Chapter 23

Kaori

The group made it back to Satsuhiro's farm a few hours later. Even though she had been healed, Kaori could almost still feel the hits the Nightmare had inflicted upon her. She felt exhausted, her legs almost giving out as she reached the front door. Metsumi was quick to realize they'd arrived. She pulled them in and quickly gave everyone a few cups of cold water.

Keiko and Opah occupied the furniture opposite where Kaori and Ash currently were. Satsuhiro sighed and finally spoke up, just as the moonlight started to come in from the screen door to the back.

"Well, that's done." He declared. "Kaori," he addressed her. The blonde looked up. "Kaori, take a moment to rest up. I want to tell you something."

"Uh, okay," Kaori replied.

She was a bag of mixed emotions at the moment. While one one hand a part of her was still crumbling because of what she'd done, on the other hand, gaining Ash's trust, watching her fight purely on her behalf, she couldn't deny that it had brought some happiness to her.

"Ah!" Metsumi spoke up. "Went well huh? Are your parents alright?" She asked. Kaori didn't answer. Instead, the Savior took off her boots and curled her knees up to her chest on the couch. "Huh?"

"Ah, honey," Satsuhiro placed a hand on her shoulder. He gestured for them to walk a short distance away. Kaori didn't need to hear the conversation to understand he was letting her know what had happened. To what extent, she couldn't tell, but Metsumi looked at her and then looked back at Satsuhiro, nodding.

She walked over to Kaori and placed a hand on her knee.

"So, uh, Satsu didn't say much, but since you're apparently feeling a bit down, how about I make you a nice pie! Made with tons of love! How's that sound?"

She highly doubted that could lift her spirits, but she found herself nodding, receiving a smile from Metsumi in return as the woman jogged over to the kitchen. Keiko was next to walk up.

"Kaori," the Zayama started, "are you alright?"

Define "alright". Kaori thought.

"Yeah." She told Keiko. "I'm good."

She noticed Ash giving her a strange look, but she didn't ask about it. If Keiko and Metsumi didn't need to know all of the details surrounding the events that had unfolded, she didn't want to let them know.

She didn't want to risk them changing their opinion of her.

---

Once the night fully set in, Kaori, Ash, Keiko, and Satsuhiro's family were sitting in the living room, eating slices of the pie Metsumi had made. Kaori barely had an appetite. Satsuhiro was the fastest to finish, and Kaori noticed he was waiting for her to finish her own dinner before he finally stood up and said:

"Kaori, come here for a second?" He asked.

"Mhm." Kaori softly replied. She followed the older Savior out into the fields where Satsuhiro put his hands on his hips and stared out into the landscape. Kaori stood next to him and did the same. "What's up?" She asked.

The older Savior didn't say anything for a moment. With his eyes fixed on the horizon, he stoically told her:

"... If you want to quit, it's fine."

"What?" Kaori asked.

Satsuhiro, a determined expression aimed at the world beyond the farm, nodded.

"Saviors like us are incredibly valuable. Everything I've done for you and Ash has been because of that truth. However," he continued, "if you want to resign, I'd accept that outcome."

"What? But..." Kaori looked down at her own hands.

"You don't have to decide anything right now," Satsuhiro told her. "But I'm trying to let you know. This world is cruel, and if you stay on this path, you will see a lot of terrible things. You'll definitely have moments of success too, but heartbreak is pretty common in our line of work and... I'm not sure you can handle it. It's not too late to turn back. Ash is here right now because she needs the money, I doubt you do though, right?" He asked. Bringing up the half-demon made Kaori feel something strange. "If you decide to quit, you can just keep living here as a guest. Once all of this blows over and the citizen's anger fades away, you could go back to Jade and live the rest of your life out like a normal person. No one would judge you for that." Satsuhiro told her. "As I said, you don't have to decide anything right now, but I just want you to think about it."

Kaori looked at him, feeling that she'd come to understand a side of him that took some time for her to see. In truth, she felt like he may have actually been a kind person. Then again, she'd judged Varcon to be the same. She didn't trust her own judgment anymore.

"I don't know," Kaori replied. "It's hard to think about anything right now, like, deeply. It's... It's weird."

"Understood," Satsuhiro responded. "Let me know if you come to any conclusions."

"Okay."

Satsuhiro went back into the farm, but Kaori didn't.

Instead, she remained outside, taking a moment to sit down and gaze at the twin moons above. Satsuhiro's words circled her mind. Maybe... Varcon's face appeared in her thoughts. She shuddered. Maybe I'm just not cut out to be...

"Kaori?" Her eyes opened. She turned and found Keiko standing there.

"Mhm. I'm here." She told her and the Zayama girl took a few steps closer. "Over here." She said, and Keiko sat down next to her. Kaori took a deep breath, trying to regain her composure as Keiko crossed her legs, maintaining a straight posture as she spoke to her.

"Uhm, so things went well?"

"Mhm."

"Ah, you will be staying with us then?"

"Oh, uh, I'm not sure." Kaori scratched behind her head.

