ISEKAI EXORCIST - Ch.90 'The Wrong Destination' (Patreon)

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90 – The Wrong Destination

While my friends were off dealing with the Black Hound den, I wandered through the village, checking on the people and occasionally accepting the minor gifts they handed me, like salted meats, mushroom bread, and a local drink called Troll Sweat.

Despite the frankly-quite-awful name, Troll Sweat was a delicious beverage made from the nectar of a flower known as Dewsuckle, the ground-up roots of a bush called Alan’s Thorn, and water from the pond, which the villagers seemed very proud of, despite the fact that it looked stagnant. Nevertheless, I risked dysentery to taste the drink and was rewarded with a heavenly-sweet taste, that cleared away my mental fog, apparently thanks to the Alan’s Thorn roots, which had an energising side-effect.

I sipped contentedly on my waterskin full of the worst-named-beverage-in-the-world, as I wandered over to where the coachman had left his carriage after untethering his horse. The villagers had been kind enough to help move the carriage and dead horse into their village, lending a horse of their own, though they only had three in total, despite more than a hundred people living here.

I’d offered to perform the rites for the man’s dead mount, but he had refused, choosing to deal with the burial himself. I used my Observer familiar to watch him as I sat down inside the parked carriage, chewing on a bit of salted meat. He was chopping down small bushes and collecting sticks to make a funerary pyre, though to get enough for a horse, he would need to collect for hours, not to mention the fact that all his wood was soaking wet from the rain.

But I left him to it. It was better to do something to deal with your grief, than to sit and be alone with your dark thoughts. For me, it had helped that immediately following Lukas’ death I’d jumped straight into fighting, since otherwise it would have torn me apart. I’d lost my dad at an early age to a heart-attack, but had been too young at the time to fully understand it, so losing Lukas felt like the first time someone very close to me had died.

What I wouldn’t give to bring him back…

Suddenly a knock on the door to the carriage broke me out of my thoughts.

I opened it and a girl, who looked about my age, took it as an invitation to enter. She had a white summer’s dress and dark-brown wavy hair and amber eyes, as well as dimpled apple-cheeks. However, what immediately caught my attention was her aura. It was a prominent blue and the potency of an Otherworlder’s.

“Can I help you with something?” I asked. “I didn’t realise there were other Otherworlders here besides my Party.”

The girl looked on the verge of crying. “Is that what I am? An Otherworlder?”

I was taken aback by her question. Is she another Native like Lukas perhaps?

“Take a deep breath, then tell me what’s going on, because I’m a bit confused.”

The girl breathed in slowly, then let out an exaggerated exhale.

“My name is Emily and I don’t know where I am!”

I nodded slowly, wondering if maybe she’d gotten lost in the forest and just happened to find this village.

“Were you also heading to Altar?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No! I mean, I just appeared here four days ago, when I was walking into town. It was as though I fell through a hole in the ground! The people here are very different from the ones where I live. I really just want to go home!”

I blinked as realisation hit me and a question formed in my mind, though it was clearly impossible, given how far we were from Lundia.

“Emily… what is the name of your world?”

“What do you mean!? It’s Oblus, isn’t that where we are??”

I frowned. This didn’t make any sense. Why is she here and not in Lundia?

“We’re in a world called Mondus. You’ve been transported here. Just like me. Just like all Otherworlders.”

“But that’s… That’s…”

It seemed to slowly sink in, though I could tell she was having a hard time processing this revelation.

“Oh… what will my parents think? And my brother, he’ll be so worried!”

“I understand how you feel. I myself have only been in this world for about half a year.”

“How am I going to survive? I’ve been in this strange village for several days, but everyone is so wary around me, as though I am a bad omen!”

“Normally,” I started, knowing what I was about to say was little comfort, “Otherworlders are supposed to all appear in the same place. Currently, that place is the city of Lundia far to the south of here.”

“Do you think I should go there?” she asked, looking at me with her sad brown eyes.

“It’ll take many weeks by carriage,” I told her, “But it may be easier if you stick with me and my Party until we reach Altar. They should have an Adventurers’ Guild that can help you.”

“A Guild? And what do you mean Party? Are there others like us here?”

“You didn’t see them when we came to help?”

“I was hiding from the monsters in a closet,” she said, sounding shameful about it.

“My friend Renji is super strong, and will make sure nothing can hurt you; and Elye is really acrobatic and funny, but in a strange way.”

She sniffled slightly. “And what about you?”

“Eh, I’m the ‘strategist’, so I’m not that impressive.”

“I’d like to go with you I think.”

