Yesterday's Friend

The elven capital was only a few hours away, but those hours were beginning to feel a lot longer. Minutes of walking felt like days. Everyone kept an eye on their surroundings, still disturbed by the thing that had been following them. Some of the elves were saying that it was just a curious beast, but even they doubted their own words as it came rolling out of their very mouths.

Near the end of the trip, the paranoia grew even worse when it should have been the exact opposite. The elves were arguing among themselves, wondering if it was a good idea to continue to the capital with potential enemies on their tails. No, not potential, they were confirmed to be enemies. Kies felt their presence, bouncing in and out of his detection range, following them relentlessly.

A steel scraping across some wood silenced the elves as they all turned to Nyana, who was drawing her arrow. Her bow was already in hand and her face said that she had enough of the stalker. "We have to confront them eventually. Now is the best time."

Since they had to escort the villagers, Nyana and Kies had to refrain from doing anything rash, but now that they are close to the capital, the villagers shouldn't have a problem completing the journey on their own without their protection.

A green aura enveloped the arrow in Nyana's hand and she shot it straight up past the thick leaves. The arrow exploded upon reaching a height into a shower of green. In seconds, Kies sensed a presence approaching them from all directions, though mostly from in front of them.

By the bunch, elves armed to the teeth with weapons appeared from the trees. Without saying even a single word, the new elves knew the reason why they were here and took over the escorting from Nyana and Kies. With the villagers safely passed onto them, the pair departed to catch the snake that refused to leave them alone.

Kies scanned the area for where the pursuer was and discovered them trying to escape them. "Directly in front of us," Kies told the elf.

Nyana, who also pinpointed the target's location by now sent her salutations with a barrage of arrows. Their target responded to her greetings by sending something of their own as well. A forcefield intercepted the arrows, disintegrating them midflight. Kies and Nyana both bounced off to the side, the forcefield missing them by a hair's length as it accelerated past and tore through the trunk of a tree. An unnatural square-shaped was now hollowed in the tree.

Nyana saw this and snarled, furious that the attack damaged a precious tree. "Don't know if they were trying to piss me off, but they've done it now!" The angered elf sped up and fired another volley of arrows at the target.

This time, the arrows missed as well, but Nyana intended for them to miss. The arrows were imbued with her nature magic and upon hitting the dirt, vines sprouted out of the ground where they landed, cutting off the target's escape path.

With the route cut off, the target had no choice but to turn around and confront the two. A flash of purple nearly blinded the pair as they closed in and Kies yelled for Nyana to get out of the way. "Dodge it!"

Unsure about how wide the attack was, Kies decided to not take the gamble and constructed a barrier of wind in front of him. There was an explosion followed by loud crackling, almost like firecrackers. It was not a sound that Kies was familiar with.

Another explosion went off and scattered the barrier like glass and sent Kies spiraling out of control into a tree. The impact rattled his core and his whole body froze up for a split second. Luckily, there was no real damage sustained and he quickly recovered his senses.

Taking a glance behind him to see the force of the attack, Kies saw his silhouette imprinted in the tree. It was a rather funny-looking pose with his arms and legs outstretched, sort of like a scarecrow. Hopefully, the elves won't condemn him for this.

Nyana was luckier and managed to get out of the way of the attack since she took the chance of dodging it. She returned fire with yet another volley of arrows and once again, none of them hit their mark. Using minimal movement the target dodged each arrow with such skill that the elf could have sworn that each of them nicked them a tiny bit.

Nyana reached into her quiver to fetch a few more arrows but found herself clawing at the smooth wood surface. It was empty. She clicked her tongue in annoyance and resorted to conjuring more arrows with her magic.

However, the enemy wasn't about to let her do just that. They charged forward, closing the gap in an instant. The elf was surprised by the sudden advance and couldn't move away in time. She twisted her body and received a nasty cut down from her shoulder to her elbow.

"Gah!" With one eye closed from the pain, Nyana reached for her dagger and drew it in time to parry the follow-up attack. The force behind the strike knocked the weapon out of her hands, grazing her arm before getting wedged into a tree branch.

With nothing left to protect herself with, Nyana held up her arms and braced for the third attack when she heard Kies' voice yell, "Get down!"

Doing as commanded, the elf dropped to the ground as a strong torrent of wind blew over her, uprooting the grass from the soil and blasting foliage everywhere. The winds slammed into the target and blew off their hood, revealing the enemy to be what they expected it to be.

"Demon," Nyana mouthed the word distastefully. It was a demoness armed with two gloves with claws protruding out of them. It wasn't a conventional weapon like the ones they were used to seeing.

Though the enemy was in front of her, the demoness paid no heed to the elf. Instead, her eyes were on Kies. She was more interested in his reaction that the elf's, and rightfully so.

Though it had been years, the two recognized each. Kies scowled, knowing that the day would come when he had to face his former allies. Long hair, purple eyes, and a sharp face. The face was older but it resembled that of someone he knew... Ammine's.

There were no hellos or hugs for this reunion. No, they were warriors on opposing sides. Ammine simply smiled and challenged Kies with, "Let's see if your strength has grown. I'd be disappointed to find out if it were just your appearance."

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