Chapter 23: Following Trails

“Ugh, I hate riding a horse.” 

 

Moaned Ren as she sat atop a brown horse, holding the rein, wearing leather trousers and boots with a tucked in white shirt and a brown leather vest with the crest of the Empire embedded on it, while her long, silvery hair were tied up in a ponytail. Her small frame was only just a little taller than four years ago and everyone knew better not to bring it up as it would trigger the little demon’s temper, flaring up like a volcano over it.

 

“I would be rich if I would get a coin every time you say that.” snorted Isha, arriving next to her with her own horse, wearing a similar outfit, only hers were filled to the brim, revealing enchanting curves that captivated any traveling merchant’s eyes who passed them on the road. 

 

“We will arrive in a few days, Ren, relax.” laughed Leinor who looked like a handsome adult by now, his aura radiating out the charm of an elegant prince, arriving next to her trying to appease his sulking fiancé. Both of them wore the same, simple silver rings on their fingers, signaling their official engagement that came into effect the previous year when the Emperor held an official banquet for the two. 

 

“I hope so. What about Zern and Poli?”

 

“They are still ahead of us by a day, going by the letter they sent. They found trails of demons nearby so they are checking it out.” answered Isha, petting the little pigeon on her shoulder that cooed a little and soon flew back up.

 

“Oh? Then we are really getting close to the frontlines.” stretched Ren with a tired moan, looking up at the blue skies.

 

It was the middle of summer, even though they are traveling by hills and forests, having the blessing of shades, the hot air still made their journey too hot to enjoy, especially wearing the designated uniforms so people they come across recognize them as part of the military. 

 

“Then we should get back on the move, maybe we can get in some exercise before arriving at Catherine Forest and onwards to Cath’s Door.” said while starting to ride out, picking up a notebook from her stachel 

 

“Did you come up with something again?” asked Leinor, riding up next to her

 

“Kinda. Since last year I have been compiling the results from Uncle Boursat’s people who he trained with our technique. It shows an interesting pattern that I think we should compile and build a system around it.”

 

“You mean?” asked Isha who had little interest in research but always kept her attention on Ren’s ideas.

 

“There are affinities that are more common than others, if we could build an institution that helps the masses with improving themselves we could more easily find gems amongst them.”

 

“What are the main affinities?”

 

“It’s still not big enough to be sure but it seems like 40% have affinity to fire, 30% to earth, 20% water and the rest is spread out, wind, lightning, light, shadows, etc. I somewhat expected that there will be elements that are more common than others, so it will be easy to create a stable, fixed system to let them train and spot who has special talent and can rise above the rest.” explained as she was scratching her chin while thinking “I already submitted my findings to Father-in-law and let him devise the institutionalized training program, first for the army. Then comes the civil population. Anyway, we need more data to be 100% sure but it’s now mostly his problem to solve. I’m more interested in developing my second affinity to match my first. I reached the ninth level but still, I feel I can improve myself more. I want to maximize my abilities before attempting to break through.” 

 

“Maniac.” said Isha, rolling her eyes as in the past years she saw that Ren and Leinor spent most of their time training and only taking some days off to rest and relax which mostly meant they were at home lazing on the couch or sleeping. 

 

She couldn’t help but feel inferior that made her work twice as much, now loitering around the edge of breaking through the ninth refinement. Leinor was already at the ninth just like his love, while Zern just broke through the eight while Poli surprised everyone as he was the first to go straight to the ninth realm before anyone in the past four years and could keep up with the fighting speed of Ren and when wielding his sword he was even faster.

 

“I just feel an imbalance. It’s a weird feeling, I just… get this whispering in the back of my head that before trying to reach Harmony I need to balance out my inner forces.” sighed Ren, a bit frustrated, putting away her notebook.

 

“You're probably right, I have the same premonition when I want to break through, yet I get the feeling something is not ready yet and I should not rush. I just don’t know what.”

 

“You guys are just training maniacs. Same as the other two blockheads. In the past four years I had less fun than when I was out on the streets begging for bread.” 

 

“Hey, it’s fun to train! Nyahaha, especially when we fight!”

 

“For you, maybe, you like whooping Poli’s and Zern’s asses eh?”

 

“They get easily distracted.” giggled Ren with a mischievous smile

 

“Yet I see you two less and less to butt heads.”

