After they came to an understanding, Tiar and Bara put their new-found abilities to work to give rest to all the dead in the almeya’s home city as fast as possible. No matter how risky it was, her people deserved this final honor after the horrible manner in which their lives had ended. The first reason for the hastiness of the process was that although the Viktar and the mortal had encountered no enemies since the two Chaos Griffins they had killed, more could come at any time and discover them. The other reason, which Tiar and Bara eventually realized was the more important one, was that neither of them could handle being close to, much less looking at and even less touching the gruesomely mangled bodies of the townsfolk.

One consolation they had to more easily overcome the physical (and mental for the pink-skinned beauty) challenges of the funeral was the company of the other, after toiling side by side for several hours their work finally being done. They could now say their final good-bye to the graveyard of ruins this place had become – and along with it to the old order in Yut it represented – in order to move on to their first destination on the path to freeing the dimension from Chaos’ grip.

The almeya’s teacher gave her one of the two torches he was holding as she stood right next to the first in a row of pyres built just outside the city, all of which were connected through the Order champion’s energy deva. He went to the other row of pyres, touching his torch to the wood in several places until it caught fire, stepping back and looking over at his new disciple. As expected, she was yet standing as still as a statue in front of her pyres, staring at all the corpses piled up on them.

While having undoubtedly observed as much violence as every occupant of Yut born under Tiar’s rule of Chaos, this day marked the peak for the horrors in Bara’s life and as strong-willed as she was, one could not expect for her to not be affected by this at all. Going over to her, her teacher hoped to offer some words of comfort and counsel, neither of which were his forte, but a few steps short of reaching her, she lit the first pyre up. Through the energy link between them all the pyres were set ablaze soon enough as it had happened with the Viktar’s row, the Order energy mixing with the flames and turning them pale blue in color, the smoke rising above the structures turning dark blue. The fire illuminated the young woman’s face, the tears that had rolled down her cheeks having not yet dried, but the expression on her face being even more emotionless than her statue-like stillness from moments earlier.

This was it. This was the moment for her. The moment of resignation. The moment she would first choose to bury her feelings deep down after realizing they are too painful to live with otherwise. Her attack against the Chaos Griffin that led to the discovery of her powers had been her first unconscious step, but with the burning of the dead she had taken her first conscious step on the path to serving Order.

The pyres that burned represented something more than simply a farewell to the people and the home she had known all her life. What burned away in the present was also her past self, the one from the time before she had met Tiar or Atir as she called him due to the deception she was under as to his actual identity. Her innocence, her mercy, her naivety, her helplessness – all of it – now burned away. For she was about to go to war the likes of which this dimension had not seen in centuries, perhaps even ever.

All Tiar did in the end was put his hand on her shoulder, both of them watching the bodies crumble to ash. Until finally the female almeya moved away from what was left of her people. Farewells did not need to be said. The act itself signified it was time to move on to the future.

The first stop in that future was located in the westernmost continent on Almeya called Iktaz. Along its South West coast there was a group of seven cities that existed only as a metropolitan alliance, not having a country formed between them. They were called the Southern Sovereignty Seven or the New South due to being the newest founded cities on the planet, all of them being massive supporters of regional independence from the forces of Chaos.

Although there was surely going to be Chaos champion presence there as well, the monsters’ numbers were going to be much smaller compared to the rest of Almeya, especially in the city among the seven Tiar and Bara were headed for– Negite. If the Southern Sovereignty Seven were to be looked at as a country, then Negite would be its capital, being the oldest, biggest, most advanced and most thriving of the group. That was the best starting point for the recruitment of allies against Chaos in the whole world, or at least it was so according to Bara who had gained the knowledge now shared with the Viktar from her late father.

Having worked in the shop from where her teacher was planning to obtain the crystals needed for the long-distance teleportation, the pink-skinned beauty picked out the best of the remaining Flexocrystals there to give him. She had said the rest were rubbish so they needn’t take them all and considering how busy trade was in the New South, there were bound to be plenty more items of the same type in Negite, only of higher quality. Ergo the two could replenish their stock once they reached their destination, about which she further inquired after having put on the rather plain-looking, but very comfortable dress she had found miraculously intact amid the remains of her home. Tiar’s focus was on taking the final steps to teleport them, but he looked her way once being called.