"Huh? Why?" Keiko asked.

"I... I'm just thinking about things." Kaori replied. "I don't know what I want to do right now. You know, maybe I'd like to train alone, I mean."

"Oh." Kaori could feel Keiko's disappointment. "I see."

"I mean, it's not that I have a problem with you or Ash or everyone else, you're all really cool, it's just... Yeah."

She had no intentions of telling Keiko what happened, even if she understood that at some point she'd find out naturally.

"... I hope you do," Keiko told her. Kaori turned to look at the blindfolded woman. "Stay with us, I mean. We haven't known each other for too long, but you seem like a wonderful person. I'd love to get to know you better."

She couldn't help but chuckle sadly at that.

"Thank you," Kaori replied softly.

---

Ash

The next day, the hybrid stood in the fields behind the house with Satsuhiro. He had set a simple goal, to be done with her attunements by today. And, so far, they were making decent progress.

"FUCK!" Ash fell to the floor as a basic Dark spell hit her in the stomach. Satsuhiro quickly began healing her and they were set to repeat this process for as long as Satsuhiro deemed it safe to do so.

Last night, Ash had finally found some time to allocate the attribute points she'd gained from the fight with the Nightmare. She gained so much EXP that she leveled up three times. When it came time to make her choice, she ended up deciding to go with her Intelligence attribute and her Constitution since she was determined to get her other physical attributes to 10 on her own, and Wisdom seemed somewhat easy to increase.

Her stats looked like this by the time she was done:

Level 6

EXP: 15/65

MP: 60/60

Strength: 7

Dexterity: 7

Constitution: 8

Intelligence: 4

Wisdom: 6

Luck: 100

Ash heard a sigh behind her and she looked back to find Kaori looking down at her own hands. Ash quickly tore her eyes away from her. Her lust had become a problem again, thanks to the fight against the Nightmare.

Even as she took Dark spells to the chest, it was hard not to imagine pinning Kaori to a wall and training her Hand Proficiency. She was almost breathing heavily at the mere thought.

However, as she'd come to understand it more, she guessed that as long as she focused on other things, kept her mind occupied, that troublesome part of her life hopefully wouldn't come into play. So, she looked at Satsuhiro and told him to cast another spell, ready to keep the process going.

"Hey!" Metsumi called out and the group collectively turned around. "Talo's here!"

Seriously? So soon? Ash thought as she and her mentor turned to walk inside. Kaori stayed out. Talo was sitting at the living room table, enjoying a glass of tea as Ash and Satsuhiro sat opposite them.

"We must say, coming to and from this location is beginning to make it feel fairly homely." Talo chuckled.

"Well, what is it?" Satsuhiro asked, crossing his arms.

"Straight to business as usual. Will you ever change?" Talo sighed light-heartedly. "Very well then. We simply came to inform you of a few important things. Mainly concerning your training and the missions, which of course, previously Varcon would give to you, but now... He is less than capable of doing so."

"Why don't you just send a courier or something?" Satsuhiro asked.

"Simple. We enjoy traveling quite a bit." Talo laughed as Ash wondered if that was actually why they came personally. "As we were saying, here is what you need to know." They placed a paper on the table and slid it over to Ash. "That contains the locations of all active and retired Saviors. Once your training with Satsuhiro finishes, you can use that to find your next mentor. We've already sent them each some letters specifying that you may or may not go to them for training soon. Now, about the missions which, again, a certain person would have provided, we will be sending you missions ourselves."

"What can she expect?" Satsuhiro asked.

"We will not send you anything too arduous, of course. Generally, they will be simple locate-and-eliminate type tasks. Like with the Nightmare mission from before. As you go to each of the Saviors, they will notify us of your location, and so, our letters will reach you."

"They don't mind the whole, you know, dead leader of the church thing?" Ash asked. She saw Keiko tilt her head out of the corner of her eye.

"Some do, some don't," Talo answered. "They have been informed of the real sequence of events, though some of them are skeptical, for the most part, they are going to be cooperative."

Ash nodded slowly.

"Thank you for the tea!" Talo exclaimed to Metsumi who was standing nearby, a proud grin on her face.

"So, is that it?" Satsuhiro asked.

"Yes!" Talo stood up. "We had hoped you would like to conversate a little more, though we suppose that may have been highly optimistic of us. We will not bother you any longer then."

As they stood up, Ash looked back to where Kaori was still sitting outside.

The other Savior hadn't changed since they got back. She was, understandably of course, still in that same mental space. Ash wondered if there was anything that could be done for her. But, the issue was what?

Then, something came to her mind.

"Hey, Talo, can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

Well, it's better than nothing. It probably won't get her back to how she was before, but I think it might help.

She explained to them what she had in mind.

"It's just a favor, but if you could do this, I'm sure it would help us focus more too." Ash tried to reason with them.

"Hm... What you are saying does make sense..." Talo looked over at Kaori. "We will see what we can do."

"Thanks."

