Walking around, you see different people wearing formal wear, it looks like the barong from the Spanish era, the people talking and the different food you familiarize yourself but that didn't matter as your eyes instantly zoom into one kid walking down the street with a happy grin, you felt familiar towards the kid, so you followed him.
Mapulon walked along the streets and noticed that for some reason no was paying attention towards him, it was weird and nauseating, you felt an unnatural cold gathering at your feet and walked towards kids with a forced calm that felt like you, the kid walked around happily greeting children and adults as they too waved them, he enters into a temple of sorts,
You felt the presence of a god, as you followed the child, it seemed initially displeased with you for some reason but a begrudging silence followed, with you having nothing to defend yourself from a god, you could only hope that the god wouldn't smite you.
And within moments as if willed upon, he felt himself granted entrance towards the gate and he quickly follows the child, as the child walks around and goes to change clothes, Mapulon himself went towards the area where he felt the gathering of spiritual energy,
A god was sitting upon the top of shrine, shimmering the form was not perfect but had an outline of a female, he didn't know which god was sitting on top it but he could look at the ritual being formed, it was not perfect and there was a bit of mess,
But it seems that the god was compensating for the person creating this ritual, he wished to see the person who would do such a ritual, as from what he could see by the talismans and runes in it, it seemed like something an priestess or a priest would practice every day,
Moments of waiting, he could see himself waddling towards the ritual, as he approaches he could hear the chants beginning as he carefully slides into a form for that ritual, as he practices different forms while carefully not touching the runes,
Well, you don't know anything familiar yet it seemed familiar, those rune makes and talismans familiar yet not clear in his mind, some sort of fear appeared in his body yet he continued onward, he doesn't know yet but a feeling of looking close at the runes,
Familiarity bloomed in the chest of him, no wonder he picked up magic that easy, you can't just become proficient in magic and in another type of magic within mere months,
If anything, he didn't have any missing memories at all, everything he saw here was just like one of the books he had, studying around him, he looked at the goddess that materialized right in front of him lazily,
He was stunned in the ground in the revelations he saw, but all he could do was watch, as the goddess herself materialized, she looked at the ritual put down by his past self and sighed, and smiled. Looking upon the face of the child was a smile of contentment as if he had done something surreal,
They continued to talk there, with the child pulling up water bottle near the ritual site but far enough that it won't disrupt it, he drinks up and goes into the temple where, his room is also situated nearby, changing for the appropriate clothes,
It was nearing night and despite that he was wearing formal wear, it was not uncommon for people to come here despite the time of the day, he waits in the front and indeed, he could hear walking towards here,
Mapulon fumbles with herbs and a teapot with his hands, arriving where he gets the guest, he waits there and as soon as he arrived, a young woman who had some sort of surface wound in her leg, there were bandages but it didn't stop it.
"Good Evening! Are you the current priest here?"
Mapulon seemed to hold back a tear as if suddenly remembered something but he forced those thoughts to evaporate, "Yes? The current one is…"
The woman seemed to notice the tone of change or his face and decided to say what she came here instead. "Would you please check this wound out? It was 5 days ago I received the wound but it seemed that it wouldn't stop bleeding, can you help me with this?" She asked with some sort of unreadable face
"Of course! I'm after the current priest but-" He yawns and the woman had the two grimaces in the time she had to go to, she tried to say an excuse but Mapulon lift a hand and says , " Don't worry! Let's get this over with"
The woman grimaced further but didn't say anything and proceeded to go towards Mapulon. Mapulon grabbed his herbs and slowly looks at the wound as he prepares for fresh herbs with a talisman designed for checking what type of wound the woman had,
He grabs the talisman and uses it, the talisman grew near the touch of the wounded leg and disappeared for a few moments, he carefully removes the wound but the woman fought a hiss as he unraveled the wound,
" Some sort of claw wound, if any chance has you ever got bitten or clawed at by any particular animal? As it's obviously magical in nature and has some nasty curse on it, something that prevents it from healing naturally… Have you encountered something of magical in nature?"
The woman went here, she wanted to try if she had some sort of tetanus and from what she believed there aren't that many trustworthy and those who were in the business tended to either frauds or busy, like booked for this week, She didn't believe in magic until today that is,
She showed surprise when the Talisman glowed and evaporated towards her wound, and kept her face neutral to mask her mask, during how lucky she got here, meanwhile Mapulon was waiting patiently waiting for the woman to respond, he taps her on the shoulder
She was surprised but quickly says , " Some sort of dog that looked really strange, had some sort of reddish color in its neck and I encountered during walk back home, got scratched by it but when I tried to run it didn't pursue but ran back towards the woods instead "
"For now, I have ideas for what it was but I do recommend that you bring this" he hands her amulet that had three talismans in a triangle, "This would ward you from those types of creatures, kept it with you all times". He gestures her to get nearer.
