The Seventh Mill

"Fucking creepy ass woods. Who the hell wants to come out here? Asshole always makes us guard the spookiest places," The guard internally says as he looks out at the forest.

The man brings cups his hands around his mouth, blowing warm air onto them to stop them from freezing momentarily.

As he tries to warm himself up, his gaze snaps towards the trees as he swears that he just heard some sort of noise similar to a hum. A chill runs up his spine, but this time, it's not from the ice-laced wind that brushes against him.

He looks around, trying to find the source of the noise, but can't find anything.

Just then, he hears another noise, then another, and another. The sudden noises begin driving him crazy, but finally, he finds the source of all the noise.

A little green figure currently floats just a few feet away from him. The figure is checking their nails, not even looking at the guard as she mindlessly hums away.

The guard is stunned as the incredibly small figure doesn't even flinch at his movement. He even takes a step forward, and yet, they seemingly don't care.

Eventually, the guard clears his throat, and the figure finally snaps into reality, "Oh! Hey there! You're a big one, ain't ya?"

"U-u-uh, thank you?" The guard meekly responds to the feminine voice.

The poor man is absolutely confused by this sudden encounter, but he decides to get some answers. "Hey, what are... you exactly?"

"Who, me?" The figure rhetorically asks. "I'm a forest sprite! You might be heard about my kind in some tales, but as you can see, I ain't mythical."

The guard is taken aback. He's standing in front of a real, living forest sprite! He couldn't even count the amount of times he had heard the tales of forest sprites running amok throughout the countless amounts of forests throughout the world. He had also heard the tales of what they get up to when they meet a Fuckion, orc, elf or any other regular race.

He immediately starts to feel excited. This could be his chance to... well, you know damn well why he's excited.

Those jitters fill his body and the figure sees it, "You seem nervous big man, you alright?"

"Uhh, y-yeah, I'm good. How are you?" The guard begins to kick himself mentally for asking such a stupid question.

The figure however, actually answers, "Oh, you know how we forest sprites are. Speaking of, do you fancy helping me out with a little problem?"

"A p-p-problem? Uhh, sure, yeah! What is it?"

The figure then twirls around, "Well, you see, I've been a little... frustrated as of late, and I kinda need something to help me... relieve some stress, if you catch my drift."

The guards excitement and jitters coming flushing back, and he realizes exactly what the sprite is offering. He then says, "I will do whatever I can to help."

The sprite then chuckles, "Glad to know. Follow me, big man."

The sprite then begins to fly back to the trees with the guard following immediately behind her.

They pass by the first line of trees, and the guard is so nervous that he can barely contain himself.

They then get to the second line of trees, and as the guard is just about to pass said tree, he is grabbed by a set of large hands and brought behind said tree.

His eyes go wide as he sees the face of a very intimidating orc, but then, his eyes would soon start to fall as a dagger is swiftly driven into his heart. The last few gasps of air escape his lips and his soul escapes its mortal shell.

Kyuala then removes her dagger from the guards heart, quickly cleaning the blade before sheathing it once more.

"Thank the Gods. I need to get all this crap off."

Lani immediately starts ripping the leaves off of her body as Kyuala begins to move the guards body. A few seconds later, Lani has managed to de-green herself while Kyuala has got ready to begin the distraction.

Lani then heads over to Kyuala and asks, "So, what are you going to do?"

"This," Kyuala simply responds. She then grabs the helmet from the guard before tossing it toward the other guards.

The clanging of the metal helm rings out as skips across the ground like a thin rock skipped across water.

The clattering steel immediately attracts the attention of all the other guards, causing them to look over.

"Makli? What in the hells are you doing?" The closest guard asks.

The man receives no response, and begins to get worried, "Makli? You better stop playing games! Come out! This isn't funny!"

Once again, no response.

The closest guard then signals to the others, causing them to draw their swords and come closer.

"Makli! I'm giving you one last chance! Come out, right now!"

The guards are then shocked as they receive a response this time. However, it's in the form of a tossed sword, clattering at the feet of the guards.

Meanwhile, at the back, John and Amilia have crept forward and manage to take out the two guards closest to them before carefully putting them down.

They move forward, inching closer to the next trio of guards.

Amilia realizes that they have to take done all three at once, and so, she readies both of her daggers before carefully moving up.

In the blink of an eye, Amilia has driven both of her daggers into the sides of the necks of the two guards in front of her as John drives his dagger into the heart of his guard whilst covering his mouth.

Just then, disaster strikes as one of Amilia's guards drops his sword, causing the metal to ring out, and attracts the attention of the four remaining guards.

"GET THEM!" The elder guard calls out.

Immediately, the four rush over, swinging and slashing at both Amilia and John, who has now drawn his sword.

