After their short conversation, Hyejoon had left Baeri alone, knowing that she probably needed some time to process the information she had given her. The elf had been thankful for this piece information. She had felt the relief wash over her. The town hadn’t been massacred like the Dragon temple. Baeri felt empathy for her childhood friend. Chaima didn’t deserve to see that horrible scene, but she was glad she wasn’t in her place. Although the girl didn’t express it, Baeri knew that the pyrokinetic must be thinking about the deceased. Though the girl’s cheerful personality didn’t allow her to show any remorse, or misery. Baeri sighed clearing her mind from the haze of thoughts. Sorting them out didn’t work. The hurricane of emotions would just throw them apart anyway, no matter how many times she would try to overcome the difficult trial of sorting and organising. Knowing this and knowing she lacked the patience to do so, Baeri gave up and found herself gazing at the star again. Her star.

Once again Baeri heard shuffling in the night. This time not from the camp but from the forest in front of her. Narrowing her eyes lightly, the girl rose to her feet as silent as possible and reached for the knife at the back of her belt. Her eyes sought the source of the sound, but it was silent. The shuffling had disappeared completely. Baeri waited, without making a sound. Even her breathing had grown silent as her fighter’s instinct kicked in. Her ears twitched upon sensing the footsteps nearby. A little more to the left of where she was staring at. Taking a dagger, the elf’s hand moved swiftly, throwing it right towards the source. Her target moved, rushing to the right and also right towards her. Baeri jumped forward as well, with her knife in front of her, ready to take on anyone or anything that faced her. Just as she landed though, she was unable to hear or sense a presence nearby. The lingering eerie sensation of being stared at remained, sending a cold tingle down her spine.

Baeri had the feeling that the person was staring at her from behind and higher up. Upon realising where her target might be, the girl turned around instantly, lifting her eyes up the bark of the tree she had been leaning against moments ago. And just like she had expected, she could see a pair of eyes glimmering in the night. The hand she held the knife in swayed backwards before her arm whipped forward, accurately aiming at the figure. She heard the knife pierce the tree’s bark with a thud. The eyes had disappeared once again. Baeri looked down quickly, finding the figure charge right at her. She hadn’t even heard it land nor its steps. Taken aback, the healer jumped back, bracing herself for numbing this figure with her abilities. The familiar eyes she was met with held her back. Baeri was forced to suppress her shock and dodged the attack by stepping aside and turning. She got hold of the figure’s arm, twisted it and threw it to the ground. Upon feeling herself pushed back into the air and eventually on the ground, Baeri let out a gasp. The girl scowled at the person on top of her, growling her demand.

“Lee Gikwang, get your off me right now.”

The laughter that rang in her ears, was the push to make her anger explode.

“I’m serious. Don’t touch me.”

The seriousness in her voice, had startled Gikwang but also made the young man curious. He released her, kneeling behind the girl and also offered her a hand to get up.

“Hey? Everything all right?” The dark haired asked her.

With a grunt Baeri grabbed Gikwang’s hand and sat up. She glared right into the boy’s eyes, her determination to stay angry fading with seeing the concern he expressed towards her.

“Yeah,” she managed to voice out. “I guess.”

Baeri got up to her feet again, looking down at her crouching friend. Her eyebrow rose as she again stared down at the boy with a warning expression.

“Don’t you ever do that again. It scared the hell out of me!”

Gikwang stared up at the girl for a while, wondering what was on her mind. She had even admitted that she was scared, which was a very rare thing to occur. Where had the confident jumpy elf gone?

“Are you sure, you’re okay?” Gikwang inquired once more, as he as well rose to his feet.

“I think I just need to rest, I guess,” she responded to his question.

Gikwang noticed how the girl avoided his gaze, but kept his stare on her.

“Well…” he started again. “I’m here to take over the watch, so go ahead.”

Baeri nodded, muttering a thanks before slowly stalking away. Gikwang followed her a few steps in order to take a hold on her arm. The healer stopped immediately and turned back, with questioning and rather annoyed gaze. She hadn’t meant it, but for some reason she was really sensitive. Baeri remembered why she tended to avoid Gikwang’s eyes when she wasn’t quite her usual self. The beast tamer’s puppy eyes, staring right at hers, made her talk about whatever was on her mind one way or another. She didn’t know how he managed to, but in the end she would get everything off her chest and he would listen. Without a word he would listen with a usual reacting hum, either in understanding or to let her know he was listening, that her words had reached him. Once again the little anger in her faded and Gikwang’s intense stare caused it to melt down even before his words did.

“You know, you can always talk to me right?”

It wasn’t a question, but a statement. Baeri nodded and felt Gikwang’s hand loosen and eventually slide down her skin, until it dropped completely. The last thing she saw, was his soft compassionate smile, before completely turning away and returning to her tent. As silently as she could, Baeri crawled to her side of the tent, lying down on the cloth that was supposed to be her matras. She pulled her trenchcoat over her, while wearing her body warmer. A few more minutes she recalled the scene with Gikwang and the last words he whispered to her. Gikwang’s smile was the last thing she saw, before her mind drifted into the numb darkness that was sleep. There hadn’t been much time for Baeri to rest. The bright sun greeted the group in the morning, forcing it’s light through the thin material of the tent and with a groan, the girl who lacked sleep stretched out like a cat, before doing a failed attempt in sitting up and rubbing her eyes in her current position instead. She heard noises from outside, along with the familiar male voices she recognised as her friends. Feeling dizzy she rolled around a bit more. When a powerful ray of light fell directly on her face, she groaned audibly in complaint and covered her face with her coat before rolling to her other side, making her back face the opening of the tent.

