And (N)one Shall Remain

The first thing Esperanza had to do when she finally reached the spot where Eda-Zil and Kvar-Litu had hidden themselves together with the rest of the survivors was to assure them that it was her. She had forgotten that the villagers were used to her barely-humanoid makeshift guise and had never seen how she looked like prior to that. Fortunately Dali and Gordy snuggling against her legs helped to show and assure them that it was indeed her that returned.

 

“Just had my shapeshifting skill evolve, so I tried it out,” she had explained to the two once they calmed down. 

 

A quick assessment of their group showed her what she had to work with. Twenty-five children of various ages, some being literal toddlers all the way up to young teens. The children roughly balanced themselves out, as the older kids can likely help carry one of the toddlers each and still keep pace with the rest. Other than that, there was Eda-Zil and Kvar-Litu, though the two of them were injured from earlier.

 

Fortunately after a cursory inspection she determined that their injury was relatively light and would heal on its own within a couple of days, at most. That helped, as it would have been difficult to keep watch over the gaggle of children with only three people able to fight at all. Having the two youths for assistance – no matter how little – helped alleviate some weight from Esperanza’s mind.

 

They stayed the night in the hideout since it was already late in the evening by the time Esperanza returned with the remaining children. Many of the children had difficulty sleeping, some crying out for their parents, too young to comprehend that their parents were gone, while others muttered and speculated about what would become of them in the future.

 

Esperanza would have joined them in the tossing and turning, wracking her brains out at the mess, if not for the fact that she remembered that the cooldown on her time to chat with Oldies would end soon, and thus she would be able to toss the ball in their court, so to speak. They ought to be able to give some advice on how to proceed, she hoped.

 

Her musing had not gone unrewarded, though. The way the name of the [Champion] she fought hung at the back of her mind, like it was something she should be familiar with yet was unable to pinpoint, had nagged at her throughout the night, until she suddenly found herself learning a new general skill – they often popped out of nowhere like that when she met some sort of conditions – that helped with exactly that issue.

 

You Have Learned the General Skill [Clear Recollection Lvl1]!

 

[Clear Recollection]

Rare Skill

Level 1

What you had witnessed, you could find once more in the sea of memories.

Allows the user to recall memories of anything they had experienced before. Clarity and detail increases with skill level.

 

It was pretty much what she expected out of a skill with that sort of name. What the skill immediately helped her with was telling her where she had seen the name of the [Champion] she faced in the village earlier. It turned out she had read about him once in the history books – reading had always been one of her hobbies back then – when she was browsing around at random in the library.

 

It was a different spelling, but she was quite certain that the man was likely none other than Subotai Bahadur, a Mongolian general from the Golden Age of the Mongolian Empire in Asia, who served as a general under the infamous Genghis Khan himself, and was often called one of his “Dogs of War” to boot. That sort of history was not something commonly taught in class, and she only happened to read it when she was reading books in the library to while away the time back at school.

 

That also bode poorly for the human side of the conflict, she guessed.

 

Oldies had explained to her about the general situation of the conflict, of course, and she naturally was also informed about how at times the gods summoned not random people like her and her classmates, but instead called out to souls from history which had some fame to their name, one way or another. The fame requirement itself meant that the sort of soul summoned might be pretty random, though.

 

She had been quite amused when Oldies told her how once time the human side had summoned a famous singer, though the man was nowhere as useless as the idea sounded at first, as he quickly grew into a powerhouse whose songs invigorated his allies and frayed upon his enemy’s willpower and turned the tides of battles on many occasions.

 

That the demon side lucked out and got a general of all things for one of their [Champions] while the humans had some random schoolkids – on top of them missing one of their [Heroes] due to how things went with Esperanza – meant that the odds were heavily tilted in the demon side’s favor in this period, which left Esperanza was unsure on whether it was beneficial or detrimental for her.

 

In the end she shelved those considerations to the back of her mind and tried her best to get some proper sleep. God knows when she might be able to get a good rest if what she thought was the most likely case came true and she had to babysit the whole gaggle of children until she could bring them to some place that would not kill them on sight just because they – or their parents – worshiped Oldies.

 

******************************

Esperanza.

 

The very next morning – it was barely dawn, and just about everyone other than Dali and Gordy were still fast asleep at the time – Esperanza was awakened by an all too familiar voice in her mind, a voice that she had been hoping to hear from over the past day or so. She had so much she wanted to say to Oldies, and so much to ask.

