White Flower, Black Feather

Something Changed…

The red glow on the Terror Stone faded by the sunset, letting her relax a bit before sleeping. Miriam was still digesting the arm, letting her focus be on using her healing magic to completely repair her arm and wing…

Falling asleep next to Sunny and Tina…

…

Unaware of what started to happen

/////

That night, the one that noticed anything at all…

‘Ah…!’ was Brenna, who woke up in the middle of the night ‘W-what is going on…?’ it wasn't because she was having a nightmare at the time…

-What do you mean?-

‘Something is… different…’ she looked at the darkness around her…

But other than her bad feeling, she had no idea of what made her shiver

-…? I have access to your senses, but I don’t feel anything through them-

‘Ugh… then I hope it’s nothing…’

/////

Ding

‘Yes…?’ Miriam didn’t gave importance to the sound until she finished replanting and watering Tina ‘Status’ the fragments of the hoof were already buried underground

‘What…? Maxed…?’

-It should level up…-

‘Yes, I know. That’s what is confusing me… it should say… ah?!’ she shook her head realizing what the Helper meant ‘You mean after evolving it?!’

-Yes…-

Miriam looked at her left arm and wing, moving and flexing them while the vines climbed the bark of the tree that offered help with holding them

‘No time like the present then. Traits, Evolve Lesser Self Regeneration’ since she had no wounds on her body, she had little reasons to not do it… but as the window closed she realized that the day was still young…

‘Oh… I should have waited until nighttime…?’ three vines agreed with that, while three others believed that evolving it at that moment was a good idea

The last one didn’t wanted to give her opinion, because she was sad that Miriam had to go away

‘Is everyone all right?’ she looked back at Tina hearing their answers and gave them and the tree some of her magic, before looking at the open place behind her… ‘Ugh… I can smell a lot of blood…’

She was certain that the trees, or other creatures, had already dealt with the corpses… and even if she knew that those men were slavers…

‘Ugh…’ she couldn’t help but feel sick from the memories that the place invoked in her…

Miriam looked to the slope, not expecting to see the Singer and aware that she probably didn’t wanted to see her after trying to… still, her chest filled with longing while Imbuing her arms, as she moved to the middle of the area, once more drawing blood from the scars on her right hand…

‘Beautiful plant stored in my blood, let your flowers bloom again…’ she let a small puddle form, before she placed her open palm on top of it ‘Grow…’

Sunny had told her that she only needed to make one of the plants, they could spread quite fast if they wanted regardless of the colors of the flowers. It was good advise, just growing one plant used a third of the total magic in her Magic Core

‘Hello…’ the flower bloomed and opened quickly, waving a greeting to Miriam ‘I like those colors’

The flower had blue, pink, and white in every petal. She liked it a lot

Buzz!

‘Ah?!’ Sunny suddenly appeared and crashed against her horns ‘Sunny?! How?!’ the vines answered her question ‘You can do what…?’

-Expand Sunny’s flight area…-

‘All of you knew this was going to happen…?’ she asked incredulously at Tina, getting a positive answer from them and Sunny ‘Hmm… should I make more like you everywhere-?’

Buzz…

‘Sunny…’ she sounded unhappy ‘I believe in you, ok? You can do it!’

Buzz~

But the cheerful mood that all of them shared, didn’t lasted for long. The trees around Miriam shook…

Buzz?¹What?

Sunny’s confusion made the wings at the back of Miriam’s head to flap slowly, just as her tail was waving, revealing that the mission made her nervous for some reason…

‘You… aren't talking about Singer… right…?’ Sunny and the trees confirmed that she was to the northwest ‘All… right… ugh…’ she moved her hand to her horns and waited until Sunny got on top of it ‘Time to say goodbye… again…’

It was mid morning when she reached that place, because Sunny didn’t wanted to be separated from her. It took a lot of convincing from Miriam’s part, and her saying that she would come back after planting Tina and making another flowering plant on that spot, for Sunny to let her go…

‘The slavers are that way too…’ she couldn’t detect them from that place, but Sunny confirmed that they had appeared from that direction… ‘Ugh… I suppose that this mission is the closest thing I’ll get to a… ugh… I know that they need to be stopped…’

Buzz…?

