As they crossed the city, Nil took notice of all the spots that would have been out of place on Earth. There was an alchemist’s shop, a smithy specializing in magical enchantments, and they even passed across the street from the adventurer’s guild the old man had mentioned. The town was smaller than they’d thought when they saw it from above, and the guild building was tiny, making the fact no one had offered to help more understandable. Still, there were a lot of travelers around, probably trying to cross from east to west or vice versa.
Nil wondered why they knew what was common on Earth if they weren’t human after all. Everything about Asphodel felt so foreign, and while they didn’t have any concrete memories of Earth, they instinctively knew what it was like to live there. That fact clashed with their assumed identity as a Seraph. Or, they imagined it did; they couldn’t recall any details about being one.
While Nil walked silently, ruminating by themself, the other members of the party were having a lively chat amongst themselves. Nil catched fragments of it; Ray asked Asha if she had any plans for after the mission, hoping she could join them more permanently, but she dismissed him by saying that she already had a destination in mind, although she didn’t specify which. Kai was talking up a storm at an annoyed Nova, pointing out everything that caught his eye about the city. The only one as distant as Nil was Max, who eventually approached them to start a conversation.
“I’m not good at being subtle, kid, so I’ll ask you straight out,” he said. “What actually happened back there, during the ceremony? And don’t tell me nothing happened, because you’re being painfully obvious about it.”
Nil looked down. “It’s… It’s complicated, Max.” They couldn’t just tell him they had remembered they were a mass murderer, or that the world would end in less than a year, or—
[If you don't trust anyone, you’ll never accomplish anything.]
That voice again. It wasn’t the same as the one who had saved them. Where did it come from?
Nil hesitated, more reluctant to follow its advice this time around. It wasn’t about trust; they trusted Max and the rest. It was just that—
[It is about trust. You believe they will abandon you once they know the truth.]
No! Nil was planning to leave either way, so why would they—
[It is easier to abandon than to be abandoned.]
Nil stopped walking, biting down hard on their lip. “Shut up,” they whispered. The voice didn’t respond.
Max turned back and frowned at them. “Nil?”
They shook their head and rushed back to the others. Max opened his mouth to speak, but Nil cut in. “I’m fine,” they said. Max eyed them with suspicion, but didn’t pry further.
The group soon reached the end of the town, where an ancient-looking stone gate was being watched by a single guard, who greeted the old man with familiarity.
“You found some willing adventurers?” the guard asked.
The old man nodded. “They’re fresh graduates from the Academy.”
The guard looked at them with a grateful smile. “Thanks for the help,” he said. “I hope you find Lynet soon; she’s never taken so long to come back before.”
“Are you a friend of hers?” Nova asked.
The guard scratched his head and chuckled. “Kind of,” he said. “I’m on duty here nearly every day. My orders are to not let anyone out without a reason, since it’s dangerous, but she was always begging me to let her pass. One day I told her that I would make an exception if she proved to me that she could defend herself.”
“And?” Nova said, raising an eyebrow. “What did she do?”
The guard laughed, seeming slightly embarrassed. “She beat me in a fight,” he admitted. “I couldn’t land a single hit on her.”
“I’d say that improves the chances of her being alright,” Ray said.
Asha nodded. “Even so, we should hurry, just in case.”
“You’re right,” the guard said. “I’ll open the gate, wait a second.” He walked up to a winch on the wall and the gate slid open as he activated the mechanism, revealing the icy tundra beyond.
The treeless landscape was decorated by a few bare bushes rising from the snow. The terrain became gradually steeper the more you advanced, leading to the mountains surrounding Owl’s Crown.
The old man took a moment to look around before pointing to a specific location where the cliffside was sharper than normal. The ground around that spot seemed to almost sink into it, creating an eerie shadow.
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
“You’ll have to follow along that side of the mountain,” the man said. “It shouldn’t take more than an hour to get to the cave.”
With that, the party set off on their first quest. Pretty early on, they realized the coats provided to them by the Academy weren’t the thickest in the world.
“At this rate we’re going to turn into icicles,” Ray complained, rubbing his hands together. “Isn’t it supposed to be spring already?”
Max sighed. “It’s the middle of spring, but that doesn’t seem to matter much up here. What did you expect? Just look at all the snow.”
“It was warmer back in the city,” Ray said. “I thought we’d be fine.”
Nova shook her head. “Of course it’s warmer in the city; it’s likely built to trap as much heat as possible. The people there feel the cold too, you know?”
