Her heart pounded in her chest, adrenaline fueling her desperate flight.
The woods were dark. Hostile. Working with that thing to slow her down. Trap her. Kill her.
Branches lashed out to claw at her hair and her clothes. Roots rose from the earth to gab at her feet and trip her. An angry roar echoed through the darkness, punctuated by the crashing of something large charging through the forest.
She was being hunted.
Her weapon was gone, dropped as she fled the camp in her mad dash to escape. She was alone. Her magic was gone, used up in a desperate attempt to keep avoid the sharp claw of the thing that hunted her. It had bought her time, but not enough.
The monster was closing in. She could hear its heavy breathing as it drew closer, the smell its rancid breath filling the air with the scent of death. All she could do was run, but she knew it wouldn't be enough. She was too slow. Too clumsy. Too weak.
A scream tore from her lips as she tripped and sprawled on the forest floor. Desperately she scrambled on her hands and knees, crawling to put any more distance between her and the monster that she could.
A scaly claw grabbed her around the ankle and she desperately lunged against a tree, her nails sinking into the rough bark as she tried to pull herself free.
The monster's grip on her ankle was too strong. It ripped her away from the tree, her nails ripping out, left behind in the bark as it dragged her into its maw and crunched down.
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Jun winced as she flexed her hand again. The knuckles were still sore from where she flailed against the tree as she woke from her nightmare in the post-dawn forest. It had made climbing down from the tree difficult and painful, but not impossible.
The effort worked up an appetite, but she was horrified and disappointed to find that the remains of last night's dinner were gone. When Shiori woke, she didn't say anything about the missing meat and simply conjured some of her soup and lapped it up. A second bowl had appeared in front of Jun and she had to rush to catch it with her good hand, grimacing as she gulped down the soup, its broth like engine grease with chunks of swamp gunk. At this point she was starting to wonder if Shiori had a spell called [Conjure Soup of Despair] or something. It was better than starving she supposed, but only just.
After choking down the soup and washing it down with some fresh stream water, Jun had shouldered her pack, cradling her not-spear in her good hand, and watched as Shiori simply made the campfire vanish before jumping up to perch on her shoulder and point the way.
As she walked that day she could only half pay attention as Shiori shared what she knew of human culture in Merinthia. The other half of her poorly rested mind was occupied with memories of the nightmare. It had felt unnatural, more so than any other dream she could remember. The feeling of being hunted felt so visceral and real that even the bright light of day and a peaceful walk through the woods did nothing to distract her from the feeling that something was hunting her.
In the midafternoon they reached a crystal clear lake where Shiori declared they would be stopping for the night. The lake was large, massive enough that Jun had mistaken it for the ocean as the other side of the shore was obscured over the horizon. Small windblown waves broke upon the white sand beach of the shoreline, and Jun could see a line of debris marking the high water mark. The lake's water was crisp, cool, and fresh, without a hint of salt. From the shore, she could make out a colorful coral reef that wouldn't have looked out of place in photos of a tropical paradise on Earth, but here it was in the middle of what Shiori assured her was a landlocked lake in the middle of the forest. Its existence didn't make any sense to Jun's limited understanding of natural sciences.
As Jun walked along the shoreline, Shiori was unusually silent and spent some time simply staring out into the center of the lake. Jun tried to see what her Master was looking at, but all she could make out was a black speck on the horizon. After an hour of walking along the beach, Shiori directed Jun up into the forest for a few minutes then up to a weather worn stone path, the first real sign of civilization that Jun saw since being reborn.
Shiori jumped down her shoulder then and led the way upon the time worn stone path. The road was wide enough for a modern vehicle from Earth to travel down with space to spare and sloped upwards, the stones eerily straight and undisturbed as not even stray leaves remaining to cover the road. Grass sprouted between the narrow gaps in the large paving stones, the only evidence that nature fought to reclaim the road.
Jun followed Shiori down the road in silence for a few minutes, the shadows of the trees beginning to lengthen across the road as dusk approached. The pair reached the end of the path as the sky above was painted the pinks, oranges, and purples of sunset.
