It was his first night that he could sleep through peacefully, ever since they left Grainwick.

  Morning came too quickly, with David’s body rejecting the signals to wake up. The exhaustion of their travel was only really now catching up to him.

  He turned to the side, and raised his brow. Aura and Bert were gone. Sophie was already up, washing herself with a wet cloth over a bucket, with her naked back to the bed.

  David rolled over to face the wall, giving her some privacy.

  “Marco, wake up!” A girl’s voice sounded out.

  He woke up to hands shaking his shoulders. How long was I out? He opened his eyes, only to see it was already past noon. Sophie was kneeling over him with an annoyed expression.

  “Honestly, Aura and Bert have been working since dawn and I can't even wake you up.” She said. “We’ve got so much to do before they’re back.”

  His groggy eyelids still half-closed, David nodded and got up. He grabbed a slice of bread and started chewing on it. “We can go now.”

  Sophie raised a brow, but shrugged.

  They left for the city.

  There were shops with groceries almost immediately outside their building. It was… convenient. The area they lived in felt like a city within a city. A separate entity, almost.

  It felt like they were purposefully sorting out refugees from ‘normal’ people.

  The grocery shop wasn’t much to talk about. It had little to pick from, mostly boraks and some talups.

  Sophie was familiar with them, so they grabbed a bit of each, enough for a few days, and brought them back to the room.

  Next stop? Merchant’s guild.

  As soon as they stepped outside the ‘refugee area’ of the city, everything around them changed dramatically. The city looked and even felt rich. Not to say that everyone on the streets was affluent, but they didn’t seem to be struggling.

  The merchant’s guild was an opulent place with a square of free space in front of the entrance. Many people moved to and from, some carrying stacks of notes, others clinking bags. There were few carrying larger objects or even dead animals.

  The whole crowd parted before one man, who was carrying two carcasses of furry animals. David didn’t have to wonder why for long.

  As soon as they were closer to him, an unbelievable stench hit their noses. What are those? Skunks?

  They didn’t look the part, but they definitely smelled it. David made a mental note to avoid such animals in the future, and together with Sophie, they approached the guild.

  The building was ornate, with multiple marble pillars. But they never made it close. In the middle of the square stood a broad man in chainmail, checking over people.

  As soon as he spotted David and Sophie, he took one look at their armbands and stepped in their way.

  “This is a citizen only area.” His eyes were sharp and his hand was already resting atop his sword scabbard. “No refugees.”

  They were both stupefied. Not wanting to risk any further troubles, they quickly stepped away from the square.

  “What now? How will we make money if we can’t even walk in there?” David asked, equal measure anxious and annoyed.

  “I don’t know.” Sophie sighed. “Maybe we’ll just go gathering and let Aura figure that out?”

  David didn’t like that idea, but couldn’t think of anything better. His chest tightened. The city really was segregated. And we’re on the wrong side of it.

  They were about to go back home until a woman approached them. She was dressed in a completely unassuming way, someone you wouldn’t look twice at in the crowd. Brown hair, pretty face with sharp cheekbones.

  “You kids got anything to sell?” She asked

  “Maybe. Who are you?” David immediately took initiative. This could be their chance.

  “No one important, just a kind soul looking to help.” She smiled, “I could sell things for you at the guild… for a small fee.”

  Sophie’s face lit up a bit and she was about to respond, but David squeezed her hand. Alarm bells were ringing in his head.

  She could be an undercover guard looking to jail them. Or a robber who would take all their stuff and run away.

  Or, she could be telling the truth… David shook his head.

  “We don’t have anything, sorry, we were just looking around.” He said, “We’ll find you if we get anything, though.”

  “Aye, you do that.” The woman looked amused with his response. “Just remember, without me, you won’t get a single coin in the city.”

  She walked away, nonchalantly.

  David stared after her, trying to bore her image into his retinas. If, after careful observation, she turned out to be honest… That would be a saving grace for them.

  But as she grew further and further away, David was having a hard time focusing on her. It felt as if she was dissolving into the crowd.

  He focused his sight and noticed a slight shimmer of mana around her - strong enough to stand out from the crowd.

  He remembered the coloration and the intensity of her mana, just in case. Would be a tragedy if they approached someone else by mistake.

  “What was that about?” Sophie’s words brought David back to the present. “She wanted to help us!” She stared at him.

  But she did trust him enough to not interrupt in front of the woman.

