Chapter 38: Red and White
Every fiber of his body ached.
From the tips of his fingers to the depth of his bones, all were crying out, a howl of the bitter end. Kai was no stranger it, but never had he experienced such pain; spread thoroughly into him. When the roar had come to his ears, Kai even doubted if it was all a dream.
If it was, the roar woke him up.
The sight came to his eyes; the heat came from his left. Kai knew a sun was bound for the horizon, but this wasn't the pleasant heat of dawn.
'The wrath of summer noon,' Kai thought. 'What else can it be?'
The rope had almost loosened around him, but Kai couldn't take his eyes off Peter's face. The wizard was horrified beyond recognition. Half of his face was already swollen. The remaining half had turned pale blue and white. The colors of fear, terror, and confusion lingered on his face. They danced in his eyes. Kai had seen men shaking before. This was something else.
The heat hit his left again.
Kai turned his head, and his eyes met Arlen. The blue in his eyes had paled too. He was free of ropes, the tip of his wand sizzling. But he showed no sign of standing up. Arlen only looked at Kai with those faded blue eyes. They seemed to warn Kai as if saying, 'No matter what, don't stand up.'
Arlen, though, wasn't the summer's sun. He was just another rock getting burned by its heat. Kai had to look beyond Arlen. There he stood, behind Shae's pitiful figure, and over Simon's dying body. Wrapped under an ugly coverlet, holding a wand. He was the sun; he was the heat, and he was the Mana.
He was Beedle, the bard. And it seemed it was his time to sing.
A song of magic!
He stepped forward, his sunken eyes beaming with just rage and life. The heat intensified, and the wet moss and rocks were the first to face the full brunt of it. They quaked. Some even rolled away from him as he advanced. A few shattered, unknowing about the cause of their death.
Peter stumbled back, one step at a time. Kai saw Dickon running for Peter from afar, his wand raised high, and his mouth chanting something magical. The heat burned away that magic, though. A puff of steam and sparks appeared on Dickon's wand. Blood seeped out from the corner of his mouth.
Peter took another step back.
What… No… Why… These were his chants.
"WHO WAS IT?" Mr. Beedle roared, blasting the rocks and moss rolling away. Peter, the wizard; 'No! Peter, the fool,' Kai corrected, answered by pointing his wand at the legendary wizard.
"SO IT WAS YOU!" Mr. Beedle said, lifting his wand. All the heat vanished suddenly, and the chill came running to take its place. A breath of frozen air escaped Kai's mouth. Then he heard that. The same word he had heard many times by now. "EXPELLIARMUS!"
When Kai had seen it the first time, it was just a scarlet light. The second time, crossing over the sea, he didn't even notice that. He had expected a flash this time, or worse, a bolt of lightning. What appeared, though, was a pillar. A pillar of light. So pure, and so hot, even the chill got frightened.
The pillar shot straight towards Peter. Dickon got caught by the pillar's edge and flung off to the cliff's boundary some dozens of meters away. Peter wasn't that fortunate. The Pillar hit him, engulfing his figure from top to bottom. And then a broken kite fluttered in the sky.
A kite named Peter the fool.
Kai never saw him again. Hundred meters. Two hundred meters, or even farther. But no sound of Peter crashing on the rocks reached Kai.
'Idiot!' Kai spat.
Kai threw the heavy ropes aside and stood up. Strength seemed to have abandoned him, though. The first step he took brought him to his knees. In a single attack, he had lost more than half of his HP. And for the first time, his SP had been damaged, too. He felt tired, feeble, and powerless.
'Now get rid of the other two,' Kai thought, turning his head towards Mr. Beedle. 'What the…?'
The thing he saw made him jump to his feet. The boldness and power the wizard had shown weren't there anymore. He was quivering like a leaf before facing the storm. His head was twisting from left to right, and then up.
Where was the magical heat, where was the sun, and where was the Power that Kai had sensed? Kai looked at Mr. Beedle, but all he saw was a terrified old man. His pants were wet from the stream running down from his manhood. Pale yellow drops trickled off his pants. Kai could have sworn it wasn't the sun playing tricks on his eyes.
"Help me!" Mr. Beedle shouted. "Somebody help me. It's here. It's looking at me."
Then he bolted. The wand raised high, Mr. Beedle chose a random direction and ran off.
Kai saw a blur chasing the mad wizard. It was the woman. She wasn't the strongest of the two Order's Contestants, but she sure was the fastest. And she had the gun.
"Simon! Bloody!" Arlen shouted, almost running behind her. "Hold the other one."
But Arlen didn't need to give that order. The round-faced, long-braided man had already stood himself between Arlen's disappearing figure and Kai. Shae came running to Kai, and even Simon came limping, his face pale from the blood loss.
"Today, yes," the man grinned vilely, "today I will get my Title."
Kai gave a meaningful look to Simon and held the longsword with both of his hands. When he looked back, the man's hand wasn't empty. There was some kind of ball in his right hand. Its top half was red, and the bottom white. Kai could even see a small button over the seam where the red and white met.
'What's that?!' Kai asked himself.
The man replied by pressing the button and throwing the ball. A sudden flash of light and his raspy voice echoed in Kai's ears. "GO! Ekans."
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AN: Those who has never watched Pokemon, or have forgotten, don't worry. The description will be enough. Still, I will be uploading details about Ekans on Discord as I have already communicated. Enjoy!
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