After experiencing that dream again, I woke up flustered, knife drawn pointed at the figure in front of me, except the space that figure occupied immediately appeared empty, a vision perhaps. Studying my surroundings, I noticed Nora had retreated to the boundary of the hollowed tree and was facing me with a worried expression, she must’ve seen me stir. When I caught eye contact she seemed to have adopted an expression bred from fear, upon closer inspection the reason was clear, my shadow had expanded while I slept and had now increased a metre or so from its normal position, nearby light seemed to be diverted into the shadow which due to photons now flowing into the shadow due to the bending trajectory caused previously illuminated areas to now be darkening, causing an increase in shadow. Upon fully regaining my consciousness the shadow receding again, ignoring the girl I threw some leftovers into my mouth, consisting of an eye ball and some flesh and gripped onto my sword in preparation for todays hunt. The blade I had was akin to a standard longsword, the iron had been chemically altered in some way due to the absorption of shadow causing it to somehow affect those creatures that dwell at night, hence why a replacement weapon is unnecessary. The blade doesn’t have particularly sharp edges but doesn’t seem to affect its effectiveness, presumably once again to the presence of shadow, no matter how hard I slice, cut, bludgeon or stab, the blade never cracks or breaks, I’ve never questioned it, as up until now it’s saved me countless times, this blade. Villagers and onlookers had started to dub it the reaper, I’m not one for names though.

Nora had never removed her gaze from me even while I ate and continued to remain cautious of the seemingly living shadow by my side. In the end it’s her fault for following somebody she knows nothing about. As promised, today she would have to accompany me for the hunt, else she would starve and that would be the end of Nora. Eventually she equipped her weapon, for now it was a simple wooden bow and a set of arrows. Nora had chosen this weapon as she apparently is adept at magic and is more adept at ranged combat.

Magic in this world is similar to the previous, however it is different to the fantasy novels one might read in some respects. Mana doesn’t exist, as far as I can tell, instead upon casting a spell, it requires some amount of mental concentration and imagination, a caster must consider multiple things upon casting a spell.

In the world exists particles, much as you would expect, qualities inherent to these particles dictate the size, structure, density, transparency and everything else about every manner of matter within the world. For instance, a set of closely packed particles will create various elements which could have a solid, liquid or gaseous state as one might learn in science. The fundamental difference is each particle has a magi-particle ‘attached’ to it, magicians of the world can see and interact with a selection of these particles, the selection is dictated by a magicians specific elemental magic affinity. Such as a wind magician might see air magi-particles existent in the atmosphere. A magician then has the ability to interact with these particles, energy is expended from the body to generate these particles in a selected space and a ‘spell’ is formed, once casted the spell would expel energy, this could be through sound on collision, fire or through interaction with particles in the atmosphere. This energy is converted into more magi particles instantaneously to replace the ones used, naturally this means objects can also absorb magi particles momentarily, some weapons have properties that allow them to contain these particles and expend them when commanded. Naturally this also means it’s hard for a magician to interfere with another magician’s spell as they wont be aware of the same magi particles. As described this also means that the usage of more magi particles, meaning perhaps bigger spells, expels more energy. In regards to mana, it’s essentially the same as stamina, a large spell would give you the same outcome as running a marathon if you cast above your limit, which is dictated by your personal fitness, to add to that, casting is also a form of exercise, your stamina can increase as your body adapts and hence the level of magic you cast.

Regarding imagination, if a wind caster wants to fly, they must maintain concentration and would have to ‘picture’ the flow of magi particles to cause flight, an inefficient method would be to continuously summon particles below you to glide, a slightly more efficient method would be to summon the required magi particles, then manipulate them.

Nora in this case has had little to eat and has had little sleep, therefore her capacity for casting is severely diminished, hence the bow. We left the hollow tree and emerged into a beautiful forest, there was a dense selection of trees and the peaceful calling of nearby wildlife, naturally the initial signs of where to hunt. Walking first, Nora followed behind unenthusiastically. Eventually we came across a pig-like creature, a large snout and a plump body with short legs, however the feet where equipped with sharp, vulture like claws and its gums were neatly aligned with razor sharp teeth. Fortunately, it was feasting upon one of its kin, who appeared to be missing parts of its body, likely caught by last night’s shadows. Most creatures practice cannibalism as ‘survival of the fittest’ mentality is extremely prevalent.

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Upon my signal, a simple raising of my right hand, Nora placed an arrow onto the string, aimed, caught her breath and released, after manipulating the air in the arrows path, (Nora is most adept at wind magics), the arrow followed a parabola but otherwise flew straight at a fast speed due to no air resistance and planted itself into the pig-like creatures soft skin behind the ear on its head, killing it instantly. Nora had apparently had previous experience hunting with her previous village and so shouldn’t be a dead weight. She proceeded to skin the creature and slice of pieces of meat, avoiding the bones and poison sacks situated below the stomach, the sacs work by seeping poison into the stomach acids and lining the oesophagus which can then be expelled with haste to poison foes.

