A New Beginning

The Meeting

Debra felt someone slapping her face repeatedly and her eyes started to flutter open. True enough, she was not hallucinating about the slaps, she was being slapped, by Shayne no less.

"Hey Emma, she woke up!"

"Oh, stop this Shayne."

"Stop what?" Shayne asked with mock innocence.

"Stop slapping me. I'm awake already."

"Good, just wanted to make sure. Slapping you sure is fun though. Especially when I want to change your eyes but I can't. Be happy I'm not using my full strength. Okay? You sure you're awake? You still look a bit sleepy..."

"Is that an excuse to slap me? Then, no. Get lost. I'm perfectly fine," Debra replied while glaring at Shayne. Emma opened the flap of the tent and snickered, causing Debra to mutter, "Who needs enemies, when I have friends like you guys." She clambered out of the tent and took a walk to a gigantic rock. She wanted to be far gone and sharpening her sword was always the perfect excuse to get away. She was reaching out for her sword when she realised, it was gone from her scabbard. Surprised, she ran back to the tent to find Shayne, hoping for a just explanation. 

"Oh, I passed it to a village to alter the sword a little bit. They agreed to it. Sharpening it and the sort. My Claymore was dying miserably anyway, after cutting down vines, to reach the damn village. And those vines were thick! Ooh, and their leader agreed to make other weapons too." Debra had a suspicious feeling but then, she was starting to become suspicious of everyone, including Shayne. 

Reading Debra's expression Shayne sighed and replied, "You want to go to the village now? It takes a few hours to reach there and they said that they would be done by sun down..." Without another thought, Shayne started jogging -- or rather running for Debra -- to the trees. Sure enough, there was a path which had many broken thick vines dangling from trees, which loomed overhead and covered almost all source of light that streamed in. The path was more of a piece of soil covered with an abundance of moss and could only be found if it wanted to be found. Debra bent down and went to poke the moss while she gaped at the amount of green. She never knew it had existed beforehand. Prove how dumb I am, huh? She thought with a slight smile. Ants the length and girth of her thumb crawled to and forth, creeping the hell right out of Debra who decided to just stick to the path ahead. She glanced up and realised that Shayne was already far ahead. Debra strolled along the path, tripping over branches multiple times as her head was faced upwards, looking at birds flying to and fro. Then she fell. She had tripped on a very innocent branch which was at her knee level and Shayne who had heard the loud thud turned around and snickered before jogging back and lending Debra a hand to stand up. Debra felt heat flushing her neck red and decided to just pay attention to the path. 

Not long after, they reached the village. While they talked to the village leader, who introduced herself as Jen, several men passed all the weapons to them in a gigantic cart. Right when they were about to leave the village with the weapons, Debra swore she saw a familiar-looking boy that had been looking at them earlier on. And his eyes were red.

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The boy walked along from the forest and started thinking about why the village would have so many weapons. Not many villages had that many blacksmiths. And not that they would need swords that look like army issue anyway. He trudged ahead and felt some of his excitement flowing into the drain. The ants made everything worse. Why were they so big anyway? Their mandibles creeped the shit out of him and they kept biting him too. He shoved his hand at one and lived to regret it. The whole army of ants came chasing him and forced him to jump in the river, which was blessedly clean. He was now drenched wet , his body stung and he was not suppose to feel less excited? Tough chance.

At least the village was getting closer. He was peering at the village when he whacked his head on a large, thick vine. In anger, he used his spear to bat the annoying yet innocent vine away which went back right in his face and slapped him. Again. The boy gave up and continued on with his view set on the village and saw that it was -- surprise, surprise! -- surrounded by a moat. He was sure getting damn pissed off at all these unknown stuff that kept getting thrown into his face and grumbled audibly. First he suddenly had red eyes, then there were wolves, the worst was probably The wizard wolf. Not forgetting the strange and annoying bugs and insects that roamed the forest which kept biting him, he now had a new challenge. The moat. It was rather clear albeit a few soil particles and it was probably at least ten meters wide and more than ten times that amount deep. Making it worst was the amount of sharp pointy rocks that surrounded the base of the island which was clearly elevated at least three meters above the water level. 

The boy would had used the rocks as things for him to climb up with but the rocks were sharp and pointed and there was a skeleton at the base of the rocks, which he could see thanks to the visibility of the water. The rocks were probably purposely sharpened and serrated to harm any unwanted visitor. From what he could see, the only connection from the village to proper ground was a slope through a thick forest, which he had no access to. The boy sighed and finally decided to build a raft out of whatever branches he had till he realised every branch that was on the ground was either too thin or brittle enough that it probably could not even withstand the entire weight of his sword, let alone his whole body. He exhaled a deep breath and carefully entered the water. The water was deep and he had no plans to drown in there just when he was so close. His shoulder still slightly ached but he bit his bottom lip as he swam to the other side.

Once he reached the other side he quickly tried using his spear and sword to pierce the soft earth and climb up to the island. After several failed attempts and cutting his arms at several deadly rocks, he finally made it up to the village. He quickly went to a nearby tree to take a few leaves and wipe off his blood. He needed to make a good first impression after all. 

Then a he heard a sharp voice behind him, "Put your weapons down. All of them. Crouch down on all fours and do not resist." The boy quickly obeyed but still wondered why he needed to go down to an animal's pose. The same man prodded his back with the butt of his spear and asked why the boy was in the village. The boy crouched down lower but still responded that he needed shelter. The man grunted a satisfied reply and led him to a hut, at knife point, no less. First, they led him to their leader's hut who frowned at him for a while before saying, "What do you have to say for yourself, intruder? What do you have to say before I cut off your head and give it to King Richard? I'm not afraid of your eyes anyway."

Frightened, the boy quickly replied meekly, "Richard hates me and you hate him. And the enemy of my enemy is my friend... So you shouldn't hate me? And why does everyone says that about my eyes?" The leader raised one eyebrow before shaking her head and replied, "You're the family of one of the rebels, aren't you?" On seeing his confused face, she added, "Or are you so out of the loop you have no idea what I'm talking about?" He blushed and she continued asking if he was good at any thing apart from killing innocent creatures. He felt a deeper flush of his neck before saying that he could whittle some weapons too. He was confused why the leader would ask all these and the leader, who probably had read his mind said, "If you want shelter here, you need a skill. I don't give away free resources to some useless guy who cannot help me. Anyways, the rebels are coming. For the weapons, I presume. Go to that corner there though." Whatever she said answered some of his questions but he erupted with more questions in his head. When the two rebels came, he realised he knew the both of them. 

"Is that General Douglas smiling and talking with a junior? And who is that person? She looks so familiar?" the boy muttered quietly. Apparently him being quiet was not quiet enough as the unknown girl turned her head sharply towards his direction. He instinctively ducked being the leader's hut but he was sure she still saw him. When she turned her head, he had a clearer view of her face and despite her looking older than when he last saw her, he immediately knew it was his younger sister. What was she doing as a rebel?