Hello everyone,

So we have finished the reviewed draft of the story. We're going to post it part by part to give everyone a chance to tell us what they think about it. This hasn't been Totally proofreaded yet as this isn't final. It's for your point of view on the story. This is the prologue.

NB: we have decided to make it bi-weekly (Monday, Friday) from here on, so the next release is this Friday!

Image: Courtesy of @Syarrf

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Story

Authors: @DjennyFloro, @Michaias

Prologue

Part II - A New Arrival (Miwa)

As we were scouting around an area to camp for the night, a teleport circle opened up in our midst. A woman appeared and immediately reached to her waist to grab something. I didn’t wait around to find out if it was a weapon or not. I nocked an arrow and let it fly. Everyone drew their weapons at the ready.

The woman flash-stepped away and shouted, “I’m Aurora, Shard of Truth of the Faith of Mystery, regular member of the Sanctuary Guild. Who dares to raise arms against me?” She was displaying a guild badge, which she had fished out of a pouch strapped to her belt. That was our guild’s badge, indeed.

“We are the Saint Guard, if we had raised arms against you, you’d be dead,” Kenten said. “Kayuki told me he’d send you, but you were supposed to wait for us at the Temple of Heavens near Esperia.”

“Seems like he didn’t want to wait,” Miss Aurora-san said with a shrug before turning toward me. “You didn’t have to attack me, you know? You nearly took my head off! If I hadn’t flash-stepped, I’d be dead right now!”

“It was a warning shot,” I said. “If I had wanted to kill you, I would have, flash-step or not.” I slung my soul-bow around my shoulder, but didn’t dematerialize it. I wanted the weapon in her sight so my words would sink in.

“Yeah, sure, uh,” she answered as if she didn’t believe me. I frowned at the lack of fear she was displaying, which was an astounding reaction from someone so young. What the hell was going on in that kid’s head?

After a moment, she did a quick count and said, “There are eight of you here… what? The whole Saint Guard was mobilized?!” her face had a cryptic expression. She seemed both jarred and uneasy.

“Thank you for noticing, but I hope Kayuki sent you with more useful information than that,” Kenten said, clearly annoyed. He sheathed his sword, and everyone else followed suit. He was already turning to scout ahead a bit. I dismissed my soul-weapon

Miss Aurora-san returned her guild badge to the pouch at her waist and threw her backpack on the ground. “So, are you settling for the night, or will we walk through it, Saint Enkha Kenten-sama?”

Kenten did a U-turn and glowered at her as if she had insulted him. It was quite amusing, to be honest, to see someone call him his full title in such circumstances. Most of our guildmates would simply call him Saint Enkha-sama.

“Stop it with the formalities. We’re resting tonight. Tomorrow, we’re hiking through the forest,” he grunted, turning back again. “Same for the others, address them informally.” Miss Aurora-san looked a little lost and simply nodded.

After a moment, everyone else returned to scouting the area. Once we had secured it and Chiki had scared off a wild fox, we were ready to settle in.

“Let’s be discre—” Kenten was about to say, but he didn’t have time to finish. We turned toward the kid again. She was chanting a spell that made a giant pillar of light.

“I call upon the gods of hell and heavens, see the power that I hold in your name, you that send scourge and swords at the heretic, and you who bless and purify the faithful, raise a servant for your messenger!”

“What the hell did I just say?” Kenten said, his jaw left hanging wide open.

A golem appeared, and Miss Aurora-san ordered it to mount her tent and prepare the camp. We practically bored a hole straight through her with our stares, but she ignored us. Next, she used a blast of energy, which I didn’t think was from the God of Mysteries, to open the ground, and she made herself a bath with a water spell. A bath, of all things!

But the surprises didn’t stop there. She said a quick chant and was suddenly clothed in swimwear. It was a one-piece swimsuit with a towel around her hips. She heated the bath with a firebolt and then dived in with an enormous smile on her face. She leaned back in the pool and looked immediately refreshed.

Clapping her hands, she ordered the golem to fetch an evening snack as if he were some manservant. With a few others incantations, a table grew out of the ground, her tent was elevated a bit, and a few other commodities appeared.

“What the hell? She’s not even tired after using all that magic?” grunted Chiki, more verbal than was his wont. “She’s just used the most major spells of the neutral and elemental magic schools.”

“I think I remember hearing she uses magic casually,” said Yoten. “A member of my temple asked me about her once when he heard she’s in our guild.”

“Her notion of camping is quite… uncommon,” stated Ino, looking on with curiosity.

“Isn’t she making herself at home there?” asked Ijil, smirking. “Then let’s accept the invitation.”

After watching her for a moment, stunned, I withdrew along with the guys. It didn’t take long for a debate to break out. Ijil was insisting that it was kind of creepy to just watch her, but it would be okay if we joined in the bath. It was certainly big enough, so he figured she must have been indirectly proposing for us to bathe, too.