 

Calm yourself down, child. We could sense the chaos in your thoughts even through our connection. We assume that something had happened in the time since we last spoke to each other?

 

“Oldies… I wish you all were here yesterday… Por el amor de Dios…” she muttered under her breath, careful not to raise her voice so as to not wake up any of the slumbering children and youths in the vicinity. Twenty-seven young survivors, all that were left from the villagers of Navef, with all their elders and parents dead and slain.

 

It was a true effort of will that Esperanza managed to prevent herself from breaking down in tears as she related her experiences of the previous day – from the first time she sighted the smoke in the horizon, all the way to her battle with the [Champion], without leaving anything out – as she poured out her many grievances and frustrations into her tale.

 

For their part, Oldies seemed content to listen quietly, never raising their voice as Esperanza retold the incident. Her voice nearly broke when she described seeing the pile that the villagers’ corpses had been haphazardly stacked up on by the invaders, and at times she almost yelled out in rage over what she had seen them do to the villagers who had been powerless to resist.

 

“Why, why would they go that far!?” said Esperanza in a nearly silent scream that was only really “hearable” for Oldies. “I can see them trying to kill others who believed in you. I can understand that. I cannot understand the cruelty and enjoyment they had while they did so! Why did they make it a cruel game to dangle a false hope in front of people they were about to kill!? In front of children for that matter!?” she ranted emotionally. “I’ve seen what they did to some of the corpses… By god, Oldies, that alone made me feel justified that I’d be ridding this world from scum like them. How could people fall so low!?”

 

One thing Esperanza had hidden from the children – both those she found hiding in the village and the ones who escaped beforehand – was the condition of the corpses of the villagers she saw piled up. Those who had been killed quickly and efficiently were the

minority of the bunch, whereas most of the corpses showed far more signs of abuse that sickened Esperanza.

 

Many showed signs of having been toyed with before they died painfully, sort of like what happened to Avec-Litu and Avalanusi. The invaders had made them shield the children with their bodies while purposefully shooting not to kill in a sort of cruel game for their own amusement. Many of the abused bodies showed similar signs.

 

Others had been… used in ways that made Esperanza see red when she noticed it, which was partly a reason she had really let loose on the invaders back during the final ambush. 

 

We neither delight in nor promote such actions either, child, but alas, we had witnessed it far too many times in our memories. All too often, when one group designated another as an “enemy”, it was as if they justified all sorts of behavior that they would have never shown to or done on one of their own. It was something we have observed far too many times. This was but another occasion on the long road of blood that the world had traversed.

 

“Right. I’ve read some things in books myself. People would cast their enemies as ‘other’ to themselves to make the act of killing them easier,” Esperanza said after she took a moment to calm herself down and control her emotions once more. “Foolish of me to not have considered that the pendejos of this world would not have done the same, when it’s been the tried and true approach throughout my own world’s history.”

 

For what it was worth, child, at times We have witnessed people who worshiped us commit acts of great violence out of a mistaken understanding that to do so would please us. Sometimes people are also great at fooling themselves, even if nobody else tried to drape the curtain over their eyes. That said, We have also witnessed far, far worse things in the many wars that took place around the summonings of heroes and champions.

 

“Right. The two sides must have had… what? Dozens of generations of history of pure hostility to one another by now? Hundred generations?” mumbled Esperanza exasperatedly. “They would have no issues whatsoever seeing the other as just an enemy to be killed, a monster or beast where no negotiations nor mercy were warranted.”

 

That is indeed so, child. You would need to steel yourself if you were to ever wander near the sites where battles took place between the two, as they were wont to happen in the near future.

 

“Yeah, I guess… Gracias, Oldies, for listening to me. I got something else to ask about, though,” said Esperanza as she calmed her emotions and brought her mind back to the current issue, namely that of the twenty-seven survivors of Navef that now slept under her guard. “Namely what options I have with these people. Are there any locations I could bring them to which would shelter them? Maybe other places that worship you?”

 

There are two locations that are not too far away from here, but the journey to either would still be a commendable ordeal for these people, much less the children. Still, with your guidance and help, We believe that you should be able to bring most of them to newfound safety and shelter in those places. Both have their complications, however.

 

“Lay them down on me, then,” said Esperanza as she nodded upon hearing what Oldies said. Her eyes peered through the dark and made out the shapes of the sleeping children, all huddled together into one clump on the forest floor, with only large leaves as their bedding. “It’s the least I could have done, for their sakes.”