Woken up by Kurai once they reached a safe distance, Kesshō stretched her body before getting up and yawning, still somewhat sleepy. She opened her eyes and looked around, noticing the time to be day, though gray clouds covered the sun, the surroundings being fairly dark. Strong winds blew from the south-west direction, carrying a good amount of moisture in them, nearly perfect for rains.

"I wonder why these lands never have proper climates." Kurai pondered as he looked to the sky, sitting down right beside her under a tree. Kesshō tilted her head, continued to turn it till she fell on his leg, trying to get back to sleep. Kurai nudged her back awake, grabbing her by the shoulders and making her sit straight up. "Kesshō, get up already, we don't have that much time to waste like this," Kurai sighed.

Kesshō stood up, walking behind him while he remained sitting down, wrapping her arms around his neck she clung tightly to him before closing her eyes, resting her head in his shoulder. Kurai sighed but didn't say anything as he got up, walking down the path without complaints with her laziness.

Even while her eyes were closed Kesshō could sense the environment due to her ears. She practiced long enough with them for her ears to now instinctively sense her surroundings at all times, allowing her to see everything even with her eyes closed. Even when asleep her sense of smell and her ears remained prepared and alerted her of the surroundings. If any odd movements or odd scents were spotted she instantly woke up on impulse, unless with someone she felt safe around.

She did choose to not use it and her eyes at certain times, such as the fight in the inn. Whenever she feels that her opponents are not worth the effort she chooses not to use certain abilities which give her an upper hand.

Just from the echolocation of her ears she could tell they were in a forest, following a path winding through the thick woods. There were a lot of small shrubs around the trees, and somehow the wind still remained strong enough to pierce through them, causing both her and Kurai's clothes to flutter, and also disrupt her sense of smell.

The forest seemed filled with sounds other than just the whistling gusts of wind. She could hear the sounds of rabbits and rodents all throughout the forest, the momentary sounds of deers and other herbivores eating the shrubbery alongside them, the fluttering sounds of birds as they soared overhead and through the woods. She often heard buzzing sounds, believing it to be beehives somewhere on the nearby trees, and sometimes they belonged to bees and dragonflies that flew close to the two.

Her sense of hearing remained the strongest of her five senses, majorly due to having four ears suited for all sorts of noises. She relied on her hearing more than her eyes even in combat, and with her tails having their own ways to sense their surroundings somewhat similar to echolocation, she could easily sense all her surroundings accurately even with her eyes closed. Though she still preferred to keep her tails, wings and claws retracted while traveling, and even during normal combat, but if things were to get troublesome or she simply needed them for anything she could easily extend them.

Kurai continued walking in silence, not speaking and simply enjoying the beautiful scenery of the nature. Kesshō, with her head resting on his shoulder, enjoyed it in her own way, though she still every so often opened her eyes to take in the scenery through them.

In her time traveling alone, she came to enjoy the beauty of the nature, sitting at one place and gazing into the distance for even hours on some occassions. She did get fairly aggressive if anyone attempted to ruin it, killing any who dared to do such a thing if they seemed evil enough, which she only found monsters to be.

Many times goblins, which were for some reason the ones she found most, also the worst kind of monsters according to her eyes, appearing completely black through them. After having killed a few hundreds of them she realised they were nothing more than a nuisance to her, and simply started to blast them with her breath attack when they appeared, knowing she wouldn't get a good fight from them.

The thought also crossed her mind as to why she chose to travel with Kurai so easily, even when she declined the other offer she received. She didn't decide such due to him being powerful, she could tell how powerful he is, more than her even, but she knew that isn't the reason. She simply felt a deeper connection with him, something that didn't belong to this life, but it went over her head and so she left that line of thought.

She still wondered if it happened to be something of a past life, in which case she would never know. There were some elves and phoenixes whom she has heard talking about reincarnation and rebirth, though none seemed to know any details about them. Regardless, she didn't think of him as a bad person, the perfect balance of black and white in his soul, along with the calmness of it, felt very relaxing to her.

She has also been trying to figure out more about why her eyes can see the 'soul patterns', as she calls them, of any living beings, and also what all she could do from them. While she found nothing about why she could see them, she knew no one other than her who could so far. She carried many theories of what she could do with them so far, while some she confirmed by experimentation, there were very few which she could already do with perfection.

For example, she believed that she can read minds with the 'soul patterns'. She drew this theory due to constant movements of everyone's soul patterns, similar to thoughts in someone's mind. While she felt certain she could sense their emotions from them at the very least, she still didn't figure out which type of flow gestured to which emotion. She simply figured that if she can tell the emotions others are experiencing, maybe she can even read their thoughts, even if just vaguely.

