800 The Bright, The Bard and The Bird
Yuyui wanted to raise as many arguments for herself as she could, but she found none. The sheer degree of contradiction she felt between her heart and mind made her feel as if she was about to go insane.
At one point, she directed all that rage at Replicus.
Why wouldn’t he just admit it? After getting rid of his curse, he could finally get more reliable combatants to his side, so now he was just trying to get rid of her, wasn’t he?
But an opposing thought crashed against her rage almost immediately.
That wasn’t fair. After what he had just admitted a few minutes ago, it was apparent that Replicus cared for Yuyui’s emotions more than she had thought. He even exposed his vulnerable sentiments and gave her a choice.
Even though she was bound to his service, he was giving her the option of getting away from this world that she herself had said she wasn’t fit for.
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Yuyui silently battled it out against herself while following behind the mass of clouds that buried within it a pitch black skeleton. Replicus knew she had a decision to make, and didn’t bother her with idle chat since he had spoken his piece.
Yuyui only gave a quarter of her focus to where they were going.
Her current mood drove away any intent she had had to ask Replicus where they were going. Had he called her along just so he could have her make a choice, and in the meantime he could completed his own vague missions?
When put like that, the thought that Replicus just wanted to get rid of her grew stronger within Yuyui’s mental opposition.
Soon, the duo were exiting the grassy plain they had been passing through, closing in on the first line of green leading to a forest that felt as though the trees and shrubs it held were the backdrop for something more wondrous within it.
“Do not approach any further, Bright Storm!”
A powerful, agitated voice blared from the edge of forest, prompting Replicus to stop and Yuyui to hurry closer to his side with a yelp.
Replicus raised his head to the thick canopies of the trees and expelled a visible breath of mana.
“How did that name find its way onto your tongue?” he said to something that couldn’t be seen, the originator of the voice from just now.
“Pfff. Hypocrite. Your men call you that, so why shouldn’t I?” the voice came again, sounding grumpy and a bit raspy.
Replicus turned to Yuyui, genuinely wondering if this was true, and the lime haired girl gave a weird shrug that implied that it indeed was.
‘I guess they can’t always call me boss,’ the Penetrator thought exasperatedly. To think that stupid name…
“Why are you here? It is unlike you to suddenly pay a visit without warning me, pfff,” the voice said, and a slight shift through the trees yonder gave the impression that its owner was moving.
“I grew bored of waiting. I know for a fact that IT must be ready, or close to it at least. By your previous estimations, today was the day, and right now was the hour. You should have already called me,” Replicus replied.
“Pfff. So powerful yet so impatient. I have never known such a combination. Or maybe it is because you are unnatural in your own right. In any case, you are right. I was only minutes away from calling.”
At that moment, something flew from the forest and perched on a branch visible to Replicus and Yuyui.
It was a bird. A stork with red feathers, its whole as large as a man. Strangely, its eyes conveyed emotion just as well as a human too, as just from the way it looked at Replicus, Yuyui could tell it wasn’t feeling jovial.
“Alright, follow me, pfff. I wish you hadn’t brought another stranger though. My fellow beasts are this close to thinking I’m submitting to outsiders.”
‘This close’ was represented by a raise of the stork’s feet.
Replicus didn’t pay the stork’s words too much mind. He had already started to walk forward by the time the stork dropped its foot, a ‘Curse you, pfff,’ leaving its beak.
Yuyui assumed the ‘pfff’ sound the creature made was because it had a cold. Ooze dripped from two holes on its beak, after all.
To no surprise, this forest, was a Sacred Forest.
When Replicus was awarded this island as the base for his group, he had found the matter of the forest a big problem, because unlike with Sacred Forests on the mainland – Feinheath which was closest, for instance – the creatures within this forest liked to roam outside their habitats from time to time, because there were no threats on the island.
When Replicus and company had arrived, they had felt threatened, and some of them made to defend their home.
