by DB King
The first King of Lucario had come from that place, it was said, walking out of the ruins. Then he’d laid down his flag, declared he was going to build a kingdom, and forbidden all to enter where he’d emerged.
That was centuries ago, of course, and these days, the constables didn’t waste their time or energy enforcing the ancient edict. If someone wanted to venture into what people now called the junkyard, he or she was free to do so.
And many had, adventurers of all kinds, years ago, at least, or so Raphael had heard. He hadn’t seen many growing up, just a few ragged, desperate bands who walked past his house and into the junkyard, never to return. Perhaps a few of them had been eaten by the scrounge-worm, even.
It was a dangerous place. Shadow fiends and howlers came out during the night, and when the sun shone, beasts like the scrounge-worm lurked, ready to pounce. All these were nothing Raphael or Koshi couldn’t handle, of course. Even though Koshi was sick, he’d beaten up an entire pack of howlers last week when they’d been late getting home before nightfall.
But it was also a frustrating place. Raphael had spent more than two hours looking through dusty stone houses and piles of broken rocks. He’d climbed to the top of an ancient tower, finding handholds and footholds in the cracks running down its length, but when he kicked open the rotted wooden windows at its summit, all he’d found was a desiccated skeleton and an empty glass bottle.
In a small dirt pit, he’d picked up a few rusty springs, and he’d had to fight off a very startled and sleepy shadow fiend. As the beast ran away, bruised and whimpering, Raphael sighed and put the springs into his sack. The glass bottle was there, too. Maybe it would fetch a coin from Mr. Paolo, who might want to use it to store one of his perfumes.
The junkyard shifted and changed every time Raphael visited it, too. A building he’d searched through last week might be gone several days later, replaced by an ancient, dried-out well or a collapsed tower. If the Dragon Meridian hadn’t sharpened his mind, he supposed he would have a tough time finding the way home. Maybe that was why the adventurers never came back.
In any case, the sun would set soon, and Raphael still wanted to catch the last moments of the marketplace before he went home. He crawled out of the dirt pit and shook out some of the sand from his cloth shoes.
As he was retying his laces, the scrounge-worm emerged from behind a broken pillar and hurtled toward him.
“Seriously? Again? I don’t have the time for this right…” Raphael snapped, but the words died in his mouth as he realized something. The scrounge-worm wasn’t attacking him. It was running away from something and hoping he would help it.
The creature skidded to a halt beside Raphael, zipped behind him, and coiled its body up.
“Wow. Using me as a shield. How nice of you,” he grumbled. “What is it? Did you annoy too many shadow fiends and they’ve finally decided to gang up on you? Or is it the howlers? I told you not to fart into their nests. Serves you right if they’re coming after you now.”
But the scrounge-worm was shivering in terror. It gave him a desultory bleat.
“Hey, what’s the matter? What’s gotten you so scared?” he asked, now genuinely concerned.
“What’s this? A boy?” a high, feminine voice cut through the silence draped across the junkyard.
“A man,” Raphael insisted. “I just turned eighteen!” He turned to her. She was tall, clad in a suit of dark leather with lots of buckles and belts. On her hands, she wore gloves with shiny, expensive-looking stones at the knuckles. Black boots covered her feet.
“You must be an adventurer, right?” he asked. “Need some help?”
The adventurer blinked, obviously surprised at the question, but she recovered swiftly and tossed her long, flowing blond hair back. Raphael supposed she thought it was a gesture that would make her look impressive, but it had the opposite effect, the dark rings beneath her blue eyes and her cracked lips showing how tired and worn-out she was, instead. Her button nose and round cheeks were smudged with dirt. She seemed to be slightly older than Raphael. He guessed she was about eighteen, the same age as those who’d be finishing school this year.
“I am Eliza Wildwynd, famed battlemage,” she declared. “Now move out of the way. I have business with—”
“I’m Raphael! Pleased to meet you, Eliza Wildwynd, famed battlemage. That’s… a bit of a mouthful. Can I call you Lizzy instead?”