“Baeri, Chaima, get up and get out. It’s almost 10.” Baeri heard Hyejoon’s voice wake them.

Another complaining grunt escaped her before she moved and finally managed to sit up. She quickly packed her belongings, with Chaima following her into an even slower pace, before grabbing their bags and heading out of the tent. With a touch of his hand, Doojoon returned the tents to their original state as trees, plants and the other material he had used to create their shelter with. Baeri yawned and the realisation that the man’s alchemy was very useful in all kinds of situations. When the scent of fire and food reached her nose, Baeri looked around and snapped completely awake. The girl’s eyes fell on Hyunseung and Dongwoon, who were busy making a breakfast for the group. Both the healer and the pyrokinetic almost ran to the two, with lips curled into satisfied grins and eyes shouting out their hunger. The men had noticed the two from far away and offered them something, before they raided the plate of limited nutrition for a group of nine.

The small moment of peace was soon ruined, by a familiar growling and howling. Gikwang’s back straightened as he sniffed the air, alerted of danger. Second to notice the disturbance was Chaima, whose natural instincts sensed the malice from the distance. The others had noticed their friends strange behaviour, before realising what could be up. Hyejoon questioningly stared at the leader, who packed some folders and necessities in his pouch before getting up. While some were lucky enough to retrieve their bags, others didn’t even have the chance to look for them as a horde of Vexes invaded the camp. Gikwang and Junhyung stood back to back, repelling several attacks from the artificial life forms. Gikwangs eyes dashed from place to place as he effectively kicked and punched the incoming Vexes out of his sight. He was looking for one particular figure, among the others, but she was the one he couldn’t find. A curse escaped his lips as he grabbed Junhyung’s arm and dove to dodge an attack from three sides they could never have countered. The two started to dash into the forest, followed by the black creatures.

Baeri and Hyunseung had started to run as well. The healer made sure to hold the illusionist’s hand at all times, knowing he had been struck by a Vex. His hip had a nasty cut and it had made running difficult for him. While escaping from the huge group of creatures she tried to patch up the wound as best as she could. It had been the first time to concentrate on so many things at the same time and the quality of her healing was only a quarter of what she was capable of normally and it would probably take long for it to heal. She could see evident proof of pain in her friend’s expression, but her attempts into numbing the pain were failed. She was scared to paralyse him if she tried to do more and instead focussed on patching up the wound instead. A curse escaped her as she got pulled around a tree and a large boulder to their left. She eyed Hyunseung and he was scanning the area, as the sweat dripped down his forehead. Baeri thought she saw his eyes lit up, discovering something. And he had. The man threw the elf into the tree, surprising her as she let out a yelp.

From the first branch Baeri saw what Hyunseung had seen. They could climb up a steep hill and hopefully stay out of the Vexes’ reach for a while. She turned around and hung down to offer Hyunseung a hand. He accepted it quickly and made a small leap. The jump had put a lot of pressure on his injury and he winced visibly. The girl pulled him up with all her strength rapidly when spotting a Vex that had jumped towards Hyunseung. It’s claws managed to slice into the skin of his leg, before the man was out of its reach. Baeri urged for Hyunseung to climb higher first as she touched the wound, sealing it’s surface to prevent more blood loss. His jeans had already been stained with the blood he had lost from both wounds. From there the two climbed from branch to branch, followed by the vicious creatures that snarled at them. Once they finally reached the rock, Baeri kicked the highest branch with all the strength she could muster up in her legs repeatedly. It took a while for the thick branch to give in and detach from the bark. The gravity pulled it down, making it fall on the climbing Vexes. Some creatures managed to climb past it, but were unable to reach the two in their high spot. It gave the healer some time to patch up Hyunseung before they started running again.

Just like how the group split up into, the horde of Vexes split along with them tailing their preys with only one mission. Elimination. A group that had less difficulties with escaping from the Vexes and instead, decided to take on as many as they could, were Chaima and Dongwoon. Chaima’s fire and Dongwoon’s gravity manipulation allowed them to defeat their foes more easily than Baeri and Hyunseung’s or Gikwang and Junhyung’s, although they were slightly better off than the former duo. The tallest of the group of nine eyed each other while sharing a high five. They worked well together despite the fact that they rarely did. The increasing amount of Vex corpses that lay lifelessly on the floor before dissolving into dust, were the proof. When the last of their targets were taken down, the two looked around at the destroyed area. There were scratch marks, fallen trees, annihilated animals. Destruction and chaos was everywhere around them, but their friends were nowhere to see.

The last group of escapees was a group of three. Yoseob tailed Doojoon and Hyejoon as he attempted to keep the Vexes as distant as possible for them, by creating barriers and explosive spells along the way as he ran. The two on the front didn’t move much unless they noticed that the spellcaster was having either trouble, or grew tired. Their battle formation was created in a split moment by the decisive leader who created an effective way to escape and take down their enemies. Doojoon had drawn symbols on the backs of his hands and touched a tree to the left and the right of the forest path the ran down. The trees moved as soon as Yoseob passed them, growing vines and thorns big enough to impale a couple of Vexes. Soon they found a river, with water running down quite wildly. Hyejoon glanced at the Alchemist with doubt in her eyes. He simply nodded at her, extracting a grunt from the girl. That was the sign to jump into the water and swim to the current. Yoseob followed them without a single protest. He looked around once to find out that the Vexes didn’t follow them into the water and noted it in mind as it perked his curiosity.