|
Sumi
|
 |
« Reply #59 on: August 19, 2010, 04:39:46 PM » |
|
Well, theres quite a bit then. Here's more to read. Chapter 8&9
No internet makes Sumi a productive boy...
TRANSLATED CHAPTER 8
Sumi woke up to the forest. He was leaned against the same tree he was by the last night. He checked his shoulder, and the bandages were still clean meaning the wound was healing. Movement was returning to his arm as well, though hardly any. At first he couldn't see Lucy and he started to panic, but when he circled the tree trunk he saw her asleep leaning against the tree. He decided to look around and see what the surroundings were like, as he didn't get to see them well the night before. He saw the tree they were sleeping at, and it was huge. Bigger than the last by far, wider than two men lieing down foot to head, and at least skyscraper tall the size of the canopy created a sort of clearing around the tree, almost as if the forest gave it distance in reverance. He marveled in the sight for a bit, then walked along more. The sun peaked through the trees and fell in beams to the ground. The forest was alive with animals, birds were singing, the bugs were crawling and flying and the small mammals were rushing around. There wasn't a sign of anything bad anywhere, just untouched forest in every direction. Sumi listened harder for a minute or two, and heard something other thant he sund of creatures, he heard what sounded like water, and sure enough a bit right of the site and saw a stream of fresh running water. Sumi returned to the large tree and saw Lucy, who had just woken up, walking around the tree.
Lucy: Someone's up early.
Sumi: Not so much, I only just got up.
Lucy: Ah. Well, then you ready for some food then?
Sumi realized he hadn't eaten in quite a long time and his stomach answered for him.
Lucy: I'll take that as a yes. Any way, I'll go get the packs down, and catch some wild game. You think you can manage getting a fire started?
Sumi: Yea, I can do that.
Lucy walked to the tree where she hid the packs and climbed it as usual and pulled them down and brought them over to the campsite. She opened the pack and took out a rabbit snare, and matches. She tossed the matches to Sumi, who pocketed them for later.
Lucy: I'll be back in an hour or so, don't get lost, and we'll meet up here again.
Sumi: Don't worry, I won't leave the camp site, tinder isn't hard to find anyway.
Lucy smiled and turned around to leave. She was wearing a belt around her waist, with pouches around the sides, and a small sheath on her hip. Sticking out of the sheath was a Leaf-hilted dagger. Sumi reached for his own feather hilted dagger to compare the design, and noticed that his intution was right. She was carrying a weapon her father had crafted.
Sumi stood up, now alone at the camp site again. He walked toward the tree line of the clearing and examined the tree's for old man's beard and looked for some birches to peel the bark from. He found quite a bit of old man's beard and a single birch which he peeled a large helping of bark from.
Sumi: Could be useful, there doesn't see to be a whole lot of good tinder around. I may as well take what I can.
He collected some dry branches and some larger peices of wood and brought it back to the camp in a few trips. He cleared away the grass and left only the dirt in a small area and surrounded the patch with as big of rocks as he could carry with one arm. He took the bark and beard and tossed it in the fire pit, seperating and organizing the rest of the wood, just biding his time until Lucy returned.
Sure enough, in roughly an hour Lucy returned to the camp site, carrying a skinned and cleaned rabbit on her shoulder.
Lucy: This area is teeming with wild life. It barely took me any time to find this one.
Sumi: I noticed, it's really beautiful here. It looks like it's been untouched by the humans doesn't it?
Lucy: Mm, it's really natural. The trees are all so large, it's really strange. We can't be too far from the village, I'm surrpised no one has come this way
Lucy walked to the fire pit and Sumi took the matches and prepared the fire, first lighting the tinder then adding branches and progressively bigger logs. Lucy took a folding roaster from a pack and placed it on the fire.
Lucy: Hmm, I kinda want to make stew from this, since there aren't that many nutrients in rabbit, and the vegtables would add in the missing ones. All I have is the drinking water though.
