It was midday, which Luz could figure out just by looking at the sky with the sun in the center of the sky, clouds dotting about in it. The Erdtree in the distance shined a brilliant gold, which made something stir in her chest upon looking at it.
However, she wasn't allowed to stare upon the Erdtree for too long, as she ducked out of the way of a downward sword slash from a man dressed in similar armour as in the cave she had been in a while back.
"Cease this resistent immediately!" The soldier barked, as Luz sidestepped a broad swing of his steel short sword.
"I was just asking for directions!" Luz shouted back, swinging her club as it slammed against the soldier's brass shield.
When she first woke up, Kalé had warned her about the soldiers in the woods, and how they hunted Tarnished like her. She should've believed him, especially given how everyone else had wanted her dead prior to any of this, but still. She was a fool for thinking that she could ignore the obvious.
"You're Tarnished. You're better off rotting in a grave or grafted to Lord Godrick!" The soldier spat back as Luz deflected his sword swing her club, giving her an opening. She kicked the man down to the ground, before slamming her club down in his chest with all the strength she could muster. Blood erupted from his mouth, and then, he stopped moving. A small trail of dust flew off of his body, followed by a handful of runes flowing into her chest, and just like that, it was over.
She stared down at the soldier's body, breathing a sigh of relief. She had been lucky that he hadn't been able to stab or slash at her. She glanced at his sword and took it from his dead hands. It was light, short, and quick. She gave it a few test swings and smirked.
While it wasn't good for clubbing people over the head, it was better to have something to stab with. Clubbing only worked if they had hardly armour. Stabbing killed just about anything, as morbid as that thought had been.
"Thanks, jerk," Luz spat, kicking the corpse as she stored her club in her handy-dandy magic pouch. She thought about taking some of his armour, but she wasn't that desperate. Besides, she could see more soldiers up in the distance coming over to investigate, so she doubted she had time to take pieces of the soldier's armour off.
Luz ducked into a bush, keeping her new shortsword gripped in her right hand. She didn't know how to properly use it, but she didn't really care. A sword was a sword, and she was sure she'd be able to figure out how to use it as she continued to wield it.
"Someone's here…" one of the soldiers that came to investigate muttered, touching the blood of the soldier that had died. "Ron has perished. Lord Godrick will not be amused," the soldier said as another soldier approached.
"Ron will return in three cycles of the sun and moon, so it doesn't matter. We need to find the individual responsible. Mayhaps it's a Tarnished?" the other soldier said, as the first one hummed.
"T'would seemth the case," and with that the soldier, who she now noticed had a trumpet, picked it off of his left hip and blew into it. A signal.
"Crap…" Luz thought as she took a step back in the bush. There was nothing but forest surrounding her, and she doubted she'd be able to stay out of sight for too long. She'd need to be stealthy. She had been pretty good at it in the cave, so it stood to reason that the same would apply here.
So, she crouched even further to the ground and began to hobble her way through various bushes, stopping every time a soldier came too close to one of the bushes. With each second, she felt her nerves spike. This whole thing was far too nerve-wracking. She knew she would be caught at one point, but even so, she would fight tooth and nail if she had to.
She cleared more of the forest, but the soldiers seemed dogged to try and find her. They had begun searching through bushes now, meaning that they knew she was hiding in one. "Crap!" Luz thought, gnashing her teeth together. It was a matter of time before she was found.
She needed somewhere else to hide.
Off in the distance, she spotted a small cave opening in the distance. A soldier sat at a camp, eating some kind of strip of flesh. Luz didn't care what it was he was doing. She could wait out the search in that cave. All she had to do was get past or kill that soldier and she'd be home free. At least, for the time being, anyway.
"You can do this, Luz," and with that thought, Luz sprung up from the bush and rushed the man at the campfire, sword in hand the man grunted in surprise, but before he could do anything, she shoved the end of her blade through the soldier's neck, before violently ripping the blade out from the left side, killing him instantly as he crumbled.
On his person, he had a small shield, which she stole and strapped to her arm, before ducking into the cave just as thudding footsteps began to fill her ears. Just as she ducked into the cave and turned a corner, pressing herself against the wall, she could hear loud shouts of "find the Tarnished" and "for Lord Godrick" before they all left the area around the cave judging by how their footsteps faded off into the distance.
