At the start of the attack, Tatsy was lucky enough to run away together with other people. She knew that some allies had to arrive, but she didn't know when. She only knew the direction from which they were about to arrive because she had heard it from Darian and the others.
'If I can tell an animal about this…' thought she as she slowly glanced around with her eyes, trying to see if an animal was somewhere to be seen. Suddenly, a small bird perched not far from the crowd that was running away, and Tatsy luckily spotted him.
'I need to get there.' Tatsy tried to reach the small animal by passing through the crowd. 'Birds usually fly away when I get next to them… I think I need to use one of my spells.' The bird remained confused, watching Tatsy getting closer to him; the moment he was about to fly away, Tatsy used one of her spells.
"Animal Companion." This spell lets Tatsy choose an animal that can't get away from her anymore, it is obliged to get close to her and listen to every command she gives it.
The moment the bird flew onto Tatsy's shoulder, she immediately touched his head with her finger and started to speak directly into his mind: "Go in that direction. You should be able to find some people, just try everything to bring them here." After Tatsy finished speaking, the bird immediately flew toward the direction she had told him.
"Please find them…" Tatsy could only pray and hope that the bird she obliged to go and find the humans would return safely.
"It's late, guys. We should rest here," said Tauren to Kael and Enea next to him. "I agree. To be honest, I'm a bit tired and we don't know for how much longer we need to keep walking," said Kael as he sat down on the sand. Enea sat slowly and silently, far from the others, remaining alone.
"So Eros told you that it should take around six days for us to get there, right?" asked Kael, worried that they might not arrive in time. "Exactly, but considering the fact that we have walked faster than usual…" Tauren grabbed something from his backpack, it was a map.
"If I am correct, we should have recently surpassed the ruins of this small village… soon we will reach this other place, in which Yalemba is built." This map was really old, it was over 300 years old. It had been created even before Yalemba was built and all the grass appeared in that small part.
"So the moment we pass this small river, we should be able to reach Yalemba, right?" asked Kael. Tauren nodded his head. "Exactly. The southernmost part of this map…" Tauren marked the spot with his hand, "is where Yalemba is built… Enea, are you ready?" asked Tauren. Enea gasped in surprise, scared.
"Re-Ready? I don't kn-know… but I'll try." Enea was looking down while he felt awkward; he didn't know what to say, so he turned silent again.
"Remind me, why did we bring him along with us?" Kael whispered into Tauren's ear, trying not to be heard by Enea. "I've told you: Jaune and Nysira are training the new recruits, and Bianca, as always, is somewhere around the world… I know that he just joined the Shakurn, but trust me when I say that he is ready to fight and help us."
Kael made a sort of confused face. 'He hasn't even told me what his power can do… well, I hope he will be enough.' Enea remained silent, watching toward the horizon; it didn't feel like he was able to hear them.
"Well, guys, tomorrow we should be able to reach Yalemba. We should rest now," said Tauren. Before any of them could fall asleep, they heard the tweet of a bird. All of them looked up because it wasn't a natural tweet, it felt weird.
The moment the bird spotted the humans, he immediately dived toward them. "What?" Tauren remained confused the moment the bird perched in his hand, he was tweeting as if something bad had happened, and it wasn't normal.
Kael immediately got closer to him to understand what was happening. "What is it, Tauren?" asked Kael. Enea gasped again, scared.
"What is it? I'm scared, everyone," said he, almost shouting and covering his ears because of the sudden mess created by the bird.
While the bird was tweeting, he was moving his head and wings, it felt like he was telling them to move in that direction.
"Is he telling us to go that way…?" Kael, confused, watched the bird, trying to figure something out, but the only thing they were able to see was him pointing at something with his wings.
Tauren, with a serious face, immediately got up, "Maybe something bad is happening, Everyone, follow me!" shouted Tauren. Kael immediately grabbed everything on the sand and started to run together with Tauren in the same direction the bird was pointing.
