"These herbs will be needed to make healing potions, and these for strengthening..."
Naori's thoughts flowed slowly as she gathered the herbs needed in her village. Her brown eyes scanned the plants, and with a nod, she carefully cut them and placed them in the basket. Her trained eye and keen senses helped the girl find the right plants, including those that had accumulated magical energy. These herbs were of much better quality and had a stronger effect when used in decoctions. Just what was needed to treat serious injuries and illnesses.
Naori looked at the human road and shook her head. A quiet sigh escaped her lips. People were expanding their borders, building new buildings and roads, destroying nature. The girl had nothing against them, but this situation caused the spirits of nature to worry. Yokai were no exception.
"What a pity...
Because of humans, places like this forest were becoming fewer and fewer, forcing us to move constantly. It would be fine if they could scare humans away, but that wouldn't work with demons and the fallen. Naori frowned and shook her head. Damned representatives of the biblical faction! They spread all over the world and started pushing their agenda, breaking old customs and traditions! How insolent! But their insolence is based on the great power of the creatures of the biblical god, may he rot in hell!
"No, no, it's not worth it..." Naori exhaled and continued with her business. Lady Yasaka would not allow these creatures to roam their territory and do whatever they pleased. Now the lady had enough power and strength to punish such acts, but even so... Cunning demons and fallen ones still find ways to kidnap yokai.
All for the sake of turning them into servants who are forced to serve their higher demons! Naori had not personally encountered this, but she had seen broken couples, orphans, and grief-stricken parents because of this "hunt"! The demon lords all claim that the conversion is voluntary, but this is a blatant lie! Or perhaps they are incapable of keeping their own subordinates on a short leash!
The quiet rage at her inability to influence the situation vanished instantly when her keen ears caught someone's footsteps. They were quiet, but not quiet enough to escape Naori's attention.
"A demon? A fallen one?" flashed through the girl's mind. The recent attack on her village had left her paranoid and fearful. If it weren't for Lady Yasaka, who had come to visit...
Yokai did not practise martial arts, devoting herself to healing and supporting the sick and infirm. But Naori had no intention of giving up without a fight and falling into the clutches of the vile demons, so she grabbed the knife more comfortably, preparing to fight. Running away and turning your back on demons is foolish, and if they are fallen ones, it is even more foolish. These black-winged monsters hunt yokai for practically the same reasons as demons... No, even more despicable reasons!
"What...?" The girl sniffed and lowered her weapon slightly when the scent of a human reached her nose. Not a reborn, pure-blooded demon or a fallen one, but an ordinary mage. No, a powerful one. He literally exuded magical energy, which he did not hide. Carelessness or deliberate action?
Out of the trees came... a young man. The first thing that caught the girl's eye was his eyes, strange as it may sound. Blue as ice, they glowed with an unnatural cold colour. Naori couldn't make out any emotions in those icy lakes, nor in the small smile that seemed to be permanently fixed on his face. Short wheat-coloured hair and neat stubble only added to the stranger's appearance, along with his heavy black cloak. The man also gave off a cold aura. It wasn't unpleasant, more like the coolness of a summer night. It was a strange feeling that made her frown slightly.
The mage did not move, just looked at her with a smile, but then put his hand to his chin and began to say something. Naori blinked when she did not understand what the man was saying! She simply did not understand! Her innate ability to understand any human language wasn't working at all! The young man ignored her shock and continued talking, even starting to walk in circles.
"Um, excuse me!" Naori exclaimed. The man stopped and looked at her. Her instincts sensed no danger, and human mages, unless they worked for demons, were mostly neutral. So she spoke to him. Not without caution and readiness to fight.
"Did something specific bring you here?"
The mage's expression became somewhat saddened when he clearly did not understand her. Naori slowly exhaled and looked away, surprised by what she had just experienced. The man was speaking an unfamiliar language and did not understand her! She had never encountered anything like this before! She had no idea why this was the case. Her mind was completely blank due to the shock she had experienced.
"Watch out!" Yoka quickly raised her head and shouted a warning to the mage when she heard the whistle of a fallen spear.
***
"I don't remember the exact name of this species, but I clearly remember the description of their appearance, their habitat, and their strong connection to nature.
Castor frowned slightly, trying to recall the lost information from his old memories, but nothing came to mind. Perhaps his brain had long since discarded this insignificant fact to make room for new information. This organ in the skull is not infinite, even though it possesses incredible abilities. Of course, one could try to forcibly "bring back" the memory with potions and spells, but there was a high probability of either frying the brain or falling into a vegetative state.
"Judging by the size of her hips, the oval of her face, and the size of her breasts, she shows no signs of aggression," Castor glanced at the girl, who was looking with horror and surprise at the magician and then at what was frozen near his right temple.
"Compared to what I saw during the Dark Dawn, this fox woman is almost a goddess of beauty," Brinel's gaze swept over the girl's figure without any interest. "Perhaps there is no global conflict or end of the world here. Truly, that would be good," he smiled a little more warmly, then turned his head towards the frozen spear.
"Strange shape. The blade is too wide and ornate in relation to the shaft. A spell based on..." Castor's smile faded as he felt himself freeze. Energy extremely similar to that of the priests of Empyrion. The god who left them all to perish, dissolving somewhere among the stars. The lord of light and the best god for humans. The only sane representative of a madhouse that proudly called itself a "pantheon."
