The memories I regained from unsealing two more chain links, were surreal. My head hurt when I they first revealed themselves to me, and I saw impossible infinite shapes, colors without names, and a space that bent in itself. Then, the scenery changed to something more comprehensible, and my head stopped hurting.
I saw entire worlds floating in a multicolored space, as many of them as there were stars in the skies, and before each of these worlds, stood one figure, or a group of figures, all very distinct, and all staring at me astonishingly, and I couldn’t tell if they were incredibly tall people, or if the worlds they guarded were incredibly small, for the continents and seas and everything in them could fit in a single hand of those beings.
One of the beings in particular, a vaguely man-like one without a face, and using traditional leather and fur clothes, with many arrows and knives made out of stone and bones floating around him, had his arms crossed and said:
“And now, you fall. World Ender, the tormented one. And a new age begins… Where creation belongs to all, to the lowest worlds.”
*
After finishing teacher Visck Cera, I reported my fight to Mari and the others, and though that problem had been dealt with, we still had lots of work to do in Blizz’s village: Mari spoke with the three elders, and managed to convince them to open to the rest of the world a little more, and even send more promising students to the Bear Mountain the next year, so they could face their threats eye to eye, and she even traveled to the red masks village and convinced them to at least accept a temporary truce in between the competing settlements under the condition that Blizz’s tribesmen wouldn’t use the reed masks’ corpses as their puppets. Splash, Dust, and I helped the Frozen Blood, and the Skull Helmet clan members to cut ice from the frozen sea, and rebuild their destroyed buildings, as well as give back the cadavers of the red masks to their tribe of origin.
All this work took us a few days to complete, but it was finally time to go back to the Bear Mountain, and then we walked back through the snow. And I had lots of things in mind.
I started to think that, maybe, Mari was right. Maybe all I needed was a job, something to which I could focus my mind on, and dedicate myself to. Life in the village, as a student, as a friend, and even life as a clan member, I had failed them all, but, perhaps, as a fraternity member, I had found my place. I was… good at it. I was even starting to have fun.
“Here we are, now let’s see if the others have succeeded in dealing with the Council Members”, Mari said as we reached back the portal to the Bear Mountain.
We touched the flickering line, and showed up in a completely different place, in a forest of sparse trees in between a large settlement, and a grass plain that extended itself to the base of a huge bear carcass the size of a mountain.
We walked towards those teaching grounds with caution, but it didn’t take long for the wind to carry to us excited screams of rooting fans, and sounds of drums and flutes, and of people having fun, and then we caught a glimpse of the myriad of sports being played, food being distributed, and strangers walking all around the Bear Mountain. The Great Games had started without incidents, we had successfully stopped the Moon Mirror Order! I had been successful for once…!
“Welp, it seems everything went according to the plan”, Mari pointed with a smile on her face. Looking over her shoulders and at me, she continued: “Hey, Coyote, sweety, your friends would compete in the games to try to increase their ranks, right? You can go watch the matches, perhaps you’re lucky and get a glimpse at them playing?”
“N-No, I’m sure they’re fine. Plus, we need to report our victory to the others.”
Aspen hit me on my shoulder, and with the shadow of a smile on his face, he commented: “What, you have done all the hard work again. At least let us help you with something too.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll take full responsibility for the accuracy of the report!”, Spash said, raising a thumb up.
“Yeah, just go have some fun!”, Dust said with a large smile on her face, resting both hands behind her head.
“…Thanks, guys. I’ll go root for my friends, then.”
Somehow, suddenly having a job I could do, I felt like I could appreciate the calm moments more, and so I walked through the festival that was happening in between the hinder legs of the Bear Mountain with tranquility, stopping to see what was happening at each sport’s court, and I even got a tasty toasted corn as courtesy from someone else of the Prea Order.
It wasn’t hard to find where Ike and Spruce would be competing, however, as the biggest arena in the school had spells flying upwards and exploding in the air. If there was somewhere in which shamans could prove they deserved more respect, that would be it.
I walked around the stone T-shaped court, and found my way through the vibrating crowd, moving forward and closer to the front of the lines of people to have a better view. Meanwhile, I could hear the organizers screaming and hyping up the viewers even more: “Welcome, welcome, everyone! To the annual Great Games of the Bear Mountain! And to the shaman fights!”, the crowd erupted in cheers, and I could barely squeeze through the people. “A particular event full of bloodshed, spells, and action! Some people even lose their lives during this… Magical Tournament! And this year’s opening event will be a huge team battle! Multiple duos will fight against one another until there’s only one left! Then, without further ado… Let the games begin!”
As soon as the narrator finished his speech, walls of intense wind started to blow in between the spectators’ seats, and the arena, and even before reaching the edge of the seats, I could see fireballs and other spells hitting the wall, and being carried away without doing any harm to the viewers.
As I was being pushed and pulled to this side and that side by the sea of people, I could only catch glimpses of what was going on the battlefield; people getting hit by blunt spears, fireballs targeting arms and legs, Manitou being manipulated to create holes and walls, but all of this happening to strangers.
“We are already halfway through the event! As expected, it is a chaotic battlefield, and few are the ones able to stand up and fight to the end! Right now, as I speak, even more competitors are falling off this competition in great style!”
When I finally got to the front rows of the viewers, there were only three people standing still in the arena, with many more being carried away by the staff of the Bear Mountain with all sorts of wounds in them. The three competitors? Ike, Spruce, and a hooded third one.
Right as I was about to scream their names, to root for them, to show, that though I had distanced myself from them, I still considered them friends, they dashed towards their last remaining opponent.
Then, their heads exploded.