Asha was doing well thanks to her leather armor, while Kai didn’t seem to mind the freezing temperature all that much. Nil themself, strangely, couldn’t feel it at all. Was it Tenacious at work, or something else entirely?
In the end, they decided to walk as close to the steep mountainside as possible, to be more guarded against the icy wind.
“It’s a good thing the layer of snow is thin,” Asha commented.
Max grunted in agreement. “It would be a pain in the ass to walk so far if it was any thicker.”
As if on cue, the snowfall started picking up. Within ten minutes, the group had a full-blown blizzard on their hands.
“You idiots just had to jinx it!” Nova yelled, her voice struggling to get through the heavy winds.
“Don’t be like that!” Ray shouted back. “You know it’s not their fault!”
Nova cursed under her breath. “I know, goddamnit!”
“Stop wasting your energy!” Max cried out. “Come here, I’m going to try something!”
Everyone gathered close to him, and Max closed his eyes and furrowed his brow, looking like he was trying to focus. Seconds later, the harsh wind and the snowfall both stopped. Actually, they had only stopped in their immediate surroundings.
“I’ve set up a barrier around us,” he said. “It’s pretty weak, since I would be wasting too much mana otherwise, but it should be able to handle this.” He breathed out heavily, causing a misty cloud to exit his mouth due to the low temperature. It was obvious maintaining concentration on the spell wasn’t a walk in the park.
The six of them kept on advancing through the tundra, huddled close since the barrier wasn’t too large. However, the visibility had become extremely limited, and some of them worried about being lost.
“We’ve been rounding the mountain like they told us,” Asha said. “Let’s trust we’re on the right track and keep an eye out for a cave.”
Her words managed to calm down the others for a while, but as time passed and they kept going, even she started to look uncertain.
“It’s been longer than an hour already…” Kai said, hugging himself to ward off the cold.
Nova sneezed. “Are you sure we haven’t already passed the entrance and missed it?”
“I–I don’t know,” Ray responded with chattering teeth.
Asha squinted, trying to make out something useful through the blizzard, but she stayed silent. Meanwhile, Max was too busy keeping up the barrier to think about anything else.
“This is the worst possible start to our adventuring careers…” Kai said, crestfallen. “We haven’t fought a single monster yet!”
Then, Asha raised a hand, prompting the whole group to stop moving.
“Wh–What is it?” Ray asked.
Nil stepped forward and narrowed their eyes, putting themself at the front of the party. “There’s something coming toward us.”
Asha nodded. Silence took over, leaving only the sound of the wind, muffled by the barrier. Eventually, a furry figure appeared through the heavy snow, limping and whimpering. It was barely a foot tall.
“A fox?” Nova said.
Kai gasped and rushed through the barrier, inadvertently breaking it and causing the fury of the elements to come down on the group once more. He grabbed the little white fox and ran back to the others. With a scowl, Max raised the barrier again.
“Don’t do that again!” he said. “You scared me!”
Kai ignored him, raising the animal up to his face to examine it more closely. “I think it’s hurt,” he said. “Max, use your healing magic!”
He grumbled about it, but did it nonetheless, although he had to deactivate the barrier for a few seconds to do it. Afterward, Kai let the fox down gently, and it yelped in what could be interpreted as a gesture of gratitude. Then, it spun around and barked again.
“I think it’s trying to tell us something!” Kai said.
Asha chuckled, amused by the situation. “Maybe it wants us to follow it?”
The little fox led them backward, retreading the path they had already traveled through, except this time they managed to find the cave without issue. The entrance to it was pretty big, too.
“How the hell did we miss that?” Nova said.
Ray shrugged. “I don’t care, I just want to get out of this blizzard.”
One after another, they all stepped into it and Max turned off his magic, clearly exhausted. “I hope I don’t ever have to do that again…” he said.
Just as they thought they had reached a place where they could take a break, a deep voice greeted them from the darkness of the cavern.
“More humans?” it said. “Why do you always insist on intruding upon that which doesn’t belong to you?”
Slowly, yet another furry figure emerged from the shadows, similar in shape to the little fox, but many, many times bigger. Its white fur was accented by red stripes, and its yellow eyes seemed to penetrate one’s very soul. Nine tails sprouted from its back, enveloping around its figure like a cloak.
Asha gasped in shock. “A kitsune?”
“I am done being merciful,” it said. “You humans have been running rampant for far too long. This holy site shall be your grave.”