For a second, Naren thought he had something. As if something had sprouted in his mind, taking root in his brain, a fruit that was finally ripe enough for him to bite into. But just as he opened his mouth, his teeth clamped on itself. No sweetness to taste.
Just as it had been...it was gone.
"Number two?"
Yuna, sighed before rubbing her eyes. Her gaze landed back on Cairo who was already writing her off with his eyes.
"I'm the best chance you have. You want to be a shaman don't you?...Or would you rather walk around an empty husk?"
Cairo gently let go of the hilt, clicking his tongue before rolling his neck in a circle.
"For now, you good."
Naren watched the two at odds end. His thoughts were already preoccupied with other matters. For instance, the number two. He felt like it had some meaning. But just thinking about it made his head hurt.
But there was also another matter, the matter of a heir. As he thought the voice of Alice resounded in his head. His posture unconsciously getting straighter. All her bragging and self gloating inevitably came from one big feat.
"What's the big deal about being a heir?"
The unspoken tension between the two slowly melted as they both filtered their gaze onto Naren.
"Where you even from? A cave?"
"Are you a dunce?"
Exchanging looks of pure wonder, Naren spoke before either could get a word out.
"What can I do? Alice would go on and on about how great it is without telling me what it meant."
"Lady Alice?...with blonde hair and a black ribbon?"
"Yeah. You know her?"
Yuna smiled slightly, looking at Naren with a playful expression.
"You were conned...There's no way you met the real lady Alice."
"You think I'm a liar?"
"No. You wouldn't lie. You were played."
"What's there to play about? Who cares about cosplaying that crazy woman?"
Cairo scratched his hair, running his hands along the sharp white spikes.
"She a heir."
Yuna cut in.
"A shaman directly acknowledged and throned by the head of a noble family"
"What makes a family so noble?"
"You really did grow up in a cave didn't you?"
Naren scowled as he waved them off.
"Yeah yeah. If you two are just gonna gang up on me I'll figure it out some other way."
"Pfftt...They're direct bloodlines of Grimm's party...In other words, they're the ones who stand at the top of this world."
Yuna placed her hand on her chest, motioning to herself.
"And I am a princess of those families. A heir."
Cairo rolled his eye.
"More like a scam artist."
"A princess, really?"
Naren leaned in closer. If she was a heir as well then she would be the same as Alice. Just thinking about how freakishly strong she was sent a shiver down his spine. With someone like her, they'd definitely get out of this nightmare.
Nightmare...Why was it nightmare?
"Of course. I can't lie."
Yuna caught herself mid sentence, her hands instinctively going to her mouth. Naren's thoughts cut out by this new revelation.
"You can't lie?"
"I can't."
"Why?"
She kept silent for a while. Her eyes shut as she clenched her jaw. Then they snapped open.
"...It's my spite."
She exhaled a long breath. Relieving all the pain from refusing to answer.
Naren tilted his head.
"Never?"
"Never...Well, not like I don't know both your secrets...An affinity to reflections that lets you travel through them...and increasing your body temperature at will. As well as a sickly spite to boot."
Naren stared at her, mouth gaping open. he whipped his head to Cairo then back at Yuna.
"How did you know?! Cairo I think we should just get rid of her."
"Pain in my ass...Heir of Macedonia with God's eye...Prolly got something cooked up in case we can't be of use."
"We really should just get rid of her...No don't tell me she thought of that too."
Yuna scoffed.
"I'd never do anything that barbaric...As I've said, I plan on being your guide."
"For what scheme?"
"To overthrow the son of Zeus."
Her words were met only by the crackling of flames. Both Naren and Cairo fell silent. The old lady behind them, however, was the most reactive. She limped up to her feet, prying her way past Naren.
There, she fell down, all the way down. Her forehead touching the white stone ground, her hands prostrated.
"Please...Please my lady. You mustn't."
The twilight hue of the day was beginning to wane, the flames now brighter by the darkness that soon welcomed itself.
Naren stood up, dusting himself off as he began stretching. Yuna was dangerous. She was one hundred percent going to be a problem down the line. Alice would sprinkle in tidbits of useful advice from time to time. One she stressed was: Avoid the smart.
They would either drag you into their plans without you knowing. Or you would know, and that too is part of their tricks.
Naren had no intentions of being dragged into any plans or schemes of anyone. He already had a lofty goal in mind of meeting a deadbeat sister. But before that he had other matters to attend.
