It rushed towards her, its gaping mouth filled with countless sharp teeth.

----------------------------------------

“Ahhhhh, ahhhhh, ahhhh.” Liz took a moment to calm herself down, she could feel her heart trying to burst out of her chest.

She rapidly inspected her surroundings, still in high alert because of the nightmare. She was in the inn room, next to Iso and Dere, who seemed to have woken up because of her.

“Lise, are you alright, did you have a bad dream?” Iso asked, trying to comfort her.

“…maerd a tsuj saw tI …seY”

“Uh?” He asked, confused.

“Sorry… It was just… A dream…” She said.

The three stayed silent for some time, letting Liz relax as much as she could then, Iso suggested they leave for their breakfast. They were planning on leaving the city that night after all.

Their breakfast consisted of gruel with some fruit scrambled in, but Liz ate it eagerly, and even asked for an extra ration.

Just when they left for the street, Liz's head started hurting quite a lot, and after some time, she realised that she instinctively activated her mana sense just after waking up. But of course, deactivating it was immediately followed by a feeling of nakedness.

She nervously followed Iso and Dere through the city, she could feel everyone’s gaze drifting across her back, inspecting every strand of her hair.

Their first stop was a big store wich’s products were directed towards adventurers and mercenaries, from cheap but sturdy clothes, to items and gear that could help anyone who travelled through the desert.

“What do you think Lise? Do you like it?” Dere asked as Liz steeped from behind some wooden panels, wearing a dark brown leather jacket and short dark pants.

Liz looked at her reflection for some time, thinking about what would happen to her clothes if she was forced to transform. Since the only thing that grows are my limbs and height, but my hips and shoulders dont change, they shouldn't break… but.

There was something more concerning to her than the safety of her clothes, her appearance. She had grown used to her “weak girl” persona, and most of her tactics involved making sure that everyone underestimated her, and changing her clothes could be detrimental.

Still, having leather clothes would be beneficial to her defences, not to

“I like them…” She finally said, still somewhat unsure.

The moment Dere heard her answer, she rushed towards the shelves and bought the same jacket for her, joking about how they looked like sisters. Iso paid four silver coins for the clothes, which meant that they had already spent half of their money.

This however, proved to be a quite convenient excuse to avoid buying shoes for herself. They would just break when I transform after all…

Even if Liz tried to forget about her nightmare, she couldn’t help but feel overved, like someone’s eyes were analysing every thread of her hair. I hope we leave this place soon, I might go crazy if I can’t activate my mana sense…

“Hey, stop looking at her like that!” Dere screamed at the shopkeeper.

“Huh?” That moment, Liz realised that she wasn’t going crazy.

“Oh sorry, sorry. It’s the first time I’ve seen someone with silver hair, I was kind of curious.” The shopkeeper explained.

Liz rushed towards him. “You are… saying that everyone… is staring… because my hair!?!?”

“I’m not sure if everyone, but most people would be surprised to say the least” He replied. “Even if people with white or silver hair are mentioned in stories, I don’t think anyone in the city has seen one.”

“Then…”

----------------------------------------

Almost an hour later, Dere and Iso exit the store, followed by a little girl with hazel hair and almond eyes, who wore a leather jacket and black pants.

“Are you sure about this, Lise?” Iso asked the girl.

“I am.”Liz answered, as she looked into the straw bag filled with hair dye and some kind of coloured contact lenses she was carrying.

“But, but… you were so cute…!” Dere said, almost crying.

“Stand out… don’t like…” She replied.

“If she doesn’t want to stand out, we should respect it.” Iso said. “Besides, maybe you should take her example Dere, your pink hair also stands out…”

“But… mister Garf said he liked my hair. That it reminded him of my mom…”

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Iso bit his lower lip as he sorted his thoughts. He had been growing more and more uncomfortable with her hair for some months now, but he didn’t want to see her sad. Mister Garf said nothing about it though, so I guess it's fine…

After this, the group continued visiting different shops, and spent most of their budget on new gear and of course, some dinner.

“We should head towards the caravan’s meating spot.” Iso suggested. “We should be able to buy 3 fighter seats for around a copper each.”

“Hmmm…” Dere mumbled. “But where should we go to, now that we have been exiled from the village we could take a different route.”

“We could head east, I heard there are a lot of weak monsters in the plains, so gathering materials and levelling could be easy.”

“But easy monsters are boring, we could go south and try to level in the caves.”

The discussion continued while they kept walking towards the caravans, and Liz started understanding better their situation. They’d been doing the same route for at least a decade, and apparently their guardian, mister Garf, died only a year ago…

“Why not… leave the continent…” Liz asked.

“Now that she mentions it…”

“We’ve been following the same route for so long, we forgot we could just leave…”

Dere and Iso said, realising that they now had much more possibilities than before.

“But if we leave, we should go to the east…” Dere pointed out.

Why do they hate the idea of going north that much? Liz thought, remembering how that direction wasn’t ever mentioned during the conversation.

“But the security of the border city will be far greater than the one in every other city or village we’ve been to, even at the same level as the capital.” Iso said.

