They had been walking and sprinting for over an hour, resting only to relieve themselves once in a while.
Looking at it from his former position, it seemed to only be a few kilometers away, but his heart burning told another story. To a lively and active person, this might be considered whining, in truth he could be regarded as a man with unnatural endurance and strength, which he showed off to no one in particular as he outran Alric. Though it could also be a kind of payback for making him see all those fucked up memories.
His companion simply laughed it off however, and by standards, it really was more like a maniacal laugh than an amused laugh, or maybe both. Either way, he was annoyed by the latter, and terrified by the former.
All the running and ducking under tree branches without any out of the ordinary happening gave him time to think and look back at what happened before they began running into the forest...
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He tried to blink once, then twice, then rapidly in succession, to no avail.
The moment he stepped forward in sync with Alric, his vision went blank. If not for the fact that the whiteness of the surroundings contrasted too greatly to the usual darkness behind closed eyes, he would have thought he simply dreamt all that happened with Alric. But it was not to be so.
What felt like eternity finally ended, the former environment filled his sight with Alric right in front, who had a face of confusion but with a smirk on the corner of his mouth readied.
Alric waved his hand and a virtually-made table came into view. It was more or less detailed, but riddled only with the most important info we needed. Alric's smirk turned into a full-blown smile that seemed just as creepy as his laugh, unfortunately even as a man himself, he can't see Alric as anything but good-looking at the very least, especially when compared to him.
He formerly had dark brown hair, but being Alric's first follower, his hair turned ash brown, only a shade darker to Alric's ash gray hair. His chiseled looks contrasted the soft, round face of his companion; the latter was as beautiful as he was handsome, the former became almost as good-looking as Alric but only because of the transformation.
Before Alric crowned himself, he was only a plain-looking guy whose only hobby was to work on his strength and fighting ability, but during the coronation, he changed slowly.
Alric was the first to change.
Already considerably attractive, the transformation only served to emphasize his looks.
Then the first follower followed suit, the plain countenance and relatively large built changed into a manly sort of look with a slimmer figure, though if one were to look behind his clothes, one would find that his muscles never toned down. In fact, his muscles even increased in density by a bit.
"Mind if you show yours?" Alric looked at his first follower with eyes full of expectation, not even trying to hide his blatant excitement.
Status Window Name: Casimir Age: 21 Race: (??) Affiliation: Alric's Party Power: C Potential: (??) Lineage: (????) Faith: (??) Titles Harbinger of War Fame: Negligible Infamy: Negligible Status Effects Harbinger of War: Immense Increase in Martial; Decrease in Statecraft and Intrigue Fame: (Depending on Fame level) Greater Increase in Martial; Decrease in Intrigue Infamy: (Depending on Infamy level) Greater Increase in Martial and Fate; Decrease in Statecraft and Intrigue Martial: Superior Statecraft: Novice Intrigue: Novice Knowledge: Competent Fate: Superior
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Casimir squinted his eyes slightly as Alric grew only more curious to the status window his follower showed.
"What's this?" Alric pointed towards the virtual table, with a smirk slowly forming on his lips. "Harbinger of War? Question marks on the race?"
Even the man in question knew nothing of the title he was given. Perhaps titles were given as well for the potential future as an advance, or perhaps he had done something he did not know of, or maybe there was an error on the table?
And the race part, while his memories were enough to make him see his childhood, he never knew his parents. He was orphaned at birth, and this revelation about his race actually made sense.
However, thinking too deeply into things never helped anyone, Casimir resolved to find out more but left that for meanwhile and focused on the immediate event.
"The comet. We need to find it, Alric." He appeared to be resolute, but in all honesty he was scared. Everything was happening too fast, he was unlike Alric who wanted everything to happen. Adapting to the situation was difficult for him, but he resolved himself as he recalled jumbled up memories of his past and Alric's past.
The crowned young man returned Casimir's look with a grin on his face and pupils dilated, indicating a sincere compassion for the situation and the actions they were to partake in.
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After another half an hour of walking and running, Casimir finally saw smoke belching from the horizon. An indication that the comet fell nearby the area and caused a few of the trees to catch fire and friction.
The group of two finally slowed their advance slightly to recover some of their stamina in preparation to what they might encounter when they find the comet.
Crown, comet, and status windows. These were all relatively ominous signs that foreshadowed a change in the Arkus.
While Alric was mostly curious and excited for what was to come, drowning out any speculations he might have for the events occurring, Casimir had a clear head that questioned many of the happenings.
What was the crown exactly? How did it change their appearance and even their power? What were the status windows and does everyone have them? Where did that comet come from and what was it exactly?
His mind was riddled with all these unanswered questions, and the more time he was left inside his head, the more questions piled up on top of each other.
Suddenly, his thoughts interrupted, a scream came from the other direction of the smoke. It was a scream that most likely came from a woman. Casimir contemplated just running toward that direction and helping the woman, but he was frozen in fear. Despite all his strength, he felt a fear normal to most people encountering danger.
Alric, though, simply changed directions instantly and motioned Casimir to follow him. This gave Casimir a short fright but ultimately followed as he felt a distinct connection and pull from Alric that he felt he could never detach.
The amount of screams increased as they got closer and closer, which gave way to horrifying growls that drowned out most of the fear-induced, loud, piercing cries for help.
As the two reached the clearing, they saw what was once a small settlement nearby a river, but the buildings were in disrepair. The damages looked as if they were freshly made, and if one were to think that, one would be right.
Casimir scanned the surroundings and saw, more than just the buildings, humans being dragged and thrown and even eaten by some kind of human-shaped flesh creatures.
He squinted his eyes and saw the features of one of the said creatures. Its head was pure flesh except for the hard-looking bone that covered the upper parts of its head. The lower parts were soft-looking though horrifying jagged teeth covered the whole area from horn to horn. They had no ears, in place were bull-like horns that protruded from the back toward the front, and were menacingly sharp. Dark and seemingly deep holes replaced where eyes were supposed to be in place. Its body was bone and flesh that looked to be brittle, but that would be wrong.
As Casimir was gasping inaudibly at the terrifying scene of blood and carnage, Alric dashed toward the nearest creature and used both hands to throw it at Casimir who reacted quickly enough to catch the head and pummel it to the ground.
Flesh and bone with not much blood except for their victim's sprawled all over the ground. Casimir withdrew his hand and clenched it, his eyes glanced momentarily at the creature then his fist, then raised his head to meet Alric's eye level.
"You can do this, Casimir." Alric said with conviction in his voice and an unhidden look of admiration for the display of strength and reflex from his companion.