  “It could be a ruse. Or a sting.” He said.

  Sophie tilted her head. Having lived in a smaller, tight-knit village, she might not be too familiar with scammers.

  “Sometimes people pretend to help you to steal from you.” He said in a hushed voice. “Or make you commit a crime.”

  Sophie took a second to think. “Let’s just go gathering then. Unless you have some plan?”

  “Not much of one. We’ll try to find her again later.”

  Sophie nodded and they walked toward the gates.

  The guards at the walls gave one look at their armbands and let them through. They walked past the entry tunnel and out into the field.

  The refugee camp didn’t change much in the day. There was still a queue for entry and the general despair filled the air like miasma.

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  David clutched Sophie’s hand a little tighter and pulled her forward - towards the forest. In opposition to him, she was really taking the refugee situation personally.

  Soon they left the muddied path and started walking toward the forest on a beaten path, passing some workers along the way.

  Once they reached the forest, Sophie picked up two longer, thicker branches to use as walking sticks and a first-response weapon.

  This close to the city, it should be safe… but you never knew.

  Leaves rustled softly underfoot as he and Sophie stepped over a moss-covered log.

  David glanced back toward the thick canopy. “Think we’re far enough?”

  He didn’t want to get lost. Again.

  Sophie didn’t respond immediately. She was scanning the layers of bark, soil, and leaf—a professional in her workspace.

  David caught a clump of mana shimmering faintly nearby. “There,” he murmured, stepping off to the side.

  “How?” Sophie followed but voiced her hesitation. “How did you see it before me? Again?”

  “It glows a little. Bert told you I can see mana, right?” David said.

  “Ah right, that.” She nodded. “Then how come we’re finding so little?”

  “I’m trying my best, but everything’s picked clean.” He crouched beside the bush. “It’s just voel. Damn.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Don’t go cursing the plant. Just because it was common around Grainwick doesn’t mean it’s the same here.”

  He nodded, fingers already moving to pinch the leaves with care. “I’m not holding my breath, though.”

  He grabbed his knife, cut the stems, then held the leaves upside-down until the juice stopped flowing.

  Sophie knelt beside him. “Can’t you guide us to something rare and expensive?”

  “It’s not foolproof,” David said. “Mana is everywhere, and it’s hard to tell things apart.”

  “Well, we’ll be happy with anything at this point.”

  “Even monsters?” David pointed deeper into the forest. “The stronger mana sources are all far away from the city.”

  “It’s just a forest. I’ve spent most of my life inside one.” Her shaking shoulders betrayed her words. “Do you have better ideas? So far we haven’t even made enough for today’s dinner.”

  David tried hard to come up with something. Anything that didn’t involve imminent death… But drew a blank.

  After a short silence, Sophie spoke again.

  “You’ll lead us there and I’ll protect you. And if…” she took a deeper breath, “if we have to, we run.”

  When it was Sophie saying this—after all she’d been through—David just had to agree.

  If I’d been as resilient as her… would I still be alive and back on Earth?

  A stinging phantom pain appeared in his neck. David’s hand instinctively reached for it—but stopped.

  Sophie raised her brows, but he played it off as scratching.

  “Well, if you feel like it, I guess we can go,” David said, forcing a smile. “But I’ll be doing the protecting!” He bashed a fist against his chest.

  Sophie rolled her eyes and chuckled. “Well then, lead on, mister protector.”

  He focused on the distant mana sources.

  Hopefully, he would be able to discern plants from monsters ahead of time.

  They continued deeper. Patches of ground had clearly been disturbed—freshly turned soil, snapped stems.

  Signs of animal activity.

  Sophie sighed. “If we go much farther, we’ll need a map back.”

  David didn’t answer. He was focused again, this time on a silvery-blue hue poking from behind a low stone.

  He pointed it out, and Sophie quickly harvested the narrow-stalked plant.

  “Tern. It’s pretty useful,” she muttered. “We’ll have to check what the market’s paying.”

  “Useful?” David asked, his eyes darting around.

  “It helps with fevers.”

  They pressed on, more wary with each step. David kept scanning—every signature he checked could be a monster.

  Every rustle of the leaves sounded like a prowling monster.

  Nothing happened. Not yet.

  This is bad for my heart.

  He shook his head, about to try and relax a bit.

  And then he saw it.

  Across the clearing, atop a flat stone, sat a two-tailed fox. Its fur gleamed like fire—both beautiful and dangerous. It stared directly at him.