"Despite his kindness, I despise Empirion for his actions."
"A follower of the god of light, but I sense an admixture of chaotic energy. An apostate?" Brinel snapped his fingers, and the ice holding the enemy spell contracted, shattered into many fragments, which flew back to where the projectile had come from.
The purpose of this stream of ice was not to kill, but to lure the enemy towards them so that the mage could see him with his own eyes, without using spells that clearly distorted perception. But he had the ability to conduct remote observation even through stone, wood and metal. Including magical ones.
"How interesting..." Castor muttered, seeing a man flying over the forest, dodging razor-sharp shards. Yes, outwardly, this creature looked completely human. If it weren't for the energy and the two pairs of large black swan wings, Brinel would have easily mistaken this creature for one of his own.
"Disguising itself as a human to improve its hunting skills? Hide and seek in plain sight? Was the creator of such a creature acting on purpose? Is this creature cursed by someone?" Questions poured out of the mage's mouth one after another, and his brain tried to find a logical answer or at least a hypothesis. But the result was unsatisfactory — Castor lacked knowledge about this world and this flying creature. Correction: no longer flying. The chunk of ice that struck the creature's back forced it to land in a seal-like position, forming a crater beneath it. It was a pity about the two trees, a couple of dozen small insects, and several plants.
"High strength, resistance to relatively low temperatures, and increased endurance," Brinel grunted as the piece of ice was thrown aside. "Add superhuman strength to that."
The mage fell silent when the unknown creature (whose face and body structure resembled that of a human woman) quickly recovered from the hard landing and hurled two spears made of light at him, gaining the opportunity to attack unhindered while he fended off the projectiles. At least, that was what Castor decided was the winged creature's plan.
"Not a bad plan, but you always need a couple hundred backups.
His palms gripped the hilts of icy swords that appeared in a couple of moments. The left blade deflected the spear downward. The projectile crashed into the ground with a loud bang, sending clods of earth flying into the air. But instead of staining the mage's clothes, they froze, turning into frozen, hard soil that flew towards the enemy. The right blade was right in front of Castor's face, blade forward. The second spear struck him and froze in place, quickly covered with ice. The winged woman jumped up to reinforce her attack with another spear she was holding in her right hand. But the attack failed — clods of hard earth struck her side, causing her to cry out in pain.
"I strongly recommend that you admit defeat and stop resisting. Continuing the conflict will only lead to your swift death," Brinel said coldly. Of course, no one understood his words, but the habit of trying to stop his own kind from making fatal mistakes had not gone away.
"As you wish," a quick blow with the icy hilt to the temple caused the unconscious body to go limp and fall to the ground. The winged woman decided not to give up and created a sword, for which she received a blow intended to stun her but not kill her.
"Accomplices? A capture team? Saboteurs? Security?" Castor threw his sword into the bushes. He heard characteristic noises: whispering, the quiet hum of spells, and the creaking of shoes. The mage sighed, closed his eyes, raised his hands, and then brought them down sharply. A visible stream of blue ice and snow-white cold flew out of Brinel's body, which became the centre of the circle. The cold bypassed the female fox, but it was not merciful to the rest. The circular stream swept in all directions.
"Enough to freeze everything within a radius of a hundred metres. Olekhra's flash is a basic spell, but with experience and enough energy, it can freeze even a deity. For a second, unfortunately, but this fact proves the genius of the mage who created it.
Castor looked at the work of his hands. All the grass, trees and plants had turned into icy statues of themselves. Not a single leaf stirred in the wind, frozen solid to the branches. The trunks did not creak, having been frozen in deep frost. So deep that all processes inside had frozen, stopping in time. All these creatures that had fallen under the cold were alive. They were merely frozen in a single moment of their lives, unable to grow or age.
"The captured winged creatures could become a necessary source of knowledge and information about this world. If not, their freezing will be fatal, with no possibility of thawing.
The mage looked at the female fox, who had taken a step back from him. Clouds of steam escaped from her mouth due to the temperature difference between her body and the environment, and her eyes were frozen in genuine terror. Castor did not react in any way. Now he was looking at the typical reaction he got from people and even gods. The power hidden within him frightened intelligent beings with its wrongness, quantity, and otherworldly origin. The cold that emanated not from winter, not from the depths of the oceans, not from death, but from the gloomy calm of space.
"Now we need to gather all the information we've obtained, compile it in one place, and then extract everything we need from it. It's a pity that it will cost them their lives, but they attacked first with the intention to kill.
"And if you are ready to kill, be ready to die yourself," thought Brinel as the frozen figure with wings rose into the air and landed near one of the frozen trees. He had work to do, but first he had to deal with the next wave of intruders whose footsteps he could hear.
"What?" Castor glanced at the fox, who shrank away from his gaze and tried to hide behind a cold tree. The mage frowned slightly: the ice told him that more creatures like this girl were on their way.
"Probably, the incredible release of magical energy and the change in nature over a large radius attracted attention. This was not part of the main plan, but an additional source of knowledge would not be superfluous. Whether he will voluntarily share the information or not is irrelevant," Brinel's smile grew even warmer.
***
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