“What? No! You may not call me Lizzy!” she protested.
“Liza then? Or Windy?”
“Neither!” Eliza shouted, stamping her foot. “Now, as I was saying, boy, get out of my—”
“I’m not a ‘boy’—we’re almost the same age!” Raphael shook his head. “You must be having trouble with your memory. You should go see a physician,” Raphael said. “I’m Raphael. Raph, if your memory’s impaired.”
All this time, Eliza had been approaching. The scrounge-worm’s trembles increased, and it even whimpered.
The battlemage raised her right hand. A ball of red light began to form in her fist. She glared down at the scrounge-worm.
“Now, you die, foul beast,” she said.
Raphael smacked her hand aside. The ball of red light in her hand flew away and hit a stone pillar. It exploded in a shower of rocky shards.
“That was dangerous!” Raphael whistled. “You could have really hurt someone with that.”
“What? How?” Eliza stammered. She glared at Raphael. “What did you just do?”
“I stopped you from hurting somebody.”
The battlemage’s eyes hardened. She thrust her left palm against Raphael’s chest and uttered a single word. Green light flared.
Raphael caught her by the wrist, turned it like Koshi had taught him how to, and swept his instep against her shin. Eliza yelped as she was spun off her feet. Raphael placed his hand underneath her head before it could bounce off the ground.
A strong gust of wind blasted from her left palm, now facing up. It threw the trailing ends of Raphael’s dark hair back from his face and rustled the sleeves of his tunic.
“That was refreshing,” Raphael said, fixing his hair. “Thanks, I guess.”
The battlemage pushed Raphael’s hand from her head and struggled to her feet. Her teeth were clenched, and she had a thunderous look in her eyes.
“I won’t ask this again, boy,” she snarled. “Get out of my way.”
Standing so close, Raphael realized that she wasn’t taller than he was. In fact, if not for her boots, she’d be quite a bit shorter, with the top of her head barely reaching his brow.
So he blurted the first thing that came to his mind.
“Hey, you’re pretty short,” he said. “I hope people don’t make fun of you too much for that.”
Growling, Eliza raised her hands. This time, red balls of light burned into existence above both her palms.
“Stand aside or die.”
“If I stand aside, you’ll try to hurt Wormy, won’t you?”
“Isn’t that obvious by now?” she shrieked. “Yes, I’m going to kill that thing and harvest its Core!”
“Well, in that case, I won’t. Leave Wormy alone. He can be annoying, I grant, but he’s friendly,” Raphael said, folding his arms. “I won’t let you hurt him or do anything to his core, whatever that is.”
“Then die!” Eliza cried.
“So we’re fighting, then?” Raphael said. “Are you sure?”
“Yes!” the battlemage snapped. “Yes, we’re fighting! How dense can you be?”
“Fine, but don’t say I didn’t give you a chance to walk away.” Raphael grinned and heightened the flow of his Ryu-To-Ki and ignited the First Draconic Brazier. He could go as far as the Second Draconic Brazier, but he didn’t think he needed to do that, not now, at least. His senses became even sharper, and his mind and body became even faster. To him, Eliza moved like she was underwater, slowly and sloppily.
He picked the scrounge-worm up, hoisted it above his shoulders, and leaped awa
y. The battlemage’s red balls hit the ground where he’d been standing a heartbeat ago. Dirt and rock erupted from the twin explosions.
Another red ball appeared in Eliza’s fist. Raphael put the scrounge-worm down and darted to her left. Fortunately, she tracked him with her gaze, and it was easy enough for him to side-flip away from her next hurled projectile, which whistled past his face and into the shadowy depths of a stone house, detonating with a dull thump.
Raphael charged at her, moving in a zigzag pattern as he closed the distance, just like Koshi had taught him to when fighting someone who attacked from afar. Eliza managed to hurl and miss with one more red ball before he got within arm’s length of her.
“What are you?” she gasped.
“Raphael,” he replied, shrugging. Hadn’t he already told her his name? Maybe she really was having memory problems. Or perhaps she was just slow.