Another thing she felt certain of happened to be that the patterns were also affected by the movements of someone's body. She knew this because many people she saw doing the same movements also possessed, to some extent, identical patterns, though she failed to recognise which parts were identical, the similarities only being momentary.

She theorized she could know and dodge attacks before her opponent even used them if she could learn to read these carefully, but that could take years of fighting, and she did not like it very much at times, more so when her opponents planned on fighting to kill instead of having fun.

So far, the only thing she could already do is vaguely tell the likeliness of someone doing something evil or good. The white in a person's soul patterns represented their likeliness to do good, and the black represented their likeliness to do evil, or so she has found thus far. This did not mean those with more white in their soul pattern were better people however.

Kesshō is well aware that good and evil are relative terms, they are not absolute. Even the act of killing a creature is not evil if done in self defense or to protect someone. It simply meant the likeliness of someone doing something even they knew to be wrong. Their consciousness being aware that it's wrong to do a certain thing, but yet due to many reasons they did it, that's what the black represented according to her.

She is still not aware just how well it worked, because she knew from experience that she shouldn't judge anyone based on it. Afterall, she has seen a man, not long before meeting Kurai, with most of his soul patterns being black, more than ninety percent even. He killed four people in front of her and stole the belongings of all of them and ran from the scene. Kesshō felt determined to avenge those four people and followed the man, but she couldn't finish the job after seeing why he did it.

The man gave all those belongings to children he seemed to be looking after, all of them appearing to be abandoned children, exiled from their houses by their own family. That man took them in as his own family despite not being able to even care well for himself. He did everything he could to raise them, even killing and robbing while he knew how wrong it is to do such things.

Kesshō couldn't bring herself to kill him, and instead left five small pouches of gold coins by him as he slept, having gotten them from one of the several dungeons she cleared. They were meaningless to her but she figured they could make a difference if given to him. But even she remained well aware that her not punishing someone who did wrong doesn't mean others won't either.

Knights found and arrested the man not long after, decapitating him in a public execution, right in front of the kids he raised as they watched in horror. Kesshō didn't know of it till a day later when she heard of it from travelers talking amongst each other, returning to the place out of curiosity and worry. She checked on the kids as soon as she returned, being surprised to see they were still where they lived before with the man, a small area at the end of the street, accessible through an opening in the wall.

She also felt relieved to find that the pouches of gold coins were still with the kids, and so she left the city the next day, not wanting to know what happened with them there on. She felt afraid the cruelty of the world would only give her another example of why she should lose faith in good, having already received more than enough examples but refusing to believe them.

She did not know what to do there, being well aware that man killed and robbed many, even robbing many of their loved ones, he hurt many, but he only did so to make sure those kids didn't have to suffer or turn to the darkness like he did. Being aware that if he didn't do something the kids will only end up homeless and poor like him, or even dead, and so he did everything he could, even if it meant doing morally incorrect acts and hurting others. Kesshō felt far too conflicted to pick a side and so she left the problem to resolve itself in whatever messed up way the world chose for it to.

While that isn't the only instance of such a thing, she found it to be the most impactful one, even causing her to think hard about right and wrong, before stopping using her eyes entirely for deducing if someone is good or evil. She used them still, the eyes she felt someone named as the 'Soul Seer's eyes', but only to learn more on how to effectively use them, hoping that one day she might be able to fairly judge good and evil.

There were times when she felt unsure of acts she commited herself and attempted to see the patterns of her own soul, but not once did it work. Whenever she attempted to look into a pond or mirror she got blinded by a dazzling bright glow, having disoriented herself at night once by accidentally glancing into a mirror. Even if she attempted to look at any parts of her body she only saw the dazzling while glow, all her attempts failing to the glow.

She concluded that she could only see the soul patterns of others and not herself, luckily for her, she needed to focus on herself to try see her own patterns, which would then blind her with the glow, while for others it happened as soon they were in her field of vision. If it did not work in such a way, she would've blinded herself several times in battle while using her eyes.

She snapped back to attention by a drop of water falling on her ear. Flicking her ear to remove the droplet she looked upwards as it begun to rain slowly. The winds were also picking up and the trees swayed with it, leaves blowing from one side to the other. She could hear the sounds of animals shuffling their young ones into burrows and other hiding places to avoid the worsening weather.

"Are you alright?" Kurai inquired, rubbing her head gently with one hand. Kesshō nodded, her eyes closed again. "If you feel cold then let me know, I wouldn't want you falling ill, not like I know if that's even possible for you." Kurai informed as he continued marching down the path.