Luz breathed out a sigh of relief. She was safe, for now. Only now, she was stuck in a cave, damp and gross. But, for the time being, it served her as a good hiding spot. Though, as she stared down the cave, she spotted what appeared to be a site of Grace. Her eyebrow rose in curiosity as she approached it, the familiar warm glow washing over her.
Why would there be a site of Grace inside the cave? She took a seat in front of it, and when she did, momentarily, she caught a glimpse of every other site of Grace that she had been to. Each layered in front of her in such a way that she could individually pick out which Grace was from where.
That was when it hit her. "I can travel between sites of Grace! That's so cool!" Luz thought, a wide smile spreading across her face. She wanted to try it out, but just as she attempted to head back to what she now knew was The Church of Elleh, she felt something forbid her. A hiss forced itself out of her as she slumped.
"Well that's lame…" Luz muttered. Of course, because nothing could ever be that simple. Something was blocking her ability to hop around from grace to grace. Or, at the very least, something here was. If she had to guess, it was probably some kind of spell. This reeked of magic, and so because of that, she reasoned that if she explored the cave and stopped it, she'd be able to transport from place to place again.
"Welp, time to go splunking!" Luz bit out, a faux chipper tone to her voice as she marched down the jagged rocky tunnel. The bumpy, uncomfortably cold floor, was felt even in her shoes and it was pitch black inside. Frankly, it was annoying and unnerving.
She wondered, though, how it was that the Cave of Knowledge—the one where she had first discovered and reignited her "warrior blood" or whatever that Ghost had said she supposedly had—had as much light as it did.
Furthermore, on the topic of her "warrior blood," she wondered if, in her prior life, she was actually a warrior. Given the fact that she was fifteen—at least, she thought so anyway because she definitely felt and looked the part—she probably wasn't. But a girl could dream.
"Heh, for all I know I could've been some witch or whatever. Doubt it, though," Luz thought as she stumbled deeper into the cave. She made sure that, as she walked, she had a hand on the wall of the cave just to make sure she knew where she was going or if she was coming close to a dead end so she didn't walk into a particularly sharp or jagged stone.
She thought back to what that soldier she had killed had said. That she was better off rotting in a grave or being grafted to "Lord Godrick." She didn't know who this "Lord Godrick" was, nor did she know what being "grafted" was, but if she had to guess it probably wasn't anything good. Especially given how that probably meant certain, and permanent, death.
In the distance, she could see a glowing light. Without stopping to question where it was coming from, she made her way to it, and when she got there, she was met with a hollowed-out part of the cave, where a campfire and wolves resided. She immediately came to a halt when she saw them, but they didn't see her.
They were huge, easily up to her chest in height just by looking at them, and they all seemed to be asleep. Off to her right, there was what looked to be a man-maned tunnel in the rock, and so, she used that to sneak around them. There was another sleeping wolf at the end of the man-made tunnel, but by keeping low to the ground, and being sure to watch her footing, she was able to get around it just fine.
There was another tunnel, this one seeming more natural than the one she had gone down, and after making her way down it, she was stopped by a giant glowing gate of gold. "Another one of these?" Luz thought, narrowing her eyes. "But for what? A big, bad wolf or something?" She shrugged, pressing her hand against it. "Only one way to find out, I guess," and with that, she passed through the gate.
On the other side, there was an entire campsite, fitted with a tent, a campfire, and some crates and barrels of food and water. But rather a human, she was greeted with a man-wolf thing, It saw her, and snarled, pulling out what looked to be some kind of misshapen metal stick that looked like a sword—and it had a handle and everything.
"Oh crap!"
When it stood up, it easily stood just about a head over her in height, and it charged at her wildly, like a hungry, ravenous beast. It cleared the distance between itself and her, its maw open wide, revealing large, sharp, and dangerous teeth aimed at her throat. The only thing she could do was dodge out of the way, but as she did, its sword swiped upward, and the sharp end of the blade met just underneath her armpit….
And severed it completely.