Replicus had been warned about this by his ‘peers’, and had been advised to eradicate any Sacred Forests anywhere in his territory, since more often than not, there would be one guardian beast or more protecting the creatures inside, and such creatures tended to be difficult to deal with.
Of course Replicus knew this.
He had met the Great Mane Mountain Ape Azila and had almost met the Aqua Ripper too, in the Tremur Forest. As guardians, he had gauged that their kind were no easy opponents. But that was another matter.
Instead of resorting to violence, Replicus chose to try a more peaceful approach. His desire to increase his power, and his knowledge about how reasonable beasts could be, told him of opportunity, and he had turned out to be right.
The stork that was leading them right now, was a guardian, rather the guardian of the Sacred Forest, and Replicus shared a fantastic relationship with it.
“I feel your trust in me is slipping, Bright Storm! Your respect too! Last time, you sent that straight-faced monster to check up on your things instead of coming yourself and now, you just drop in unannounced! I demand compensation, pfff!” the stork complained.
“I was busy then, and I would think Pherdanta is the perfect messenger. She gets right to the point, doesn’t she? If I had sent anyone else, they would have explored this forest wantonly,” Replicus explained, thinking he would never trust Grim with something like that.
“Weave all the logic you want, Bright Storm! You might find that next time, I might not be too inclined to do you anymore EXTRA favours, pfff!”
Yuyui could have sworn the stork looked back at them with a sly look, its beak almost contorting into a smile.
Replicus sighed.
“Sorry Timmit. It won’t happen again,” he said in as hollow a tone as possible, but the stork, whose name was Timmit, apparently, seemed quite satisfied.
Yuyui was shocked to see Replicus apologise. Granted, this was her first time getting anywhere near the Sacred Forest, well, except for that one time she got close enough to almost be chucked in by Grim after she lost a bet with him.
Suffice it to say, she didn’t know much about Replicus and this bird.
Around their party, Yuyui saw, through thick forestry that obstructed the light from the sun at times, groups of beasts mostly of similar kind going about their business. Some of them fought, those that were intelligent discussed unknown topics. Several could be seen feeding, and not in the express restaurant sort of way.
Most of them turned as the trio passed, but they depicted a certain level of aggression that made Yuyui kind of understand why Timmit did not like having visitors in the forest. Human visitors.
Unlike most guardians, Timmit didn’t seem like the type the other beasts feared to the point of keeping their dissatisfaction to themselves.
“Look at them! They are already forming doubts in their minds about me, pfff! I should remind them that I could destroy them and their habits just as easily as they gawk at me with those stupid eyes!” Timmit raged. “Maybe I should advertise our friendship more, Bright Storm! Yes, we could make a concession about that.”
“I’ll consider it if you stop calling me Bright Storm. The other Factions call me that, apparently my men call me that in secret too, but I can’t have you joining in too,” Replicus said.
Timmit scoffed.
“Uh, master,” Yuyui finally found the gall to chime in. “Why did you bring me here exactly?”
Given the circumstances, it truly seemed Yuyui’s presence was more bad than good. This pushed her to ask.
“Just wait and see…” Replicus replied simply.
Yuyui pursed her lips. She missed the days when her master was very expressive and authentic, being open about his homicidal tendencies and dissatisfactions. He often killed her just to prove a hostile point.
Maybe she had been right to miss Skullius when he split to create Replicus.
They were turning out to be very different.
A few minutes later, Yuyui recognised a change in the environment. The different geographies within this one Sacred Forest that had spotted a menagerie of very different beasts clustered in carefully separated habitats; magic habitats that accelerated the growth of one species within them, disappeared.
The trees that had spotted a green to a yellowish shade with brown barks, turned entirely scarlet the further she, Replicus and Timmit went.
Yuyui gulped.
Space started to warp as the miscolouring persisted, and the vast forest disappeared in the next moment.
The first thing in the new view which Yuyui saw, was a giant nest within which two, large familiar eggs sat, smothered by crystals brambles and leaves.