Chapter 3

Chapter 3 : The Parting
Sefra, riding on the back of a magnificent white horse felt queezy due to the bumpy ride but she didn’t complain. If I couldn’t even cope with a bumpy ride, how am I supposed to save Darkmeth thought Valerie.

She looked behind her to catch a glimpse of Seigheart riding on his brown horse. How does he ride on a horse and keep his eyes closed anyways. Won’t that make you even more nausea Valerie thought bitterly. Listening to the surrounding, she could hear Resha running along with them among the dense bushes.

‘So what happened to Tirion in these 30 years?’

‘Well, we failed to defend Tirion against Weil Xela and his minions. We believe that there was a traitor in Tirion because there was no way they could have invaded us when we still have the barrier,’ answered Sefra.

‘Wait, so there really is a barrier protecting Tirion? So what I’ve heard wasn’t just a gossip. So what is the key for securing the barrier?’ interrupted Valerie.

‘We’re not sure either. But we’ve heard that it was a sword which was protecting Tirion,’ answered Haquis who had ride up beside them. ‘And the current Dark-Elf lord, Weil Xela, had his dark mystics and wizards turn this into what you see now. Since then there never was peace, no light, no happiness. New monsters and creatures now lurk these woods, most of them serving Weil Xela. Lurkers and stalkers, satyrs and dark nymphs and dryaids, mammoth insects to dragons. Its sad to see all has changed to this state.

‘So what is this Resistance people we are heading to?’
‘Well they are the ones who are now trying to overthrow Weil Xela’s reign and stop this madness that he has caused. We were sent by the leaders of Weil Xela to spy on their defences and to see what we’re up against for 3 whole weeks, and thing’s don’t look too good. The Resistance consists of various races, the remaining High-Elves from Tirion, giants and dwarves just to name a few. But what I hate most are those pesky Reggins. They always take other race’s ideas and plans, manipulated it and claim its theirs. They are like thieves to me in my eyes,’ explained Haquis.

‘Hey, if it wasn’t for them, Islandior would have been overthrown by now. It’s their ability to copy another’s technology to make it more efficient which made Islandior a sanctuary for the innocent to escape from the War. So, stop being a racist. And if you guys don’t tone down your voice, Dark Dryaids might hear us and that will only slow us down,’ snapped Dylan.

‘Ok ok, don’t need to be so agitated. Geez.’

The rest of the journey was a silent one after that. The journey was rough as they had to travel swiftly so that they could get out of the main forest of Du’Tauren. The sun was in midsky which indicates it was around 4pm when Valerie noticed that the trees have turned from dark purple to a milder pink. ‘Are we out of the main forest of Du’Tauren now?’

‘Yes, we’ve made it. If we had not gotten out of that place, we might be captured and ambushed easily. That’s because there are much are more hideous creatures which will appear during the night in the main forest. For now, we have to find a suitable place to camp,’ replied Dylan.

‘There, among the trees, that looks like a good spot to camp. Seems familiar too,’ exclaimed Haquis.

‘That’s because that is the same spot which we had camped the night before we entered the main forest remember dimwit?’ said Sefra with a hand hitting head.

‘Oh..’

xxxxxx

After a couple of days, the group was travelling as usual. Suddenly Valerie noticed something strange about the sky, clouds started to form, and it wasn’t even the raining season she thought. Strangely she felt the dark clouds formed is much different than regular ones. Then a huge green lightning flashed across the sky with a loud ear piercing crack of thunder.

‘Dark Storm! Find a cave or anything to shelter from it, fast!!’ shouted Seigheart as he whistle to Resha who was somewhere in the forest to warn him about the storm.

Valerie said ‘What is this Dark Sto-’

‘No time to explain, find shelter now!’ shouted Dylan.

The group moved fast, hoping for a place to shield from the mysterious rain.


‘Look! I see a small cave at the far end there!’ exclaimed Seigheart.

