I looked at myself in the mirror and smiled. I had brushed my curly, dark brown hair to more or less perfection, except for a stray bang, which swoops to the left all the time. My gray eyes shimmered in the Solight. Drops fell as I rubbed my face with water and shook my head. My brown skin was surprisingly clear today, obviously drinking water was helping. Honestly, I looked great. I rummaged through my cabinet and found my old compass watch, a half compass/half watch. My dad gave it to me when I went on my first adventure. I wrapped it around my wrist and grabbed my adventure bag and checked to make sure I had everything. I had tons of stuff packed already so-
“Zeke! You ready to go?!” my mom asks from downstairs.
“Coming!” I yell back.
I quickly put on my scarf (all the important guys wear scarves) and head downstairs to my mom.
“Do you have your toothbrush?” My mother asks.
“Yup! I even had time to-” I began.
“Your blanket? Your extra clothes? Did you pack your traveling dagger?”
“Yes, yes, and most definitely yes,” I assure her. “Trust me, I’ll be fine!”
“Okay, see you in a forra. Love you, Zeke.”
“Love you too, bye, Mom.”
I shut the door and began to walk out onto the pathway headed towards the outer gate. I’ve never been to the Gale district before. I couldn’t wait to see what it was like. However, something caught my eye… or I guess I should say, someone. Slowly, I felt the inquisitiveness spread from my eyes straight to my legs and I began to creep over into the field in front of me, where the figure was standing.
Has curiosity gotten the best of me? Yes.
Is this a bad idea? Maybe.
Should I just mind my own business and do what I’m supposed to be doing? Probably.
…Am I going to? No.
I slowly approached the mysterious figure and peered closely. And identifying as much as I could with the bright Sol in my eyes, I concluded that the silhouette was a girl.
“Hey, you! Are you okay?!” I shouted at her. At first, she just awkwardly stared at me, then slowly, as if she hadn’t actually wanted to, approached me. After a longer than normal pause, she finally spoke up;
“Who’re you?” she asked
“I- I’m not important right now. The real question is, who are you, and why are you staring at that grass?”
“I’m... Jennifer- where am I? God, I feel so dizzy. What was that thing?”
She was talking, but it didn’t feel like she was talking to me.
“Um… My name is Christopher Danterro. Are you okay?”
“I don’t… I just want to go back home, okay?”
I stare blankly at Jennifer, this very mysterious girl, and wonder what’s going through her head because mine is telling me that this doesn’t make any sense. Her eyes were jittery and unnerved. I wasn’t sure what was wrong, but I could just take her home and forget about it.
“Okay,” I say, “Where do you live?”
“...what am I doing!? You’re a total stranger! I’m not telling you where I live!”
I blink twice. “What?”
“I’m not telling you where I live-”
“How do you expect me to take you home if you won’t tell me where to go?” I say, “Look… What’s your district code?”
“My what?” She asks. Although I can’t see her face, I can tell by the tone of her voice that she’s getting a bit annoyed with me, even though I’m trying to be reasonable. However, she was starting to snap out of the fog she seemed to be in. Jennifer shook her head and ran her fingers through her hair,
“Where am I?” she asks.
“This is the Priemery District.” I answered, “and that’s Viridian Cove, right other there.”
“...Priemery District?! Viridian Cove?!” She throws her hand up in frustration and puts her face in her hands. “What, are you just saying words?”
“Well…” I say, trying not to make her too upset, “What’s your Affinity? Most districts are based off of-?”
“Affinity!?” She replies, “Ugh… listen, you’re not making any sense! Am I crazy? One moment I was looking for Gwen- and the next… Oh, crap- Gwen! Where did she go?”
She was back to talking to herself.
Well, surely she has amnesia or something, because even I’m not that oblivious. Although… She did remember her name pretty clearly. Weird.
“Okay, obviously you’re a little lost. I probably can’t help you, but my mom can,” I say to her calmly. She hesitates and then follows slowly behind me.
“Just so you know, I’m only following you because I have no other choice!” she said from a fair distance
I reopen the door to my mom’s house and take a step inside.
“Hey, Mom,” I say.
My mom turns around to see me standing in the doorway with Jennifer. A bit confused, she tried to piece something together.
“Have you… already made a new friend?” She asks curiously
“Um, you could say that...” I replied.
Jennifer steps into the house and I can finally see her clearly. Jennifer has short, brown and yellow hair with curls at the ends. A pair of round, black glasses and electric blue eyes. She’s got these, like, dots on her cheeks (I don’t have a clue what those are) and she’s wearing… pajamas?!
“Wh- whoa wait, why are you wearing pajamas?!” I ask
“It’s not like I had time to change…,” she murmured.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“It's… a long story.” She answers.
‘Well, you can tell us about it later,” My mom chimes in, “in the meantime, why are you lot here?”
“I don’t think she knows what her Affinity is…” I answer.
My mom examined her carefully.
“Zeke, she doesn’t know what it is because she probably doesn’t have one.” my mom tells me
I gasp quickly.
“You’re not from around here are you?” I ask
“Honey, which district are you from,” my mother says calmly
Jennifer steps away from my mom and looks at both of us.
“Uh, yeah, I think I’m gonna go?” She asks nervously
“What do you mean?” my mom answers. “Have you remembered where you live?”
Jennifer takes a step back.
Oh, man! She probably thinks we're crazy. Which is totally reasonable. She takes another step back and reaches for the door.
“Wait!” I shouted.
But no, she just left. There was a bit of a pause before I realized I had to run out after her.
