Saki

  Tama hugged Usaki in her arms and turned to look out of Drestor. After a long moment she said “Manna is here.” As she said it, her tail curled around her and she held Usaki even closer. I could see discomfort and anxiety practically emanating off of the fearsome and powerful ninja.

  I felt anxiety begin to rise in my stomach and I began to wonder if maybe going back to bed would be the right call. I had not heard much of Manna, though from what little details Tama had dropped.

  Manna’s full name was Mantheria and she was some form of green Dragon. She was apparently an ancient enigma that did strange things like sleep next to Tama naked randomly and constantly appeared around her saying as Tama put it ‘strange stuff’. She would never elaborate. Tama mentioned Manna was her friend, but she certainly didn’t act like it.

  “Don’t worry Tama, we can cross that bridge when we come to it, for now we…” As I spoke I turned to walk towards the guild hall, only to see a green haired Elven woman with green eyes, wearing a dark green robe standing there.

  She had a carefree smile on her face, but her eyes screamed anciently. Almost instinctively I took multiple steps backwards into Tama, who caught me.

  “Hello Saki, It’s a pleasure to meet you. I am sure Tama has mentioned me?” She said in a casual, almost playful tone. I felt a wave of power wash over me and my dread grew. I knew logically what this was. Dragons fear, and I doubted Manna was doing it on purpose. The fact I could still stand at all meant she was suppressing it greatly.

  I took a deep breath and stood confidently before stepping forward with a smile I did not feel. “Nice to meet you Manna. Tama has in fact mentioned you. She claims you are quite… er… forward in your ways of doing things.” Despite my fear I refused to be cowed by this creature.

  Her response was for her smile to widen almost unnaturally as her hand was suddenly shaking mine. I hadn’t even seen it move. “Such a classic heroic trait. But that is to be expected of the Hero, or is it Heroine? I suppose titles aren’t really relevant, it's what's inside that counts.”

  It took every ounce of control I had not to pull back or react negatively to that. Instead, I widened my smile slightly and stated “Ah, Hero you say? Sadly, I am just Saki. The title was more so accidental, a mistake.” I said trying to sound genuine.

  I turned to look at Tama, only to see Tama was gone! Had she seriously left me with the dragon?!

  “Oh, don’t worry, Tama is playing hide and seek again. When she was little she would try to hide in so many places. Underwater, inside closets, behind her goblin friends, one time she even set a trap to have a forest troll attack me. She has quite the imagination. But she has never won the game.”

  I turned back in shock, my facade dropping as anger overwhelmed fear. I stabbed a spike at Manna but she didn’t even dodge, my spike shattered on impact and Manna didn’t even blink.

  Fear began to flood me, but rage won out again and I began to summon my void sphere. This time, Manna reacted and tapped me in my chest. Extreme pain consumed me and suddenly everything went dark for a few seconds. When I came too, everything around me was blurry.

  Then Tama appeared and grabbed me for some reason. Suddenly the world jilted into view and Tama was drenching me in water with fear. So much fear in her features. I winced as the pain slowly faded. I saw Tama’s anger as she stood and began screaming at someone.

  As my vision began to clear I saw Manna, she looked upset. She was standing there, arms crossed as Tama screamed at her. I couldn’t tell what she was saying, everything was so quiet, yet so loud.

  I reached my arm up and realized I was bleeding from my ears. I realized what had happened. Manna had tapped me hard enough for me to forcibly be pushed back, so fast that I broke the sound barrier causing my ears to relapse and rupture. That meant the water was Tama healing me.

  I felt a moment of pain as my ears popped, healing themselves with Tama’s mending. I could barely hear the end of Tama’s words “OR MY FRIENDS EVER AGAIN” She was so loud.

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  Manna sighed and shook her head “It was an accident, your friend tried to erase me Tama, keep a closer eye on your pets. Hero or not, I will kill her if she tries that again.” Manna turned after saying that, two massive green wings growing from her back.