“You won’t have anything to worry about,” I promised her. “I can see your soul and can tell what powers you’ll have. You’ll become something named a Spellhand. They’re powerful and always in high demand.”

“You can see my soul?”

“That’s one of my powers,” I confirmed.

“I think I accidentally used one of my powers when I came here,” she admitted. “I was really scared and I pushed this guy away from me using just the wind!”

“I don’t know a lot about Oblus,” I told her, “But do you know what a wizard or a magician is?”

She nodded. “Like in the Great Tales.”

I assumed this was something akin to myth or fairytale in her world, so I said, “That’s right. Your soul tells me that you’ll become a magician. You should be able to control the elements.”

“Really?” she asked, sceptically, although I could tell by her aura that she wanted to believe me.

“If you want, I can teach you how to visualise the energy in your body.”

She nodded cautiously.

“Let’s do it outside. I find it’s always easier in the open air.”

I left through the door she’d entered from and she followed a moment later, then I crawled up onto the driver seat and from there onto the roof of the parked carriage. After finding a seat, I folded my legs under me.

The still-wet canopies above still let a few heavy droplets fall occasionally, which produced heavy thuds as they landed, but the rain had completely abated. A velvet-soft and warm breeze brushed through the trees, carrying the scent of wet earth and musky bark. Meanwhile, rays of sunlight shone down through the cracks in the forest’s ‘ceiling’. In short, it was one of the most idyllic and calming atmospheres I’d ever experienced.

She came to sit in front of me.

“Copy my posture,” I told her and she awkwardly folded her legs, while doing her best to not lift the skirt of her dress.

Over the next half hour or more, I guided her through some simple meditation, but, already just ten minutes in, she told me that she could see the light in her body. Though her aura showed she was still terrified and lost, I felt certain that she had the potential to become very strong, given the ease with which she picked up the meditation.

I offered her some of the food and drink that the villagers had given me, after we had finished our meditation, and we laughed about the terrible naming sense of the village and their speciality beverage.

“Can you teach me how to use my powers?” she then asked.

I scratched my chin, considering it. “I may not be a very good teacher, mostly because I don’t know much about Spellhands, but I can try.”

“I don’t want to accidentally hurt someone again.”

“The guy you shoved with your power, was he hurt badly?”

“He tripped and hit his head, but he was okay. I think that accident is why the villagers started avoiding me.”

“Did they at least feed you?”

“A little bit, but they said that people who don’t work can’t get any food. The mushroom bread you gave me was the first thing I’ve eaten today.”

I frowned, as it was already getting close to evening. If I hadn’t met Emily today, then I would’ve thought that this was a great village that was warm and welcoming to all, but it was clear that I was viewing it through a saviour-biased lens. I was just glad that they hadn’t kicked her out of their village or punished her for the accident. Perhaps in that regard they were nicer than most villages?

“Let’s find somewhere a bit further away to practice.”

She nodded cautiously, but followed me as I climbed down from the carriage roof and went out into an area of the mossy forest floor that was relatively-dry. As she kept glancing around and giving me a hopeful look that was belied slightly by her apprehensive aura, I realised that we were still basically strangers, and I had just separated her from the rest of the village.

I promise I’m not a creep, Emily…

The mossy ground was like a luscious carpet and soft like a cat’s fur, but it made for slightly awkward footing. Fortunately, footwork seemed irrelevant to spell-casting.

After taking up a stance and pointing my black hand at the thick trunk of one of the red-brown Troll Spire trees, I said, “I have an ability that allows me to send a wave of concentrated energy, and I think it may be similar in use to some of the spells you should have access to.”

I went on to explain how I imagined the glowing energy in my body moved and sent parts of its mass off down my arm and out through my hand, while picturing the specific shape. As I talked through it, it seemed that she was more interested in my Ifrit Claw than my lesson, but I persevered, hoping she was as capable as I believed.

“Repel,” I said and send a spinning ball of invisible energy out from my hand, though it was surrounded by a trail of fire, making it look like some trippy flame vortex. As it hit the shaggy bark of the Troll Spire, it released an echoing pop, which was far weaker than earlier when I’d used my Singing Branch as a Focus. The bark itself was singed a bit and there was a visible indent in the trunk, though it was no bigger than a fist.

“You can use fire!?” she exclaimed in surprise. I could tell by her expression and aura that she’d only been half-believing everything I’d told her up until now, but with my little display she was fully convinced it seemed.

“It’s a bit complicated as to why my spell has fire mixed into it, but anyway, now it’s your turn.”

“What am I supposed to say when I use my ability?” she asked.

I paused for a moment, as I realised I’d overlooked this part.

