In this chapter, I introduce and kill off a character in the exact same chapter. Oh goody.
I woke up on my own accord the next morning, and instantly grabbed a lock of my hair and brought it into my view. Still that deep green color… looks like I was definitely not dreaming. For whatever reason, I really was Ion, and I'd have to continue to be Ion. I got up and dressed myself again, in an identical outfit to the previous day, and picked up my staff on the way out. I had to get to the Cheagle Woods… hopefully, Jade and Anise would follow me. It was easy enough to sneak to the door, which was unfortunately closed.
"Need some help there, Fon Master?" a slightly amused female voice said from behind me. I turned, startled, to see one of the Malkuth soldiers there. Her uniform was the usual uniform, with the helmet that covered her face like a bird's beak over her head, but it was a girl, and she didn't even sound that old.
"Oh… uh, yes please. I have to go do something," I said. She giggled, and opened the door.
"Don't hurt yourself, darling. Want me to come with you?" the soldier girl said as the stairs unfolded downwards. I considered this. The extra hand fighting and the protection would be nice, but if I got too attached to her, if she died in the attack on the Tartarus… ah well, maybe we wouldn't even need Jade to rescue us from the liger if she was good.
"Sure," I said, smiling as I started down the stairs to the ground. "What's your name?"
"Talia Quinn, pleased to meet you," she said. She followed me, calm and quiet as I started to walk north, away from town.
I knew it was the right way, partly because after several minutes, Talia interrupted the silence and asked, "Why are we going north?"
"Well… it's about the cheagles," I said, hoping she wasn't going to take me back before I could get there.
"Oh, okay. If we get attacked, leave it to me, darling," she said. Phew. We continued walking, going largely ignored by the occasional wild creature. Once, one of those things that looks like an Oddish with two leaf-antennae- yes, I know about Pokémon, shut up I'm not a nerd- attacked, and Talia quickly whipped out a sword and beat the little creature with the flat of the blade until it ran away. It dropped a few coins as it fled.
"Huh, it dropped… money…?" I said, scooping up the coins.
"Yup. Nobody knows why, but that's how it is, darling," Talia said with a shrug. I sort of wished she would stop calling me darling. We continued, and soon, we arrived at the entrance to the Cheagle Woods.
A wolf suddenly jumped out of nowhere and tackled Talia from behind, knocking her to the ground. She rolled over with an alarmed cry, trying to wrestle the animal off her back. I took a few steps back, and found more wolves appearing. While some of them went for Talia, a couple of the wolves turned towards me. I froze up, too scared to react, while Talia screamed, struggling under a horde of wolves. As I watched, she stopped struggling, and a couple of the wolves started to drag her limp body away, leaving only her sword on the ground.
I was seriously in trouble now.
Talia was almost certainly dead, and now the wolves were starting to eye me hungrily. As they started to approach, something clicked into place in my mind.
Have you ever been thinking, and all of a sudden you just remember something and it's like you just know it all of a sudden?
I suddenly just knew how to use all of the abilities I had as Fon Master Ion- the Daathic fonic artes, reading the Score, everything. It was almost overwhelming. As the wolves surrounded me, I knew what I could do to save myself. Too bad I couldn't have saved Talia too…
"I'm sorry, Talia… I found out too late," I said aloud. I focused, and a huge amount of energy entered my body. I knelt down and slammed my hand against the ground. A huge white glyph appeared on the ground below me, and under the wolves. I felt the energy suddenly flow out of me into the glyph, and a pillar of white light burst from the glyph, incinerating the wolves that had moved to attack me. The remaining wolves turned and fled. It was a good thing, too, because a wave of dizziness and pain washed over me as I stood back up. I gave a soft gasp, and lost my grip on my staff as I collapsed to the ground. My heart was pounding frantically in my chest, and I tried to reach out and grab my staff, but I couldn't move. I had known that Daathic fonic artes hurt Ion to use, but this felt more like I was dying than anything.
"Fon Master! Are you alright?" I heard a voice call. It sounded like Tear… I saw this was right when I felt someone roll me over on my back, and I found myself looking up at Tear's worried face. I drew a shaky breath, tried to speak, only managed a painful wheeze. I took another breath.
"I-I'll be fine… I used a strong Daathic fonic arte… too strong," I gasped. The pain was fading fast, but I still felt incredibly weak.
"Jeez… yeah, we saw that. You just about killed yourself doing that," Luke said. I sat up, shaking slightly, and Tear and Luke both helped me to stand up. I staggered slightly, but managed to stay up.
"I-I had a soldier with me… Talia… th-the wolves got her while I was still casting that," I said, looking down at the bloody sword in the grass while still trembling.
"Man… so you were trying to save her too, but you couldn't? Dang… poor little guy," Luke said. He picked up the sword. "…Since she doesn't need this anymore, could I?" He apparently took my silence as a yes, as he replaced his wooden sword with the fallen Talia's.
"Ion. What are you doing in such a dangerous place?" Tear asked me. She bent down and retrieved my staff, and I gratefully took it back from her.
"I wanted to find out why the cheagles were stealing… they're peaceful creatures, and they eat things that grow around here," I said, putting the end of my staff against the ground and leaning on it. "Maybe there's trouble… they might need help. By the way, I never got your name…" A lie, of course, I knew who she was. But she didn't know that.
Solana's now a bit closer to being on track with the game... watch her ruin it next chapter.
