"Huh...huh... Huh...huh... Huh...huh..."

A girl wearing a long, red shawl covering her upper body knelt in pain. Her right hand clutched her abdomen while her left hand trembled, trying to hold her saber still. She breathed heavily in pain and tried to stand up. Another girl, also wearing a red shawl, stood in front of the first girl, wielding a rapier in her hands. "Get up."

"You know I can't. You're the one who did this to me. What do you want?"

"To be Elder Sister, that's all."

"Then why didn't you just say so? I'll gladly withdraw my nomination. Listen..." The first girl spat out a splatter of blood as she struggled to explain. "Whether we're blood sisters, step-sisters, half-sisters, or just Scarlet Shawl sisters, you will always be as close to me like a real sister. I would never cause you any harm."

"But you did! I knew it was too good to be true for us to be so close. Everyone started liking you, even the guy I like. I'm taking back what I lost!" The second girl lifted her rapier and stabbed the first girl in the heart.

"I'm sorry for everything that I did, no matter how big or small." The stabbed girl fell back against a cabinet and shattered some glassware. "Please forgive me. Farewell..." She lost her breath without mentioning the other girl's name.

The second girl took the first girl's saber and wiped both weapons clean of the blood on her own shawl. It all just blended in nicely, as if there was no blood in the first place at all. "What's done is done. There's no return, which means I can't go back to the Sisterhood either."

She fixed her shawl and moved forward to her next destination.

-x-x-x-x-x-

Meaning 'equal night' in Latin, Equinox was the name of a sacred land faraway, created by the gods as a buffer zone to protect everywhere else from the evil that lurked in one specific area.

The Moon Goddess monitored this land herself, who passed her powers down to a young girl many generations ago. One day, the young girl was visiting her grandmother, but not long after entering the house, a wolf rushed in and attacked the family of two. Luckily, a hunter came by and saved the girl in time, but the grandmother sustained too many injuries and died of exsanguination.

The hunter raised the young girl as his own daughter and taught her every skill she would need to fight against the wolves plus the evil that later lurked in these lands. She grew up and took in other young girls who lost their families to this evil, teaching them what her late adoptive father taught her years ago. Because of her efforts as the very first Elder Sister, Equinox has in its present day to fight against that evil...

...the Sisters of the Scarlet Shawl.

-x-x-x-x-x-

"To your left!"

"No, your right! She entered from your left!"

"Heads up!"

As everyone in the crowd shouted, a blue-pigtailed girl lunged forward and turned around swiftly, slashing the incoming arrows into pieces with her bladed gloves. However, the arrowheads flew everywhere, and the other cloaked girls whined and ducked. "Not again..." she sighed.

"Everyone stop! Training is dismissed!" declared a silver-haired girl as the other cloaked girls packed up and left. She approached the first girl and shook her head. "Runo, when slashing arrows with your bladed gloves, you swing down, not sideways. That's how physics work."

"I'm not that good with physics, Julie..."

"Well, think of it this way. Slashing sideways does not bring the arrowheads down. Besides, this is the fourth time in which an arrowhead accident like this has happened since you started using bladed gloves. How about switching to another weapon?"

"I can't. My hands tremble when I prepare and arrow shot. Wielding a sword and shield is heavy. The single-bladed axes have a high tendency of swinging back."

"What about a crossbow?"

"I never pull the trigger at the right time. Julie, what am I going to do? Bladed gloves are my weapon of choice, but I keep forgetting which direction to slash in. Different setting, different orientation."

"No one ever does the same thing in a different situation. Besides, let's eat now so we can practice earlier with less people here." Julie bent down and picked up the broken arrow pieces. "At least we can use this for compost. In real combat, we use metallic arrows, each made from different metals."

"That means my bladed gloves won't work."

"Well...there's a kind of loophole here. Metal arrows are more solid and fall easily. Wooden arrows break apart and disperse. That's as much as I know. Let's eat!"

"Sure, why not?" Runo tied up her bladed gloves and hung the pair and her shawl on her designated hooks. She noticed the red scratch marks all over her knuckles and fingers. It's not exactly the softest weapon to touch, but at least I have the best control over this compared to all the others. "Julie, what's your weapon of choice?"

"A pair of crescent-blade axes. I've practiced with them since I was a child, so they double as bladed boomerangs, in a way. Come on, you should meet the other sisters!" The bubbly sister dragged the bluenette around tables to the center. "Girls, have you met our newest Sister yet? This is Runo. Say hi!"

"Hi Runo! I'm Mira."

"I'm Soon."

"My name's Chris."

"Paige speaking!"

"Chan. A pleasure to meet you."

Julie frowned and counted everyone in the room. "I know Daisy went out a few days ago, but we're still missing some people. Either way, we're all here to help you, Runo!"

Runo bowed to them all and stood up. "Thank you for the greetings. I'll strive to work hard now that I'm a Sister of the Scarlet Shawl."

"That's the spirit!" Julie squealed. "If only you knew how to slash wooden arrows properly during practice, we'll all be fine."

