The First Mage

When the guards unexpectedly stormed the office and threatened all of their lives, Berla was confused by Miles’ inactivity. He didn’t attempt to fight back, he barely even argued with Grom. Though she knew him, and that talking to him was unlikely to accomplish anything. Even if it was Miles doing the talking.

When she and her friends stood in the temple’s reception area, awaiting whatever was to happen on the other side of the door, her confusion grew further. A single attempt to address Pallo was all that came out of Miles’ mouth. There were holes in the guards’ formation and they were somewhat distracted by the situation outside. She didn’t understand why they weren’t putting up a fight now, but she figured that Miles must have some sort of plan. There must have been something, because the man she loved wouldn’t take this lying down. He obviously couldn’t share it in front of the enemy, but it was just a matter of time.

When Miles gave them the signal to prepare to fight back, she thought this was it. Maybe he wanted to scout ahead, to make an informed decision, or maybe he wanted to convince the citizens of the truth. However, when she heard his brief message to the people, she was starting to question his motives. He wasn’t putting up a fight at all.

Finally, he called for them to defend themselves, and as she had presumed, their group was beginning to reach a point where normal guards barely stood a chance against them anymore. With Riala blasting them away, Reurig distracting the remaining ones, and Hati and her picking them off in the blink of an eye, they were able to walk out of the temple unhindered after seconds. But once more, Miles’ actions seemed uncharacteristic. Standing atop the stage, he didn’t prepare to give another speech, nor fight the guards. It appeared like he was truly considering simply leaving and abandoning the people, even though he knew that doing so would endanger them. What if Arax learned about this? What if she came here and eradicated this town? Or worse... What if she turned it into her personal human farm, where people only got to live until she decided to kill them?

Unfortunately, her concerns became reality more quickly than she could’ve ever anticipated when a wolf with silvery white fur suddenly stood smack in the middle of the citizens. As if the color of its fur wasn’t enough, it suddenly stood up like a human, making it obvious that this wasn’t a random beast. Arax was here. At that moment, feeling her sinister presence, Berla understood what Miles had seen when he first met this monster. Arax was unlike any other beast she had ever seen, and just laying eyes on her was enough to make your hairs stand on end.

Her eyes were glued to this calamity calmly approaching the stage, but also to Miles responding to her in an equally calm manner, discussing and negotiating sacrifices to Arax as if it was nothing.

For a fraction of a second, she was relieved when Miles prepared to attack the beast and instructed them—specifically Riala—to take care of the ones threatening the people near the market district. However, from where they stood, they stared at nothing but a wall of people. Based on the desperate cries for help, she understood that something was there, but she didn’t know how they would get to it.

“Right,” he says... Berla thought. But how are we supposed to get there!?

Had Miles failed to consider this? If there was a risk that beasts might attack innocent people the second he went for Arax, was this really the best approach? Regardless, this was what they had to deal with now.

Berla looked around hastily, focused entirely on this problem. If Miles’ new script worked, and Arax didn’t survive the next two seconds, they would only need to deal with the other beasts. There were at least two more, because Miles had pointed one arm at Arax and one to his left. But if two of four streets were blocked off, chances were that the others had beasts on them as well. Miles would presumably take care of the other streets in that case, meaning that she and the others would just need to handle this one.

They tried to find a way, ignoring the sounds of water being shot out and wet thuds on stone coming from the center of the main square. Riala looked up at Berla with a frown, raring to go and follow Miles’ command, but unable to see how to do so. Then, Berla’s eyes fell on the wolf in the group.

“Hati! Can you get us to the market?” she asked desperately.

After a quick, cursory glance, he nodded, “Yes!”

“Okay, let’s go! Hayla, go back inside the temple!”

Berla grabbed Riala and hopped onto Hati, followed by Reurig. It all happened so fast that Hayla was barely able to follow what was going on, but she was able to at least do as asked, turning heel and fleeing into the temple.

Hati took off, running straight westwards until he almost barreled into a part of the crowd, huddled together in the north-west of the main square. Just before this happened, however, he made a huge jump onto the roofs of a line of two-story houses next to them. From there, they would need just a few more hops until they were at their destination.

With their new vantage point, Berla was also able to look over the people. She saw two bears on the other side of the square, while two wolves were keeping people in check at the market street. It didn’t look good, and Riala couldn’t get off a shot from here without risk hitting the citizens, but if they got closer fast enough, the casualties would hopefully be kept at a minimum.

