Materia

In the Ursus Tribes Camp

The orange evening sky set upon the damaged camp and all its laid-out bodies, and the once pink and purple leaves turned into grey ash. Leif and Eira now knocked unconscious too. To think the Jutonn Fang was essentially a one-hit knockout attack on people even slightly weaker than Bo is a truly terrifying thought.

Standing amongst the unconscious and laid-out crowd was only Joar, putting his hand over the pierced hole on his blood-leaking stomach. His gloating demeanor filled the air as he limped toward Bo, his fingers curling around Bo's collar as he picked him from the floor and held him up by the tip of his white shirt, a rush of triumph coursing through Joars veins, looking into the dreaded and heavy eyes of Bo. Joar had wide eyes, his brows arched, and veins popping from his head, furious yet relishing the moment of victory.

He sneered, "You should have taken the easy way out kid, you're an idiot, a real fucking idiot. Some brats like yall are better off just handing the slave over. You have any idea who you're messing with?! You know what happens to people when they test the Jutonn Tribe kid?!”

Bo's expression remained soulless, with low eyes and head pointed to the grass. His eyes full of despair gazed at the malice in Joar's, and his voice trembled only able to mutter his words softly,

"Whatever it is… Just leave my people out of this." He pleaded.

Joars fist dug into Bo’s face, questioning him, “Your people, you mean the people that you just sacrificed for a slave? These people?” Joar pointed at both Leif and Eira’s knocked-out cold bodies, “They must be a bunch of fools, to follow a man who chooses a mere slave over his companions.”

His tone became more aggressive. "I mean seriously did you actually believe you could win this fight?”

Joar calmed his temper, he took a deep breath before he spoke.

"I should kill you, but this fight has already been decided, and I came here for only one purpose.” With a disdainful flick of his wrist, Joar released his grip on Bo, letting him slump back to the grass.

Bo's attention shifted away from Joar, and his desperate gaze turned to his fallen comrades, faintly reaching his arms out to Leif and Eira.

His voice quivered, "Leif, Eira... Can you hear me? Say something, please!"

He scanned the area with his eyes looking for where Kirby could have gone. His heart sank and he realized, "I’ve failed. I'm no good…" He admitted to himself, his voice tinged with despair.

His eyes became moist, water evident yet no river flowed. His body struggled to swallow down a still-beating heart.

He muscled with every fiber in his bones to pull Materia from his utility belt around his waist. His gaze met his mantle, his voice tinged with anguish.

"I don’t know what to do, I need your help do something, you bastard! For once do something!" He yelled at Materia.

Limping his way back to the hut, Joar grabbed and picked up Feng with little to no reluctance. Regretfully Feng had already realized that he had been caught.

“Just please leave him and his friends alone.” Feng faintly whispered as his body hung by Joar’s shoulder. His heart treaded calmly, and his eyes were shallow.

“That’s not for a slave to decide. You realize you will be punished for what you’ve done today right? So I suggest you just keep your mouth closed unless you want to end up like them.” Joar replied, his tone stern.

His herd of warriors one by one slowly regained their consciousness after Eira's Type C: Drain wore off, all of them rising back to their two feet once again.

“She got us good.” One of the warriors said, unplucking Eira’s knife from his thigh.

“You're all lucky I got the job done while you were asleep. You idiots get yourselves together, we're heading back.” Joar insisted.

As Joar and his forces proceeded, a keen-eyed warrior looked back at Bo lying on the floor staring into Materia with dreaded eyes, and reported to Joar, "What about that kid? You think we should finish him off ?"

Joar regarded Bo with a disdainful expression, his response swift and cold, "Go ahead. He was getting on my nerves anyway." He replied looking off ahead of him.

One of the warriors began marching toward Bo while drawing their sword, each step approaching Bo’s demise.

The evening blaze had fallen into the bleak skies of the night. A solitary figure watched the camp from the shadows of the nearby woods, he was hardly visible surrounded by the giant trees of the forest. The man's presence was obscured, a mysterious silhouette against the trees, and standing on his shoulder appeared to be the silhouette of a lemur.

The man's voice carried softly on the wind, a whisper he let out "Heeee he he, looks like I might have to step in."

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

The warrior’s steps were deliberate, and calculated as he closed in on Bo. He taunted, his voice dripping with malice, "You're not even going to try to defend yourself?"

However, Bo’s eyes were fixated on Materia, still pleading for it to work. His response to the approaching warrior. The warrior stood just centimeters away from Bo, raising his silver sword high, feeling the cool breeze of the night sky.

Yet, just as his blade descended, a piece of the ground next to Bo erupted, a spike of rock jolting upward and through the heart of the opposing warrior killing him instantly.

As if he were the sun a, radiant golden aura began emerging around Bo’s body, the same glow that had appeared when Bjorn passed Materia onto him. However, the glow was spiked not just hovering over his skin, but spiking as if it were a constantly shifting current.

“What do we have here?” The man hidden in the shadows questioned.

Bo painstakingly stood to his feet again, firmly gripping Materia off the grass. His eyes set ablaze with the golden aura covering it. He turned his gaze toward Joar and his retreating forces still unaware of the dead warrior Bo left behind, a fierce glint in Bo’s eyes lit as he noticed Feng laying on the shoulder of Joar.