"About that..." Runo laughed weakly as the Sisters all giggled. "I'll work hard on that, too. Trust me." With that said, she and Julie sat at a table and ate their food. "Wait. You said you practiced with your crescent axes since you were a child? How old were you?!"

"I definitely started around ten years around. It's all about starting early. Why?"

"You could lift an ax up already?"

"More or less. My sister Daisy uses crescent axes as well, so she was my trainer. Most of us joined the Sisterhood when we were very young. Then again, there was no way for any of us to control our fate. It's not our fault that the Mist Wolves attacked us and killed our family. At least I still have Daisy."

"Must be really lonely and tiresome being here."

"At first, it was. But the sadness and despair eventually all wear off after we all get to know each other better and train from day to night. You might as well as a lot now while you can. We still have a long way ahead of us."

"You're right." Runo took a bite of her rice and sighed. Mom, Dad, I wish you two were still here...

-x-x-x-x-x-

"My compass is not broken!" screamed a brunette as he shoved the said device into a short blond boy's face.

The blond stepped back and pushed his glasses up. "Take it easy, Dan. The last thing you would want to do is break it even more by throwing it at my face. Maybe you're wearing something metallic interfering with the needle."

"No way, Marucho. It was still fine when we took a break minutes ago." Dan tapped the glass surface and watched the needle jump. "I think we took a wrong turn. Ace, can we see the map?"

A mint-haired boy unfolded his map and held it up by the corners. "Dan may be right. There's no mountain listed on the map anywhere. Baron, your binoculars please!"

"Let me look first!" Baron looked up everywhere with his binoculars and shook his head. "I think we went too far and got off the map."

"Baron, that's crazy!"

"Why don't you look at the map?!"

A taller blond boy rushed up and took a moment to regain his breath. "Guys, what time is it?"

"It's..." Dan took out his phone and answered, "...ten past five, Billy. What's wrong?"

"Don't you think the sky is becoming dark a little too early?"

"I agree." Jake came over and counted fingers. "We've been on this retreat for five days, and not a single day went dark before eight in the evening. Either that, or—"

"It's going to rain!" Dan screamed for the second time today. "Everyone find shelter!"

-x-x-x-x-x-

Runo applied Daisy's homemade aloe vera cream onto the backs of her hand. "I guess my hands are too small for the bladed gloves. Either that, or the inside of the gloves triggered an allergy."

Julie shook her head. "I think they're just friction burns. If you want, I'll find a pair of softer gloves for you to put on so that the gloves fit and don't irritate your hands. Be right back."

Just when Runo twisted the cap back onto the bottle of cream, Chan ran over to frantically. "Oh, hi Runo! Have you seen Julie?!"

"Julie said she went to get me a pair of regular gloves. Why?"

"I wouldn't say that this is important, but it can't be ignored either..."

Mira stepped out of the locker room and faced Chan. "Is something happening again, Chan?"

"Look at this." Chan took out her compass and tapped the glass, projecting a red, holographic map in the air. "Chris and Soon said that the skies are darkening quite early today, and I found some stray wanders—six, to be exact. I'm sure they have nothing to do with the sky, but we should find these people and bring them to a safe place. I don't think the skies are darkening because of rain."

"Thanks for the information, Chan. I'll go check it out first."

Runo put on her shawl and grabbed her gloves. "Mira, I'll go with you. Chan, if you see Julie, just tell her that Mira and I went to check out what you found."

"Of course. Stay safe!"

Meanwhile, Julie came back with a pair of gloves to see Runo gone. "Chan, have you seen Runo?"

"She and Mira went to check on a few foreign people and will probably be back soon. What's the matter?"

"We're in trouble..."

-x-x-x-x-x-

Dan threw his backpack down and rested by the tree trunk. "I'm tired..."

"Dan, will you stop whining for once?" Ace grumbled. "It was your idea to come here in the first place."

"Hey! We all agreed to go on a retreat together!"

"But it was mainly your idea to hike out here. You're getting us out of this mess."

"Guys, please stop!" Marucho begged. "Look, the sky's really dark. We need to find shelter now before it rains or hails. I hate hail."

"Then let's—" Dan stopped after a grumbling sound. "Ace, be quiet!"

"I didn't say anything."

"Then whose stomach was that grumbling earlier?" The others shook their heads. Dan turned around to look but saw a dark figure lunge at him. "Back off!"

All the guys hid behind the trees as they watched a wolf rush by with black mist drifting of its body. Its red eyes sent fearful chills through everyone. Baron took out his binoculars and looked. "Dan, what are we going to do now?"

"Beats me! But maybe this will work!" Dan stepped out and waves his red jacket at the wolf. "Come on! Get over here and leave!"

"Dan, are you nuts?!" the others screamed.

The brunette didn't hear and watched the red-eyed wolf charge forward. "See? I told you that it would—oh shoot!"

"Take that!"

Before the misty wolf could put its paws on Dan, someone lunged forward and kicked the wolf away. The wolf stood up and charged again, and the mystery person grabbed Dan aside and tumbled shortly downhill.

Shortly after, Dan opened his red eyes and looked directly at a pair of emerald irises staring back. "Um...who are you? Why are you on top of me?!"

"I can explain..."