It felt as if the air had frozen around us, and the guard's face was clearly not normal. He had a nasty shit-eating grin on his face that clearly indicated that he was up to no good.
“So this little missy finally decides to talk! If you can tell me why you need to get back so quickly, then maybe, JUST MAYBE, I’ll let you go! How does that sound?”
*silence*
“Looks like I’m gonna need to beat the shit out of you again. I thought I’d just let you off the hook, but you go and decide to go against ME!? Blame yourself for your own misfortune!” *laughs*
I stared at this man in front of me who was clearly beyond the grasps of reality and had been consumed by his desire to inflict pain on others. I looked somewhat worriedly at the girl who appeared to be slightly afraid, but also strangely calm. I did not think about her for too long, however, because there were still people I needed to take care of in my group. But I did have an odd feeling that I had heard her voice somewhere before, although I was not able to pinpoint exactly where I had heard it.
The human girl was taken away and the remaining five of us were left standing there. I decided to leave right away and although the others seemed worried for the girl, they went on their own ways without saying a word. Perhaps we all had too many other things to worry about other than the girl. Or perhaps we all had been desensitized to the gruesome reality of our state of being. No one was able to face the reality of our situation, and instead, we were convincing ourselves of a different reality that was not real. How low had we fallen to not even care about another person because they were of a different group.
This thought lingered with me for a little bit but eventually vanished as I replaced those thoughts with Nor, Rosa, and the many others I had grown to know. Perhaps this was my own way of unconsciously justifying my own deluded thoughts, but somewhere deep within my mind, I had already started to doubt my own inactions towards the guard’s acts.
I got back to my group and was greeted by many of them as I passed by. However, my thoughts had kept drifting towards that girl’s voice and it annoyed me that I could not remember where I had heard that voice. I absentmindedly walked past most of the greetings until I finally snapped out of it when I heard Rosa’s voice. I didn’t see Nor around her so I assumed that he was out training or already asleep. Rosa came up to me and gave me a big hug.
“Did everything go alright at the meeting?”
I contemplated on whether I should tell them about the events that had occurred today, and after thinking about it for a little while, I decided that I’d give her a simplified form of what had happened.
“We gathered together like usual, but the guards got angry at one of the younger girls and took her away to beat her. The other leaders and I couldn’t do anything so we decided to just go back to our groups.”
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Rosa looked infuriated for a few moments before she calmed back down. I did not know what had gotten her so worked up, but she was probably mad at the guards' actions. I found it admirable that the person I looked up to was able to worry about others even during the worst of times. After being taken care of by Rosa for several months, I thought of her as my parents. Although it had been awkward at first, I had learned and grown through their guidance. They now held a special place in my heart. Even Nor, who I am still awkward with even now, looked out for my safety and taught me basic physical movements during his personal training sessions. There were times when I could not copy the moves because he was a beastman and I was not, however, he continued to teach me regardless.
“The moves are foundations of what we beastmen call Physical Arts. Ya won’t be able to master them, but they should provide ya some power if ya work hard enough kid.”
Sometimes, we would have a duel to see if I had made any progress, and I had been told by Nor that I had been making clear, steady strides towards learning the fundamentals. Nor couldn’t control his strength and would often knock me out as he had done in our first duel. Each of those times, I would wake up to see Rosa scolding Nor as if he were a child. Nor would then listen to her lecture and proceed to apologize to me without fail. As a result of our countless duels, I had concluded that Nor was the strongest inside these mines, and I had been taught by that man himself.
I always tried my best to diligently listen to him, but there were times when I got extremely annoyed and bored because it took forever to learn certain Physical Arts. I have been complaining about how hard it is, but each time I try to do so, Nor gives me a whole lecture about how I need to learn to protect myself and I’ve learned to just keep my mouth shut. In the few months he has taught me, I’ve learned a few basic moves and I felt like I would be able to take on some guards when the time came. Nor had told me not to get overconfident, but I felt like, at the very least, I would be able to fight when it was to come down to it.
I walked towards the area we slept in with Rosa and saw that Nor was not there.
“He’s probably training at the usual place. You can go to him if you want to train more, but try not to get hurt again.”
“Okay!”
I hurried off towards the inner mines where he usually trained. Although it was dangerous, it was also the place furthest from the guards and we would have the least likely chance of being caught that deep inside the cave system. As I went deeper, I heard Nor punching against an invisible enemy and it was clear that he had been at this for a while. As I approached, he noticed me and decided to take a break.
“Today, Imma teach ya about the basic footwork techniques”
It seems that for today, I would learn how to move on my feet. I thought this was silly since I could already run well enough and didn’t know how learning how to move my feet would help me fight against someone else. I said this out loud to Nor’s face and to my surprise, he had decided to show me the difference in a duel. As we stood apart from each other at about 20 Cubits, Nor counted down and the match began. I suddenly remembered the first duel we had together and how fast Nor had been on his feet. Before I could shout at Nor that I had remembered the importance of footwork, he disappeared from view and I felt a tap on my neck. I turned to see Nor’s face which was an expression of pure panic.
*internally* “Heh, he used too much force again, he’s gonna get another scolding from Rosa… That girl’s voice… it was the same voice as the one that cried for help.”
And then… I blacked out.