‘No… I don’t like killing…’ she looked at her hands while Sunny walked on one of them, and used magic to heal the cut that was still there… ‘But I…’

Buzz…

‘Ah…’ the ladybug sounded sorrowful ‘Wait… this message is a confirmations that you can do it’ her words confused Sunny, so she continued ‘Lets turn this into a competition! I’ll come back, but! Can you come to me before that happens…?’

Buzz~!

‘Then I’ll see you soon~’ Miriam moved with Sunny towards Tina ‘I’ll visit all of you too, be nice with each other…’ they coiled briefly around her fingers, before all of them returned to rest against the tree ‘And don’t prank too much people…’ she waggled a finger to a specific vine, making the rest laugh

Her last stop before she left that place, was the new plant

‘Want me to name you…?’ she got a no for an answer ‘All right… then take care, Tina said that they are going to protect all of you, and I believe in them’ the plant wiggled the tricolor flower ‘But… if the humans get too annoying, ask the Lady of The Forest to send me a message… even if she hasn't done that in a while…’

Buzz~

‘Shy…?’ she shook her head, dropping the topic ‘Either her or the trees, get a message to me and I’ll run here to scream and scare the humans…’ the plant wiggled with happiness ‘Yeah… I’m good at that…’

She moved to the edge of the trees while Sunny stayed with the plant… turning to wave at them for a moment…

And she was gone

/////

Earlier, Brenna had just started to eat the fruit-

Ding

‘AH?!!!’ when she heard the sound she had been waiting for a while ‘Gahhhh!!!’ even if she had forgotten about the feeling associated to reaching the Cap ‘Ugh!!!’ causing her to almost choke on the fruit

-Sorry… I can’t warn you about those…-

‘Ugh… it’s… fine… don’t worry about that’ she shook her head ‘Status’

‘Good… those are enough points to buy another Focus. Which one should I buy?’

-Sorry. You can only get the Eyes. Remember that you will need to upgrade the Bones and the Muscles, if you get the Beak. The total for that is 160 EP-

‘Really? EP Shop’

‘One hundred… and forty-five…?’ the Helper confirmed her math for the Focus and the upgrades to the eyes ‘Ugh… I should have waited before buying the upgrades for my body…? Will… will buying the senses three times, be enough to fix my eyes?’

-I don’t believe that upgrading your body to complete the Deed of the discount, was a mistake. And yes, upgrading your eyes 3 times should be enough-

Brenna had done that the day before, not long after Pridebreaker stopped affecting her. She hadn't counted, she just had expected that the last level would get her enough points…

-If you prefer the Beak, you can always wait until after you evolve? If you get an Adjustment, it should give you enough points for both-

‘Perhaps… but the shop is going to get more expensive if I do that…’

-True… well! You have until sunset to think about it-

She hummed trying to think which one of the options was better…

‘Ah?!’ when the tree where she was waiting hid her body while rustling

-What…? Why…?-

‘What’s happening? Another human?!’

None of the trees moved to answer her question… making her feel an unknown dread…

-For some reason… they are hiding you for now to let you evolve. If you want… but they aren't telling me why…-

That feeling wasn't going away, but Brenna couldn’t think of why it was happening… her evolving, was something that everyone wanted

‘Species? Eh?’

There were two other screens showing the Balance and the Physical evolutions of Brenna’s current species, but like the warning mentioned, she hadn't killed enough creatures to unlock those. The Physical one in particular, stated that those kills must be from Melee Combat

-WHAT?!!! HOW?!!!-

But she could only focus on the reaction of her Helper…

-Brenna! There is a Key of Evolution nearby!-

‘Eh…? Ah, the creature that allows someone else to evolve?’

-That’s the only reason there is for the Species section to show this much information!-

‘You call this “Much information…”? I mean… it is more than before, but…’

-You need to take into account that the evolution function, it’s something for creatures, not humans. Getting a mind capable of complaining about this, before reaching the humanoid stage is… something that technically only you and Miriam have done…-

‘But we cheated…?’ she asked, because she felt like the Helper wanted to complain about it

There was a moment of silence that she used to close the screens to avoid an accident, before the next message appeared

-I wouldn't use that word… but that is the easiest way of describing it-

‘Wait… could this be what woke me up?’

