Chapter 5: Witch’s gaze
In a vast and grassy plain that stretched for miles and miles on end, the sky was a perfect blue with pure white clouds that floated in the sky but did not block out the sun giving it reign to shine upon the land uninterrupted, the breeze was cool and helped balance out the heat from the sun.
Upon the plane was a white round table with two similar coloured chairs, the table had a complete tea set placed upon it, there was a large umbrella that gave the table and chairs some shade as protection from the sun and on one of the chairs was a woman.
The woman was a striking beauty. She had long white hair that flowed down her back to her waist, her skin was strikingly pale almost as if bleached, her black pupiled eyes shone with intelligence, as a contrast to her skin she wore a black dress with long sleeves, the woman’s beauty was enough to captivate even the most strong-willed people.
As of right now she stared at a crystal ball that was on her hand and watched two individuals that had peeked her curiosity, a man and woman, the woman was a red head who was equally beautiful as her and the man had silver white hair and was fairly handsome.
The man and woman were currently at a rundown village, handing out food to the starving villagers, what had peaked her curiosity was not their current actions but instead their power, she had never seen that type of power before, not only that but both had astronomical power much greater than hers.
The woman had a dark soul that seemed to house a power similar to hers. This, of course, made her very curious. She wondered if this woman had a similar origin as herself. There was also something hidden in that woman’s soul she couldn’t identify.
“Does she have it too??”
She wondered. However, the woman wasn’t what grabbed her attention the most. It was the man, his soul possessed myriad of colors like that of a rainbow, it was beautiful to see, it was mesmerizing almost as if drawing her in, however the most surprising thing about the man, the thing that made her curse the Gods for sealing her in this place, she wanted to jump out of this place and be right there with him and satiate her curiosity.
The man had performed something that she was never able to do, a field of magic that was lost even during her own time as an active member of society. The man had performed [ creation magic ]
The art of creating an object through the use of mana or the art of manipulating the mana particles in the air to create an object, that is creation magic, a very versatile very useful magic as a witch she could accomplish many things with that magic alone.
“hmm”
She let out a hum as she dug deep into her mind to find a way that could help her get that man to where her seal is located, she cannot simply sit here while a person wielding creation magic exists, she needs to find out how he accomplished it and find any other secrets he might hold.
…….
Jericho found himself befuddled and utterly shocked. He had no words to describe what he was currently witnessing.
Forgetting the two strangers that came out of nowhere and suddenly gave the people food that also came out of nowhere, what was most shocking to him was the near skeleton like villagers, sickly elders and malnourished children were currently laughing and dancing with wide smiles.
Jericho had spent about 5 months within this village going to and from the his home city trying to convince the villagers to abandon the village and search for greener pastures literally, but they didn’t listen.
He watched as the already dead village die even more. The people become akin to the undead until currently at this moment, all that he had seen could be thought to be a dream. Seeing the people like this brought a smile to his face he was sure this was their first taste of happiness they’ve had in a while.
Looking to the side choosing to take his eyes off the crowd of dancing villagers, his eyes went to look for the people were responsible.
There near one of the run down houses a man with white short hair and silver eyes was standing near a grill stand as he grilled the meat, there was large amount of it inside the house while near him a red haired woman with crimson eyes sat on a chair as she handed out fruits to everyone as they waited for the meat to be done.
It’s been close to at least 8 hours since the strangers arrived, and it was slowly getting dark. Everyone in the villagers should have had their fill of everything and should be full, but it seemed they still wanted more, and the man obliged, it seemed as if the food was endless.
To Jericho, this wasn’t what mages were capable of off or at least the few ones he had met were not capable of that, even the princess for all her genuis was unable to accomplish this.
It was at the dead of night that everyone seemed to have had enough and went to their homes to sleep, but they went home with bags full of food and fruits with seeds to plant tomorrow.
Reniris sat on a chair as she stared into the sky, watching the stars that seemed to glisten like jewels.
For some reason, she felt that she was seeing the stars for the first time, and perhaps she was, a satisfied sigh left her mouth. She felt good.
Helping those people made her feel good though that feeling quickly disappeared as she recalled the villagers and their families, her mood turned sour, she had a family name yet why could she not remember her own family?
With those thoughts, a singe of envy appeared in her heart, but that feeling quickly disappeared as she heard a voice beside her.
“You feeling alright?”
Eon was the one to ask, grasping her attention as he placed his chair closer to her and sat near her. Despite being attentive to his presence, she did not look at him. Despite having asked her that question, he was the one feeling the most tired.
“I’m fine, just feeling a little down about my missing memories regarding my family”
She confessed without turning to look, his response to her statement was a contemplative hum as he thought, in all honesty he had no idea what to say to her, in his past life he never really had a family so he was at loss for words.
