Chapter 1: Chapter 1

The screams echoed over the dark village as the girl crawled through the alley. Her red eyes darted from side to side, looking for the slightest hint of movement. The mark over her heart itched and burned as a new voice joined the chorus. 

"Listen," it seemed to say, "they need you. Save them!" But she couldn't. 

Her hands shook, devoid of blade and courage. A divine mark wasn’t enough to turn a town girl into a Heroine. She'd been worried when it had appeared. The legends were clear on what she had to do. 

She'd told her parents, of course, but they'd been unconcerned. They'd get her training, they said. Help her prepare to face the Dark Lord's forces as a heroine should. 

They'd been excited, even. 

Then the screams started. 

She slid around the corner, freezing as she saw the fire engulfing the inn. The screams assaulted her ears as she met Anysima's pleading eyes. The serving girl lay on her back before the building, her pretty dress torn from her body, bloody scratches covering her chest as the furred monster leaned over her. Its snout was filled with misformed teeth, drool leaking from it as the creature moved between her friend’s legs.

“Please.” 

The word was easy to read in her eyes, though the heroine did not know whether she was pleading for help, or death. The mark burned, and she grit her teeth as she turned away. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. She should have gone on a journey to teach her. To prepare her.

Not watch as her friends and family were taken and hurt by monsters.

The girl moved forward, her friend’s screams dying behind her. Finding another street, she tried to ignore the accusing eyes staring from lifeless bodies. Her ears twitched, standing up on her head.

Footsteps. She dove to the side, pressing herself tight against an upturned cart. She steadied her breath as the steps came closer, listening. Half a dozen of them at least. Unintelligible growls and whimpers escaped their jaws, sending shivers down her spine as they talked. 

She waited as they stopped mere feet from the cart. They fell silent before one started letting out short, authoritative barks. The girl flinched, the sound painful to her sensitive ears, and reached up to push them flat against her head. She couldn’t hear the sound anymore.

Yet it still hurt.

Every syllable echoed through her, the mark on her chest burning brighter and hotter, as though rejecting the sheer existence of the language itself. She grit her teeth, determined not to make the slightest sound that would surely let them know just how close their prey was hiding. Then, before the burning had even stopped, she felt the ground shake as a dozen monsters charged the doors. She closed her eyes as muted screams of panic and pain echoed through the street. The mark burned. 

She had to get away. They’d come out, eventually. They’d find her.

Her eyes darted across the street as she bit her lip. Were they all gone? A glint caught her eye. She made her choice.

Bar’s eyes didn’t judge her. He just lay there, his hand still holding the thin knife he’d doubtlessly been using to prepare fresh cuts of meat to sell. He’d tried to fight the monsters off, and she had to jump over a massive corpse to get to the blade.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered as she pried open his fingers. An impulse, but it still felt wrong to steal from the butcher. Even if he’d never use the tool again, or sneak her a snack with a laugh and wink. 

 

No roars and growls of triumph echoed her as she rose, blade in hand. She glanced around, considering directions, before rushing an alley to her left. It was deeper into the town, rather than the walls, but was that truly less safe? The mark pounded in response to her heartbeat, urging her on.

More corpses littered the alley and she winced as she stepped over them, careful to not disturb their rest. Bile rose in her throat as she recognised friends and family she’d known all her life. If she’d been stronger. Or prepared. Ready for the blessings of the Goddess, then this wouldn’t have happened.

But she hadn’t been. There was no way forward except past the loss of everyone she had ever known.

The alley passed her by quickly, leaving her in yet another street. The Goddess’ Church rose above the plaza at the end, its spire piercing the heavens. Her mark burned. She stepped towards it.

She was no heroine. 

She couldn’t do this.

The Goddess needed to know.

The street around her was empty, no bodies, or people, or monsters impeding her path. It almost seemed peaceful, if not for the screams and roars echoing ever louder.

She tried to ignore them as she walked a path she had walked a thousand times before. Her eyes locked on the spire, and then the large wooden doors as she neared her destination.

A screech. Too close.

