The sun shines brightly over the lands of Lisbea. The sound of weapons being dropped to the ground echoed through the field as the lisbean army finally found a rest after nearly an hour of fighting against the forces of Esteller. Countless corpses of both humans and demons lay scattered across the battlefield.
The few demons that had the brains to surrender were grouped up in a circle, surrounded by soldiers of Lisbea while General Drake put magic sealing bracelets on them. The soldiers were prepared to act in case the demons tried anything, however they were not stupid enough to not know that this was the best opportunity they had of making it out alive.
Once Drake had put the final bracelet on one of the demons, he proceeded to walk out of the circle of soldiers, none of them had the intention of leaving them unguarded. The general took a moment to recover, taking a deep breath, demons were unpredictable and he feared getting jumped to the jugular by one of them.
As he regained his calm, Drake noticed many people cheering at someone, he turned to look at where everyone else was and there he saw Julius, his skin looked pale and all covered in blood and bruises, panting, his armor was almost completely shattered to the point there was nothing remaining of the upper part, his face was half-burned and in one of his hands he dragged the head of that demon he had jumped at the beginning of the battle.
The general approached his prince and bowed before him.
"I'm glad to see you alive, my prince" Drake said.
"It was a close call, closer than I would've liked, but at least I'm not this guy" Julius said as he dropped the demon's head into the ground in front of Drake. "I'm in severe pain right now, so if any healer could please heal me I would really appreciate it!"
A healer nearby heard him and quickly ran towards Julius to heal his wounds.
"How many did we lose?" Julius asked as the healer began using his magic on him.
"Half of our people. A great result considering who we faced off against" Drake said with a proud smile.
Julius seemed a bit disgusted by his general's positivity, causing Drake to quickly erase the smile from his face.
"And what happened to the cannon?" The prince asked.
"I don't know yet, Sylvana and some other people made it inside the tower but they haven't come down yet. Erbow stayed to watch over and-" Drake responded, however, his words got interrupted by the sound of Erbow's voice calling them both out.
Julius and Drake looked at Erbow who waved at them while standing next to Sylvana. The healer taking care of Julius' injuries had finished his job so they both walked towards Erbow and Sylvana.
"Sylvana, how did things go?" Julius asked the elf.
Sylvana let out a painful smirk, holding her abdomen. "It all went smoothly. The cannon has been destroyed and we also ended with the life of a demon that claimed to be on level to be one of Esteller's generals"
"Are you serious?" Drake was shocked.
"How did you do that?" Julius asked, shocked as well.
"Well, I didn't do it alone. Tsk. But I'll tell you more about it later, when I'm in less pain" Sylvana said, holding her abdomen.
"I understand, to be honest I just got healed and I still feel a lot of pain" Julius exclaimed.
Not too far away, Lyle, holding himself to Stella, walked alongside Terrac and Dante, looking for their respective teams. Their pace is slow because of Lyle, who remains exhausted and feeling the pain of the battle despite his injuries being healed.
As the four of them walked, the sound of Ascalon's voice calling out to Lyle while making his way through the corpses scattered over the ground, stepping on them without much care.
Lyle weakly waved at his friend with a smile, comforted to see him fine. However, his attention got caught by Mistia, who walked at a slower pace behind Ascalon, avoiding as much as she could stepping on the corpses. Lyle could not avoid looking at all the blood covering Mistia's body.
Once Ascalon and Mistia were next to them, Lyle quickly limped closer to Mistia with concern in his face.
"Mistia, oh gods, are you ok?" Lyle asked with a weak voice, his legs shaked.
"Yes, I'm ok. T-This… this blood isn't mine" She answered, her voice sounded almost devoid of emotion.
"Oh, what a relief" Lyle said, letting out a breath as he let himself fall onto Mistia with his arms falling over her shoulders in an attempt to hug her.
"Forget about me, what happened to you?" Mistia said, noticeably worried, instinctively hugging Lyle, making him let out a little groan.
"I had a tough battle, I'm just tired after it that's all" Lyle answered with a smile.
Ascalon and Stella were surprised, seeing Mistia not only not push a man away but actually hugging him just like that took them both off guard. Ascalon smiled.
"Can you walk?" Mistia questioned.
