"A Little Conversation Before Sleep"

The sun started to slip. It was going to be dark. Dan and Za were camping out. They have brought supplies for two days just like how they planned. However, they didn't expect to lost one of their member.

"She hasn't died yet," said Za. "I can still feel her presence echoing through this place."

"Can you track it? Her presence?" asked Dan while eating his rations.

"In a normal forest, yes. Here, the presence seems to be coming from every direction. Sometimes it feels like her presence is far away. Sometimes it feels like we are close," answered Za.

"Is that so?" Dan's grip was strengthened for a moment almost wrecking his rations. However, he became calm again after eating his rations again.

"We should go back to village tomorrow morning and create a search team," said Za giving his opinion that was different from their plan. Originally, they were going back to the village tomorrow in the afternoon.

"Yeah."

With that, they just sit there and rested for the night.

***

['pi]

Her staff produced a fire. It was there in the air shining and illuminating the dark. She didn't need to concentrate that much since it was low-level magic. Rather than concentrating on her magic, she was instead looking over a man lying down on the ground.

Nadia was worried and cautious. She was worried because he was her lifesaver and his condition was going downhill after conjuring what she thought as self-explosion magic. The cautiousness came because she was afraid of him. She didn't know who he was and he has a mana flow inside him (just like a monster). He might be a monster. Maybe he was a Beastmen? But Nadia didn't know for sure.

'I have to ask him.'

***

The sky is getting dark. Slowly, Raka opened his eyes. His body feels a little numb, but he can still move. He tried to sit but his body isn't able to sit straight. He leaned his back to a tree and surveyed the location. He was still in the forest. There was a bonfire in front of him.

The place was quiet. The only sound he heard was wind, owl, and the crackling sound from the bonfire. He decided to be a bit cautious since he was all alone.

His orcish sword wasn't far from where he had laid. He crawled and grabbed its handle. Then he crawled back to the tree where he sat. He stared at the darkness. The silence still dominated the whole place.

Then, there was a cracking sound as if somebody stepped a tree branch. Then from the darkness, a group of small fire floating around like a will o' wisp and it seemed to approach him. He readied his weapon. He tried to cast his electric shock but he was too tired.

'I thought sleeping recover my mana.'

Then slowly the will o' wisp approaching and then the moonlight illuminated someone surrounded by the fire. It was the girl he saved. Even though Raka didn't know anything about "killing aura", he felt like the girl didn't have any harmful intention. So, he lowered his sword.

"Are you okay?" she asked with a soft voice. She lowered her staff and the will o' wisp gone.

"I'm fine. I was just tired." He sighed.

"Oh, is that so? I want to ask you about many things. But I think it can wait."

"Just ask me. It would be awkward if we didn't talk for the rest of the night. We will talk eventually. Anyway, I also have many questions."

***

Two people were sitting in the dark with only the moon and a bonfire as their light sources. The darkness surrounded them like they were trapped in a cage. Once and twice Nadia tried to check the perimeter but she never strayed too far

Raka told her the story if his life from when he was in a place she didn't know called airport, woke up in the forest, met Mony't then ran away, his pain, his fight against orc, and finally when he found her.

Nadia was silent throughout the story. His story has some element that can be believed easily, but some of them are just … strange.

"So … I will not ask you about anything about being transported from another world. That story is just ridiculous but not impossible," said her. "However, did you just mention a shiny stone? Like this?" She pointed the tip of her staff.

"Yes, the one I throw at the monster. Why?"

"That was a mana stone and no human should ever touch that."

"Come to think of it, you said before that human doesn't have mana flow. Care to explain?"

"It's widely known by everyone that if mana contacted with any being/creature that doesn't have an affinity to it, the mana will eat them from the inside. Human doesn't have any affinity to it.

"And then the stone you picked is a mana stone. A lightning one. Mana stone contained mana it's collecting over the years. Most of them contain natural mana. However, some of them contained some specific element they got from world mana. The one you picked contained lightning mana. Therefore you can use lightning magic."

"But I can also conjure fireball"

"Because fireball is a low-leveled magic just like my barrier. Everyone can create a fireball even someone who has water mana affinity can do it."

"That's weird."

"You are weirder, you shouldn't be able to use magic from the first place."

"Huh, so how about you mages? How did you use magic?"

"We didn't use magic, we manipulate it."

Nadia then proceeded on explaining how mages manipulate mana to create magic. People who have the ability to sense the world's mana were recruited by or sent to the academy. There, they were taught how to sharpen their concentration, redirect the flow, and 'sew' magic with it.

"I specialize in fire magic. You can see it from my mana stone."

"So, basically, human say weird words or spell and a glowing stone to redirect the world's mana to create magic?"

"That's not entirely true," said Nadia. Raka tilted his head in confusion. "Yes, some of us used a spell to conjure magic. As I said before, the point in 'sewing' magic is concentration. That means the concentration is the key ability that every mage should have.

"However, the way people sharpen their concentration is different. Basically, mage was divided into three group. Mage like me is called Spellcaster. We used words to concentrate and conjure magic. Then, there is a Wizard. They utilize images and symbols to concentrate. The last is the Sorcerers. They are powerful mage that doesn't even need words or symbol to conjure magic.

"There are other people who use tools to redirect magic. But they are not called mage."

"That's interesting," said Raka while yawning. "I'm tired so I'm gonna sleep. Goodnight."

"Hey, you can't sleep yet. It was my turn to sleep." She sighed. "I was about to ask you why did you want to blow up yourself."

Then after checking the area and didn't found anything dangerous, she fell asleep.