Goddesses’ Remedy and Dream

Oh! My father once told me that {Calda City} held an airship to help travelers and merchants ride across the {Black Mountain} without troubles.

It might be expensive though since travelling by foot will take me about twenty days to arrive in {White Haven}.

That is if I was incredibly lucky without encountering any monsters along the way. Airship only took five whole days to arrive at the same destination and guess what? No monsters at all!

Although, about that… I feared that one of these days. There would be a monster that could roam the skies and threaten us all from above.

How can a sword kill a flying monster? Thats practically impossible!

Haaaa. I need to wash my face, I went on a rant for no reason now.

I went by the river and splash my face with its cold freezing water.

Brr, its cold alright. Oh yeah, I should wake him up after I clean up my boots though. Wolf blood from yesterday pretty much stained my leather boots and I don like it when my boots are pretty much dirty.

”Fuhh! ”, I let out a calm sigh after rinsing my boots from the wolfs bloodstains.

Now at least Im a bit energized from the cold water, I should be able to keep up for sometime.

But, I doubt myself that I can even last for another sleepless night…

I will COLLAPSE, I tell you.

”Coll… haaa! ”

I took a deep sigh as I walked toward Kuren. Hmm, poking his face with a stick would be funny since he kept having this serious sleeping face stuck on him.

Cmon, make some disturbed face, you don want to look old, right?~

”…Ermm… ”, he turned his body away from me.

Oh, no. I hope that doesn make him feel some type of pain in his right shoulder for that!

Hm?

”Gah!! ”, him suddenly sitting up gave me a fright!

”K-Kuren, are you alright sitting up right now? ”, I asked, not even realising that I was stuttering from being startled.

Kuren turned his face, giving me his side glint as I hid my stick behind my back while whistling away innocently as I am.

”…Stop poking me, dummy. ”, he smiled, theres that lady killer smile. He should smile like that more since all that frowning will make him look other than his age and…

If Kuren was a girl, any man wouldve fallen for that smile. I wonder if its the same for his current self?

I mean, hes pretty handsome if he smiles more but he doesn seem to have some kind of emotions toward another girl in our village except for his…

Right… we no longer have our families now.

He lost his mother in that terrible night too, right? I hope he could at least recover from that. We need to move forward and live on to tell the tale.

Hehe, Im pretty optimistic in life after all.

*****

…

Xalkren and Kian continued their journey ahead of them. They needed to leave behind nothing as Xalkren didn want any pursuers to catch up after them.

He knew that if he couldn fight against the pursuers under his fathers orders, neither could Kian. They have to leave. And prepare for the worst.

After an hour of walking, Kian opened up the conversation with a light chatter, ”Kuren, this feels like a camping trip all over again. ”

Xalkren nodded, smiling, ”Yeah, indeed. Just that its only the two of us on an unlimited pass of camping hours. ”

”Hahaha! ”, Kian laughed heartily.

Xalkren closed his eyes as he tried to focus on his chakra.

Chakra. A form of energy only nurtured and flowed within an {Assassin} of the {Cold Dread Village}. Xalkren learned one of the few known paths of the {Assassin}s Chakra Tree.

He couldn control more than one Chakra path in the same life. However, some paths allow restricted abilities to play around their main chosen path.

{Assassin}, can meditate and evolve into either a {Taoist} or a {Shinobi}. Xalkren had chosen the path of a {Taoist} due to his high affinity for Dark energy.

{Taoist} can control two types of elemental energy, Dark and Light. These two energies can be categorised as Offensive and Support abilities. Dark being the former while Light, the latter.

Xalkren wanted to become an {Abysmal Assassin}, a legendary Dark {Taoist} class rarely appear in Agenda.

The other path was named {Light Bringer}, a Light {Taoist} that developed a stronger healing skill and a powerful Chakra bomb.

Xalkren is now currently at the beginning phase of his {Taoist} path.

”Kian, lets speed up a bit with this. ”

Xalkren called up to him as he stopped to motion his hands in a circle. Kian stopped after hearing his friends footsteps ceasing.

”What is…! ”, his eyes went wide as he watched his friend channel a circle of a {Taoist}, ”Oh, I know this ring! ”

Xalkren smirked as he expanded his hands suddenly, creating a large tunnel of «Chakra Brisk».

A Chakra infused with Light energy. This was a powerful ability to further enhance a {Taoist}s self and allys movement speed within the tunnel.

Xalkren kicked the ground, disappearing in an instant into the Chakra tunnel. Kian snorted inwardly as he followed suit.

