God Ash: Remnants of the fallen.

Sitting on the ground, Cain quietly nursed the terrible gash across his face with a grimace.

He looked around him.

The ground was scorched and smoldering with embers and remnants of the violet flames produced by the {Darkfire Imp}.

He turned to his side. Right beside him was half the smoldering corpse of Imp.

He grimaced and winced as he recalled how terrible the battle had been.

The Imp had been no easy opponent. Not only had she been swift and incredibly noble, she had a near endless supply of the sticky violet flames that locked flesh clean off bones. He has almost lost his life in that battle.

Luckily, he had come out with only a few deep gashes, a punctured lung, and many terrible burns.

The girls, who were the only ones still alive after that terrible battle sat down across from him, throwing distrustful glances at him from time to time.

He grimaced again, 'I can't trust you backstabbers either.'

Then he sighed.

His wounds were healing rather fast. In a few hours, they should have closed up neatly without any intervention.

Despite that, he didn't feel good at all.

Now, he was very certain there was a fog of confusion shrouding his mind.

There were two reasons for his suspicions.

One, the strange skills and abilities he continuously acquired on necessity. Regardless of that, he used them naturally, almost as though they were second nature to him.

It was odd and peculiar.

And then, there was the existence of the crimson threads that ran through all beings, both living and dead in this hellscape.

He suspected that Whatever being was messing with his mind, was also responsible for the crimson threads.

It was just a guess, but something told him he was right.

'Which means all the answers can be found. All I have to do, is follow this thing to the end.' He said to himself, looking at the ethereal crimson thread hanging out of his chest, leading out into the distant horizon.

Suddenly, Susan spoke up,

"Now what?"

Roselle narrowed her eyes. Susan sighed and clarified,

"What I'm trying to say, is what will you do now?"

She frowned as she continued, her face a bit grim,

"I plan on continuing this journey. To be honest, I'm tired of the constant killing. This place makes me sick. I want a way out."

Roselle pursed her lips and nodded softly,

"I couldn't agree more. Don't you agree as well, Cain?"

Both turned to him, their brows raised.

Cain could only raise his hands,

"Yeah. I don't want to kill anymore."

In his mind, he frowned. While it was true that the murderous impulse was fading, it wasn't completely gone.

There had to be something affecting it.

'Could it the interactions I am having with other living beings?' He thought to himself.

He shook his head. It didn't seem plausible.

Probably...

Roselle turned to Jenny,

"You should know this by now, but just in case, where we are headed, is most likely than not, where the origins of all this is. We may or may not find some answers there."

Susan nodded, "Then if it will not be too much trouble, I will go along with you."

Cain glared at her,

"I don't think that will be very ideal."

Susan shook her head,

"I think otherwise."

Then she turned to Roselle,

"I believe we have the same goal. To get out of this place. Greater numbers mean a higher chance of accomplishing that."

She pursed her lips, then added,

"Now that we understand each other better, we can also prevent... accidents like what happened earlier from occuring again."

Cain scowled. Regardless of how he felt, he knew she was right. As far as he was concerned, they were the only ones that had gathered enough reason not to kill themselves despite spending longer than five minutes together.

And he was not unreasonable...

Let's get going then." Cain said as he moved to rise to his feet.

Susan shot up and glared down at him.

"Not yet."

Then she walked towards him slowly.

Cain couldn't help but inch away,

"What?! Why?"

"Your injuries aren't healed yet. Let me help you."

Cain violently shook his head. He still didn't trust her once bit.

"I'll heal soon enough. Don't worry about it."

Susan shook her head,

"It's fine, really. I don't mind..."

Cain smiled bitterly, 'Aren't those supposed to be my lines?'

Susan stopped in front of him and stretched her hands down at him.

He was about to say something, but the words didn't come out.

He frowned instead.

For some reason, the warmth coming from her palms were familiar.

Too familiar...

He couldn't help but ask with narrowed eyes,

"Have we met before?"

Susan stared at him, a subtle confused frown on her face.

She was silent for a while, then she said,

"I don't know."