Crap, I don’t know the invocation for any Spellhand abilities!

While I thought about it, Emily came over to stand where I’d stood and aimed her left hand at the trunk, before yelling, “Repel!”

Nothing happened.

No surprise there, I suppose.

She kept trying a few more times, but it was clear that something was missing. As I thought about it more, I remembered that I’d seen Zelser, Harleigh’s party member, use elemental magic without an invocation. Granted, he had been transformed by the Flayed Noble at the time, and possessed the advanced Elementalist Role, but I guessed that it was possible to forego invocations.

Maybe I should try it as well?

After Emily had tried and failed to replicate my method and invocation for a fifth time, I stopped her with a gesture and said, “Try to not say any word when attempting it. Or maybe you could say the word of the element you’re trying to manifest. If possible, try to also attempt to visualise your inner energy transforming into your chosen element as you expel it from your hand.”

She nodded, and then took a deep breath, before lifting her left arm again.

I watched her carefully with my Spirit Sight and saw that her aura became even and focused, which was a good start. I wondered if there existed a way to see the energy inside a person’s body, since I suddenly recalled that Bacchi had used glasses that could see how a soul was contained in a vessel.

Something to investigate when I get to Altar and meet Ludwig Pawn, I noted to myself, filing the thought away for later.

“Wind!” Emily suddenly shouted and though nothing spectacular happened, I saw how the shrubbery that sparsely dotted the understory started bending away from her. It was a subtle but clear sign that it had worked.

“I think I did it?” she remarked, unsure.

I nodded. “You’re a fast learner. Good job.”

The praise caused a shudder to run through her aura and she lowered her arm and turned to face me. “Is there a way for us to get back home?” she then asked, seriously.

I was momentarily taken aback by her question, but then I replied, truthfully, “I don’t know. Everyone has told me there isn’t, but there are a lot of mysteries in this world, so who can truly say for sure?”

She looked a bit sad by the answer. “I suspected as much.”

“Let’s try with a different element,” I then urged.

“Okay.”

She replicated her previous stance, and spent a minute to recompose herself, before shouting, “Fire!”

Nothing happened.

She attempted the same element a few more times, before moving on to “Water!”, then, when that failed as well, “Stone!”

After about fifteen minutes of trying, she switched back to ‘Wind!’, perhaps to prove that it wasn’t just a fluke.

As with the first time, a weak gust of air was expelled through her hand, though the trunk I’d dented was left unscathed.

“Is this all I can do?” she complained disappointedly.

“How are you picturing the wind when you expel it?”

“Like wind? How else am I to picture it?”

I smiled slightly at her sincerity. “For me, I try to imagine my Repel as a condensed ball or spear of my energy. I think that’s why it has a strong impact. I’m not entirely certain if my belief of how it works is accurate, but I view it like I’m reducing the size of the expelled energy, even if it’s the same volume, which increases the density and weight of my projectile.”

The first time Owl had shown me his Repel, he had shaped it to form a clear path through a crowd by limiting the energy and widening the area of his spell. Though I had initially relied on my Focus to achieve a better control over the shape and accuracy of my Repel, I’d at some point realised that the main obstacle was my mind’s eye, thus allowing me to achieve a result similar to using a Focus, by just sharpening the image in my mind.

And though a Focus would help Emily, I wanted her to have a better foundation than I’d had. Owl was someone who relied on tools like the Focus and Spirit Goggles, and thus hadn’t taught me how to use my abilities without the tools that made them easy-to-use; meanwhile Harleigh had taught me that speed was important, since in a combat setting you only had a split-second to react. I was finally starting to find my own path, as their guidance, albeit mostly well-intentioned, was slowly being shed from me. Hopefully, I could put Emily on her own path as well, without influencing her learning too much in one specific direction. After all, it was impossible to perfect a method that wasn’t made specifically for you.

She nodded slowly. “I think I understand. I’ll try again.”

With a deep breath and deliberate movements, she took up a stance, similar to an archer, with her left hand serving as the sights that framed her target.

“Wind Arrow!” she yelled and I felt a warm wind ruffle my hair and brush over my face. Emily’s hair fluttered behind her and she took a step back as though her released spell had recoil. The shrubbery flattened as her projectile flew by and though there was hardly a sound made as her spell connected with the trunk, it sent a backwash of air which forced me to shield my eyes, as tiny bits of debris flew back at us.

When I opened my eyes, there was a hole straight through the tree to the other side, though it was no wider than a pencil.

“Holy shit…”

I was about to praise Emily for the incredible success, when she suddenly collapsed to the ground.