Cecily blinked, and it took her a moment to notice the subtle signs of shadow sorcery. The degree of control the unknown woman had with her shadow magic was frightening.
Shaking herself again, she dismissed that worry. Years of training had drilled her well, and with the woman now no longer visible, she quickly scanned her surroundings in search of any other potential threats.
Only after she had confirmed that all Grunloks were running, and the woman had vanished, did she finally turn to Lucy, who still hadn’t answered her question.
She found the young woman staring at the place where the newcomer had vanished a few moments prior, her face as white as ash. Panic was written across her features, her eyes wide and unblinking, even her breathing seemed to have stopped.
“Lucy? Are you okay?” Cecily asked again, getting worried.
She had heard of times where non-combatants went into a state of shock during an attack. So far she hadn’t had to deal with that herself yet, only running escort missions very rarely. And for all the girl's weirdness, Lucy hadn’t ever really seemed all too bothered with whatever was happening, despite the disturbing frequency with which she managed to get into all kinds of trouble.
Now, though?
“Lucy? Do you hear me?” She asked again, voice gentle, reaching out to carefully shake the other woman.
Finally Lucy jerked, blinking rapidly a few times, her entire body starting to shiver. Then she turned her attention to Cecily, eyes still wide. It seemed to take her a moment to remember who Cecily was, before recognition became visible in her eyes.
“M-Miss C-Cecily… W-Who was that?” Her voice was hollow and terrified, a far cry from her usually energetic nature, and Cecily frowned beneath her mask.
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen anyone like her before.”
She tried to recall the features of the woman that had appeared, although in the chaos of the moment she hadn’t paid too much attention, more worried about Lucy’s well being. Not only was she a paying client, for all her strangeness Cecily did like the woman.
It also didn’t help that she couldn’t recall any mention of a powerful shadow sorcerer on the guilds payroll. Even if the name wasn’t widespread, knowing adventurers, she was pretty darn sure she would’ve heard at least some tales about a person this ridiculously powerful and dangerous.
The strange confusion of the unknown woman also didn’t help. Why would someone that powerful and experienced act like that? Even if they were surprised by what they saw, they should not let their guard down like that.
“Don’t you have that weird magic thing that tells you what things are?” She probed, watching Lucy for a moment, before turning to survey her surroundings.
One of the many things that made Lucy so weird was some form of magic she called a ‘System’ of some variety. Cecily had absolutely no idea what exactly it was or how it worked, but apparently it helped Lucy collect information about basically everything, as long as she could see it or knew how to ask properly.
According to Lucy’s explanations, this weird magic of hers drew upon the knowledge of the gods, which is why it basically knew everything. To Cecily it sounded more like some high level Divination Sorcery, but it wasn’t like she had any experience with that either.
And, not to put too fine a point on it, but Lucy wasn’t even a halfway competent spellcaster by any stretch of the imagination. She knew no offensive or defensive spells, and the few utility spells she did know and was able to cast were all to do with day to day life, like a minor cleaning spell, or a spell to help her organise her items. Not exactly the sort of magic that required much in the way of talent, knowledge, or power.
Yet, for all of that, this weird ‘System’ or whatever had never failed to deliver, no matter how many times Cecily had probed Lucy about it.
“Uhm… Y-Yeah…” The woman stammered in reply, still sounding shocked to the core. Her feline ears were practically glued to her head at this point, and if it wasn’t for the situation at hand, Cecily would’ve found the way her tail stood up straight adorable. “That’s the thing… It’s still calculating.”
Finally Cecily looked back at her. Lucy couldn’t see her face through the mask, obviously, but her confusion must’ve come across in other ways, because the Catgirl took a deep breath, trying to center herself, before she continued.
“Normally it just… shows me what I wanna know. When I tried to check who that woman was, I just got a window that told me to wait until the report could be finalised. Something about mana overload?”
It took the adventurer a moment to parse what had just been said. Window, if she recalled the young woman’s explanation about her weird powers, referred to something more akin to a piece of paper than an opening in a building. Why Lucy didn’t just call it paper she didn’t know. Equally, she had little understanding of how this weird magic actually functioned, although given that it was magic, the mention of mana at least made sense.
Her family called it essence, other cultures called it lifeblood, yet others called it something else. Everyone had their own term, but it all described the same thing.