-No idea… maybe? I don’t pay constant attention to your evolutions, so I didn’t thought about checking those at night-

‘It’s all right… then… which one?’

-That’s your choice. Reaching the level cap as an Uvply Cidia, will complete the Deed that I mentioned before, while also letting you orient your magic as you want. The Woia Igtuvply is good since it could give a growth boost to Wind, Sound, and Lightning magic (And it's only there because the Key is nearby), but while your Affinities to every magic type wouldn't change, it still will slightly diminishing the growth of the rest-

‘So… Traits…?’

‘Hmm… if I ignore that water is tied with lightning, then those are my strongest… no, my most trained types of magic… I don’t think any of my spells reach the level of work I gave my S. L. S.’

The idea of placing that amount of effort on an offensive spell reached her mind…

-As I said, it’s your choice- but that message made her focus on the task at hand

‘Hmm…Grimoire…’ she quickly saw the list of her spells and reached a conclusion ‘No, I’ll stay as an Uvply. I don’t have fully defensive spells of those types, and if I meet the things that Miriam is hunting, or go to that side, then I’ll be in trouble if I can’t defend against them… I suppose that I’ll get the Focus for my eyes too…’

-Remember that is going to feel awful!-

‘Oh, I remember… ugh…! Don’t worry about that…’

With her choices made, she purchased her Focus, ending with a migraine and blurred vision that made her uneasy, until she got the Upgrades for that sense

Brenna was happy to see her eyes working like normal once she got left with five EP, and evolved immediately afterwards…

Leaving her unable to help Miriam while her body changed…

/////

Miriam moved towards the east staying at a stone throw of the river, and was considered finally testing the modified water sword…

‘Ugh… no, if I do that here, then I’ll go back to tell them how it’s working…’ she was hiding both of her weapons under her wings, using fragile strips of dirt to held them ‘There are a lot of boar tracks in this place’ there were from other creatures too, just in less quantities, including humans and Porkus' ‘Hmm…?’

The most recent tracks of the Destroyer had moved in that direction for a while, but those eventually, and sharply, moved south. What picked Miriam’s attention was a creature hiding under the broad leaves of a plant, once she moved them out of the way she saw a trembling piglet with short spikes along its back…

It was frozen with fear…

‘Kinda cute…’ she picked the piglet with a hand and turned it around, so it was looking away from her… ‘Really…?’ even after she let it go, the creature remained there, trembling ‘Off you go’ so she tapped it softly on the rear, finally making it run away after it gave a small squeal ‘I don’t smell more recent spiky boars around… why-?!’

CLANK!!!

She used her skill to move away, the place where she was standing exploding in a cloud of dust-

CLANK!!!

And she did it again-

CLANK!!! CLANK!!! CLANK!!!

And other three times, before her attacker stopped using [Boundary Break]. He was an enormous dark haired man, wielding an equally huge and wide two-handed sword, his nearly three meters of height were covered mostly by separate plates of armor, that were loosely tied to each other by chains

But he didn’t had an actual chain mail, or any kind of cloth or leather under it, the only clothes he had, were pants under the plates on his legs, and sturdy looking metal boots. This, let her see that he had hundreds of scars on his visible skin, and like the woman she fought he also lacked a helmet

‘WHAT IS WRONG WITH-?!’ she didn’t had time to release her aura

CLANK!!!

Miriam only got a brief respite, before she had to use her skill to move away, once more dodging an impact that caused a cloud of dust from the impacts of the slab of metal he used like a sword

HISS!!!

She didn’t risked lowering her hands to the ground, instead she raised a spike near her and used it to make the blade of her sword

“Tsk…” he only scoffed, before lowering his stance and dash towards her

‘Fu-!!!’ fast enough for her to consider the use of her skill-

CLANK!!!

But managed to hold back from that urge and instead deflected the swing of the weapon with the tip of her own, feeling the impact travel along her body while moving away from him, and dodging a short follow-up swipe…

‘What…?’ confused because her Combat Gauge told her nothing of her opponent…

“Annoying” and his now neutral expression didn’t told her anything either…

That confusion stopped her from releasing her aura, instead she made another spike grow towards her other hand, her anger slowly increasing as she turned the dirt into another sword… anger at being cornered like that…

Miriam had used her skill to dodge between the trees, thankful that none of the strikes of the man had hit a tree, but aware that she didn’t had the space to fight freely… that, plus the idea that he wasn't going to let her move to a clearing…

Meant that she couldn’t use her skill other than to dodge

[Boundary Break] gave her a ridiculous boost to her speed and reflexes, and she confirmed while fighting Porkus that overuse of the skill caused damage to her body, but the small delay that happened between uses…

Was a death sentence against him

If she became the attacker, he just had to wait and counter with his own skill, unlike her that was forced to dodge the massive weapon

‘No… he is getting restricted by the trees too-!’

