“Hey, Deina, do I have to die at the altar for the whole thing to work?”

  Regius didn’t even know why he asked that. He wanted to live, even if only for a few more days. But was his subconscious really willing to let Skia kill him, if it meant victory?

  “Yes, you must not die now, or Lord Caleo’s powers will die with you,” Deina responded swiftly, swerving out of the way of a barrage of darkness that didn’t look intimidating, but probably had the same effect as touching a shadeling.

  “We’re going against the shadeling god here, how would we be able to escape?” Regius argued. Instead of Deina, he received a response from Skia who was on their tails. “You can’t escape me! Be grateful I’m also weakened right now, or you’d both be gone!”

  Regius was seriously losing hope, first Deina gets injured multiple times, then they run into the literal boss of all shadelings.

  To the boy’s surprise, his sister slung her torch from over her shoulder and whipped around, as if preparing to fight. She whispered to him, “Distract her.”

  “What do you mean, dis-” Regius began asking, but was shut up by a sharp glare. Skia seemed as surprised as he was at Deina’s supposed attack, so her focus was entirely on the young girl. The brown-haired boy snatched a rock from the cave floor, before chucking it directly at what seemed to be the face-area of the clump of darkness called Skia.

  Since Skia had the form of a shadeling, the rock could not make contact with her. Still, the goddess hissed in anger, lunging towards Regius.

  He let out a small shout, ducking and rolling away. He took a moment to glance at Deina, who seemed to be speaking another incantation like the one most land of fire residents needed to say in order to light their torches with Caleo’s fire.

  Could she have some other secret move up her giant cape sleeves?

  “Regius, out of the way!” she shouted, moving her torch to point directly at Skia. A large flame had materialized on her torch, though she didn’t seem to be moving towards her foe. Regardless, the brown-haired boy chose to obey and lunged out of the way just as a giant pillar of flame blasted Skia right in the general area of her face. “Blazing Lance!”

  The darkness lightened. Since Skia was the goddess of shadelings, she didn’t disappear like normal ones. Surely she would return in a minute or two.

  “Come on, run while she’s incapacitated,” Deina ordered. Regius nodded, following her as they ran out of the cavern. “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

  The two children ran for a solid five minutes until there was no chance Skia could find them again. Exhausted, Regius plopped down on a large rock and took a sip of water. “So, what was that move just now? Burning Lance or something?”

  “Blazing Lance,” Deina corrected. She took her time taking a seat on another rock, and gulping down some of her own water. “Powerful Land of Fire residents can access their own unique technique, a special blessing of Lord Caleo upon everyone once they reach a certain level of strength, different for everyone. They require an extensive incantation unique to the person.”

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  Regius was somewhat miffed that nobody bothered to mention that everyone had special moves to him before, but it sounds cool, so he decided it’s alright. Come to think of it... “The way Logia could do that prophecy thing... was that her technique?”

  “Yes, certain people have what we call a Prophet’s Technique, which involves slightly varying ways of gaining prophecies from Caleo.” The black-haired girl stood up, placing her torch back across her back with her bag and tying her bottle to her waist. “We have to keep going. Our direction is slightly off from all that running.”

  “Do we have to?” Sighing, the boy tried to wipe the sweat off his forehead with his hand, only to realize the entirety of his right hand had burnt away, leaving only a scorching stump.

  Deina glanced at his burning hand, a slightly smug look on her face. “See? The burning will only get faster. We have to hurry. If we go now, we should be able to get there tomorrow.”

  Some part of him refused to accept that once he reached the altar, he would die. But then again, he would die anyway, so he should help these people when he does.

  “...fine, let’s keep going.”

  Deina whipped around and took a second to find her direction, before walking off. Heaving another sigh, Regius followed after his sister.

  Their travels were, thankfully, uneventful, with no shadeling attacks and no literal gods chasing them. Pretty soon, the sunlight seeping from the long crack in the cave roof began to fade.

  “Has it been that long already?” Regius questioned, glancing at moonlight starting to appear in the sunlight’s place. Deina shrugged, then nodded, fanning herself with her hand a bit as she took a seat beside a large stalagmite. “Apparently so. Let’s rest here tonight, we should get to the altar in an hour tomorrow.”

  The two set up in a few minutes, their capes forming two semi-sleeping bags and rolled up segments forming pillows. Deina placed her bag and torch by the stalagmite, before returning her water bottle to the bag. Regius, who didn’t have nearly as much luggage, just dropped his half-finished wooden bottle beside his cape-bed, before hitting the sheets and going straight to sleep.

  Deina couldn’t sleep as easily. Sure, she was tired, but it still felt unrealistic that Regius was going to die. While she had only known her older brother for a few days, it was rare for anyone to be willing to befriend her.

  Plus, they had run into Skia herself that day. Like how Lord Caleo was never seen, and the closest mortals could get to him was his fire, Skia was just as mysterious as Caleo. Shadelings were nothing new to Land of Fire residents, but Skia herself had never been seen by a human, at least in centuries.

  Was Deina really that special? Did she deserve to be that special?

  Blazing Lance, her technique. She had first unlocked her unique technique at the age of 8, being one of the youngest. In fact, her powerful adoptive grandfather Laios himself only gained his at age 6.

  Blazing Lance had the special property of being unable to be blown or extinguished, hence making it great defensively on top of its great offensive properties. Still, the fact that it managed to temporarily dissipate Skia herself, while Caleo was weakened no less...

  “Stop overthinking!” Deina shouted to herself internally, not even realizing she was spoken out loud. She curled up in her cape-bed for almost an hour, before sleep finally grasped her.

  “Hey, Deina, wake up.”

  Deina’s brown eyes flew open. The girl was surprised that for once Regius had woken up before her, especially since it still seemed quite early. The brown-haired boy in question actually woke up quite a few times in the night, his imminent death doing nothing good for his sleep.

  “Let’s go.” The black-haired girl quickly packed her things, and set off towards the altar without waiting for Regius. He followed his sister without complaint, heart too heavy to argue.

  That day, he would be sacrificed.

  That day, Regius Adusta would die.