Another War

1. Girl with White Deer

"Are you ready to face your fears?"

"Umm... Do I need to?"

Yule was stammering when he answered the beautiful girl in front of her. 

The girl has a long black hair and wearing a violet dress. On her head, she's wearing a diadem,while her arms are covered by bracelets with shining jewels embedded on them. The boy might be fascinated by the person in front of her. 

But Yule is also wondering how ended up in this dark place. Him and this beautiful girl are only in this dark area. 

This dark area is empty and besides the two of them, they are the only living beings.The girl stepped closer to Yule and grabbed his right hand.

"Fear makes you human. And your humanity is the one thing I need right now." Then out of the blue, shards started dropping around this dark empty area. 

"What's happening?" Yule started stepping back when he noticed the shards dropping around him. He looked around, but he can't find where the shards coming from. 

The girl inched closer again to him. Then her jewels on her bracelets started glowing.

"Yule. Will you be the hero that my world need right now?"

"I-I don't know what's happening! But if you need a hero, then I'm telling you. I'm not a hero material." The beautiful girl smiled and hold her face. 

"Then you're the kind of hero that we need."Then everything went black.

*****

DZZZZZT!

Yule woke up from the sound of his alarm clock. His body was sweating. He immediately rose from his bed and looked at his mirror beside the cabinet. He started to inhale and exhale just calm his nerves.

"Yule! Wake up already! You're gonna be late from school." His mom shouted from downstairs. 

"Coming down!"

Yule started pulling his school uniform from his cabinet and went to shower. After preparing himself, he quickly grabbed a bite for his breakfast and said goodbye to his mother and younger sister.

While walking to school, somebody grabbed his shoulder.

"Hey Yule! Have you read the latest chapter from Draconian webnovel?"The guy who grabbed Yule is his best friend in high school, Neil Gomez.

Neil is a geeky guy who loves to read comics, manga, lightnovels and webnovels just like Yule. That's why they are a hit when they first meet during their freshmen year. 

"Sorry man, but I stayed late night last night, studying for our Third Quarter Exam."

"But our exam is next week?"

"I know. But I just want to prepare in advance, so I won't be loaded next week."

"God, Yule Azul! You're still stiff. You do know that our Senior Year is still next year, right? So us, juniors still have a lot of time to slack of."

"Well, someone has to be serious between the two of us." Neil started laughing which made Yule laughed too. 

Then suddenly, everything went slow for Yule. Like the laughter and actions of Neil started from slow motion to still. Yule started looking around, and his surroundings just froze. 

"The hell-"

Then a magic circle appeared from where he's standing. And his vision is filled by white light.

*****

After the white light vanished, Yule suddenly collapsed on the ground. Yule woke up and roll on his back to look at the sky. But he's surprised to see that the sky is painted by red color. 

He immediately stand up and look at his surrounding. And Yule was gaping from what he's seeing. Everything is ruined. Tall buildings collapsed on the ground. Pave roads had been wrecked or smashed by heavy objects.Cars were smashed on the side roads.There's no life around except for him.

"W-What happened here?!"

Yule started running, looking for any sign of life. He saw some ruined road signs indicating that he is still around Metro Manila. But a different kind of Metro Manila from where he used to know. He is wondering from a mere moments ago, he was just laughing with his high school best friend. 

Then now, it looks like his country just came from a war. While running around the area, he started hearing some stomping noise. He immediately turned to the area where it's coming from. Any sound is a indication of sign of life. 

He hopes.

When he arrived to a plaza, he found where the stomping sound came from. 

It came from a big creature. Or a monster, Yule thought.

He stepped back, but his foot stumbled from a can. The eight foot creature stopped stomping, and it found Yule. 

The creature looked like a cross breed of a wild boar and a bull. It's a bipedal creature with wild boar head complete with a tusk jutting from his mouth. The creature also has a horns beside its ear. The body is covered by black fur. 

"What the hell?" 

Yule slowly started crawling backwards, away from the monster. The monster with his full attention on Yule. He walked with heavy footsteps towards him.

Yule started crying and crawling backwards when he saw the monster inching closer to him. Now that the monster is getting closer to him. Yule found out what the creature is stomping on that area. It was stomping on a human or what it's supposed to be. Now just  a chunks of meat splattered on the ground. Yule shrieked when he saw the carnage. 

"I just want to go back!" Yule shouted.

The monster halted from his walking. Then it bends its body, preparing for a jump. The moment that Yule found that the monster will jump towards him and probably splattering him on the ground, he just closed his eyes and hope to God that it will be not painful. 

The monster flared its nostril, and jumped towards the boy. 

But the jump was blocked by another creature. The wild boar-bull monster was thrown away to a nearby wrecked building. 

Yule while waiting for his impeding doom, peeked and saw a white creature collided its head toward the monster. The white creature landed gracefully on the ground near where Yule is. 

He noticed that the white creature is a white stag, crowned with long horns. Yule is also surprised that a girl is riding on it. The girl stepped down from the white stag. She's wearing a white long sleeve uniform and checkered short skirt. 

 "Surprise to see a mundane human here." The girl said to Yule. Then, she hold her right hand on the air. 

"Zura! Weaponize!"

The white stag glowed and turned into a ball of light and went to the girl's hand. The light molded to a bow.

"Now let's start the slaying." The girl faced the monster and aimed her bow. "You will be my fifth aswang to be slay today."