“The heck’s she thinking?” asked Tenshi. “Is she an airhead or out of her mind?”

Kenten only shook his head in dismay, but mere minutes later, that didn’t stop him from stripping down to his shorts like the rest of us. Chiki was the first one in, and Miss Aurora-san did a quick double-take when the rest of the Saint Guard slipped into the bath. Wait, she really invited us, right?

“Make yourselves at home,” she said sarcastically.

Ah, seemed we were mistaken… but it was too late at that point.

“I think you know who we are,” Fuin said. “But Master Kayuki recruited you quite secretively, so we don’t know much about you except that you’re going to help on this mission. How long have you been in the guild?”

“Something like two years,” Miss Aurora-san said with an air of reflection.

“We usually work in teams,” Kenten said. “Miwa is with Chiki; Fuin and I are paired together. Ijil is paired with Ino, and Tenshi with Yoten.”

Kenten paused for a moment as she began to scrub her arms while looking around the circle. “I’m assigning you to Miwa’s group,” he suddenly announced. Her eyes snapped back to me for a moment. Chiki gave her a slight wave and the hint of a smile.

I could already feel Ijil’s annoyance at Kenten’s decision. Judging by the look on his face, he would have definitely loved to help her scrub herself some more, too. But she didn’t seem to notice Ijil so much. For my part, it was was the first time I had felt so willing to be noticed in a long while.

“Saint Enkha…” A scowl reminded her that he had ordered her to be less formal. She paused, as if debating how to address him. “Enkha-sama,” she tried. This time he looked sideways at her, but said that would do. “Master Kayuki said you would tell me what the mission was about?”

She moved to the pool’s edge and scrubbed her legs. My eyes were magnetized to the sponge she had teleported out of her bag, and even if he would never admit, Kenten must have been staring, too, because it took him time to answer.

“We’re going to investigate Esperia. The town is suspected of being a nest of heretics,” he summarized, taking a deep breath, and leaning back. Ijil was about to get up and reach to Miss Aurora-san’s side, but ice formed on the water’s surface, and he was forced to sit back down.

I thought, That girl’s head is definitely weird. What is she trying to achieve? But then I realized it wasn’t her, but Yoten, who froze the water. “Oh, that remind me, haven’t you always been in a group with two guys from the regular division?” asked Yoten.

She raised her head and nodded, then she asked if that was troublesome, or if the other women of the guild had complained. “Genji and Leon are quite popular after all,” she nodded, affecting an air of total disinterest.

“Hum, I wondered if you were used to being in a men’s group,” Yoten clarified. Miss Aurora-san continued washing without much reaction and said that she had never been in a women’s group. He asked if she ever felt awkward being in groups with men, and she shook her head. “Oh, well, they’re just guildmates. It’s not like gender is a big deal between guildmates.”

Yoten had nailed it. She probably saw any guildmate as some non-gendered person. But I was gendered, and I didn’t follow that approach, so I was feeling borderline strange at being faced with such indifference to my presence. And at the same time, it felt like a challenge to make myself noticed.

The conversation was fairly light from that point on. Kenten grew quieter as the warm bath relaxed him, which I was glad to see. He’d certainly grown rather tense over the last day or so. I think the lack of action so far had him on edge. We hadn’t expected any real trouble on the journey, but absolute peace and quiet? That was unnerving for any soldier.

Slowly, we exited the bath, one by one. Ijil was the first to give up, and he seemed to be the most upset about leaving. Yoten followed shortly after. Chiki hung out next to me for a long while, although he eventually sulked away, too. Kenten, despite being the most reluctant to join in the first place, was the last one to depart, besides me.

Finally, it was just Miss Aurora-san and me remaining in the bath. The water was still warm, and I was impressed by her magical prowess. At last, she had to take notice of me. I stretched my arms out wide along the edge of the bath, and although she tried to be discreet about it, I caught her eyes looking at my chest and then straying down the length of my torso. That was enough of an invitation for me.

I moved clockwise around the bath, saying something about my neck hurting from looking left so long. I sidled up to her so she was on my right.

“We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow,” she said, her eyes meeting mine.

“Uh-huh,” I agreed.

“But you seem to have something on your mind?” Her voice tilted upward at the end, making it sound like something between a statement and a question.

I leaned in close, placed a hand on her side, and pressed my lips against hers. She locked a hand around the top of my shorts, kissed me hard, and then just as suddenly pushed me away. I leaned backward, a bit confused.

“It’s getting late, don’t you think?” she asked.

“Well, yeah, but I think that’s a pretty common time for—”

“I’ll be honest,” she interrupted. “I’m dead tired.”

“So it’s not because you’re not interested?” I asked.

She grinned. “I guess you’ll have to wait and see.”

With that, she hopped out of the bath and strutted away. She scooped up her towel and dried off as she walked to her tent. I leaned my head back and let out a deep sigh. Well, after all that dullness before, the day certainly got more interesting.