  Tama suddenly grabbed me, pulled out Serenity and stabbed her into the ground. A moment later I learned why. A single flap caused a massive wave of air to form and Tama had to hold us in place as Manna took to the air and flew towards the Trelloark.

  I slowly climbed to my feet, the pain was overwhelming even with Tama’s healing. I was pretty sure every single rib was still shattered and I looked down to see my dress wasn’t even scratched.

  That dragon had almost killed me from a tap. I was starting to realize why Tama did not see herself as powerful or worthy. If Manna ever attacked the kingdom… I winced as the edges of my sight began to darken. Tama was next to me and more water was pouring over me in an instant.

  We had apparently gone rather far. I couldn’t even see Drestor in the hilly terrain around us. I could however see the three separate large hills that I had gone through from Manna’s tap. I imagined the visceral impact of my body not just hitting, but going through not one, but three entire hills.

  The mere fact I was alive was astonishing to me. But what scared me more was that Tama couldn’t catch me before that point. It meant Tama genuinely had to go as fast as she could to even catch up.

  I could literally see Tama panting slighting. Tama, who could blink for hours without rest was panting from the exertion.

  I laid there for what felt like only a few minutes when I heard Talia’s voice. “What happened here?” Her voice sounded calm, but I heard barely contained rage in that voice. I don’t think I had ever heard Talia actually enraged. Frustrated? Definitely. Angry? Also yes. Enraged? Not even once.

  I sat up and tried to speak, but Talia held up a hand. “No, you need to heal.” Was all she said as she looked directly at Tama who was looking at the ground. Tama looked genuinely upset at herself. I tried to speak, but realized I couldn’t through the pain and had to stay quiet.

  “Manna visited me, she and Saki talked and Saki used her purple stuff. Then Manna did her poke and Tama had to catch Saki. She.. She almost didn’t make it.” Tama’s voice quavered and I could hear the anxiety and anger in her voice.

  She was resentful she didn’t catch me sooner?! I was happy she had caught me at all. Manna was definitely lying, if I had kept going I would have died. There was a moment of silence, then Talia slowly turned, took a deep breath, and threw her hammer at a nearby hill.

  It erupted and suddenly where the hill once was, there was a flat plain of dirt. She turned back to Tama and asked calmly “And, by Manna, do you mean Mantheria, the legendary ancient dragon that lives north of the Trelloark?

  The one who guards the ancient shrine?” Even as she spoke, her voice rose slightly and her ears twitched angrily. Her wolf tail lashed aggressively, betraying her calm tone.

  “Nya” Tama said quietly, her voice barely above a whisper. Her eyes had not left the ground, even when Talia’s hammer had erased the nearby hill. Her tail was wrapped around her body and her ears were flattened.

  Talia nodded, looked over to the forest, looked back behind her, I am assuming towards Drestor even if I couldn’t see it, and then she sighed and walked over to me. She pulled out a bottle of red liquid, a health potion.

  But it looked much stronger than anything I had ever seen before. She grabbed me by my dress and pulled me forward, the pain was immense. I weakly tried to grab her massive hand but my arms felt weak.

  She forced the potion to my lips and the taste was horrible. After a moment however, I felt my body coming back together much more quickly. I felt my ribs reform in an instant.

  After most of the potion went down she let go and corked the remaining amount in the bottle. I felt much better, and my mind was already swimming with how much that potion must have cost. It was ridiculous to even guess.

  But at the moment I needed to latch onto anything. Tama had been the most powerful person I knew, with maybe Talia being above her. Manna wasn’t just stronger than Tama, she was the strongest being I had ever met.

  I didn’t know how to handle that. There was no plan, no trickery, no scheme that could win against someone who was clearly as intelligent and predatory as that void creature was. For the first time in my life since I was a child.

  My mind drew a blank on how I could even begin. But it also told me something else. Something that I needed to start actually paying attention to and learning about. The void within me.

  Chapter 108: Not your Chosen