Chapter 5 “Barbarians“
Chapter 5
Loud noises sounded from the village, as the red manicules started to fluctate.
'Is there a ongoing festival?'
Since Julian didn't know how to get an element to acknowledge him, he wanted to have a look at what was going on.
He picked up the books and put them into the Void, before walking down the forest. After closing in to the village, he noticed that it wasn't an ongoing festival at all. It was a cruel scene. Elves being brutaly murdered by what seemed to be humans. Humans that were clothed in fur of animals, their muscles brimming and their body unwashed and dirty.
At that moment, something clicked within Julian. Making him feel remorse and pure anger against these humans. He didn't know the reason why these, seemingly barbarians, attacked the village. Maybe they had a good reason. But Julian couldn't help but be reminded of his family and their last moments.
Fallen into pure anger, he put on his cloak before rushing into the village.
"AAHH!" a woman screemed.
"Mommy!" a kid cried.
"NO!" a man screemed.
The elves cried out for help, as they were cruely slaughtered by the hoards of barbarians. The few hunters and fighters tried to fight back, but it was hopeless. There were at least a few hundreds of these cruel humans, while there were only a dozen or so elven fighters.
One of the barbarians had just killed the father of a small family, now standing in front of the mother of their only daughter.
"Hehehe, this raid really~ is beneficial! If only we had done this earlier!" He told himself while licking the blood off of the battleaxe in his hand. The father's head was cleanly cut-off, and now rolling on the ground. The mother was holding the child in her arms, covering her eyes and ears to protect them from the scene.
"Woman! You shall be my concubine!" He loudly spoke while pointing the axe at her.
"I-I will, b-but please spare my daughter's life!" the crying elf exclaimed while still embreacing her child tightly.
"Who told you to talk back at me?!" The barbarian screemed at her, slapping her across the face. "But since you insist... Your daughter would also make a good concubine..." He blatantly spoke with a wide, perverted grin on his face. The mother's face was full of terror and hatred. But she couldn't do anything against it. She was powerless.
"Let me see the bearer oof my children closely" he said as he extended his arm to the little girl. The mother was still hugging her child everso tight.
"No-NO!! PLEASE!!!" The mother screemed out. And as if the gods head answered her call, the barbarian stopped moving. The frightened mother watched as the barbarian's body slowly parted vertically. The body was cut perfectly in half and the blood of the man started splattering everywhere. The organs also slowly squirmed out of the lifeless hull.
Behind the corpse stood a cloaked figure. The woman couldn't see the figure's face or body shape. It was covered in a black mist that gave the figure an eerie aura. The figure held a plain, big, black-gray scythe in it's hand. For the woman, this figure looked like a ghost from hell. But in this moment this ghost gave her hope.
"Oh, great goddess. Thank you for this chance.", the woman sobbed tiredly "Oh, great ghost, who was sent by the goddess, please save our village!" She put her daughter aside and slowly began to get in a kneeling position, starting to kowtow to it.
This "ghost" was Julian. His sight was fully concentrated on the headless man on the ground. It reminded him of his father, which gave him a boost in rage, slowly accumulating within him.
Suddenly he vanished from the woman's sight. As if he never had been there to begin with.
Julian wandered from one attacker to the next, killing them within one strike. By this time, he had killed over 20 of them. And with his rage the raging flames of the buildings started to get attracted by him.
In the middle of the village, 10 or so barbarians were gathered. One large, imposing and muscular barbarian in the middle.
"Chief! There is someone going around killing our men! What should we do?" "Someone? What do you mean "Someone"?" "None of us has seen them yet. Everyone who has, seems to be dead!" "Then make groups of three and always watch the other's back. I want them to be dealt wi-"
Before the Chief coul finish his sentence, he felt that something was wrong. He felt dread. So he instinctively dodged to the right, escaping death by just a millimeter.
In front of him, now stood a ghost-like figure, that gave him a creepy feeling. The figure's cloak shaking in the wind.
"Who are you? Identify yourself!" The chief screemed at Julian, but he just ignored it. Julian had used his teleportation more than 40 times by now and he was slowly growing tired. But since he had already begun, he would see it to the end.
"Who I am doesn't matter since you won't be alive soon" Julian spoke in a deep, calm voice. Then he teleported in front of the barbarian chief striking him frontally. The chief blocked it with the broad axe in his hand, before counter-attacking Julian. He wanted to dodge the axe, but ultimately his arm flew off, together with the scythe.
There was blood gushing out of the wound and it hurt badly. "HAHAHA! You can't beat me with your frail body, you shrimp!" The man loudly exclaimed, wildly laughing at the scene. But before he could celebrabrate his victory, something strange and ghostly happened. Black tentacles appeared from the blood of the wound and grabbed the severed arm, reattaching it.
"Huh? T-This can't be! It's a dream! IT MUST BE A DREAM!" The man went crazy, mostly because the cloak emitted a dark and carrupting aura. It wasn't something a human should be able to do. So with all his might, he swung down on Julian, in hopes of slashing him apart.
"I'm behind you..." Julian disappeared from the man's sight. Before he felt a stabbing pain in his neck. Julian stabbed him in the spine, severing any connection to his body.
"When did it go wrong... How did this happen..." The man sobbed, the light in his eyes had already faded. He recalled all of his wrong-doings in his life, before Julian split open his skull with the man's axe. After killing him he went ahead and killed the remaining barbarians. The chief seemed to be the strongest of the bunch by far.
