Soul of a Human

While the welcome back party was in full swing, and the exhausted veteran hunters and the two young Ice-kin were slumped over the set-up tables, Lize came over to the still awake Mor. She sat down next to the Soul-kin and smiled as he tried to suppress a big yawn. Lize embraced Mor in a somewhat awkward hug and thanked him for what he did.

"Thank you for bringing everyone back alive."

"It's fine," Mor mumbled. "I didn't do that much. It was a team effort and a good learning experience."

"Maybe, but no one would have even tried without you here," Lize replied.

"I see," Mor said with a nod.

°It's always surprising how much your kin are restricted by "traditions".° The human added.

°Yes, it is. I mean, with our history, it's understandable, but with you, I learned that sometimes you have to try something in the name of progress, regardless of traditions.° Mor replied.

°True enough.° The human agreed.

Mors gaze wandered to the ones he helped bring back. Gorn, who was slumped forward, his face on a half-eaten steak, a cloak draped over his shoulder, and loudly snoring. Silence and Drop, who were holding each other up, back to back, and amusingly breathing in opposite. Cutter, who had his head on his wife's chest while drooling, the woman taking care so he wouldn't fall, with her single arm. However, the cutest view was of the two young Ice-kin, Elly's head lying on Jorgen's shoulder, and the boy nodding off while sitting up.

Lize followed Mor's gaze and smiled.

"They are really exhausted." She stated.

"Just like me," Mor said, forcing himself to stay awake.

"Then go sleep. You're not needed here right now. The men can get drunk all on their own, " Lize said.

"You're right," Mor stated and then got up. However, a few meters after the warmth of the fire had switched to the coldness of night, his eyes felt heavier and heavier. Only the human, taking over the Soul-kin's body, enabled him to reach the provided sleeping quarters, on which Mor awoke the next morning with hurting knuckles.

°Did you sleep well?° The human needlessly asked, as it was quite clear.

°Yes, did you get me to bed? I don't remember lying down.° Mor replied.

°Yup, I sure did.° The human stated.

°And why is my hand hurting?° Mor asked.

°There was a slight hiccup, but there was this hollow stake in the way, and I stumbled, hitting it with your fist. So, nothing nefarious.° The human half lied, leading Mor to sigh, but the Soul-kin deemed it better not to ask any further.

Last night, as the human stumbled Mor's body towards the bed, he again ran into Thor, who wanted to let his muscles play. Thor said stupid stuff like, "The outsider was just lucky, and he would have done so much better." Anyway, the human wasn't in the mood to reply. However, the sleeping Mor did that for him.

"Fucking asshat... shut up..." The Soul-kin mumbled, probably having a dream about someone else.

But this was the wrong moment for sleep talking, as Thor was enraged and threw a punch. However, the Ice-kin miscalculated because before his punch could hit, the human had already acted and delivered a nose-cracking hit. This led to Mor having a hurt knuckle, and when he next saw Thor, the smart boy instantly added two plus two and got his answer anyway.

Still, with the whole excitement of the returning hunters over, it was time to restart training. For Jorgen and Elly, it meant getting more acquainted with their weapons. Jorgen had handled his long curved blade like any other greatsword, only sporadically using the lightweight for fast attacks. Elly simply needed to get used to this bow, as it had a pretty different weight and feel than the training longbows, and combined with the still ongoing magic training, their days were very much filled.

Also, Mor couldn't help them because he had only rudimentary experience with weapons and mainly depended on his magic and some basic skills to carry him through. Still, he sparred with Jorgen under the tutelage of the recovering veteran hunters, who took turns giving advice, raising the weapon proficiency of both boys steadily, in addition to Mor's solo magic training, trying, at the human's insistence, to get more familiar with the wind-based lightning spells. While training, he still didn't know how to deal with the strange jokes the human made about emperors and death stars, but he stopped caring after a while.

Everything went well until a specific day when Mor suddenly got sulky again, confusing the few Ice-kin close to him. After a bit of prying, Elly found out that today was the day for the start of Mor's final school year, which he, of course, would miss. The solution came in the form of Jorgen, who basically jumped on the chance to get payback. The Ice-kin boy argued that if Mor had time to sulk, he could train his body some more. A sentiment the human wholehardy agreed to.

After that, Jorgen drilled Mor through the Ice-kin training regime to "repay" Mor for his help with magic training. It was exhausting, and Jorgen was an even more heartless trainer than Mor had been. Still, without Dino's regulation to keep the fact hidden that Soul-kin can train their bodies, it was time for the lean Soul-kin to bulk up for real.

So while Saphine, Orth, Clare, and Tiara suffered through boring lessons, Mor was drilled by a bunch of unforgiving Ice-kin because after Jorgen had kicked off the training, the adult warriors quickly took over, stating that Jorgen also could use more exercise to build his muscles further, which promptly made the Ice-kin boy regret his cockyness.

Ultimately, a rather eventless year went by, except for the few hunting excursions the young hunters were allowed to tag along with. Much to the grumbling of the chief, who hated this blatant disregard for tradition, however, when his son and the rest of the youth were invited for the same treatment, he couldn't protest anymore. More so, because the veteran hunters kept the kids out of harm's way as well as possible and mostly delegated them to watch the fight and the surroundings. In turn, this started a whole new tradition, which allowed a single hunter in training to tag along with a veteran team and get practical experience.

The deciding factor was Klang, who explained to the chief that if the young ones had some firsthand experience now, their first hunt would have a greater chance of succeeding. This means that the village would bring forth more capable hunters and raise the esteem of the whole village. This explanation shut up the chief for good and let the hunters deal with it on their own.

For Mor, this meant he grew into a more Ice-kin-like stature. He was almost indisguinishable from them, only his prominent Soul-kin features, like the eye color and a slight, nearly unnoticeable magic shimmer on his skin, betraying him as an outsider. For any other outsider, he and Jorgen could be brothers, and with him being formally adopted into Lize and Gorn's family as honorary Ice-kin, it wasn't that much of a stretch. Elly completely embraced having a brother, and they quickly hashed out who the older sibling was in this situation. Mor won by being two months older and physically stronger. After that, the two of them shared almost everything.

Almost being fears, hopes, dreams, and Elly once wanted to speak with Mor about Jorgens, well package, and his skill with it, which the Soul-kin really didn't want to know. For him, it was still strange that the Ice-kin were that free with their fleshly desires. He then remembered his real parents doing the same. Still, he personally believed that doing such things should be done after marriage. On the other hand, the human was very much interested in saucy stories to make fun of or tease Mor with.

Still, with the unrelenting passage of time, it soon was necessary to pack up and leave for the main Ice-kin settlement. Something called the glacial fortress. A name that got the human very excited because it sounded plain awesome. However, just days before the village was ready to escort their young hunters to this settlement, a surprise was incoming, literally. It came in the shape of three gliders of the cargo variety, which shouldn't be here but at the glacial fortress. Mor didn't notice those gliders as he was repacking his bag repeatedly so he wouldn't forget anything, to the degree that his human counterpart got annoyed.