Uncharted

[Caira Ayryn]

Chapter Two, Excavating Ruins?

The woman’s eyes still would not wander toward the challenger in front of her, Where was her courage when she needed it?

“I”m just going to excavate some ruins with my new friend here,” she lied and gestured to the jailbird she had emancipated, but would never actually consider his companionship that of a friend despite how she found herself cornered into slicing the rope with her sword.

It was a most unbelievable alibi, but there was a moment of pause that came from the threatening figure, who was looking for one whom had freed the prisoner. Merik leaned to Cai for a moment, “I’ll show you what I’m made of,” there was a searing villainy that had been ignited in his distinctly red eyes, for a moment she almost found herself admiring him, he didn’t seem to meet the evil inside of him with any fear. Nor did he care if he became contemptible in this land of bandits. A stark contrast to what she valued in herself, yet he bore his quality with pride.

Merik cracked his knuckles for a moment before launching himself forward with a burst of speed and hitting the opponent in the chest. It helped that the man wasn’t expecting it, Merik was bounced back the same distance as his opponent was recovering on the sand and gasping for air. It was only at this moment, Caira found herself looking at the sand-bitten being. The enemy was a tall, tan westerner with dark hair and seething eyes. He was well-equipped for battle but looked as though he had just awoken from a long hibernating nap.

Caira thought for a moment that Merik had just wrecked their promise, yet this man wasn’t dead. She seized the moment to wrap him in a coil as her hands moved in an ‘x’ shape and ropes of heated energy leapt from the air and bound him. The girl then placed her sword to his still gasping neck. “Today isn’t your lucky day.” she said with a sigh and deliberating killing the poor guy. How could she justify her life over his? If only for something so small as a running start.

"KILL ME." The man rasped.

The girl was taken aback and lowered the blade of her sword from his neck. This guy was suicidal.

"I have failed. When they find out, they'll do much worse to me. Kill me, now."

"I...I... Won't." She concluded.

"Have you no honor?" his eyes asked, looking tearily into hers, Have you no mercy?

Caira was a soldier now. It hung in the demeanor over her shoulders. From the distinguished sword perched on her hip, he could tell. Her eyes shook, tracing the fine lines of their conversation, and the consequences it would have if she made the wrong choice. A glance over to Merik assured her that the telepath was enjoying the show. Great. He would hold anything she did against her, later.

"You don't deserve to die. You were in over your head." She tried to reason with the man, who now stood tall, despite the coiling gnarls of rope.

"I sold my soul to the devil. She'll come back to collect." There was enough ice in his words, to chill the air.

She? The Prime had no idea what the secondary was talking about, who the secondary was talking about. But before she could ask any more, the man ran on her sword -which was lowered, until she raised it out of instinct... In self-defense.

Shock froze her still. The girl had chosen to uphold her own sense of justice even if it compromised her upper hand on the situation, it is for this reason that she couldn't fathom why he had lunged at her. That is, before the Prime speared himself with her own sword. Caira almost screamed at the sight of the completely unexpected bloodshed, dripping into a puddle on the sand because this meant she had just killed a defenseless man bound in rope.

Her eyelids weighed heavy for a moment, as she drew her sword from the sopping mess of blood, the dragging feel as it slid out of his cartilage did not reassure her of the cost. "You didn't have to die." Caira muttered before cleaning her sword.

Merik had watched, “Don’t look so surprised, he doesn’t know you, nor what kind of person you are and has to assume that you, his enemy, will torture him to death or worse. Seems like his employer was the type to do the same. At least this gives him the chance to escape without being banished.” he summed up and explained the way the enemy thought easily, as though he had once been in their shoes.

"Escape?"

"Who knows, if a secondary dies, they could be released from this prison." The Omniverse.

“To be captured is one of the most feared things. For anyone in that position especially Primes like us. I’m surprised you let him run on your sword like that without asking for information. Er... That's the term for what it was called where I was from. Chivalrous foe would run up their own sword when meeting defeat.”

Caira remained silent as she looked up to Merik, whom had dusted himself off from his fall into the sand and spoke, “I wouldn’t worry about it, this is our head start anyway.”