1 Shadow Fighter

Yetunde hated fighting, especially one that happens when she was hungry and had just arrived at a village expecting food and not called to save the village chief. It couldn't be helped though, she was a battle Sage after all. She had just arrived at the village when she was told that the village chief had been kidnapped and help as hostage, the villages had already paid but the kidnapper wanted more and now they wanted her to go to where the kidnapper was waiting at the bridge.

"Who are you again?" The voice was full of boredom as if he was tired but Yetunde knew better– no person would choose to stay on a bridge because they were bored, "Why don't you people give up and do as I say? That way nobody has to get hurt or killed and this night will go without blood."

Yetunde had just gotten to the bridge and she was not amused by this man, she clenched her teeth and the urge to draw the blade that hung around her waist was strong. She was hungry after all.

"I am Yetunde, battle sage master from Grisa and my oath to this kingdom bound me to stop you."

The man's face was covered with a large straw hat and the moon could not reveal his face, he straighten away from the safety rail of the bridge he was leaning on. "A master you say? You don't look like a master. You are too...."

"Pretty?" Yetunde scowled, she hated when this happens, when no one took her seriously because she had large blue eyes that were set so so perfectly and a full mouth that she had heard on many occasions was made for kissing or that her dark skin was too delicate for harsh training and that she should instead be a concubine to some loading .

She hated it but she always consoled herself with knocking the smirk and sometimes the head off the people that said such. Only two people took her seriously– Lord Alani, the future Duke of the western Domain of the Kingdom, and Lord master Kalokalo, her mater and mentor.

She and Alani had trained together at the Royal Sage Art Academy.

She shook herself from her thought – Alani would not forgive her if she died here and had not tell him about her journeys as a master battle sage that was traveling through the kingdom.

She smiled sweetly, "Pretty things can be deadly."

He waved her off, his right-hand glittering silver as if he wore a ring, "Where are my cowries? you should know to bring them," he said, replying to the money he had demanded in return for the one he kidnapped.

Yetunde readied herself mentally for what was to come.

"You hold the Chief here hostage and ask for ten thousand cowries? After you already received seven thousand!"

He chuckled, "I don't want to go looking for the money myself in the village you know but I guess I don't have much choice. I have other villages to go to. I've used two days here already."

This village was too far away from the capital to receive the full protection of the Kingdom's force.

It was part of the law that for three months out of every year battle sages were bound to travel to as many villages as they could and did what they could to help. Yetunde herself had just gotten to this village, she had to make sure it ended quickly but first, "Where is the village chief?"

"I tied him and threw him over," he smiled as if he enjoyed doing it and pointed at where he had tied a roap on the railing, the village chief must be at the very end, "I would simply cut the roap if I don't my money."

Yetunde narrowed her eyes then without giving him any warning she attacked, drawing her sword and using air to make herself faster as she slashed at him but when her blade struck, it was the iron railing it met and not flesh. How had he moved so fast? He shouldn't be this fast but on the plus side he had moved away from the other end of the rope that connected the village chief.

The air shifted and she get out of the way just as small blades flew past where she just was, the blades instead met the iron of the railing and made a clanging noise as they connect. The man was somehow fast enough to not only avoid her sword attack but to counter with his attack from behind her!

Yetunde's eyes narrowed as she looked at him now, everything about him was black from his straw hat to his black short cloak to his clothes and shoes. The shadows clung to him, pouring from his face down to his chest and past that till he almost became a man made of shadows.

"You are fast, girl but not quite fast enough. Let's end this, I'm getting irritated." This time his voice held a hint of anger, he raised his right hand and shadows curl around his it until he was holding a ball of shadows on his right hand while the shadows in his left hand formed into a black long knife, a shadow blade that was just like a normal blade but was made entirely of shadows and was just as sharp.

Yetunde understood what he wanted to do the seconds he snapped his right hand and the ball of shadows turned into a whip made of shadows that snapped out and at the same time he sent out his shadow blade in a double offensive move, that was very difficult to counter. She moved her sword in a downward arc that sent the shadow blade flying but left herself open for the shadow whip, the whip warped around her neck and he pulled, hard.

She flew threw the air and towards him like a doll but this doll had pointy sword and she made use of it. She raised her sword and called fire, her sword flared bright yellow, melting away the shadows that were around her neck as if it was never there.

With her momentum already swinging towards the man and her knowing she could not avoid the man's second shadow knife – she simply did not avoid it, instead, she pulled her left shoulder to inwards and shadow blade entered the flesh of her shoulders and with her left shoulder blazing with pain and him still surprised that she would pull that kind of stunt she swung her flaming sword upward taking the man's head clean off.

The man's head hit the bridge with a wet thud and rolled a few times before stopping. She stood there looking at the headless body then took a step back before her eyes caught something that flashed when the lights from her sword passed over it. The man was wearing a ring, after all.

She bent and hissed in pain when her left shoulder flared up in pain. She ignored the pain in favor of removing the ring. The ring was pitch black and cold to the touch, engraved on the head of the ring was a snaring wolf with blue and red eyes.

She knew that crest, it belongs to the infamous criminal organization– Black fangs.

Her body went cold at the realization, the organization was made up of almost master battle sages. The man she had just killed was no master, she knew that now but he might be an apprentice to some master.

What did the black fangs want with a small village? She paused, what did they want money for? Going from village to village. She had to report this to the headquarter.

This can't be good, she thought putting the ring inside the pocket of her trousers for later inspection. She had a wound to heal, she looked at her shoulder, angry red, and bleeding but shadow dagger had melted away.

She was sure the man she just killed was a shadow fighter, an assassin that was part of the Black fangs that used shadow art to assassinate. They are very deadly because of their mastery of shadows, only masters of subtle art like the shadow ones could be sure of winning against them unless one uses their sages.

Shadow was a very difficult element to handle even more so than fire– fire was a powerful and very difficult to call while shadow's power was more subtle and its control slippy but very deadly, much like the men that wield them.

She stood up and her burning shoulder reminded her that she still had something to do. She closed her eyes and thought about the one she wanted to summon, the one that would heal her. one of her sages– a less but powerful in healing sage– when she had the image she simply pulled it towards herself and willed herself to enter Sage state.

A small tattoo of a woman's head with five eyes glowed on her forehead and when she opened her eyes they glowed like small fire had been lit in them. The first thing she felt was the pain in her shoulders flowing away as if it was being called to do so and the second was the sage power moving through her like new breath after a long time breathing stale air. Her shoulder stopped aching and she released her healing sage, with a whispered thanks. As if a dead goddess could hear her.

Now, to save a village chief, a bath and food.