He grabs the wound and silently mutters a spell with a god murmuring beside him to support him in this sensitive wound, it was shallow and he saw the curse, with a careful hand he grabs a talisman and puts it hovering the wound purifying it, grabbing the herbs to avoid infection,
He began to put back fresh band-aid as if a nurse and tightens it a bit, adds a talisman for safety and stands up but nearly falls from exhaustion the woman suddenly grabs him to hold him up and wonder in her eyes as to the sudden erasure of the wound.
The woman smiles sadly at the boy, he was at the age where he could pass up as her son, a smile tug at her sight of the child. " Sorry, about that forgot how healing is quite hard for me and despite the shallowness of the wound".
He tries to walk it off but he was exhausted from other activities, he stretches and promptly removed the cups and other herbs that he didn't used and put it back in a box, he walks back to find the woman looking at him with concern,
He dismisses her but she stayed there and, instead told him to hand her the keys and change for bed, and that travelling alone at night is bad. He tried to tell her that he has been doing this for a long time but she didn't budge and instead did what she told him.
He complained towards his goddess about the insistent woman but all he got was amusement and felt a little betrayed by his patron goddess about the woman, but was didn't mind as it would be night and going out would be dangerous with the creature that bitten her in her leg,
She was standing there as he guided her towards where he slept and from there on, he removes the extra futon he had lying for guests, they prepared there and both of them fell asleep fast as for Mapulon it was tiring and for the Woman travelling here was tiring too.
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Morning arrives and it's the start of the weekends and with the help of the kind young woman, you prepared both breakfast and ate despite the woman not requiring help, he felt that she was overbearing but he let that set aside for keeping her here,
With the rise of the sudden increase of monsters and negativity, it is important that he wouldn't let a woman herself wonder around in the dark for too long, that was something he had in mind to remove that pang of annoyance, and with upcoming annoyance of the dog monster thing or whatever it was, he would need to take a closer look for him to either deal with it,
Despite his age, he was proficient at hunting youkai, though they rare enough but most of his time is spent on healing injuries, blessing houses that were just built or just securing the many wards present in his temple,
He never had the chance to experience something that close to an experience of death, but that is a good thing after all boring means that there aren't any people who are suffering from injuries or attacks from small youkai from his area anyway,
With that being said though it never hurts to be prepared, from the simple med kits, band aids and paper for additional talismans, and a few gemstones and stones in case if the barriers and wards gets damaged and if needs replacing,
Though currently know with being no people entering his temple, he walks out decked out with his priest wear and leather clothing never hurts to be prepared and he can't afford armor at the moment,
He waits for the woman to go out and talk her about where she last located the monster and it was outside the range of the few wards he put in place to ward off evil monster, but as being who is the only priest here, it would be better check
He checked the perimeter and lo behold, there are indeed scratch marks in the area of the wards, there was attempt in breaking them, with one of them nearly broken from getting strained by such an attack
Pulling out one of the gems he had, winced and grimaced as he would likely be more likely eating store-bought noodles soon despite the allowance given to him by his guardian, Philippines is not a rich country and with the recent wars and the increase of negativity,
Food was scarce and he was blessed that he had food in the first place, back to the wards he removed the worn-out gem and found it to be quite hot, he hisses from the burn and quickly changes it with another gem and adding the prepared talisman, the gem shines a bit and goes back to its natural color
He felt the cool sensation in his body and shivered at the sensation, just moment later the he felt something attacking the wards, "putangina!" He seethed at that just the moment he fixed, something is trying to attack it, though obviously not the wards he fixed,
With that, he ran full speed ahead towards the area where it was being attacked, arriving at the scene there was the foul stench of the creature, it was a small hellhound three of them to be exact. Without pass he withdrew three talismans and a knife at his other hand
Throwing at them with accuracy, one punctured straight to the head, blasting it off turning to dust. One barely dodges it but a fatal strike towards its belly nearly crippling it, the third dodging it and looked at the area where it saw the object moving towards him,
Rages filled its brain and rushed towards the thing that dared to attack it, it dodged the pitiful attempts at attacking him and animal instincts took over its body, rushing towards the human and imagines the fresh blood leaking over the thing that dared to attack it,
Its jaws open and targeted the neck of the puny human, but it felt bones cracking and flesh, he looks at the surrounding to see the human or rather an wall appeared, he moved away but is vision was falling apart,
