The larger moon, Lune, shone high in the sky, a bright blue. The smaller, red Ares, a day away from full, was just rising. Adam glanced around the empty road. He was already close to Orone, a small farming town. After a moment, he saw Selene sitting on a rock near the road.
"You're running slow for a warrior," she said, laughing lightly
. "We wouldn't have had to flee that town if you hadn't tried to rob that tax collection—"
"We wouldn't have had to flee if you hadn't punched that nobleman who tripped over me when he fell. Why did you do that anyway?" "
He called me a scumbag... Well, let's just say I have a particularly negative view of all kinds of class divisions and ruling classes—"
"And I have a negative view of sleeping on the bare ground,"
he sighed. All their belongings, except for what they had with them, were left behind in the inn of the town they had fled. They had only a few coins, their clothes, and their weapons. They slowly entered the town streets.
"I have an idea... there's an inn called the Grey Wolf somewhere around here, I know the owner a little."
"And...?" "
I should be able to get a room."
After a few minutes of searching, they found the Grey Wolf—a three-story, half-brick building with aspirations more of a brothel than an inn. Adam went inside. He heard Selene calling after him:
"If you don't hurry, we'll have to run again."
Adam entered the dark room, grimacing at the smell of cheap beer being sipped by several customers. He had never been a fan of alcohol. He approached the innkeeper, whom, despite what he said, he had never seen before. He quickly used the remaining money he had left to rent a single room on the third floor. He went upstairs, quietly opened the window, and lowered the chain. A moment later, Selene was standing in the room.
"Not bad, but we still have one bed."
But Adam was already lying on the floor, in the opposite corner of the room, pulling the hood of his coat over his head.
"Good night."
She rolled over in bed once again. She couldn't fall asleep. In just a few days, her entire life had changed. Selene looked at the culprit, who was lying on the ground. After a short time, she noticed that Adam wasn't sleeping either.
"Trouble sleeping?" she asked
. "I rarely sleep..."
"I was thinking..." she thought for a moment. "Tell me, am I really some kind of mythical heroine?"
She heard him sigh. He raised himself slightly on his elbows to look into her eyes and shook his head
. "Forgive me for lying to you. No, you're not. The chain won't hurt the truly good either."
"Exactly... this chain and this whole legend... can you tell me about it?"
"More like this... It all started, as you know, with the defeat of Ther, the god of evil, over half a century ago by five heroes. As usual, the god refused to acknowledge defeat, and a prophecy was made that he would be reborn to sow destruction and terror. And as is often the case in prophecies, he can only be defeated by the descendants of those heroes and those "unborn in this world." And that's where Alabaster stepped in—"
"Alabaster?" "
Alabaster, the archmage. He brought us from another world, armed us, and trained us for five years. Unfortunately, two years ago, Ther attacked our training ground. We were about to set out to find the descendants of the heroes of half a century ago when the teleportation spell was disrupted by the magic of Ther's minions..." However, Alabaster completed the spell, scattering the five of us across the world... "
Five?" "
Yes." Besides me, Alabaster also trained Cram, the wizard; Sylphie, the priestess; Olivie, the bard; and Anne, the technologist. Each had talents in different fields, though we sometimes trained together. You could say we were good friends, he smiled sadly.
"I see..." The silence lasted a bit too long. "Do you have any plans for tomorrow?" she asked
. "A little more than a day's journey from here, one of the old heroes has taken up residence in an old tower. If we leave in the morning, we should be there by evening..."
"And then?"
"We'll see..."
Ten minutes later, they both fell asleep. This time, she didn't dream.
The red moon was just rising in front of the blue one. The night wind rustled the grass. A pair of red eyes fixed on the caravan that had set up camp at the foot of a small hill. A devilish smile appeared beneath them. The air filled with a silent, sinister incantation. The moment it ended, the sole guard standing guard suddenly collapsed as all his bones turned to liquid. Another, slightly louder incantation filled the silence. The nearest tent vanished, flooded by a wave of pure acid. Moments later, the camp transformed into an inferno of exploding fireballs, undead killing without mercy, and countless creatures dying quickly, painfully, and bloodily. Morning found the remains of the camp fading. The perpetrator, having sated his hunger for violence, had long since departed. Only the unbroken silence of dawn remained.
