by J. J. Pavlov
"I-I do not understand." The angel girl slides down from my back and walks forward to stare down at what appears to be an abandoned nomad camp.
"Is your eyesight alright?" Turning back into my human shape, I come up next to her and look at her expression of disbelief. I remember when I used her template to transform into a Fata. They have hawk-like sight that allows them to spot things over long distances.
At the time, it didn't feel like much compared to the liberating sensation of flying though, so I had forgotten about it until now. But it makes sense for airborne races to have good eyes. Never mind bats, though.
"W-we Fatas always have perfect eyesight." Her voice is trembling as she gazes into the distance and back to the tents. She looks quite shaken by the realization that something is wrong with her eyes. "Mine has always been perfect..."
"I think it may be your curse." I explain to her, remembering how her eyes were glowing when she literally killed Aldebrand with a look. "Remember when you turned Aldebrand to dust? I'm sure that this is the price you have to pay for activating the curse."
Like other abilities gained from curses, there's always some form of drawback. Kamii's arm mutated into the form of a crab's pincer, and Daica's body grew bigger than is typical for dark elves. For a Fata, this tradeoff may be too much, depending on whether it's only temporary or permanent. If it's the latter, she may go blind eventually.
"If it is for your sake, I will gladly use it." She gathers her feelings and states with a courageous smile. While I appreciate that blind love for me, I don't want her to go blind.
"Thank you, but please refrain from using it from now on." Putting a hand on Hestia's shoulder, I speak in an imploring tone. It's for her own good, and I can think of many other ways to kill people without leaving any traces that don't have any such drawbacks.
"I do not even understand how it happened. I only felt unspeakable rage at the professor for hurting you so, and then my eyes felt hot." Confused, she averts her gaze. Technically, she just explained the condition for activating it with that.
In either case, it's an incredibly powerful but scary ability. I have to make sure that she doesn't let her emotions get the better of her and use it on people close to me whom she might perceive as enemies or rivals - such as Kamii or Daica.
"Keep your emotions in check. I didn't, and look where that got us." I sigh and begin to descend the slope, realizing halfway down that I just expressed regret for having avenged the slap to her face. In a way, I do regret my course of actions, but I would never take that back. Staying still and watching my beloved girls getting hurt is something I'd never do.
The tents are arranged in a circle, and there aren't any movements among them except for loose cloth flapping in the breeze. But judging by the fact that a few of them haven't been covered by any sand yet, I can tell that they aren't entirely abandoned after all. In an ever-shifting desert, even a day without anyone cleaning up could bury the tents.
"Anyone here?" I announce our approach without a care in the world. If they're hostile, I'll kill them all without even giving them time to prepare; I'm not in the mood to play nice right now.
But there's no answer. Maybe they're asleep during the day and move at night. I walk toward one tent and round it to find its opening. It's a dome-shaped construct with a hole in the front, covered by a cloth fixed in all corners to keep the sand out. The tent doesn't appear to be used permanently, as it looks like it can be taken down and put up pretty quickly.
I pull aside the cloth and peer inside through the small opening. It's completely dark on the other side, so I quickly adjust my eyes by switching on night vision. That's when I see that a curved dagger is pointed at my nose. I stare at it with my eyes nearly crossed, then I close them and sigh. The person behind it is an emaciated boy, about as old as Senka looks. He has the dark skin one would expect from someone living in a desert.
"I'm not here to harm you, so drop that thing." I announce in a firm voice and point at the weapon in his shaky hands. "If you touch me with it, you will lose it - along with the hand holding it."
But he doesn't seem to understand what I'm saying. Apparently, the world isn't as convenient as I thought it was. The language spoken in the Dominion is nearly the same as the one in the Kingdom of Lares - with small variations in the dialects. Both are forms of Imperian, which is propagated by the Empire of Terminus.
This isn't like all those copy-pasted reincarnation anime I've seen at all, where only one language exists, and everybody understands each other without a problem.
I don't have the patience to waste time trying to appease this terrified child. Instead, I give him real terror, as I grab the blade with my hand and pull it into my palm. As expected, the boy's eyes turn into perfect circles, and he inches backward to get away from me. But it seems that he's trying to block my view on something behind him. I pull the weapon back out of my palm and crawl into the tent. It's too low for me to stand up, so I kneel instead - in all of my naked glory.
Yes, I didn't pay attention to it until now, but I've been naked all this time because my school uniform was destroyed when I undid my transformation to fight the professors. More important matters occupied my mind, and Hestia wasn't bothered by it; I'm sure she was silently enjoying the view.
Finally, I see what he was trying to hide, or rather, shield from harm. It's a little girl looking no older than six years old, cowering behind the boy with a fearful expression on her equally emaciated face. They look quite alike, so they're most likely siblings, or I just lack facial awareness when it comes to foreigners.
The two children look at me like I'm a monster, and while I have no opposition to offer to that view of me - especially not after showing that my body is not human - I also don't have any interest in harming children unless I sense real danger coming from them. Right now, I don't.
