la finally caught up, her hair a ss of twigs and her face a thundercloud. "Are you two completely insane?! This is not a leisurely stroll! Elder Theron’s hunters could be anywhere!"
Nox, who was currently trying to run backward just to taunt Serian, nearly tripped over a root. "Relax, pointy-ears. We’re just stretching our legs. Gotta be ward up for the boss fight, right?"
"This isn’t a ga!"
"Says you," Serian laughed, easily sidestepping Nox as he stumbled. She used the opportunity to surge ahead, her form a silver-and-gold flash against the dark green of the trees. "Looks like you’re losing, human!"
’Oh, no you don’t.’ Nox’s competitive streak flared up. Serian was just too damn good in this terrain. Fair play was officially off the table.
He stopped for a split second, a wicked grin spreading across his face. He scooped up a handful of wet, sloppy mud from the forest floor.
’Void Forging.’
He didn’t make a weapon. He just poured a tiny bit of his corrupted mana into the mud, hardening it into a solid, perfectly weighted projectile. It was a mud clod of doom.
"Hey, princess!" he yelled. "Think fast!"
He chucked it with all his might. The mud missile flew through the air in a perfect spiral and smacked right into the back of Serian’s knee.
SPLAT.
It wasn’t enough to hurt her, not really, but the surprise and the sudden, solid impact made her stumble. Her graceful stride broke, and she nearly face-planted into a mossy log before catching herself.
That was all the opening he needed.
He blew past her, cackling like a maniac. "Works every ti!"
She straightened up, wiping a sar of mud off her leg. She wasn’t mad. Oh no, she was way past mad. Her eyes lit up with a look of pure, unholy promise. The kind of look that says, ’I’m going to get you back for this, and it’s going to be glorious.’
"Oh, you are so going to pay for that!"
la, who had witnessed the entire, idiotic exchange, just stood there, completely frozen. Her brain was trying to process what it had just seen, and failing spectacularly.
’Did he just... throw mud at her? In the middle of running for our lives? And is she... laughing?’ The sheer, mind-boggling stupidity of it all was too much. She felt a vein in her forehead start to throb. ’I’m going to die here. I am going to be murdered by a legendary dark elf, and it’s going to be because my companions decided to play mud-tag.’
She just put her head in her hands and let out a long, long groan that was one part frustration and ten parts pure despair.
The next few hours were a blur of green and brown, a high-speed, three-person stampede through the most dangerous part of the forest. And it was the most fun Nox had had in... well, ever.
Serian got her revenge for the mud-clod, obviously. About ten minutes later, as Nox was scrambling up a rock face, she whispered a word to the wind. A sudden, targeted gust slamd into him, filling his face with a cloud of dead leaves and pollen.
He spent the next thirty seconds sputtering and trying to see, while she breezed past him with a triumphant laugh.
"Who’s desperate now, human?"
"Allergies are my only weakness!" he yelled back, which only made her laugh harder.
la, anwhile, was experiencing a level of suffering she didn’t know was possible. She was keeping up, but just barely. Her elven stamina was being pushed to its absolute limit, not by the pace, but by the sheer, unadulterated chaos of her companions.
’They’re going to get us killed,’ she thought, panting as she dodged a low branch that Nox had just kicked back in her direction. ’I’m being hunted by the most powerful dark elf in this hemisphere, and my only backup consists of a mud-throwing human lunatic and a princess who thinks this is a damn obstacle course.’
The landscape started to change. The dark, claw-like trees of the Blackwood thinned out, replaced by lighter, greener woods. The air got warr, losing its oppressive chill. They were leaving the elf territories behind.
They finally burst out of the treeline and into the bright, open sunlight of rolling green hills. The forest was behind them. They were safe.
So naturally, they kept running.
The frantic, life-or-death sprint slowed to a steady, ground-eating jog, but the race was still on.
"So," Nox said between breaths, not even looking at Serian as he ran beside her. "I win. I crossed the treeline first."
"You did not!" She shot back, her breathing perfectly even. "You only got ahead because you blinded with that leaf-storm. That’s cheating."
"All’s fair in love and racing, princess. You should know that."
la finally caught up, bending over with her hands on her knees, gasping for air. "Are you... are you two... trying to kill ?" she managed to wheeze out. "We’re out of the woods! We can stop now!"
Nox and Serian just looked at each other, then back at her, and then started jogging in place, like two boxers waiting for the next round.
"Stop? But she hasn’t conceded defeat yet," he said, pointing at Serian.
"I will never concede to a cheater," Serian declared, lifting her chin.
la just stared at them, her expression a perfect blend of exhaustion and disbelief. "I hate you. I hate you both so much." She finally straightened up, taking a deep breath. "Where are we even going? Are we just going to run north until we hit an ocean?"
