Chapter 25: Stowaway
*Pant* *Pant* *Pant*
"This way!" A young girl frantically waved her arms, a woman grabbed her when another man nearly caught them.
"What about Naomi?!" She yelled as her mother brought them both away from the scene.
"Go without me! One of us has to tell them!" Naomi struggled as a man grabbed her shoulder, she pushed him back and drew a sword. "Not one step further!" She lightly swung her sword, knocking the man on his bald head, a clang reverberated throughout the empty area.
A little girl's mother held a knife, she thrusted it into plated armor. Her face filled with shock when the dagger snapped in two. "N-no, stay awa-!" She took several steps backwards, and attempted to run towards Naomi who was wielding a sword. But was quickly cut down by the soldier.
A tall man came from behind the shadows of a large marble house. He clapped whilst walking towards the body of the woman. "You did well to get this far, unfortunately. You only got this far."
"We're not going down!" Naomi yelled, she slowly crept towards the mother. The tall man drew a thin and flexible iron rod. '!' The man plunged the object into the woman, who was lying on the ground.
She reached her hand out, but Naomi didn't dare take a step forward out of fear. A lightning bolt struck the woman, and she instantly turned to ash.
'Where's the kid?' The child who was with them earlier, was no longer anywhere to be seen. The tall man laughed, seemingly to be had been unaffected by the bolt. "Forgive my rudeness, my name is Ruther. I am a knight from the land of Engfoard. By the way, it's pronounced Eng-fo-ard. Not Eng-furd."
He scratched the mustache above his lip. "You lot tend to mispronounce anything that isn't from your own nation, I hope that you don't make this silly mistake. Frankly, I'm getting very irritated by this. I've been here for 3 years, and not a single person has understood this!"
Naomi stared at the man. "What? Are you looking at this sword? It's quite beautiful isn't it. The intricate carvings and designs on both the handle and the blade. You should see the scabbard this thing was in when we first found it. Absolutely stunning I'd say."
Ruther raised the blade to his face, "looks like I need to clean this better, it deserves to have a wielder that takes care of it greatly."
"Say... weren't you here for this sword?" Naomi continued silently staring at the man. "Soldier." The man in plated armor confusedly turned towards Ruther. "Yes you! Go capture her."
The man reluctantly walked towards Naomi, who was still standing still as he approached closed. The soldier grabbed her wrist, and she turned into fog. "Damn it!" Ruther slammed the sword into the ground, sending lightning into the ground, causing it to blacken.
"This is the 2nd time she's done this! And why I can't realise it?!"
His face became furious when he saw a small ship sailing past the dock. Naomi was on board, she hid something under a blanket behind her. "What?"
The sword in his hand slowly faded away. "WHAT?!"
"You! Get a hundred soldiers right this instant! We're killing that girl."
The soldier firmly saluted before running off. "These damn... whatever they were called again!" He scratched his mustache again while stomping off the dock.
'I need to bring this back to the leader at all costs.'
The ride back to her base was rough, the ocean was mostly calm in the morning. But the voyage would likely take several days. 'Will she be able to last so long without food?'
Naomi had training to withstand hunger, but the little girl didn't. Naomi patted the girl on the head, "wait here ok? I'll go get some food."
Naomi crept up to a smaller compartment in the ship. 'I can't kill any of the crew... there's 3 currently on the deck, 1 steering the ship.' A clanking came from a room in the far back of the ship. 'There's 1 in the there...'
She slowly crept towards the door of the dimly lit room. The door was wide open, and someone was preparing food inside. Naomi quietly grabbed a spoon from the table, and violently slammed it into the neck of the chef, 'did I kill him?' She checked the man's pulse, "he's also breathing.' She sighed, then checked what was inside the pot he was using.
'This'll do.'
She picked up a wooden bowl, and used the spoon to scoop the contents of the pot into the bowl, but taking care not to take too much.
"Make sure you eat a lot alright? You're still young."
The little girl stared at Naomi, "is something wrong? Is the soup too hot?"
"t-tha-"
'?'
"Thank you..." the girl huddled herself into a corner and ate the soup. Naomi was caught by surprise by what she said. She smiled, "eat up, we'll be in somewhere safer soon alright?"
"A-alright..."
'I need to make sure she doesn't found out what happened to her mother, she's too young to know.'
When Ruther thought he'd cornered Naomi, the little girl was nowhere to be seen, because her mother had ran off to hide her under a flight of staircases, and then ran back to help Naomi with the dagger than she'd given her.
And Naomi used a skill that she'd learnt from a skilled person, someone who she hated, yet held in high regard. The skill that she learnt was a middle level one, something that even the average person could do, given enough training and a good teacher. She laid a dense fog around her body, each separate in color to match her clothing, facial features and hair.
Something that's identical to herself at the time of using it, giving the sense that the person was clearly still there, when they weren't. This skill is referred to as a trick by most of the general people. Seeing as it was only often used for games of hide-and-seek, or a party trick to scare others.
Of course, it was only this way before Kuoka turned it into something that's widely used for stealth. Then it turned into a skill, rather than a trick.
There is a slight difference in effect depending on the skill of the user. A masterful user's use of a skill would be slightly different than if a normal person used it. Yet the effect is greatly different.
The skill that Naomi used to escape Ruther, was a skill that she mastered. So without closer inspection, the fact that something changed would be near invisible to the naked eye. But if an average user were to try and use that skill. It would be apparent that something changed, it could be an arm was missing, or a piece of clothing was forgotten, maybe just an accessory.
Nobody knows where the fog comes from, seemingly coming out from the body of the user. A few clever uses of this skill were created by some who had mastered it. Such as only creating an arm that peeked out from around a corner, in order to slow down those who chased them. And also to distract them, allowing for more than enough time to escape.
Or creating the illusion of several archers mounted on a wall, when there wasn't a single person there. Each of these uses by masters were carefully selected, and only a single one managed to catch the attention of Kuoka.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone