[Author's note: A little rushed chap]
"My name is Zero. A Light element user, who specialises in combat, healing, and scouting. I am in dire need of something found only in that forest so… How about we make a deal, Miss Vatra?" I ask with a humble smile on my face.
She looks deep into my eyes with a dumbfounded expression before she speaks,"Am I… dreaming? A Light user… is willing to help me out?" before she looks at her friends who had the same expression as her. Even people looking from far ahead kept peeking at me with a surprised expression.
"Help you? Haha! I think you are mistaken. I am just here to achieve my own goal. I just thought making a deal with you will ease my travels, so I came forward to make a deal here. So let me ask this again, Miss Vatra. Would you be interested in making a deal?" I spoke with the same humble expression, this time with a tinge of dominance in it.
Vatra kept looking at me for a few moments before answering,"ye-" though before she could complete her sentence, Iliara interfered,"What is it that you want?"
I looked at Iliara and then sighed before speaking,"I want you to guide me to the centre of the HellFire forest. Or at least show me the way," and they looked at me with a deep analysing gaze.
The surrounding people started murmuring as they kept looking at me. I could more or less make out what they were talking about. Something along the lines of who I am and if anyone knows about me.
"Okay, we have a deal. When should we leave?" Iliara asked as she looked at me and I made a slight nod before speaking,"if it does not bother you then can we leave immediately?"
She nods at me before speaking,"given our circumstance, I would prefer to heal and regain our strength first. Healing can be done if you help us out, as for strength I think we don't really have time for that right now. So… I guess yeah.. Yeah we can leave immediately."
I look at her tired smile before she stands up and picks up the bag placed beside her. While Iliana and Vatra also stand up and bow at me before moving towards the forest. Iliara turns at me as she keeps walking,
"I can explain everything you want to know on the way… for now can you heal us on the way too?"
'Not wasting any moment whatsoever, huh?' I thought as I moved behind her, Dion and Ariel too followed them along with me. Not long after we had ventured quite a bit into the forest, I had already healed them back to normal and while I was doing so; we sensed someone following us, which made us stop and look behind.
An old man with a long white beard and a silver sword was walking towards us. He had a white robe covering his body with his eyes silverish blue in colour gazing deep into mine. Before I could utter anything he spoke first,
"Can I join your noble cause?"
He had a cheeky smile on his face and I understood that he wanted to join us in venturing into the forest.
"Yetris?" Iliara spoke as she gaped at that old man and I looked at her as I asked,"Acquaintance?" and she shakes her head signaling no before speaking,
"He is one of the strongest adventurers. What do you want Yetris?"
Yetris smiled before looking at me as he spoke,"I just want something from the Elder Flame Forest." and I looked at him before asking,"You are putting that much of a risk on someone whom you don't even know properly?"
Yetris' smile deepened as he spoke,"I know a strong man when I see one. And you Mr. Zero aren't ordinary by any means. My instincts are telling me that if I miss this chance, I probably won't get any better chance than this in my entire life."
'Quite the instinct he got there,' I thought as I sighed before speaking,"Just don't do anything that might get you killed," and he gazed at me with a serious expression at which I simply smirked and he nodded before I spoke to Iliara,
"Guess there is one more to us now."
She looked at me before looking at Ariel and Dion as she said,"I did not notice them before, but are they with you?" and I nod at her, at which Iliara looks at them strangely before sighing and nodding at herself and then looking at me as she speaks,
"Whatever. Let's hurry now."
Then she starts running immediately without waiting for us. The other two also start running and we too follow immediately. As we were running, I helped Dion and Ariel to maintain their strength and stamina, from time to time using Life magic. Though I did skillfully hide it from the sisters. Still, Yetris managed to see through me and was really surprised to say the least.
However, he did not speak anything and just kept quiet on the fact that I could use Life magic too, or perhaps even more than that I think I saw him smiling a little as he pondered over something.
'It's kinda creepy… Man, did I make a mistake by letting him join us? I thought getting someone powerful to use for once will be a good thing… wonder how things would turn out later on,' I thought as I contemplated my decision but since I had already made one I think there is little I can do about it.
From that point onwards, we kept on running and running. Yetris tried to talk to me about where I was from or where I was going to but all in all, I dodged his every question by making up some sort of bullshit which he honestly didn't buy at all.
'Maybe I should work on my bullshitting skill,' I thought because really, all my lies are easily seen through… or maybe I am not trying hard enough honestly.
When he realised that he couldn't see through me at all, he tried to talk to Dion and Ariel but honestly; they kept their mouths shut the whole time without speaking any word at all.
As for Yetris himself, I did not get to know about him either… or rather I did not try to find out about him, honestly. Though if there is one thing that I did find about him was…
'He f*cking talks too much,' I cursed inside with an annoyed expression as I kept looking forward. Though not long after we started engaging with monsters on our way. While detouring around the monsters to reach the destination faster was the plan according to the sisters but with Yetris easily cutting down those monsters with his dual swords, we moved even faster.
As we ventured deeper and deeper, the power of the monsters, the temperature of the forest, the eerines of the location was increasing step by step. Though, it was still under my control, as I could still keep using Life and Light magic together for as long as I wanted, this much heat wasn't much for me.
However, after a certain mark, we reached a point where fighting against the monster became difficult even with the help of Yetris. Every time we stopped to fight, it would take about 5 to 10 minutes to defeat the minotaurs and that too increased wave by wave and not long after, I even had to engage into combat and show some of my cards.
Though it didn't really sit well with the sisters that I was hiding my powers. They glared at me and Iliara was even about to fight with me saying that if I had used my power before, we could have saved so much time.
"My power is limited and takes time to recharge," I answered her and she looked at me with a slightly dumbfounded gaze before an embarrassed expression came on her face as she apologised for her lack of understanding.
I kinda felt bad for her but I was not going to correct her so it was fine. We then kept moving deeper and deeper into the forest, finally reaching a spot where it looked like we were at a stalemate. To be honest, it wasn't a stalemate since I haven't shown my complete powers though it wasn't just me… Yetris too hadn't shown his complete power as well.
In fact, he kept his powers hidden till the very end and I had to trick him into revealing his cards in front of everyone which he kinda did… and it was a dual sword skill using white fire magic which is… not something I had seen before.
'It's flashy…' is the only remark I could make. Though something happened right after it, which made me question whether I was looking at the real thing or was it all an illusion which I was witnessing?
This content is taken from free web nov𝒆l.com