Learning from trial and error

After a week had passed, Shade finally was let to see his new house. The first thing Shade said when he saw it was.

- So it's basically a cabin.

With the new cabin built, the villagers holded a housewarming party. There were so many people though, most of the party was held outside. People were that grateful for what Shade had done.

After the party was over, Shade got to sleep in his new bed. He had some difficulty sleeping even in Mira's palace since he was used to sleeping outside. Now was a time to adjust. And while she wouldn't admit it herself, Mira felt quite lonely now that Shade had left her house.

Now that Shade was appointed as the forest guardian, he decided to make a circle of runes surrounding the whole village. But that would take some time, so he took his time to make sure it was as good as he could possibly make it without disturbing nature.

And in the village, Yui asked Aisha to teach her common so that she could talk to Shade normally. Normally Aisha wouldn't put aside his rare free time, but this time she saw that in the future, Yui could become someone like her and lessen her workload. Aisha had long heard that Yui was a smart child with a bright future. Aisha then proceeded to teach Yui not only to speak and write common, but also to do some logistics, mathematics and people management.

As for the other two, Yun wanted to help his dad run a business, meaning that he would become a smith. Kai wanted to become a soldier, even though he had to help his dad with his restaurant. But even though Kai had his hands busy helping his dad, when he wasn't hanging out with Yui and Yun, he was training with soldiers in the barracks. This reached his dad's ears at some point and he let his son have more freetime because of it.

Shade had spent a week making the barrier and he was only halfway through. The materials that he had to get weren't easy to find thanks to the foreign environment. It did help however when he read books that would tell more about the fauna of the valley. The way he managed to read foreign script was because he took his shaman teacher's glasses that could translate foreign script to something he could understand.

It took some trial and error to come up with a rune that could be made from the materials that he had. He had to ask Mira to come and translate for him when he went to talk to a merchant. He would have asked Aisha, but he had a feeling she would pull something if he asked.

During his house arrest a week back, he made a rune that repelled insects and bugs in a short radius. He made some cold selling these runes to the people of the village who wanted their nights free of insects and bugs. This was the reason he could spend some money to gather ingredients.

Another thing that he had made was a stamina potion. People in the mines loved it and so did the guards and hunters.

Today the kids came to play in Shade's camp. In the end they decided to fish and Shade joined them. Until one moment Shade felt the barrier near his camp activate and he felt something coming with a bad aura. He managed to take a look with one of his runes he had in hand to see what it was and it was what he had feared. A green collar bear who had the aura of a man eater. Green collar bear is double the size of a normal bear who has green fur around its neck, hence the name.

Shade then quickly had to think of something, since once the bear reached the camp, it would start to attack the kids. And even though they would escape, the bear would have a clear scent of them so it would pick up the pace and go to the village. And to make matters worse, Shade wasn't confident in his ability to kill the bear by himself. He had only one choice he could make. He had to make the kids run to back to the village and make Amy call for help from the village. In the meantime Shade had to make some time so that the bear wouldn't chase the kids back to the village. This would then danger his life, but it would lessen the casualties.

The problem was how to convey this in time so that the others would understand what he means. He pulls out his limited knowledge of dialon and starts shouting to the kids.

- "Death coming!"

The kids are surprised. Kai then asked.

- "What are you…?"

- "Death coming! Home sanctuary! Like a wind!"

Yui then realizes what Shade was saying and tells the other.

- "We need to run back to the village now! Something dangerous is coming!"

Kai then says half joking while he starts running.

- "Then why didn't he say so!?"

The kids were now running and Shade had caught Amy's attention. Shade shouted while looking at her direction.

- "Death coming! Call Mira! Like a wind!"

Amy understood the gist of it and flew to the palace as fast as she could.

Now that Shade had got the others out, he saw the bear coming from the woods on the other side of the river. The bear notices Shade and starts to swim across the river to get to him.

While arrows would be a good idea to have, Shade had left them back at his house and he didn't have time to get them. The question whether or not the arrows would even pierce the bear's tough fur was also what made Shade hesitant to get to the cabin. He only had a couple of runes that could be useful as well as a knife used for dissection and another knife for runemaking. He took what little time he had and made a trap rune to the ground the bear was about to cross.