They all raced to the small cave but at the same time, Valerie saw raindrops falling down on them and thought what was to be worried of them when she noticed that the raindrops were in fact purplish green in color, similar to the current surroundings. Then out of nowhere, a raindrop landed on Valerie which caused a sharp corrosive pain. Haquis began to swear as he too felt the rain. The group lunged towards the cave and made it just in time before there was an extremely heavy downpour. They ripped the supplies of the horse and ran into the same and squeezy cave while the horses are outside and the reigns of the horse are secured inside the cave. They were all out of breath. The first thing that Seigheart and Dylan do was to check the supplies while Haquis was desperately wiping the rainwater off his face and Sefra was trying to rinse her hair with her drinking water. Valerie took a clothe and quickly wipe the water off all of her exposed skin. Then she heard the familiar growl and saw Resha entering the cave soaked and wet. Dylan gave a huge sigh.

‘Most of the supplies are spoiled by the rain. Now we are in the mercy of the forest and this storm.’

‘How can there be a storm during the summer? I mean, it isn’t even the raining season in this dimension too, right?’ asked Valerie

‘It is not that strange that a Dark Storm appears in this season nowadays. These storms have been occurring very randomly recently. We should have better preparations for it. Its all my fault,’ said Seigheart.

‘No, if anyone that was supposed to be blame, it’s me. I should’ve taken better measures of taking care of our supplies. Dammit, I was too busy thinking of something else to check before leaving this morning,’ said Dylan.

‘Well it could not get much worse can it?’ said Haquis.

Then Sefra cursed and swear repeatedly.

‘DAMN this storm, my bow string got eaten through it. My hair is a mess and I am really really hungry!!.’

‘Chill, chill.’ Said Haquis. ‘At least you look as pretty as ever.’

‘Stop your jabbing, without my bow I am useless. I am an archer and you expect me to chill? What happen if an ambush comes? We have no range capabilities and I am force to hide and do nothing. &$%$’

Haquis went silent.

‘And to make matters worse,’ said Seigheart while litting a fire, ‘our journey will most likely be delayed another week.’

‘Great. Just Great’ Sefra frowned and just sat at the far end of the corner gloomily.

‘Sieg, what is this, Dark Storm?’ Valerie asked.

‘To put it simple, this is what the humans refer as the Dark Elves Acid Rain or Dark Storm in short. It’s very acidic and corrodes exposed flesh and skin and sensitive equipments. Here, use this cream. It’ll help reduce the pain and cures the rashes.’

‘Aren’t the horses in danger too?’

‘No, furred animals like horses and Resha are quite inert to the rain due to their fur. It was called Dark Storm because other than its corrosiveness, it’s like a morale boost, or something enjoying and worth drenching for the dark creatures especially the Dark Dryaids. The storm is the one which transformed the previous green and flourish landscape into this, that’s why the forest is glowing evil purple. This will delay our journey greatly because the shortest route which we were supposed to travel will most probably be overgrown by new mutated plants. We believe the Dark Elves are responsible for this vile storm. Though during the rainny season this sort of rain will be of a common thing, their wizards can conjure up the storm easily. If one is to be exposed in the storm for a long period of time, you’ll get poisoned and will have any part of your exposed skin melted off.’

‘Oh, I see. Poor Sefra. Cheer up ok?’

She didn’t bother replying.

‘Oh man, I am covered in rashes, my hair is a mess too and most importantly, I not handsome anymore for now.’ imitated Haquis in a playful tone. Sefra shot him a dirty look and merely ignored him.

‘This is not the time to fool around moron. The only thing worry about your is looks, I worry about our supplies now that our supplies are all ruined and now most of the wild food are poisonous. And do not forget we have a disabled comrade.’ snapped Dylan.

‘Ok ok, my bad. So what are we supposed to do now? I’m so freaking bored.’

‘We’ll have to wait for the rain to stop before we can move again. We’ll have to find food or else we won’t last another week. Resha, you’re the one with the greatest hunting ability here. So we’re depending on you now,’ said Seigheart.

Resha merely growled while the others just sat there, waiting for the rain to stop.

‘By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask you guys something. Do you guys have a place called the Treehouse here in this dimension? I assumed so,’ asked Valerie.