 

“Ugh…”

 

“Oh, we do fight.” smiled Leinor with a teasing expression “It’s just Ren can’t win.”

 

“What?” blinked Isha completely stunned 

 

“Hey, you said it’s our secret!”

 

“Ahaha, sorry~”

 

“Hmf! Yeah, yeah, be proud until you can!”

 

“So you can’t beat him? How surprising!” laughed Isha

 

“It seems LeiLei got completely accustomed to my energies. His bloodline is scary, you know!” looked at Isha with a defeated face “He just consumes any attack I aim at him and turns it into his own! The longer we fight and I exhaust my energies, he just gets stronger! A complete cheat! Unfair!” moaned frustratedly, grabbing into her hair with the accompanying laughter of Isha and chuckles from Leinor

 

…

….

…..

 

“They went this way.” stood up Poli from the ground where he was checking the trails on the ground while they were surrounded by an evergreen forest.

 

“It’s too thick to give chase with horses here, also this forest itself connects to Catharine’s Forest in the north. They can retreat easily from here.”

 

“Not really, the forest ends at Swordscar pass and they need to cross that to reach their homeground. It’s a good natural barrier, hard to cross and we demolished most of the bridges thousands of years ago.”

 

“Maybe they made a new one?”

 

“That means they are commanded by someone in the Harmony Realm.”

 

“If it’s just one, we can take it on and escape with our lives.”

 

“If Master comes, then we can even kill it.”

 

“Maybe. But we need to be careful. You weren't there when we fought our first Harmony expert, it wasn’t good, we lost badly.”

 

“I heard it from Master. But she also said we are much, much stronger by now.”

 

“Have you ever fought with demonfolk?”

 

“No.”

 

“Exactly. Let’s rendezvous with Master and make a decision then.”

 

…

….

…..

 

It was already night when the five were together again at the bonfire, grilling their dinner.

 

“Mmm, you may be right, they must have made a crossing over the pass. Probably trying to open a second front because Father still holds the fortress and also killed the previous leader in the last battle.”

 

“Should we ask for help?”

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“We know too little. We will circle the forest and check out the pass, if we find how they cross we will decide what to do. If we can, we will destroy it first, then make a report later. If we can't, we leave, report for duty and pass on the information.”

 

“What if we come across a Harmony realm demonfolk?” 

 

“Depends. If it’s just one we can try fighting it. But not on their side of the pass. We MUST NOT cross over. Got it? If we stuck there we would be in deep shit.” said Ren looking around them with a commanding presence “If it crosses to our side good, this is our territory, even if we can’t win we can retreat safely.”

 

“Got it Master.” nodded Poli with great enthusiasm as he was itching for a real fight to finally try out his new powers

 

“Relax, you will have your turn, I also look forward to seeing how sharp your sword really became.” 

 

“I just want to get this over with. Really… How the heck am I stuck with you four? I’m supposed to be back home, taking a bath and lazing around in one of the brothels.” moaned Isha, while massaging her feet after taking her boots off.”

 

“Well, it was your Daddy’s order.” added Leinor

 

“Fuck off boytoy.”

 

“Oh, you gave up on him?” asked Ren, surprised 

 

“Fuck you too.”

 

“Lady Isha still has feelings for Mr. Boursat, it’s just… he refused her confession for the… fifth time? if I remember the numbers correctly.”

 

“Zern, you can too, fuck off.” sighed Isha, looking at him with slanted eyes 

 

“Really now? Oh, this is new~ Isha, if it’s not working and you can’t push him off yet, then maybe you should try making him jealous! Why don’t you two start going out in front of Boursat?”

 

“Huh?” came the exact answer from Isha and Zern at the same time

 

“Master is right, brother Zern.” nodded Poli with an understanding expression

 

“Poli…” rolled his eyes as an answer but Isha put on a thinking expression

 

“I never thought about that… it may work. Yo, Zern, when we go home take me to dinner!”

 

“What? Why? No. You always drink too much and I need to drag your passed out body through the streets to get you home!”

 

“Why don't I remember something like this?”

 

“Because you black out like a dead person always puking on me in the last 50 meters!” murmured with a frustrated voice 

 

“Bwahahaha, so you two regularly go to dates? Nyahahaha! I see, I see!”