Once the trap rune was hastily made, Shade jumped back and waited for the bear to come. When the bear got to the shore, it started to run towards Shade as fast as it could. It stepped on the trap rune and suddenly a bunch of vines came from the ground entangling the bear to that spot. For a moment Shade thought that the vines could hold the bear for some time so he tried to stab the bear with his runemaking knife which was sharper. However, the bear then quickly got free from the vines and slashed Shade right on the chest.

With a great force, Shade was launched some way back. Miraculously he was still holding his knife and only his guts were in a bit tattered state. Shade quickly healed as much as he could, but he didn't have the time to heal them completely since the bear was charging at him at a great speed.

In the meantime Amy got back to the palace and she informed Mira what little she knew.

- "Shade told me and the kids that death was coming!"

- "What?! He told you that?! Can you be a bit more specific?"

- "He said "Like a wind" so I assumed he needed me to go as fast as possible, so here I am."

- "Thank you. I head to Shade's camp immediately. Aisha, tell the guards on duty to head to Shade's camp as well. As soon as you're done with it, you should come as well."

Aisha responds.

- "As you wish."

Then Aisha starts gathering the guards and Mira takes her katana and charges back to Shade's camp as fast as she can make it.

Back to Shade's situation. He dodged the charging bear just slightly and then tried to run towards a tree. He didn't have the energy to use wind magic to jump on the tree branches so he simply used wind magic to boost his speed however he could. The bear was still hot in his tail and not a single step could be taken lightly.

Once he reached the tree, he jumped with the little energy he had left from a tree's surface on top of the bear. When he was on top of the bear, he stabbed it on the neck as hard as he could and then applied thunderous shock with all the magic he had left. The sound of thunder could be heard from far away. The bear immediately flung Shade from its back and proceeded to run away injured. This was something that Shade considered lucky, since he didn't have any energy to move after all that. Even if the bear would have started killing him now, he wouldn't have had any power to stop it. He couldn't even heal since all his mana was depleted, so he had to sit there with blood oozing from his open stomach.

Little did Shade know, the bear left because of the bloodlust that was emanating from Mira after she got a scent of human blood on her nose. Shortly after Mira got to the camp and saw Shade slowly dying. Mira was in a panic, since she couldn't do anything to stop the bleeding. She was frantic and tried to cover the wound with her hands. She told Shade in a desperate attempt to keep him alive.

- Don't worry. Help will be here soon. Just hold on and don't you dare close your eyes.

Then Shade picked a rune from his pocket and gave it to Mira saying.

- Break it.

Mira does so and then strange small green lights come from the shattered stone and start to gather on Shade. The rune he gave Mira was a healing rune that had to be broken before it could activate. This was something that Shade wouldn't usually do. Usually he would make a rune that takes no effort to break in an emergency or is simply needed to activate using magic. This rune had a magic activation in it, but Shade wasn't sure if Mira could activate it with her magic since he never asked if she had any skill in magic or magical tools.

The wound doesn't completely heal and Shade continues to bleed, but it has greatly slowed down. He then tells Mira.

- A green collar bear came. It had an aura of a man eater… Had to protect the village.

- A bear. Got it. Aisha!

Shortly after Aisha appears from the skies and she says.

- "Five men are on their way here. What do you need?"

- "Heal Shade as best as you can."

- "As you wish."

Then Mira asks Shade.

- Which way did the bear go?

- There.

Shade points north-west and then said.

- Follow the river upwards. Also be on guard. There are two other aura similar to the one I faced further west.

- Got it. "Aisha, tell the others to head north-west-west to get the other two. I'll handle the one going the river upwards."

Aisha says.

- "Understood."

Then Mira leaves and lets Aisha handle Shade. With a rage burning inside her, she hunted her prey as fast as she could. Eventually she found a bear with a dagger on its neck. The bear noticed Mira following it and since it didn't have the strength to run any faster, it decided to take a last stand against Mira. She then mumbles to herself.

- "So you were the one who hurt him. Prepare to die."

The bear stands on upward and tries to intimidate its hunter, but it knows it is for naught, for the bloodlust coming from its hunter is something it is most terrified of.

Then in a flash, Mira gets near the knife that Shade put on the bear, grabs it and slices the bear with it while it was still inside the bear. The knife was now out, the bear was screaming and Mira jumped down to take a look at Shade's knife. Then she says.

