The Soul Keeper

I woke up to a dark sky filled with stars and the two moons of this world. Shivering under the cold night breeze, I pushed myself up to a sitting position.

"It's not morning yet, go back to sleep." Vincent's low voice sounded. I flinched; I hadn't noticed him. He was sitting by the embers of the campfire. His shortsword rested on his knees as he carefully cleaned it.

"I could tell you the same." I responded as I rose to my feet. "What's bothering you?"

It was he who flinched this time. "I'm not-"

"You're a bad liar." I said as I sat not too far away from him. "What's wrong, Vincent? You're not acting like yourself."

He shook his head. "It's nothing too important. I guess, it just hit me that death is… very real." He hesitated. "When the dragon, serpent, whatever it was, dragged you underwater, we all thought you'd died. And later, when we couldn't find Joshua for a bit, I got scared. I thought the idiot had gone and gotten himself killed somewhere."

I was a big reason for all their worries, so I didn't really know what to say. Vincent placed his sword in his inventory and sighed. "I'm scared of losing someone, Kai." He looked up to the sky. "I'm scared of losing my friends and my brother. I want to go home. I want this wicked game to end."

I hesitated then reached out and lightly squeezed his shoulder. I had no words that could comfort him, or help him even a little, so we sat there in silence. After a while I stood up. Sitting here, doing nothing was useless.

"Where are you going?" Vincent asked me as I stretched my arms and walked a few steps away from the embers of the campfire.

"Hunting." I said with a smile. "Since I'm awake already, I'd better make use of this time." As I spoke, my wings materialized. I stretched them and leapt in the air, leaving a confused Vincent behind.

I soared high up in the sky, watching the ground below. My mind was, once again, a mess. But thinking about Vincent's words wasn't going to solve anything. I clenched my fists and folded my wings a little, heading down to the lake we fought the sea serpent at a little earlier. I could already see plenty of scavengers s circling the area. They all wanted to feast on the serpent's meat.

I summoned my scythe as I landed on the trampled and overturned grass. I didn't use Fallen Grace or any of my other spells. I had put it off for long enough, but it was time for me to learn how to wield my scythe properly. As my wings disappeared into mist, I clenched my fingers around the dark, metal shaft of the weapon.

"Here we go." I whispered before putting two fingers on my lips and whistling loudly. The loud noise echoed, shattering the silence covering the forest. I didn't have that spell Asher used to gather creatures around him, but a whistle should work just fine, I thought.

I was not wrong as soon the howls and screeches of the local fauna sounded all around me. I stood at the centre of the grassy area and waited. My first opponents to arrive were, of course, airborne creatures. As soon as they entered my vision, I motioned to open my interface to get rid of them with Dark Bolt. I stopped myself at the last second.

"Let's see," I mumbled as I closed my eyes. I forced myself to remember the warmth of the phoenix, just like I'd done before. I felt the warmth with ease. The next step was turning that warmth into something else. Like a small firebolt, perhaps?

I imagined a tiny flame on my palm. The sound of the creature's wings drew closer as I forced myself to hang on to the image of that flame. I opened my eyes and glanced at my raised palm.

Nothing. I had failed, again.

My shoulders dropped in disappointment. Why was I not any good at this?

The first bat-like creature dove towards me with its claws extended. I got rid of it with a simple swing of my weapon, then glanced around me. I could spy glowing red eyes in the woods. They were watching.

My lips formed a grin as I spun my scythe around. I was challenging them to come at me, in their turf. This was their hunting area, and a new predator had appeared. It didn't take long for them to come out of the woods and even less for them to leap at me.

I danced between the claws and teeth aiming for my life, using only my scythe to kill them, one by one. I felt their souls reach out to me as the pale blade of my scythe cut through their fur and flesh effortlessly. By the time I'd killed the last of them, I was out of breath and exhausted. My clothes where covered in their blood and all the small scratches and bite marks hurt.

With the coldness in my chest growing stronger, I placed my scythe into my inventory and washed the blood off me in the jade coloured lake. Using Soul's Respite, I let the souls circling around me mend my wounds.

These forests were seriously overpopulated. At no point should a single forest this size have more than a hundred of the same predators in them. I shook my head and opened my status panel.

'Kai Friseal – Level 71 Soul Keeper | Exp: 7800/44000 - - Souls 100/100 + 570 - - Mana: 790

Fallen Grace Lv. 5 | Death's Scythe Lv. 5 | Dark Bolt Lv. 5 | Soul's Respite Lv. 2 | Explorer | Crystal Sage'

"Just two?" I said, fairly disappointed. When Asher had done the same, I'd gained over twenty levels. What were we doing differently?

With a tired sigh, I gave up on trying to figure it out and summoned my wings. It was time to go back and get a few more hours of sleep. With a few powerful beats of my wings, I was soon in the air again. I shivered as the cold night winds hit me. When had it gotten so cold? Did this world even have seasons? Was winter approaching or something?

I once again wished I knew a little more about this world. There was so much that was unknown to me. I knew nothing about the Ereth, who we were supposed to be helping. I knew almost nothing about demons and what little I knew was challenged almost daily.

I shook my head, thinking about that stuff wasn't doing me any good. I needed to learn to focus on my goal and stop getting distracted by useless thoughts like these.

The camp soon entered my vision, and I folded my wings for a proper landing right outside the protective runes Rina placed.

"You're alive." Vincent said with a breath of relief. He was still sitting by the campfire, though as soon as he saw me, he leapt up to his feet.

"Of course I am." I said with a smile I hoped was reassuring. "And you're still awake."

"I wasn't sleepy anyways." He mumbled. His gaze was fixed on my wings. "Can I see them?" He asked after a moment's hesitation. I nodded, though I did feel somewhat odd. Vincent gently touched my feathers with the tip of his fingers. "They look too real." He mumbled, then stepped back. "Sorry. It's probably best if we head to sleep."

"Yeah, but are you sure you're ok?" I asked after a short moment of hesitation. He showed me a smile that his eyes didn't reflect. "Yeah, I'm just tired. Good night, Kai."

With that, he disappeared in the tent he shared with his brother. I sighed and laid on the grass.

I could tell. Something was wrong.