It’s a couple hours after the incident. Much later then when all of us: Me, Angela, Rob and Jack sat all together on the new graveyard.

And now again we sit, now without Angela. A deathly mood settles as we each sit on a separate log, forming a triangle with a fire comfortably burning the little twigs we put in it away.

We were in the middle of nowhere – the forest. As darkness settles in.

“So, where do we begin...?”

I start unwillingly, knowing eventually at some point I must.

They meet with a prolonging silence and diverging eye contact away from me, and towards anywhere else.

“How could you possibly think that Ed is dangerous...?”

Once again, I venture into the silence. They look at each other before Jack starts to speak.

“Listen... There must be a reason that they took Ed away for being dangerous. They would never just do that without being provoked. You must have heard it! They said he was a time emblem monster!”

“Monster...?”

I bluntly respond.

“What has he ever done to you that was so bad? What has he ever asked of you that was so bad?”

“Nothing...”

“Then how dare you have the audacity to call him a monster!?”

All the meanwhile, Rob watches in silence.

“Time emblem or not he is still our friend!”

“We should just move on from him...”

Jack continues.

“And what If I developed a time emblem? Would you simply move on?”

“What? Of course not! I’ve known you much longer.”

“Jack this isn’t going to work out... Any friend of yours is a friend of mine. And any friend of mine – I would die for.”

He’s quiet now; I continue without hesitation.

“We need to get Ed back somehow, or at least help him! I say we train as hard as possible! And when the time comes, we go help Ed! Who’s in with me!?”

Rob makes direct eye contact with me for the first time in a while.

“I’m in!”

He triumphs, and then we both look towards Jack. The youngest in the group of us by far – almost thirteen.

“I just can’t...”

A disappointed voice come out, and he get up and starts to leave.

“Jack.”

I quickly utter, and he stops.

“I don’t blame you, you have your entire life ahead, five or so years until you get to our age. Do something useful, it’s not too late for you master a profession and go work in the capital. Age beats the competition.”

“Thanks, Gaven... I’ll see you around.”

“I’ll see you around too...”

He finally leaves and when we can no longer hear crisp leaves being decimated by his footsteps we start speaking seriously.

“So, what now Gaven...?”

“We train and train unleashing the hell out of our emblems, and if no emblems then we will make sure that pure skill beats talent.”

“But what about our families and lives?”

“It’s a massive sacrifice, but I'm sure they’ll understand at some point. Arthur was a second father and brother to anyone around that knew him. And if we out of all people don’t stand up for this wrong-doing than who will!?”

“Alright then I see.”

“Tomorrow we will start, as soon as the sun can be first seen. I will see you there at the river.”

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We both head back, and as I eat my last meal for the day. I savour every bite, as I know that very well this could be my last comfortable feeling for a while.”

I sleep with a scorching soul of unrest. And soon enough after a few rare hours of sleep, the skies outside my window grow lighter.

In the midst of everyone sleeping, I get up like an eagle eagerly waiting for a moment to hunt.

A silhouette stands, on top the bridge walking towards me. Soon enough, we are standing face to face. Me and Rob, in a midst of the night, merging into the morning.

“You with your bladed emblem, and even if I don’t find an emblem of my own, we will train until absolute mastery of our skills Summon two swords!”

“Zwaarden komen tevoorschijn!”

He grabs the air, as if he is swatting a fly or insect out the way. Then a pair of swords appear. Fine forged, and slightly worn out with scratches – with many more to go.

He draws his sword with a hand, and I draw out mine through the intense weight of each inch of steel – holding it out feeling my arm starting to feel the tension.

“Let’s start then.”

In a swift action, he pulls back his blade, and orchestrates a wavy strike down at the ground.

“That would have hit you.”

Looking in my eye he says.

“However, that would have never killed me. With that unsteady strike you leave yourself wide open.”

I raise my sword up, whilst speaking, while his blade is down. He rushes to pull up. And right as he does so.

I sweep his legs with a dash, and then a hit to his ankle. He falls. His sword falling, and then dancing on the fall.

“Lesson one – don’t let your guard down! And get those strikes under control!”

He looks at me whilst on the ground, and then he tries to dash for me, I jump backwards and as I do, he reaches for his sword. He pushes the handle, accelerating the sword right at my feet as I land down.