It saw the human and grinned, it wanted payback for the trick it did, it ran towards nearing, suddenly it felt pain laced towards its body, looking down, spike emerged from its belly as the same color as the things it's threw,
It tried to move but all it felt was the dimming of the surroundings and all it saw was the human boy with dark expression, with his clothes covered with dust, it tried running away but it fell sleep anyway,
The hellhound died with a whimper and the human looked at the ashes it disperses, and he looked at the ashes, he killed the creatures that hurt the woman and what could possibly be more than man citizens saved by that,
Yet all he felt were tears in his eyes and promptly nearly fell from the sudden emotion welling inside him, murmurs of comfort were heard upon his ear by his goddess patron but he didn't hear that,
He wiped of his tears and let himself calm down for a moment and walked back towards outside the barrier governing the city, he had work to do and, all he felt was calmness, he didn't know where it came from but all his thoughts were just suddenly scrambled by the whimper of that monster,
Was it because of the months repressing the feelings he saw from killing monster and youkai alike, his mind didn't know but all he got from his patroness was words of comfort and a word that was persevere,
That was the last time he had heard his patron truly say something that was worded clearly, most of her words were said in a tone that was clearly not any language he knew yet he understood the words clearly, the implication was clear,
He didn't understand what she said at that moment, but she was his companion during when he found the temple when he was sick and hungry, it was something he treasured, he moved towards the woods to investigate the stench similar to the hellhound, though he should stop saying it like that,
It was not a true hellhound but rather the image formed by the people of here from the envy, left over hate from the last occupation of the foreigners, But Mapulon didn't know that he was an orphan and raised to become a priest by a goddess who was unknown and only told him that she was there to help him,
Hours passed for Mapulon but in actuality 50 minutes passed in real-time, he killed the rest of the hellhound with a grimace in his face and tracing towards the last hellhound, it fought bravely but Mapulon was trained by the goddess herself,
But despite that he was panting for air himself, scratches in his body were present, a tear in his leather clothes was present facing him was the largest of the hellhound, he felt it suddenly shifts as if it stopped playing with him.
His probes were effective and spotted parts where the creature was compensating with his left leg lifting it slightly, was it injured by his traps he placed? Even with the bait he put up, only he caught most of the younger ones and killed the older ones through pursuing them,
What was different with this one? He looked closer to see that it was wounded by another hellhound whether it may be an enemy or an competition for the leader, whatever it was he spotted a weakness and he exploited it ruthlessly,
He saw through the eyes of the hellhound, and a slight glimmer of triumph showed through as he was preparing to pounce at the human who dared to kill his pack, the human was injured and heavily breathing,
What the creature itself saw and moved impossibly fast towards the human resting, and at the moment it saw things lighting up, the human smirked and bones piercing it, the creature was confused but smiled anyway, it could simply regenerate what it lost but found itself not healing,
It cursed as the spears grow longer and forming a cage, with only the head seen, he looked at the human hate forming in its vision. It cannot let a puny human kill him within just few tricks, so he looked at the human and howled a howl of its death throes,
The human looked trembled at that and it didn't know what it caused but it felt satisfaction to change the puny human's face before it died, and thus it died fading into dusts with it; exoskeleton left behind,
Mapulon felt his body shiver, he didn't know he wanted to triumph at killing something that large with his body aching and injured, he felt glass break from another direction, he looked at there, his heart beat rose and dread rose, smoke was rising and that was where he was city,
It looked like an ordinary flame but all but his instincts screamed to back out and don't go there, but all he thoughts were of a woman, he felt frozen but fear forced it back out and instead rage came out, the warnings of his patroness was heard but he let himself control his rage but it didn't,
Instead, he ran full speed and tinges of flames sprouted near his eyes and body, he ran and ran but it wasn't enough he wasn't fast enough, he felt something in his body and he used something he didn't had, fire blazed around his body and his patroness was shouting but he didn't hear it, he left something at home and something dared to attack it, and something was to pay.
Author notes: It's good to be back! Though sadly publishing here in this account left with me, with issues instead, look at my profile instead, I already message them about it but it seemed permanent instead,
But anyway, I liked creating the interlude here! Though don't read further than this if you haven't finished the chapter
Spoiler: I really like how I created this chapter especially the origin and though it didn't come out what I intended, I liked the ending though.