Elsewhere, the silence was broken by the sounds of hooves slowly padding across the marble floor. Their red-eyed owner glanced out the window at the rapidly approaching dawn. With the first ray of sunlight, the red faded, giving way to gray. The next sound that echoed through the tower was the sound of a body falling limply.
They set off early in the morning. The area slowly transitioned from cultivated fields to wild pastures and clearings. There were few travelers on the trail. The sun was warming merrily, even though it was already late autumn. Around noon, Adam decided it was time to leave the trail, which curved sharply to the right. They stopped by a few young trees to rest, filling their canteens from a nearby stream. After a while, a freshly killed hare and a few hastily caught fish were roasting on the fire. They agreed to wait out the hottest part of the day in the shade. They settled down in the shade of a large oak tree.
A cool breeze roused Adam from his slumber. He looked around. The sun was already setting, bathing the sky in a crimson glow. It had grown noticeably colder. He woke Selene, who was lying next to him.
"We have to go... I thought we'd make it before dark, but we'll probably have to disturb them at night."
"Luckily, there's a double full moon tonight." We won't have to travel in the dark."
Adama glanced at the sky. Indeed, blue Lune was just rising. Red Ares should join her shortly after sunset. They extinguished the remains of the fire and continued their journey. Late evening slowly gave way to night. An unnaturally quiet night. Suddenly, a tall, gray structure appeared on the horizon. The hero's tower. In it, they would find shelter and help. This sight calmed Adam somewhat. He was only alarmed by the dark silhouette waiting for them as they climbed one of the hills. And what completely distracted him was the fact that she sent fireballs their way.
The fire only lightly singed the fur on her shoulder as she made the only sensible maneuver she could—she leaped forward, dodging the fiery projectile in mid-air. Adam landed slightly behind and extinguished his cloak with a few quick movements. It hadn't rained in a while, so a stream of flames spread behind them, consuming the dry grass and pushing them toward the apparently hostile mage. She drew both short swords, which now glowed faintly red. Adam's chain was already heading towards his opponent, who was just finishing an incantation. Suddenly, her new blades glowed with a fierce blue light, blinding her for a moment. When she regained her sight, squinting hard, she saw an expression of utter astonishment on Adam's face. He stared at his weapon, which had missed its target by a few centimeters. A moment later, however, with a shake of his head, he snapped out of his stupor and forced the chain to wrap around his opponent, immobilizing him. After a few moments, it was over. Selene aimed her sword at the mage's face, who turned out to be a midnight-black, red-eyed horse.
"Why did you do it?" "
Because I wanted to and I could," he replied, chuckling.
"Who are you?" Adam interjected
. "And you don't know?" So I won't tell you...
And he stopped answering any questions. Selene was tempted to use the surveillance methods she'd learned in the bandit camp on him, but Adam stopped her and merely allowed her to gag him.
"You saw what happened. Whoever he is, we probably shouldn't do anything to him... for now. We should get to that tower first. Maybe someone there can explain all this."
Selene shrugged.
"And how do you plan to get him there?"
Adam smiled mysteriously. Suddenly, the entangled mage rose from the ground, the chains encircling him. She tightened her grip on her swords, preparing to jump, but she felt Adam's hand on her shoulder. She understood what he meant and allowed Adam and the levitating prisoner to lead the way. After a short walk, they reached the tower. Adam stayed in one of the lower rooms, guarding the mage, while she went to look for any possible occupants. She found no one. The tower had seven stories, a ground floor, and three underground levels. They all looked like typical mage rooms – lots of jars and books, except for the lowest level of the dungeon, which seemed abandoned. It also bore numerous signs of a fight – a massive spell fight at that. She returned to the room where Adam was waiting. She noticed the prisoner was asleep. She intended to wake him with the toe of her boot, but noticed that Adam was asleep too. She huffed in irritation and shook the warrior. He quickly woke up.
"Sorry... this whole levitation thing is tiring..."
She smiled.
"Not just for you." She pointed at the prisoner – though I don't know what could have made him so tired. "
It's dawn already. He's probably been hunting travelers like us all night and..." he was interrupted by the sound of the mage struggling in his chains and whimpering through his gag. She approached, intending to silence him, but recoiled as if scalded. A pair of gray, friendly, but slightly frightened eyes stared at her.
"I'm sorry again," the gray horse said after untying him from his chains. "I really didn't mean for what happened..." "
Perhaps you could explain it to us?"
Yaxim sighed.