---

Later, Ash was close to finishing her attunements. She celebrated the fact that she would be done with this whole process soon while she winced on the ground due to another Dark spell.

"You want to take a break?" Satsuhiro asked.

"Fuck no. The sooner this is done the better." Ash took a few deep breaths and stood back up.

"Alright. Another Dark spell and I'll heal you."

"Okay."

Ash took another one of those painful spheres to the chest and let out a curse while everyone else, Keiko, Metsumi, Opah, and Kaori all watched behind her. Ash could hear Metsumi cheering her on while she stood up. Satsuhiro was already there, healing her.

And that was it, as far as her Light was concerned.

Light: 100% Attunement

"Well, Light's done," Ash told her teacher.

"Good. We'll finish attuning your Dark in a bit, we've got to let your body rest up."

"So, now what?"

"Well, it's time for you to cast your first spell," Satsuhiro announced. "Ready?"

"Sure."

"Alright. The way this works is simple. In order to cast a spell, you need to recite the spell's incantation, channel your mana and let it loose unto the world."

"But you barely use incantations," Ash told him. "What's up with that?"

"Once you've mastered a spell, you don't need to recite the words anymore. Additionally, you can pass your knowledge of a spell to someone else instantly, though they won't have it mastered when they receive it."

"Wow." Ash blinked. "So, what, you can teach me a hundred spells right now?"

"I'm not a Light mage. It's not my specialty. I only have a few mastered spells in that realm."

"What about Dark?"

"Same." He replied. "Enough to get you started, but not enough to dissuade you from ever needing to learn on your own. See, something to note is that every spell is likely to have a better version of itself somewhere out in the world. So, for instance, the healing spell you know. Let's say you use it 50 times and then you find a spellbook that contains a better one somewhere out in Nova. You ditch the worse one and you keep the new spell. Then, you find a better version of that one and so on so forth. See? A lot of the time, you never even get the chance to fully master spells because you're always finding new, better versions. Unless, of course, you make a point of mastering it."

"Gotcha."

"Alright, here goes the healing spell."

Satsuhiro's magical tendrils manifested from his hands and passed to Ash. She felt knowledge entering her mind, suddenly, she knew how to perform a Light spell.

"It's the most basic one. Slow Radiance." Satsuhiro explained. "Heals you up very slowly, but even the most basic Light spell can save your life. The incantation is, 'guard my soul against the dark's reach'. Try it. Search for your mana, guide it out and recite the words."

Ash nodded, breathing in. She briefly looked back at Kaori and the others. Here goes nothing.

"Guard my soul against the dark's reach."

She felt power stirring within her. A power she instinctively understood she could control. She held it, then willed it to move to her hands, all the while trying to keep her surprise restrained. When it reached her hands, a light grey glow came from her hands.

"Congratulations, you cast a spell," Satsuhiro told her. Ash looked up. She could see the hint of a smile on his face.

Holy shit. She chuckled. Took long enough.

"Check your mana," Satsuhiro instructed.

"Right." Ash nodded and glanced at her status.

Level 6

MP: 50/60

"Costs 10 mana to cast that spell," Satsuhiro said. "Whenever you're out on a mission, use your spells sparingly. You don't want to get caught by anything without having the mana to heal yourself."

Then, a pair of strong arms wrapped themselves around Ash and embraced her.

"Progress!" Metsumi yelled into her ears. "Good job!"

"Thanks..." Ash took a deep breath. Small victory, but, hey, I'll take it.

A small part of her genuinely felt proud. Of course, it had been a matter of time before the attunements were done, but it did require some persistence.

"Let's finish up your Dark, you'll cast a spell and we can stop the magic training there for today."

"Alright."

They did exactly that. A few painful moments later, her Dark attunement was at 100%. Satsuhiro nodded to himself before sighing and telling her:

"Listen," he started, "Dark is... a strange category. It's the only form of magic that affects the user's emotions."

"What do you mean?" Ash asked.

"Exactly what I said. Using these spells might make you feel, well, more aggressive, sadder, etc. Most of the time, it's not enough to be noticeable, but sometimes it'll pop up pretty harshly. Just trying to let you know." He put his hands on his hips. "Alright, so. I already taught you the Dark spell you'll be using when you first came here. Remember? The incantation was 'corruption spread, corruption launch', use it on me."

Ash nodded. She breathed in as Metsumi took a step back.

"Corruption spread, corruption launch," she said, allowing her mana to flow to her fingertips and pointing them at Satsuhiro. Instantly, she understood what Satsuhiro meant about her emotions.

A wave of raw anger bubbled underneath her skin, one that simply wasn't there before. It didn't overtake her the same way her Demon Form usually did, but it was there.

But, soon, the spell manifested. A black and violet sphere launched out from her palm and struck Satsuhiro's chest. The older Savior didn't even flinch.

"There you go."

As Ash looked down at her own hands, she wondered if her affinity was just a half-demon thing. Then again, she thought, why do I have an affinity for Light too?

"Let's celebrate!" Metsumi suddenly declared, and Ash sighed.