Upon acquiring the meat, Nora knelt and placed her hands above the creature clamped together and began to speak under her breath in prayer, she then continued to cut off the remaining edible meat and looked at me.

“Look, I get you honouring the dead and showing appreciation for the meal, however in the end you killed it, I doubt it’ll accept any prayers happily considering that fact. Don’t expect mean to participate in your rituals, it died by your hand, so it gets eaten by you, it’s only natural.”

Hearing this Nora pulled an expression to show her dissatisfaction and then stood to signal her readiness to continue.

We left promptly to move west towards the nearest village, Nora had mentioned a nearby village that would have the facilities for a good night’s rest and some stores for more suitable clothing, normally I wasn’t allowed to enter such places as discovered by me and Rex in the past but apparently they won’t particularly mind if accompanied by a member of their own race, an Erze.

I don’t know much about the Erze race, only that they typically inhabit areas close to dense forestry and mainly keep to themselves.

After walking for a few hours we decided to prepare camp in a small clearing surrounded by large trees, this was particularly useful due to visibility in all directions in the case of an ambush, however this also meant enemies would have many vantage points available to them.

First, I placed a pile of wood in the centre-most point and rolled out my make shift duvet (animal hide). Finally, after Nora had done the same we prepared the meat we caught earlier (I had hunted my own previously). Tonight, was different however, normally Nora would silently take the food I prepared for her, consume it and sleep, today however she was silently watching me and seemed like she had a sentence or two resting on her lips awaiting my acknowledgement. Conveniently, after absorption of the gem upon meeting Nora, language was understood between both parties which would allow us (if we conversed) to understand one another. Noticing her gaze, I ushered her to speak.

“Mr. Shado-“

“Call me Kurt.”

“Well then, call me Nfmmz”

“Nora is fine, your real name is a bother to pronounce.”

After this Nora looked somewhat angry, she continued to speak however;

“Well Kurt, may I ask what you were doing in this forest to begin with?”

Hearing that, my mind instantly brought up my memories of Rex, first it was us laughing at a fire, then slowly I remembered his twisted despaired expression and felt a sudden but strong sense of rage that I tempered.

“For now, I’m looking for a place to rest properly, away from the shadows.”

Noticing my expression, Nora looked a little inquisitively but seemed to decide the topic was something she wasn’t qualified to hear yet, without dwelling she moved the topic to the shadows I had mentioned.

“On that topic, sometimes you stir at night, what is up with your shadow, I’ve never seen a person’s shadow act in such a way.”

Straight to the point huh? This girl really doesn’t understand boundaries; however, I don’t want to make a habit of revealing my secrets to strangers, especially ones I don’t understand myself.

“I’m going to rest.”

With that, I rested upon my unrolled hide, closing my eyes.

I was woken abruptly, due to past experiences I tend to rest while guarded and can be woken up and ready for combat in moments. I surveyed the area and quickly found the source of my disruptor. There was a dark entity feasting on the leftovers of yesterdays meal, fortunately the torch nearby was still lit, illuminating both me and Nora and fending off the creature somewhat. As they consisted of shadow they were unable to enter lit areas unless they first ‘consumed’ the light, which took mere moments, however that moment was long enough to escape with another light source if well trained. This shadow was small, it was bipedal and was hunched over the meat, throwing it into an aligned set of razor sharp teeth, if one was to investigate the mouth they would see the rows of teeth stretched on almost endlessly into an apparent abyss. There were two rings above its maw, which were a darker shade of black, seemingly the eyes, they looked like what one would expect if looking into a pitch-black tunnel, although somehow darker.

After studying the creature, I had lightly shaken the sleeping Nora and was lightly holding a hand to her mouth to catch any screams that might try to escape her lips. She quickly awoke and caught sight of the creature and after a slight loss of composure and panic, noticed my calm expression with a finger placed to my lips and calmed herself down.

Normally in this situation you would either try to illuminate the area further to keep the creatures at a distance until daybreak or you would try running to a nearby village or outpost which were suitably equipped to drive out the darkness with magic or light emitting tools.

In this instance, burning wood was preferable because the village in question was still a day or so away. Considering this, I gave Nora a light tab on the shoulder and directed my gaze to the nearby firewood which we used to light a camp fire previously, noticing my gaze she nodded and instantly ran for it. I followed alongside, as we approached the shadow in front absorbed the light and slowly approached us, suddenly it quickly enveloped the remaining light, a pair of dark eyes was now looking up at us, slowly it raised its position until it was eyelevel. It appeared the creature had finished its meal and was now intent on consuming the next course, us.