“Now watch this...”
Ran released me, then turned toward a faraway tree and thrust out her staff. The tree was definitely too far for her to hit, but in that instant, the grass floating around suddenly rushed out. Flowing over her outstretched staff, it rushed for the trunk of the targeted tree and...
Whoom! The trunk shook audibly in the wind, the impact causing leaves to rustle and fall.
“It makes the wind help me in lots of good ways!”
“Wait, wait. Hang on a minute here,” I quickly interrupted. I’d heard her chaos words. And I understood the magical principles at play here—which made what I was seeing all the more baffling to me. “Help you in a lot of good ways? That spell... You wreathe yourself in the wind, which you can use to accelerate, attack, or defend, depending on the situation?”
“Yeeeup!”
“Hang on, hang on, hang on...” A single spell for offense, defense, or support, all based on the user’s will in the moment? How was that possible?! Normal spells manifested power to a single simple end, or combined two or three simple ends for a more complex effect.
Take Flare Arrow, for example. You conjure fire, and you send it flying. Simple. And combining types of power and commands—like “create a barrier from wind blowing backward to propel us” and “create lift to repel us from the ground”—gets you magic like my high-speed flight spell, Lei Wing. But how many elements would you have to combine to get a spell that “helps in lots of good ways”? It was unthinkable. Including all those detailed instructions would result in one hell of an incantation, if nothing else, but Ran’s hadn’t even been particularly long. What should’ve been the longest part was replaced with a single phrase...
“Ran! There was a part of your chant that went ‘with the guardianship of the Dragon of Sky, of one with and a piece of the True Dragon.’ Does that mean... your spell borrows the power of Airlord?!”
Airlord Valwin was one of the four Dragon Lords which Flare Dragon Ceifeed had split his power into. The inner lands were cut off from Earthlord, Flarelord, and Airlord, so magic that called upon them was foreign to us. But when I stopped to think about it... it would be perfectly at home here in the outer lands!
“Yah!” Ran responded easily.
As a sorcerer, I was dying to know more! “Ran! Teach me that spell!” I implored her fervently, spurred on by pure curiosity.
“Hmm...” With a stern expression, she replied, “’Kay... but the elf who taught it to me said that affinity mattered a ton when it comes to using it... and when you first try it, it’ll be super blurk no matter what.”
“Blurk?” I parroted, not grokking her meaning.
She nodded. “Yeah. When you cast the spell and think ‘I want to run really fast,’ the wind will start pushing you under your feet.”
“Yeah? Yeah?”
“If your feet can’t keep up and you fall, it’ll smoosh you into the ground.”
“What?!”
“So it’s very blurk!”
“That’s more than just ‘blurk’!”
“Maybe, yah. It was super tough for me at first!”
I had to wonder... was this spell actually, in fact, useless? I had some questions for the elf who’d decided to teach it to space-case Ran too. I would’ve loved to meet them. It was impressive Ran had learned to use the spell so well, but I wasn’t really feeling up to giving it a try myself under the circumstances.
“Well, could you teach me the form of the spell, at least? I suspect it’ll be worse than ‘blurk’ for me if I mess up, so I probably won’t use it, but I’d like to study it.”
“Sure thing. Lessee...”
“Oh, um, not right this instant. Once things have calmed down a little. For now, we should probably head out,” I said, but...
“Ooh! Me, me, me!” Ran raised her hand again.
“Yes, Ran?”
“We still haven’t figured out how our pursuers found us!”
“That’s true, but much as I hate to say it... when you give a question all your brainpower and still can’t come up with an answer, it’s probably time to move on. Getting too bogged down trying to figure things out can be ultimately counterproductive.”
It was possible our pursuers had just stumbled upon us through sheer dumb luck, after all. Most of the men who’d been a party to the conquest of the Dark Lord of the North (lame version) had worn helmets, so it’s possible they could recognize me when I didn’t recognize them. Maybe we’d just passed one of those guys in Lanoma City.
“So, which way do we go?” Ran asked.
I mulled a few things over and answered, “We could head east or west for a while... but I think they’ll find us sooner or later even then, so we might as well go straight north. I’d prefer to avoid any big trouble, but I’m willing to brute force things if it gets us out of this kingdom.”
“Resorting to force as usual, huh?” Gourry said with a sigh.
“Oh, come on. All I’m saying is the world isn’t all about brain or brawn, but the balance between brain and brawn. Isn’t that right?” I said, striding up to Gourry and getting in his face.
“Er... Uh... I mean,” Gourry said, flinching in response.
“Striking that balance is another application of brains. If you think something over and realize that brawn is the way to go, you use brawn.”
“Aha. So brute force is the real big-brain maneuver!”
“No, that’s not quite what I said... Whatever. Let’s move out.”
“Right!” Gourry and Ran responded in hearty agreement.
The sky was blue. The clouds were white. The biscuits were tough.
“Tough.”
“Totally tough.”
“It’s kinda scary.”
Me, Gourry, and Ran sat amid the windswept grassland, crunching down on our ultra-tough biscuits. It had been four days since the attack in Lanoma. And, surprising as it was, we’d yet to see signs of pursuers again.
I’d assumed at first that if we kept following the main road north, they’d catch up to us right away. We’d put up a fight—not hard enough to kill anyone, but enough to set them back. Then the guys whose butts we’d kicked would run home and report in, but even if they formed a new band to come after us, it would take them a while to catch up again. In the meantime, we could press straight northward or take a detour. Rinse and repeat until we reached the border.
That was the plan, but so far, we’d been walking scot-free. It was possible we were still being followed and our pursuers were just waiting for us to let our guard down, though. So, with that in mind, we’d leisurely elected to stay at an inn last night... But even then, nothing.
Thus our journey continued until we reached a small village called Renihorn. The town before it had set a precedent for good grub, but it was a little too early to eat when we got there and we couldn’t afford to sightsee until lunchtime. And so we’d decided to keep going until the next village. We’d accordingly hit Renihorn about noon, but it turned out nowhere in town offered a proper meal. With little other option, we’d bought some rations from a little shack of a shop and were now dining on the flavorless meal in the grasslands outside of the village.
“Lina, try some of this jerky too. It’s tough,” Gourry offered.
“You said it. This stuff may not fill the stomach, but it kinda fills the heart.”
“Nissy Lina, I think that’s heartburn.”
And so, we ate in peace and quiet (or maybe quiet rage) until... Gourry stood up without a sound.
“What’s wrong? Finally had enough of how tough this stuff is?” I asked... and then I heard it. Something was coming closer. It was approaching from the south, and I knew that rumbling sound—it was countless hoofbeats pounding the earth!
“This way!” I shouted, leaping to my feet and making a break for the nearby forest.
“We’re running?!” Gourry asked as he ran beside me.
“We’ll meet them out here!” I said back, then turned to Ran, who was of course running with us too. “Ran, you stay hidden and don’t interfere!”
“Aw, but—”
“I’ve gotten you mixed up in enough! I’m not dragging you into more!”