(POV: 3rd Person, Cresik Forrest)

The 4 bandits had just witnessed an unknown figure (A.N: Its Ullr btw:P) appear from the trees so fast that to all but the elf woman, who's senses were naturally greater than the others because of her Elf heritage, had seemed to just appear from know where. Then almost instantaneously kick Jerett with so much force it broke his back and send him flying nearly ten meters across the clearing like a rag doll before colliding into a tree ending his journey and seemingly his life.

The shock of witnessing this left them all frozen where they were staring at the figure before them.

The figure looked to be male, he was about 6ft 2 (A.N: 184cm), his body had almost perfect proportions, broad shoulders, slim waist and limbs that were the perfect length for his torso, in short he had an athletic but strong build.(A.N: Similar to a Rugby player or for my American readers a Football Player. :D)

He wore a cloak with the hood up and a scarf that was pulled up covering the lower half of his face. Under the cloak it looked he wore a black top made from an unknown material, dark brown trousers, a belt with many pouches and two weird objects hanging from it and finally armoured boots and gloves/greaves with a strange design and made from an unknown material to them.

The man's body was turned sideways to the bandits, (in their prospective he came from the left side of the clearing straight across to Jerett) briefly he looked at his handy work then turned towards them.

Facing them they now can all clearly see his eyes, one was a deep sapphire blue and the other was an emerald green. It was the slight glow coming from them and the clear disgust in them that made all of them feel a little fear in their hearts.

The Elf was the first to recover, her long sword was half drawn which she did when she was approaching Jerett giving her warning.

Kicking off she charged at Ullr her sword now fully drawn. As he was not armed she wanted to press an attack and either kill him or in the worst case prevent him from drawing a weapon. Unfortunately she barely was able to take three steps before Ullr raised his hand and force pushed her away, she was thrown nearly 10 feet in the air as she flew back across the whole clearing before disappearing into the surrounding forest.

Garon was the next to react closely followed by the other two. The other human started chanting something while Garon moved to attack with sword and dagger in hand, closely followed by the Orc who wielded a great hammer which he had taken from the dwarf the killed.

As Garon made his approach to attack, he saw Ullr calmly reach for the strange looking artefact(light sword) that hung from his belt. Garon quickened his pace as he assumed the artefact is a weapon, a powerful one at that.

The other man finished chanting when Garon is about 10 meters from Ullr. Garon and the Orc both have a red glow appear on them, the spell the human Mage cast was a buff spell to increase their strength and speed.

He covers the last few meters between them almost instantly, he also performs the sword ability 'Phantom Strike'. The ability creates an identical copy of the user who attacks from the front as the real user will be instantly transported behind the target and hidden from there senses and free to attack their unaware foe.

Ullr thinking he had time to draw one of his light swords, was very surprised when the man who was about to attack him, suddenly moved so fast it seemed he teleported in front of him. With no time to draw his weapon Ullr had to doge, as he was about to step back and avoid the attack, through his connection with the force it sent a warning that if he stepped back only death awaited him. With that instead he dodged to the side rolled once before standing up light sword in hand but not turned on.

Ullr saw why he would have died if he had stepped back to doge, the person who attacked from the front was now fading away with the real attacker landing next to him, coming from the opposite direction. Ullr guessed he had used some sort of technique to achieve this, and he was unable to sense him using the mana for the technique because the spell the other man used drowned it out.

Not wanting to waist time as the Orc man was getting close and fighting both of them with the Mage man aiding them and the Elf lady preparing to attack while hidden in the trees, Ullr activated the light sword in his hand and moved to attack Garon.

Garon was disappointed and surprised his attack had been dogged, it was one of his strongest and favourite techniques, it could fool some powerful warriors, only those with great perception are able to see though it.

Looking at his target who was now turning to face him, he saw he now held the strange artefact, Garon now had no doubt it was a weapon of some kind. He heard Tarin (human Mage) start another chant and saw that Kurrn was only a few seconds away. As a grin started to form on his face Ullr activated his Sword. Seeing the yellow blade made of light appear as if from no where, Garon became serious and prepared to defend as Ullr move to attack.

Ullr raised his light sword intending to make a diagonal strike. Garon had raised his sword to deflect the incoming attack before his counter attack. But as their weapons met and he saw the strange sword cut through his blade as if it was butter, he was only filled with confusion before he was bisected by the same weapon and his life ended.