 

“Also, she still has that fetish?” sighed Leinor with the same provoking face as Ren usually has

 

“You can kiss Zern’s dickhole.” threw her boots at Leinor’s head who just leaned sideways to dodge it “Anyway, what is so surprising about that? Every time Zern came over for the reports on the training, you asked for, we also sparred a little and the best thing to do afterwards is taking a bath and go for a drink!”

 

“I don’t think they realized yet.” sent a voice projection Leinor over 

 

“Yeah, Zern maybe did, but he is too reserved while Isha is just too dumb.”

 

“Anyway!” cut in Zern, clearing his throat “We should go to sleep, I’ll take on the first shift of guarding.”

 

“Good idea, we should ride off before dawn anyway.” stretched Ren, soon climbing into Leinor’s lap, curling up like a little kitten, enjoying his gentle strokes on her head while quickly falling asleep.

 

“Really… I feel like puking at your constant flirting…” harrumphed softly Isha, taking out a wine jug from somewhere, turning away, looking at the clear, night sky while drinking, ignoring Leinor’s chuckle.

 

“What is this puking thing about?” whispered Poli to Zern but before he could answer, Isha throw her other boot at them, which firmly landed on Poli’s face.

 

“I’ll tell you later.” sighed Zern, shaking his head but taking some glimpse at Isha’s back as she was drinking, with a bit of red hue on his face.

 

…

….

….

 

“This way!” shouted Poli, riding in the front as they were going along a 2-300 meters deep gush that was stretching endlessly and was about 50 meters wide, while down in the deep a quick flowing, violent river was churning. “There! I found it while scouting ahead!” 

 

When he stopped on a smaller hill and the rest of the team arrived they saw a bridge, made out of wood in the distance that was clearly freshly built, stretching over the pass. 

 

“You were right, Zern. They built a bridge.” grinned Ren as the midday sun shone on them “It seems small and only able to support small groups of 5 or 6 passing over but it could be only a temporary solution before they expand on it.”

 

“It’s made of wood, I just need to burn it down.” commented Isha

 

“True, but I don’t think it's that simple. Why aren't there any guards? They just left it there? To be found and destroyed?” asked Leinor, furrowing his brows

 

“Also we are standing on a hill, It’s easy to spot us but I don’t see any movement.” added Zern

 

“Because I am the one who guards it.” cut in a male voice with a strange accent, like if he only learnt the language not yet fluent in it.

 

When they turned there stood a tall man, around 220cms tall behind them with crossed hands. Or at least he looked like a man only at first sight. Soon you could spot the clear differences, as he didn’t wear any clothes, but his body was covered in brown scales, leaving him a V neck and only there and on his face grew some human-like flesh. His black hair, worn in dreadlocks, was shoulder length as his eyes were completely black without any colors. Around his waist he had a scorpion like tail wrapped around and his frame although skinny looked tough as nails. 

 

“He came from underground.” murmured Ren as getting off the horse just like the others, sending the animals farther away as they already were terrified and restless by the aura the demonfolk was releasing.

 

Behind the man, on the ground they could see a hole that led to who knew where, but it only raised the question: Is he the only one here or are there others?

 

“You’re not the first humans here. Sorry to say, but you won’t leave.” said as his scorpion tail struck out from his waist but to his surprise it was blocked off by Zern, whose hand threw off sparks as it was shining in a metallic, silvery color “Oh?” let out a surprised sound while bringing back his tail, blocking Poli’s sword who already was behind him, trying to slash the back of his neck.

 

As the sword slashed the tail another round of sparks flew everywhere, before the demonfolk kicked backwards but Poli was way faster and easily dodged and soon he found himself surrounded by Ren’s group.

 

“You are not ordinary soldiers.” looked around him with a serious expression now

 

“Not really soldiers.” smiled Ren “Sorry to say Mr. Scorpion, but I think you miscalculated here.” looked into his black eyes, while licking her lips “Your aura feels strong but…”

 

“Not as strong as he was.” finished Leinor with also a smile on his face

 

When all five of them released their own auras the scorpion tailed man trembled a little as he couldn’t believe all five of them possessed strength like this.

 

“It seems I really did. But don’t get too cocky, humans.” growled while his hands turned to pincers, clanking around with strength that could snap metals into half easily, clearly getting ready to go all out, with a fight for his life.

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