A stone monument that reminded Jun of an obelisk with a hole bored through the center dominated the clearing at the end of the path, a scenic view of the lake and surrounding forest beyond. The crashing waves of the lake beat against the cliffside a hundred feet below. Through the hole in the monument, Jun could see the black speck that Shiori had stared at the entire afternoon magnified, revealing a small island covered in trees with a low rocky shoreline around it.
Shiori stopped and sat, staring at the monument as the sun set.
Jun kneeled down next to her Master, something in her telling her asking her to respect the peace of this place. Her knees began to ache as her stomach signaled its hunger, but still she sat with the silent black cat, simply watching the stone monument. The sky soon turned dark and the first twinkling stars of Merinthia's night sky came out to shine before Shiori broke the silence of the moment. "Thank you, apprentice." Shiori's voice was a whisper, a hint of sadness hidden in its tone.
Shiori nodded once to the monument, then turned around to look over her shoulder down the now dark path, her tail flicking. A ball of night light manifested itself, illuminating the area as if a star had descended from the sky above. Shiori's eyes narrowed as she stared down the path at something hidden in the shifting darkness.
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A low growl echoed from down the path alongside the scraping of claws against stone, and soon a hulking thing revealed itself in the bright light. Its scaley hide was blood red and would have appeared black in the dark. A long, jagged scar ran down the length of its left forelimb, devoid of scales. Its claws scraped the stone of the path as it moved forward, dragging each of its sharp talons against the stone with every step. A long reptilian head reminiscent of a crocodile sat upon its well-muscled shoulders, sharp teeth bared in a predatory smile as it growled, its slitted eyes locked upon Jun.
A purple barrier snapped into being around the clearing, separating Shiori, Jun, and the hulking monster from the rest of the forest. A strange pressure shot out from the monster and pressed down upon them. Jun could feel alien emotions clawing at her psyche as she trembled. It demanded vengeance. It spoke of violence. It demanded her death.
Jun struggled to breath, the aura pressing down on her suffocating her, making her body hard to move. She strained to move her hand to reach for the weapon tied to her pack on the ground as she struggled to move her mana into [Piercing Missile], the pressure making it near impossible for her to focus. The world seemed to move in slow motion as the monster's muscles bunched up and it lunged forward, claws extended and pointed for her throat. Jun snapped her hand shut as she felt the cool metal of her weapon's shaft and tugged it loose, placing it between herself and the charging monster!
Everything froze. The monster hovered in mid lunge, its maw frozen in an fanged snarl. Jun was frozen in a half crouch, her weapon barely extended in front of her, her mana still and unmoving. Shiori casually padded forward between Jun and the monster!
The monster blinked and worked its jaw, its head suddenly free. Jun could see its muscles bulge as it struggled to move, but only its head was free. It angrily snarled and hissed at Shiori, and she replied in the same, a growling, hissing language of monsters. The forest beyond the barrier went silent as an apex predator announced its presence to the world and demanded submission in the face of its overwhelming might. The monster's face softened and grew meek, its head lifting to bare its throat and its tone submissive as it replied to Shiori.
Shiori hissed and snarled again and the monster dropped to all fours, looking small as all its desire to fight vanished. Hissing one last time, the monster turned and fled back down the stone path, its tail tucked between its legs.
Jun wheezed and struggled to catch her breath as the force holding her in place faded and the purple barrier vanished.
"Wh-What was that...?" Jun wheezed her question at Shiori.
The cat regarded her for a moment, her tail flicking back and forth as she considered her apprentice. "The foolishness of youth." Shiori finally replied after a long moment. "We will discuss more in the morning." Shiori's campfire snapped into being at the edge of the path, a piece of meat appearing right after and spearing itself to the spit to begin roasting. Jun's sleeping fur floated from her pack and laid itself out. "For now, rest, and recover."