Kurrn was only a few meters away now but the shock of seeing Garon sliced in half made his concentration falter, this was enough for Ullr to make a quick strike slicing through half of the orc's body before Kurrn could defend. With the Orc taken care of only the Elf girl and the human Mage (who was still chanting) remained.

Not wanting the Mage to finish his spell and attack, Ullr shot purple lightning at him. The lightning was partially blocked by a blue barrier that appeared around the man, the lightning that wasn't stopped hit the man causing him to scream interrupting his chant. The barrier only held for a few moments be for shattering and the full force of the attack did its work, killing him quickly.

The Elf was hidden just outside the clearing, she was aiming her bow at Ullr's back intending to support Kurrn. The rather gruesome death of Garon had shocked her a little but with the numerous past battle experiences she was unfazed. However seeing Kurrn, who was easily a greater warrior than Garon especially one on one, cut down so easily did rattle her enough for the thought of retreat to be the best option.

Unfortunately for her Ullr knew exactly where she is hidden. Spinning round he pulls her from hiding into the clearing, the Elf attempted to land on her feet but is unsuccessful. Without a chance to stand Ullr launches purple lightning from his hand. The Elf screams in complete agony as she feels lightning corse through her body burning every cell it touches in her body, after a few seconds the screams cease as does the elf's life.

With the last bandit dead Ullr let's out a sigh as he sheaths his weapon before he turns and look at the wide eyed girl he had rescued. Ullr was extremely surprised by her appearance, during the fight Ullr had not actually properly looked at the girl due to focusing on the fight, and now Ullr subconsciously spoke.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"Lumia"

The girl had the upper body of a human and the lower body of a snake, her scales were a dark green colour with hints of blue in it, he hair was the same. She looked quite young, at a guess 13-14 five or take a year, it was hard to say because she was quite thin. Her eyes were green with irises like a snakes, she had a petite nose and her lips were a light pink. Her skin was ever so slightly tanned, giving her a even light bronze colour, her skin looked smooth with very few blemishes but a number of scars were clearly visible.

When the girl had heard Ullr speak, it caused her to leave the trance like state where she just stared completely still, she had been like this more or less since the start of the fight.

The girl was now flooded with many different emotions both positive and negative about what she had just witnessed, but with all she was feeling one emotion drowned out all the others,fear. She new many hated her race most being from the main races of the world. Hearing the man say 'lumia' with almost no emotion in his voice terrified her the most. Closing her eyes she curled up as best she could with her injuries and stared crying.

Ullr felt deep down he pitied her, despite wanting to just leave something in him wouldn't let him and pushed him to help her.

First he removed his hood and the scarf hiding his face, slowly he approached the girl as he tried to recall his lessons in a few healing techniques, he was never good with healing but he had managed a basic one and one other slightly better.

Ullr knelt down in front of the girl, she kept her eyes shut, she still wept but now it was much quieter only an occasional whimper, she had also started to shake in fear when Ullr was right in front of her.

Without a word Ullr raised his right hand moving it just above the wound on her arm. Ullr attempted the harder technique knowing the other couldn't heal a wound like this. As he makes his attempt, his hand gives of a soft light that flickers for a few seconds before vanishing, he was unsuccessful.

After a brief pause another attempt was made, this time the light was brighter but still flickered. Believing he was performing everything correctly, Ullr focused on the force hoping to find something. As he started he sensed that he wasn't including mana, curious to see if it would have an effect he added the mana to the technique.

Almost as soon as he included the mana the flickering light around his hand intensified and no longer flickered, and the girls injury started to heal. Seeing the light around his hand Ullr could see it looked and felt different from the one the teacher used during his training with the Order. The intensity was more or less the same but instead of giving of a white light, it now also had strands of blue that circled round his hand, as well as this the wound healed at a much faster rate, only taking a couple of seconds before it closed only leaving a light scar. As the technique was relatively simple even with mana it didn't completely heal the girls arm, it still would need a few weeks before completely healing.

The young lumia had stopped crying when she felt a weird itchy tingling sensation on her injured arm, still shaking slightly she opened her eyes a little, she saw the man was kneeling down just in front of her, his face no longer concealed. Her eyes fully opened when she saw the man. He was not the hideous monster she had imagined while she cried, he was quite handsome and despite two vicious scars, one starting just above the right eye and runs down, just missing his eye, then moving down his cheek and neck stopping at his collar bone, the other from a few centimetres above his Adams apple and runs horizontally across his neck crossing the other scar stopping at the back of his neck.