Kesshō tightened her arms around him for warmth, feeling the weather getting steadily colder, the raindrops falling like shards of ice, just not as painful. Being cold-blooded, she isn't suited for cold environments, due to the fact that they made her a lot less active and could potentially kill her. She felt like curling up and sleeping whenever it got cold, although she didn't like warm weathers either. During warm weathers she felt too energetic, with no way of expending all that excess energy. She preferred the weather to be a bit on the cold side, but not freezing either usually, the rain feeling perfect to her.

The gusts of wind were now cold along with the water droplets, feeling as if they were not far from freezing temperatures. The rain also begun falling much more heavily now, darkness already having settled on the surroundings due to the black clouds. Kesshō couldn't tell if it's just due to the dark storm clouds, or it already turned nighttime when she opened her eyes, but it seemed evident that close to no light remained in the surroundings now, the path being hard to see even for her due to the rain. The rain even disoriented her echolocation, the droplets causing many vibrations all through the surroundings. There were many times she heard things close to her when they were actually very far, or didn't even exist.

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"I think we should find shelter soon," Kurai suggested, "I don't want anything happening to you."

Kesshō positioned her hands on his shoulders and pushed herself up. Hanging her legs off his shoulders as she rested her upper body on his head. Bending forwards, she hung her head in front of him, staring at his face, tilting her head to the side.

"Sorry but I can't read minds, I have no clue what you mean to say by being so excessive," Kurai sighed.

"Can continue? If alone?" Kesshō inquired, not bothering to rack her brain to form a proper sentence.

"I really thought you would be able to speak properly by now, but I guess you can only speak how much you have learnt from hearing others," Kurai sighed. Kesshō tilted her head to the other side, still confused and waiting for an answer.

"Yes, if I was alone it won't be hard to continue, but with you I don't think it's a good idea for me to do so," Kurai answered.

Kesshō straightened her body and raising her hand pointed forwards. "Rain, good, continue."

Kurai glanced upwards at her and smiled. "Really just as I remember, I do really wish you never change." Kesshō tilted her head at him again, lowering her head in front of him. "Nothing, enjoy the stormy weather, and don't break your neck." Kurai laughed.

Kesshō nodded and looked up at the sky, feeling the rain on her face. It started raining even faster, but the raindrops were fairly thin and light, not like she would feel much of the impact due to her scales anyways. She started to like the feeling of the rain hitting her body and spread her arms, welcoming the downpour. As if satisfied to know that she liked it, the clouds rained even more heavily as the winds roared through the trees, shaking them and bending them to the sides, almost felling some of the weaker ones.

Kesshō's hair, even after being completely drenched in water didn't stick to her body, floating in the wind. Her body, being mostly water resistant, caused most of the water to slide right off after a short moment, but even her hair started to get soaked now after so much rain. A strand of hair stuck to her face from between her eyes, going to the side of her nose and off her cheek. Most of her hair hung loosely behind her, being tossed to the side with the roaring winds.

Even though all her tails were hidden under her coat, even they were soaked in water by now. She allowed the phoenix tails to be their normal length, hanging loosely behind her, just slightly above the ground. Thunder roared in the sky a second or two after a bright flash of lightning, forming zigzagging patterns in the sky.

A loud crackling sound echoed through the forest as lightning struck a nearby tree, lighting it ablaze. Kesshō used her echolocation to check if anyone got hurt there, not being able to get a good estimate due to the rain. She focused completely, separating out the sounds of the rain from the sounds of everything else. She needed to account for rain falling on different surfaces too, on the dirt, rocks, grass, leaves, branches, on her and Kurai, she needed to think of all of them and seperate them out to be able to get a good estimate, something she already learnt how to do, and this served as not much more than practice.

The first time she did this she failed miserably, and the attempt after that as well, but she perfected it in the third. She focused and analysed the environment, zoning in on the struck tree slowly. Kesshō gasped on realising a small figure lay by the tree, most likely been struck by the lightning, it's beating heart barely noticeable even by her ears.

Kesshō launched herself off Kurai and bolted towards the tree, retracting her tails inside her coat to keep them from dragging behind her or getting tangled anywhere due to being wet right now. Kurai called out to her but she ignored it, too focused on something else to worry about it. Bursting out of a bush she reached the tree, examining the environment and finding the creature struck by lightning. She found it fairly quickly, having been able to locate it with her echolocation beforehand. Kurai appeared from the same bush just as she crouched down to examine the little creature.

"Please don't bolt away like that, you really made me worry there," Kurai requested.