CLANK!!!

Once more she had to use her skill to avoid a downward stab, and she threw her extra sword at his face, making him pull back his weapon to block it with the flat side of it, shattering back into dirt. Miriam had intended that to happen, but when she tried to reuse the dirt, or move it to his eyes

‘…?!’ she found herself unable to do that-

CLANK!!!

And had to dodge another ground breaking stab…

A tiny bow tensed…

“Tsk…” he took a deep breath, that Miriam used to make spikes on the ground next to him, but like the girl before, he also dispelled her magic with a stomp

‘Is that a Skill…?!’ she reached that conclusion, because she couldn't force that spell on that spot for a couple of seconds before giving up on doing that…

Seconds that he used to exhale-

‘…?!!!’ making his muscles grow, and leaving all the chains on his armor taut

Miriam started to move backwards to the river-

CLANK!!! CLANK!!! CLANK!!! CLANK!!! CLANK!!!

‘AAAHHH!!!’ the speed and strength of the impacts were on a whole new level, compared to what the potion of the woman did. With her, she needed to use [Boundary Break] just to be safe… with him, it was a must. Miriam didn’t needed the reminder that the circumstances of the fight were different: he only wanted to kill her

Making her push against the limits of the skill, leaving her with her brain and body burning from the need to shorten the delay in her skill, still trying to reach the water, while feeling the shockwaves from each and every impact that she was barely avoiding

Her long body was working against her, due to being unable to take a direct hit anywhere, and needing to make sure nothing was going to get hit

The sudden change of speed made the archer dash to follow them…

The blade of her weapon had been destroyed, sending the handle away from her while uselessly trying to redirect one of the stabs, meaning that she entered the river weaponless and with a numb arm-

“DIE!!!” using her skill down to dodge a horizontal slash-

CLANK!!!

Just to see the sword harshly change direction mid-swing, because he used his skill to turn the slash into a stab

The attack caused a burst of water to jump up temporarily blocking his sight, but Titan felt how his sword cut through something hard… after blinking he saw how the water was dyed with blood and sediments

The archer froze in place… seeing how Miriam’s wings twitched and slowly sunk into the river, becoming a spectacle of colors as the air trapped in her feathers was replaced by water, taking longer to turn invisible in comparison to the rest of her body

He smiled even if the effort of using his skills like that, made him cough and a drip of blood ran down his chin

“A shame…” he ignored the colors and just stared at the yellow eyes looking at him under the river “If I had ignored those bastards with that stupid request, he might have extracted the affinity…”

‘Oh… well, ow…’ she couldn't heard him due to the moving water and her pain ‘It makes sense if my eyes aren't invisible: one of the things that I removed from Absorb was Fish Eyes…’ she had to close the screen that appeared as she slowly moved her left hand towards the weapon that fell from her left wing

Miriam, the moment she saw the attack changing mid-swing, had used her magic to condense the water around the impact area, while trying to use the riverbank to help her with blocking the sword. She still got a deep cut on her torso at some distance under her right arm, but it was better than being fully bisected

Her magic also had helped with sending the shockwave up, instead of through her organs

“But it doesn’t matter…” he gave a hollow and sad chuckle “Soon, time… will be meaningless, so, completing this experiment is irrelevant for us… even if I want to be stronger…”

‘The fact that I couldn’t smell you, means that you are like the first man that I killed…’ she tensed her body, preparing for what was about to happen ‘But, why is “Playing dead” working with you…?’

The bow tensed with the anger of its owner, and he looked in that direction the moment he sensed the hostility aimed at him-

“What?!” but Miriam used that distraction to grab his weapon and sink it into the riverbank

Releasing her aura at the same time she made five floating spheres of water-

Titan roared as he used his [Boundary Break] to break his weapon free and jump backwards, he didn’t cut anything with that movement, but was mostly focused on the projectiles he expected from the spheres

So, when four of those suddenly turned into steam-

CLANK!!!

