“Ah! Iseca! How ‘bout it? Would you like some wind root?” A grizzly looking elf started shouting from his shop’s window. Like all the houses they were connected via series of bridges. The elder elf held up a sizable pouch. “It’ll put quite a step in your jump if you eat it!” he let out a wheezy laugh.

Iseca smiled, stopping by his window, “Not today. I have to look out for Rina; it’d be pretty bad if I can’t use it to protect the both of us.” She had stepped aside grabbing Rina by the shoulders, putting the silver-haired child into view of the old man. The last few days Rina had been saving all the magic she could. It also meant she had to stop focusing. This, however, indicated that absent-minded child spent countless hours with the female elf.

The old man pulled out of the window and went silent. He stepped outside. His appearance was the first thing that was noticeable about him. He didn’t look like he a typical elf, most were lithe and well maintained while he was nearly the complete opposite. He tried to make something of the little girl. His eyes went up and down. She lacked several qualities and elf would have but still had a few similarities. He stroked his beard. Then reached into a satchel he had around his neck. “Here! Catch!” He tossed the bag to Rina, snapping out of her mindless state she barely caught the bags, she looked directly at the thrower, “It’s on me!” He chuckled.

“On...you?” She repeated, spending time with the elf girl had also proven to be useful, Rina was able to learn more expressions than she was able to before without her.

“Yeah, If you bring me a slice of boar, consider it paid!” He gave a hearty laugh. In this forest. Four-horned boars were a rare hunt due to their ferocity when cornered. More than a few elves have died to them. Eating them was considered a luxury. “Also, consider this an investment. That little girl looks a lot stronger than she’s letting out.”

In her hand, she could feel the magic within the bag. It tasted...colorful and light. There was a lot of magic stored in this ‘wind root,’ Rina, magic didn’t necessarily have to be from a living organism. Everything had magic in itself. Non-sentient vessels however just did not produce any more than what they were born with, the magic drained more and more by the second as she maintained contact with the bag.

“Well, thanks?” Iseca looked to the sky, the sun was no longer midday. “Oh, damn!” she started to move away from the old elf. “We’re burning daylight! See yah, pops!” Her movement quickened to a quick jog, with the newly gained magic Rina had enough to expend towards fastening her own pace.

They went through bridge after bridge until they came to one that abruptly just stopped. This was where the village ended, past this point was the forest, the hunting grounds they intended.

Iseca was the first to jump. She aimed for a branch that hung low and then on to the ground; she rolled minimizing all potential damage. She couldn’t see Rina, but she jumped and aimed at the earth below, disregarding all safety.

Out in the wild, it was time to be attentive, it was wise to use all their senses to track their prey. Iseca was ahead of her, naturally, as she was leading the hunt. She kept her back hunched and her steps light. She looked for any and all traces of anything that could provide her with a means to a prey. So far she had found nothing. Not a broken twig, no footprints, nothing just the tracks she, herself left and Rina who was following close behind.

She turned her face to Rina. She pointed to the girl then upward. Iseca wanted to go deeper into the forest. To minimize the threat of danger she wanted her to use the trees to follow. The thick forest was home to many vicious animals, creatures that would instead use you to sate their boredom until you were nothing but a mumbling husk. It was best for Rina to have the advantage to escape. Rina however, was hoping for this. A few hunts before this one she learned that most animals could sense the danger from her and opted to avoid her altogether. The only species that didn’t avoid her were the ones that lacked a certain level of intelligence and fear which just so happened to be boars.

Above in the tree’s Rina could overwatch all of Iseca’s actions. She could also reserve a lot of the magical energy from her advanced positioning.

Watching Rina climbing and disappearing into the tree washed her body of worry, she sighed and continued onward. Eventually, the tracks did seem to appear. There had been a small footprint with three claw marks. The more she looked, the more she found traces.

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“...gobs,” she whispered. She followed the direction until it reached a clearing. “Huh.” The tracks instantly stopped going forward, many of them went around into a loop. Within the clearing the prints were wildly all run about, everything made perfect sense. She jumped away from the edges and went to the dead center. It was an ambush! She readied her bow. Four goblins stepped from the bushes in front of her. Then six, then eight, the number continued to grow until she was cornered on all sides by at the very least twenty goblins. Taking no time she fired an arrow.