Mana overload probably meant that the divination magic was having a hard time going through whatever defences people set up to shield themselves from being divined in the first place. At least that was her understanding. If she were to take Lucy’s word for it that it was some sort of divine mechanism, she had absolutely no clue what it could imply.
“So you don’t know either?” Cecily asked.
That was… mildly worrying. So far there had been nothing this weird ‘System’ of Lucy’s hadn’t been able to explain, up to and including some rather potent magic items that Cecily had asked the woman to tell her more about. Some explanations Cecily doubted were accurate, such as the summary about some of the ruins they visited a few weeks ago that Lucy had given her. Not that Cecily knew them to be false, but it all sounded wrong.
In addition to that, Lucy’s weird magic could also learn details about void magic. Which was strange, as void magic usually devoured and destroyed any magic it came into contact with. That was why ordinary divination spells usually just fizzled. It was in part why Cecily had such an easy time remaining relatively anonymous. As a Voidcaller, she didn’t enjoy the same benefits most casters did, given that she couldn’t channel the void through her body–hence her family’s ‘Calling’ casting style. But, even then the presence of the void rendered her damn resistant to any form of divination magic trying to learn more about her. Yet Lucy had punched through that with no issues.
And now the thing that had no issues breaking through what was meant to be nigh on unbreakable, was suddenly struggling to give her more about a random person?
Sure, that person was very, very powerful, but Cecily couldn’t shake a strange feeling of danger. And she trusted her gut feeling.
“We might want to leave, then”, she decided, before Lucy could offer much of a reply.
Looking around once again, she glanced back at the woman. “Can you walk?”
“I think so?” She frowned for a moment. “My Stamina is pretty wiped, I’m down to like five percent or so of my total. I’ll need some time to properly regenerate, but if we keep to a more reasonable pace I can go for at least a little longer. My natural recovery should at least keep up with that before I’m suffering any longer lasting debuffs.”
Cecily nodded, then got up, her blade still held in hand. Over the past few months that she had spent travelling with Lucy, she had started to learn to understand the weird ways the woman expressed herself. So, she had at least somewhat of an idea what she meant.
“Our best bet is the city, I think. At least so we can take a break. Then we can figure out where we are and how to get out of the cursed lands.”
Lucy nodded, getting up on shaky legs. She was obviously still rather panicked and terrified, but she was doing her best to keep herself focused. Something Cecily could respect. Lucy may be a member of the guild, and therefore an adventurer on paper, but she was not a combatant. The only thing she had to keep herself safe was a small dagger and Cecily’s escort. But despite this, the young woman seemed almost impossible to shake up.
Taking the lead, Cecily began to walk along the road leading to the ruined city gates. Lucy quickly fell behind her, the two settling on a pace that was only slightly hurried. Both were still tense, and Cecily made sure to keep her senses sharp, in case there was another surprise waiting for them anywhere.
The two barely made it a hundred meters, when Cecily stopped yet again, raising her blade towards the whisper of shadow sorcery she could feel not far in front of them. It was barely enough time to even react, before the shadows coalesced into the form of the same woman they had seen prior. And with it came that same oppressive presence that somehow felt equal parts terrifying and soothing.
The woman immediately raised her hands and took a step back the moment she noticed Cecily raise her blade into a ready position.
“Woah, woah, woah. Calm down, no need to panic. You’re safe. I think. I killed the… whatever those things were.”
Behind Cecily, Lucy went stiff, something the adventurer didn’t need to turn to sense. Despite the stranger’s words, she didn’t lower her weapon, nor did she let her guard down for even a moment.
“Who are you?” She asked simply, her voice court, and with a warning, but carefully non-hostile. If at all possible, she wanted to avoid antagonising the stranger, but that wasn’t the same as letting her guard down.
The newcomer sighed, smiling sheepishly. “That’s… a very complicated question, to be honest. One I’m not quite sure how to answer yet.”
Cecily narrowed her eyes. That was definitely not the reply she had expected. And it made her suspicious. Again, she knew very well that her chances to win in a fight were probably somewhere between zero and nil, which was to say, she would die no matter what she tried. But she also couldn’t just back down, roll over, and expose her throat.
