Chapter II

Strangers

Rilury wasn't the morning type, but this time she woke up early only to realize that her guest hadn't eaten anything since he got there. She tried to dress up as fast as and went straight to the kitchen. The fridge was as empty as her stomach.

It was still early in the morning so she still had time to buy some groceries. And this was a reason for her to dress up more...acceptable for going out.

She looked at herself in the dusty mirror. Her face looked a bit tired, and the slight dark rings accentuated her rifle green eyes which she inherited from her mother. Being a common face in the crowd full of people always in a hurry, perhaps nobody would notice that her short brown hair was a bit messed up, especially that blonde strand that was never in place, but it was supposed to be rebellious as it was the second and last appearance gene from her mother.

Nothing could fix her look except for a banal black shirt and kaki comfortable pants, to get completely invisible. Only the black straps would look a bit odd on her, but she wanted to wear them anytime she had the chance. After all they were a gift from an old friend, and those kind of things always bring luck.

But it didn't happen as she wanted to. It never did. In the grocery store, there was a weird tiny boy looking at her with big eyes. By his height, it seemed he was in the 6th grade, but actually he had quite a mature and analytic look. He stared at her for at least ten minutes, analyzing her. She couldn't stand it anymore so she wanted to say something. But the boy turned his head really quick and his blush was so cute that Rilury thought it isn't so bad to enjoy some harmless attention for the first time.

As she was returning home with the bags twice as heavier, she decided to take the shortcut, which was walking by a small river. Then she had the surprise of seeing Hao, fishing with sort of a handmade rod.

"I think I haven't done this in a while. I'm glad I haven't forgotten about it" he said with his eyes looking on the bait.

"Oh my, sorry for keeping you waiting…"she said a bit surprised, because she had never seen people doing this near-by.

"Don't worry, this type of food is healthier. After all, this is a mountain zone."

A fish popped out of the water. The sun was making its mullet sparkle. Even if that poor creature suffered, it was interesting to watch.

"Want to give it a try?" he asked gazing at her with some joyful eyes.

"Um, I haven't done this before. But I think I'll give it a shot."

She held the wooden bat and tried to stand properly.

"You are too tense. This activity is meant for recreation" Hao told her friendly patting her shoulder.

The waiting was a bit long but the reaction Rilury had when the sting was moving, was priceless. She received a little help to control the angle, but she managed to catch that small stubborn fish.

"Well, I think we have enough to eat. I caught another three ones when you were gone."

Rilury was looking at her fish desperately trying to escape from the bucket and started to think that it wasn't right to take away his childish aspiration to swim to the open wide sea.

"Um, I think I'll let mine go back in the water… she said and then she took the slippery creature in her hands. The little ungrateful bastard jumped in the river and splashed her."

They both had a little portion of laugh. How foolish of her to think those kind of crazy stuff about those creatures.

But she was glad that she hadn't put something so small in such a big fire. Hao lighten it himself, out of nowhere. So he can control fire. She suddenly remembered about the sort of training session they were supposed to do that day, but continued to quietly eat the snacks she bought.

They were both standing in the open mountain field, a place where Rilury used to train by bringing some wooden stools to practice on, even if they would get destroyed real quickly and it just felt like fighting in the open air. They were also heavy, so the training area would usually take her two or three days to prepare. But firstly she wanted to show him the place.

"It's not ready yet, but at least we have enough space…"

"Don't worry about that, it will only take a minute."

He touched the ground with his hand and suddenly twelve earth columns rose from the ground, forming a closed barricade. Then a series of circle columns followed, one larger and bigger than another. It was amazing, a basic form she would probably never build even in ten years.

"I thought you controlled only fire" she said astonishingly watching the surrounding.

"Actually, I think have a connection with all nature elements."

"Hmm... So, who goes first?" she asked with an exciting voice.

"Please, I insist!" Hao made a hand gesture inviting her to begin.

Tremendous and a little intimidating, but she wanted to try and take down at least one. She took her blade, which was in fact a wolfram wire shaped in form of a little sword.

The she canalized the furyoku in her hands. Her hair became messy, affected by electrostatics and yellow fractals came out from place she was holding the metal. In a few seconds the electric sparkles made a magnificent sword shape, which looked like a sword made out of golden unstable spikes.

But it wasn't only nature power. That blade was not made of lightning. It was more like pure energy which affected the atoms surrounding the wolfram and made the electrons combine, overwhelming the protons, so the electromagnetic waves could smash material things. This was the result of a spirit power which didn't seem to be made by her, but only brought in this shape and not so effortlessly controlled.

She attacks. Leaf edge forms cut twenty columns randomly. But those were just simply waves.

And that was just the warm up. She climbed one column and then jumped. Shamans could do really high jumps using the furyoku to bust their feet. She raised her blade and attacked in a spiral shape form, which made the air particles to resonate in a burst of sky splinters. This time the rocks smashed on the ground and the field looked like a pizza missing a big slice.

"I call this The Shocking Spiral... Hey, don't laugh! I'm still working with the names!"

-"Usually shamans name their techniques in order to compound his soul with the spirit by shouting it loud. I don't think you need to do that."

"Yeah, but it still sounds cool."

"And it was quite impressive."

"Thanks..." she said flattered. "Now it's your turn."

"Hmm, let's see. I still can't remember how to summon my guardian spirit. But I will use the energy from the sun... even if I could destroy those things using my earth power again, since I had created them in the first place."

She laughed with a bit of jealousy:

"Now, now, and you thought I was showing off…"

Hao took his gloves off. He needed to gather the right amount of energy to release it in an efficient attacking form. Rilury watched him curiously, as he suddenly raised his right arm and formed a more stable sword than hers. He was holding it effortlessly with one hand. The left arm only touched the edge to confer it a big energy density.

He attacked with precision and steadiness. Making a small quick move, the whole row of columns was completely destroyed.

He indeed was much more experienced than her. She figured that out from that perfect direct attack.

The next move was with energy unleashing. Hao took his position and the sword movement was under his waist. It was more like a rising wave, or in this case… fire.

It seemed to be at first a flame tornado, but it inexplicably exploded. The columns burst into flames and because of their arrangement they formed a freaking burning pentagram.

All that Rilury could see was him standing there unmoved, not realizing that everything was burning to ashes. He seemed to have disrupted himself from the horrifying view.

Did he lost control? Did he made this on a whim?

Hao was just staring blankly at the enormous disastrous fire.