“To be honest with you, Ren, I don’t know how to advise you, I’m sorry I can’t be helpful,"
He stated the truth, telling her false words of hope was not something he felt like doing. He didn’t want to feign understanding when he didn’t, it felt dishonest. After all, he doesn’t know what it felt like to know you have a family but not remember them.
“it’s fine, plus we helped a lot of people today”
She said with a smile and momentarily stunning Eon as he witnessed the smile of a goddess or at least that what he thought. To him, Reniris was a Goddess even though she’s a demon in reality.
“I-…I suppose we did”
The two sat in silence as both felt nothing could be said anymore.
“Can I join you?”
A voice that was accompanied by the sound of armor clanging, it was Jericho, who had brought his own chair and placed It right beside Eon.
“Did you even need to ask? you already joined before we could give an answer”
Jericho awkwardly laughed while scratching the back of his head. It wasn’t that Eon was displeased but rather was playful, but Jericho didn’t catch the playfulness in his tone.
“So? Did you need something?”
“No, I just simply thought I’d come and say thank you, what you guys did was great”
He bowed his head in the direction of Eon it was a sincere gesture that Eon appreciated. Being thanked for your deeds always felt right.
“it’s fine, and besides, it was my friend here who suggested we help, so all the credit belongs to her”
Hearing Eon give her the credit caused Reniris to smile awkwardly before speaking.
“I thought it was only natural to help. it's no big deal”
She expressed, stating that there was no need to thank her. However, Jericho bowed his head regardless of her words, further expressing his gratitude.
“angel she is, right?”
Eon gave her a compliment, and Jericho found himself nodding in agreement with him after all its rare finding kind-hearted individuals in the world. Plus, the girl was beautiful to boot quite rare indeed from his experience with beautiful noble ladies none were that kind, but there’s always an exception.
"Thank you very much, Miss Reniris. Your kindness is well appreciated but…”
He paused, and his face adopted a rather serious expression before preparing himself to speak again.
“I feel that your kindness was wasted”
“hm how so?”
Reniris questioned, slightly confused by his statement.
“Well you see the land here is exhausted and can no longer be planted, even if one does plant something nothing will come out of it, no harvest can be had here, plus all the ripe land is in monster territory and can’t be used”
“So the villagers have no choice but to leave this place and move to another village or city?”
“Yes but they don’t want to leave I’ve been trying to convince them, but they won’t listen, so I thought I’d wait them out eventually they’d…”
He explained, leaving out the part about waiting for the old people to die and then moving with the young people.
Reniris hearing this turned to look at Eon, who shrugged his shoulders before speaking he could tell what she wanted to ask of him.
“Even if I can revive the land that doesn’t really solve much considering the village is pretty much done for. From the people I saw none of them have any particular skill aside from farming, they don’t have any money to hire someone to fix houses, there are no artisans and the distance from here to the nearest town is too long, bandits would be a problem”
Explained and looked at Jericho for any confirmation about whether he was right or not , Jericho nodded, affirming his explanation. Unfortunately for Reniris Eon can not revive the land
Healing magic isn’t his Forte plus the creation magic had drained his mana reserves so he is kinda exhausted right now. Using magic to create physical matter used a lot of mana
“It’s as you say, Mr. Eon, that’s why I had planned to move them in small groups over a few weeks to keep us from being attacked.”
“Eon can’t you teleport?”
She asked, he seemed capable of many things so she wondered if he could do something like teleportation.
Unfortunately Eon could not plus he wasn’t really a mage and more of a warrior, or rather he wanted to be a warrior instead of a mage, unfortunately though he couldn’t use teleportation magic, the creation magic was just a gift to make things easier for him.
“Isn’t it better to let them be, if they don’t want to leave then they don’t want to, all you can do is simply watch over them, like you said eventually they’ll see their mistakes”
Reniris understood what he was saying. People have the free will to choose whatever they want, so forcing an issue when they don’t want it is pointless, so she yielded at his reasoning and agreed with him.
“I see your point. These people are free to choose what they want”
Reniris affirmed, truthfully she is confused about what she should do, she feels that it is only right to help the ones in need but at the same time she also feels that these villagers should be able to help themselves.
They have the option or leaving yet they won’t, Eon was the one to use his power to help, it would be selfish of her to ask him to do anything more. The villagers should be able to at least survive long enough for them to choose what they want, Eon has helped them enough.
“Anyway we should definitely go to sleep I’m kinda tired”
Eon suggested, he was very tired, his mana was depleted and he needed to sleep, he should probably stop using creation magic for things that aren't actually important, the amount of fatigue he felt was unreal, his mana had been depleted greatly.
Converting mana to something like food or clothes took far too much magic, he was reckless and didn't notice the depletion of mana when he used it in the forest but now he felt like he just ran an 800 meter dash.
“Oh right”
....
A/N: Hope you enjoyed, leave a comment or a like.