Clarissa and Marina had stopped screaming their heads off once they realized they couldn't even feel the passage of the wind on their skin. They could tell that they were moving, but it wasn't a severe thing, and Clarissa said it felt much better and much safer to fly this way. I currently was channeling a similar barrier around Cici, but I didn't need it myself. The wind against my body actually felt kinda nice.
"I CAN'T BELIEVE HOW FAST WE ARE GOING!!" Clarissa shouted, her voice not muffled from the wind currents due to my power.
"INDEED! WE'VE TRAVELED WHAT WOULD HAVE TAKEN WEEKS IN ONLY AN HOUR OR TWO! LOOK TO THE RIGHT, YOU CAN SEE THE CITY OF TRESCHE FROM HERE!" Marina exclaimed, and I did indeed see a walled off city over to the east.
I remembered seeing that city on the map, and I think Clarissa mentioned it being a smaller city overseen by a Countess or something. I wasn't really paying attention to that, as it wasn't our destination. However, it did tell me that we have traveled a good amount of time. That being said, I do think the trip was affecting Marina's brain, as it has only been like 30 minutes max. We should honestly be to Arbigold in roughly an hour given this pace. Since I hadn't traveled a super long distance before, I wasn't exactly sure, so our time was surprising even me.
"They're loud." Cici said as she buried her nose into my neck, before slowly running her tongue over that same spot.
"Behave please kitten." I said with a chuckle, and that caused her to let out small girlish laugh.
"Fine. Fine. Are we getting closer?" She asked me, and I nodded.
"Another half hour or so, and we should be there. Honestly, we are making way better time than I had imagined. We probably could have stayed at home for a while longer." I said, and Cici just shrugged.
"True, but we could always go back if we had to in no time at all. Plus, I've never been to a big city, and neither have you. After all of what those 2 told us, it could actually be a lot of fun." She said, sounding more and more excited as she spoke.
I just grinned as I bent my head down to kiss the top of hers.
"You're right. We'll just make the most of it. Clarissa gave me a decent amount of cash, and if all of what I heard is actually a thing, I could make us even more." I said, remembering Clarissa's brief mention of guilds.
She had mentioned associations and guilds, one of them being an adventurer's guild. That always had me foaming at the mouth when she mentioned that at dinner. This place had more cool shit that I was just scratching the surface of, and many of them were turning out to be some of my favorite things about fantasy worlds. Going out and killing monsters and taking care of problems for money? Going through and clearing dungeons for loot? Hell to the fuck yes.
It was a little over 20 minutes later that Clarissa pointed and shouted.
"I DON'T BELIEVE IT! THERE IT IS!!"
Sure enough, when I looked towards where she was pointing, I saw a massive circular walled off city of in the distance. The similarities between it and the cities I've seen in the animes I liked were insane, and I actually felt a little giddy looking at it. Despite it looked similar to a lot of what I've seen, it was also fresh and a sight to behold, as I was seeing a city like this with my own two eyes, although, as we got closer, I could make out many things about this place that stood out.
The buildings seemed to be large cobblestone workings that looked expensive as well. Many buildings were tall, elegant structures that rose high above city, although none were as high up as we currently were. Many of these tall buildings had golden trim around the edges thst gleamed in the light of the sun. Not sure it was was a gaudy coincidence, or tied into the city's name.
"Nice." I said, smiling at the two incredulous women, "That only took us a little over an hour."
They both snapped their eyes to me, and their eyes buldged.
"THAT'S NOT POSSIBLE!" Marina shouted, making me roll my eyes. It was possible, because it just happened.
I pulled both women closer to me in the air, and slowed down.
"Can you stop yelling, please?" I asked.
"Elias... this makes no sense. You claim that we made a month long journey in an hour??" She asked, incredulously.
"1 hour, 11 minutes, and 24 seconds." Cici said as she removed her face from my chest.
"You were counting this whole time?" I asked, impressed.
"Yup. I figured we'd be there in no time. And I was right. I don't even think you truly understand how strong you are." She said.
Clarissa suddenly began to giggle a merry sound, and when we all looked at her, she was wiping a tear from her eye.
