Chapter 3: Region Of Roses

As Yuta and Issei say goodbye the to girl, she does not take this lightly, "Didn't I tell you to leave? Get out of here!" Astounded by this reaction, the two boys take off in a hurry toward the gothic and mysterious castle.

"What's her deal?" Issei says

 "I don't know but, I didn't want to ask. It seemed a bit personal." Yuta responds.

They both quiet down as the atmosphere around them is depressing and demotivating. Yuta opens his mouth intending to say something to Issei, but hesitates and looks away.

"You wanna tell me something?" Issei asks Yuta.

Yuta says, "No, I was just looking around." He looks like he's hiding something but, Issei doesn't care to get an answer right now.

Yuta can see an army camp in the area near the castle, "I can hear something, it's like the yell of a soldier."

"Where is it coming from?" Issei asks. He tightens his fist.

Yuta points 30 degrees to the right, "Around the castle but, a bit to the right."

"Well, we should go and fight them! We need a bit of training anyway, how strong could some soldiers be?" Issei says. He soon thinks twice about this comment, for the girl said that even the weakest beings were stronger than her, and she was stronger than Yuta and him combined.

He soon brushes off this fear as, without the proper sleep, he'd become a bit more carefree than usual.

Issei spots two giant arms sticking out of the ground with a boulder chained to their wrists. He points it out to Issei and they run toward it, curious as to what it might look like up close. Besides, it was on the way to the castle.

They both start to remember that this is one of the safest regions in the whole world. To think something can be as dark and uncomforting as this region is astonishing to them.

As they run toward the two giant arms they don't notice anything in the landscape, nothing at all, not even a hill. They realize this is probably going to be a very boring adventure through this region. Boy, they were wrong.

The roses seem to emit a faint smoke, as if spirits are rising from them. Yuta and Issei attempt to ignore it for, it is a bit unsettling.

The barren world around them gives them both a terrified and calm feeling. Like the cold air on a winter night.

They reach the two arms in what felt like days. The midnight black color of the arms seems to look like a void. The chains around the wrists and the bony hands signal distress. Yuta and Issei wonder what the origin of this disturbing piece of art is. They walk toward it and put their hands on each arm. It seems to be made of charcoal. They both expected something more grand when they ran towards it but, nothing happened.

As they walk towards the battle near the castle, they hear a slight crackling sound behind them. They look behind themselves slowly, the charcoal arms have started to shake. The stiff charcoal cracks as the statue bends its arms. The two arms start to push on the ground, revealing the rest of the statue. The charcoal beast comes out of the ground. Its back is hunched, it has stiff movement, and it leaves Yuta and Issei both confused and astounded at what has happened in the last few seconds.

The statue seems to be 50 feet tall. It stomps the ground next to Issei, and he jumps to the left, avoiding the attack.

"What is this thing?" Issei mutters.

Yuta says to Issei, "Try kicking it with whatever you did to the old man! It might be strong enough. It is just charcoal, after all.

Issei nods his head in agreement. He jumps up onto the monster's leg, then jumps up to its arm and does a running jump to its head. He focuses energy into his leg, it glows with a white aura around it. Issei puts his leg behind him, bent. And kicks the monster in its eye with substantial force. The monster is startled by the powerful kick, but it will take more than that to destroy something as powerful as itself.

While the monster is startled, Issei takes the time to tell Yuta about what he calls "tsu", "Yuta, try and focus energy into your fist and punch the monster in its eye. If we do it in sync we might get enough force to knock it down."

Yuta and Issei jump up to the legs, then onto the arms. The monster tries and flails its arms around to get them off. This doesn't have much effect though. 3, 2, 1, go! Issei and Yuta jump off each arm, focus energy into their arm, and punch the monster as hard as they can. The monster shrieks and tries to catch itself with its legs. The monster fails and is knocked down onto its back.

"Issei, let's go before it can get up!" Yuta yells.

"Okay!" Issei yells back.

The two focus energy into their legs and take off. The imbue of the aura gives them a boost in their running. After they are sure the monster won't see them anymore.

As they both sit down to breathe a bit, they realize what has made them so tired. The energy they focus on makes them powerful. But, it greatly tires them and leads to intense fatigue.

"Yuta, we need to figure out how to use this for longer. But until then, try focusing less energy. It will burn less aura and keep us on our feet for longer. If we go all out every time we won't even be able to fight for just 10 minutes." Issei says

Yuta had already fallen asleep. Issei decides to wake Yuta up by flicking him in the forehead. Yuta doesn't even wake up. Issei decides to leave him alone. He remembers when Yuta fell asleep in the woods when they were kids. And how peaceful it was. Issei and Yuta's parents didn't care much for them, they didn't turn a blind eye to them being in the woods for more than 2 days. I bet they don't even care that they've been out for more than a week. The pacing of their journey had been too fast so far, they didn't savor the moments of beauty enough. From now on, Yuta and Issei will slow down their journey. After all, they embarked on this journey to enjoy it, not complete it.