A trail of blood and searing pain was what she was met with as she collapsed to the ground in pain She screamed, tears forcing themselves out of her eyes as she tried to keep her wits about her. The beast-man roared, before slamming its sword down toward her.
In that time, she was able to roll to the side—she didn't want to die, and besides, if she could just get to her flask and drink it, maybe her arm would come back. She forced herself to her feet, breathing heavily and trying her best to push down the pain she was in as the beast man grabbed her severed arm, and ate it in front of her, as if it was showing her what it was going to do to her.
She reached for her flask as it began to stalk toward her, and when she swung it back, in the blink of an eye, bone, muscle, and flesh regrew in an instant, restoring her arm in its entirety—even the sleeve of the shirt she was wearing, bizarrely enough.
The beast-man, either out of anger or confusion, growled at her like the feral beast it was. She narrowed her eyes and took a step back as it continued to stalk toward her. Feral black eyes met radiant gold, and then, in a single heartbeat, they both ran forward toward one another.
Pulling out her blade, she met its bizarrely shaped sword, metal clashing and scraping against one another as she groaned. The beast-man was stronger than her, which was much more obvious, but despite that, she put all of her weight behind her swing, and it was enough to throw it off balance.
She slashed at it, only for the beast-man to jump back, avoiding the slash completely. "Great, it's fast and it's strong!" She was going to need an opening. Something that she could use to take it out in one strike. Otherwise, she'd be dog food. Well, beast man food, but it looked like a dog—"Whatever!"
The beast-man charged again, closing the distance between herself and itself and slashing with its massive blade, aiming to bisect her this time, only for Luz to dodge in the other direction, and finally tag the beast-man with a slash above its bicep. Blood squirted out, but the beast man seemingly didn't care.
She was going to need to go for a kill shot. It clearly had a higher resilience to pain than she did. A part of her wanted to flee in fear, but because of the fog gate over the entrance, she knew that was impossible.
Luz dodged another slash, but what she hadn't expected was two more follow-up upward and diagonal slashes, the beast man's blade digging across her chest and midriff, and by the time it was about to go for a third slash, she was able to jump back, wincing in pain as she drank from her flask again, the wounds repairing and stitching themselves back together.
She had one more shot of her flask.
She needed to kill this thing, and now.
The beast man roared, and charged at her again, its maw wide open. "It's going for the same thing again!" Luz noted, a smirk coming to her face as she put her flask away. This was her chance to kill the beast man, and she was going to take it.
And so, she charged, meeting the beast man halfway. Both of them had murderous gleams in their eyes, and both set out to kill one another.
One would stand.
The other would fall.
The beast-man went to swipe upward with its blade after shifting into a lower swinging position, its mouth still wide open, drool and saliva falling to its lower jaw.
And then, Luz struck.
Luz thrust her sword into its mouth, and out of the back of its throat, before mercilessly chopping down and out of its neck, blood spewing out like a geyser. Any ferocity the beast-man had died the second she ripped the blade out as it dropped its weapon to the floor. It gurgled with blood spilling over and out of its mouth.
It fell to the floor, and as she stood there, looming over it as it floundered around, she saw the pain in its eyes. For a brief moment, she felt bad about what she did. But then she remembered the fact that it literally disarmed her, which earned it a scowl.
But she wasn't going to leave it to choke on its blood. Instead, she thrust her sword right between its eyes. She felt the bone of its skull on the other end of her blade, and with another, deeper and more powerful thrust, she stabbed through its head, piercing its brain, and putting it out of its misery.
Multiple rays of golden light passed from the beast and into her. Runes. She had gotten a good amount of runes from the beast man, 1000 to be exact. She didn't know how she knew, but she did.
The golden fog over the entrance to the camp lifted, and just as Luz was about to leave in the same way that she came, she noticed a blue pillar of light in the corner of her eye. There was also something on the hip of the beast-man's corpse, and whether it was out of curiosity or because she wanted to get something out of the fight—because she knew she wasn't going to be able to lift the piece of deformed metal it called a sword—she reached for its hip and was confused with what she saw.
It was a glowing piece of golden metal with a flame emblem on the front. It ebbed and flowed with what she could only assume was magic, and a part of her was admittedly curious. Maybe Kalé would know what it was?
