"Trust is tested when blades are drawn."
The morning mist clung low to the forest floor, curling around tree roots like secrets unwilling to be shared. The last of the campfire's embers hissed softly as Lena poured water over them, breaking the silence with a few muttered curses about cold mornings and stiff backs.
Nala moved with calculated precision—her armor already buckled into place, cloak thrown over one shoulder, hood up. She hadn't spoken to Hikaru since last night, hadn't even looked at him, really. Her jaw was tight, and the air around her pulsed with quiet command.
Hikaru tried not to watch her, but failed miserably. The image of her beneath moonlight, bare and calm in the spring, was burned behind his eyes like a brand.
He tightened the straps on his horse, glancing up just as Lena swung onto hers.
"You're awful quiet this morning," she said, eyeing him. "Not usually your style."
Hikaru gave a grunt. "Just listening."
"Hmm. You sure you're not staring?"
He blinked. "What?"
Lena smirked but didn't press. Instead, she looked toward Nala. "So, how far's this shrine?"
"Couple hours if we keep pace," Nala replied without turning. She mounted Yoru in one fluid motion, her silhouette framed against the rising sun.
Lena gave Hikaru a sideways look as she tugged her reins. "Try to keep up."
Hikaru clicked his tongue, muttered something about women conspiring, and followed.
Behind them, the forest watched in silence.
The path narrowed as they descended into the valley, its floor sunken between ridges like a wound carved into the land. Dead leaves carpeted the earth, muffling the clop of hooves. The trees arched overhead in strange ways, gnarled and reaching.
"This place feels off," Lena muttered.
Nala didn't respond.
Hikaru had heard rumors of this place during his time with the Lotus. Whispered mentions of "disappearances" and "cleansings." He hadn't believed most of it—until now. The air felt wrong. Heavy. Like they were being watched.
And then—
The snap of a branch.
"Down!" Nala shouted.
She threw herself from Yoru's saddle just as a spear flew past her head, embedding into a tree trunk with a sickening thunk.
From the ridge above, four masked figures descended in a flurry of black and steel—Lotus blades glinting in the filtered light.
Lena rolled into cover and threw two daggers in a blink, one slashing across an attacker's shoulder.
Hikaru drew his blade just as a tall enemy charged him with twin scimitars.
CLANG.
Steel met steel. Sparks flew.
Hikaru ducked, pivoted low, and swept the enemy's legs. But the man recovered fast, springing up and slashing across Hikaru's cheek with a shallow cut.
"Should've stayed dead, traitor," the man hissed in Japanese.
Hikaru's blood chilled. That voice—he knew it.
"Natsuo?"
The man smiled beneath his mask. "Didn't think I'd forget you."
Hikaru didn't answer. He lunged.
Their swords clashed again, Hikaru fighting not just for survival—but to bury old guilt. He moved fast, controlled—ducking under blows, rotating his shoulder for tighter slashes. He used the terrain: kicked dirt into Natsuo's face, elbowed him in the ribs, then drove the hilt of his blade into his jaw.
Across the clearing, Nala moved like fire. Her strikes were fluid and brutal. She ducked under a spinning strike, twisted the attacker's arm back with a crack, and swept his legs in one smooth motion. She didn't hesitate. Her sword sank into the man's side and was pulled out just as quickly, blood spraying into the dirt.
Hikaru stole a glance. She was magnificent.
"Focus," he growled to himself, turning back to Natsuo—just in time to block another strike.
Lena had tangled with a fourth fighter who wielded chain weapons. Her agility outmatched his reach. She danced in and out, slicing at his sides with a short blade, taunting him with sharp quips.
"You all always this dramatic, or is this a special performance?"
Soon only one remained.
He tried to run.
Nala was faster.
With a quick motion, she threw her blade—piercing his calf and sending him crashing to the ground with a strangled cry. She was on him in seconds, boot pressed to his chest, her second blade at his throat.
"Who sent you?" she asked quietly, the tip of her blade resting just under his chin.
He glared up at her, chest heaving. "You think I'd tell you anything?"
She didn't blink. "If you want to see another sunrise, you will."
He bared his teeth, defiant. "Do your worst. I'm not afraid of you."
