"Damn, it's already too late. It took longer than I thought," he cursed, his breath catching from running.

"I think we shouldn't have done this, Agito," lamented the one running beside him at the same pace.

Agito stopped to catch his breath. He had to take a deep breath to calm his racing heartbeat.

"What do you mean? She deserved it, Inari."

Inari had his hands on his knees. He swallowed with some effort and, imitating his friend, regulated his breathing.

"We went too far, Agito. She must be hurt," said Inari, a bit worried. Although it was true that he remembered the embarrassment of the previous day.

"I thought we were just going to scare her a bit," he questioned, standing upright and piercing his friend with an accusatory look.

"And we did, didn't we?" Agito responded proudly, raising an eyebrow and flashing a half-smile.

"Hey, don't look at me like that, you agreed too," he hurried to clarify when he felt Inari's accusing gaze in his gray eyes.

"Alright, alright, maybe we did go a bit too far," he admitted reluctantly.

The boys had stopped a little distance from where they had left Mana, but not too far. They planned to go get her once she had "learned her lesson." From where they were, they could hear the desperate voice of the girl.

Agito chuckled softly. "I can't wait to see her face when she finds out it was us."

Inari forced a half-smile. He didn't find it as funny. He had spent most of his childhood with his brother and her; they were very close. Elia even took care of him every time Igro went hunting. When she found out, she would surely be very disappointed in him. She was the only maternal figure he knew, as his parents had died when he was very young.

"I think it's enough already. We should go get her; it's getting dark," Inari requested. Regret was evident in every part of his body.

Agito's dark eyebrows, a few shades darker than his skin, furrowed. It was too late for regrets, and by the way his friend spoke, it seemed like he was the only one to blame. He grabbed Inari's white shirt and clenched it in his fists.

"I don't like this attitude of yours at all, Inari. I decide when it's enough," he declared with an air of superiority, as if his authority were absolute.

They would have gotten into an argument if it weren't for the movement they caught out of the corner of their eyes, stopping them instantly.

In the dark forest, anything could kill you in the blink of an eye, and it was already late. They had made a grave mistake by venturing so far. Their bodies froze simultaneously as if they were competing to see who could hold still the longest.

Both turned, first their eyes slowly, then their heads. They swallowed almost in unison.

They scanned the body of the creature in front of them, from its segmented abdomen, covered in tiny scales lighter than those that followed on its chest, navy blue. These reached its jaw, then changed to smaller, snake-like ones. Until they stopped at its eyes, floating in the darkness like two stones of the brightest blue.

It had to be at least twice their size; it was enormous and robust. The claws resting on either side exuded pure danger. All their alarms went off when the creature's pupils dilated for a moment; it was the creature they saw at the Green Lake. At night, its appearance was even more striking.

Those seconds seemed like hours while they remained frozen in place. The sweat sliding down their faces was evidence of the tremendous mental stress they must be experiencing.

The creature drilled them with its gaze, shifting it from one to the other. What were those two boys doing in the dark forest? If it remembered correctly, they were the ones who saw it. What were they up to here?

A muscle twitched under its left eye upon hearing the distant pleas. It directed its attention there and squinted. By the time it returned its gaze to the boys, they were already running in opposite directions at full speed, driven by fear.

It raised its eyebrows slightly, bored. It decided to ignore them and advanced toward where the other human's voice was coming from.

***

Mana tried to keep her composure as much as she could; panicking wouldn't do her any good. If she didn't act, she had little chance of getting out alive. *I'm not going to die here.*

She gave up trying to remove the rope; it was tightly bound around her wrists.

She had tried to break them by rubbing against a rock on the ground, but it was taking too long, and she could hardly see anything. It didn't seem that late, but in the dark forest, very little light pierced the canopy of leaves formed between the trees.

She needed to hurry and get out while she could still see something. Finding the exit was her priority, but she had no idea which direction to go. All paths seemed the same, and her patience was running out.

*I won't gain anything by staying here.* She thought as she walked with determined steps. She was still sore from being dragged and had to ensure her feet didn't give out; she needed them to get out of there.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"You're going in the wrong direction." The girl stopped dead in her tracks upon hearing the deep voice resonate through the forest like an echo.

Mana turned slowly to her right, where she located the voice. A figure covered in shadows was approaching her without making the slightest sound. If it weren't for her seeing it, she couldn't say it was moving.

With the poor lighting, it looked like a person, a tall and robust man, maybe a hunter.

Her eyes shone with hope. If it was a Cepir hunter, he could get her out of there. However, in just a few more steps, she concluded it wasn't human. Its silhouette certainly resembled one, but no human could move so silently, as if it didn't exist, like a predator stalking its prey, ready to sink its fangs.

Everything in her told her to run in the opposite direction and get as far away as possible.

The creature remained hidden, where the thin rays of the moon couldn't touch it, and the girl covered her mouth with a hand when she glimpsed the bright spheres she understood to be its eyes. She had never seen anything so beautiful, and dangerous, as if they absorbed all the light in the world to plunge everything into darkness, or to illuminate it.

*It's not human.* The air around her became dense and heavy, almost as if she could touch it. A thin drop of sweat slid down her temple. She was completely defenseless, hands bound and injured. Her legs wouldn't respond even if she stabbed them.

