"How much further?"

Jed seemed impatient. They'd been walking for three days now. Nothing in sight.

"Ask that one more fucking time and I'll kill you"

Rafe glared at Jed.

"Twilight?"

"What? I agree...in fact I'll help him"

Jed sighed.

"Seriously though, how lon-"

Rafe's Dao flew past his eyes, millimetres away from slicing through them like a knife on butter.

"Happy?"

Rafe wore a creepily friendly face.

"Happy"

Jed never asked again.

Another day passed...nothing. No settlements, no humans.

If it weren't for Twilight's waterskin, they'd have died some time ago.

As for food, they were running low. The calories burned by the endless trudging was immense, and so they had to eat an incredible amount of food, so they hunted monsters obviously. Yet hunting monsters had become more difficult with their fatigue.

It was an endless cycle of suffering.

"Alright...maybe we should just commit suicide. Thoughts?"

Twilight didn't even look and answered.

"Rafe...hearing your voice is making me more suicidal than this walk. And trust me, I hate this"

Rafe spat.

"Pass the waterskin"

Twilight chuckled.

"What's the magic word?"

"What are we fucking six? Pass the damn water"

Twilight was stubborn.

"What. Is. The. Magic. Word"

Rafe sighed, defeated. He cared more about hydration than his pride.

"Twilight, my love, please could you give me the waterskin"

"I could"

Twilight paused.

"I won't"

Rafe clenched his fist. His grip was so tight he began to draw blood.

"I'm just joking, one sec...here"

Rafe sipped the water. Slowly increasing the size of his gulps.

"I'm just gonna go water the plants"

Rafe suddenly moved his attention to Jed, chuckling.

"Water the plants? Why'd you say it so weird?"

Jed ignored him and went over to the bushes.

Twilight and Rafe simply kept moving. Jed could catch up after.

The path ahead was long and arduous. Each step felt heavier than the last. Yet, they had to keep moving. They had to find a settlement.

Around this area, the grass was short and lifeless. It's yellow and brown colouring suggested it had died a while ago. Perhaps it hadn't rained in months...or years.

As time went on, their boots seemed like wasteful baggage, but the blistering of their feet and the size of their swollen feet prevented their escape. Twilight seemed to be suffering the most.

Since their armours were items, they could remove that weight and simply summon the armour back once they sighted a settlement. Or when they entered combat.

Yet, they stupidly didn't. Why? Because they'd be left naked.

In fairness, that meant if they were subjected to a surprise attack, they'd suffer worse wounds. However, they seemed to be suffering enough with the heavy armour on.

It had certainly slowed down their progress.

"How are you feeling?"

Twilight smiled.

"Fine. Little uncomfortable but it's whatever. Since when are you the caring type"

"I'm not. Just starting a conversation"

Twilight chuckled.

"Do you think we'll find a settlement?"

Rafe sighed.

"I can't say. I hope we will. But that's different to thinking that. Right now, I'm keeping my thoughts neutral. What about you?"

"I think we will. My instinct says so"

"Oh...woman's instinct?"

Twilight laughed.

"It's woman's intuition. And no. It's my murder's instinct. My fighter instinct"

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At that moment, Jed caught back up with the two of them.

They continued the long journey North, unsure of what was to come. Whilst Twilight suggested her hopes were high, they were not. However, her instinct was telling her they would find something if they continued, and so she trusted her instinct.

She was determined to continue.

Once the night drew in once again, they were ready to rest. Jed took first watch.

They decided the next day would be a day of rest after all. They needed to regather their energy and strength.

With the food they had at the moment, consisting of Juntig flesh, a small monster about the size of a dog from the real world, they weren't very strong creatures so they didn't require much energy to kill thankfully, they could feast for a day.

Once they set off again, they would need to hunt something, in order to feed themselves. If they couldn't find anything, they'd have to search the vicinity.

They couldn't afford to bet on finding something further North. They couldn't continue walking on insufficient energy.

Since they were taking the day off, they decided to sleep longer. Each member would get eight hours sleep; that was an insane amount for a stranded. Well, for the ones that didn't live in a settlement.

Sixteen hours passed, it was bliss. Now, they were all awake.

"How'd you sleep?" Rafe asked.

"Like shit" Twilight replied.

"How can you two complain? I had to sleep under the beaming sun"

Jed said, frustrated.

"Oh, right. What a shame. Get better soon, Jed"

Jed spat.

With time left of the day, and no plans to journey further, they didn't quite know what to do. Of course, they had to eat, but aside from that, there was nothing.

"Anyone else bored?"

Twilight and Jed nodded.

"We need to recuperate though"

Rafe sighed. The blissful day he imagined turned out to be worse than walking...well that was a bit of an exaggeration but it wasn't blissful in the end.

At least they got some good sleep.

"We've had enough rest, we should move out after eating. Focus our efforts on hunting, since we'll be out of food by then"

Twilight was reluctant.

"We haven't rested enough yet"

"Do you not feel fine right now?"

Twilight thought for a moment.

"I do but..."

"But what?"