Those had been the immediate thoughts on her mind, and nothing else mattered. Until a maniacal cackling resounded through the main square.

“Hahaha! It’s you!” Arax said. “Didn’t I kill you, Miles?” Lying on the ground, a good forty meters away from the stage, Arax propped herself up to look at Miles.

There was no way that he hadn’t used the new script. The chance was too perfect—a shot at point blank, coupled with the element of surprise. This should’ve killed her. It should’ve obliterated her. But Arax appeared to not even be wounded. Their battle plan was immediately falling apart. If they didn’t deal with Arax, nothing else they did would matter.

The blood drained from Berla’s face as Arax hopped back to her feet and sprinted towards the surprised Miles, traversing the distance in a flash and grabbing him by his throat.

No... No! Not again! Berla thought in a panic. “Take care of those two!” she instructed before jumping off Hati’s back.

***

Arax took my attack without any damage. At best, there should’ve been a clean hole in her chest. At absolute worst, I thought this would put a decent dent into her, which would have amounted to a serious injury. Neither came to pass, however. Had I been too cocky? Perplexed, her sudden approach didn’t even register until I felt her sharp claws dig into my neck.

“Ahh!”

Shaken out of my daze, I immediately tried to aim at her again, but she simply slapped my arm away. I tried the other one, and it was the same story. It looked as if she was just swatting away a fly, but it hurt enough for me to not want to attempt it again. I gave snapping a try, a wave of mana erupting around me, but aside from ruffling her fur a little, it did absolutely nothing.

Her grip around my neck tightened, making it difficult to breathe. Any attempts of mine to pry her hands off of me were laughably pointless. Her arms felt like they were pure muscle, not budging even a millimeter. My actions didn’t matter to her.

Fascination in her eyes, she cocked her head. “You escaped death by hopping to a different body...” she whispered. “That’s actually possible?” She thought for a moment as I stared at her helplessly. “I made a mistake,” she finally concluded. “You’re much more capable than I thought. Leaving it to Tomar... How silly of me. But your attacks are lacking.”

Using her free hand, Arax parted the fur on her chest a little and I saw sigils peak through the hairs. Not enough to make out any details, but it must have been a script.

“You’re not the first scripter to try to kill me, you know?” she mused. “And you all have the same flaw. You’re too confident in the potency of your water scripts.”

“Is that so?” I croaked. “You were worried. Or you wouldn’t have offered another deal.”

“Only a fool would approach an enemy thinking they are guaranteed to win.” Arax sneered. “Speaking of which... Was this it? Don’t you have a contingency plan?”

I didn’t. There was nothing we could do. Whoever had given her that presumed script had ensured that ours wouldn’t work. And without it, we had no way of fighting her. Subsequently, not having prepared anything else, I would be a fool in her eyes. If I wanted to protect this town, however, this had been the best I could do. She had just been a step ahead of me.

I remained silent as she continued. “I would say it’s disappointing, but maybe you’re not much of a fighter? Surrendering to your fate seems to be very much your style after all.”

Fuck you... What am I supposed to do!?

“Oh, I had it all wrong!” she said. “You’re more of a Researcher, aren’t you? How I wish I could still take a peek into your mind. How are you preventing this, is it a script as well?”

So I was right... Something changed. But it’s not because of a script...

When I continuously refused to answer her questions, she seemed to get somewhat irritated, though she remained calm. “No response? Well, I killed you for a reason. I didn’t want to bother with this, but I assure you that I will get my answers.”

Arax straightened up and looked to her right, starting to address her minions. “Guys!” Her head swiveled from her right to her left, “Bring me—”, but she suddenly stopped when something came flying at her at high speed, hit her straight in the face, and catapulted her away, letting go of me in the process.

Released from her grip, I fell to my knees, coughing. I quickly looked after her, seeing her roll over the ground roughly.

Who? I thought, wondering who had been crazy enough to come to my rescue. Prying my eyes off Arax, my eyes fell on Berla, standing in front of the stage. Her eyes wide and her breathing ragged, she seemed surprised her attack had actually worked. She had to recover quickly though, seeing Arax already getting back up, glinting at her menacingly.

“What are you doing!?” I yelled at her.

“Figure something out!” she commanded, ignoring my question. “I’ll distract her!”

“Are you insane!?” I shot back.

Berla didn’t listen. Before I could even finish my sentence, she was off after Arax.