“He heeeeee, this'll be fun, looks like someone's Mantle has activated!” Said the man in the woods.

{Mantle: Materia}

The ground underneath Joar and his herd began shaking, causing them to halt.

“An earthquake?” Joar questioned.

He immediately turned his head looking for the cause. All he and his herd of warriors could see was a glimpse of Bo shrouded in his blinding golden aura.

“He’s still alive.” a glimpse of hope sparked in Feng's eyes.

Joar's eyes were squinted, frowning sternly, “ He should be dead by now, and the hell is this glow around him?” He said.

His gaze of confusion turned into an explosive outburst once he noticed the warrior Bo had already impaled earlier.

His demand was clear, “KILL HIM NOW!”

The herd all simultaneously drew their blades charging Bo at once.

However, sharp stones began piercing the warrior's hearts and bones of the warriors from the ground and descending on them from above. Branches from the forest trees elongated and stretched wide, impaling the warriors. Unnatural heavy winds blew from east and west. All forms of matter worked at once against the Jutonn Warriors and waving his hammer from left to right, the conductor of it all Bo, standing in the middle of the madness.

The vast majority of Joar’s men left as impaled corpses, speared heads, and mushed rubble.

“What’s even going on?! How is this kid even doing this? Just who the hell are you!” Joar thought.

His heart pumped out his chest further with each second. Still keeping one hand on his blood-stained stomach, he gripped Feng tighter with the other. He concluded,

“If I can just escape before it’s too late, then maybe…”

Suddenly the ground underneath Joar and whatever was left of the decimated herd rose levels above everything else.

He lost his balance as the ground kept rising, he felt the cold blood of his comrades as he tried to pick himself up but it was no good. He looked at Bo standing before him. Bo was oozed in his gold glow as if he were a beacon in the dark sky, dipped in the blood of the herd he had just pulverized.

He limped toward Joar and stopped just a few meters away.

Joar’s eyes were wide, his body drenched in sweat, and he could barely even remember to breathe with the sight of this judgment staring down at him.

He hopelessly drew his sword, waving it side to side aimlessly. But in a matter of a second, his sword vanished into smoke. Bo had changed its state of matter into gas.

Stuck to the grass with no answers left Joar was frozen in disbelief only waiting for what Bo would do next.

Bo's sharp eyes poured into Joar's soul, an unspoken promise of retribution.

He demanded, “Give him to me and I won’t hurt you.”

Without second-guessing, Joar left his grip on Feng tossing him toward Bo. Even Feng was terrified of what Bo had become; however, he was the closest to the thought of safety. He stood behind Bo quickly.

Bo raised Materia high summoning his last reserves of power. The surrounding environment of the forest waters, rocks, and giant trees began formulating around Materia, creating a colossal arm comprised of a massive portion of the Forest. The enormous appendage swayed menacingly, casting a shadow that eclipsed the entire Ursus Camp.

Terror overcame Joar’s men, and many fell unconscious, leaving Joar to face the cataclysmic fist alone.

The magnitude of his peril finally registered as he gazed upward, witnessing the culmination of Bo's newfound power. All of his bravado crumbled in the face of overwhelming force.

Bo's voice was a low, resolute rumble as he addressed Joar,

"Run."

With a single, earth-shaking punch, the colossal arm struck Joar, propelling him through the air. Joar's body twisted and contorted as he sailed across the landscape, his screams fading into the distance. The impact shattered trees, razed the terrain, and obliterated any remnants of Joar's forces.

When silence returned to the Ursus Camp, Bo sank to the ground falling unconscious, drained by the exertion of his newfound power. The colossal arm dissipated, and all its earthly elements fell. His golden glow started fading away.

The dirt underneath him and Feng started crumbling. Holding Bo tightly, Feng slid down the crumbling dirt until he fumbled down the Ursus campgrounds, losing his grip on Bo.

While lying on the camp floor, Feng looked at his hands he couldn’t stop shaking.

“We're still alive somehow.” He thought. Though the battle damaged everyone in the camp, he could only let out a big sigh of relief.

“At least it’s over. Where’s Bo?” He thought.

He turned his head, and behind him was Bo, laid out on the ground, and the shadowed man with his lemur behind Bo.

The man's face appeared more visible. He stood a little over six feet and looked mature. He was redheaded with short messy hair and scruffy stubble. His eyes were lime, his eye bags heavy, and his skin appeared rugged with wrinkles. Though his facial features suggested a struggling man, his fancy dark green and golden cape, smooth silver clothes from top to bottom, and golden crown suggested otherwise.

Feng was left speechless unable to utter a word and fell unconscious.

The man bent down to Bo and smiled uncontrollably. His voice was a whisper, laden with both praise and admonishment,

"He heee, That was quite the show you put on. You really are Bjorn's brother huh? But you still have so much to learn.” He said. “So much potential, but you still have no clue what it takes to be a king.”

With those words, the lemur on his back leaped to the camp's floor and released a smoke bomb,

Finally, the man stated,

"Welp, let’s get the kid out of this mess. He hee, This is gonna be fun.”