The steel tipped whistled as it cut the air. The purplish blood of a goblin splattered as the arrow pierced the creature’s skull. Goblins aren’t creatures that are necessarily hard to kill but in numbers aiming at a single target becomes annoyingly tricky as they tend to all move at one time, some surviving accounts would equate them to wind blowing through a grass field.

Iseca already knocked another arrow. The Goblin Horde whooped and roared, the thrill of a battle surged through all of them. Being another magically afflicted species they were also users of enhanced adrenaline, she caught another goblin in the gut. It toppled over screeching in pain. The arrow may not kill it instantly, but eventually, that goblin would bleed out. The horde charged her. She turned to make a quick exit back into the forest; she could most likely escape the group by putting as much dangerous terrain between them and her.

Instead, she was caught in the neck by a larger goblin it was much more substantial armored than the rest. It wore the discarded armor that it more than likely stole from those it killed. Iseca could see the putrid breath coming from the closed face helmet. This was no doubt a hobgoblin. The creature threw her into the bark of a tree some 15 feet away.

“Gah!” She dropped her bow as her back collided with the tree bark. There was also the sound of arrows snapping within her quiver, in her daze she could see the hobgoblin walking towards her. She scrambled to retrieve her bow, she dropped to one knee and continuously pulled arrows until she could find one in usable condition. To her dismay, there was only one. She knocked it and fired.

The shot had connected...only the hobgoblin was unhurt. He had anticipated her plans as he dropped one of his minion’s lifeless corpse.

Blood began to trickle from her head. She pulled out a hunting dagger. Its edge was horribly dull, as she mostly used it to slice up vegetation and animal hides.

“Damn..” Her vision was blurring again. She took more damage than she thought in the impact. Before long she wasn’t even able to hold her blade. She fell backward on her butt. Time began moving insanely slow, The goblins in the background were jumping up and down for completing one action per minute. Once again she was grabbed by the neck. She was lifted high enough to meet eye level of the hobgoblin.

She closed her eyes she accepted her fate, she was to die at the hands of goblins. Images of Rina flashed before her she must have been still in the trees! She reopened her eyes. She would not let the goblins track her down. She weakly stretched out her hand, magic trickled into the ground. In seconds roots began to envelop the two in an organic prison. The hobgoblin looked around to see his surroundings change.

That’s when Iseca was let go of. Confused she looked up her supposed killer. He was no longer paying attention to Iseca. He was staring at Rina on the far end of the dome.

“Rina! No! Get out of here!” She cried out. “Use the wind root! Leave!”

Rina pulled the pouch out overturned it, only ash left the bag. She had consumed the root’s magical energy until nothing was left. The hobgoblin started to laugh. Its understanding of their language was another quality of why they were dangerous. It approached the silver-haired girl.

“No!” She yelled once more. She stretched her hand once more. Vines weakly grasped at the hobgoblins wrists and ankles but proved to not impede his stride.

Tears began to well up in her eyes once more. She was going to lose Rina a second time. That’s when the purple blood splattered onto her face. Rubbing her eyes with the tears, she looked once more. The hobgoblin was kneeling with both his arms cut from his body. He squealed in a way only an inhuman monster could.

Rina licked the blood from her fingers. “Disgusting…” She spoke as she licked her lips. Not before long she decapitated the goblin. He, after all, wasn’t what she was here for.

She kneeled next to Iseca and smiled. Iseca tried her best to get on her feet but failed. She ended up just embracing her while on her knees. Then she stopped feeling everything, Rina pulled out of her embrace holding two objects. Iseca’s heart and her magic organ. Rina consumed the magical organ and dropped the heart. Once again time went slow, the sound was empty. She fell to the ground.

Rina felt the magical energy filling her. It was almost overflowing through her body. She curled up in a ball. The excess magic openly swirled in the air until it became a physical entity. It hardened and encased Rina in a cocoon. Now was the time for her next stage.