‘-Have you ever been to Negite?’

‘-The last time I was in Iktaz, none of these cities you mentioned had been founded, but I have visited the exact place where you said Negite is located. It shouldn’t be a problem to get us there with these crystals.’

He looked at the five Flexocrystals chosen by his disciple that currently lied in the palms of his hands, each of them being roughly the size of an apple and with an elongated octahedron shape. While having the light sapphire blue color he knew very well, these were less refined than the ones he was used to seeing. Nonetheless, they seemed to be of a sufficient quality to cross the distance in question and that was all the Viktar needed. Bara did not yet seem quite convinced, however.

‘-You have no idea what part of the city we’ll wind up in, though, right?’

It was pointless to lie to the young woman about that as she needed to be keenly aware of the kind of danger she was putting herself in by joining the former Distroya – something she probably could not fully grasp at the moment.

‘-In truth, Bara, I don’t. As I have never been to Negite or any of the cities near it, I do not know what awaits us there one bit. What I hope we will find is a small number of enemies and a great many allies to join us. That is what I pray for as well, even while speaking to you at this moment. I suggest you do the same.’

‘-As a veteran servant of Order, Arit … would you say praying helps? Does God hear us? And if he does, are the prayers to him answered?’

The honesty between the two ran out again and it was time to resort to lying – an act that Tiar hated to admit he was slowly getting used to. Akin to the other times where his lies were meant to comfort his companion, he forced a smile on his face as he answered Bara’s question.

‘-Of course he does, child. He hears them all. But you must surely be aware by now that many pray for horrible things to happen. If all their prayers were answered, what would become of our cosmos? It is God’s choice alone which prayers to answer and which not to and whatever he chooses is always right because he alone knows all, including all the right choices to be made.’

The lie succeeded in comforting the Junior Griffin Slayer, her teacher placing four of the Flexocrystals in a circle around him, giving the female almeya that stepped within the circle a hand then. After a few moments of insecurity she took his hand or rather a part of it as it was three times the size of her own, Tiar holding the last of the crystals in the palm of that hand. He then put Bara’s hand over the crystal, the item starting to shine in brighter shades of blue.

‘-Are you ready, Bara?’

‘-I am.’

‘-Then start praying if you haven’t already.’

Both of them closed their eyes, energy now starting to swirl around them in great quantities, the earth under their feet shaking. Even without seeing it, the Order champion’s sensory abilities allowed him to clearly picture the typhoon of Flexoid – the energy powering the crystals and the one that was going to be used to transport them to Negite – that had now formed within the circle of four crystals.

Steeling his mind to block out every detail of his surroundings, Tiar focused on the location of the New South’s unofficial capital, not even praying at that point as he doubted anyone would answer a prayer from him. Hopefully, Bara’s prayers would be better received and would yield a more positive result. Whether it was so or not would soon be confirmed as the Flexoid typhoon reached it energy peak, in that moment the ground under the companions’ feet disappearing.

Still feeling the pink-skinned beauty’s hand on the crystal in his palm, her teacher found himself floating amid an empty and silent space, his dread of what would follow now taking full hold of him. And as he would realize within seconds, that dread was very well-founded.

What the Viktar first felt after the successful teleportation was no ground under his feet and no air entering his nostrils or mouth. Instead there was only a single thing all around, which judging by the density and the taste was most likely water.

Of course teleporting in the middle of water was not what he had expected, but that was far from the main issue at hand. Right after his mind registered he was in water, his body experienced the most immense amount of pain it had in a very long time. It was as if he had been put in a pool of fire, his flesh starting to melt away with the same speed as the one of all the corpses he and Bara had burned back in her home.

Only once had water brought him such nerve-wrecking agony – when he had been captured by a group of enemies during war and boiled alive in Order water. Being a Distroya back then, he had survived without suffering permanent damage due to the rapid response of the trusted healers he was taken to. However, at the current time he was so overwhelmed by the pain that he could no longer dwell on the past.

If Order water had managed to hurt him so much before, what he was submerged in now was surely Chaos water, the difference being that he had been held by force under that poisonous water to all Chaos champions back then. There was nothing holding him in this hellish pool now, so with a single thrust he emerged halfway above the water with a thunderous roar of soul-crushing torment.

