Like a gift from Corin herself, blades of grass began to fall like rain around where the ancient being had shown itself. The brief appearance of the divine wyrm had caused the Dagorachi horde to run with their tails between their legs as the humans shrouding their faces behind painted masks fell on their knees, in reverence for their uncaring but fair God.

In the tall grass nearby where the wyrm had emerged, another ancient being rolled onto her back before spreading her arms, causing her elven companion to stare at her with a mild frown.

"Why are you smiling like an idiot?" Iris whispered as her warm hands held Kia's head searching for any head trauma the girl might have experienced during the fighting.

The girl remained silent as her small chest rise and fell in a mesmerising pattern drawing the attention of the elf's remaining eye. In many ways, the panting undead appeared much more alive than many of the humans who crossed paths with the former slave.

Before Iris knew it, she found the living undead pressed against her body with Kia's pale slender arm reaching toward her mangled face. As the comfortable feeling permeated from the petite girl's palm onto her face, Iris focused on listing to the environment around them.

"Why are you so excited?" Iris asked again.

"I'm not excited," Kia grumbled. "...Just don't mind me."

Iris smirked to herself as she laid her head on the ground. It was hard for her not to mind the mage. She could hear things from quite a way away, never mind the hammering-like sound within the petite breast pressed tightly against her.

After a brief moment, Iris felt that her body had fully regenerated. She thanked the adorable healer, playing with her sensitive ears with a quick peck before she stood up and walked toward the human settlement with the necromancer only a step behind.

Dozens of people were running franticly pulling down the cloth tents as fire set during the battle consumed a few of them. Hanging above the closest tent which was on fire a ghostly fish swam in circles creating a downpour of water, extinguishing the inferno.

"What magic is that?" Kia asked as she stared at the fish which swam through the air toward another fire.

"I would guess that's spirit magic," Iris answered. "I thought you could cast the same magic shamans use."

"I can conjure a summon but I can't see any summon or master bonds coming from the fish but I can see the fish feeding off someone's mana."

The elf shrugged not understanding the undead mage's confusion. A shaman and a summoner were the same things. Both of the classes utilised spirits or other monsters to fight for them, they both primarily stayed behind the front line attacking their opponents from a distance while their summons did most of the work. The one major distinction she saw between the two classes was that summoners were more dependent on their summons while shamans she heard were more capable of fighting without them. Turning around, Iris saw Ruu running east with a large group of armed humans behind him. She glanced at where the humans were running to and saw the group of humans gathered in a circle blocking the small path between the tents.

A low buzz hung above that group integrated with an occasional pained gasp. Iris tried to see what was the fuss as the crowd grew ever larger.

"Ahem." An unknown female voice coming from behind caused the elf to quickly turn around.

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"Kasheng?" Iris saw the older human dressed in a long blue silk dress with wide red fabric wrapped around her hips impatiently waiting for her to move. The woman's voice lacked the edge she usually addressed the elf with, making her voice sound like a different person.

Iris noticed blue light coming from underneath Kashengs clothes giving her an otherwordly look while the shaman stared at the blood-covered elf's face.

Quickly stepping out of the way Iris watched as the mass of people parted a path for the venerable shaman to walk through. Strange silence suddenly fell onto the humans, beside herself the elf found Kia crouching trying to see what was the cause of the silence through the forest of legs.

Sobs began to overpower the sound of the wind as a black mask with gold around its edges and a single red tear running down its cheek was held high above the human's heads.

"Our Tserei is dead!"

Iris found herself standing in the windswept grassland right outside the human village. With crossed arms, she watched Kia's back, illuminated by the last orange rays of the sun as the girl was sitting over the frozen edge of a giant black void, easily able to fit two houses side by side in it. Kia's black hair fluttered back in the powerful draft coming from the depths of Niuran. The girl had commented that the air coming out of the void was filled with mana which didn't surprise her.