He can let his friend abandon him like that and soil his pride as a {Warrior}!

{Warrior}, unlike Xalkrens {Assassin}s Chakra Tree path. They follow a strict Discipline (mana) gauge. The more disciplined you are within you, the stronger you are with {Warrior}.

As a {Warrior}, one can advance their worth into two type of strength. Skilled with physical disciplines or skilled with brutal disciplines.

One heavily trained with the shortsword, longsword, broadsword and greatsword will able to train themselves with physical disciplines.

This path is known commonly as {Swordmaster}.

On another hand, with brutal disciplines. One would brutally mauling their foes with their own hands, sledgehammer and other blunt force weapons will be called {Bastard Brute}.

{Swordmaster} and {Bastard Brute} also able to advance further into their own paths.

Starting with the latter, {Bastard Brute} could advance into an {Executioner}, skilled with overwhelming Wind manipulation of their weaponry and their swift and deadly techniques.

Or into a {Brutal Destroyer}, one skilled with breaking everything in their path with Roar energy and environmental destruction of their strong slams.

Meanwhile, on {Swordmaster}.

The strongest {Swordmaster} will undergo a process of advancing immediately into their best path, {Bladesmaster}.

{Bladesmaster} path in the right hands and skills will be a deadly force with excellent sword dance techniques and destructive power of their preferred affinity.

If a {Swordmaster} mostly leaning towards the arts of discipline within their magical potentials, they will become a {Mystical Warrior}.

{Mystical Warrior} skilled with magical prowess of perfect energy attacks and excellent executions with their styles of combat.

…

Xalkren came out of the end of the one way Chakra tunnel and had his eyes darted around as he quickly scanned the surroundings.

He needed to make sure it was safe enough to recreate another tunnel for when Kian arrived at the same place as him.

He nodded inwardly, confirming that it was safe enough for another tunnel but he looked around one last time, this time to get information of the dirt road.

Xalkren didn know much outside of {Cold Dread Village}. He has never left the village for long and only traverse around the river nearby for camping trips.

Kian finally arrived at the end of the Chakra tunnel. His eyes wandered around, searching for the boy who casted the tunnel spell.

”Kuren, where are we now? ”

Xalkren shook his head, ”Not sure. Do we keep following the dirt pathway? Im afraid that we might encounter danger. ”

Kian looked at his infected right shoulder and nodded slightly, ”Lets try to avoid anything suspicious, but if its multiple carriages with decent looking people, well be stopping them to ask for directions. ”

Xalkren nodded firmly at his plan, ”It will not work all the time, but well give it a try. ”, he clutched his hand against his right shoulder, ”Ill be the one to ask, if its you… ”

Kian squinted, ”…Fine, I might be scheming something if I was the one going. ”

”Good. ”, Xalkren placed his foot forward, beginning to track his path down the dirt road.

”Lets go. ”

Kian took out his sword from the sack behind his back and rested it against his left shoulder.

He decided to get ready for potential battles.

Xalkrens eyes caught something in the distance after a few minutes of tracking his eyes on the road, ”Kian. ”

”Hm. ”, Kian nodded as he walked toward a tree near the dirt pathway and leaned against it. It was best to not hide or theyll look more suspicious.

Xalkren noticed not one, but two carriages being pulled by horses advancing toward their destination.

There were trained soldiers of the city escorting a noble family out into the wild open for a fresh air.

”Decent formation, possible {Calda City}s noble family trip outside. ”, he shook his head slightly.

One of the soldiers riding a horse in front of the line noticed Xalkren and Kian nearby. He did a side glance to his partner and the latter nodded firmly.

The soldier then roared as he raised his reigns of the horse, ”Hiyaa! ”

*neigh*

Loud horse footsteps closing in fast toward the two {Adventurers} before stopping its noble steed in front of them.

”Who and what are you two doing out here? ”, he demanded answers from the two of them.

Xalkren answered firmly with a straight face, ”Im Xalkren, and this is my friend, Kian. We are lost and in need of a guidance to reach our destination to {Calda City}. ”

The soldier nodded at Kian after noticing his nod. He then asked, ”{Adventurers}? ”

”Yes. ”, Xalkren replied.

The soldier raised his hand as he heard the carriages closing in behind him, ”Do you two have an empty map? We have a map and ink for you to draw your own map with it. ”

Xalkren faced Kian as the latter rummaged into his large sack after putting away his sword first to not attract any unwanted aggression from the soldier.

”Hnn… Found it! ”