ILIAS VAN PAYNE

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Shoya was the last major settlement north of the eastern region. Though we did come upon the odd house every couple of hours, the fields were all completely ruled by nature. The only scenery we saw was green. Green fields, green meadows, green trees, green shrubbery. There were sometimes blues when we passed by lakes, rivers, and ponds.

One time, we set up camp early because there was a gorgeous-looking waterfall with lots of fish swimming in the pond below. The day was particularly hot as well so it was a perfect day to take a dip. It was good to have a goal and strive for it, but slowing down and enjoying the quiet moments was a great way to relax.

On average, the temperature dropped each day we trekked further north. The seasons never changed no matter the time of the year. The more north you go, the colder it got and the more south, the hotter it was. The humidity was different too. The land on the western half of the peaks of Assaru had much more humid air than the east. It was drier here and it was something it took a while to get used to.

Everyone had thick layers of clothing. They simply added or removed layers depending on how they were feeling.

The farmers and the rest of the sentinels were ready for the cold.

Jaime and I weren’t. A cold breeze was the coldest it ever got in Gilead. Luckily, we were wearing thick garments when we got teleported. I was wearing double layers and the brown coat I used when I travelled to the Capital. Even my hat kept me warm. Jaime was wearing a jacket with fur lined on its shoulders. That jacket belonged to Mother and she gave it to Jaime while she was staying with us. The fur especially made her look like a cute but ferocious animal.

We got north enough that there was snow sprinkled throughout the land. Even counting my previous life, this was the first time I saw snow. Technically, Heloise and I had summoned snow during one of our lessons, but this was the first time I saw natural snow.

Askeladd noticed Jaime and I were gawking at the sleets and so stopped everyone when a sizeable pile was near the road we were taking. Jaime shoved a handful of snow under my shirt, but bitterly regretted it when Askeladd effortlessly threw one down hers.

The night before we arrived at the village, we gathered around a campfire.

“We’ve made a lot of ground in four days,” I said. “It’s nice having new company.”

“Yup,” Askeladd agreed. “That’s what’s great about being an adventurer. You’re always meeting interesting characters.”

“So, no one’s backing out?”

Tony was leaning against a tree. He had removed his boots and socks, placing his feet close to the fire. “If anyone had backed out, Kid, it would’ve been just when we left Shoya. I don’t think anyone’s going to back out now, especially since we’re so close.”

Mondatta agreed. “I’m surprised you and Jaime stuck out this long.”

Jaime erected her back. “We have no intentions of deserting. We have no choice, after all.”

“Are you sure? We won’t hold you against it if you leave now.”

“We’re the Seven Sentinels, remember? ‘Five Sentinels’ doesn’t have the same ring to it.”

Tony chuckled, throwing a pouch of coins to Mondatta. “Dammit. I underestimated you two.”

“You placed bets on whether we would leave or not?” Jaime pursed her lips. “How much?”

“Twenty silver coins. I thought it’d be easy money.”

Jaime turned to Askeladd. “What did you think?”

The knight sat in silence before expertly catching a pouch from Mondatta. He chuckled, placing the pouch in his bag and ruffling up Jaime’s hair. “I never doubted you two for a second.”

“Now hold on,” Tony said, pointing a finger at Mondatta. “You bet twice?”

Mondatta grinned. “The kids had a strong resolve, so I bet on them against you for more. But as insurance, I bet less against them on Askeladd.”

“So if I’m recalling this properly,” Tony spat into the darkness. “The only one who lost is me. Everyone else made something?”

“Seems so,” Askeladd chuckled. “Never put your eggs in one basket.”

“I’m a gambling man, Ser. If there’s an opportunity for me to double my eggs, I’m going all in.”

We sat in silence watching the flames dance as the cracking firewood sang its songs. The dark shadows in the foliage and the whoosh of the cold breeze were ominous, but I could rest easy knowing these guys were around to keep each other safe.

“Tomorrow, we’re going to arrive at the village, right?” I asked.

The farmers nodded.

“We’ve all been hesitant to show each other what we can do. However, after these past few days, I think it’s time to see what everyone is capable of.”

Surprisingly, everyone agreed to this. We were able to build enough trust and the curiosity to see what everyone could do gnawed at us. Hanzo picked up seven different lengths of sticks and we would go in the order of who pulled the shortest to longest. Since he was our leader, Askeladd pulled the shortest stick and was fated to go first.

He had Toshi hold a log behind him and stand in view of everyone. Askeladd slashed him with his sword while the farmer quivered. Even though his blade went through Toshi, he remained unharmed, but the log he was holding was split into two.

