We will try. Together."

We slept into the night. It was a long day, our first long day.