His face hits the ground. Again. Although by now, he's kind of used to it.
He stabs Rain down into the ground, using it as a support to stand up. After getting on his feet, he pulls the sword out, twirling it between his fingers, he again dashed at Cecilia.
The hardest part about fighting Cecilia is that she can travel through shadow. He had to be prepared for attacks that come in all directions, the last time he had begun to thought he's nailed it, Cecilia popped out from the shadow in his coat and he had her arrow tip positioned onto his throat before he knew it.
Even after a month of training, doing this is still as hard as hell.
Wrapping his blade in his plague flame (which was the result of a month's worth of training), he sent it slamming towards Cecilia's side.
Cecilia, unlike Kanitha, can't liquefy to avoid attacks. But she can disappear in a flash of black, then reappear out of the shadow behind Ralph a second later, sending two arrows flying towards him.
Ralph blocks off these attacks and jabs his sword at Cecilia. Just as she disappeared again, an idea came up to his mind.
Summoning up his power, a ring of bright, emerald flame bursts out all around him. Already he could see Cecilia reappearing more frequently than she normally does considering how little amount of shade is left in the ring. Gritting his teeth, Ralph strengthens up his flame once more, this time successfully forcing Cecilia out of the shadow.
But she didn't panic. Sliding her arrow back into her quiver, she brandishes two smaller knives tucked away around her legs and sprints toward Ralph.
Both knives came slamming down at once and came to collide with Rain. Sparks flared off the metal, Ralph, noticing that consistently maintaining the ring of flame is draining his energy at an unbelievable speed, pulls his sword away. Dodging Cecilia's knives, he jammed the bottom of his sword hilt down onto the back of her neck, knocking her to the ground.
But that's it. He's reached the limit. His flame ceased away, the shadows returned, and he collapsed onto the snow beside Cecilia.
Feeling the refreshingly freezing snowflakes pressing against his burning cheeks, he let his sweat-soaked body sink down deeper into the coolness, thinking about Cecilia's promise.
On their first day of training, Cecilia offered to show him the secrets of her family and Garavia if he manages to beat her once. Otherwise, he'll have to tell her one of his secrets. First he took on the challenge, thinking it should be easy enough. Then he went on with a whole month of screwing his mind up for insignificant secrets to tell her. During the past month, he's told her secrets like his favorite food is coconut ice, his favorite color is green, he's gotten himself stuck inside the toilet once when he was five, etc. Cecilia accepted most of them with a laugh, except that day when he really couldn't think of anything he told her he thinks she has a large nose. He was beaten up quite badly and Paulie had to stop training for a couple of days.
But now, for the first time, she fell before him. He doesn't even know if it would count, since considering how incredibly defenseless he is right now, his opponent would've still had him dead as easily as ever.
And as expected, Cecilia sat up before he did, rubbing the back of her neck where Ralph had hit.
"That hurts," she complained, bending her neck back and forth. "If I've attacked like this you would've been dead who knows how long ago."
Ralph sighed. So it probably didn't count.
"Meet me up at the entrance at six in the evening," she says, getting up. "Bring some food. It wouldn't be a short trip."
Widening his eyes in surprise, he felt a smile stretching up on his face. Even the mere energy to nod is drained now, so all he could do is lay there smiling as she walks away.
His body recovers around four in the afternoon. Pulling himself out of the snow pit, he staggers back towards the Marble house. The first thing he went for is the lunch he missed. It was still on his table, and it haven't even gotten cold yet. Devouring the yak steak, he quickly got ready for whatever Cecilia would bring him into.
At six, the sun was long gone. He steps out into the howling winds that bite into his skin, pulling up his scarf, he is beginning to understand why Paulie has his on the whole time.
Cecilia came out wrapped in fur-trimmed cloaks and heavy leathery tops. She waved her hand through the drifting snow, signaling Ralph to follow.
The two made their way down the mountains, across the valleys, and up again to another mountain. This one is particularly steep, and Ralph would have to dig his feet into the snow several times before he feel safe stepping. They climbed on like this for hours, Ralph's fingertips is starting to freeze. He watched as they slowly turned purple, he lost his senses to them, and as he again dug them into the frozen rock creaks, blood oozed out, covering his fingers in a layer of scarlet.
He looked up, Cecilia is still climbing up in front of him. Taking a deep inhale of sharp, cold air, he climbed on.
When Cecilia finally stopped and signaled him to come closer, he felt like his hand would've broken off. But he was soon distracted by the sight before him.
Built to the side of the hill was a giant, metal door painted with yellow and black stripes at the top and bottom. A large number 6 was imprinted across the doors. Following the door slit, Ralph could make out a door handle where the passcode lock was.
He and Cecilia walked closer, huffing out a breath of vapor, she wiped the passcode screen clean of snow with her gloved hand. He could tell that she didn't like doing so, by the way she instantly started to rub it dry across on her cloak as soon as she's cleared the snow.
They squinted at the blank screen, Cecilia took off her glove, exposing her frost-bit fingers, and pressed the buttons beside the screen, watching it display the numbers '080530'.
The password box made a beeping sound each time she pressed, the words 'WELCOME, PLEASE WAIT' shimmered on the green screen after a few seconds, and the box started playing an ear-splitting tone as low rumbling noises echoed within the door.
They stood waiting awkwardly outside the door as the music screeched on. Ralph glanced back, afraid that they might cause an avalanche through this godforsaken music. No— noise pollution. But then he is quite surprised and relieved at the same time that this passcode box still worked. According to Cecilia during their training earlier this month, Garavia have multiple mines scattered around the country, mining site 6 was one of them, but it had been abandoned for three years. Surely this box should have lost its functions and got stuffed with snow by now.
The dull rumbling of the door abruptly stopped with a small click and the whole door gradually scraped open, leaving a mere gap just enough for them to pass through.
Ralph peeked inside carefully. Besides the ray of light that the open door sent across the frosted ground, he could see nothing else. Suddenly, an automated voice rang behind him— "airlock door closing in ten seconds".
Ralph gasped as the door slowly started scraping backward. In a panic, Cecilia pushed him into the room, following in herself just as the door shut behind them, leaving them in a completely dark and silent mine. A mine.
Ralph stood gasping with his back as close to the door as possible, he tried pushing it back open unconsciously, but it wouldn't budge.
YOU ARE READING
Alasla: The New Age
Fantasy"What killed him isn't me. It's the world." Ralph had never asked for much. Not even his own identity. But when his best and only friend got murdered by the man he calls father, he was forced to set off on an expedition to unravel the truth of this...