"I think I have to. You would have found out anyway. If I'm still alive, it's only because you're probably legendary heroes, right?"
The black she-cat, Selene, nodded amusedly at the one who introduced himself as Adam
. "You guessed right. So perhaps you could explain why you changed your fur and eye color and then tried to fry us?" "
It was Beryl... but it's a long story. Come to the kitchen. Would you like something to drink?"
After a while, they sat comfortably, slowly sipping warm tea.
"Let me start from the beginning... you probably know what my father did half a century ago. After those important events for the worlds, the band of heroes fell apart – each went their own way, following their hearts. My father returned here, to his own land, built this tower on the ruins of the old one, and began further study of magic, remembering the prophecy. He hoped he would be able to help those heroines who would come – in this case, you. He often set out on long expeditions – even though Ther was defeated, this world was never perfect. During one such expedition, in an old fortress of the forces of an evil deity, he encountered a demon... or rather, a demoness. Atsuko. My mother... I know it sounds unbelievable, but it's true. She was imprisoned in this world and lost most of her power when Ther was banished. Which didn't stop her from fighting a long and grueling battle with my father. It ended with the total devastation of the entire fortress. And a draw." My mother wasn't some mindless beast – she quickly adapted to our world. Even more quickly to my father's company… then they traveled together for several years, often fighting side by side against Ther's old minions. I don't know much about those journeys. When my father returned from them, I was already in this world. Half-demon. It never bothered me. Neither did they. They both trained me in magic for long, happy years. When I was a bit older, we'd go on short expeditions against the few monsters that still remained in this world. A hero, a demon, and their child… heh, that must have been quite a sight. We were supposed to face Ther together when he returned… but that won't happen…" He sighed deeply and looked at the audience. While Adam betrayed no emotion, maintaining a serious expression, it was clear that Selene had become completely absorbed in the story. "It happened two years ago… A day like any other. We were getting ready to embark on another expedition. My father wasn't young anymore, but for a magician, age is all that important." That evening, I suddenly heard the sounds of fighting in the lowest level of the tower. Usually, especially when we had a quarrel, we'd spar there, but this time I sensed powerful magic. We'd never used it like that. Especially against each other. I thought someone had attacked us by digging a tunnel, but when I went down there, I saw something that terrified me. My father had fought my mother. Seriously. He was bleeding. I must have been hit by some kind of spell, too. The last thing I remembered was my father surrounding me with a spell of absolute protection... when I woke up, the room was empty. It was morning. I quickly ran through the tower. There were signs of a fight everywhere... and traces of blood. When I reached the top of the tower, my mother stood there. Beside her, wrapped in a sheet, was my father's body... I was furious but helpless. Then she looked me in the eye and briefly explained. That evening, Ther had taken possession of her body. And my father had died because he didn't want to hurt her...– His voice broke slightly. He had replayed that day so many times in his mind, analyzed it so many times coldly, but he had never shared his memories with anyone. It wasn't easy for him, but he continued. – She flew away. She spread her wings and flew away towards the sea... I searched for her for a while, but I couldn't find her. At the same time, back in Thera, Beryl awoke – my demon part. For now, she only possesses me at night, the day before and during the double full moon... Fortunately, it only occurs once every two months. You know my story. Now the question remains: will you agree to let me travel with you? However, if you answer no, I have one request... kill me so I can no longer harm anyone.
Tears welled in Selene's eyes, and Adam also looked slightly saddened, yet he maintained a serious, almost commanding demeanor. After a moment, he spoke:
"Yaxim... you may come with us. However, on three conditions—"
"I'm listening..."
"First: each subsequent member of our team will have to give similar consent..."
The horse smiled slightly
. "I understand. Not everyone wants to save the world alongside a half-demon."
"Secondly," Adam continued, "when the time for transformation approaches, we'll have to restrain you to prevent you from causing any harm." "
I'm all for it.
" And thirdly: "A sudden smile spread across the warrior's face—more optimism..." "
This will be the hardest... I'm afraid you'll have to kill me after all..." he laughed, along with his two new companions.
The tower had enough supplies for the three travelers, as well as some more funds and a few medicines. They decided to set off the very next day. Due to Yaxim's hospitality, Adam was forced to bargain it down to three days, after which they set off eastward in search of more team members. The sun still seemed to be in their favor. Adam looked at his traveling companions and smiled to himself. "We might make it..."
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