Kyuala sees that the guards have noticed the duo, and so, she draws her axe before running into the fray with Lani carefully following behind.

As Kyuala runs up, she cuts down the closest guard from behind, earning a quick death scream, alerting the three guards that remain.

John somehow manages to disarm his opponent before running his sword through the man's chest. Amilia, on the other hand, cuts off her opponents before plunging both daggers into the sides of his neck, finishing the man off with a polite knee to the balls.

The last guard is absolutely shitting himself. He looks back and forth between both sides, Amilia and John on his right and Kyuala on his left.

He knows that there's no chance of victory, witnessing first hand just how easily these three killed his friends.
His back hits the carriage that they arrived in, and he realizes that he literally has nowhere to go.

Just then, in a moment of weakness, the man tosses his sword to the side.

"P-p-please don't kill me!" The man pleads, causing the group to stop in their tracks.

Amilia then decides to ask, "Why shouldn't we?"

"B-b-because I don't know anything! H-h-he never tells us anything! I-I-I don't even know why he wanted to come here in the first place! We didn't even like him anyway!" The guard explains, trying to convince the four. He then continues, "Most of us didn't even like the guy anyway and I really needed the work! Please... Just don't kill meeeee."

The man then begins to sob, dropping to his knees as tears stream from his eyes.

John then looks at Amilia, Kyuala and Lani who all have differing looks on their faces. Amilia has a look of frustration on her face, seemingly wanting to just kill the man and be done with it. Lani has a look of compassion on her face, wishing to help the man after hearing his pleas.

Kyuala on the other hand, has a look of uncertainty. While she feels bad for the man, she also doesn't trust him as far as Lani could throw him.

The decision is seemingly left up to John. He's in the same camp as Kyuala, feeling both bad for the sobbing fellow, but also can't shake the feeling that letting him go would mean a sword in their back later.

After a few more moments of intense deliberation, John lets out a long sigh before walking over to the man and extending his hand, "Get up."

The man looks up with his blurry eyes at the outstretched hand. He apprehensively takes it and is helped up by John.

As the man gets to his feet, John says, "Go on. You're free."

The guard is confused, unsure of if he heard John correctly. John then says, "We're not going to hurt you. We've already done enough here. You're free to go."

The man looks at the others, seeing their faces all differing in expression. He then looks back to John who has a kind expression on his face, "Listen, I know you've got no reason to trust us after what we just did, but we've got no reason to hurt you."

Tears continue to stream down the man's face, but this time, they are tears of joy as he begins to shake John's hand, "Thank you, thank you, thank you! Oh lords, thank you!"

The man then begins to walk away after a nod from John, but he stops in his tracks before looking at John again, "Listen. I don't know the exact reason he's here, but I swear I overheard him muttering to himself about a package. I don't know if that helps you or not."

"It does. Thank you. Now, you better get going."

The guard nods once more before taking off up the hill and through the trees.

"We should've just killed him," Amilia comments.

"He wasn't a threat to us," Lani retorts.

"Not yet."

"Doesn't matter now. Let's go get our friend back," John says as he walks toward the front door with the others in tow.

---

INSIDE THE MILL:

The group walk inside and quickly but quietly begin to search around.

They begin going room to room, making sure they search very inch of the building as they progress.

Eventually, they come to a stairwell that leads to both a floor above and a floor below. Kyuala than says, "I'll clear upstairs."

"Good. I'll take downstairs then," Amilia says, immediately heading down the steps to the lower floor. Kyuala and John then stand there, stunned at the straightforwardness of Amilia. John then says, "Guess I'll take the rest of this floor. "

Kyuala then nods, "Stay safe."

"You too."

The two then share a quick kiss before Kyuala begins to head upstairs as John and Lani head into the next room beside them.

With his sword drawn, John slowly turns the corner into the room. There's some broken machinery within the room, overrun by moss and age. If John was in a horror movie, this would be the spot where the killer would appear behind him. Luckily, he has Lani to watch his back, and she hasn't said anything yet.

The duo then start progressing through the rest of the rooms, trying to clear them out as quickly as they can just in case they need to help one of the others.

---

UPSTAIRS:

Kyuala is in a similar predicament to John. She moves throughout he rooms, keeping a keen ear out for any modicum of sound that may happen.

Her axe remains steady in her hands, ready to swing at a moments notice.

The upstairs floor is vastly different to the middle floor as the rooms don't have any machinery in them. Instead, all the rooms appear to be just that... rooms.

There are beds in every single room. Some are single cots, some are double beds, but it's clear that the workers of the mill lived in these rooms. The beds are covered in the growth of time long passed and every inch of the building just feels dead.

After walking around for a few more minutes, Kyuala sees that nothing living has been up here for a long time.

