Chapter 28: Flaws Revealed

"Well, anyway," Dalary said, couldn't be able to keep up with the silence surrounding them. "What do you wanna talk about?"

"H-Huh?"

"You came here to talk about something, right?" She clarified as she rested her chin on her palm. "Go on, I'm listening."

"I-I… I can't say it…" He stuttered, lowering his head. Even though he's faceless, his actions showed the grief that he was feeling right now.

Giving up, she sighed, never gonna know what he had been hiding all this time.

"It's fine." She said.

Long silence greeted them back as no one attempted to talk first. They both stared at the glowing waterfall in front of them, sparkled in beauty like the starry sky above it. The darkness surrounding them was been defeated by the light of both the waters and the moon.

"M-Miss Dalary, I–"

"Don't call me that." The scarnet broke the silence, as he lowered his head, but the tendrin interrupted his sentence as soon as she heard his honorifics. A hint of disgust can be seen in her face. "You're making me old."

"S-Sorry." He said with a low voice. Then, he raised his head and turned his head to him. "A-And I'm very sorry about what I did days ago."

This widened Dalary's eyes, shocked at the sudden apology she received. She was too focused on her mistakes that she forgot about others.

"Because of me, being too paranoid, I put everyone else into danger." He lowered his head back, lifting his knee to support her tired arms. "I'm really just a useless person, not to mention a coward."

He also started to reminisce about the incident he faced. His friend, Tasan, was about to end his life using the relic of his family, that was once forbidden for anyone to wield, but then, in the help of the Above, he dodged and escaped the miserable execution.

After that, all he wanted to blame was himself, for leading him towards the shrine that forbade anyone to enter it. It was a sacred place, and the rules yelled to not check what had been staying inside. But he still chose not to listen and followed his friend, that was now fallen into the dark side.

There's no one to blame but him alone.

Because of his companion's sudden silence, Dalary sighed with a cold sweat. As expected, she couldn't keep up with the noise of the quiet place.

"Each one of us has flaws, you know…" She started to explain with crossed arms, in which he turned around to listen. She lifted her head to look at the stars twinkling on the sky. The cold breeze started to get colder than before, but that didn't bother them.

"It's not just you…" She added, now plastering a smile on her face. It was the first time that she gave sincerity to her words other than her only friend Meria. "All we have to do was to accept our mistakes, fix it, and do better next time."

After that lesson, she also remembered her mistakes. How she started to hate her kind and is one of them. The things that she was murmuring before about them. It wasn't a big deal at first, but now, she realized that if they heard everything that she said before, she was sure that they will be broken.

But they both know that they can still fix it. They might have done mistakes in the past, but they were sure never fail this time again.

***

"At last…" He said as he stood up, continued to stare at the town of Zentra in a far distance. His whole identity shouted black, as mists started emitting all around his body like there's been a force of evil that wrapped around it. Black nerves continued to scatter in his once white eyeballs.

"…we finally found them."

His smirk showed the sharp pointy teeth he had been hiding all this time, which could even be compared to the Cerberus' deadly jaws.

No one knew their existence, and they made sure of that. They had been waiting for this time to come, to find them.

"But…" His happiness disappeared all of a sudden, and now turned into a bored and irritated face. He took a peek at his back, and he can clearly see him standing, but the dark refused to show him. "…why are you here?"

"I got bored." The man behind him answered as he crossed his arms on his chest. Then, he started stepping forward, revealing his face under the moonlight.

His black hair that was once blue, had never been bothered and his body wrapped in bandages was the most attention-seeking features of him.

No one might have seen his face, but one can tell the darkness surrounding his whole body. Mists started to wrap all around him and one of his bandages became darker, absorbed too much of the evil power.

"And besides, he's there, right?" He asked, holding the long sword that he had been carrying since he first touched it. After him escaping, he was frustrated to let a single person go, now he wouldn't do it again.

"Hmm… If you're talking about your fellow mummy, then yes." The shark man answered, back on his smirk as he never turned around to his companion again, and focused on what's happening to the town targeted.

"Please don't include me." The bandaged man said with frustration in his voice. "I don't want to be known as a scarnet."

But the former didn't care and just shrugged at him. Without any choice, he started to stare at the joyful town of Zentra, planning for a way to come to their guarded walls and gates. And yet, he never killed all of them, now it's the time to finish his own job.

"I'm coming for you, Kandani." He whispered with a sly grin, continued to stare the town. He grasped for the relic, ready to bathe it into the blood.

The other couldn't help but sigh, even he wasn't having a good time with a different race as the scarnets. Even he doesn't know why he is here.

"Well, if that's your target…" Feeling defeated, he changed the subject to what they really came here for. His grin became wider as he stared at a lady lost in the middle of the grass field, carefully walking to the dark woods.

"…then this is mine."

***

MERIA ARCSON

The tall grey trees refused me to see the moonlight, and the fog blocked my way into seeing everything. Every direction I took, I always get nothing but just the feeling of being alone. There are also the times that I can see pairs of red eyes staring through my soul in the dark.

I can't believe this will be harder than I thought it would be. Looking for Cainne, a skilled fighter with great stealth, in the middle of the woods that kept me from seeing everything from back to front, is the same as the spartan training.

Was about to give up, I sensed a huge amount of presence passed through in front of me in incredible speed. And after a short amount of time, it disappeared, running away from my position and deeper into the woods.

I couldn't help but be stunned in my position. My legs are shivering and I can't be able to find my voice. Sweats are dripping from my head and my breathing became abnormal. My heart started beating faster.

When the unknown entity passed through, it sent chills down into my spines, pouring me everything that I feared in all of my life. And not just that at all, I took a glimpse of a black mist coming out of the entity.

Was that what I think it is?

I was supposed to go running after it as any normal person would do, but my feet is stuck in the ground, didn't want to come along with me. All I did was to kneel down, dropping my wooden sword on the ground and covered my whole head with my hands, my heart beat faster than before.

A tear fell from my eyes down into the ground, filled with immense fear over the entity. I don't know what will happen to me if I follow it. I may become one of them, or else, my life may be taken away from me.

But I shook my hand at my pessimism and stood up from crawling. That's right. If I chose to be scared and run away, I haven't changed at all. My whole environment started to change, my whole life started to change, and if I don't change, I couldn't be able to keep up.

I stood up and grabbed my fallen sword. I took all the courage to make my first step from my position and started running towards the entity at a fast pace. I started to run out of the air and my legs are slowly giving up on me.

Thankfully, that didn't take too long to reach for my target when I made it into a cave hiding behind the trees. It might be small but it's big enough for people to walk in. Sap started dropping from the top, making a giant puddle in front of me.

I gulped, as I felt the dark presence staying inside the dark cave. I slowly walked in the giant hole, my heart is beating faster, begging to get out of here. But I wanted to know who's behind those black mists.

When I entered, I was supposed to be greeted by complete darkness, with nothing else to see. But for some reason, I can clearly see what's inside the cave and the only dark that I see was the corners. The spikes from the ceiling started dripping saps in the middle of the large chamber.

"So you felt my presence despite being a human, huh?" A high-pitched male voice suddenly spoke in the middle of the cave, which sent me chills. I couldn't help but jump in my position.

"Or…" He added, now lowered his voice into a whisper. I was about to turn around to see his true identity, when the next thing I knew is he's already standing beside me, reaching for my ear. "… are you really a human?"