SWISH.
A bolt flew right past his ears, his head weaving out at the last second. Naren isolated the direction it came from, his golden eyes already locked into the debris.
A second bold flew from an opposing direction, this time it was aimed at Cairo, who shot it down with a shuriken mid air.
"Cairo, can you shoot one of those sta—"
"Stop!"
The sudden outburst from the old lady sent Naren into a painful retreat to a crouch. She just had to scream that loud from being that close. After all this time, he began to wonder if his hearing was his real spite.
"Siobhan. Chrys. Disengage."
Out of the debris, two figures emerged. Familiar ones that had welcomed the two in the past. Before they had gotten into this nightmare...Nightmare again...
The shorter and more giddy Chrys waved over as the two contradicting woman approached. Their masks fully blotting out any expression they may have.
"They're...They're shaman who wish to kill the lord for us."
Naren yawned as he turned his attention back to Yuna. He had no intention of being her plaything, but her spite was fairly useful to him. Afterall, there was one point that had been gnawing away at him for a while now.
"A soulless body is a husk."
The words of Alice felt more pressing now than they had to him all those years back. A husk. The only thing Alice had told him about what it meant was that you were better of dead. At least then you'd be at peace.
"Uhm...Quick question Yuna. How long until someone becomes a husk?"
The girl looked him, up and down. Cairo had also fixed his attention onto her by now. They were both thinking the same thing. Someone with so called God's eye, would know.
She sighed a deep breath. Pointing at Naren first. Then her finger moved to Cairo.
"Any normal aspirant would've felt something off about this place and tried their darndest to avoid it. But here you two are."
"Whatchu sayin?"
"I'm sure you two can feel that your bodies don't listen to you at times. Whether it be extreme exhaustion, or a constant heat that you cant extinguish...So I'd say a year."
"Really that short?!"
Yuna lowered her head, looking up at Naren with a devilish expression, her pitch black eyes staring deep into him.
"A year until you're a husk...But here you'll probably be feeling worse than outside..."
Suddenly a deep warm sensation filled Naren's abdomen. Something was spilling across his chest. Something warm. His hands reached down, coming back stained in red. His eyes slowly looked down, a sharp stone point poking out of his stomach.
Turning his head around, he was met with the rustic carving of an eye staring at him. Deep black circles devoid of any reflection.
Next to him he could hear Cairo coughing, his voice strained as he spoke. But none of those sounds reached Naren's ears. Instead, his head was filled with his own voice.
'What's happened...What is this...Why is it so hot...I can't be...'
Then the outside world flooded in once more.
"...That's because your dying."
Naren tumbled to the ground, his vision hazy and his ears ringing. The voices and sounds of the world were flowing all around him, the same way his blood poured out.
He wanted it to stop, for the sounds to go mute for even a second. But they didn't.
His golden eyes stared up at inverted ocean in the sky. A feeling a dread overcoming in. One that he felt when he was submerged in those waters. The world had gone silent.
No sounds reached him, his vision blurring by the second as he felt his body drain of any life it was clinging to.
Then he heard it. A low guttural bestial snarl. One that was all too familiar, unconsciously causing him to croak out one last remark.
"That...wolf...always here..."
Then everything went black.
—————————
Naren's eyes shot open into pure darkness. His breath heavy as he attempted to grasp his stomach, the clinking chains getting in the way. A shot of pain flowing in through his shoulder sending him into a grimace as he sat up.
But by the time he got up, the pain and disappeared, like it never existed to begin with.
Staring down in utter darkness, barely able to make anything out as his shaky breath continued to resound. He felt sick to his stomach, his head splitting in two. Naren drew several more heavy breaths before he heard the approaching footsteps.
They stopped at his cell door. He couldn't see, but he could feel their looming presence staring at him, lingering for a second. Then the footsteps began once more. Dwindling this time along with a silent mutter.
"What does she wish to achieve..."
Naren's breathing began to stabilize when a sudden flickering of light gave way to his panic.
"You straight?"
Naren looked Cairo up and down, as if not all of him should be there. His mind instantly filled with various images. Dozens of bodies, split in two, bleeding, battered...All of them were Cairo.
Then a dozen more. A dozen more burned arms, cut innards, grasping breaths...They were all of himself.
He got up to his feet, trembling as if he innards would spill out at any moment. Drawing closing to Cairo, his voice was shaky.
"Cairo...We died..."