He over reacted and used his Skill to destroy the ice spears that flew at him from the surface of the river

[Boundary Break]

And Miriam made sure to use that delay on her favor, jumping at him while slashing at his chest with her roaring water sword…

For an instant Titan thought that he was going to kill her, even if that water could do some damage to him, he just needed to swing his sword again and the snake would be cut in two-

“…?!!!” but from his left, the exact direction at which his weapon was aiming to, his instincts noticed something being fired at him. Making him twist his sword slightly to block-

Screech!!!

“AAAHHH!!!” Miriam’s sword couldn't cut the plates, but due to the nature of Titan’s skill [Muscle Growth], the chains were made of a weaker metal than the plates, meaning that she managed to cut those, and him, along the unprotected areas, making some of the plates to slip down

Neither of them noticed that the blocked arrow aimed at his eye, was like a long needle

Miriam got distracted by a magic spark on her handle, so she dropped it, using her last sphere to make a sword of ice and pull it to her right hand, but her follow-up slash missed because he used his skill again to jump away from her

“Ugh!” hitting his arm against a tree, barely avoiding dropping his sword “No! You are not killing me like this! I’m not dying to a beast of the false gods! My death will have meaning!!!”

She recognized his accent as someone from Bori, but couldn't dwell on it, because he used the tree to hide from the archer to his left and with a practiced movement he quickly unclasped the armor off his torso, letting it fall…

Revealing that every scar on his body was connected to two things: a circular scar with the size of a fist above his stomach, and to another scar of similar size above it. This last scar was shaped like a ring and inside of it, an opaque white crystal was fused with his skin

Titan grabbed something from a pouch on the back side of his belt and smirked

“Behold! I’m someone that is willing to go beyond death for a cause!!!” she saw a vial while he moved his arm from behind him

‘Blade Launcher!’ upon seeing it, her immediate reaction was to fire her ice sword to interrupt whatever he was trying, while preparing another batch of spheres to make more ice-

But other that move his hand slightly, he let the antitoxin bottle get destroyed. He grinned opening three of his fingers, to reveal that he had another vial hidden on his hand-

Crack

And he broke it against the crystal on his chest. Letting the dark, viscous liquid inside it, taint the crystal

Titan roared like a beast while his muscles grew more, as the now tainted crystal sank inside his chest, making Miriam shiver at the dark hole that appeared, feeling disgust as the smell coming from it. He started laughing as the Grudge bubbled out and started crawling along every scar in his body, quickly rotting him and his gear

“BEHOLD!!!” his voice started to echo while his body trembled… “THIS IS THE POWER…!!! THAT-!!! AAAHHH…?!!!”

Out of fear…

Miriam showed him the glowing scars on her hand while letting the spheres fall back to the river

‘Don't let your Grudges chain you…’ to Titan, her aura started to push him down… ‘It’s time for me to Guide you…!’ to burn him… ‘The End is here!’

[Boundary Break]

She moved right in front of him, stopping his right arm from moving with her left hand, while her tail hit his body behind the knees, and she slammed his half-rotting skull against the ground with her right hand

‘CROSS THE MIST!!!’

/////

If he made sound everything would be for nothing, so he had to bear the pain without making a sound

Grabbing the sword once he was able to move from the pain of his wounds

Then he killed them

The children, mothers, and elders that were in the hidden room

Then he opened the door carefully to not be heard

And he killed them

The few men that pretended to be the last line of defense, were weak

Then he moved to the door that was supposed to be filled with people like him

It was empty…

He had been careful, but couldn't help but wonder if the people he slaughtered had been too noisy, even if sound wasn't supposed to exit or enter those rooms…

He had no time to look for a secret passage, he needed to kill more, so he ran

The short sword on his hand singing on the air as he ran, slowing down when he started to hear the chanting priests

He killed them…

But for some reason the royal family was there too, and started to scream. Still, he needed to kill every priests first

Meaning that sadly, he couldn't attack the royal family immediately. Their screams called some of their knights

So he had to kill them first

He. Killed. Them. All.