Then by no more than a millimetre, he misses.

“Same goes to you!”

“Gaven!? Rob!?”

A voice from behind us on top of the bridge follows.

We look in slight awe and caution, wondering who other than use could be up at such a time.

“Angela...?”

We both say in unison, all of us look in confusion.

“What are you doing out here Angela?”

Rob asks.

“I could ask the same! But let’s not make this so complicated.”

She walks closer to us and starts.

“I took Aella to my house. I told her it was a surprise and she would be staying with us a couple days... My parents accepted the idea, even my sister – but they said we need to tell her at some point.”

“And now...?”

I stoke the conversation.

“I came here to load off all that worry and stress... And you?”

“Me and Rob decided we will train to eventually go help Ed.”

Staring, she frowns slightly at me.

“And why didn’t you tell me or ask me if I wanted to!?”

Me and Rob look at each other, trying to configure some sort of response that would heavily deescalate the situation.

“Well... Because we couldn’t find you!”

“Is that really your excuse?”

“Seriously, I’m worried about you. What if something happens to you?”

“Why would you worry about me? Remember I’m a water emblem caster, am I not? And what about Ed is he only your friend? He's my friend too! And whether you like it or not I am coming!”

Rob looks at me in silence – rightfully so. I would never ever, want to throw myself in a rip current.

“Get ready then...”

Rob goes with a sigh, and even though initially I think he is naturally talking to Angela... I realise how wrong am I when he seems to be making eye contact with me.

“We’ll do a free for all tag game, if you get touched, you're out. And after all that, we can work double on any weaknesses.”

I declare.

“How’s that fair when you don’t have an emblem?”

Rob points out.

“Nothing is fair in the real world. So, everything goes.”

We all without any communication move backwards, and end up in a triangle formation.

“Three. Two. One. Go!”

Contrary to the race-like behaviour I expect, even after I said ‘Go’ we all stand sill with a guard up. Looking at each other, almost anticipating every single move.

Rob with his blade and bladed emblem, Angela with her water emblem and me, well with nothing but a blade. It feels useless to have a blade even in this situation when all I can do it kill with it.

Five seconds pass.

“Beweging!”

Angela shouts as fast as possible, the moment I hear it I start running without much of a plan. And as I do Rob starts to run for Angela. Just like that I find myself running after him.

In all of the chaos, I almost forget what Angela had done – cast a spell! I stop and as Rob is blindly running, I see a massive sphere of water travelling across the sky matching the movement of Angela’s hand.

Then, as Rob stops to see what's happening. The entire entity of water drains onto him, through Angela’s hand gesture of letting go.

In the middle of all of this, Rob stands still guarding his face hoping to withstand the great force of at least a ton of water.

Then she shouts one more time.

“Bevriezen!”

Then he stands completely still as all the ice around him slowly freezes towards him.

And as he starts to become one with the frozen prison she casts again.

“Breken!”

She dives to tag him and perfectly as she is about to make contact with the ice, it all melts and disappears. Rob not able to do anything remains frozen, standing still.

Then as she is about to collide with the ice around him, it perfectly melts and she touches him with her index, before crashing into him.

I see the opportunity and rush, without Angela even noticing I tag her, finally she sees me, she just then realises.

“So, it looks like we have a lot yet to improve... Beginning with, Angela. You can’t just throw all your abilities like that, it’s too energy intensive although highly effective. And that dive left you vulnerable, but could be useful sometimes. And Rob you can’t just run in like that, try be more aware, although good care with your stance. Now you give me some feedback.”

“Gaven since when were you a profession army general... How do you know all of this already?”

Rob intrigues.

“Simple experience in games that’s all, I am sure if it happened with me both of you would notice.”

Angela laughs awkwardly while looking away.

“Oh, come on though, I’m not special! Angela you one hundred percent can! But now let’s get to the real training, we’re going to train to get from here to there in one run.”

And when I mean ‘there’, It is the furthest thing that I could see, a random mountain or hill in the long distance, and I get a very familiar feeling about it. Although, obviously it didn’t mean anything because I know for a fact, that I had never been there before.

“Okay let's start now! And then we can train your emblems and skills, I know we’ll be facing enemies ten times stronger than us! So, on my mark! Three! Two! One! Go!”