Sumi: Actually there's a stream not far from here, let me go get some water then.
Lucy: Really? You explored around before hand?
Sumi: Yea I like to know my surroundings, it's important to know what you're working with.
Lucy: That's smart of you, you must have honed your skills in your old world.
Sumi: Yep, I had to. Anyway, I guess there's a bucket in one of the packs?
Lucy: Yep, the one to your right.
Sumi: Mhmm. Your prepared yourself.
Lucy: I just figured we'd need all of this.
Sumi stood and walked to the pack to his right and pulled out a metal bucket and carried it to the stream. The rushing water looked like glass, and it was completely transparent. He dipped the bucket in and picked up it up full. Full it was rather heavy, and the thin wire handle dug into his palm and made him wish he had both arms available, but he brought it back to the camp site and sat the bucket down next to Lucy, who was seemingly playing with a few large and small blue pouches she took out of the pack closest to her.
Sumi: I was thinking, what are we going to go for vegtables, are there any near here? I didn't see them myself.
Lucy: I brought some.
Sumi: You brought them? But wouldn't they go bad in the packs for days?
Lucy: Nope! *She held up one of the blue pouches* I took these from the storage at home, it's something dad picked up from a traveling salesmen from the Water Nation. They're normal leather pouches, but they've been treated with water magic, and what ever you put in them stays cold and fresh for months. They're super useful for storage and taking things for trips.
Sumi: Sooo, this *he leaned over to look at the pouch better and poked it* is a magical device?
Lucy: More or less.
Sumi: I was thinking that magical devices would be fancier than a blue sack.
Lucy: Anything can have magic put in it, you just have to find a magician willing to do it. Usually for a price.
Sumi: So, anything can be magic? It seems like magic devices would be pretty common place than, why were there so little in the village? Especially when Mr. Hatchet had some magic of his own.
Lucy: Not so much, magicians are rare to come by. You have to have a pretty pure bloodline to use magic. Most nobels have it, and very few civilians can use it. It would have to run in your bloodline. Bigger cities have magic shops though, normally run my a local magician and his descendants. Rumor has it that my family, my mother's side had some Earth magic quailities as well, but the blood has run so thin that I don't think it's there anymore, not in my generation though. Well, keep this as a secret, but I think Endon had some magic in him. He had a way with plants, and he could bring them almost back to life with barely a touch and some care. My mother was the same way, and it was almost like Endon granted wishes, when ever I watch the star's with him, he'd point up and show me a shooting star that wasn't there before. Like he could make them appear by wishing it.
Sumi: I've only heard of people wishing ON shooting stars, not FOR them.
Lucy: You seem weird about this? Like you've never seen magic before.
Sumi: Besides what I saw on the battlefield, no. My world never had any.
Lucy: What contenient are you from that doesn't have any magic?
Sumi: Let's just say a foreign one, very foreign one. Anyway, about the magic again, you've mentioned Water and Earth magic, and I know Mr. Hatchet said something about Light magic, is it that each Nation has their own magic?
Lucy: For someone who's never seen it you understand well. That's precisly how it works, each Realm or Nation has a specific brand of magic related to their land. If your born there, or have magic blood from a land, then your magic will be based on that land's.
Sumi: So has anyone ever had two or more different kinds?
Lucy: Every now and then two magicians from different lands will have a child who can use multiple magics and they can unlock special kinds then themselves, ususally they become the most powerful magicians of their time and make quite a name from themselves, but it's so rare it only happens every other generation, not every hybrid child will learn both, and even then not every one who learns both will learn special kinds. Further more, two opposite magics cannot and have not ever went together, for example, Fire and Water cannot co-exist in one body, nor can Light or Dark. And no one has ever had more than two. One legend says that Time itself is a magic, known only to Mylarich. Another legend says that one man, after intense training was able to learn every single magic, including opposites, and from there mastered his own special breeds, like raw Energy magic and Time magic, even. But it's just a legend, with no base and no evidence to it ever being true.