The temples spoke of the world as being hollow in its very core and there in the Heart of Niuran the Aspects had created a great cauldron from which contents souls are created. The bubbling ichor is not only the forge of the souls but in addition as the cauldron bubbles it releases pure mana which escapes into our world through the great twin holes at the very caps of the world. Every child in Theocracy had to attend school on Tanzdays to learn how to read and write. But the school didn't only teach how to read and write but also taught the teachings of scripture and basic history but only after the harvest had ended given that most kids helped their parents by threshing the grain or grinding the grain into flour.

The elf didn't really like school for some reason, she would always sneak out of the class in the early spring and late autumn to forage in the nearby forest for nuts and berries to bring home or if she was lucky a small bird or other animals stupid enough to be caught by her. Embarrassingly enough she never learned how to read or write as her talent was doing all of the hard work for her. Returning to reality Iris sighed as she looked behind her and saw no human had come. She would have picked up their stuff and walked into the wilderness but the pale beauty wouldn't allow it.

"Are you sure you will not fall down?" Iris asked as she tapped the frozen ground with her boot.

Seeing the snow maiden nod her head while dangling her feet above the abyss the elf knelt down beside her, ready to snatch her if the earth shifts even a little.. Through her dulled sense of touch, she felt her skin being brushed by the moving column of air. The touch felt similar to how the elf felt when the necromancer casted a healing spell on her. She extended her open palm past the vertical scarp allowing the wind to rush between her fingers.

"It feels nice." Kia stated.

"It sure does," Iris replied. "Will the mana ever stop?"

"I don't know, I had never seen such a deep hole."

The grassland slowly sank into the twilight as the two undead sat beside each other enjoying the weird feeling. "Mmm mmm mmm..." Kia hummed quietly the same melody the elf had accidentally taught her at the beginning of their journey.

"Little copycat~"

"Nyo." The kitten denied the accusation before returning to humming her melody.

"Mmm Mmm Mmm..." Iris hummed quietly and heard the girl's music shift to match hers. The elf began to sing more complicated melodies for her songbird to follow as she eyed her damestar raven from the side unable to stop a smile from creeping onto her face.

"Sleep, my dear, beloved baby,

‎Leral-bayu.

Silently the crystal moon shines

‎On your cradle blue.

Ancient tales I’ll start to tell you,

‎Songs I’ll sing you too;

Eyes are closing, drift to sleep now,

‎Leral-bayu

Muddy Vitas River splashes

Boulders in the shade;

Evil Undead crept ashore

‎Sharpening his blade;

But your father is a warrior,

‎Battle-hardened, superior too:

Sleep, my child, and don’t you worry,

Leral-bayu..."

Iris realised she had been carried away with a song she didn't remember ever hearing, she allowed her voice to fade into the whirr of the wind. She turned her head where her songbird should have been only to find a pale star and bright sun glowing brightly in the twilight. The intrigued owner of the perfect gems watched her closely before getting uncomfortably close with animalistic sway to each of her moves.

"Kia...?" Iris tilted her head away but the songbird turn predator climbed on top of the risen before she felt something wet lick begins to lick her cheeks. "Kia, you can't do that." The tall undead with puffy eyes lifted the undead kitten off herself before standing up.

An orange flame burned among the grass held by Nu who seemed to be looking for something. As soon as the tall elf stood up the human narrowed her eyes before waving them to come closer.

"Ruu said that you two are free to rest with us for a couple of days but he said it would be good for you if you camped on the outside," The human voice dropped as if remembering something as her gaze dropped to the ground. "People here don't see elves in a good light. For good reasons."

"That is fine, we can even camp in the open if our presence would cause trouble."

"I-I thought you and Siri could camp with us."

Iris didn't see any problem with this arrangement seeing that Kia decided to stay here to see if Ba's treatment was successful. She gestured for the human to go forward and lead them inside their tent.

As they walked forward, Iris saw a bird made out of orange light fly from one of the tents and head directly upward before it disappeared in the thick clouds above them.

"I-Iris did you cry just now?" Kia tugged the elf's sleeve finally finding a word which she was searching for.

"No, something had flown into my eye."