The Hallowed didn’t go back to the tavern until nightfall. He spent most of the day moving through the town, trying to locate any traces of the perpetrator behind the terror that the town had endured for three years.
When he reached the tavern, he noticed the girl with whom he had spent the previous night serving the guests with a smile on her face, with no traces of worry about being abducted by a terrifying monster that none of them understood or knew anything about. He had a complex gaze as he looked at her from across the room before making his way to the bar.
After giving the room a once over, he went up to his room where he had kept his bag that contained most of his belongings—the more valuable things went inside the leather pouch attached to his side. He quickly went through his bag and grabbed a roll of parchment and a quill from it.
“Not even a fucking desk…” He said with annoyance as he grabbed a small bottle of ink and put it inside his pouch while carrying the quill and parchment downstairs. Before anyone could be affected by his presence, he exited the tavern and went to the side of the tavern, to the stables.
He slowly came up to the stall where his mare was stationed and patted her neck. She whinnied at him, bringing her muzzle close to his face.
“Easy, girl,” Xander said. “I have something for you, okay? Come on, turn to the side a bit.”
The mare turned her head to the side, and Xander unrolled the parchment on her neck, using it as the base to jot down a message. Within a few minutes, he finished up and rolled up the entire roll of parchment before fitting it into a small pocket under the saddle of his mare.
“Look at me,” he said, grabbing the reins of the mare and making it look forward. His eyes gained a gold glow that shone in the darkness, illuminating his mare’s fur. The horse whinnied weakly as its black eyes also turned a mild gold. It blinked, and they returned to the previous black, but with a faint yellow outline around its pupils. At the same time, on its forehead, the insignia of Xander’s school appeared, displaying the intricately designed curled-up dragon.
The Hallowed stepped back and unlocked the stall’s door before leading his mare out.
“You know what to do, girl. Don’t stop; make sure you get there in time.”
The mare snorted in response before breaking into a canter as it expertly made its way out of the city.
“Are you sure about that, Ser Hallowed? We don’t get a lot of horses of such caliber,” a soft feminine voice got Xander’s attention. “To send her away just like that seems like a waste. The first person who sees such a majestic horse on the road will vie to claim it first thing.”
“Did you need something, girl?” Xander asked the girl who had given herself to him the previous night. Whether out of desperation or a will to entangle him with the monster, only she and her father knew.
“It’s already night,” she said. “The people know what’s about to happen. They’ve emptied the tavern.”
“Understandable. Go back, I’ll be with you in a moment. Once you are entangled with such a monster who loves hunting, the only way to deal with it is to kill it. Otherwise, it will chase after you no matter what happens.”
“I’m sorry…” The girl suddenly sobbed. “There was no other way… We thought that the Lord was going to discourage you…”
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“Save it,” Xander said. “Knowing that there is a monster here, I have to take care of it, regardless of the requests of your Castellan. What you did is understandable. You did it in self-preservation. If anything, your actions entangled me with that monster, allowing me to hunt it more easily. Go back and rest. It’s going to be a long night.”
The girl felt a vast distance between her and the man she was talking to. A distance that seemed overwhelmingly insurmountable to her, leaving her wordless and melancholic. Quietly, she retreated as Xander stayed outside the tavern, looking like he had no plans to go back inside for his bag.
Soon, the moons were at their peak, Io in the full moon state that it had shown since the fourth day of the previous month and Leda, invisible and slowly tilting in its axis to show the waxing crescent. At its pace, within a few days, it would be a full moon just like Io. Lastly, the third and current moon, Callisto, cast nothing beyond a faint shadow in the sky in its new moon state that was only visible because of Xander’s enhanced eyesight.
All of a sudden, some kind of mist appeared in Xander’s surroundings, distorting his view of the starry sky. It quickly thickened, significantly reducing his visibility. Xander easily sensed the flow of an ethereal darkness around him as he observed it approaching the tavern. He moved swiftly, unsheathing his sword from its scabbard as he went into the tavern. The mist had already permeated through the building, making it difficult for one to see even the tables and stools in the tavern’s common area.
He quickly made his way upstairs to the only room with the presence of human life. Everyone else had already vacated the tavern, keeping as much distance from the keeper’s daughter. Suddenly, a high-pitched scream came from the room that he was approaching, making him increase his pace significantly as he kicked the door open.
There, sitting on the bed with a terrified expression, was the woman that Xander had just talked to a few hours ago. She had a quilt tightly wrapped around her figure as she looked at the surrounding fog, petrified in her spot.
Xander didn’t offer any words of consolation as his eyes glowed gold, accurately tracing the movements of a dark shadowy energy moving through the fog. It weaved around in intricate patterns, leaving traces of darkness all over the floor, walls, and ceiling as it spread all around.
‘A formation… It truly is a fucking damnatī. This corruption is creating a teleportation circle, with everything inside this room as the target. That’s why they are freely targetting me without hesitation. They won’t have to be worried about Hallowed Plight affecting this region if I am teleported away.’
Xander’s glowing gold eyes moved to focus on the terrified girl in bed and narrowed as his suspicion was confirmed.
‘I have to kill her to prevent this circle from finishing… The strange occurrences that signify the damnatī’s next target stem from its attempts at forming an interface.’
Even if Xander used his aura to interfere with the coalescing darkness, it would keep going and recover as long as the medium lived.
“We are going be teleported to an unknown location, do you understand, girl?”
“Susan…” She squeaked out.
“What?”
“My name… It’s Susan. I told it to you before.”
“It doesn’t fucking matter, come here and give me your hand. This formation will complete in any second now.”
Despite her shaking legs, Susan slowly made her way to Xander. By now, the mist had covered the room completely, making it nigh impossible to see anything. The only way she could navigate through the mist was by following the Hallowed’s voice. Still, her movements were slow and hesitant, eventually leading to him grabbing her hand as she released a weak squeal.
Xander didn’t react, and the woman felt a regal warmth emanating from that hand that invoked a deep insecurity in her heart. As if she was not even worthy enough to be looked at by such a royal personage. Yet the warmth was the most comfortable feeling in her entire life, as if nothing would happen to her as long as he was with her.
As the girl was lost in her thoughts, suddenly, the gray mist morphed into a black shadow. Her eyes widened, and she screamed in a panic.
The black shadow wrapped around both her and Xander, hiding their figures within. A golden glow shot out through the small gaps within the cover of the shadowy darkness, only to be covered by even more shadows. Everything disappeared in the next instant.
Without the source of the dark energy, the entire building was left deserted, with no more traces of the mist to be found.