"Hey, don't leave me here!" cried out Enea, seeing that the two other males were going away. He immediately got up, too, and started to run.
After some hours, they were able to reach the river. "I don't think that rain is normal…" pointed out Kael. They saw a weird purple rain coming toward them, and the moment they walked closer, they heard some people shouting.
Tauren immediately rushed toward them. "Everyone, calm down! We're here!" shouted Tauren, trying to calm the people in the crowd that had run away from the city, but they weren't hearing them, only a few people did.
"Are you the Alterids from Skar-Zhul?" asked a voice coming from the crowd. It was Tatsy. "How do you know us?" asked Kael, worried.
"Darian told me about you… you have to help them, they are in danger," said Tatsy as she tried to remain calm. The whole city behind her was being destroyed and Kyujin had just risen from the sea.
Enea's shadow seemed like it had become stronger, and seeing all these people in pain and suffering was making him suffer more and more. He had to put his hand on his head and shouted, "AHHHHH!!"
'It's the moment, Enea… doesn't seeing this make you angrier?' Enea heard a voice in his mind, it was talking in a mad way. 'You know what it means to suffer this much… let me in and I'll do everything,' said this other voice. Enea shouted hard; now all the attention in the crowd was toward him.
"Hey, are they outsiders…?"
"Don't tell me… are they here to kill us, too?"
"It's the end, there is nothing we can do!!!"
"WE WILL STOP THEM!" The bravest person walked to the front and got ready to fight against these other humans, but Tauren calmed them.
"Everyone, we don't have time to lose, we immediately need to help the others, we aren't bad people." Tauren tried to defend himself. "Yeah, we came here to help you. Let us pass!" shouted Kael. Enea kept shouting as he was having a sort of mental breakdown.
'C'mon, Enea… you know that without me you aren't able to do anything…' With that, Enea suddenly stopped shouting. It felt like his shadow became bigger, and many negative emotions were flowing from it.
"I called them, everyone! They are here to help us!" shouted Tatsy as, without any fear, she took some steps forward, even surpassing the brave people who had walked to the front.
"You're the one who sent us that bird?" asked Enea. He was talking in a totally different voice than before, he seemed mad and angry. It felt like his whole body was full of negative emotions.
Tatsy nodded her head. "You need to help the others… please," said she as she remained serious. With that, everyone started to run toward the city. "We will divide into three parts… Kael, you go toward that huge purple creature. Enea, you search the city to see if there is someone who needs help, while I…" Tauren spotted Darian about to pass out.
"Enea, I'll reach you in a moment." Tauren rushed toward Darian while the others did exactly what he had asked them.
"Before I die… let me know your name, powerful warrior," asked Archilochus of Kael, who could barely stand on his feet.
"Kael… and you are?" asked him as he tried what he could to remain on his feet.
"Archilochus… don't forget that, because next time I'll win!" shouted Archilochus. Kael gasped, confused. Suddenly, someone who was jumping fast rushed toward them.
Poisudonom grabbed Archilochus's naked body. "Sorry, everyone, we're going away."
"STOP HIM, KAEL!!" shouted Tauren. Both he and Enea were running toward Poisudonom. Kael tried to stop him with his gravity, but his power was so weak that it barely changed things for Poisudonom.
"Now that the rain has stopped, we have to run away… but don't think that this is over, everyone!" With that, Poisudonom was able to free himself from the gravity almost immediately and jumped into the sea next to him. With that, none of them was able to reach them anymore and they escaped from everyone's sight. Before they could realize it, Kyujin escaped, too.
'I have finished, Enea… you can return.' Suddenly, the shadow armor that was covering Enea disappeared and he returned to normal. The moment he snapped back to reality, everything felt so weird for him that he started to scream. "AGHHHH, WHAT IS ALL OF THIS??" shouted he, scared. "I wasn't here before… what is all of this?" Enea shouted, confused. Kael looked at him even more confused.