"Not really, but don't worry about– WAAAOH!" Lyle got taken off by the sudden feeling of Mistia carrying him over her shoulder. "What are you doing?"
"I'll carry you"
"A-Are you sure about this?" Lyle was blushing.
"Yes, you don't weigh much"
A few moments later, the imposing voice of Julius was heard all over the battlefield, he gave the order to everyone to retrieve as many corpses of their fallen comrades as possible, claiming that their bodies would be returned to their families so they could have a proper burial.
Many complaints were heard immediately, qualifying the task as a loss of time and pointing out that they could not carry that many bodies on the caravans. A vein marked on the prince's forehead, the generals took a step back in fear as the prince began yelling in sheer anger while irradiating an icy aura, his strong voice resonated over the entire place.
"Listen well you huge pieces of dogshit! Those whose bodies are scattered across this battlefield were our comrades, they fought alongside us and had lives like any of you! They were lisbean citizens and the least thing they deserve is to be properly put to rest instead of being left to rot in a place like this with those filthy demons! We will build carts to carry them if necessary but we are gonna do it, you can complain as much as you want but just fucking do it!"
The voices of complaint quickly disappeared after the prince's little speech, however, one mercenary stood up to the prince. He looked messy, his black hair seemed to be dirty, his armor was very damaged and he seemed to be limping.
"Now, listen to me, princeling. We just fought goddamn demons, we are just gonna be paid for fighting and that's what we did. Why in the world should we waste our time making sure a bunch of people rot away in a place instead of another?"
The prince slowly walked towards the mercenary.
"Don't worry, you won't have to carry anything" Julius' voice was almost devoid of any emotion but anger.
The mercenary was a bit scared but he wasn't going to allow Julius to intimidate him, unfortunately for him, that wasn't Julius' intention. The prince grabbed his face and froze the mercenary to death right where he stood. The frozen corpse fell onto the ground, shattering.
"Does anyone else have something to say?" The prince asked, looking around at everyone.
No one dared to speak up.
"If you can help, please do it" Julius said in a more calmed tone.
The soldiers and mercenaries got hands at work, those who were exhausted went back immediately to the camp while the rest began with the job of reuniting the corpses of their fallen comrades, a group took on the task to reunite the corpses while the others took on the job of making carts with the trees of a nearby forest.
Ascalon and Stella, alongside Dante and Terrac, stayed to help with the gathering of the bodies while Mistia took Lyle back to the camp to rest. Ascalon helped out with the fabrication of carts while Stella helped to gather the corpses, although she quickly began to feel grossed out by the state of some of them.
As for Lyle and Mistia, they made it back to the camp without major issues. Lyle laid on the grass, detached from his armor, feeling how each passing second his body seemed to hurt even more.
"Gods… why does it hurt so much?" He groaned.
"That's something normal, when you are in a fight your senses make it so you feel less pain, and once you relax, well… you already know what happens" MIstia used a calm tone, however a hint of worry was noticeable underneath.
"I knew that, but I never thought it could be this much…"
"First time getting severely injured?"
Lyle gave himself a moment to think as he tried to brush off the pain. "I think so… Although, my use of the Dark Boost might have something to do"
"Hmm… I think what you're feeling is just a result of muscular exhaustion because of the Dark Boost"
"Come to think of it… Can you use it? You're a dark magic user after all but I don't think I've ever seen you use it"
Mistia seemed a bit taken off by the question. "Y-yes, I can…" Deep inside she prayed for him to not continue asking about her magic knowledge.
"That's neat…" Lyle squirms, letting out a groan of pain. "Hey, are you… gonna clean yourself? It must be uncomfortable to be all covered in blood"
"Huh?" Mistia took a moment to look at herself, she had forgotten that she was still covered in the blood of those demons. "Oh, right…let me a second"
Lyle laid in silence as Mistia closed her eyes and joined her hands and a light dark aura surrounded her body, after a few seconds she lifted her hands and the blood covering both of them got completely cleaned up.
"That should do it" Mistia said, opening her eyes to look at Lyle.
The blonde's gaze shifted between his own body and Mistia's, surprised by the spell. "Wow, that's a pretty useful spell, where did you learn it from?"