“It’ll be fine, it’ll be fine. Besides, once we cross the bridge, we should be out of the empire’s grasp.”

“If you say so…” Iso finally gave in, still dub full.

With their destination settled they finally joined a caravan that was heading east. They were still expected to fight, but at least they had some new companions to help them while they crossed the desert.

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Pain.

Anger.

Heat.

Pain.

Regret.

Pain.

Hate.

All those emotions and sensations flooded Cole’s mind as he stared at the woman in front of him. He could feel the scorching heat coming from the fire from the buildings.

His eyes were flooded with a mixture of tears and the blood that flowed from the cut in his forehead. Next to him, Gale’s body was slowly sinking in the sand, tainting it red.

“I’ll only ask this once, so don’t make me repeat myself.” The woman said. “Where is that bastard?”

“What makes you think? Ugh. That I’ll answer.” Cole replied, looking at her with nothing but anger.

“Of course, they are always like this…” She said uninterested. “Let me tell you how this works…”

She slowly walked towards Gale’s body, grabbing a knife that pierced his chest.

“We will torture you for about a day… And if you still don´t want to answer my question, then we will have nothing to do but to head towards the capital.” She explained. “On the journey of… One month? We will torture you and your friends relentlessly.”

A cold shiver ran through his spined as she got closer to him.

“With the pasing days, you’ll start seeing less and less of your friends being tortured… You should be smart enough to understand what happened to them.” She mocked him. “Once we reach the capital, we will imprison the only traitor, and give you, your last night of torture.”

“If your willpower and endurance were strong enough to prevent you from breaking in that month, then we’d have nothing to do but to give up and kill you.” She finally said, and Cole felt a bit of hope returning to his heart. “But that would only mean that I had to go ask the nigromancer for some help, and turn your body into… A ghoul? Tch, you level 50s aren’t even good materials.”

She could see his eyes cover in pure despair as he understood her words, as he realised that his fate, and that of all the village, was sealed the moment that bastard was seen here.

“So tell me, will you tell us where that bastard went, or will you sacrifice everyone in the village just to give them 1 month of time.” She asked him as she pointed to all the villagers that were subjugated in the last hour.

Cole moved his head to the side and looked at the faces of his friends, of the women that tried to calm their crying children, who couldn’t help but mourn the death of their family, of their friends…

“Pl…” Cole coughed blood when he tried to speak. “Please…”

He is going to beg for his life, how boring… The woman thought.

“Please kill the children first… And I’ll tell you what I know.” He pleaded in tears.

“Ha.” The woman's crimson eyes opened as she heard his words. You are an interesting one!

She smiled for the first time in the night, who would have thought that someone like this lived in this village.

She slowly bended down till her face was almost at the same height as his and gently moved her hand through his hair, before grabbing it and forcing him to look her in the eyes. “Don’t test your luck mortal. I’ll free you from your suffering once you answer me.”

Cole gritted his teeth, impotent.

“I am not an archangel known for her patience!”

“They… They are heading towards the Oasis…” He finally confesed.

Just as she was about to “free” him, a familiar feeling invaded her.

“Is that all?”

“A little girl… has joined them.” Cole’s face was covered in tears, he felt her fingers trying to pierce his skull.

“Why?” Her interrogation continued, as that feeling grew stronger.

“They found her in the forest… She uses a strange magic and can barely speak.” The woman's body started to glow red as her mana began flowing down her arm, slowly infecting his head.

“What does she look like?” She asked, planning to use her to find the bastard.

“She is just a girl, she can’t be more than 12…”

“What else?” She knew she was close to finding “the truth”. Her Superior Interrogation was turning her crazy. Just what kind of truth are you hiding…?

“Her eyes are of different colours, one blue and one purple…” Blood started leaking from his skull. “And her hair is white…”

Her eyes widened as she heard those words, in the few seconds it took her to process “the truth” her hand got covered in blood.

“Cole!” One of the prisoners screamed, after seeing his body fall to the ground.

“Filip! Contact the Oasis’ cathedral, make sure they don't let that little girl flee the city” The woman commanded one of her soldiers.

“What about the bastard?” The soldier asked.

“Irrelevant.” The mana charged word sent chills down the spine of every soldier, and most villagers fainted after hearing it.

“Kill all the villagers here, burn everything that rises from the sand…” She ordered, as she extended her black wings. “I’ll fly to the capital and inform Him about this, then, I’ll meet you in the Oasis.”

Before any soldier had his chance to reply, she was already high in the sky.

“She said that we had to kill the villagers…” A soldier said.

“But she said nothing about having our fun first…” Another replied.

“Flame circle.”

The two soldiers watched as all the villagers were instantly burned to ashes.

“What do you think you are doing Filip!!!” One of the soldiers screamed at him.

“I’m just following master's orders as efficiently as possible.” He replied as he took a glass ball from the inner pocket of his jacket. “Maybe I should have waited ten more seconds…?”

“Tch… whatever, they were all ugly anyways…”

That night, the village next to the dark forest became nothing but a memory.