This ability came right from Askeladd’s giant sword—a cursed artifact named Sting. It had the ability to let its user choose what it could phase through. So he could choose what he wanted and didn’t want to cut with one swing.

Mondatta was up next and she went up to the area of the camp we devoted to a stage.

“Zenyatta!” she screamed, and her Faniliar materialized beside her.

“Ubasha!”

I haven’t seen a Familiar since Roswaal summoned White Stripes to fight Erina.

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“Does anyone want to guess what Zenyatta can do?”

“Ooh. Let me try! I’ve been agonizing over this ever since I saw you,” Jaime screamed. “It has something to do with those three orbs floating above Zenyatta.”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, it is. But any specifics?”

Jaime stayed silent, drawing a blank.

“First, Zenyatta could throw those orbs as a form of attack.” Her Familiar jabbed towards a still-standing dead tree thirty feet away, crying “Ora!” with each thrust. One by one, the orbs shot out, ripping through the tree. Every time an orb hit something, it reappeared above Zenyatta.

By the end of the demonstration, the tree fell over.

“Second, these orbs aren’t actually orbs. These are bubbles.” Zenyatta threw one at Roxy, growing larger until it was big enough to envelop her. The bubbles were opaque but became more transparent the larger they grew. “Roxy, please come here.”

Roxy chuckled nervously. “Uh… Okay…”

Mondatta positioned the blue-haired twin for everyone to see.

“Now, Tony, please shoot her.”

“Huh?!” she screamed in a panic. “Wait, wait, wait!”

“My pleasure.” Tony pulled out his pistol and emptied all five bullets at her without missing a beat. The bullets bounced off the bubble and into the ground.

Roxy had her eyes covered, frozen in fear. It took a moment for her to realize she was safe. “Tony, you’re evil!”

Mondatta then explained, “As you see, the bubbles are indestructible. Nothing can get through it and it prevents any damage from happening. It also works on objects, but the object mustn't have anyone holding it.” She put one on Tony’s pistol. “The bubble also travels from Zenyatta, so it can’t just appear on anyone instantly because the person or object has to be within my line of sight.”

“So, no one can touch me?” Roxy wondered.

“That bubble will protect you no matter what.”

Askeladd nodded at Mondatta’s Familiar. “Any limitations.”

“It's a powerful and versatile Familiar, so of course there are a few.” Mondatta went through a list. “One, Zenyatta only has three bubbles. Two, I can only bubble things within my line of sight and there’s travel time. Three, and the biggest limitation for me, is that I can’t put a bubble on myself.”

“So you can protect anyone in existence. But you can’t protect yourself,” Tony said.

“That’s correct.”

“I heard about the ritual to manifest Familiars. You have to defeat a manifestation of your deepest fears. What were you scared of?”

“I was training to become a fighter at the time. My biggest fear was that I wasn’t strong enough to fight anyone and that no matter how hard I trained, I wouldn’t be able to hurt them. And, most of all, I was afraid of my own mortality.”

“Actually, Mondatta, I think your Familiar is beautiful in that way,” Tony said. “You have the ability to protect anyone, but yourself. If you look at it from a different angle, you’re a selfless person who looks after everyone else first before yourself.”

Mondatta blushed at this and chuckled. “So, he does have a heart.”

Mondatta returned to her spot and we got right back to showing off our abilities.

Roxy stayed where she was while Roxanne joined her.

“I actually pulled the longest stick,” Roxy said. “But our abilities go hand in hand with each other, so we’ll do it at the same time.”

“But since I pulled the shorter stick between us,” Roxanne said, blindfolding herself, “I’ll go first.”

Roxy took large steps back as Roxanne went into position. She had her front leg bent and her back leg extended behind her as if ready to dash. She kept her sword in its sheath but held onto its hilt tightly.

On the ground beneath her, an incantation circle with a two-metre radius formed with her in its centre.

“This is an alchemy ability I developed. I call it Re-Flex. The circle is now my domain. This ability allows me to attack anything that enters it on automatic reflex.”

Roxy picked up a piece of firewood and threw it at her sister’s head from the side. The moment it entered Roxanne’s domain, it was sliced into four even pieces before it even dropped to the ground.

Roxanne had struck it like lightning. We didn’t even see it.

“However, the reflex only works if I’m in this position. So if I want to do it again, I must sheath my blade to reset the ability. Also, the automatic reflex works better head-on, but it can still react to an attack from behind, albeit slower.”

“Can it distinguish between friend and foe?” Mondatta asked.

“No, but as long as another person is inside my circle as it forms, they won’t be targeted as long as they stand still.”