Then she heard a small thud. Allowing herself a short glance behind herself, she found Lucy now kneeling on the ground, her legs finally having surrendered, her expression somehow even more terrified than she had been before.
“G-G-Goddess!”
The adventurer blinked, not quite sure what Lucy was trying to convey. From what she could tell, the Catkin wasn’t exactly the pious type, but perhaps this was enough to make even her start praying for her life.
Then the courier raised her arm, one shaky finger pointing towards the newcomer, before she repeated herself.
“S-She’s a G-G-Goddess!”
The exclamation stopped Cecily cold, quite unsure how to respond. Of course, she knew what the word goddess meant and implied. Beings who had become so powerful that they had ascended to divinity, helping their worshippers in return for a tithe. She had heard of many tales of a local deity shaping the history of a country or whatever, but she had never expected to meet one.
Even now, despite Lucy’s words, she couldn’t quite believe them. The newcomer was powerful, sure, but she also didn’t seem to fit the image that Cecily had of gods and divine beings.
The newcomer in question, though, looked… It was honestly kind of hard to tell. It was certainly a difficult expression, one equal parts surprise and resigned acceptance. Or something along those lines.
“That… isn’t exactly… untrue,” the woman began, voice conflicted. “I guess it was too much to hope for that my identity was lost to the annals of history or whatever.” She sighed, her arms falling to her side in exhaustion. “Suppose that at least answers the question about my identity. Yay?”
The last expression was such a non-sequenter that Cecily didn’t know how to take it. Mainly because it felt like it wasn’t meant for them, but as a comment to herself?
In general, she had no idea how to respond to any of this. She knew she couldn’t outrun this woman, even if the bit about being a goddess was a lie, and she also wasn’t able to win a fight. She wasn’t even sure she could wound her. Perhaps if she drew on her Void Domain, but that in and of itself was a dicey prospect.
The newcomer shook her head. “Well, whatever. I’m not here to hurt you. And you might want to at least join me in the city. It should be safe there. Not sure if the warding enchantments are still in effect after I stepped outside the city limits earlier, but so far I at least haven’t ever seen anything dangerous come close. Kind of why your little escapade stood out to me.”
There was a long moment of silence following those words. Lucy seemed still terrified to the core, her gaze not quite focused. A good sign, in Cecily’s experience, that she was busy going over whatever her strange magic told her. Cecily for her part wasn’t quite sure what to do either.
On the one hand she didn’t want to start a fight, and so far the woman at least seemed mostly non-hostile, but she also didn’t like the idea of being stuck in a city with a being that she had no chance to win against even in the best case scenario.
The newcomer just watched them for a long moment, evidently waiting for any sort of reaction. When the seconds ticked by and no reply showed itself, she tilted her head slightly, her expression becoming… worried? There was a hint of displeasure visible as well, which made Cecily wince inwardly.
“I don’t know what you heard about me, but I really don’t plan on hurting you,” the newcomer said.
That just made Cecily even more uneasy, but at this point she had to do something before she pissed off this being beyond comprehension. And as much as she didn’t like the idea of sticking close to the woman, she also didn’t see any other way forward.
The city itself was likely the safest from any beasts, if what she knew about the cursed lands held true. And even if it wasn’t, she didn’t think she could just say no thank you and leave. Whoever this woman was, she would be able to find and catch up to them no matter how far they ran, so the threat coming from her would remain no matter what she decided on.
And then there was the small, but not exactly unimportant detail that Lucy seemed to be pretty exhausted. If they wanted to have any chance at all at making it through, joining the newcomer was the only viable option.
“Alright,” she replied slowly, carefully lowering her weapon. “I suppose having a safe place to rest would be helpful.” She paused for only a moment, then fully lowered her weapon and sheathed it. “I’m Cecily, and with me is Lucy. May I have your name?”
Her upbringing had taught her that being polite opened far more doors than it closed, and it cost nothing. Not to mention that learning more about the newcomer may help her come up with a plan for the worst case scenario.
To her surprise, the newcomer flinched, her expression uncertain. That worried her a little. A worry that only got stronger the longer the pause held on.
Finally the other woman sighed, shaking her head. “I suppose there is not much point in skirting around the issue. My name is Vuthe de Thal. A pleasure to meet you.”
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