Cain nodded. He figured that would be the case, since he didn't know either.

He didn't know if he had known this girl in the past or not.

It was a strange feeling.

A feeling of subtle nostalgia and alienation.

'How annoying...'

He shrugged and moved away from the healing light,

"I told you I'm fine. No need to bother."

He didn't need all that right now.

***

They continued across the bloody plains.

Officially, they were following the path the birds had taken, but in reality, Cain was following the lines with f crimson threads.

All of them seemed to be leading to the same location, so he just had to follow the ones attacked to his chest.

In the meantime, he was completely absorbed with his mind, trying his best to remember all he could.

Occasionally, they would run into small groups of creatures of all shapes and sizes duking it out, tearing at their flesh and breaking their bones.

In a bid to sate their own bloodlust, they would join the battle.and swiftly out it to an end.

On more than one occasion, they would bite off more that they could chew and would be forced to either fight, suffering terrible injuries in the process, or run and deviate from their path, which resulted in them wasting a lot of time.

In the end, it couldn't be helped.

Cain had no idea how much time had passed.

"Stay still..." Susan scolded him quietly.

Unlike before, Cain accepted his fate and sat there. Healing light poured from the magic circles floating in Susan's plans and bathed his wounds. They soaked into his pores, through his skin, down to his bones, healing him up from the inside out.

It was soothing, but it also brought about a slightly uncomfortable itchiness.

'We are almost there. I can feel it.'

Something told him that the end of the threads was almost in sight. He couldn't tell exactly how much distance they would have to cover, but he could roughly estimate it.

'Three days, maybe shorter if we don't encounter any disturbances on the road.'

Since there were no celestial bodies to track the passage of time, Cain could only rely on his arbitrary measurements of day and night.

The sky always remained the same, after all. Gloomy and dark, with a light sprinkle and shower every few hours.

The perpetual wetness was getting to him, but he could do nothing besides bear it.

"All done. We should take a break and rest for an hour so we can recover better."

Then she collapsed to the ground, exhausted.

Cain felt a bit complicated. The two girls that had accompanied him this far were quite peculiar.

Roselle was a mostly melee combatant that relied on her skillful sword techniques and control over her body's momentum to bring her opponents to heel.

She was swift, agile, and very cunning. Her weapons were designed to reap as many lives as possible with the most minimal of efforts.

She was dangerous.

Susan on the other hand, was far less threatening. However, that didn't mean she would be easy to deal with.

She used mostly healing techniques, but that didn't mean they were the only spells in her arsenal, not by a long shot.

She relied on a plethora of ranged magical attacks, as well as a summoning technique that could give life and substance to a mass of light for a time.

They were handy allies to have, and annoying enemies to face.

He sighed to himself.

They would rest for an hour, then continue on their way.

Despite the simmering battle lust within him, he truly wished nothing more than yo be uninterrupted before they reached where they were headed. Explore new worlds at My Virtual Library Empire

Unfortunately for him, that was not going to happen.

His ears twitched.

He heard something collapse to the ground behind him.

He jolted up, aiming the tip of his sword.

Roselle and Susan reacted in similar fashion, both pointing their weapons in the same direction.

Cain's tense expression turned dark. At first, there had only been a faint outline and n the ground.

However, the camouflaged figure didn't seem to be able to keep it up any more as a moment later, the semi-invincibility began to flicker on and off before it finally deactivated.

Cain got to see a pale-faced beauty lying on the ground once again.

Just as he was about to curse his treacherous fate once again, he realized that her face was pale because she was actively losing a ton of blood.

Cain turned to Susan who immediately rushed to the bleeding girl's side. Mumbling something under her breath, she began attempting treatment.

However, a split second later, Cain sensed an incredible amount of danger.

His eyes widened, and he immediately swung his sword,

"It's a trap."

An arrow fell to the ground, split clean in two.

A chuckle came from the distance. The air in front of them shimmered. It was as though a veil had been lifted from their eyes.

Cain couldn't help but let out a mental sigh,

'Damn it...'