Sumi: Oh. It's still so fasinating though.
Lucy: Well, that's everything I know about magic. You've heard the school edition defintion striaght from the pupil there. Foods ready now so eat up.
Lucy handed Sumi a dish of sweet smelling stew which he gladly accepted. Lost in the discussion, he had forgotten that Lucy was actually preparing a meal all the while.
They each had two bowls of the stew to make sure to finished the pot entirely. There was still lef over meat so Lucy cut off what ever she could from the carcass and stored it in the blue pouches. Sumi rekindled the fire to make it bigger than ever.
Lucy: What's that for? We're leaving soon, it's nearly noon and we need to put it our before we leave.
Sumi: We should burn away our refuse first. Not only to preserve the natural state here, but just incase we were followed this far it'll help cover our tracks better.
Lucy thought for a second with a bit of a embarrassed look.
Lucy: I hadn't thought of that...
Sumi: Don't worry about it, it's just a trick I learned. They say 'Fire can make a conscience clean', I don't know how much truth there is to that, but it sure leaves everything it touches clean.
Sumi collected the scrap rabbit carcass and the bandages from last night and tossed them into the fire, which burned much brighter as a result.
Sumi: Whiel that works it's own 'magic' I'll go clean the dishes in the stream and bring back water to douse the flames later.
Lucy: I'll wait here then and pack up what I can.
Sumi walked to the river and scrubbed the pots and bowls clean with his hands, letting the residue float on down the stream. It took him about ten minutes to clean them all well enough, and when his work was done he started to stack the dishes to carry back, when he heard a scream from the camp site. He dropped the dishes, which bounced on the ground around the stream without breaking, and he dashed to the tree line of the clearing where the camp site was.
He hid in a bush and looked at the scene. Men he recognized from the village were standing around Lucy, using their size to intimidate her. They were carrying farming tools and makeshift weapons with them, there were three in front interrogating Lucy, and two snooping around in the background searching the camp site and making their way to the tree line.
Lucy: I don't know where he is! He went to do something and hasn't returned!
Man: You know you lier! Where is he?
Lucy: I don't know!
The man leaned into her face and screamed, his face red.
Man: You know damn well bitch! Now tell me where the hell that bastard is! He isn't getting away without paying for what he'd done!
Lucy: *She turned away from his face* Wash out your mouth, your language is as bad as your breath.
The man took the shaft of his makeshift spear and thrust it into Lucy, knocking her into the tree behind her. She pulled out her dagger and tried to crawl behind the tree, but the two snooping men walked on either side of the tree blocking her path and one kicked the dagger from her hand, with force.
Sumi(thought): I've got to do something.
Sumi drew his dagger and held it out with his good hand, getting into a position to spring when from above him a kunai flew to his knee and impaled the ground next to him. Sumi lost his guard from the seeming attack and search the tree line for the assailant. He saw nothing though and looked back to the exotic dagger, and noticed something about it. A piece of paper was tied to the handle, so he picked it off and examined it. It was a note reading "Just wait, don't move" . Sumi felt a bit suspicious of the note and pocketed it without paying it anymind, then was half way through his jump, when an object flew from the trees above him and exploded into a cloud of smoke in the area of the assault. A second kunai landed at his knee and the note attached this time read, "get behind the stream, now!" Sumi listened to this one and hopped past the stream, and hid behind a tree from where he could see the cloud of smoke.