“Excellent” only then… He could enter the Grand Temple of Bori. He looked down at him with a smile “You did an excellent job…” and gave his head a pat with a gloved hand “I’ll call you Titan from now on…”

He lifted his face by the chin

“You can call me Grim”

/////

Miriam screamed and pushed back against Titan’s memories. Shattering Grim’s smiling face with the memory of her. Punching. That. Exact. Face. And breaking the jaw of the skull under the illusion

That image made his soul cry in pain

Unleashing every emotion he had sealed under his loyalty, his faith, his trust, and the lies he had told himself…

Miriam’s memory was an irrefutable proof… that shattered him…

Grim was already one of the Undead… or a Doll… he killed thousands… without feeling anything…

And he never knew the truth… he never saw the true face of the man that appeared to him in dreams telling him to kill… the man that took care of him after he killed. Every. Person. Inside. The Temple…

The man that gave him the strength he boasted… to betray everyone…

‘He betrayed you too!’

Miriam took his shock, his grief, his hatred, his despair, his shame, his fear, his pain. And she used it to burn away at the rest of his memories

Destroying the Grudge tying him

Pushing his ethereal shape to a wall made of mist…

‘I’m not here to judge you… I just want to make sure you move forwards…’ she meet his eyes ‘He will suffer… and all his plans will burn to ashes in front of me…’

This wasn't a simple promise… he could feel the boundless weight of her determination in her words. It was the final push needed to destroy the chains

He passed the mist immediately

/////

And Miriam was back on her body on top of the few remaining flames destroying the Grudge

Ding

‘AAAAHHHH!!!!’ in pain and dizzy due to the blood loss, struggling with the new disjointed memories that didn’t got destroyed

She almost missed the fruit that hit her head, but seeing that it was one that granted a mixed recovery, she struggled to swallow it before collapsing on the ground

‘I… used… all… my magic…’ the pain she was feeling was being dulled by her Trait, that knowledge made her fear about how much worse she would be, without that Trait…

“Are you all right?” but hearing that voice filled her with terror…

‘Jess…?!’

Miriam’s body started to shake… she couldn't see the Fae on top of the trees, but that didn’t stopped the centuries of obsession to awaken in her mind…

‘R-run!!!’ feeling disgusted by the idea that blossomed in her mind…

“W-what?! Why?!”

‘M-make Sunny hide you!!! Y-your body’s memories-!!! UGH!!!’ her whole body started to twitch wildly… all her focus was directed to stop her Berserker, unable to do anything else, but grip the ground under her ‘RUN!!!’

HIIISSS!!!

Could she use Absorb…

Miriam struggled to ignore her senses that tried to point to the direction the Fae took…

‘AAAAHHHH!!!!’

To become one with the Fae…?

Battling the memories that she couldn't destroy…

Part of me…

‘NOOOO!!!!’

/////

It took her a long time to finally push that urge down… her hunger took priority over those memories… she couldn't remember a time where she was grateful for her hunger, other than that moment…

‘Status…’

Miriam groaned at the garbled text, but did her best to ignore it and the dread she was feeling, starting to pull her aura back towards herself

‘Ugh… thank you…’ the wound she took still felt tender and the scales in the area had a bad color… ‘I… became too reliant on my regeneration… ow…’

She looked at the gear of the man, but everything, including the blade that tasted her blood, had rusted and decayed by the clash between her magic and the Grudge…

Crack

A slight push, was enough the break anything she touched…

‘I… need food…’

She started to move towards her weapons, the one that made her earth sword was intact, but the water one was broken…

‘Damn…’ one of the chain links traveled with the water to the handle and now was piercing the stone… destroying one of the engravings ‘Right… those machines send the water on one direction… those things don’t reuse it immediately… if at all…’

Even after remembering that, Miriam looked tenderly at the alterations the plants made to the weapon… and was unable to get rid of it. She encased it in a rectangle of dirt and attached it more firmly under her left wing

After that she had to recover the two Terror Stones that fell to the river, which took her a few minutes to accomplish before she started moving away… but after a couple of seconds she hissed and stopped…

‘Don't… go… to… Sunny… she is not… part of me…’

Struggling once more to look away from that direction… and keep moving to the east… fighting the temptation of forcibly getting a humanoid body…

‘Not… like that… not like that…’