Death.

That was the only word that came to mind as I stared at the landscape below. This… was a place of death. Death not only of the people before me, but death of the earth, the land itself.

I stood on a cliff. Next to me stood Lucia and Tavarius, with bewildered expressions as they stared at the lands below us. Ersham remained behind us, uncharacteristically serious.

Below us was a desolate wasteland, devoid of trees or any sort of vegetation. An ominous black fog clung to the ground, which was littered with skeletons. The black fog extended into the sky, blocking the sun, making the sight before us even more forbidding.

Beyond all else, looking upon this harsh land made me feel a profound sense of loss and sorrow.

Only half a day of walking separated us from the abandoned fortress we had slept in last night.

What… happened here?

“What you’re looking at is what much of the lands we live in looks like. The villagers refer to it as the wastelands. Our little village is surrounded by wastelands like this.” Ersham interrupted our silence. “A great war long ago ravaged the lands. All that killing, that destruction, that carnage, all of it killed the land and the spirits that once inhabited this land. Turned into this. A land covered in miasma.” His eyebrows furrowed as his face hardened.

“Take this sight in. If you truly want to be an adventurer, you’ll have to spend days traversing through lands like this. Attacked by monstrous creatures every single day. Fatigued from the restless nights and tiring days in an unforgiving land.”

We had now turned to face him as he continued to say his heavy words.

“Var, do you understand what it means to be an adventurer? What sort of trials await you?”

Tavarius nodded with resolve.

“Luqa and Lucia, if you want to be an adventurer as well, think about my words today.”

“Yes, Uncle Ersham.”

“Good. Seems like I made my point. Let’s spend the rest of the day here so you can get the experience. The next day, we’ll be heading back to the village. C’mon.”

We walked onwards beside the edge, looking for a way to descend it. Carefully making our way down, we reached the foot of the cliff. The sight from above seemed even more imposing, now that we were experiencing it firsthand. Skulls on the ground bored into us with their empty eyes.

And this black fog. I was certain that it was that same black fog I saw the moment I was using what my mother called “demonic magic.” Was this place a result of hordes of demons endlessly using demonic magic?

“Huh?” All of a sudden, Lucia had held onto my hand with her own, with a tight, clammy grip. Honestly, I couldn’t blame her. Ever since we reached the edge of the cliff, unshakable anxiety had been eating away at me, as if my body protested against my will.

“Heh, a bit scared?” I asked her, a bit tauntingly. “Don’t worry, we’ll be fine.”

“N-not scared, just don’t want to be lost. Hmph!” she said unconvincingly.

Tavarius, on the other, looked around, as if slowly taking in everything around him. His wary eyes kept an eagle-like watch.

As we continued to walk, I felt an unusual sensation.

Mana was leaking from my mana reservoir; quite slowly, but I sensed it nonetheless. No, it wasn’t just leaking. This black fog around us seemed to be draining me of my mana.

Was there a way I could stop it? I had the ability to effectively manipulate my mana inside my body, so could I simply manipulate it to not leak?

I closed my eyes and imagined my reservoir forming a protective, outer layer preventing it from leaking, like water in a jar. Slowly, I felt that “jar” form, and the sensation of mana leaking stopped. The mana stayed swirling inside my protected reservoir.

That… worked, surprisingly.

It took immense focus and willpower to keep shape of the protection preventing the black fog from draining my energy, but I could manage nonetheless. I definitely wouldn’t be able to use magic while keeping this protection up though, because my mana channels were now closed off from the reservoir.

“Hah… hah…” Beside me, Lucia was struggling to breathe.

“Are you okay?” I asked her.

“Yes… just a bit tired…” she responded sluggishly.

This won’t do.

I turned to look at Ersham and Tavarius ahead of us, the former turning around after hearing his daughter’s words. The two of them didn’t seem to be tired at all. Was it because we were half-demons?

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

If it’s due to her mana leaking, maybe I can help her.

With her hand still holding mine, I ceased the protection of my reservoir and imagined my mana flowing into hers. I felt her reservoir swell up at the intake of my energy. Judging by how much I gave her and how slowly the draining occurred, that’ll probably last her for a while.

“Woah… what did you do? Why do I have so much mana now?” she whispered to me.

I was unable to answer her as Ersham approached to pick her up. Lucia now rode on her father’s shoulders.

“Oh dear, you’re tired, you say? Let your dad deal with it, then.”

“Thank you. Now, forwards, Daddy!” She pointed her finger outwards, treating her father as if she was a gallant knight on a stallion.

“Yes, my lady!” he responded enthusiastically. Good for her.

Wish I had a dad. Who was he? My mother never uttered a word about him. Maybe I was the child of a passionate affair between my mother and some married demon in the village who was too scared of his wife to claim he was my father. I will wait for the day he comes to me and claims to be my father, before I bitterly deny him, crying that he was never there for me. Woah. Weird thoughts like this are exactly why I need a dad.

Abruptly, the relaxed air around us changed. Tavarius stepped in front of us, drawing his sword.

A group of lizard-men had crawled out from the ground, brandishing old-rusty weapons, hissing an ugly noise at us.

“Var. Kill those lizard-men by yourself,” Ersham commanded.