The cloaked boy held out his wrist, and from his large sleeve shot a smoke bomb that detonated on impact with the clearing. In an instant he launched into the cloud with his goggles up and his gray cloak pulled past his nose, to block the smoke from his lungs, though it was his usual style of wearing his cloak anyway. He stepped into the artificial fog from the tree line where he was lying in wait. He leaped from the edge of the smoke cloud to the large tree in the center in a single agile bound. He stood for a split second before kicking over the blinded men, all in the same motion. He quickly grabbed the packs laid by the tree side, which were fully packed, he kicked some leaves on the now smothered fire to cover it up and grabbed the girl who was coughing with her sleeve over the mouth, leaned against the tree. Even with all the weight he leaped as agile as ever and made it from the cloud in three hops, and dashed from the clearing, and over the stream in hardly any time, his long sleeves trailing behind him in the wind.
Sumi watched as the cloaked boy jumped the river with Lucy and the bags in his hands, hardly hindered by the extra weight. He landed on the other bank and stood set down Lucy, who stood on her own. Sumi stood out from behind the tree and the gray cloaked man walked toward him with Lucy behind. He passed Sumi with a glance and a "follow me" motion. Sumi, seeing nothing left to do other than comply looked and Lucy and they nodded to each other and walked after the gray cloaked man. They walked at a rather fast pace, for roughly an hour before Gray Cloak stopped and motioned for everyone to sit. Sumi and Lucy sat, followed by Gray Cloak who made a quick check before resting.
Gray Cloak:....
Lucy was the first to speak.
Lucy: Thank you for back there, that was kind of you. I appreciate you doing that, I dont know what would have happened if you had-
Gray Cloak cleared their throat loudly, and stopped Lucy's nervous thank you. Sumi was the next to speak.
Sumi: Who are you anyway? Do you mind telling us your name?
Gray Cloak: For now, yes. You may call me Janin for the time being. (Pronounced Ha-nin)
Sumi: Thank you. Well, Janin, my name is Su-
Janin: I know your names.
Sumi: Oh. Then, may I ask, why did you save Lucy back there, does it have something to do with why you know our names?
Janin: Yes and no. I saved you because you must follow me.
Sumi: Where are you taking us then?
Lucy: Also, why did we travel East from the clearing? We were going to head west, to reach the Light Realm, where we could be in peace.
Sumi: We were?
Lucy: It's the only way I could see it.
Janin: That's no good. You need to come with me. We have to go to the Wind Realm. It will be stopping in the Water Nation next.
Lucy: Why Wind?
Sumi: What's wind?
Lucy: You don't know about Wind?
Sumi: The air, yea.
Janin:.....
Lucy: It's a sort of rogue Realm. It doesn't associate with the others, so I guess it isn't that odd you don't know what it is, really. The interesting thing about it is that it isn't stationary, it moves in the sky.
Sumi: A floating nation?
Lucy: Yup! Every now and then it will stop for a few days over a main city in one of the other Nations or Realms, and you're allowed to pass back and forth while it's docked. Then it'll go off again, and stop sometime later. It's rather unpredictable though. *Turned to Janin* why are we headed east then? How do you know where it will be?
Janin: Natives know when and where it will stop. And it will stop in Water a few days from now. We need to cover the distance between here and there in four days minimum. It docks in two, and stays only for two. It's waiting for us.
Lucy: Wait, we're in the upper center Earth Nation, how are we supposed to make it to the Middle of the Water Nation in two days? Even four is a bit of a stretch, with a wounded member especially. And what's this about it waiting for us, how is that even possible?
Janin: We need to make this brief, your questions are simple. If we dont waste any more time, and the wind blows right for us we can do it in two nights. When we make it there the Wind Realm will leave early with us. It wont be making any more stops.
Sumi: So, we need to cover more ground right away?
Janin: Precisely.
Lucy: I don't think it will be so easy... I lost my dagger in the fray and I can't leave without it, it was my brothers. It was made especially for him, and I cherish it as a heirloom. I need to go back for it
Janin stood and held out his wrist toward Lucy, his hand peeked out and her dagger was pinched between his thumb and forefinger.
Janin: There. Now check his wound to see if it's fine. If so we leave, if not then treat it. Either way we head out before the sun starts to set.
CHAPTER 8 ~FIN~
|