Rafe interjected.

"Fine. We'll walk a little. Once we're done hunting, we'll go back to resting, agreed?"

Rafe nodded.

"Sure"

And so, the group were back on track, heading North once again.

A few kilometres later, they came across another Juntig. Though, one Juntig wouldn't be enough for the next day, it should suffice for that morning. Especially since this one was more wolf size than some of the previous ones they'd killed.

After skinning the Juntig, slicing into the flesh and cutting out good bits of meat, they were ready to rest again.

Since they were high off sleep already, they simply sat motionless for a while, expending next to no energy.

Tomorrow, the journey North would continue.

Under the dark sky, Rafe rested on a log, bored out of his mind. He took first watch.

Looking into his palm, he saw a creepy eye with a peculiar coloured iris. It was almost like a colour he couldn't understand. It was both easy to spot yet practically colourless.

But that didn't matter.

In his hand was [Korgin Eye]. It was this which he used to recognise the truth of Jed's innocence or rather reason to murder back at the fortress. It seemed to twitch everytime a lie was told.

Back when he acquired it, he decided against consuming it. It didn't seem like the right timing. Things were too dangerous along the journey up North. He couldn't risk it having severe side effects to his sight.

But now, he had grown impatient. He was willing to take a risk.

[...it defeated the Lord of Faces]

'Who was the Lord of Faces' he pondered, 'and who created the beast capable of killing them?'

He had so many questions, yet no answers.

[Consume Korgin Eye?]

Rafe hesitated.

'Yes'

[Consuming Korgin Eye...]

Pop.

"Arghhhhhh. Fuck...ahh"

His sight flashed back. As he reopened his eye, he saw blood splattering all over.

With his screaming, which continued, Twilight and Jed jumped up, wide awake now.

"What the hell are you doing, Ra-"

Twilight's eyes widened with shock.

Before her, Rafe was screaming in agony, the pain was excrutiating. His left eye...was gone. In it's place, blood splurted everywhere, dripping down his face like bloody tears.

It felt as though something incredibly hot had been brutally poured into his innocent eye. The spouting blood only worsened that feeling, as though the blood itself was boiling.

At the moment it popped, blood was sent flying in all directions, drops of blood splattering around like projectiles. Many of the drops were shot back inside, deeper into the eye socket, causing incredible pain.

She was at a loss for words. Jed was much the same, simply watching in shock.

Rafe's world was shattered, all he wanted to do was die, then and there. In his mind, that was fine. So long as the pain ended, anything went.

He felt as though a thousand tiny blade had pierced his vulnerable socket, as though every being he had ever killed had came for their revenge. Perhaps this was the Korgin's revenge.

The pain felt endless. Eternity seemed to pass as he did everything he could to fight the pain.

Rafe covered the bleeding eye socket with his hand, which was now covered in his blood. With a grimace, he had stopped screaming.

Still, pain-filled groans escaped his mouth. Blood was dripping slowly from his lip, where he had bitten down with tremendous force as soon as his eye had popped.

It took all Rafe's mental strength to not scrape the burning eye socket now. The itchy sensation was unbearable. His thoughts had become barbaric as primal instinct attempted to take over, doing anything to be rid of the pain.

In his mind, he was fighting another battle.

Nothing could be worse than this. He could be gutted, stabbed, skinned, even burned alive and it wouldn't dare challenge this pain.

"Rafe...what...?"

Twilight was still in shock.

Suddenly, Rafe felt a tingling feeling in his bleeding eye socket, something different to the agonising pain from before, almost like it's opposite. A small bit of light escaped between Rafe's fingers as he kept his hand covering the eye socket.

'This...isn't this a bit much?' Rafe was calming down from the pain.

Whilst the harrowing pain had numbed, the sheer thought of what he had felt moments ago caused him to wince. It was...indescribably painful.

All of a sudden, Rafe saw a hand covering him; his own hand. Slowly, he swept his hand away from the eye socket. To check, he closed his right eye.

He could still see Twilight and Jed.

[Consumption Complete]

'At least I can see'

Rafe sighed.

"Rafe, what the hell just happened"

Twilight asked, confused.

"The korgin eye happened"

Something clicked inside Twilight.

"Ah...I'd forgotten about that. Does your eyesight feel better"

Rafe nodded.

"A little"

Strangely, his eye didn't twitch. Instead, something inside of him seemed to be saying 'lie'. Almost like an instinct. Yet it didn't seem to be just scanning whether something was the truth or not, it seemed as though something greater was at work.

"Korgin eye?"

Jed was confused.

"It's just an item Rafe got. Increases his sight"

'Again? But she didn't know she was lying?'

"Oh, alright. Neat"

Jed approved.

"Can we got back to sleep now?"

Rafe nodded.

"Do what you want. Apologies for that. It was...rather painful, as you can tell"

Twilight and Jed laid back down. Rafe went back to pondering.

How did his new ability work? It could tell whether anything was a lie, whether the person knew it or not. How could that even happen? Surely that was impossible.

An item like that would have to be Deific.