| ☠️ | It would be more surprising should even the most sheltered of souls have never heard of Aifread or his crew even once, although it is a curious eye he turns in her direction, taking note of words she speaks, although perhaps without having meant to. Village in the middle of a valley? Scouring geography through his mind, he tries to recall, perhaps remember a village in the middle of a valley, only to be pulled from such whirring gears with her fascination toward his ship.
“Aye, that she is. We do well to take of her. She means too much for anything else. Sometimes I wonder if we are even worthy of her.” Eizen muses, more to himself than her, a spark of mirth passing through his cyan gaze, smile slight and proudly facing The Van Eltia.
“Would you-“ Sylables hating in his throat, eyes widening a smidge as he too turns his head to look back, having heard the frantic cry of a human. A daemon invasion…? It couldn’t be here, that possibly, daemonblight had somehow struck?
“What- wait!” A shock of alarm passing stoic features, he turns on his heel, only just able to extend a hand as she shoots off, running back whence they came.
“Dammit!” Did she even know what she was getting herself into? Followed her here? Casting a look to his ship, and a few confused stragglers of his crew loading it, a hiss slips past lips. They were going to set off soon, and to delay would put them at risk for being caught as the frauds they were.
“Keep on schedule! I’ll make this quick.” An order, followed by a chorus of agreements, Eizen flicks his wrist, fingers tightening around the bangle there. His curse could either turn this in or away from his favor, and he was determined for it to be the former, following in her footsteps, a wind arte sparking at his feet and providing a burst of speed.
“Lara! Don’t you dare say anything about not leaving just yet! You alone do not make that choice!”
Shoving through the fearful and shaking crowd, The Repear steps forward, lacking in such emotion, and only intimidating the crowd back further, so he can get a glimpse of what might be the girl in the distance. Sparing a nasty glower toward any who would dare get in his way, he finally pushes forward to stand near her, gaze spared for a second on what was considered to be a daemon.
Just what in Empyrean’s name was that thing…?
Lara’s gaze was solely focused on the demon when she arrived at the commotion. A black skeletal creature with fiery horns curling over it’s skull. A long skeletal tail and four arms, each holding a different type of sword. For her, the strangest part was the fact that the demon looked smaller than she remembered; about half the size. But as she took a moment to feel the mana around her, she realized the energy was more dense in this land.
“No wonder it’s been weakened...” She muttered to herself, weapon still held at the ready.
Even weakened, however, it was giving trouble to the few armored people who had engaged with it. It wasn’t good enough. This was a demon from her world, and she could hear them. They called it by the same name, but she felt the inflection was different somehow.
Just as Eizen arrived at her side, the demon’s gaze turned towards them, it’s burning red eyes focused on Lara alone. She reached back and drew an arrow from her quiver, not even looking away from the creature. It swiped one long blade in an arc, knocking people to the side, ignoring the spells cast at it. There was something different about this one, but what?
A shift on her shoulders told her Carbuncle had poked his head out from beneath her cloak. The bluish-green fox-rabbit sniffed at the air.
“Lara, look at it’s chest.” Lara did that, noticing a swirling orb of black and violet light. A weak point maybe?
“The center of its’ chest is its’ weakness.” She stated clearly, glancing briefly at Eizen, hoping that he saw it too. He probably did, but she wasn’t going to take chances. “As for back there... I can’t just run off and let other people deal with my problems.” This demon had followed her here. She had run from it before, but now that it was threatening other people, she couldn’t run off.
A screech rang through the air, and Lara almost released her grip on her weapons to cover her ears. But she didn’t. That would only cause more trouble, as the demon was now rushing towards her. With little time to focus, she nocked the arrow and drew back, drawing on her mana as she did so. The tip of the arrow began to glow faintly, and Lara took in a breath, and released them both.
The arrow grazed across the edge of the swirling orb, and she cursed inwardly at that. But even tho it wasn’t a direct hit, it effectively caused the demon to freeze. Those eyes locked on her as it tossed one of its’ blades at her, and Lara was forced to jump to the side to avoid it.
