The Crimson Mark and the Golden Foe
Loli entered Lua's house. She already had permission as the official cook, so she moved naturally. As soon as she crossed the door, she noticed Silvia sitting at the table, calmly drinking tea while teaching Liora how to write.
"Hello, Silvia," Loli greeted quickly, trying to keep her manners, though she immediately noticed that what Liora was writing wasn't any language she knew.
"Hello. Did you come to prepare Lua's dinner?" Silvia asked with a kind smile as she looked at her.
"Yes, after all it's my mission," Loli replied with a somewhat cheerful smile.
"Of course… mission," Silvia repeated with an enigmatic smile, subtle enough to make Loli blush instantly.
"Do you want anything in particular to eat?" Loli asked right away, trying to change the subject.
"Rabbit stew!" Liora said immediately, with obvious excitement.
"Then that's what I'll make today," Loli answered with a sincere smile as she walked to the kitchen.
She took out the ingredients and began to prepare the dinner with agile movements. Meanwhile, Liora continued studying happily, asking Silvia whenever she encountered a difficulty. The girl was quite intelligent, learning at a surprisingly fast pace.
When Loli finished cutting the vegetables and the meat, she put them into the pot and left it on the fire. Since she had to wait for it to simmer, she left the kitchen with some free time.
She approached Silvia and Liora, curious about what the little girl was learning.
"May I ask what Liora is studying?" she said, looking at Silvia.
"It doesn't have a real name, but if we had to give it one, it would be 'spiritual language'… or perhaps 'vocal enchantment,'" Silvia explained with total tranquility. "The ancient goddess of magic created this language to use abilities without needing to belong to a specific race. Basically, she designed a language that allows you to manipulate the magic of other beings without restrictions. She was a cryptologist of seals, also the creator of the runes that activate such magic. Each rune has more meanings than most believe, and this language is a way to understand them."
"What?" Loli exclaimed, surprised. "Then… if you know this language you can use all magic?"
"I suppose," Silvia replied with the same calmness, as if she hadn't just dropped a monumental revelation.
Since they had started playing, not many had dedicated themselves to magic. Only Loli's grandfather was truly skilled in it, partly because rune recipes were extremely difficult to obtain. The ones Lua had taught them were just that: basic symbols. They had to figure out how to combine them and learn how to use them.
They couldn't ask Lua to teach more, because she actually only knew a handful of runes, and she just combined them to create the same spells but with different elements. After all, she hadn't had much time to study either.
But now Silvia was teaching Liora the very foundations of magic. The essentials.
"I think I heard about the goddess of magic once," Loli said thoughtfully. "But… when you mentioned the ten gods, you didn't name her."
"That's because the title 'goddess of magic' was just that, a title. The true 'goddess' wasn't a real god, but rather a demigoddess, and not even a high–level one. But thanks to her power, the goddess of life gave her that honorary title."
"I see…" Loli murmured, still with more questions in mind, though Silvia spoke before she could ask them.
"I think it's time for Lua to wake up. Could you do me that favor?" she said with a light smile.
"Ah, yes, of course," Loli replied, standing up from the table at once.
Silvia dismissed her with a calm smile, while continuing to guide Liora in her studies.
…
Loli entered Lua's room a bit nervously. The place was dark, barely lit by the faint light filtering from outside. The first thing she distinguished was the glow of Lua's red horns on the bed.
She approached slowly, her breathing quickening as she remembered whose room it was. For a moment she grew even more nervous, but shook her head, trying to push away foolish thoughts. She had to wake her up, Silvia had asked her to.
Gently, she placed her hand on what seemed to be Lua's shoulder.
"Lua… your mother sent me to wake you up," she whispered cautiously, moving her slightly. "Lua," she repeated a bit more firmly.
Before she could insist, she felt something grab her hand tightly. Suddenly, her body was pulled and she fell onto something soft.
The room seemed darker than before, though in front of her two red horns glowed and a pair of burning eyes stared at her intently. She was on the bed, trapped under the fur blanket, with Lua so close she could feel her breath.
Lua's eyes still looked lost in a dream, not recognizing her fully.
"L… Lua?" Loli muttered, completely nervous and blushing at the position they were in.
Then she saw Lua's face move closer. Her nerves burst, she shut her eyes… until a sharp pain in her shoulder made her open them wide.
Lua was biting her.
Moments later, Lua pulled away with a mocking smile, then lay down beside her and hugged her casually.
Loli's face was redder than Lua's horns. Her breathing was ragged, her heart was about to explode as she stared at the ceiling in complete disarray.
At that moment, a notification appeared before her eyes:
🔔 System Notification
"You have been marked by the Oni of Destruction"
[Active Mark]
• Crimson Heritage: your attacks gain a crimson glow and deal +5% additional damage.