Kesshō didn't respond, too focused on the little creature that lay in front of her. Kurai also noticed it, though he didn't say anything. He walked up to her and crouched down beside her, examining the creature. Kesshō could see that it's soul patterns were getting fainter and fainter, knowing very well that when the patterns disappear a creature is dead. She clenched her fists, not knowing what she should do to save it, being incapable of using magic. Kurai didn't treat it and waited for her, his attention on her actions more than the little creature. Kesshō breathed heavily as panic clawed at her heart, being able to feel the creature's the slowing heart. Noticing this Kurai laid his hand on her head, calming her down as her breathing became slower.

"Don't worry, even if you won't be able to save it, it will still find a better life in the next one," Kurai reassured.

Kesshō looked at him for a few moments and nodded understandingly. She took in a deep breath and prepared to try treat the little creature in whatever way she could. Firstly, she figured out what she needed to treat, which in this case were severe burns and it's slowing heart, the creature being charred completely and turned entirely black like a piece of charcoal.

Kesshō formed a snake's head with her right hand and took in a deep breath before striking at the little creature's heart with it. It seemed like a gamble to her, but it worked. She could see the creature's patterns already being revitalized to some extent. Breathing a sigh of relief she prepared to heal it's burns, wondering how she could do so.

Using the death touch technique in such a way? Inventive, Kurai observed.

Kesshō sat still, confused on how to treat it's burns, never having been taught any method for it Kurai sighed and pointed to her before forming a bird with both his hands. Kesshō's wings burst forth from behind her and she plucked a feather out of one, knowing just what Kurai meant.

"Phoenixal Art: Rejuvenating Inferno." Kesshō mumbled, not knowing why she said so, or even did what she did, having acted subconsciously and on impulse.

The feather burst into blue-pink flames as she swung her arm to the side, unleashing a wave of blue-pink flames in front of her, covering a large area including the giant tree which got struck by lightning. Both Kesshō and Kurai glanced at eachother, surprised and shocked by the inferno. Kesshō tilted her head and lowered one ear, attempting to look innocent, earning a resigned sigh from Kurai.

As the flames died down, Kesshō realised the tree returned back to normal mostly, no longer being charred, leaves sprouting from it's branches. Grass also burst forth from the ground around it, along with a few flowers blooming there. The rain seemed to have boosted the effectiveness of the spell by several times, from what her subconscious told her at the very least. She felt the last time she witnessed this spell it happened to be much smaller, though she failed to remember when she last witnessed it.

Kesshō and Kurai both looked in awe at the tree before returning their attention to the little creature as it shuffled around, slowly pushing itself to its feet. It's body already returned back to normal and it seemed much healthier, as if nothing ever happened. Kesshō picked it up and hugged it, the creature not resisting in the slightest and nudging her with its snout, most likely knowing she is the one who saved it. Not being worried about saving it any longer, she took a good look at the creature's features.

It seemed to be some form of a dragonoid creature, possessing four limbs armed with black claws. It seemed to be covered in majorly black feathers, randomly placed feathers of all sorts of colors present all over its body however. Kesshō could feel a layer of tough scales underneath the feathers, very much like her own, dragon scales. It's body ended with a tail covered in black feathers with randomly placed colorful feathers, similar to the rest of its body, some longer feathers at the end of the tail bursting into all sorts of colors, making up about a third of its total body length. It's head also appeared to be covered in black feathers, two large ears positioned on either side of it towards the top, similar in shape to fox ears. Its jaws resembled a dragon's, a snout at the upper jaw, and the inside lined with razor sharp teeth. Its eyes seemed to be made of the starry sky itself, mainly black irises dotted with all sorts of colors resembling brightly colored stars in a night sky.

"Well, it's time to leave." Kurai called out as he stood up, bringing Kesshō back to attention.

Kesshō got up, still holding the little creature. It showed no resistance to what she did, simply appearing to be curious. Kurai walked a bit further to move out of the downpour under a tree, waiting for Kesshō to release the creature back into the forest. Kesshō came and stood right beside Kurai, waiting for him to lead the way, still holding the little creature.

Kurai turned to her with a sigh. "Kesshō, release it back into the wild, you can't have it," Kurai ordered.

Kesshō raised the creature to Kurai's face, showing it to him closely. Kurai simply looked at it with a slightly annoyed look. The creature shrugged, gesturing there is nothing it could do, causing Kurai to raise his brow at the gesture. He stepped back from it and thought for a short while, staring at the creature, making it nervous. Kesshō stepped forward and pressed the creature against Kurai's chest, that being high as she reached.