Just then, as she turns to leave the last room, she hears Amilia on the communicator, "I've got the bastard in my sights. You three get down here, now."

Kyuala doesn't respond, instead, she immediately rushes out of the room before heading down towards Amilia.

---

DOWNSTAIRS:

Amilia is currently peeking around the corner, watching the hooded figure. The figure in question is currently kneeling over something, but no sign of Terra yet.

Not long after her message to the others, the trio carefully join Terra with Kyuala asking, "What's he doing?"

"No fuckin' clue. He's been doing that since I found him. I thought he was whacking it at first, but I ain't sure. Still, no sign of Terra though."

"Do you think it's some sort of ritual thing?" John asks.

"I can't say for sure," Lani says. "It doesn't look like he's drawing any sort of symbol, but I would need a better view to confirm that."

Lani then gets an idea, and without discussing it first, she carefully flies into the room.

John and Kyuala wish to stop her, but they can't in fear of alerting the figure.

Lani carefully gets up to the ceiling, sticking up high to try and avoid detection. As she slowly moves around, she can just see into another room, but can't see everything inside. She wants to go check it out and look for Terra, but due to the position of the figure, she would definitely get caught.

After a few seconds of careful flying, Lani can finally see what the man is doing. He's not drawing any sort of ritualistic symbol nor is he "whacking it," as Amilia thought.

Instead, he's simply crouched in front of what appears to be a plant. Due to vast amount of studying pretty much anything she could, Lani looks at the flower and sees that it is a type of blue-ish peyote.

She can't recall the name of said peyote, but knows for sure that she's seen it in a book before.

Suddenly, Lani is shocked as she sees the figure brandish a dagger before slicing his hand open. The blood begins to pour from the fresh wound down to the peyote, coating the once blue plant in a deep red.

The group then begin to hear the figure chant some words, "Zharo càhsim leei nja!"

A moment later, the blood on peyote begins to get absorbed by the peyote itself. Soon, all red is sucked into the plant, reverting it back to its formerly blue self. However, that wouldn't last for long as the blue would soon start to drain until the peyote becomes a sheet white.

The figure then picks the peyote up, carefully holding it in his non-sliced hand. The figure then gets out a small bag, similar to a coin purse before putting the peyote inside.

As the figure puts the purse away as carefully as they can. Just as they put said purse away, the figures head comes to a complete halt, seemingly sensing something.

Lani immediately begins to worry, wondering if the figure had overheard the others talking.

The figure then stands up, worrying Lani even more. The figure remains still for a few seconds, almost like he's listening out for any more noises. However, Lani is shocked as the man turns and looks at her, his eyes locked right on to hers.

"Found you."

Immediately following his words, the figure launches a bolt of magic toward Lani.

The trio see this and break from their hiding spot, rushing into the room. Amilia immediately leaps onto the figure who barely had any time to turn. Amilia then begins to claw at said figure, not with the intention to kill, but with the intention to inflict pain.

Kyuala then looks at the figure, seeing that his hood is no longer covering his face. Unfortunately, she doesn't recognize the man under said hood, but even if she did, she wouldn't stop Amilia anyway.

John on the other hand, immediately rushed over to the impact spot of the blast, fearing the worst. As he looks up at the scorch mark, he doesn't see anything that looks like Lani which gives him hope yet simultaneously makes him worry more.

A few moments later, John sees some small movement from the corner of his eye. He whips his gaze to the left to see an obviously dazed Lani getting to her feet.

"Lani! Thank God you're okay!" John says before chuckling.

Lani slowly begins to fly up toward his shoulder, "I managed to dodge at the last moment. The problem with egotistical mages, they like to let their magic show as it's building."

"Speaking of, it seems like he's regretting his decision," John comments as they look on at Amilia who is enacting on what can only be described as pure testicular torture on the figure.

"Where is Terra?!" Amilia asks as she puts more pressure onto her knee, squashing the figures twig and berries even more.

"I know not of what you speak, wench!" The figure says with a little pained whine at the end.

Kyuala then kneels down beside the man's head, "I don't need magic to know where a little rat like you is telling a lie. So, we are going to ask once again: Where is our friend?"

The man begins to laugh, "You will never find her."

The group all look amongst each other, the mixed look of fear and uncertainty obvious on all faces. John and Lani then head into the other room to quickly search before coming back moments later.

"She isn't in there."

Amilia gets visibly furious at those words, and so, she turns her fiery gaze towards the man on the ground.

Amilia then pulls out one of her daggers with an idea already formed in her mind. Then, in the blink of an eye, Amilia swipes her dagger, cutting some the man's fingers clean off.

A loud scream escapes the man's mouth, but Amilia puts a quick stop to that as she rocks his jaw with a thunderous left cross.

