Final Fantasy

CHAPTER 4 - ARC 2: NO HONOR AMONG THIEVES

At first it was a little unsettling, trekking through a world in shadows after having finally lived in the light of day. It wasn't long before their surprising show of defiance wore off either, more and more monsters getting braver and braver. To make things worse, it was getting harder to keep going, the strength of the heroes waning. For about a week they walked along the ancient dirt paths, hoping that if they wondered ever eastward they'd eventually find the city of Pravoka.

Each of them had traveled alone in some capacity, but usually under slightly better circumstances. Conner had only ever gone out alone when he was hunting, and even then he rarely strayed far from Fynn where he had been a knight. Only after it sunk did he make the trip to Cornelia, which wasn't far from where Fynn had been, just a way's further west from the Chaos Shrine. Emily had come from Crescent Lake, which was quite a bit further, but she'd had an escort take her to Cornelia before they returned home. Ava never made it quite clear where she came from, but she said she used to be far to the south of Cornelia before she set it on fire. Either way, her experience with monsters was that they tended to ignore her unless she was with other people. Bruce came from considerably farther away, as Gaia was located near the very edge of any map, but he'd left that home long ago. For many years he'd traveled the world alone, and had the most experience surviving in these wilds. If not for him, the group most likely wouldn't have lasted these past two weeks, but even then most of his experience involved knowing how to avoid the monsters, not fight hordes of them to clear their way.

With all of that in mind, the journey wasn't easy, but they were managing. Someone always kept watch when they slept, and no-one ever slept long. They stayed close to the path without standing out in the open, but hid as close to cover as they could without invading some monster's nest. Light was kept to the bare minimum as it acted like a beacon to anything with eyes, and they moved slowly as to not startle anything with ears. Food was scarce, but not altogether impossible to find. Water was easy enough to get, but difficult to purify.

In this fashion, the four heroes traveled through no man's land, until finally-- tired and beaten-- they arrived at the city of Pravoka.

... It was on fire.

"Of course," Conner half chuckled as they saw the burning buildings on the horizon. "C'mon. Let's go figure this out."

Ava grabbed him by the arm. "We should wait."

"Ava's right," Bruce nodded. "Let them sort--" He shook his head.

"I've been fighting the same thing," Conner assured them. The energy here, in this part of the world... The darkness prevented most people from caring about anything, made them stay out of other people's trouble. It was affecting them the same way.

Ava let go of Conner.

"Let's hurry," Bruce grunted. "Before we change our minds for no reason."

Luckily the monsters seemed to be staying away from the city. Firelight tended to attract monsters, but apparently they too had their limits. A city-wide fire was that limit. As for what was causing the trouble in that case...