• Unyielding Will: resistance to negative status effects (+25%).
• Oni's Aura: when within 50 meters of your partner, you gain +25% DEF, +25% Speed, and +25% Endurance.
• Flame of Devotion: while protecting your loved one, your magical energy regeneration increases greatly.
…
Silvia was sitting calmly at the table when, after a few minutes, she saw a very nervous Loli rush out of Lua's room. Her light smile only deepened the cook's confusion, whose face was so red it looked like she was about to boil.
"I have something to do. Please, turn off and take the stew off the fire when it's done. Bye!" Loli blurted out before bolting out of the house at full speed.
Liora watched her with a puzzled expression and then turned to Silvia.
"What happened? Did sister Lua get upset because someone woke her up again?" she asked with her hands on her hips, as if scolding Lua in her absence.
"Maybe," Silvia replied, without saying anything more.
A few minutes later, Lua came out of the room still drowsy, rubbing her eyes as she felt a strange sensation in her teeth.
"Sister Lua, did you get mad at Loli for waking you up?" Liora insisted in her little scolding tone. "You have to behave."
Lua blinked in confusion.
"She woke me up?" she murmured, then glanced at the door for a moment as if trying to remember something that had slipped away. Finally, she let it go and walked toward the kitchen, drawn by the smell of the stew.
Meanwhile, Silvia kept her gaze fixed on her daughter, whispering calmly:
"Truly dangerous… just like her mother."
She wasn't talking about herself, but about Lua's other mother.
…
In the center of the village, several novice players were heading in groups toward the forest. There were many of them, since the creatures in the area were growing increasingly dangerous. They chatted and joked among themselves, trying to mask the tension.
"Those lizards are such a pain. And they're only level 1! The older players said this place used to be full of rabbits, and they were way easier to kill. Lucky bastards," grumbled a walking skeleton of white bones.
"Nothing we can do. Probably just a beta species," commented a bat–man.
Their first forms were varied: a small gnoll, a floating pumpkin, a pixie, even a stick–man made of walking branches. All of them were preparing to hunt when one pointed toward the edge of the forest.
"Mmm… what's that?"
They stopped when they saw a figure standing among the trees. It was a man. His white clothing was in tatters, his blond hair fell in disarray, and his cold blue eyes gleamed with hostility. At his belt hung a shining sword, and in his chest pulsed an object that radiated strange light.
But what stood out most was his human appearance.
The novices, ignorant of the world's history, approached with curiosity.
"Hey! How did you get that evolution?" the bat–man asked naively.
The man looked at him with disgust, raising a hand.
A second later, the bat exploded in blood.
The group froze, horrified.
"Hey, that wasn't very nice!" another player managed to shout, but the answer was the same: a flick of the hand. Their bodies burst one by one in a crimson rain.
The man clicked his tongue, irritated.
"Why are these things still alive?" he muttered, gazing at the village with an expression of revulsion. He could feel the presence of hundreds of lights and spirits that should never have existed.
He pulled a compass from his pocket. The needle pointed straight to the heart of the village. His smile twisted between amusement and disgust.
"I see… some survived. I suppose it's my duty to destroy them once and for all. This will be easy."
He tore the device out of his chest. Instantly, his ragged clothes regenerated, the filth on his body vanished, and a pristine aura enveloped him. A golden circle opened on his back, glowing brightly as his body lifted into the air. In mere seconds, he became a pillar of light hovering right above the village.
He raised a finger. A beam of white energy fell like divine punishment. The blast struck the village's protective shield and shattered it in a single explosion.
"Hmm… they didn't have this thing before," he sneered, preparing another shot.
But when he launched it, his eyes widened: a new shield had instantly formed, blocking the second attack.
"Let's see how many they can withstand," he said with a cruel smile, lifting his finger again.
The players on the ground had no idea what was happening, frozen by the sheer scale of the assault.
However, before the third beam could fall, a red shadow tore through the sky. The man barely managed to turn his head… and saw a pair of furious red eyes rushing toward him.
A fist slammed into his face.
BOOM.
The roar shook the entire forest. Hundreds of trees were torn from the ground, an immense crater opened as if a meteorite had struck, and the shockwave spread all the way to the village.
Lua floated in the air, a brilliant red circle blazing on her back, far larger than the enemy's. Her gaze was pure rage, her burning eyes locked on him… and then shifted to the shadow lurking behind his presence.
From the darkness emerged a second man, sweat trickling down his face. But unlike the blond one, there was a striking difference: above his head, two large horns curved backward like a great dark crown, and his eyes were completely black, void of any light.
"Well… looks like I got myself into trouble for following the brat," he said tensely, while a black circle unfolded on his back, almost the same size as Lua's, only slightly smaller.
The air grew heavy with pressure. The battle had only just begun.