Taking out the minions Julian had gone through the whole village.
"I think I should have gotten all of them... Wait!" He realized that he had missed a spot. The little bookstore.
Hurrying to the bookstore, Julian once again saw the buildings burning and the villagers trying to save their comrades and family.
The bookstore was already catching on fire, but it wasn't very fearsome yet. Julian sprang through the door, breaking it into hundreds of pieces. The bookshelves were fallen over. Laying on top of each other. Behind the counter, where the young woman stood before, was now blood splattered around the walls and floor. But to Julian's surprise, there wasn't any corpse.
'Did she perhaps escape? Or maybe she was captured by a barbarian I oversaw.' Knowing that she wasn't dead, he made his way out of the bookstore, and started looking for her around the village. Julian still couldn't find her. 'If she isn't in the village, then maybe she ran into the forest...' Thinking, that this was the only remaining possibility, he teleported out of the village and searched the nearest forest.
He closely listened to any noice within the cluster of trees. The leaves rusteled, the hoots of the owls and the night-active animals wandering through the undergrowth. But there wasn't a single sound made by a human. The deeper he got into the forest, the more he became sure, she had died.
Then suddenly, a smell Julian recogniced, tickled his nose. It was the metallic smell of blood. Julian had memorized this sensation over time as he killed all of the barbarians.
Following the scent, he started to find traces of blood here and there. There were only small amounts.
After minutes of trailling the path of blood, he saw a small person, leaned against a tree.
*Sob*
Tears were escaping the small woman as she was holding her right leg. Julian carefully tried approaching her, so he wouldn't scare her. But just as the rest of the people witnessing Julian's appearance, she was frightened. To his surprise, she didn't even try to run or fight, she just sat there, without any spirit left in her. Julian walked closer and closer, now standing only a meter away from her.
She looked up, trying to take a glance of the face of the person in front of her. She couldn't see anything, because of a mist veiling his appearance. Julian kneeled down to her, extending his hand forward in a grabbing motion. The woman's gaze followed his every movement.
Julian got a hold of her leg. It was in a miserable state. The flesh was cut deeply and the bones were crushed.
'Since I can heal my wound with the help of my soul, maybe I can restore her leg aswell?' Julian started to infuse his soul ointo the wound, trying to heal it, which was way harder than he thought. His own wounds could easily be located because of the pain, but because he now had to heal another being, it was naturally more difficult. The process alone cost him a lot of mental pain and his bloodpressure started to increase, causing him to bleed from his nostrils. Luckily, the leg started to show aspects of healing.
'Luckily it was just he leg, if the anatomy had been any more complex, I wouldn't have been able to do anything.'
The process of healing a person needed big amounts of knowledge and wisdom. Not only about the anatomy, but also about the aspects of a person. Like, which bloodtype are they, which gender and their age, to count the least. Since it was only the leg, he restored the cells and connected them with each other. He didn't create any blood, since he lacked information about her, leaving it to her heart. But he gave her some blood plasma to speed up her recovery.
Her testosterone started to kick in and she slowly fell asleep, because her exhaustion.
Julian picked her up and carried her back to the village, before laying her down near the walls, where nothing was flamable. After that he went across the village, searching for survivors and helping them. After he finished everything he had wanted to do, he disappeared in the forest, heading for the elven capital as the fire slowly started to settle.
'Since I need to learn more about this world, I need to find a place that gives me a lot of information. And there's almost nothing better for that, than a school. But I still need to get accepted, right? Lucia said, I should go see Professor Moonlith to take the test. Well before thinking about that, I should get there somehow. I also need to think of a way to get the money to pay off the tution fee.'
Since Julian had exhausted himself quite a bit, he looked for a place to rest, before going to sleep.
After sleeping through the night, he awoke to the brightly shining sun. He set off, travelling east from the forest.
'If I walk for another 5 days in this direction, I should reach a small town called ‹Rym›. Until I get to the capital it will take a while. I could use that while to train, aswell as to gather some money.'
Julian started teleporting while sprinting, manuvering through the dense forest. When he came across a wild animal he killed it with his scythe, and looked for a crystal if it was a special animal. After removing the crystal, he put in the bodies of these beast. Maybe he could sell them alog with the crystals. When the sun vanished behind the horizon, he would rest.
Five days passed like that and he had accumulated a bunch of things.
Obtained from various beasts
›Minor‹
Age: 10 Years
Can be obtained by killing a Minor Rank Beast. Contains large amounts of spiritual energy.
Obtained from various beasts
›Advanced‹
Age: 20 Years
Can be obtained by killing a Advanced Rank Beast. Contains large amounts of spiritual energy.
Obtained from ‹Flaming Rock Giant›
›Major‹
Age: 40 Years
Can be obtained by killing a Major Rank Beast. Contains large amounts of spiritual energy.
He had killed a few big lizards, monkeys, boars, deers, panthers and so on, but one beast made him struggle quite a lot. The ‹Flaming Rock Giant› was as it said in the name, a huge golem, made of burning rocks.
[…]
'Hmm it smells strange here. Could it be a new beast?' Julian was currently in a small desert of rocks and boulders. There were a few bushes and trees here and there, but except for that it was completely empty.
As he was going around a little rock mountain, a huge boulder fell on him, crushing the earth and causing a small explosion that crumbled the earth dozens of meters in each direction.
Chapter 5 END