She put it into her magical pouch and resheathed her blade. She walked over to the blue pillar of light, and when she reached out toward it, her vision became overcome with a white blinding light. When she opened her eyes, she found herself next to the site of Grace.
"Huh?" Luz muttered, looking around herself, before shrugging. "Well, that's convenient," as Luz said that, she sat down next to the Grace, and after focusing on the other sites of Grace she had been to, she honed in on the one that would take her back to Church Elleh.
She closed her eyes, and when she opened them, she found herself back at the Church, the sun about to go down for the night. It was once again convenient. What was even more convenient was that Kalé was still awake.
"Wait, weren't you…" Kalé muttered, looking at her with wide eyes.
"Gone? Yeah, but I found out that I can teleport between sites of Grace," Luz replied, a chipperness to her tone as she smiled. Kalé chuckled, a warmness in his eyes that made her feel safe. A part of her screamed at her to not get attached, but she just couldn't. Besides, Kalé was nice. She could trust him.
"Well, no matter. Care to purchase something?" Kalé offered, reaching for his bag of wares again, which Luz promptly walked over to him, and before he could finish putting stuff out, she reached for her pouch and pulled out the strange amulet she gained from killing the beast-man. "Hm? What's this?"
"I don't know, I was hoping you'd know," Luz said as Kalé hummed.
"Well, it looks like a Talisman. It's rather weak, but I can feel the magic coming off of it. Like the flasks you have, you can attach it to your hip, and it will grant you some kind of enhancement. If my memory serves me right, that is a flamedrake talisman. It should aid you in protecting yourself against any kind of flame. Normal, black, or…" Kalé shuttered briefly, "Frenzy."
"Frenzy?"
"It's best not to know," Kalé replied, clearing his throat. "My point is that it's a good thing to have on you."
"Ah, got it," Luz said, before reaching into herself and pulling out all of her runes. "What can I get for this?"
To that, Kalé fished out of his bag a long piece of chainmail armour—a chest piece, to be exact. "How about you drape this over your clothes? It'll protect you from slashing attacks and some piercing depending on how thin or thick the blade is."
"Don't mind if I do!" Luz replied, exchanging the runes for the piece of chainmail. Slipping it over top of herself, she smiled as Kalé stuck a thump up. The two made small talk for a little while, like how Kalé had someone stop by—a wandering noble, who gave him some rowa berries in exchange for some runes.
Luz told him about her fight with the beast man, and before long, it was dark out. Just as she was about to curl up to go to sleep, out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of something in the distance. A large, white tail of something peeking out over the horizon, followed by a sickening, deafening roar.
"What was that?" Luz asked as Kalé sighed.
"Agheel. The local dragon. Pay it no mind. It resides by the lake and only by the lake. I'm fairly certain that its nest is there, and if I had to guess, it's there to protect its eggs. Assuming no one's destroyed them already."
A dragon. An honest-to-God dragon?
Maybe it was the childlike excitement in her eyes that tipped Kalé off about her thinking of the dragon which made him frown, or maybe it was her tapping her fingers on the ground, but regardless, he picked up on what it was she thinking, and shook his head. "Don't. I have no clue what you think you'll find there, but it's not what you think. Dragons hate humans. Period. Unless you raise them yourself, you won't be doing yourself any good by going there."
"Aw… but I want a pet dragon!"
"Only in your dreams, kid. Goodnight, Luz."
"Night, Kalé."
When Luz passed out, Kalé stared at her sleeping form and sighed. Why did he get the feeling that he'd become attached to the kid? Never in his life had he ever cared about a Tarnished before. He didn't want to start now. But there was something about the kid that just… clicked.
She was kind. She was friendly. She never once tried to swindle him out of his wares—though he was being generous when he gave her that chainmail for 100 runes off. But all the same, she was a Tarnished. He didn't expect her to remain friendly for long.
The Lands Between changed people. Made them cruel and heartless. It would happen to Luz, just like it did every other Tarnished.
He just hoped that day would come when he was already dead.
"What do you think, Gregory? Do you think she'll become like the other Tarnished?" Kalé asked his mule, to which it knickered at him before huffing. "You don't think so, aye? Well, let us wait and see…"
[-To Be Continued-]