"we are going to her sanctuary of course."
la looked like she was about to have a full-system ltdown. She stared at Nox, then at Serian, then back at Nox, her expression a perfect mix of exhaustion and ’I’m about to commit murder’.
"Her sanctuary? What sanctuary? Do you two have any kind of plan at all, or are you just running north until you hit a mythical snack bar?"
"It’s a real place," Serian said, finally slowing to a stop. Her breathing was perfectly even, which was just infuriating.
"A real place," la repeated, her voice dripping with the kind of sarcasm that could peel paint. "Great. Fantastic. And where is this ’real place’? Is it hidden behind a waterfall? Guarded by fluffy bunnies with big, pointy teeth?"
Nox couldn’t help it. He snorted out a laugh. "Fluffy bunnies with pointy teeth? That actually sounds kinda cool."
"This is not a joke!" la yelled, pointing a trembling finger at him. "We just ran through the territory of a dark elf who probably skins people for fun, and you two were playing tag and throwing mud at each other!"
"Hey, the mud was a legitimate tactical maneuver," he said, holding up his hands in mock surrender. "It’s called ’psychological warfare’."
"I am going to psychologically war-fare my foot up your—"
"The Sanctuary of the Silver Moon," Serian cut in, her voice calm and clear, cutting right through la’s impending rage-stroke. "That is its na."
la just stared, her face a perfect picture of soone who was about to lose their mind. "Sanctuary of the Silver Moon? Are you kidding ? You made that up on the spot, didn’t you? You just wanted an excuse to keep running."
"It’s a real place," Serian said, her playful mood from the race finally fading away, replaced by sothing more serious.
Nox, who was still trying to catch his breath, chid in. "Yeah, is it near the legendary Vending Machine of Infinite Soda? ’Cause I could really go for a soda."
Serian shot him a look, the kind that said ’not now,’ before turning back to a still-fuming la. "My sisters established it. When we first arrived in this world."
That got la’s attention. She stopped looking like she was about to explode and just looked confused. "Sisters? There are more of you?"
"Yes," Serian said, a shadow of sadness passing over her face. "Two of them. We were all pulled through during the... cataclysm."
’Great, two more of them,’ Nox thought, leaning against a tree. ’I wonder if they’re as annoying as these two.’ He was mostly kidding. Mostly. The real question was, were they strong? ’Are we talking Fena-level strong? Or stronger?’ Now that was an interesting thought.
"They are far more powerful than I am," Serian continued, as if she’d read his mind. "They had the strength and foresight to create a safe haven, a sanctuary for any of our people who might have been stranded here, like . A place to find each other."
la crossed her arms, but her posture had lost so of its angry stiffness. The idea of family, of sisters being separated, was clearly hitting a nerve. "So you got lost."
Serian nodded, her gaze dropping to the ground for a second. "Yes. We were separated when we arrived. I awoke alone, far to the south, with Gorok’s hounds already hunting ." She looked up, her eyes full of a distant focus. "Their voices... they were the only thing that kept going. They told to co north."
"So you’ve got voices in your head telling you where to go," Nox said, pushing himself off the tree. "Sounds perfectly normal to ."
"It’s not voices, it’s a soul-link," She corrected, her tone sharp. "A bond between sisters. Sothing you clearly wouldn’t understand."
"Ouch," he said, putting a hand over his heart in mock pain. "Right in the feels."
la, surprisingly, wasn’t joining in on the teasing. She was looking at Serian with a new expression, sothing that was almost... understanding. She thought of her own sisters, of Liesa and Valeria. The idea of being separated from them, of only hearing their voices from a world away... yeah, that sucked. A lot.
"So," she said, her voice a lot quieter than before. "This sanctuary. Where is it?"
"I do not know the exact location," She admitted. "Only that it lies to the north, nestled in the highest peaks of the mountains that border this land. My sisters said I would know it when I saw it."
Nox let out a groan. "Oh, fantastic. ’You’ll know it when you see it’. That’s not a plan, that’s a fortune cookie. We’re gonna be walking for weeks."
"Then we will walk for weeks," Serian said, her chin held high. Her earlier exhaustion was gone, replaced by a new fire. The thought of her sisters, of being close to them, was a powerful motivator. "I am going to find them."
la looked from the determined princess to the complaining human. She let out a long, long sigh. "Fine," she grumbled, her shoulders slumping a little. "I will escort you. It is my duty."
’I am so going to regret this,’ she thought. ’So, so much.’
"Great! The party’s back together!" Nox said, throwing his arms around both of their shoulders in a move that was so out of character it made them both freeze. "Now, who’s up for so trail mix? ’Cause I’m starving."
’The hell is going on with him?’ la thought, looking at him in shock.
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