"Hey, don't be scared. Here, take your little toy back." I hand the boy the dagger handle-first so that it doesn't look like I'm threatening him at knifepoint. "I just want to ask you something."
The boy's expression tells me that he didn't understand a word I said and is still cowering in fear without taking my offer. And when the girl mutters something with the intonation of a question, I have certainty. Not a single word she uttered sounded familiar; in fact, I don't even know how many separate words there were in her sentence. It's pointless to ask them for directions, I guess. There's a language barrier between us, and I don't have any clues on how to get past that.
I look around the tent, but there are no indications for the presence of an adult or a map. With adults, I might have been able to work something out communication-wise, but children are a different matter in how much they can understand through gestures and common sense. Thus, I crawl out of the tent, dropping the dagger on the ground carelessly in the process to signal him that this thing can't harm me.
"Keep an eye on them, Hestia." I point at the tent and order the angel girl. She nods in silence, so I move to the next one.
When I open the cover, I understand why this camp has been completely silent even though I called out to them. I get children not coming out when a stranger beckons in a different language, but adults should be at least curious or on alert.
I'm greeted by a wave of flies and the stench of decomposition the moment the cloth is pulled aside. I immediately shut down my olfactory systems by undoing their transformation. Inside the tent, I count three bodies, covered in crawling maggots and already hatched flies. Their state of decomposition has progressed to the point that I can't tell their genders, but two are adult-sized, and one is child-sized. They must have been a family.
Considering they're lying on their sleeping mats, poison or disease is the most likely explanation. Leaving this one behind, I move to check the other tents that haven't been half-buried by sand or blown open by strong winds, only to find that all of them are the same. The only survivors are the two children in the first tent I visited. It was the luck of the draw to get it on th
e first try in this circle of death.
"Hestia, can you heal diseases with light magic?" It feels like 'Cure' should be a staple of the light affinity, but I didn't find anything of the sort in Arcelia's holy book.
"Yes, I can. The Fatas Triarchy prides itself in having eliminated all diseases from within its borders." The angel girl drops this little tidbit on me with undeniable pride.
"Then give those children a checkup." I point at the tent I told her to watch. The boy is peering out from the opening and stares at the black-winged girl when she comes into sight. He falls backward onto his bottom and scurries back inside; she does make for a much more imposing figure than I do, I have to admit.
"Effero Flammis." My hand describes an arc, summoning a wave of fire that swallows the tents with the dead and the masses of insects that swarm their bodies. I repeat the spell on the other side and turn away from the blaze to go towards the one remaining home Hestia went inside just now.
"How is it looking?" I ask her wings, which are sticking out from the opening as they can't fit inside the small tent.
"They are perfectly healthy now." The angel girl comes out backward and straightens herself before answering with a reserved smile. That wording makes me think that they were already sick, but I don't see any point in asking whether or not that was the case if they're healed now.
When I peer inside, I find that the two kids are staring past me at the flames in fear, but also resignation. They most likely knew that the people inside were all dead already, and were waiting here for their turn. After all, there are no signs of any food or even water left.
"Pilos Aquos." I mutter and create a small water sphere, which I drop into an empty - and clean - bucket I find in the tent. The children stare at me, then glance at the clear water before returning their eyes to me again.
"Sahaar!" The little girl exclaims with a fascinated expression. I don't know what it means, but judging by her pointing at me and the bucket, I assume it has something to do with water or my act of magic.
"Drink." I gesture at it and say, knowing that they won't understand me. But just as I could guess the meaning of her single-word exclamation, so do the two get that I gave them water to still their thirst. The boy is still a little skeptical about this gift, but in the end, he pulls over the bucket and hands it to his sister for her to drink first.
If I were more cynical, my first thought would have been that he's making her test for poisons. But then I realize that it was my first thought. At least it's closely followed by the sentiment that he's giving her priority as she's younger than him. What has become of me?
In either case, they seem to have calmed down now, so maybe I can glean some pieces of information from them. But first, I get the most obvious solution out of the way. While it would make for a good laugh in other situations, I don't want to be wasting too much time now.
"Just in case, you don't happen to be able to speak their language?" I turn around and ask Hestia, but she shakes her head with a crestfallen expression. I expected as much since she was exiled from her home to die in the academy; learning another language would have been pointless for a person only meant to be used as a political tool. "Then this is going to be pretty hard."
Once again, I crawl into the tent. The boy moves back in fear when I get inside all the way and protectively stands between his sister and me. He's a good older brother, but it hurts when even after I had them healed and gave them water, he still doubts me.
"Do you know if there is a city nearby?" I ask the boy while trying to smile. He obviously doesn't understand a single word, and it's clearly written on his face as he stares at me with a questioning look. One word and a gesture worked, but whole sentences won't ever make it through the language barrier. "Come."
I gesture outside the tent and crawl out backward first, beckoning for the two to follow me. The boy turns to his sister and whispers a few words to her before reluctantly coming after me. It seems he told her to stay in the safety of the walls made of thin black cloth for the time being.