Another sword ability. But this, unlike Askeladd’s, was focused more on defence. Re-Flex was also alchemy so she wasn’t stuck with just this one sword.

I wonder if it works on non-bladed weapons…

“My turn,” Roxy cheered, donning her shield. “It’s fairly simple. Like my sister, this is an alchemy ability I developed myself. I call this one Death Magnetic.” Just like Roxanne, an incantation circle formed around her, but this one had a radius of eight metres—which was much larger.

A few of us were in it, so we backed away and Roxy suggested we grab our things too. Roxanne placed firewood inside her sister’s circle.

“It’s a very simple ability,” Roxy explained as she activated it. The firewood flew towards her at great speed, obliterating it into splinters when she bashed it with her shield. “I become like a magnet, except, the objects don’t have to be metal. Everything inside the circle will fall towards me.”

I now understand why they wanted to perform together. Their abilities complimented each other more than anyone here.

Roxy stood behind Roxanne as they both activated their circles. Roxy used Death Magnetic to pull in a boulder. The moment the rock trespassed into Roxanne’s Re-Flex, she shifted her breathing style and split it in half.

“Excellent abilities,” Askeladd applauded. “The attack is a perfect way to implement them together. Jaime and Ilias, I want your teamwork to be like theirs.”

As different as these two were from each other, the showcase of their abilities let us know that they worked amazingly well. They were identical twins so they had the same brain. They fight with each other a lot, but they knew exactly what the other was thinking.

The next two go were Jaime and I, in that order.

Jaime’s swordplay had gotten better, but she lacked a unique ability of either alchemy or a cursed artifact like Askeladd and Roxanne. Not to mention she hadn’t yet been taught any of the sword styles. According to the map of the village, the nearby lake was a labyrinth. She and Askeladd planned on leaving her sword there to see if it could turn into a cursed artifact.

When I showed them all the spells I knew and the ones I had written in Talking Book, they were certainly impressed that someone my age knew so much. But they weren’t exactly blown away because I lacked one thing.

“You need to come up with your own unique ability,” Tony explained. “Your skills are great, don’t get me wrong, but you need something that makes you different. What makes you the Prince of Dawn?”

“Tony’s right,” Askeladd agreed. “You’ve got great talent, so use it to create your own ability.”

“I’ll think of something,” I promised. “I’ll have my own unique ability by the time the bandits come.”

“Good,” Askeladd turned to Tony. “Which means there’s one more.”

“Fine, fine,” he said, his voice raspy as he got up. “First of all, I’m a great shot.”

He picked up six small rocks and threw them in the air. With one glance upwards, he shot each rock into smaller pieces before gravity could pull them downwards.

“Second, is my alchemy ability. I call it Guns And Roses.” He pointed to the ground. “Do you remember that spot?”

“Yes, I do!” Roxy screamed. “That’s where the bullets you shot at me bounced to.”

“Now, watch this.”

The ground bloomed into five roses.

“Wow! Flowers! So amazing…” Roxanne said sarcastically.

Tony picked up five small rocks and threw them in the air. Suddenly, a bullet from each rose shot the small rocks.

“Huh?”

“Guns And Roses is a complicated ability.” He reloaded his gun. “I imbue the bullets with my mana and once they stop moving, it will remain dormant for about a month until I command my mana to bloom into a rose. Once the rose blooms, it can re-fire the bullet it grew from. The rose has a ten-minute timer before wilting away.”

“Oh, so it’s not a cursed artifact,” I realized.

“Nope, it works on any bullet and any gun. As long as I imbue a bullet with my mana. Anyone can fire the bullet and it’ll still bloom a rose on my command.”

Jaime volunteered and fired all five shots into the ground. Tony took a bunch of steps back to make sure he couldn’t imbue the bullets as Jaime fired.

“Don’t fire all of the bullets! You’re wasting them!” Tony tsked before letting the roses bloom and refiring the bullets.

“This ability is very situational, but in a shootout, a bullet from anywhere is good. Also, if a bullet is shot at me, I can time it right and imbue it with my mana before I get hit.”

“Oh, I get it,” I said. “Bullet-Tooth Tony. That’s how you survived being shot multiple times. As the bullets hit you, you imbued them with your mana and turned them into roses.”

Tony chuckled. “Yup, I’m surprised it took you that fast to guess how I survived.”

Hanzo, Toshi, and Ritsu fell to their knees and cried with happiness when they saw what everyone was capable of.

“We’re all pretty impressed with what each of us can do. But I think it’s time to call it a night.” Askeladd laid against a log. “We’ll be arriving at the village tomorrow. I know we’re doing them a favour, but let’s at least look presentable when we’re welcomed by our hosts.”