Land of Athlora

*Chapter 10 - Olden-Rise

The forest exit is lighted by warm rays and a vast blue sky. On foot, Wren sprints the last few meters out of the Misty Woods and lets out a gleeful hoot. Wren enjoys the warm sun despite the burn on her flesh. Wren firmly presses forward all the while keeping an eye for traveler's.

The birds cheerfully tweet from their roosts without a care in world. "Huh, I'd forgotten how shrill their voices are," Wren thought at the birds singing.

Wren glances down at her hands and recalls the perverted ghost instructions, "The blood spell lineage burns blood for spells." Wren could practice, but each time she would be burning her own blood. And if she ran out of the blood, well, Wren knew exactly what would happen.

Wren focuses her eyes at the tip of her finger as she walks and wills a spell to come into being. Much later, a tiny drop of blood seeps through her skin and floats. Wren almost claps her hands her hands in delight, but immediately restrains herself lest she lose the single drop of blood.

"Spells, huh? I can do that," Wren muttered as she stares at the single drop of blood. "Explode," Wren said as the single drop of blood and falls onto the ground with a hiss. Wren comes to a halt as she stares at the small crater, before innocently walking past it. Wren hastily walks away pretending she had nothing to do with the incident.

Further away, Wren wipes the sweat from her brow and says, "It's quite tiring to even produce a single drop of blood that I can't even imagine being able to do so continuously."

Nevertheless, Wren decides to keep practicing as one never knew when she might need it. As Wren practices, she enviously says, "Father was so lucky, he got the useful one." Not that blood spells weren't incredible, but frankly speaking it would be much more incredible to pull out a blood sword out of one's hand.

The sun begins to wane, and Wren stops to camp for the night. Sniffing the air, Wren almost chokes in surprise as a visual image enters her mind. Wren snorts and says, "That thing could still see me even with its eyes blinded! That's no fair! Well, at least it's dead and this will be of use to me." Personally, though, she would have preferred to gain its magic nullification ability. But life simply wasn't fair.

With ease, Wren sniffs for food and heads towards the fruit smelled in the distance. With ease Wren climbs the tree and shakes the leaves. The hordes of fruit fall to the ground, before she is satisfied. With glee, Wren climbs back down and sits on the ground and begins to eat.

To her amazement, Wren's nails easily peel the fruit. Curious, Wren scratches at the tree bark to just tear it off chunks of the tree bark. Excited, Wren tries scratching at everything to test her strength to find that she can cut through rocks! Wren bends her fingers with glee and says, "I was wrong about you, monster, you're pretty useful after all!"

Full of cheer, Wren eats the rest of the fallen fruit, before preparing her bed for the night against the fruit tree. Not even making a fire, Wren cuddles up against the tree. Given that she can see at night and literally smell anything before it approached, Wren was fairly certain she would be okay. Besides, what was there to fear out here? In comparison to the misty woods this was nothing but child's play.

The night swiftly passes by until the birds sing their joy at a new day's sun. Wren yawns and grouchy says, "Shut up!" Still grumbling Wren stretches, before packing up and readying herself for the new day.

After breakfast, Wren checks the map one last time to make she is on course. Wren's finger traces the path and stops at the checkpoint at the village fort of Olden-Rise. To enter the Tessa Mountain pass, Wren had to pass through the guarded checkpoint. Hopefully, it would be as simple as that, but Wren wasn't so certain. Sometimes check points required a means of identification to verify one's claims.