“Get away from me, weirdo!” Jennifer yelled
“I swear, we’re not crazy!” I yell back
She kept running, faster even. We were beyond the limits of the district, into the Novias Woods. The Novias Woods is not safe at all. After all, you need to be at least a rank 5 Affinity user to travel here safely. And… I’m rank 2. Jennifer got a really good head start when she burst out the door so I can’t catch up. But I remember that I have something that she doesn’t… Psyix.
“Hey, Jennifer! Watch this!” I shouted
Although she didn’t slow down, she did turn her head slightly, just enough to glance at me. I closed my eyes and focused all of my being into becoming energy.
Starting with my hand, my body began to transform into pure light and I launched forward at what felt like lightspeed, sending me up and over Jennifer. I flicked and spasmed in the air. Surprisingly enough, this move is actually harder to use during the day because the light that forms around me wants to dissipate and split apart to reach the dark. She finally stopped running and watched me in shock as I flew through the air. The light around me flickered and faded, slowing me down tremendously. I tumbled to the ground in front of Jennifer. Landing into a roll, I quickly got up and turned toward her.
“See?!” I said, recovering from the rush of the moment.
She just stood there, watching me, for about 10 seconds and the only thing that came out was,
“Wh- wha..?” her voice faltered as she squinted at me and covered her face.
“I- what? What just-? I just-...” she stammered
Jennifer shut her eyes and silently stood there for a bit. All I could do was watch. She opened one eye slowly and all she saw was me. More silence; this was getting really weird. She just gazed at me for what seemed like forever. And then, she gracefully fell on her back, in the middle of a tree-less grass patch in the woods, and just looked up at the bright blue sky. I crept up to her and slowly sat down in front of her.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
“No! No, I’m not okay!” She yelled, “I’m in the middle of who-knows-where with a bunch of magic-using crazy people!”
I waited for a second, trying to think of the best possible response, but at the moment, there really wasn’t one, was there? So I didn’t say anything. I just laid back and looked at the sky with her. The moment was frozen in time... the silence was almost a bit calming. But then, just as the situation was beginning to get a little more mellow, an Ecraz showed up. Ecrazes are really annoying. Large, bulky, gray monsters with long arms and a nasty underbite. But they are as dangerous as they are annoying, and like I said, they’re really annoying.
“Hey, you! You looking for the daycare?” he chastised in a very grainy, very raspy voice.
Kind of like if sandpaper could sing soprano. He’s obviously making fun of my age. I'm only 13 and most of the people who come into the Novias Woods are in their late 20’s, early 30’s. Or they’re just stupid… which, I guess is the category I fall in. I stand up and turn toward the Ecraz. This whole time, Jennifer hasn’t said a word, completely distraught. I glance up at the Ecraz and try to stay calm in this life or death (mostly death) situation.
“Heh, heh, uh, no… we just got a little turned around… but, we’ll be heading back now…” I explained nervously.
He peered at us and began to snicker, then he kinda chortled a little, then he chuckled, then he broke out into a full-on laugh.
“Bwah, ha ha ha!” he bellowed, “Sorry kid, but didn’t your mommy ever tell you that you can’t come into the Novias Woods? Avaryxian adventurers such as yourself aren’t exactly welcome in these parts. But,” he smiled, or whatever it was, I can’t tell because of that underbite, “I was gettin’ kind of hungry anyway.”
“What!?” Jennifer shouted
“Uh, you wouldn’t happen to have a weapon on you, would yo-,” I was just asking a very simple question but the Ecraz had already smacked me about 20 meters away. I landed on my back and tumbled a bit. Looking up, I see this Ecraz here was almost to Jennifer, and there wasn’t much I could do. Except for one thing.
I aimed my hand towards the Ecraz. He looked towards me, only to be met with a blast of wind that knocked him into the air. Gale Burst, my go-to Psyix movie. Jennifer ran over to me before he could recover and asked,
“What is that!?” she yelped
“I’ll explain later” I answer, “if we survive this...”
“What did you just say?” She asked
“Nothing, nothing” I replied back with a small smirk.
The Ecraz had finally gotten up and he was ready to kill us. I pull out my dagger from my backpack. (Y’know, maybe that’s why I never caught up with Jennifer, I never took off my traveling backpack.) I raised my dagger towards my large opponent. Feeling a random burst of confidence, I shout,
“Hit me with your best shot!”
He growled and charged me. Jennifer stood up quickly. Flight or fight kicked in, I guess. He was running towards us, ready to strike, but I remained surprisingly calm. Maybe it’s the adrenaline or what not but, I’m feeling very heroic. Just as he was about to smash us into the ground we both quickly dodged out of the way.
“Okay, adequate attempt… let’s try with more vigor this time, no?” I said jokingly.
I looked back at Jennifer. She stood back, her eyes wide. I turned back and held my hands out in front of me. The Ecraz growled before turning to charge again. But, I decided I wasn’t going to let it.
I jumped forward and spun on my heels, building wind around me, it became a whirlwind and I let the momentum build into a moderate twister.
The cyclone appeared in front of me and it sucked the Ecraz into its clutch.
“Stand back!” I yell over to Jennifer and she steps back. I gesture my dagger in a sharp forward direction, which causes the whirlwind to grow. It got bigger and bigger until we couldn’t see the Ecraz anymore and then it flung it deep into the woods.
Jennifer and I exchanged glances and I gave her a thumbs up. She looked at me slowly and held herself.
“What… is this place?” she whimpered. I looked back at her.
“Hey!” I called out.
She looked up at me, her eyes were shaky, but she was focused.
“I can help you, okay? I need you to trust me though. You seem pretty lost.” I explained.
Her eyes darted hesitantly, trying to decide if I was trustworthy.
She took a deep breath and began nodding slowly. I walked past her, in the direction of the town and gestured to her to follow, which she did. However, she kept her distance and walked slowly. Luckily, we managed to avoid running into any other life threatening creatures.
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