- "Good knife. I better ask Shade if he could make me a similar one. Then we would have the same pair. That would be nice"

Then she takes her katana and swiftly slices the rest of the bear's head off. She then sniffs the bear's blood then swings the sword to get the blood out of it.

After that, she ran to get one of the two remaining bears. The last one was dealt with by the guards. Later the bear corpses were taken and later salvaged.

But now what was on Mira's mind was to make sure Shade got better. He was carried to his cabin and he would be resting there for a couple of days. Mira decided to stay in his cabin as well for those couple days. She would perform her duties in that cabin no matter what else was proposed.

When Shade got to know what was going to happen, he then rejected the idea. Saying.

- I will be fine by myself. The wound is now mainly healed and now the only thing I need to worry about is my stamina.

- It is twice now that you made me worry. I haven't even known you for a month and you still worry me to that point. I will make you pay by staying here for a couple of days and that is final. In the first place, we don't know if there are more of those bears coming, so I can't just let you stay here by yourself.

- Then why don't you just call some guard to stay here?

- They aren't fully capable of handling one of those bears by themselves. There would be a need to call multiple guards to stay here and that would cause some issues.

- You don't think you being here isn't causing any issues.

- It does, but it is more manageable. On the topic of capability, we might need to consider training with the guards since you need to be able to handle things by yourself since you are the guardian of the forest.

Shade says in a bit annoyed tone.

- Well sorry that I'm not good in face to face combat. I'm an ambusher by nature and I can't handle face to face combat. When the barrier that will warn us sooner of things in this nature, I can call the guards much sooner to handle it.

- But you still need to be able to guard the forest. You should…

- I tried!

- … What?

- I tried being a guard multiple times in multiple regions. Each time I tried I was told that I don't have any talent in that kind of combat and focus on other stuff. I tried my hardest to blend in with the general populace, but each time I was called a freak and told with no uncertain terms to screw myself. Do you have any idea how hard it has been?

- I… I don't.

- In the first place, isn't the forest guardian's duty to make sure there is peace between the people and the forest? That's my understanding anyways. You probably are still spoonfed to this day, so what do you know?

- … I … I …You…

Shade then realized that he was out of line and then quickly apologized.

- I'm sorry, I got a little worked up there. I don't know how many hardships you have gone through, and neither did you know how many I have. Look, I will build the barrier as soon as I can, I even take some training from your guards. But I don't know what will happen given the language barrier, but I will try my best.

- I… I see.

Then Mira leaves with a defeated look on her face and says as she was closing the door.

- I'm sorry.

Shade is then left by himself. Then he keeps mumbling to himself.

- I screwed up. To take out my frustration on her of all things… gods what's wrong with me.

Couple of days of awkwardness followed and the breaker of that awkwardness was on a dinner table when Aisha asked Shade.

- So how did you know those words in dialon? I thought you didn't know any.

- I didn't, but…

- But?

- My shaman teacher told me that sometimes the spells are more powerful if the person hearing them understands them. This is only relevant on some niche spells and curses.

- And you thought the word "death" would be something you might want?

- I like to have options.

- I see. You know I heard of your little outburst earlier. Didn't expect to hear that kind of thing from you. How very interesting.

- You did huh.

- So now that you have told us about your past, why don't we tell you about ours as well. For me, I was trained from a young age to become a secretary of sorts to a ruler that my family deemed to be worthy of my time. They would have preferred it to be a man since that could have led to marriage, but my family thought that the Kogane family was worthy enough. So low and behold, I was introduced to my lady as her playmate even though I was a bit younger than her. There began our relationship as master and servant.

Mira interrupts.

- I never saw you as a mere servant. I always saw you as a friend.

- Yes yes, quite flattering, but that is still the base of our relationship. Oh, speaking of friends, when my lady was little, she had a habit of biting people she liked.

- Aisha!

- And she wet her bed until the age of twenty.

- Aisha! Now would you be…

Shade then asks.

- Wait, twenty? I'm sorry but how old does one have to be to be an adult in her race.

- About 37.

- 37 huh. And how old is she now? *Sips some tea*

- 371.

- *Spills out tea* *Coughs* Three hundred *Coughs* Seventy one?!

- Oh, by the way, I'm 356.

- I… huh… I really forgot that I'm not in a territory where humans thrive.

- How old are you?

- 25.

- That young?

- We humans barely live to a hundred years.