"Enea has a double personality… once he gets the other one, he is able to use his power. Have you noticed when that happened?" asked Tauren. The two of them started to walk toward the crowd, knowing that the attack was finally over.
"Wait, was it when we encountered the crowd?" asked Kael. "Don't leave me here! I'm scared!" Enea cried out again, reaching Kael and Tauren, who were leaving him there.
"Exactly… Enea has a really sad past. He was in one of the orphanages in Skar-Zhul… and there, things didn't go well." Tauren looked behind. The moment he started to speak again, they heard a voice, Liro was running toward them.
"GUYSSS!!!" shouted Liro, walking closer. "EHHH, IS THAT ANOTHER KRUKIN?!" Enea, scared, immediately covered his face with his hands. Liro remained confused, watching that.
"It's over, Liro. Don't worry… we survived," said Kael, looking around. All the city was destroyed.
All the crowd entered the city again. Some people were mourning the deaths of their relatives, some of them remained in front of their fallen houses. There wasn't anything left in this city, everything had fallen.
Lily and Naluri walked toward Kael, Tauren, and Enea, and they noticed that someone was missing. "Don't tell me…" said Lily with tears in her eyes. Kael, understanding that they might be referring to the one he had hidden before, immediately looked down.
"I'm sorry… I arrived too late." These were the only words that came out of Kael's mouth. He walked toward a place, the same one where he had hidden Garoo's lifeless body, which was still intact, even though it had that huge hole in its stomach.
"GAROOOOO!!" shouted Lily as she immediately ran toward the lifeless body of her friend. Naluri walked slowly, trying to hold back the tears.
"We can't do anything anymore, Lily…" said Naluri as she positioned a hand over the distraught Lily, who couldn't stop crying.
"But… but why did it have to end like this…" Lily smashed her fist on the ground next to Garoo's lifeless body.
"Was it Archie that killed him?" asked Lily with an angry face. "The one with the purple hair? Yes…" answered Kael, looking down, mortified that he couldn't save him in time.
"Garoo told me that he had some suspicions about him… he knew that Archie couldn't be trusted…" Tears kept flowing down Lily's eyes, and she remained there crying over Garoo's lifeless body for almost the entire night.
As another hour passed, the sun was about to set. The moment the sun could be seen again, "Can you please grab Garoo's body? I want at least to bury him somewhere important," asked she, as she was able to dry the tears all over her face.
Tauren, with a sad face, grabbed Garoo's body and followed Lily. Everyone in the town gave a last goodbye to Garoo as he passed through the city. Lily asked Tauren to first walk around the city with his body, she knew how much Garoo loved his city, and she wanted to make him visit the city for one last time. They even brought him to the spot where he usually played his flute. The tree had been completely destroyed, it wasn't there anymore.
Many people followed Tauren and the others from behind, all of them crying because they had lost someone so important to their city. Everyone knew him, they knew him as Garoo the musician. Whenever he played his flute in the main square, all the people gathered around him just to dance together with him. He was able to change the air with just a few notes. He didn't even need to use the bubble that left that chill aroma, he only needed one thing: the music.
Lily walked to the same spot where the old tree had fallen. There wasn't anything there anymore; it had been completely destroyed. "We should bury him here… he loved this tree so much that—that…" Lily couldn't speak anymore as she broke down in tears again.
Kael, helped by Vane, who had regained consciousness just before the start of the walk, dug in the same spot where the tree had been standing. "You know… I read from the diary found in the tower that organic parts from our bodies can be used as fertilizer for the terrain. Maybe his body will give life to another beautiful tree like the one Yalemba had before."
Lily could only speak while they were burying Garoo, her heart was hurting so much that she couldn't hold back her tears anymore. Tauren positioned one of his hands on her shoulder. "I'm sure he will be able to give life to a new, beautiful tree." With that, the moment they completely buried Garoo, Lily positioned the remains of the flute on top of the ground, in the same spot where Garoo's body had been buried.