He was in no way a pretty boy, he looked youthful but in no way immature with his week old but tidy facial hair, his sharp features made him look mysterious but also dashing.

The two features that stuck out most though, were his slightly pointed ears that made his race a mystery to her and his green and blue eyes intense colour.

As she looked at the man's face studying every detail possible especially his eyes, she realised he wasn't looking at her and seemed to be concentrating on something else. Looking round to the right she was completely shocked at what she saw, he had his hand just above where she got stabbed and it was surrounded by a soft white glow that was flickering occasionally.

It was a beautiful and the tingling sensation felt rather pleasant despite the pain. She assumed it was magic but she had never seen something like it before. The healer in her village was a very proficient with healing spells, able to use a wide variety of them but non were like this and the girl was convinced she hadn't heard a chant.

As she was taking in every detail she saw, the tingling sensation intensified, as it did for the briefest of seconds a small smile appeared on the mans face before just as quickly disappearing. She looked at her arm seeing his hand surrounded by white light with blue streaks in it as well as her wound visibly closing. She would not have believed this if she was not seeing it with her own eyes, healing magic was the rarest kind of magic and from what she knew it wasn't like this.

Now Ullr has healed her as best he could he took out his knife (he got it in the supplies the elves gave him) and cut the ropes that were tied around the girls abdomen. When the girl did not react when he cut the ropes he noticed she was staring at him, this made him uncomfortable so he pulled up his hood and covered his face again. Standing up Ullr walked to the edge of the clearing and retrieved his pack he dropped when he entered. Walking back to the girl he took out some food and his canteen of water and handed them to the still staring girl.

"Eat and drink!"

The girl glanced at the food with a suspicious look before she took a tentative bite and chew for a few seconds, obviously deciding there's nothing wrong with it she devoured it like she hadn't eaten for a week. When she had finished the food she took the canteen and took a long drink before handing it back. Ullr put it away, shut his pack and swung it over his shoulder, then for the first time he heard her speak.

"Why?"

******

(Realm of the Gods, Maliketh's Domain(A.N. God of True Hero's). Maliketh's POV)

"Hahaha! Finally found someone not trying to kill you and a Lumia girl at that! Hahaha" I am currently sitting on a chair watching the young boy I chose to receive my blessing with the waters of connection. These waters allow you to observe beings the user has made a connection with.

Sensing someone entering my domain I break the connection and stand up to receive my guest who then appears a few yards in front of me.

"Hello Claire" Claire has an annoyed look.

"Maliketh, why are you hiding Ullr's presence from me?!?" She has a sharp tone to her voice.

"It's nice to see you too Claire. I am doing well thank you, how are you?" I struggle not to laugh when I see a vein popping on her head.

"Answer me Maliketh!" Seems she is serious and me winding her up won't be entertaining.

"Fine fine, but first answer two questions, they are relevant. First did you not wonder why summoning him took so much of your power? Second did you inspect his soul?"

"I assumed it was because of that girl who got summoned with him and no I didn't."

"I thought so. Sigh, well yes summoning that girl would require more power but not as much as you used. The reason it took so much more power is you summoned him from a different universe than the others, a much older one full of powers unknown to us." Her mouth dropped open for a brief moment before promptly shutting.

"Hmmm, that would make sense and explain why he had similar traits to them instead of being human. What about his soul?" Claire seemed to accept what I told her and move on as there is nothing we can do about it anyway.

"What I found in his soul is why I am hiding him. Despite having the requirements to be a true hero, he has put up mental barriers and has a deep fear of losing those close to him, during his second life he lost his parents when he was very young, because he never new his parents in his first life he deeply loved his new ones. Losing them and then being constantly told they were evil broke him causing him to put up mental barriers to prevent him getting close to anyone he could lose. He lived like this for years until he met his new teacher, the girl summoned with him. She over the years training him got past some of these barriers, unfortunately causing him subconsciously start to fear losing her. This caused him to push her way as much as he could and eventually run away from her. If as he is now is found, told he is the hero and asked to do all expected of a hero, at best he would run away and push others way from his heart even more"

"I didn't realise, is there anything we can do to help him?"

"I have already done what I can."

"What did you do?"

"Ullr needs to let people get close to him, he needs friends, ones he cares for and maybe love. Once his heart is open again will he be ready. In my blessing I added something to help, I made it so his true feelings in certain situations can be felt, only slightly to start growing as he opens up"

"Are you sure that will help?"

"I can only hope it will."