13 Chapter 13 : Some Well Deserved Answers

"Okay, okay. I met her in the Dead Forest,"

"How? Did you went off the path I pointed for you? As far as I knew, you should not have encountered anything or anyone in that path,"

"Y-yeah, I did. Sorry about that. I heard a scream and wanted to help. Lisa and her sister were attacked by an ogre when I arrived, so I did not regret doing so,"

"An ogre? That explains why you are no longer wearing the shirt I gave you. Which meant you must have been hurt. Then Lisa or Laura healed you, gave you that shirt and Lisa decided to follow you on your journey, and you agreed to let her do as she wished. Am I right?"

"Wow, talk about observant. You are really good at this prediction stuff. We should play charade sometimes... Wait a minute, how did you know that her sister's name is Laura?"

"I know who they are. They are the witch sisters. I have heard and seen first hand the many bad things they did. Not to be rude, but we should send her back to her sister as soon as she returns for her stuff,"

"No! Lisa told me about this. The things you heard about them are lies made up by the villagers to make them look bad. Trust me, they're actually very nice,"

"I had seen they do bad things too, Lyte. They killed animals to cast evil spells and rituals. They are bad news. The fact that you said just now that they could not defend themselves against an ogre was already very weird to me. Witches can easily defeat those sorts of monsters easily. Something does not seem to add up here,"

"All you have seen they did was kill animals, so what? That doesn't make them bad people,"

"Okay then. I am sure killing a fairy is not that bad too, right?"

"T-they killed a fairy before? But maybe it was for a good cause? You are a reapress, Snow. Not a mage. How do you know the spells they casted were bad? Do not accuse them if you don't completely understand something. You should be more mature than that,"

Lyte was getting annoyed that Snow was acting like how he expected the villagers in Big B Village would act from Lisa's descriptions. He could not believe Snow would be so immature and assume the worst after seeing something she could not understand.

Snow on the other hand was getting fed up too at Lyte. It is good to be a positive thinker but at times, these sorts of thoughts would be the death of the thinkers. Snow raised her hand and suddenly, her pendant that was supposed to be her scythe turned into a staff. The silver coloured staff had a sharp end and the top was a carved into the shape of a Chinese dragon situated on a scarlet red cresent moon shaped gemstone fixed into the wood of the staff as if it was one with the staff. The middle had random vine like shapes with small red roses rhinestones trailing from the top part of the staff to the middle. That caught Lyte's attention.

Beginner mages used wands that only allowed them to cast small and simple spells. Wands could easily be carried around but could also break easily as they are made of wood from any common tree. They were practically carved sticks with some accessories and were blessed with a wand spell. Even a mage child could make one at home as long as the required materials and the wand spell was provided to them. However, a mage could only own their own wand and use them when their teacher finally deemed them qualified.

Staffs such as the one that Snow was holding were for elite mages. Only those who had completely mastered all types of magic may own one. Staffs were not easy to bring around but the skilled mages may turn them into smaller items such as what Snow did with her staff. Staffs were almost impossible to break as they were made out of wood from only one specific ancient tree, the tree that grew from the dead body of the most powerful mage to ever exist - Werlock Tree. The reason staffs were so powerful was because they went through a lot to become a staff. A staff would be carved neatly, decorated with magical gems, soaked in healing water for seven days and lastly, a ritual would be held to combine the staff to the owner where the blood and hair of the mage will be absorbed and become part of the wand. This would create an unbreakable bond between the mage and the staff, making the staff as strong as the wielder.

Lyte tried to think of any other possible way Snow could have gotten her hands on such a powerful item. But no matter how he thought, he knew there was no other way. Snow must had been an elite mage, which he thought impossible for someone her age, until he met her of course. Lyte who studied the history of magic knew that elite mages that were less than 79 years old was none since the youngest one was 79 years old which was Sir Werlock. There was a reason why he was the most powerful mage to had ever existed, after all.

Lyte once thought that a staff could easily be bought off the black market but he was taught that it was not possible. The staffs would be buried or burnt with the owner mages as they die - it is possible as staffs become normal wood as the owner die. Even if one is to buy a staff from the black market, the buyer would either be cursed or would not be able to use it at all. Even so, Lyte could not help himself and he wanted to know how Snow got that staff as he still could not believe that Snow was an elite mage, although he clearly saw her summoned the wand out of a pendant.

"H-how? You are younger than me. It took me 12 whole years to master one genre of spells and be qualified to own my own wand,"

"I do not have a lot of friends growing up, so I had all the time in the world to pick up a few skills, magic being one of them. I had a tutor who gave me access to a library full of all the possible existing spell books in the universe. It was almost endless, so I had to spend day and night reading through and practicing all of them, occasionally taking 2 hours breaks daily and sometimes 3 hours. It took me 7 years which was when I turned 13 to master all of it. It was a tiring but rewarding process,"

"What? How is that possible? Okay, I have a lot of questions right now,"

"I understand, but can we talk about Lisa first. Before she returns,"

"Okay, but you owe me an explanation after this. Wait a moment, what were we talking about that brought to this?"

"You were accusing me of blindly stating the spells and rituals Lisa and Laura did were evil without knowing anything. Now I have proven to you that I know exactly what I am talking about. She is no good, Lyte. I am not one to made the calls here, but I think the best will be to send her back to her sister,"

"But maybe they did those evil for a good cause? You know, the be a bad guy for the good reason thing,"

"I really do not see how cursing a child to suffer from an incurable disease to death because he accidentally spilled some coffee on Laura's dress or summoning a drought to make growing crops impossible to starve the villagers were good causes, but like I said, you are the only one that have the rights to make the calls here. Just promise me you will be weary of her, okay? Keep your eyes sharp and be careful when it comes to her,"

"I will, I promise. But just as an additional note, the child may be a Fallen One that could be dangerous to people around them and the coffee may just be a coincidence, you never know. The drought may be because they foreseen something worse will happen if there was no drought, like someone may try to conquer the place if it was in perfect condition, or something like that. We never know,"

"Sure, whatever you say. By the way, let me see the shirt I gave you. It must be bloodied from the fight you had with that ogre,"

With that, Lyte took the bloodied shirt out of his bag and handed it to Snow. By that time, he had already realised what had hurt him in the first place. He was thinking about it while getting dragged here by Snow and he remembered that...