That thought made Raphael hold back the clenched fist he’d been about to slam into her face. Then again, if he didn’t stop her, she would kill the scrounge-worm. Raphael didn’t want that to happen. He’d still hit her then, but maybe not so hard, just enough to put her to sleep for a bit.
But his hesitation gave her enough time to thrust both her hands up in front of his face. Green light burst from her palms, and a mighty gale blasted into Raphael.
It pushed him back and plucked at his clothes, threatening to tear him from his feet. Raphael clenched his teeth and ignited the Second Draconic Brazier. His muscles swelled, heightening his strength tenfold. He planted his feet into the ground and leaned into the howling wind.
The battlemage’s eyes were wide with shock as her spell played itself out, leaving Raphael bedraggled but standing.
He pulled back his fist again, and he could see that Eliza knew there was nothing she could do to stop him from hitting her. Her eyes went dark and flinty, as if she were used to being disappointed and hurt. Somehow, he felt bad for her.
“Just say you’ll leave Wormy alone, and we’ll call it a draw,” he offered. “You won’t have to feel bad that you lost a fight, then.”
Eliza chuckled bitterly. She lowered her hands. “A draw? I was completely at your mercy. No, never let it be said that I, Eliza Wildwynd, am incapable of acknowledging defeat. This is your victory, boy. I’ll leave the beast alone.”
“Alright.” Raphael reached out, took one of her hands, and gave it a few vigorous shakes. “It was nice to meet you, Lizzy. Have a good evening.”
“My name is Eliza Wildwynd!” she protested as he walked away. “And… are you just going to leave like that?”
“Uh, yes,” Raphael replied, looking over his shoulder. “It’s going to get dark very soon, and you really don’t want to be here by yourself when there’s no daylight. You should go home, too.”
“But…”
“Oh right. I forget that other people usually have trouble finding their way out of the junkyard.” Raphael sighed. He beckoned to Eliza. “You better follow me, Windy. I’ll take you to the city gates, since I’m headed there myself.”
“My name is Eliza Wildwynd!”
And though she stamped her feet and fumed for a bit, before Raphael had gone more than a dozen paces, she’d caught up to him.
With the scrounge-worm oozing its way behind them, they began the trek out of the junkyard.
Chapter 4
“Just who are you, Raphael?” Eliza demanded, as she brought down his waterskin from her lips and passed it back to him.
He shook his head and sighed. The battlemage hadn’t even thought to bring water with her. Raphael had been more than happy to share the last of his, but he shuddered to think just how bad things might have gotten for her if they hadn’t met and fought. Perhaps she really had been one of the slow children in school.
“I’m Raphael. I live with Koshi just outside the city, right in front of the junkyard.”
“No, I mean… how do you do the things you just did? I couldn’t detect any spell residue on you, and as far as I can tell, your Spell Vectors haven’t even been opened before. You couldn’t have been using any magic, so how can you move so fast and be so strong?”
“I eat apples at least three times a week! Getting enough vitamins and minerals means that your body will be strong and healthy,” he told her, making sure that his words came out clearly and slowly for her benefit.
“Why are you talking like that?” Eliza frowned, putting her fists against her hips. “And no, I don’t accept that answer. What kind of… wait a minute… you think I’m stupid, don’t you?”
“Uh… no, I don’t.” Raphael tried to keep his face as neutral as possible. He dutifully recited what one of his teachers had said about slow children. “With hard work and lots of patience, anybody can strive for excellence, no matter what challenges you’re born with or you’ll face.”
“Raphael…” Eliza growled dangerously.
A bead of cold sweat ran down the side of his cheek. Raphael wasn’t a stranger to girls. After all, half of the children in school were girls, and he spoke to them as easily as he did to anyone else. But as they all got older, the way they spoke and the things they discussed changed, and not in a way Raphael was sure he liked.
“I don’t think you’re stupid,” he blurted, laughing nervously. Eliza’s frown deepened. Something cold and uncomfortable began squirming in Raphael’s stomach. A sideways glance at the scrounge-worm trundling beside them only made that feeling worse.
