Catching Up

"Sif, are you sure that you feel fine?"

It was hours that the two young fugitives were traveling in silence, walking deep into the Iryona Forest. During this time, Syndra re-examined what happened back at the village multiple times in her head, especially the last things that Sif had done to Rob's corpse.

At first she didn't think much of her friend's actions. However, that was mostly because she was in shock about what she had just done. She killed a man. She wasn't new to killing or violence, she was an expert hunter and she had beaten pretty badly a lot of people in her life.

However she never thought that she would one day kill a human being. It was different that killing an animal or beating someone that had been rude to her. It felt different. One could say that she was in shock from the moment she realized what she had done to the moment that they finally reached the forest and began their escape. So she couldn't be blamed for not immediately recognize the weirdness of her companion's actions.

It was only way after they left the village, in the tranquillity of the forest, that she started to examine to the thing that happened with more calm. It didn't take long to make her realize that Sif's actions had been pretty extreme.

She had murdered a man, true, but it was in the fury of the moment. She was trying to save her friend that she believed was going to get murdered. Sif, however, was extremely collected and rational when he started to smash Rob's corpse into pieces.

That wasn't sane behaviour. Even if it was just a corpse, who could do something like that? And why?

Maybe he did it to intimidate the people of the village and make them stop from following them No, that was absurd. Just making them know that he bested Rob in combat would have been sufficient.

Not even her grand-father would had taken the chance to follow someone capable of dispatching of Rob in such short span of time. There was no need to destroy its corpse in such a ferocious way.

She really couldn't understand why he did it and she even began to have the suspicion that Sif had really lost his mind.

Observing him now he didn't look completely normal: he moved around in silence, seemingly lost in his own thoughts. From time to time he made some strange gesture in the air in front of him and muttered some strange words.

Maybe he was just speaking with himself out loud, but Syndra could almost swear that he was using nonsensical words. Sounds that she never heard before, that didn't even sound like words.

All this, plus the fact that he just recently recovered from a long period when he was in an almost catatonic state. Where he would never talk and move around slowly like a living puppet, unable to feel pain of any kind, made her fear for the worst.

Was he going to fall into a new type of craziness now? She needed to known.

Not having received any answer to her question, she tried to tap his shoulder. "Ah!" She immediately retracted her hand, fleeing the scorching temperature of her friend's skin.

Prometheus stopped on his tracks, turning around and looking at her with a guilty expression.

"Fuck, I'm sorry... I was testing something"

Syndra looked at her hand and then to the thin young man in front of her in confusion. Did she just get burned touching him?

The one armed youth looked at her hand with apprehension. He made a large gesture with his hand, causing a small red lizard to appear from under his clothes.

"This is the reason why I was in that state during the last year."

Syndra's eyes narrowed looking at the long narrow body of the small crimson creature. A red lizard?

"I don't under... oh"

A memory passed through her mind. She actually recalled something about a creature like that.

"That, a squire was looking for it!"

"Yes, it's the same that the squire was looking for... it bonded with me" Prometheus didn't beat under the bush, giving her an honest reply to the girl.

Seeing that she clearly didn't get what he was saying, he tried to be more careful with his words. " This is no ordinary lizard, it's a Horned Flaming Lizard that has the ability to use fire magic. If someone bond with it, they will also gain such an ability..."

Although it wasn't the whole truth and he had grossly simplified his powers, it was the clearest way that he could make her understand what he was talking about. Talking about how a strange man gave him a magic system in another world would not be that easy to follow for her.

To make his point even more clear, he decided to even show her what he could do now that he had full control over his first totem.

"And now, I can do this..." the young man snapped his fingers and the lizard transformed into a ray of red light, darting towards his hand. A red tattoo appeared on the back of his hand, depicting the crimson reptile. It was an exact replica, that didn't look like a drawing at all. It even seemed to breath.

"And this..." Prometheus moved his hand towards one of the branches that was obstructing his path, touching a particular leaf with his fingers.

Immediate, the point of contact between his fingers and the leaf began to generate smoke. Then, a crisp burning sound started to emanate from the leaf, and it began to transform to ashes that drifted away with the wind.

"I don't know any other tricks for now, but I'm also way more stronger and faster than before..." continued the young man. He truly gave her almost the complete truth about his powers.

The reason why he did so was that he had read and watch so many adventures where the main hero kept secrecy around his powers and only got endless trouble for that. If he trusted a person and he did trust Syndra, why wouldn't he let her know the extend of his powers?

That was just stupid in so many ways. Sure, he wasn't sure that it was the moment to reveal to her that he wasn't her "Sif", but that day would also come eventually.

He truly had no problem revealing that. It was not like he harmed her friend in any way, he was dead when he took his body and continued living as him.

Syndra was blown away. She moved her arm towards Prometheus, pointing at his face with a slender finger.

"You're truly a magician?"

Prometheus felt that something was wrong with her expression. He expected some strange reaction to his revelations, but Syndra was taking all that crazy information very well it.

"Uhm? Well...yes, I guess..."

She stood there in silence for a moment, then she started to jump around laughing with joy. Her eyes shined with an unprecedented amount of excitement as she moved next to Sif.

"HA HA HA, then we can just go to another domain, far from the Feng and join a mercenary group there! Magician don't even have to pay for admission to the Guild and they can create their own company!"

Prometheus smiled at her excitement. If what she said was true, that it wasn't a bad deal if he could make himself pass as a magician.

'Magicians, uh? I remember a couple of stories about them...'

In his precedent life he had heard of regions where cultivation was not the most used method of gaining power and people followed different paths to gain power.

If he was not mistaken, magicians stored their power outside their body, on gems and staffs, and were renowned for their incredible complex incantations. However he didn't know anything more than that, so he wasn't completely sure that trying to make himself pass as one of them was a good idea.

Syndra put her hand on her sides, pointed her head toward North East. "We can leave right now, I know the road to Marraki City, grandpa showed it to me once when we visited Feng City"

Prometheus shook his head. "I don't think it's a wise idea, we should stay here for a while..."

The red haired girl seemed surprised for second, then a sad look appeared on her face. She came closer to her friend, sighed, and put a hand on his shoulder, making sure to not touch any stop that had naked skin.

"Listen Sif, I understand how you feel, I truly do... when... when I was told that the love of my life escaped with a bunch of random mercenaries I felt heartbroken for days..."

Prometheus almost wanted to stop her there. First he really didn't understand what she was getting at, and second: only a few days? Wasn't that too little to grieve for the love of one's life?

Yet, looking at her serious expression he decided to let her finish her little speech without commenting on her sense of commitment. Or better lack of it.

"However, no matter what, now you're a magician! Do not concern yourself with that old hag, I'm sure that you will find a lot of more interesting cougars in the new places we'll go to. You'll get over it... Come on, let's go to Marraki."

Then, almost as she was talking to herself, her eyes started to shine with an invisible flame as she gripped tightly her fists.

"They said that the Knight that rules over that city is the most beautiful lady that was ever born in the Eastern Region! I know it's impossible, but... well, a girl can still dream..."

Prometheus looked a the visibly intoxicated young lady with a confused expression. Old hag? Getting over it?

'Oh, no no no no'

A shrill voice came out of the one armed man throath. "Wait, what??"