Waving my hands in a smaller version of the earth magic form, I infuse the sand in front of me with magic. Raising the ground, I create a miniature city made of crude cubes and crooked fortifications. The boy's eyes look like they're about pop out of their sockets; he's getting to see so many wondrous things today.
"City." I gesture at the model and then point in random directions around us. "Where?"
Just like I could tell that the little girl was asking her brother something through her intonation alone, so does he understand that I'm posing a question. But the boy looks at me dubiously, then at the tiny city, as if he's never seen one before. My heart sinks.
"Where?" I ask once again while pointing at the model in the sand, showing him my palms in a gesture I hope has the same meaning in this culture as it does everywhere else I've been so far. And with this, I finally see understanding dawn on his face when he alternates his gaze between me and the sand city.
"Baldar." He points behind me. I didn't understand the word he said, but he undeniably pointed out a direction. A city must lie in that direction.
But if he knew where the city is, why didn't he or the others of the tribe try to go there when people became sick and started dying? And even after everybody else died, they stayed here, waiting for their turn to meet their maker. Maybe it's too far away for two children to travel on their own, and they may have died under the sun before reaching it, but if it were me, I would have still tried.
"How far?" I ask while pointing where he did, then holding out my hands at a distance of about half a meter before spreading my arms. Varying the length, I ask again. "How far is it?"
"Bayed jiddaan!" The boy replies, and I realize my mistake. Even if he tells me the exact distance, I won't be able to understand it. But it doesn’t matter because I'll find it eventually when I fly there with Hestia.
Finally, I got our first clue to finding our way back to the academy.
"Let's go." I say to Hestia, and she follows me wordlessly. But a twinge of guilt hits me when I think of these two kids. They've been staying here for days with their dead family and tribe just a few steps away from them, and here I am about to leave them. They are like abandoned puppies by the roadside, and after feeding them, I got needlessly attached.
As expected, I can't just leave them to die because that's what will happen if I don't take them with me. Maybe that's what they would want, but I can't think so without knowing for sure. But bringing them with us will slow us down.
I stop and turn to look at Hestia. She seems to realize the internal conflict I'm having and gives me a smile and a knowing nod.
"Let me take care of them, Chloe." Her expression is innocent, but I feel something dark lurking underneath it.
"What do you plan on doing?" I don't let it show on my face and ask innocently.
"I shall give them painless deaths." With a charming smile, she speaks those terrifying words like someone would announce that they're going to have a cake as dessert. Does she think that only because I killed the men in the alleyway so ruthlessly, I'd approve the murder of innocent children who even helped us by showing us the way?
I walk up to Hestia and grab the back of her head. She may be expecting a treat in the form of a kiss, but I pull on her hair and force her down onto her knees. She's shocked at my rough treatment and tries to struggle free, but when her eyes meet mine, she stops, and fear fills her face.
"Never talk about killing innocent children again." My voice is low and menacing, as I glare at her coldly. "If you do that again, you'll be no longer welcome by my side."
With these words, I let go of her hair and turn around but wait in place to hear her reply. Hestia begins to sob behind me, and the sound of it pulls on my heartstrings. But I stay strong, as this is a matter concerning her personality, which is in part my fault.
"I-I... I am so sorry... for suggesting... something like that." She crawls towards me in desperation, and I can tell that sh
e's crying. "Please, do not abandon me..."
Keeping my composure and not turning around, I walk back to the tent, in front of which the boy has been sitting while watching our short exchange with a curious expression. His sister is peeking out from the opening but pulls her head back inside like a turtle when she sees me approaching.
"Come." I say and make the universal gesture of beckoning someone while pointing where he did earlier, the direction in which the city lies. He seems to understand but shakes his head with a downcast gaze. Does that mean he intends to die here with his sister? I can accept that the despair of losing everyone close to him gave him the idea to share their fate, but children should never choose death.
I turn to the tent behind me, once again glimpsing the little girl's head before it disappears inside. This time, I put my hands on the wooden frame and pull hard, tearing the entire construction away from where it stood and exposing the terrified little girl inside.
Pulling the broken and twisted remains of the tent along the ground, accompanied by the screams and shouts of the boy as he protests loudly, I throw them into the still burning fires of the other ones. With this, they no longer have any shelter to retreat inside - no more protection from the reality that they're either going to die here or have to come with me.
"Come." I turn my head and say to the boy with my hand outstretched before him once again. He will have to take this offer himself because I won't be doing something as forceful as pulling on their arms.
But I think I finally got through because he turns to look at his sister, who has come over to hide behind him. He mutters a few words to her, and she nods. Then the boy finally takes my hand while his sister holds onto his arm. The sight reminds me of how Kamii always clung to me, and I avert my gaze before walking toward where Hestia is still kneeling in the sand. She's shaking, and tears are rolling down her face.
Maybe I overdid it a little.
"You little dummy." I let go of the boy's hand to pull the angel girl up and hug her to my chest.