Upon hearing the question, Mistia shrugged, dropping a sweat as she tried to formulate her words, fortunately for her, someone walked in to interrupt the conversation. It was Raphael, who sat on the ground in front of them, he seemed weak.
"Glad to see you alive" He said.
"Same to you" Lyle responded while doing his best to sit. "How did things go for you?"
"It was alright, although I had to retire early from the battle…" Raphael didn't sound proud of himself.
"You got injured by the demons?" Mistia asked.
Raphael let out a chuckle. "Injured, yes. By the demons, no" He lifted his hands, giving Lyle and Mistia a good glance of his hands, they looked very rigid, some of his fingers were twitching a bit and had a red coloration in a root like pattern that seemed to extend up his arms, they also had a blue-purple coloration in some parts.
Lyle was taken aback and somewhat disgusted by Ralph's hands, although he felt like he should be more disgusted than he actually is, whereas Mistia barely had any reaction aside from raising an eyebrow.
"Are those marks of electrocution?" Lyle questioned.
"Yes, they are. Electric magic is powerful, but it can be a bit complicated to handle" Raphael said with a little smile, trying to stiffen the pain. "But don't worry, I'll be fine. And tell me, are your companions ok?"
"Yes, they are helping out with gathering the corpses" Mistia answered.
"So are mine, it's good that none of our groups got any casualties"
"Speaking of the devil…" Both Lyle and Raphael seemed confused by her words until after a few seconds Stella walked in, looking a bit disturbed.
"Oh, hey Stella, how-" Lyle couldn't finish his sentence before Stella fell to her knees and puked on the grass.
Mistia immediately stood up and positioned herself across Lyle.
"Fuck, that was… so disgusting…" Stella mumbled.
"Weren't you trained for this kind of shit?" Mistia questioned.
"Yes, but no training in the world could prepare me for the deformations I saw there…" Stella answered as she cleaned up the puke from her mouth with her forearm.
"Where is Ascalon?" Lyle asked.
Stella stood up before responding. "He's still helping, he was with your companions" She said looking at Raphael.
"Hey, you're a healer, right?" Raphael asked.
"Hm? Yes, I am"
"Can you do something about this?" Raphael showed her his hands.
Stella walked in closer and grabbed his hands to inspect them, causing Raphael to let out a small groan of pain, in response, Stella softened the grip on his hands as she continued to look at them.
"I asked other healers but they said they couldn't do anything about this" Raphael's fingers twitched.
"Hmm… I can see why, a burn like this… Let me try something" Stella held one of his hands in hers.
The healer's hands glowed with a soft yellow light as she began to softly massage Raphael's hand. He groaned, it hurted like hell and he wanted to stop her until he noticed that, as she continued, the pain was diminishing. After a few moments of massaging his hand, Stella proceeded to do the same with the other, giving the same result.
"That should be better" Stella said.
Raphael looked at his hands, he was amazed by the results of that, he still felt pain from the burning, but his hands were no longer numb and he could move his fingers like normal.
"I can't do much for the burn, but at least that should've gotten rid of the muscular pain"
Raphael smiled. "It does feel better, thank you"
"I must admit, that was sorta impressive" Mistia confessed.
The elemental stood up and stretched a bit before starting to walk away. "Even if it still hurts, I can tolerate it. Imma go check on my companions. Thanks again!"
"Stella, you think you can do something for my ache?" Lyle asked, he shivered.
"Of course I can!" Stella declared as she turned to look at Lyle with a warm smile.
Stella walked towards Lyle and sat next to him. Her hands began to glow again and she began with the massage. Lyle grunted at the feeling of Stella's soft hands caressing and roaming over his aching muscles, nonetheless it made him feel way too relaxed, which made him not notice the change on Mistia's expression, whose gaze was filled with disdain towards the healer who seemed to be purposefully avoiding to connect her gaze with Mistia's.
After a brief moment, Mistia walked away without saying a word. Stella continued with the massage, but her movements had become more dull and in a moment, pressed a sensitive spot way too hard, causing Lyle to let out a groan of pain.
In response, Stella backed out, apologizing for the hard press.
"I-It's ok…" Lyle said as he caressed the spot Stella had pressed. He looked around as his mind cleared, noticing Mistia's absence. "Where is Mistia?"