"Honestly, I don't know why I get surprised when it comes to you. Eli, you are truly absurd, you know that?" She asked me with a laugh.
"I've been told similar things a few times." I said, and she just smiled.
"How are you all so calm?" Marina asked, although her tone told me that she was getting there herself.
"Trust me, Marina, you get used to it. Clarissa has only seen a bit of what my mate can do, and she's already getting used to it. Stick around us long enough, and you'll see." Cici said. A primal part of my brain surged when she called me her mate, rather than her husband. It felt a bit more possessive, and I would be lying if I said I didn't like it.
We flew onwards at a slower pace from that point, and it was funny watching the slow acceptance form on Marina's face. Hell, she hadn't even seen me fight yet, so she was definitely in for more surprises. I wasn't going to intentionally hide my power, but I wasn't going to flaunt it either. If I needed it, I'd use it. And I'd definitely put people in their place if I needed to. I wasn't anyone's fucking doormat any longer. God help someone if they try to touch my Cici, or the other 2 for that matter.
As we flew, I scanned my surroundings, using my senses to scan the surrounding forests, to hear the bustling wildlife, and the smell of the fresh air and scents of various plant life and more. However, as I was doing that, I frowned, as my senses caught the faint scent of blood. Fresh blood, and next when I focused my auditory senses, I could hear shouts off in the distance, battle cries, whimpering, and the sound of a loud beast.
"Hey, I'm gonna speed us up and take us somewhere. I'm hearing something that I'm curious about." I said, and before the women could ask anything else, the barriers formed fully over their bodies once more, and we sped off in the direction of the noise.
"What is it, darling?" Cici asked me.
"I hear fighting up ahead. Sounds like people fighting a monster. I'm curious, and plus, someone is hurt. I can smell the blood." I said.
Just as I said that, I stopped us, as we had arrived at the scene only a moment later. I was right. I currently saw 2 people fighting against what looked like a goddamn troll. Tall, muscular, green colored and ugly as sin, and wielding its fists like like trucks, its might cratering the ground with every punch.
"Abyssal Eye."
[Name: Forest Troll]
[Rank: B+]
Damn, that's a pretty high rank for a creature, as least as far as I had seen so far. Not anything super dangerous, but I did give myself a pat on the back for guessing correctly. After that, I turned my eyes to the combatants. Currently, there was one man and one woman facing off against the beast, and I blinked my eyes as I stared at them. It was almost comical for a situation like this to occur just as we got here, but it was cool scene to behold.
The man was large, about as large as myself, and he had a powerful frame with buldging muscles that strained as he took a blow from the Troll on large tower shield he had on his left arm. What caught my attention was the rounded fluffy ears and the small poofy tail, but they definitely weren't that of a cat like I had been used to seeing.
[Name: Terroth Stonebreaker]
[Age: 35]
[Race: Beastkin (Bear)]
[Class: Tank (B-)]
[Designation: A Member of the party, "The Misfits"]
"Holy hell, a real life adventuring party." I said, feeling excitement build within me.
The next thing I did was check out the fast and agile black furred woman that was raking her claws across the troll, only to jump or dodge away when the troll would attack. She was pretty quick. Her ears and tails reminded of a dog, or a wolf. She was also bedy strong looking, wearing the barest of armor. This let me see the musculature of her strong arms and legs, as well as the defined six pack abs that we visible for all to see.
[Name: Sheila Darkfang]
[Age: 23]
[Race: Beastkin (Wolf)]
[Class: Berserker (C+)]
[Designation: A Member of the Party, "The Misfits"]
"SERENA! PLEASE STAY WITH ME!" I heard a voice shout from the side below me, causing me to pan my gaze all the way down. What I saw confirmed why I smelled blood, and without any warning, I shot downwards.
I didn't even need to use my ability to see that these two were probably fox beastkin. I loved foxes, and I especially liked fox girls in anime, and fantasy novels. What I saw below was a woman with fox features, and a man with those same fox features. Their fur was a deep blood red color, and they both had fluffy fox ears and a fox tail.
