Chapter 5

"Tonight, I will teach you about our goddess." The priest said while sitting around the campfire and adding more firewood to it.

"About our goddess? The one who saved me and sent you to me? The one who blessed me with the ability to understand you?" Raven asked from the priest and got visibly excited about the subject as that goddess sent the teacher to her. Because that goddess, she got a name. So she wanted to learn more about the goddess, as she had done so much to her already. 

"Yes, child, that one. I have served my whole life to her, and I don't regret it at all. Not even a single day. But let's not talk about that now. Let's talk about the goddess. Rodona is the goddess of lost souls, bad omen, darkness, insight, wisdom, and death. She might sound evil goddess, but that isn't at all. She takes care of the souls and guides them to the afterlife. She makes sure that everyone is judged fairly and has a chance to redeem themselves. Many think that she is an evil goddess, but that just lies that the other churches started to spread about her. As she is an old goddess and once she was a very strong one with many believers, but then the other gods and goddesses got jealous of her and wanted to overthrow her and steal her power to themselves. So they sent a divine command to their churches to hunt down every believer of Rodona, to weaken her power. Now it has been about five years when that started, and I'm the only priest left now. And our goddess powers she doesn't have any now, and she's slumbering now. She is gathering her powers again. But in these five years, our reputation has been lowered, and as I said, many think that she's an evil goddess. And some other gods and goddesses have taken her place now. But I still haven't lost my faith and do the ceremonies to her." 

Before the priest could continue, Raven asked from him."Teacher, is that why we are continually moving and changing our locations? Because there are people after us, and those people want to harm us?" Raven looked towards the priest's eyes that were calm as a serene lake.

"Yes, my child, and you are quite a clever one." But before the priest could continue, there were suddenly noises around them, and then before Raven and the old priest could react, there was a crossbow bolt on the old priest's stomach. Raven, who was in shock, ran near to the priest and started to cry. 

"Don't cry, my child. I'm going to meet Rodona now. You go with those men and treasure this with most in the world. It doesn't make you forget." The old man who was wiping out the tears from the girl's face before he formed a small dark ball of something and made Raven swallow it suddenly.

"That contains all of my memories and what I know about Rodona as well most of my skills. I'm sorry, I have to do this. I needed to wipe out all of your memories about Rodona and me." The priest said and started to wipe out the memories about him and Rodona from Raven's mind.

Raven falls asleep while forgetting everything that she had experienced with the old priest. "You will remember this all when you are strong enough. So, my child, I hope that you work hard."

The man who was hunting down the priest came to the campfire. One of them said, "Look at that monster. He had a little girl here. You there go and make sure the girl is alright."

One of them went towards Raven and then looked at the girl and answered."Her face has one scar, and from what I can see, there are also scars at her back."

"That monster was using that innocent little girl at her sadistic and unholy ceremonies. Good that we stopped him now and saved that girl. Who knows what that man could have done next to the girl. But captain, what are we going to do with the girl now?" Another member of the team said.

The captain of the team answered them."We cannot leave the girl here. She has suffered enough already. We are going to take her as our disciple and teach her our god's way, and give her a better life without any fear that she needs to be tortured or any other cruelties."

The team who listened to their captain's speech was impressed and praised him, as he was so kind and caring towards one unknown girl. The team took Raven and gently carried her to their carriage and put her there to sleep. 

At this time as well, the captain stayed with the old priest's body and burned it down with his belongings and said, "Now you and your evil goddess are no more. You have killed and tortured enough humans, and your cruelty couldn't even know the limits, as you had one little girl here, and I don't even want to know how you treated her. But the scars tell us enough already. So burn you a heretic, and I hope that we don't see you anymore."

The captain started to walk towards the carriage where the child was sleeping and asked from his team. "Now, when we are done here. Let's continue our journey back to our holy place." The rest of the team nodded and started to prepare themselves and the carriage to the journey back to their headquarters.