"No idea. She just walked away, whatever the reason was I'm sure I was part of it" Stella responded, she sounded a bit annoyed.
"Hmm… I've talked with her… about you two. You really don't get along pretty well"
"Don't tell me. Like, I know I can sometimes be a bit too much but come on, she really exaggerates. I don't even flirt with her anymore" Stella's voice tone became angrier.
"She… doesn't really like you being so… promiscuous" Lyle sounded somewhat uncomfortable.
"I… *sigh* I know… but… what is her problem with it?"
"Well… I remember you told me a theory of yours about the why of it…"
Stella shivered and stayed silent for a brief moment, she looked away uncomfortably and took a deep breath.
"It's not that hard…" Lyle said with a soft voice. "To just… hold yourself a bit"
"Yes, I'm aware of that, but…. I just…. ugh, I really don't like that!" Stella sounded angry.
"Why?" Lyle asked with worry.
"Having to change my behavior because someone doesn't like it! Ugh… it… it reminds me of my parents! And that's not good by any means!"
"Mind telling me?"
Stella doubted whether to tell him or not for a moment but she ended up deciding to do so.
"Ok… so, I'm not gonna make it long because I really don't wanna talk about this… so… I was born in a wealthy family, the firstborn actually. Since I was young my parents were really… controlling of every god damn aspect of my life, which I really didn't like. They noticed my abilities for healing magic very early on. I have practiced it since I can remember but that part is something I do like, so it wasn't that bad, but even though I excelled on things related to healing and medicine… there were other areas I was not so good at…"
"Like?"
"Mostly things that didn't require memory, they were minor subjects, mostly something complementary, barely worth anything for my final grade, and yet… my parents would just not shut the fuck up about my faults on those areas… I swear, we could be at the table having dinner and the only thought on my head was grabbing a fork and stabbing them in the eyes!" Steall yelled.
She began hyperventilating but Lyle helped calm down a bit.
"I-It's ok, you don't have to continue" Lyle said with a warm and comforting voice as he patted her back very slowly.
"No…" Stella said, calmed down. "I think it'll be good to let it out, at least once"
"Alright, I'll hear whatever you have to say"
Stella took a deep breath before starting to tell her life again.
"And then came my siblings… don't misunderstand me, I don't have anything against them, but unlike me they were good at everything which led to… comparisons, that I really didn't like. Honestly, I don't if I can describe how horrible is to have a pair of motherfuckers bitching at your ear about the few things you can't do well 24/7"
"It must be… horrible" Lyle said, feeling bad for Stella. "And… What was the breaking point? What made you… leave?"
"That part… ok, so… when I was 13, I gave my first kiss and it was… magical, explosive, it made me feel… free! At school I would roam around during the breaks to get kisses, doing it just gave a sensation that I just can't express with words… my parents fortunately never found out about that and some time passed. When I became 15 I got into my first relationship, her name was Greeta, she was a classmate of mine, we had kissed some times before and one day we kinda just decided to give it a shot"
Lyle continued to listen carefully.
"It was… nice. I really liked her, then… the day came, hiding the kisses was one thing, but a relationship? Didn't last long. They asked… no, they ordered me to bring her home so they could meet her and I went along with it, not like I had many options…"
Stella stayed silent for a moment before resuming.
"I don't know what bothered them the most, me taking a decision for myself or dating a woman"
"Why would they be bothered by you dating a woman?" Lyle asked in confusion.
"A thing of the rich, relationships have two purposes, power and heirs. Same sex relationships can't exactly give that second one"
"I guess that makes sense… Go on"
"Okay… so… I brought Greeta to meet my parents, I believe you can already imagine how things went on…"
Lyle limited himself to nod.
"As if the passive-aggressive atmosphere wasn't bad enough, at a certain point, my mother took Greeta to talk alone. I don't know what she told her, but not much after she left with tears dropping down her face like a cascade. I tried talking with her the next day but she couldn't even look me in the eyes, and…"
Stella went silent for a moment.
"W-what happened?" Lyle asked.
"She…" Stella took a prolonged moment to finish her sentence "She told me that she couldn't look at me, because I was so similar to my mom… that I could only remind her of the horrible things she had told her… That… felt like a stab to the chest, and the worst part was that what hurt me the most was not that our relationship had ended, but that she compared me to my mom…"
Both of them remained silent for many seconds.
