The Witch Hunt

It was the night when the moon was shining at its brightest light, and the wind was blowing gently amidst the dark sky.

It was peacefully quiet that night, that the only thing you can hear is the gentle sound from an owl who is quietly sitting on a tree, and the calming sound from the cold night breeze surrounding the area.

But then this deafening silence was interrupted by several loud stomps which came from the horses led by many soldiers, as if they are chasing after something...or someone.

The harder the beating these soldiers make on these weary horses, the faster they run after that thing. In front of them is a young witch on her teenage years that is desperately looking for ways right now to flee from these soldiers who is chasing after her.

Well...that's me.

My name's Charm, a 13-year old full-blooded deity or also known as a witch in a mortal's vocabulary. Deities are those rare beings who can wield magic, like me.

And that, my friend, is the very reason why I am being chased by these soldiers at this very moment.

These good for nothing mortals are treating our kind as some sort of a threat to them, thus they have this so-called Witch Hunt system who's sole purpose is to kill every one of our kind.

I was then alarmed by the sound of an arrow which is currently making it's way to me caused by a soldier's bow gun. But don't you ever underestimate me, my friend.

Before that arrow can be able to successfully land on me, I was able to create a magic barrier around me to prevent it from happening.

Well, I admit that it is not that strong type of a barrier for now since I have so much to learn in my young age, but this should be enough to shield myself from their upcoming attacks.

However, these annoying soldiers are still chasing after me and I'm so sick and tired of it. This barrier is draining all of my energy right now and I'm afraid that it will just suddenly disappear any minute from now.

I really want to fight back, but I was strictly forbidden by Gran-gran, who is a mortal but is the one who raised me as her own child ever since I was born, to hurt any mortal with my powers. But what should I do? I can already feel my barrier fading, so therefore I should decide right now what course of action should I take next to survive this situation that I am in right now.

"Don't stop until you catch that witch!" I heard someone shouted, perhaps that was their captain giving them an order.

And I really can't blame them if they are still chasing after me. I heard that the ransom money placed above our heads is extremely high to encourage every person all throughout Gilead to hunt every one of our kind.

As I felt my barrier slowly fading, I suddenly halted and bravely faced these soldiers. The moment I stopped running, they also halted and climbed down from their horses.

If I remember it correctly... a temple of one of our supreme deities, Deity Morrel, has been placed here at the heart of this forest on which we are currently in.

Gran-gran was one of those rare mortals who chose to be a follower of the supreme deities. She was the one to explain to me about the existence of Deity Morrel's temple here before we parted ways and letting me escape from the hands of these soldiers. She told me about a guardian animal that is residing on that temple that she believes will keep me safe from any mortal who wishes to capture me.

"So what will you do now? Are you going to surrender yourself to us ... witch?!" said by the captain who is quite amused by the situation. I just smirked at him.

"You wish!" I confidently said, not letting go of my smirk.

After that short chitchat with the captain, I then raised my silver-carved wand and chanted a level 1 fire spell. Since my experience with magic is just limited, for now I can only do some basic magic spells but this should do it.

"Flamma Imbrem!"

As I chanted that spell, several ball of magical flames soon appeared and surrounded me at this very moment. This separates me from these soldiers who wish to capture me. I noticed that they all took a step backwards as soon as they saw these flames, and their horses made weird cries which made the soldiers forget about my existence for a bit and hushed each of their horses.

This is my chance to escape!

I raised again my wand which caused a tremendous white light to cover my entire body. I'm sure that Deity Morrel's temple is just a few walks away from here so I will just teleport my way there.

I know I should have done this earlier, but then the farther the place where I'll do the teleporting is, the greater is the magic power needed and I can't risk my life to do so. Plus, I am really saving my powers for my successful escapade from these soldiers.

At this moment, I started to plan my escape. I started to chant the ritual for teleportation and a magic circle appeared on the ground.

As its light glowed even more, I can feel a tremendous energy pulling me upwards. as if sucking my entire body into it. This is a sign that my teleportation is nearly complete.

However...

Before I completely disappeared from their sight, I felt something sharp hit beneath my waist... something made of metal.

I just found out what it is the moment I faded amidst these perpetrators and made my way towards my destination in just a blink of an eye.

The moment I arrived on the temple grounds of Deity Morrel's temple, I immediately fell on the ground, face first, while holding on the part where I was hit with an arrow from a soldier's bow gun which I know contains poison.

The poison immediately took effect and made my body shiver in an instant. I noticed my surroundings are also starting to dim out..

After several seconds of fighting to stay conscious, darkness soon started to swallow me.