The moment of reprieve he enjoyed allowed him to clear his mind and remember Bara was with him, which meant she had most likely also fallen in the Chaos water. As a result of the Order energy she carried within, she would be at least half as vulnerable as him to the liquid of terror, but it was highly unlikely that she had ever experienced so much pain and would therefore be unable to escape the pool herself.

Not being able to see her with his eyes, he searched for the almeya with his hand, grasping hers amid the water, yanking her above it and straining himself further despite the throbbing pain to throw her out of the pool. He might have hurt her with the amount of force used for his throw, but staying in the water would’ve been much more fatal, which meant there was no time to be delicate.

With the disciple’s safety being assured, the teacher could also crawl out of the Chaos-infused fluid that burned him to the very core of his soul. The moment his body lost any contact with the water, the pain started subsiding, Tiar realizing what true relief meant then. He had felt a bit better after partially coming out of the water, but now that he was completely free of it, the feeling was akin to being reborn.

The damage the water had done to him was still plenty hurtful, of course, but as a battle-hardened warrior who had been wounded on occasions too numerous to count, the level of the pain post exiting the pool was something he could cope with. Due to that, his mind started regaining its proper focus just as his vision fully cleared so he could study his surroundings. First and foremost, he needed to know what the reason for being teleported in a pool of Chaos water was, then – if whether he and Bara had successfully reached Negite or not.

To be precise, the two hadn’t fallen in a pool, but inside a big fountain. All of it was bronze-made, having seven statues placed inside, six of them being smaller with only the central one standing taller than the rest. All seven were female almeyas dressed in tunics, each one’s body being chained, their arms holding a star with a different number of points high above their heads while looking up with a hope-filled expression. The number of points ranged from four to ten, the central statue holding the ten-pointed one, the Chaos water filling the inside of the fountain flowing precisely from a hole in each of the stars.

As for the surroundings of the fountain, in terms of structures it stood at the center of a circular plaza with triangular pavement stones that were mainly magenta in color, only the outlines being yellow. The exception to that were the black pavement stones which one would imagine formed a decagram around the fountain when looking at the plaza from the sky. Between some of the points of that star and at the edges of the plaza were placed six tall black obelisks that had golden stars attached to them, the number of points for each of them matching the one for the statues in the fountain with the exception of the central one.

Lastly, in terms of the situation unfolding on that plaza at present, thousands of almeyas – men, women and children – were gathered there, held in close ranks by hundreds of Chaos Harpies. An equal number of the harpies were male and female, the feathers of their wings, their hair and most of the skin on their eagle-like legs being black while the rest of their skin was magenta, their iris-less and pupil-less eyes burning in bright red while their revealing armor shined in gold. Everyone’s attention was directed toward the group of harpies gathered in front of the fountain, six chained almeyas – four men and two women – having been brought to their knees there while another male almeya stood next to them. This looked like a public execution of members of the local elite if judging by their resplendent clothes, the harpies that seemed to have control over this region having orchestrated the event. An event now interrupted by Tiar and Bara’s arrival.

Tens of harpies had spread their wings and flown straight at the two that had now escaped from the fountain’s waters to quickly dispose of them in order to continue the execution while the Viktar had been analyzing the circumstances, suddenly being left with no time to think. But there was still enough time left to be shocked as another interruption occurred just before the servants of Chaos reached the weakened Order duet.

Claps echoed as bursts of bright green smoke filled the air in mere seconds, dark blue particles falling down amid that smoke, each particle exploding in a mini-blast that combined azure and pale green upon touching a Chaos Harpy. None of the almeyas around were affected by this, clearly the weapon used for the attack being Order-based so as to damage only those bound to that Great Power’s opposite. And the ones who had fired them were the hordes of herkleri soldiers that had just appeared on the plaza, one in particular standing out amid the rest as he was carrying a herkleri boy on his shoulders.

Tiar recognized both the soldier and the boy he carried – they were part of the same group he had saved two days past – the last prince of Herklera and his loyal guardians. Even though it hadn’t gone as planned, someone had indeed sent a message to the peoples of Yut on that day that the end of the rule of Chaos over the dimension is near. The boy prince was the one who had done that, simultaneously repaying his debt to the Griffin Slayer and officially starting the rebellion of Order.