‘Yes, in fact, it’s been our custom to go there every other week. Do you go to the Treehouse with us from your dimension?’ asked Haquis who answered her out of boredom.

The Storm raged on for the whole night. Though Resha and the horses are fine, the group is in terrible shape. Tired. Worn. Hungry. Weakened. The storm finally started to set. After a few hours the storm was had completely stopped.

‘I think it’s safe now. Put on your gloves provided. Now you all go gather up some wild food you see and bring them back here to the cave immediately. I will filter the harmful from the harmless. Go now, we wasted too much time.’ Ordered Dylan.

So they split and scour the woods for food. Sefra’s still have red rashes though she looks more tired than mad. Valerie with a furry glove worn, spotted a bush full of shiny berries. It look very similar to those back at her dimension where she would randomly pick and enjoy them. So she assume its fine and took some of it and some pocket it some of it for later use. She also hand held some other larger dull looking and some tough looking fruits and brought it back to the cave.
xxxxxx

They regrouped after an hour. By the time Valerie reached the cave, Haquis and Seigheart was skinning a reindeer while Sefra and Dylan was packing up the food. Valerie handed her findings to Sefra and she went to help with the skinny of the reindeer.

It didn’t took them long to cut all those meat because Seigheart got impatient with it and used his magic to cut the pieces of reindeer meat together. ‘That’s better. Thanks to Resha, we’ll at least have enough food for the week,’ he said as he was patting the purring Resha.

‘You should’ve done that earlier man, wasted our time,’ complained Haquis.

‘My magic is almost drenched, I would rather save up the energy in case of an emergency. It’s better to take precautions. But since I feel that we’ll take forever to get this done manually, so I changed my mind.’

‘Right... So you mean you got lazy..’

‘Whatever..’

‘Let’s go everyone. The Council is expecting us, we’ve lost enough time in this commotion,’ said Dylan. And so they set of once again.

xxxxxx

It was only an hour later that Valerie felt a little weird and her vision started to swirl and she couldn’t even sit properly another. She was swaying from left to right. She was about to collapse and fall down the horse when Resha came up just in time to catch her on it’s back.

The whole team halted and Seigheart inspected Valerie.

‘This is very bad,’ Seigheart said, ‘these berries in her pocket are very poisonous. And since it’s from the storm, there is no known cure yet, only suppressants which we happen to have none.’

‘Damn it Valerie, why did you disobey my orders, I’ve told you not to eat anything.’ frowned Dylan.

‘Huh what? Why do I feel so sick? What is going on?’ Her face was really pale.

'Seig, can you teleport along with Valerie to the nearest city?' ased Dylan.

'I am in no state to perform a teleportation. My magic power is almost completely drained.'

'Dammit!' Dylan took a deep thought, looked and Seigheart and said ‘You take Valerie and go on as fast as you can to the nearest with Resha. You can conjure up some magic to make her last during the trip, can you? With her speed she might have a chance. And take this portion of the supplies. We’ll catch up with you eventually. Take the forest road, you guys can travel swiftly with Resha.’

‘Oh man, there goes another pretty girl,’ said Haquis. Everyone snapped him a dirty look then he backed off looking guilty.

Dylan handed a share of the supplies to Seigheart who is flipping through his magic books. ‘Ah, found it. 'Muic’Emarap’ Seigheart changed with his hands on Valerie’s stomach. Her chest glowed a bit and she was now sweating all over.

‘That’ll slow down the poison,’ panted Seigheart.


‘Go now, as swiftly as you can. May the stars be you guide,’ said Sefra.

‘Can’t I come along?’ asked Haquis.

‘You know that Resha can’t carry that many people and that much load at a time,’ answered Dylan.

‘Oh man, why does Seig get to be alone with the pretty girl.’

‘You’re seriously sick man. No wonder you have no girlfriend,’ retorted Sefra.

‘Uh, I don’t feel so well..’ and Valerie puked at the side.

‘At least the spell is somewhat helping,’ said Seigheart.

So the team was split into to with both teams having a handicapped.

(Story by : Bonggie. Edited by yours truely :) )