Amilia then turns the man onto his stomach before placing her knee on his back and grabs his arm with her open hand, "Listen up, shitstick! I'm not in any sort of mood to fucking play right now! So, you better tell me where Terra is right now! Or you're gonna keep losing pieces of yourself til you're nothing but a stump! So, what's it gonna be?!"

John, Lani and Kyuala are shocked at Amilia's almost sadistic and psychotic actions, but don't interrupt as this might be the only way that they get some answers.

The man is obviously conflicted about all of this, on one hand, he's loyal to his master. On the other hand... well... there is no other hand anymore after Amilia's actions.

A few more moments later, and after some intense blood loss, the man says, "I don't know where she is! But she was here before I arrived!"

"We checked every inch of this place. She isn't here," Kyuala says.

"That's because they took her! After I came down here, I was informed that my master had her taken to his new location for safety in case someone came looking! I guess they were right!"

"Good for them! Where is this place!" Amilia asks... no, she demands to know.

"I have no idea! I'm just the messenger for him!"

John then asks, "Who is your master?"

"I cannot speak his name!"

Amilia begins to twist the man's arm, nearly to the point of breaking it, "And why not?!"

"Because I cannot speak his name!"

Amilia begins to twist his arm even more, but Lani finally chimes in, "He's bewitched! He literally cannot speak his name!"

Amilia looks at Lani's face and sees her small, innocent face. Amilia then lets go of the man's arm, causing some relieved noises from the man. He then quickly grabs at his fingers, quickly using some magic to heal the open wounds.

The group all stand beside one another, looking at the man who is currently sat on the floor, grasping at the parts where his index and middle fingers used to be.

"What do we do now?" Lani asks.

"We find the tracks and follow them. Hopefully, they'll lead us back to his master and Terra," Kyuala explains.

Amilia however, isn't paying attention. She is just staring at the man with that fury still in her eyes. Something inside her has completely tuned her out to the planning by the others. Instead, her hand is firmly clasped around her dagger and her mind is focused on one thing.
Murder.

The man is also deep in thought. He wonders why they decided to spare him, but then realizes that they haven't outright stated that they have. They literally just tortured him for information that he is literally unable to divulge, and he knows how frustrating that can be.

He can also feel the eyes of the catfolk burrowing through him. He knows all too well what that means, and so, he gets an idea of his own.

He thinks back to the last words that he heard directly from his master, "Loyalty above life, or die with dishonour."

As he thinks on those last words, he slowly gets to a knee before whipping his body around, his remaining fingers pointing at the group as another bolt begins to charge.
Amilia is the first to see this, and without hesitation, her dagger is thrown through the air and plunges directly into the man's heart.

The magic fades from his hand as the shock sets in. His breaths quickly become laboured as he feels the blood spill from his chest. As he looks at the group, he speaks his final words, "Forgive me, Master."

The man's body falls back, thudding on the concrete below, leaving the other three utterly shocked and confused at what just happened.

Amilia however, is just glad that he made the first move.

Eventually, the four just stand there, staring at the body of the man, unsure of what to say. Eventually, Amilia just walks over, retrieving her dagger from the man's chest before saying, "There should be tracks. Let's try find them before it gets any darker."

Amilia then walks out of the room, heading to the stairs with John and Lani following behind not long after. Kyuala however, quickly heads over to the man, kneeling down before grabbing the purse with the peyote in question.

She then gets back up to her feet, quickly joining the group once again as they head back up the steps. As the trio of Kyuala, John and Lani walk up the stairs, they share a look, signifying that they're beginning to worry about what this is all turning Amilia into.

---

BACK OUTSIDE:

As the group get outside of the building, they are immediately met with a downpour of rain. As they realize how little time they have, they frantically begin to search for tracks leading away from the mill. The problem is, they only see the tracks from the recently arriving cart.

They then begin to scour around the back of the building, trying to find any sort of track, but it becomes difficult to find anything through the forest.

After around ten or so minutes, Kyuala finds a leaf on the ground that looks somewhat stepped on. Even through the rain, the lessons from her father still help her, and so, Kyuala inspects the crushed leaf on the ground.

As she inspects said leaf, she sees the front part of a boot print ahead of it, still slightly visible as the rain is quickly turning the rain into mud. She then looks a bit forward, seeing several more prints ahead, and from more than just one person.

"Over here!" Kyuala shouts, with the others quickly converging on her position.

"What is it?!" John asks, raising his voice to overcome the pounding rain.

"Boot prints! They're leading away from the mill! I can barely see them through this damn rain though! Plus, we won't have long til it's all mud!"

Just then, a familiar voice calls out to them, "Then I guess you'll be needing a master tracker then!"