Too tired, confused, and stressed to argue, Jun numbly obeyed, moving over to sit on her fur. A wooden bowl piled with herb rubbed meat soon floated over to sit on the ground in front of her. She ate carefully with her left hand, her eyes flicking back and forth between the bowl in front of her, Shiori sitting across the fire from her, and the dark path the monster had fled down.
Finishing her food, she laid down on the fur, the exhaustion and stress of the evening quickly dragging her to sleep, her right hand still tightly wrapped around her weapon.
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Draxar fled into the night, fear gripping his soul. He made a mistake. Chose the wrong prey. He had dared to snarl at her, insult her, threaten to rip off her head. She responded with her own aura, and he had nearly drowned in it!
His chest heaved as he remembered the soul crushing pressure of Her attention on him. He was less than nothing before Her. Less than a speck of dust. He felt the binding chains around his soul, reminding him of his oath to Her. The exchange was fresh in his mind, and he knew he would not forget it.
The compulsion placed upon him urged him forward into the night. He had a year to complete Her assigned task. A year to prove himself worthy to Her or die.
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Morning came quietly as Jun woke to the soft light of dawn. Her hand was stiff and sore from where she gripped the handle of her weapon the entire night. Slowly releasing the weapon, she began to stretch her hand, working her fingers into some semblance of usefulness as she looked around the camp in the golden light of dawn.
The campfire still burned merrily and a pot had taken the place of the roasted meat from the night before to quietly simmer above the open flames. Of the night's confrontation there was no evidence. No scratches in the stone at the end of the path, not a single blade of grass out of place.
The view from the cliffside was spectacular, the rising sun peaking out from the horizon across the lake, its light shining upon the morning dew dotting the grass like precious diamonds. Shiori sat before the strange stone monument again, sitting and staring quietly at it. Her Master's voice was quiet and reverent as she spoke, her voice whispering through the wind to reach Jun's ears. "Sun Wind's Fall is a peaceful place. No violence should occur here, and yet I didn't stop what happened last night from occurring. Merinthia is a beautiful and brutal world, where strength is all that matters in the end. I could have prevented that monster from hunting you from the start, but I needed you to see the world for what it is kitten."
"I spoke to the kobold. He sought your death for his own satisfaction and greed for power and prestige. I bound him and challenged him on your behalf to a duel in a year's time, to give you an obstacle to overcome, to help you grow and learn enough to face the world as it is, not as we might wish it to be. I am sorry to force this upon you, kitten."
A mix of memories and emotions bubbled up inside her at her Master's words. Memories of her first encounter with the monster in the cave, of the boar and other hunting trips that had her come so close to injury. The demonstration of Shiori's powers, shaded in a new light after the night before. Fear. Hurt. Anger. Betrayal.
Memories of Shiori finding her in the forest, taking her in, and caring for her when sick and injured. Shiori protecting her from the parasite and her guidance, often mocking or showing off, but filled with patience as she learned magic from the mysterious cat. Acceptance. Love. Trust.
Jun kneeled next to the cat and idly stroked her fur, eliciting a soft purr from her Master. Memories of her last life, ended in tragedy, horror, and pain, floated through her mind as she acknowledge them, then set them aside. "Life can be ugly and full of pain, with obstacles and challenges. Everything you did helped me to learn. Thank you, Master Shiori." Jun smiled at the cat, so small and yet so incredibly powerful, as she continued to pet her.
"The next year will be hard. You will need to train your body and your magic, and learn to fight beyond simply casting spells. But that is a problem for tomorrow, today, we rest." Shiori stepped into Jun's lap and laid her head down on her paws, purring softly as Jun sat back, watching the sun rise over the lake.
They sat like that for some time as the sun rose, until both of their rumbling stomachs broke the silence. Laughing, Shiori floated two bowls of her soup over to them, one laying down in the grass in front of the cat, the other in front of the young woman, waiting to be accepted.
Jun stared at the steaming bowl of soup, the scent of the bitter herbs causing her tongue to recoil in fear. Giggling, she reached up and accepted the bowl in her hands and gladly drained it.