What. What’s he thinking?

“Gotcha!” Tavarius came speeding forwards. A spear directed at him was sliced in half before the lizard-man holding it fell to the demon boy’s swift blade. Three other lizard-men surrounded him, threatening to impale him from all sides.

However, he jumped up high into the sky, over the lizard-men, before landing behind one of them. One quick stab to the back took care of one of them, and two swift slashes marked the deaths of the other two. As five other lizard-men moved in to surround him again, he simply weaved through their attacks, cleaving their legs from their bodies.

Sheesh.

What happened to this boy these past three years?

Ersham smiled meanwhile, beaming with pride at his nephew’s recent growth.

“That boy worked himself off, day and night. He’s many times better at it than when I was his age. I might have just raised a future legend,” Ersham said, as if answering my apparent astonishment.

The group of twenty lizard-men was eventually slain by the skilled swordsmanship of Tavarius. He took a few moments to catch his breath, used a rag to wipe off the blood from his blade and sheathed it back in.

“How’s that for ya, uncle?”

“Good job. Really good job. Guess I’ll have to abide by your wishes.” The man scratched his head at the base of his horns. “I’ll let you adventure outside the village without my guidance.”

“Hell yes!” Tavarius jumped with hands raised in the air, cheering.

“A couple stipulations though. One, until you can beat me in battle, I won’t let you spend more than a day outside of the village. Two, whenever these two want to come with you, let them accompany you. It’ll be helpful for them as well to get experience, while you get the experience of learning to fight alongside others.”

Tavarius’ excitement slightly deflated at his uncle’s words, but he was enthusiastic nonetheless. Spending my days adventuring with him and Lucia… that certainly sounded alluring, an exciting change from a slow-paced life in the village.

“Here that, Luqa?” Tavarius said. “We’re gonna be adventurers, from now on.” Turning back to his Ersham, he continued, “Just you watch, Uncle. We’ll become the most famous adventurers across these lands.”

“Don’t forget me too,” Lucia joined in as well.

“Hmph! Don’t just talk big words, little man. I’ll be waiting to see you grow even more, so keep training hard as you’ve always been!” Ersham responded.

I placed a hand on Tavarius’ back and called upon a basic healing spell.

“Gather o benevolent spirits to mend wounds — [Heal] —”

The scratches and minor injuries covering Tavarius’ skin disappeared. “Don’t get too carried away, you adventure-loving brute,” I said contently.

“Same goes for you, you magic prodigy!” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder, ruffling my hair with his other hand.

Oh, stop it, you.

Lucia pouted as she watched the two of us with envy, still atop her father’s shoulders.

Sorry, Lucia! Think I accidentally stole your cousin.

***

The campfire illuminated the otherwise pitch-black cliff-side by which we stayed. Tavarius practiced through motions with his sword, the flickering of the flames creating a dance with his shadow projected on the cliff-side.

I sat in front of the fire. Somewhat bored, I practiced ice magic in my hands. The trick to ice magic — which was a specific application of water magic — was something my mother taught me recently. Some of our spell tomes claimed that ice magic was entirely different from water magic, but my mother was unconvinced. Apparently, the trick was simply to conjure water and then apply your mana to manipulate the water — imagining your mana to hold each particulate of water fixed in place — until the water became ice.

I used my mana to create and destroy large crystals of ice, each time forming a different internal structure and shape to it. I focused — interested in learning how precisely I could control the structure and orientation of the crystal. I had gotten good enough with the size of the crystal and the speed of conjuration, though the structure seemed really difficult to control. Beside me, Lucia was sleeping soundly, her head propped on my shoulder.

Ersham had gone to scout around the area to make sure it was safe and also to fetch us the corpse of a monster that wouldn’t taste absolutely terrible. I placed more importance on the latter, of course.

“Luqa, I gotta question for you,” Tavarius said without stopping his sword practice.

“Sure, what’s up?”

“Ya seriously thinking about being an adventurer?”

“…Probably yea. I want to see the world with my own eyes.”

Our foray into the wastelands today only confirmed my desire to do so. What did the world hold in store outside our village? Outside our little bubble? And what lay beyond these wastelands? I stretched my left hand up, fingers extended towards the heavens. The stars above shone brightly as ever tonight.

“That’s good to hear, then. We’ll be adventurer friends, then! An adventurer always travels in a merry band of companions, right?”

“Hmph, dunno. That’s what the myths say. Though practically speaking, having a companion to watch your back is probably many times safer and more convenient.”

“Ya got that right! Your magic is real convenient for traveling, y’know!”

Tavarius made three swift motions with his blade before he abruptly stopped, his body suddenly tensing. He stepped in front of us and readied himself into a defensive stance.

“Do you feel that, Luqa?” he asked me.

“Yes… just what is that?”

That presence… there’s something dangerous headed here. I shook a drowsy Lucia awake before I scrambled to my feet, pulled out my sword, and made myself wary.

Not far away from us crawled a creature, most of its features shrouded by the shadows — except for its crimson red eyes, with a gaze that pierced directly into me.

< You. You are me. You… belong to me. >

A harsh voice invaded my thoughts.

What… the hell is this thing?