Outside the portal, the streets were bustling with activity. Most hunters had returned from raids and reported back to their guilds.
Slowly and quietly, the light began to fade.
At first, no one paid it any mind. The sky dimmed a little, and people assumed it was about to rain. A few looked up, just to be sure, but paused when they noticed something strange. It wasn’t rain.
The clouds weren’t dark, they were pulling apart. That’s when someone pointed. "Hey... what’s that?" Everyone stopped what they were doing and turned to look up at the sky.
And that was when they all noticed something was wrong.The sun had dimmed and the moon was over it like an eclipse... but the thing that surprised people more was that the moon was blood red. A deep, eerie crimson that seemed to swallow the light around it.
"What the hell is that?"
"Is this supposed to happen?"
"I thought eclipses looked different, this looks...off"
"I got a bad feeling about this."
People exchanged looks, Fear hadn’t kicked in yet, but confusion had already taken over. No one knew what the hell that was supposed to mean.
One man near the guild gates looked up and said what everyone else was thinking.
"First it was multiple portals showing up at once... now this?"
"Is the world coming to an end or something?"
"I need to get back home, I feel safer remaining inside the comfort of my house. I ain’t taking any risks."
Everyone dispersed and began heading home, none hunters knew they couldn’t defend themselves if something disastrous were to happen. They had magic but no fighting skills or training. So yeah, they were more or less useless in that aspect.
"Inform the guilds about this, we need to prepare for the worst, this isn’t a good sign."
Kaizen remained quiet for a moment, his mind reeling. He remembered that memory he was shown by that old man, his birth mother had mentioned something about the blood moon announcing his birth.
"They’d never know it’s me, they’ll be aware of my existence but they’d believe the baby has just been born. They’ll search blindly for a baby that doesn’t exist, I won’t let them find me, at least not now."
Velmaria finally relaxed, her eyes observing him. That was when she noticed she still couldn’t sense any mana from him even after the seal had been broken. After that first burst of energy as soon as she broke the seal, she didn’t sense anything after then.
"How do you feel, you....i can’t sense anything from you still."
Kaizen stood up carefully, his body felt lighter than usual, he flexed his fists, opening and closing his hand.
"I feel, different....I...." As he looked up to talk to her, he paused when he noticed something strange. Floating texts in the air, right in front of his face.
His brows furrowed deeply, what in the world was that.
"Hey, what’s that?" He asked, reaching to touch the texts...but to his surprise, his fingers slipped through instead, like it wasn’t there at all.
"This." He pointed directly to it.
"Is there something on my face?" Velmaria asked, reaching to touch her face which she thought Kaizen was pointing at.
"Not your face, these texts floating in the air."
"Texts floating in the air? Are you hallucinating? Because even I can’t make texts float midair. " Kaizen’s question sounded ridiculous to her, but to Kaizen...he knew exactly what he was seeing.
His eyes narrowed as he tried to read what was written.
[YOU’VE BEEN CHOSEN AS THE HOST]
[SELECT ’YES’ TO COMPLETE PROCESS. SELECT ’NO’ TO DECLINE OFFER]
"Elf, is this...one of your mind games? Stop it cause it’s not funny."
"You’re the one who should stop, what the hell do you mean by floating texts. Did breaking the seal mess with your head?"
"So you really don’t see it?"
"What does the text say?" Velmaria asked in a curious tone as she walked closer to stand beside kaizen, trying to see if she would also see what he was talking about. But there was nothing still.
"Don’t worry about it, it’s nothing." Kaizen said, waving it off. If she couldn’t see it, then there was no need in giving her details.
Velmaria turned to him, "you still haven’t answered my question, how do you feel? Why can’t I sense any magic from you up till now?
"Because I suppressed it." He replied. Maybe it was because he was used to not having any magic, but his body naturally suppressed the energy after the first burst. It felt effortless, not something draining or hard to contain.
Velmaria’s eyes brightened in astonishment, "Do you have any idea what that means? No single hunter that I know of is capable of suppressing their magic completely like you just did. I can’t sense a single thing from you."
Then that’s good, at least I wouldn’t draw attention.
"I’ve been wanting to ask, why were you searching for his successor?" Kaizen wasn’t ready to play along with whatever revenge plan she had in mind, but there was no harm in knowing.
"I’ll tell you when we meet again, for now—you have to leave. You don’t want anyone to get suspicious do you?"
She was right. If he did spend too long in here and still return alive, people would ask questions and get suspicious, and that was the last thing he wanted.
"How about you gimme a really good beating? That’d be enough to fool everyone." Kaizen requested, picking up his shirt from the floor. If he wanted to lie, he would at least make the lie believable. I barely escaped alive, she spared me at the last moment when I desperately begged for my life.
It was simple and straightforward, but there was nothing more believable than that.
Velmaria smirked at his request, her eyes lighting up. "my pleasure, I’ll be sure to do a good job."