"And… that's what finally made me reach my limit. I couldn't continue living with them, or in a place where I would be compared with my mom… that same night, I ran away, infiltrated in a merchant cart and came to the capital for a new life, making a life as I could. I have done some things I'm not particularly proud of, but just having the freedom I've always desired… made it all worth it" Stella smiled.
"I… see…" Lyle tried to think of something else to say.
"Being able to be myself, freely, without having to worry about what someone else thinks, is something I'm not willing to change" Stella said with a serious look.
None of them continued to talk after Stella gave her finishing sentence. They just stayed in silence, Stella looking at the ground as Lyle tried to gather his thoughts and come up with something to say about this whole situation.
After a bit of thinking, Lyle finally broke the silence.
"Look, I can't say I understand that feeling. Desiring to have freedom so much, but I remember something that my father said sometimes, that our freedom ends where that of others begin"
"Hm?"
"I… think that you're on your right to act as you please, but… you should be more caring about your behavior when you're around other people, especially if those people feel… uncomfortable with it. Otherwise it's not freedom, but mere selfishness"
Stella seemed to be taken aback by his words.
"You can't just act like you always are, it's a matter of manners and basic respect for other people. For example… think of a child, you wouldn't act like you normally would in front of a child, right?"
Stella looked down for a second before turning to look at Lyle. "No"
"Do you understand my point?"
"I… I do…" Stella seemed to have a realization. "Gods… you are right and I hate it… Sorry"
"It is not I who you have to apologize to"
Stella sighed before standing up. "You're right…"
Lyle stood up as well as he stretched. "I feel somewhat better thanks to the massage so I'll go see if I can help with something, you go find Mistia"
"I will"
Lyle and Stella parted ways, while the former started to walk back into the battlefield to aid with whatever could be needed, the latter began searching for Mistia across the camp, it took asking some people to finally find her secluded behind a tent.
Neither of them said anything as Stella approached, Mistia was just there, sitting and looking at the sky without anything particular in mind. The moment Stella entered her line of sight her thoughtless expression became an annoyed one that immediately made Stella shiver as she felt her gaze upon her, but she didn't back off, instead, she stepped closer with noticeable fear running through her body.
Mistia was surprised to see her being this brave, her glare softened a bit, which made Stella approach with more confidence and sit right next to her.
"What do you want?" Mistia asked, straight to the point, diverting her gaze from the healer.
"I came here to apologize. For… my behavior as teammate and I guess also as costumer" Stella declared, nervous.
"Why now?"
"Lyle made me realize that… I may have been somewhat mean to you… even though I knew my behavior makes you feel uncomfortable, I didn't even bother to really stop being like that around and instead just tried to avoid you as much as possible, even though we are teammates" Stella sounded truly apologetic.
"So, will you stop being such a whore when I'm around?" Mistia's words were sharp but not dismissive.
"I'll do my best" Stella promised, although her voice lacked security.
"If you keep it at the level of when we were just bartender and costumer and maybe a bit less, it'll be fine" Mistia declared as she once again turned her glance towards Stella, in her eyes could be seen a weird middle point between affection and hatred.
"I will make sure to do my best" Stella smiled. "So… friends?" She extended her hand, offering Mistia a handshake.
Mistia turned her head down. "Stella, I'm gonna be clear. You are not a person that I would call a friend, ever" Stella was about to retreat her hand but Mistia gave her a handshake. "Teammates, it is"
Stella just nodded and went along with the handshake. For her, it was enough that Mistia didn't hate her guts. The healer stood up and said that she was gonna go give her aid and asked Mistia if she wanted to tag along. The latter denied the proposition with gentleness so Stella went back to the battlefield on her own.
The army spent the rest of the day gathering corpses and building carts to carry them back to the capital as well as recovering from the battle that had just taken place. Once night arrived, a little feast was done as congratulation for the victory and an even bigger one was promised for the survivors once they had made it back to the capital. The night was difficult for most of the lisbeans, many of them were unable to get to sleep and many of those who had managed to fall asleep had bad dreams.
Despite what the soldiers felt or thought, the night passed and the sun rose again, signaling the start of a new day, whether they were ready or not.