As the sun sets, Issei remembers when Yuta and himself used to watch the sunset each night. He remembers his peaceful life of the cold winter days, and playing around on the frozen lake. He wishes he could go back to those days but, he has more grand things to do. Besides, he couldn't go back if he needed to.

The moon illuminates a neon-white shine through the thick, dark clouds. The atmosphere is dark enough to scare even the bravest warriors. Issei soon falls asleep, his exhaustion from the last week has burnt him out. The journey ahead will be a tough one.

Issei and Yuta are asleep for almost a full day until they wake up. The moonlight is brighter than the sunlight in the region of roses, so it is pretty hard to wake up. On top of that, they were exhausted from their adventure so far. They have so much more to do.

Issei explains, "Yuta when you use tsu, remember to use about 25% of the energy you would normally use while preparing for a heavy attack. While you do a light attack just use 5-10%. If we are tired after 3 hits on a monster and 10 minutes of running, we need to build up to 100%."

"What was that? I didn't hear you." Yuta says. A long pause of silence is broken by, "I was just kidding!" Yuta laughs, "You should've seen the despair on your face!"

Issei groans, "Let's just go toward the camp already."

Yuta and Issei walk along the barren landscape. The region of roses was a very boring place, they were pretty excited to go into the giant castle so they held up.

"Yuta, let's slow our journey down a little bit. If we go too fast we might feel like we wasted the beauty of the world." Issei says.

Yuta mocks him, "Ok, you poet."

Issei's eye twitches and he holds up his fist, "I'm just trying to be more sincere!"

Yuta looks at him with a blank look. Issei looks back. Yuta starts laughing, leaving Issei with an annoyed tone. 

As they approach the army camp ahead, the sky suddenly lightens up. The clouds above them clear and the sun shines onto them. In awe, Yuta and Issei's jaw drops, and their eyes widen. The beautiful shining light of nature has touched them. It could be the most extraordinary thing they have ever seen. Their minds seem to ease every stressful thought in their head, and the laughs of the carefree soldiers at their base suddenly stop.

As the sky once again darkens, so does the world around them. Yuta and Issei keep running toward the army camp. They preserve most of their aura for the battle ahead. Wasting energy in an area like this could be fatal.

Yuta and Issei reach the perimeter of the army camp. They both make sure their steps are silent. They both approach the appropriate angle for an attack. Issei sneaks up behind one of the soldiers. Their coats are a deep and proud red on the inside, while the perimeter is a bright yellow. In the middle of the cape on their back, there is a white symbol indicating the king of the region of roses. Of course, Issei and Yuta wouldn't know that. Well, yet.

Issei kicks the foot of the soldier and the soldier falls to the ground. Issei punches the soldier in the neck imbued with a large amount of tsu. Leaving the soldier unable to make even the tiniest of noise. Issei grabs the katana from the soldier's sheath and signals Yuta to him.

"I don't have another weapon, you might have to go without one," Issei whispers.

Yuta says, "Okay, but I get some extra food when we leave this terribly boring region."

Issei agrees to the deal and jumps into the giant army camp. The captain of the team of soldiers points with his axe to Yuta and Issei, "Get them!" He yells.

Issei grins and jumps above one of the soldiers' head, thinking it would be easy. He grabs the katana from his sheath and slices the confused soldier's head. It was a deep and clean cut, the soldier passes out and bleeds onto the floor.

Yuta imbues his leg with tsu and gets into position to kick the soldier charging at him. The soldier gets in range of Yuta and he kicks in what looks like a flash. The top of the soldier's body is torn off, Yuta's kick was so powerful it could take someone's upper half. The aura on Yuta's leg looks like a faint sparking fire. Yuta opens his eyes only to see his opponent's lower half on top of a horse. On one hand, he is happy to see how much his strength has grown. But on the other hand, he just killed a real human. Though he was certainly not innocent, it hurt his heart to see someone die at his hands.

The army retreats when they process what has happened. Yuta and Issei try to talk about what has happened, but nothing comes out. It seems as if a barrier is between their vocal cords and their mouth.

As Yuta and Issei are walking to the castle, something comes over them. They don't want to go to the castle anymore. They can't be ready yet. They must wait until later, it's for the best.