- Huh, so you will be gone just like that.

- Compared to you two I will.

Mira then says.

- You are almost at the same age as Yui and Yun.

- How… I'm almost afraid to ask, but how old are they?

- 18.

- 18 huh. I thought that they were about ten or so.

- But then they would be a lot smaller.

- I know, just… I need to forget my human standards since I'm in a foreign land.

- It sure looks like you are in shock.

- I am… Two people I thought were my age are over ten times my age. You are now the oldest people I know.

- No we aren't.

- What?

- Iris…

- Don't say it.

- …

Aisha then grins and says.

- 831.

- *Slams hands on the table* God damn it! … *Slams his head on the table* How am I ever going to fulfill my duty as a forest guardian?

- Actually she is 851 but I didn't want to put you down.

- You liar. You knew it didn't make a difference at this point.

- True. But don't go telling us that we are old ladies. None of us are even halfway our lifespans.

- Because of course you aren't. *Raises his head from the table* Anyways…

- Anyways?

- Anyways!

- Anyways, did you know that my lady's parents had their kids at a very old age of 912 and 938.

- How long is a demon's lifespan?

- Well it differs between each type of demon and type of beast folk like myself, but both of our kind of demon and beast folk live about 1200 years.

- Of course. While we were at it, was Mira the only child?

- No, she was fifth. They had seven kids in total.

- Where are they now?

- …

- I see.Sorry I asked.

Mira says.

- It's fine. They all died over 300 years ago.

- So wait, you have been the only one taking care of this land for over 300 years?

Aisha says.

- 323 to be exact.

- What happened.

- I think you should know your place as a foreigner.

I see.

Mira then answers.

- My older siblings and my parents were sent out to war back then. They were forced on a suicide mission. Even with their demon blood, they were no match for a dragon lord.

- They were tasked to take out a dragon lord? Who on earth would ask such a thing?

- We had many enemies and the emperor of Hokori was forced to send out a force against the dragon lord of fire. And with their last breath they managed to fell down the mighty dragon lord of fire. There were no survivors, but there was a last message sent via magic by my older sister, saying that my oldest brother managed to put the finishing blow. Then, after a investigation team went in, they saw from the remains of the dragon lord that it lit aflame all that it was and spilled out its blood that was also flaming. By doing so, it burned down the last survivors. And so the eight was turned to seven.

- That's a tragic tale.

- It was. If only our late dragon lord of fire Fotiá wasn't stricken by maddening curse, then maybe there wouldn't have been so many loses in those times.

- That reminds me of the tragedy of the dragon lord of wind Tuulinenkö. What happened to your younger siblings then?

- One was stricken by illness. The other was assassinated.

Aisha then quickly says.

- By my family.

- What?

- My family saw my lady's younger sibling as bothersome, so they ordered someone to kill him in his sleep.

- If they wanted a marriage or something, shouldn't it be the opposite?

- They saw that since I wasn't interested in being anything more than a servant to the Kogane household that it was better to try and make my younger brother Ailon marry my lady.

- So it was that complicated. Yet you still serve here.

- Yes, thanks to my lady's kind heart.

- But are you sure Mira? Her family killed your…

Mira answers.

- She proved her loyalty by offering to cut her wings. There was no need for that though, since I trusted that she wasn't involved with that household anymore. I trust her like I would trust my other family members, would they be alive.

- My lady.

- Anyways. That was my story. What do you think?

Shade responds.

- You sure got it rough.

- Not as bad as you did. You were driven out by people you trusted and then you were driven out by many other places you wanted to call your home.

- No, I think you got it harder. You had to bear the weight of your territory by yourself all this time.

- I also had Aisha helping me so it wasn't that bad. I think yours were worse.

- And I think yours were worse.

Aisha then interrupts.

- Yes yes. You both think the other had it worse and lets leave it at that. Now then, back to the things in hand. How did you do this exactly Shade? I'm sure I got this rune right, but I sense no magic from it.

- Ah, you see, you didn't write that correctly. There is supposed to be a stroke there as well.

- Oh, I see.

- But why did you two want to learn to make healing runes?

Mira answers.

- Just in case something bad happens.

- Just as my lady said.

Shade says.

- If you say so.

And so was the last day Mira stayed in Shade's house. When she got to bed back at her palace, she started to miss the smell that was in that house. And a tad bit lonely.