She turned just in time to see a monster dash towards her. It was different from the others. Smaller and green skinned, with a face that looked almost like an orc but not quite. It helf a large, ugly, curved blade and swung at her head. The mark burned and, for the first time, she listened.

She dove low, crashing into the monsters belly as the blade passed over her. It cried out, a roar of anger as her hand clenched around Bar’s knife. Its clawed hand crashed into her back and she gasped as she fell to a knee. She didn’t hesitate. The knife moved. The monster roared.

The heroine jumped back with the knife, now covered by dark blood, comfortably resting in her hand. The monster clutched at its thigh, where her blade had found an opening between its leather protection. Its eyes, as red as her own, were narrowed. Cautious.

“Come then!” she shouted as she sank through her knees, her hand steady as she held her weapon before her. It roared in answer, the sound echoing within her body, but she steadied her breath as it charged. The mark on her chest throbbed. “Wait.” And she did.

The creature neared her, it’s mouth open as it shouted its rage and pain to the world. Its weapon raised high to cleave her in twain. “Wait.”

Her fingers clenched the handle of her weapon. She could see the whites of its eyes. Its weapon moved. “Now!”

And so did she. A step. A twirl, and her knife shot out. The monster’s roar died in an instant.

It fell, and the heroine took deep breaths as she looked at it. Her knife embedded into the back of its skull. Power filled her, strength unlike any she had ever known as, on instinct, she exercised a Heroine’s Right and claimed the creature’s strength for her own.

Roars and shouts of anger echoed through the plaza, pulling her from the feeling. She rose, reaching out to grab the knife, before turning to the streets surrounding her. Shadowy forms, dozens of them, were flooding out of them. Most of them were small and green, like the monster she’d killed. Others, large and misshapen. Like the one she’d seen at the inn.

She hesitated, the knife almost weightless in her hand. She was stronger already. Could she kill them? Take bits and pieces of their strength one by one and grow enough that she could save… everyone?

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The mark throbbed. “No.”

She turned away and rushed to the church’s door. The monsters cried out, at least some having seen her move.

It didn’t matter. The doors were light under her hands, almost seeming to close by themselves. She took a large metal candelabra, and slammed it down onto the large handles, locking them into place.

Then, she turned to face the sanctum of the Goddess.

They’d been here. Bodies covered the stone floor, both the robed Servants and their horrifying attackers. The large wooden benches were scattered about, shattered by the fighting that had filled the hall, and on the dais she stood. A wooden effigy of a woman so beautiful she couldn't be of any of the seven races. She was untouched, the only sign of the fighting on her visage a splatter of blood covering her cheek. 

"Goddess," the heroine whispered as she stepped forward. Behind her, the roars of monsters echoed as the door trembled. 

A touch of cold passed over her shoulders, and she closed her eyes. Her feet kept walking as she shivered. 

"This isn't right, is it? They're here… hundreds of them." Her words were soft, but the touch became warm and she knew she'd been heard. 

"No, my child." Warmth filled her heart as the comforting voice passed through it. She didn't hear it with her ears as much as her heart. Still, they were as clear as the waters of the lake. 

"Fate and Destiny are in flux, the future is clouded through the interference of another. He should not have known to find you here, yet he did and you must rise up as so many have before you. Escape. Grow from the blood of your enemies, the love of your companions, the wealth of your experiences, and reclaim the future for your people." The words filled her with warmth and dread in equal measure. She considered how to respond, but the cold touch of the Goddess faded. 

"Wait!" she shouted, and the cold remained as she opened her eyes. She was standing in front of the statue, the Goddess's hand reaching out towards her. She threw herself to her knees, stretching out her hand in return, though not daring to touch. "Please," she whispered desperately, "I can't do it. I'm just… I'm just a girl! I can't fight them…" 

“You can. Or are you saying that I chose wrong? That my sight is clouded?” There was a warning in the voice that sent a shiver up the Heroine’s spine, but she grit her teeth. If the Goddess wanted to strike her down for her insolence, that still would be better than the fate that awaited her once the doors failed.