What concerned me greatly was the amount of blood leaking out of the woman's stomach from a large tree branch that pierced her body all the way through her. Her blood pooled on the ground below her, and I could see the dribbles of it leaking out of her mouth. She was alive though, and currently, she was whimpering and screaming in pain as the male foxkin attempted to pull it out to no success.
I landed next the two with a thump, causing the man to look up sharply. The two women followed right after me, landing gently on the ground next to me, and once they saw what was happening, their eyes widened. I gently put Cici on her feet, and she immediately went down on her knees next to the two beastkin, much to the man's distress.
"Easy. Calm down, we won't hurt you." Cici said gently as she raised her hands in a non threatening manner, "We can help..."
"That's a forest troll!" Marina said, and then looked down at the foxgirl, "Oh Gods..."
"What happened to her??" Clarissa asked, kneeling down with Cici, a hand over her mouth.
The man looked unsure of what to do with all of the new arrivals, but the woman's cries and moans of pain seemed to break something inside of him, and he began to panic as tears began forming in his eyes.
"SHE'S MY SISTER! SHE PUSHED ME OUT OF THE WAY! THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE ME, NOT HER!" He yelled, his voice manic as be begged for help, before his voice became a soft whimper, "Please...you said you could help... I must be at my wits end asking strangers for help that just showed up but... I can't lose her."
"You won't." I said, kneeling down next to them, "We need to remove this."
I saw the woman look over at all of us, intense pain evident in her yellow eyes. She opened her mouth, and then coughed out a mouth full of blood, screaming in pain from the contractions coughing caused her stomach to make.
I looked behind the girl, and saw at least 2 feet of branch sticking out of her back.
"Lean her forward more." I said, the man complying quickly, and that movement caused the girl's eyes to open wide as she screamed in agony.
"It's okay Serena. I'm here." Her brother said as he began to cry again.
"Hold her. I need to get to work." I said, before concentrating my power.
I summoned a claw of Abyssal energy out of my pointer finger, brought it to her back, and sliced right through the branch, shortening it as much as possible. The woman grunted from that sensation, but didn't try to speak more than that. Her eyes were firmly locked on me as I brought my hand to where the branch was impaling her stomach from the front. I wrapped my hand around it. She was tough to remain conscious throughout all of this, that's for sure.
"You're going to be okay, but this will probably hurt a lot." I said, watching as her gaze shift from my hand to my eyes, "I promise that you'll be okay... I won't let you die. Now, are you ready?"
She both looked like she didn't trust or believe me, but also had no choice but to. So, after a moments, she weakly nodded at me.
"Hold her steady." I told her brother, and the man nodded as he held her to him gripping her firmly from behind.
"3...2...1..." I counted down, and once I hit one, I ripped the large branch out of her stomach.
She screamed something fierce that actually hurt my heart to hear. Tears fell from her eyes as she wailed, blood pooling from the wound. I immediately cast Abyssal Reconstruction, and watched as the blood stopped flowing, and the wound closed in less than a second. She stopped screaming abruptly, and now stared down at her now closed and healthy skin where the wound had been wide eyes. Her brother was equally as surprised, but his eyes held more gratitude than anything else as his sister's wound closed.
"It's... gone... and there's no pain..." She said in awe, before looking up at me, and her eyes locked on mine, "Thank you..."
"SERENA! YOU'RE OKAY!" The man, and then hugged her tightly from behind, and that caused the admittedly very cute foxgirl's eyes to glisten with tears as she put her hands on his arm.
I smiled at them both.
"You're welcome. Happy to-" I was saying, but was cut off by a loud boom from the battle still being fought, and a female scream.
I looked over to see that the noise had come from the bear beastkin being driven through several trees, and was slumped down on the ground, barely clinging to life. The wolfgirl had was on one knee, looking defiantly at the Troll as it reared back a fist. Marina pulled her sword and began rushing towards it, but she wouldn't be fast enough. I gave a brief glance to Cici, who nodded with a smile at me.
"TERROTH!" SHEILA!" The pair of foxes yelled, as their friend's imminent demise drew near, and the troll threw a heavy punch at the wolfgirl.
*BOOM*