It gave him a sulky bleat and turned its maw away.
Thanks for nothing, he thought. But then an idea came to him, then. It wasn’t one of his best ones, and he thought that it would probably get him into even more trouble later, but it would definitely deflect the crisis now.
“I think you’re pretty,” he told her, scratching the back of his head and screaming inwardly in horror.
A slight tinge of red flowered on Eliza’s cheeks, and for a moment, her frown faltered and her glare softened. When she put those back on again, she did so with a visible effort. “That has nothing to do with anything we’re talking about! Answer me, Raphael. How are you so strong and fast without using magic?”
“We’re almost out of the junkyard,” Raphael said, changing the subject. “We just have to climb that little hill of garbage there and the city gates will be in sight.”
“Being coy and evasive, eh?” A crooked grin appeared on Eliza’s face. Somehow it looked even scarier than her frown. “Two can play at that game.”
“Game? I like games.” Raphael shrugged. “If you’re not too sour about losing the fight, maybe we can play checkers some time.”
“That’s not what I meant! Ugh! You—”
“So there you are,” a man’s voice said. Raphael snapped his head in its direction, his eyes wide. He hadn’t detected the man’s presence, a fact that alarmed him. He hadn’t been snuck up on since he’d attained Perpetuation.
Another adventurer stood atop the garbage hill they had to crest. He was dressed quite similarly to Eliza, though while she looked stiff and uncomfortable in her leathers, he was poised and intimidating. He also wore a bright red cloak that fluttered from his shoulders.
Raphael thought again about the few, sparse groups of adventurers he’d seen pass by his house on their way to the junkyard. They wore tattered armor and carried old, battered weapons. All of them also had a hungry, faraway look in their eyes, and the few who’d stopped to share a meal with Koshi and ranted and raved on and on about how this trip into the junkyard was their last chance for fame, fortune, or something along those lines.
Koshi always tried to dissuade them, warning them about the shadow-fiends, the howlers, and the shifting landscape. None of them had listened, of course, and none of them had ever emerged from the junkyard.
This person, presumably a battlemage like Eliza given how he dressed, was completely different. His eyes were cold, hard, and focused, and his every movement radiated power and confidence. He was no adventurer, at least not like any of those Rapha
el had seen and spoken with. Raphael was fascinated. He wondered if he could beat someone like this in a fight. A grin spread across his face.
“Fenix!” Eliza cried. “I…”
“I heard someone matching your description tried to join the Hell Drakes today but was turned away by the Guild Registrar because she was too weak. She’d also been told that a beast’s Spell Core would buy her admission into the Guild, and she was last seen storming off into the junkyard.” Fenix stroked his neatly trimmed beard and smoothed back his oiled brown hair from his temples. “And I thought to myself, no, it can’t be Eliza. Even she wouldn’t be so stupid, still holding onto her dreams of becoming a battlemage even though her lack of skill and power should have meant her expulsion from our academy a long time ago.”
He clutched his belly and laughed. “But it is. You’re actually here! How did that happen? Did our Master send you away with his blessings, or did you sneak off, somehow? Actually, there’s no need to answer that question. Last time I saw you, he was trying to marry you off to a local pig farmer as a third wife, so it’s pretty clear already how and why you’re here, trying to pass yourself off as a battlemage.”
“I am a battlemage!” Eliza protested, clenching her fists.
“Yeah!” Raphael said. “And a famed one at that!”
Her downcast expression told Raphael that her claim to fame was more of a promise than a fact. He gulped. “Oh, I see. Never mind, then.”
“Anyway, I just had to see for myself.” Fenix waved dismissively. “You’re a joke, Eliza. Get the hell out of Lucia City. The Hell Drakes will never take you. Go die in a gutter somewhere, or be a whore. That might be the only thing you’ll ever be good for.”
“That’s enough,” Raphael said. “I don’t know what Eliza has done to you, but you’re being a jerk. Don’t take your inferiority complex out on others.” Raphael clenched his fists. “That’s a good way to get your jaw broken.”