The silence was tormenting and eternal under that gaze. Mana was getting impatient; if it was going to kill her, it was better to do it now. She felt her throat clear, ready to utter the words that might get her out of there.

"Do you know which direction Cepir is?" she dared to ask in such a low tone she feared it hadn't heard her.

The creature raised an eyebrow, as if surprised or insulted by her question. Mana couldn't tell which, but she hoped it was the first; her life depended on it. The creature began to walk toward her with a hypnotic step.

Her throat instantly dried up, and she swallowed.

She hadn't realized she had been holding her breath until her lungs started to burn. The creature was just a few steps in front of her; now she could see it more clearly. Its navy blue scales, sharp claws, and the thick tail it smoothly dragged across the ground were all hidden before, indicating that its entire body was a lethal weapon. It could easily strangle her with it.

She slightly widened her eyes, recalling the description given by the boys at the inn.

*Large, blue scales, claws, and a thick tail with spikes.* Her heart raced due to nerves.

*It's him.* She thought as her lips curved slightly upward, containing the joy that invaded her. She had been longing to see it for a long time, and there it was, in front of her. She couldn't believe it. Her legs gave way, and she fell to the ground, sitting on them.

She forced herself not to analyze it further. She kept her gaze on its eyes, which, unlike its body, indicated the opposite, kind and with a certain sadness. And though its appearance was undoubtedly threatening, it didn't seem like the beast the villagers talked about. Its face had some similarity to humans, hardened by its sharp features.

She noticed the creature raising a protuberance that would be its eyebrow again. Maybe it was insolent to hold its gaze, but she couldn't help it, as if a powerful magnetism drew her to it.

The creature crouched, elegantly kneeling on one knee.

Mana's eyes widened. What kind of god would kneel before a human?

She let out a gasp when the creature raised its arm and, with a swift motion, cut the rope binding her arms. She hadn't expected it to do something like that so suddenly.

The girl rubbed her sore wrists and felt the warmth return to her pale hands down to her fingers. She returned her gaze to the being with a broad smile.

"Thank you."

The creature furrowed its brow and stood up, moving a few steps to the right. It pointed with one of its claws the path the girl should follow.

"If you go in that direction, you'll reach your village," it responded coldly without taking its eyes off the human.

Mana raised her eyebrows. She didn't waste time; she got up as best she could and started walking. She could feel a sort of light highlighting the path she should follow, though maybe it was her imagination playing tricks on her, a product of the mix of emotions she was experiencing.

She looked over her shoulder for a moment after walking a bit; the creature had already disappeared. She looked back ahead, a little sad, wanting to thank it again. She smiled, knowing she could return to the village.

***

The creature now walked with confusion etched on its face. Did that human just thank it? When had a human ever thanked it before? Certainly, she was afraid, but it didn't notice her having a particular fear of it, rather of everything around her. She was quite an insolent human, daring to ask it something and even holding its gaze.

It stopped, detecting the constant stalking of something hidden in the shadows. It had been following since it appeared in front of the human. It could sense it easily; the environment around it reeked of rotting blood.

In the Grove, a large number of beings coexist, even more so in areas hunters wouldn't dare to explore.

"How long do you plan to keep watching, scavenger?" it retorted at the insistence of this one to remain hidden.

It didn't appear; rather, it vanished. The god grew bored and continued its path in silence.

***

Mana had been moving, following the direction marked by the creature precisely, maneuvering around trees or branches that blocked her way.

Her whole body begged her to collapse, but against that urge, she forced herself to keep walking. Every step she took brought her closer to the village. She had been walking for a while. She really had ventured far.

She looked down and noticed her clothes. Her long beige skirt, which reached her ankles, was torn in several places. Inside this, her once-white, long-sleeved shirt began, now full of cuts and mud.

*How am I supposed to explain this? I don't even know who did it. Father will kill me when he sees me, I hope.* The more she thought about it, there was only one possible culprit, the adventurer from the previous day. But she had heard more than one person leaving, or was it her imagination?

In any case, there was no point in thinking about it now. She could already see the orange lights from the village's torches. Her eyes widened and her mouth opened into a smile. She was almost there.

She couldn't believe it had been the creature, so hated by the villagers of Cepir, who had led her back home. Certainly, its features were not entirely human, but its eyes... *Oh gods, they were so beautiful.*

She was sure she would never forget them.

She was already exiting the grove. The moon was at its highest point, waxing. It would soon be a full moon, possibly a hunter's moon given its current size.

Night had completely fallen. Her parents would be alarmed, and she was surely in for a good scolding once she arrived. She took a deep breath and continued her way towards the wall. She raised one of her arms as she approached so that the guards at the north gate would spot her. She could only wave it twice before lowering it.

"It's Mana!" someone shouted from the tower.

The enormous red wooden gate opened with a creak that made her wince.

Her vision began to blur and her eyelids became heavy as lead. She knelt just inside the gate, exhausted. Her body had surpassed any limit just to get her home; now that she was there, she could rest.

She closed her eyes and swayed to one side before opening them again, collapsing to the ground. A couple of men were approaching, running, as her vision faded completely.

"Mana, are you alright?"

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