“Yes. Goddess. That’s exactly what I’m saying. There is no way out. My home is on fire, my friends and family taken. The doors to your church here are falling. Tell me. How am I supposed to escape and save them!?” She shouted the last words as she shot to her feet.

Silence was her answer, only the muted shouts of her enemies and the rhythmic thump of axes striking the doors filling her ears. Yet the cold touch of the Goddess remained. The seconds passed slowly as she stood, hand clenching the blade as she tried to prepare herself for her fate.

“I do not make mistakes when choosing my Heroines, daughter. Yet, I must concede, your Realm is shrouded in Darkness. Only you, calling upon me as you are, have allowed me to pierce the veil in truth. Should you wish me to know more then you must allow me… open your heart, for but a moment, and take my hand.”

The girl didn’t truly know how to do as she was instructed, but she knew that she did want the Goddess to see, and she focussed on that desire. She reached out, clasping the statue’s hand with her own smaller one.

An instant passed, and then another, as she waited. Then, the cold surged through her, filling her, and she saw.

In that same instant, she heard the screams of fathers and sons, mothers and daughters not only across her town, but far too many others. She saw the crowd of monsters, a dozen or more, outside the doors to the church. Roaring and laughing and taunting as they tried to break in. Beyond them, throughout the town, easily a thousand more.

Then, she stood on a hill. The Great Mountains rose up at her back, her home far beyond them, as she witnessed a horde stretching as far as her eyes could see. In the distance, a tower.

Suddenly she saw the horde from above, the tower’s cruel, spiked, railing before her. She turned, and saw Him. A man that would seem almost normal if not for his strange clothes that looked more detailed than anything she had ever seen before. His tunic was short, with sleeves that didn’t even reach his elbows and black with symbols painted on it which were separated by a crooked line. Before the man rested a majestic marble table, the borders of the six nations seared within its surface as figures glowed upon it. His face shot up. His eyes were black, almost seeming to draw in the light. She couldn’t stop herself from looking.

He looked back at her. A smirk grew on his lips and nausea filled her belly.

“Hello, kitten.”

She gasped, the stone floor of the church hard against her knees as the cold that had filled her body passed. The tower was gone, but the nausea she had felt under His gaze remained. How was she supposed to fight him? 

“I… I can’t,” she whispered, tears running down her cheeks.

“Perhaps you could have made it out…” A vision of herself climbing the stairs, kicking open a shutter, and fleeing over the roofs, “but now He knows which of the seven races you belong to, time is too short. No… you are right, daughter. But there is a chance.”

“Please!”

“To change the fate of your world, to save those in peril. What would you give, for the aid of another?”

“Anything! Everything!” There was no doubt in her mind. That man’s eyes… she could feel what he wanted. What would happen if she didn’t stop it.

“Then, think. Think, feel, learn and then speak. Who do you need?”

“I…” she cut herself off, carefully considering the Goddess’s words even as the door cracked under the monster’s assault. “I need someone that can beat him. I can’t do it. I… I want to live. To escape, and fight.”

“There are many Heroes within the Twelve Realms that could guarantee your escape, yet none that would win you the war that is coming.”

The Heroine hesitated, looking up at the statue. She swallowed. That man… She made her choice.

“I didn’t say I needed a Hero.”

The cold moved, and she got the distinct sense the Goddess was laughing, before she spoke again.

“Indeed, you did not. Let it be done then. Through the Gates opened by Him, I shall call another, and then… I shall be gone. At least, for now. We will speak again, daughter, of this I am certain. He has never disappointed me, after all.”

Before she could answer, the cold faded and a flash of light, bright enough that she clenched her eyes shut, filled her vision. 

Then, a groan, and something wet and warm hit her face. She flinched away, before carefully opening her eyes.

“Fucking Amyra, again?” the man said as she lay her eyes upon him. He was tall, far taller than her, his body lithe, yet muscles clearly defined. He was also very naked. His penis was pointed straight at her as though it was a sword, and she suddenly realised exactly what the wetness on her face was.

A thousand emotions ran through her, before she laughed. A single, broken sound escaping her throat before her eyes rolled back, and the world went dark.

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