  David froze.

  For an instant, the forest was gone.

  His mind was somewhere else; facing the giant fox.

  Blood-soaked. Screaming. Visions of brutal demise permeating his being.

  He remembered the terror. The helplessness.

  The fox blinked once and turned away, slinking into the brush as if uninterested.

  Sophie didn’t even notice it.

  David exhaled slowly, trying to calm his heart, and continued forward without a word.

  When did he grow so paranoid? It was just an animal.

  They were very close to one of the larger mana sources he could pinpoint.

  They walked around a massive tree. Grass crunched under David’s foot.

  He jumped back, startled by the sound of his own making. The ground felt brittle here.

  Sophie stopped just as suddenly, eyes wide. “Ice blossoms?”

  They followed the frozen trail around a rock, where tiny crystalline flowers bloomed, freezing the ground in little rings beneath them.

  The air shimmered faintly with cold, fighting against the spring-like weather that dominated the rest of the forest.

  “So beautiful,” David muttered. They were similar to firebloom—just as enchanting to look at. He could see the mana pulsing in the air, siphoning back into the flowers.

  “They are,” she agreed. “and they’re worth a lot… if we can get them.”

  “Why wouldn’t we?” David tilted his head. “Didn’t you gather some ice somethings for mom?”

  She reached out, but as she got close to the plant, she inhaled sharply and retracted her hand.

  “Those are different. They protect themselves with that cold,” she said. “You need a special cream from coiling ivy to harvest them.”

  They both looked around. For once, the damn weed was nowhere to be found.

  And it used to be so abundant near their village.

  I’m not giving this prize up, anyway.

  He stepped forward to see for himself.

  As his hand entered the frost aura, he felt an intense prickle… but it didn’t feel like cold. No—it was something David was intimately familiar with.

  He forced himself to bear the pain, keeping his hand close. The zone was infusing mana into him as he drew near, causing damage similar to miscontrolled energy during training.

  No wonder Sophie couldn’t bear it.

  “Anything specific we need to do to harvest it correctly?” he asked.

  “Just pluck it. The flowers are the important part.” She said, her brows knit with worry.

  David paused, focused. He pulled mana back from his arm, accepting and redirecting the energy coming off the flower. He let it flow through him, then dissipate—slowly.

  Steadily, his hand reached the first stem. He plucked it. Then another.

  “How—wait! Don’t pick more than two-thirds.” Sophie was confused but still gave crucial instruction.

  David stepped back with a veritable bouquet in his hand. Once plucked from the earth, the blossoms stopped exuding their aura—but their vibrant mana signatures didn’t dim. He carefully placed them in his satchel.

  Finally something he could do well.

  “Marco? What did you do?” Sophie seemed more puzzled than amazed. A pity.

  “It wasn’t cold, but mana,” he explained, puffing out his chest slightly. “I learned how to deal with things like that when practicing alchemy with Aura.”

  Shit. I should have said ‘Mom’. He caught himself too late.

  His mind lapsed in the short moment of panic and the mana he was currently moving around rushed back into his arms.

  A stinging pain then… nothing? He looked down toward his hands.

  Nonononono.

  His claws grew. Just a tiny bit, but they did. And they were visible.

  He clasped his hands behind his back, the sharp tips biting into his palm like needles.

  “That’s great.” Her eyes dropped to the ground, her shoulders hunched. “I’m glad. We’ll have something to show for today.”

  Luckily, Sophie didn’t seem to notice, neither the slip nor his weird behavior. “We keep going?”

  What do I do?

  If the claws grew from mana… maybe I can siphon it back out?

  “Yeah,” Sophie said, turning away from him. Out of the corner of his eye, David saw her subtly brush at her cheek.

  She’s distracted, I gotta hurry.

  He closed his eyes and focused hard on the sensation in his fingers.

  Nothing.

  He tried harder, imagining a vacuum in his fingertips; a place the mana couldn’t stay.

  Yes! It worked. The claws, miniscule as they were, receded.

  He took another glance at Sophie, just to make sure she wasn’t looking back yet.

  Was she crying? He couldn’t tell. Maybe she just needed a moment. That worked for him.

  He peeked at his hand and there they were. His nails. Normal, human nails.

  That’s amazing. No more filing them down… I need to experiment with this later.

  The day was still young and making money took precedence over personal revelations.

  They had to push on and gather lots.