"Fine, fine, you can keep it, just take good care of it, I am not responsible for it." Kurai sighed, gesturing her to follow.

Kesshō cheerily followed, happy to have been allowed to keep the little creature. She kept the creature close to her chest with her arms wrapped around it, hoping to keep it warm and away from the cold rain. The direction of the rain however, happened to be from the front, causing her idea to not work in the slightest as the rain fell right on the creature's face. As for keeping it warm, Kesshō failed to realise the creature is warm-blooded, while she is cold-blooded, meaning she only succeeded in warming herself up if anything. Kurai sighed at her carelessness, knowing he would need to keep an eye on the little thing as well now.

He kept one eye at the creature's behaviour, though the creature failed to realise he did. Kurai, not being one to miss details easily, felt certain that a creature without intelligence won't shrug like that at him, and even with intelligence it's a very human thing to do. Leading him to suspect the creature to be either a highly intelligent being well acquainted with human behaviour, or a human turned into that due to a spell, granted there also remained the possibility of it being just a coincidence.

Still, Kurai chose not to let his guard down with matters involving Kesshō, something he already did a while ago when they got ambushed, the two only having been allowed to escape due to the group not even attempting a capture and simply testing them.

The three walked through the stormy weather, which only one of them really seemed to be enjoying. Kurai started to suspect Kesshō caused the rain, though not consciously, due to him knowing very well the weather currently should be on the warmer side, and Kesshō hated warm weathers, but the chances of that were low, although there were still chances. Due to Kesshō's weird ability to cause magical phenomena unintentionally, having a massive amount of mana for someone incapable of using it, Kurai wouldn't be surprised if she actually caused the storm.

Being a mix so many species meant to possess and use mana, but not being capable of using it, much of the mana at times unintentionally leaked from her body, causing phenomena in the surroundings according to her recent wishes. It didn't grant her wish, only causing phenomena that worked in correspondence with her wishes, bringing them a step closer to fulfillment.

His suspicions grew as time passed and the winds grew stronger, reaching the speed of fourth category cyclones. Even Kurai found it hard to continue, starting to heavily suspect Kesshō to be the cause of it as the storm seemed to be centred near them. He refused to believe such a strong storm could occur so suddenly, and without the formation of an eye, not in common cases at the very least.

They slowly made their way to a small burrow in a raised hill, where they sat at the entrance of it as the downpour drummed loudly along with the occasional thunder. Only when shielded from the downpour did Kurai notice that Kesshō has been walking with the help of her tails. Four of them stabbing into the ground and pulling her forwards as she attempted to walk while other four kept her hooked to the ground. Due to her light build, if not for her tails, its anyone's guess what would happen to her in such powerful winds.

Kurai sat at a comparatively raised and drier spot inside the burrow, only to realise that what seemed like a burrow when hidden behind a curtain of rain, actually turned out to be a mineshaft, an unexpected discovery, but he disregarded it as it did not concern him. Kesshō came and sat on his lap, her fairly water resistant body already having started to dry. The little creature on the other hand, having been entirely drenched in water and shivering, curled up into a ball in her arms.

Kesshō let out a small plume of fire, lighting the environment and warming everyone up, along with drying them faster. Kurai looked around for anything to light on fire so they can have a constant fire burning, before remembering Kesshō's flames are, fundamentally, phoenixal flames, which do not die out until their work has been completed, or they have been forcibly extinguished.

"Can you breath some fire on the ground somewhere?" Kurai requested. "Not too much, just a bit, and don't make it spread around."

Kesshō nodded and opened her jaws, a light glow traveling through her neck as she let out a blast of flames on the ground, releasing a beautiful blue-pink pulse along the surface as a fire ignited at the area of impact. Kesshō then rested her head on Kurai, loosening her grip on the little creature as she allowed it to rest in her lap.

Seeing the opportunity, the little thing bounded out of Kesshō's arms, startling her. She did not get up, not wanting to forcefully keep it with her if it wished to not stick around, but her worries were unfounded. It simply placed itself close to the fire, dangerously close even, and lied down to rest, seeming to have drifted to sleep before long.

Kesshō also fell asleep on Kurai before much time passed, and he didn't have anything to do so he also chose to sleep. Trying to do anything would have woken her up anyways, unless he carried her along with him, which would be far too troublesome. Something he found from experimenting long ago, that if Kesshō fell asleep near him, and senses that he is not nearby while she is asleep, she will instantly wake up, and no trick worked in trying to make her think he is still there, so he let it be since it did not seem necessarily like a bad thing. He needed to maintain her trust and affection till the time came afterall.