Wrong answer.
She leaned in slightly, voice steady. "You should be."
Still, he said nothing.
For a moment, the forest was silent—only the distant wind and the crackle of disturbed leaves.
Then—quick, clean—she drove the blade into his throat.
The man went still.
Lena stared, wide-eyed. "Remind me never to get on her bad side."
Hikaru, still catching his breath, watched Nala carefully. Not with fear—but with wariness. Calculation. Respect.
She wiped her blades on the man's tattered clothing and turned without a word.
"We need to keep moving," she said.
Without waiting, she mounted Yoru and started down the path.
Lena exhaled slowly. "She's got a way of making a point, huh?"
Hikaru mounted his horse. "She is the point."
They rode on, leaving the bodies behind—and the message written in silence.
The forest grew hushed again as they rode, the weight of what had happened pressing into the silence. Blood still streaked Nala's gloves. Lena trailed behind them, quiet for once—either out of shock or finally grasping that Nala was more than just a sharp-tongued traveler.
Hikaru pulled up beside her.
She didn't look at him, gaze fixed ahead. Her posture was as straight as her blade had been, as if the ambush hadn't shaken her in the slightest.
"You didn't have to kill him," he said after a moment, voice low.
Nala didn't even blink. "He made his choice."
"Maybe. But sometimes... people break when you give them room to."
She turned her head just enough to glance at him from the corner of her eye. "You don't know the kind of people I've dealt with. He wouldn't have talked. He would've waited for us to sleep and slit our throats."
"And you're always that sure of people?"
"No," she said. "But I'm sure of cowards with empty loyalty. I've seen enough of them."
Hikaru let out a breath. He wanted to argue—wanted to push—but deep down, he knew she wasn't wrong. She wasn't careless. If anything, she was too careful. That was the part that got to him.
She had walls thicker than the mountains they were heading toward.
"You fight like someone who's been fighting their whole life," he said finally.
She gave a humorless chuckle. "Maybe I have."
He almost asked more. Almost pressed again. But then she turned her face fully toward him, those unreadable eyes catching the light, daring him to dig deeper.
So he backed off—for now.
Behind them, Lena finally spoke up. "So... this might be the worst road trip I've ever been on."
That cracked something. Hikaru gave a short laugh. Even Nala's mouth twitched, just slightly.
"But you're still alive," Nala said. "That's a win."
Lena frowned dramatically. "Barely. And we haven't even reached the village yet."
They pushed forward, the trail narrowing again as the sun dipped lower, casting long, golden shadows across the path.
Hikaru glanced once more at Nala—her stoic face, her bloodstained gloves, the slight sway of her ponytail in the breeze—and he wondered again what it was that shaped someone into that kind of steel.
And why, against all logic, he couldn't look away.
By the time they reached the narrow valley pass, the sun had dipped low behind the mountains, casting the path in a golden haze. A thin layer of mist rolled in from the trees, curling low around Yoru's hooves as he stepped carefully over the mossy trail.
The village came into view slowly, hidden within a thicket of tall cedars and crumbling stone terraces. Small, wooden houses clustered together like secrets kept too long—ancient but intact, preserved by time or stubborn will. A single bell hung in the center of the square, unmoving in the still air.
Nala slowed Yoru to a halt, her eyes scanning the quiet settlement. "It's too quiet."
Lena frowned, shifting in her saddle. "Where are the kids? The elders? I don't even hear birds..."
From the shadows of a nearby house, a handful of villagers emerged—men and women, elderly mostly, faces worn by time. They didn't speak. Just stared.
Nala dismounted first, Hikaru following suit. The villagers didn't move closer, only whispered quietly among themselves in a dialect Nala caught pieces of.
"Outsiders," one murmured.
Another whispered, "She bears the mark. Look at her eyes..."
A tall man with silver-streaked hair stepped forward, cane in hand but with a commanding presence. He looked Nala over from head to toe, then Hikaru.
"You stir old wounds coming here," he said, voice gruff but clear. "Why?"
"We're searching for answers," Hikaru replied calmly. "There's a symbol—Lotus. We think someone from here might know what it means."
The old man's eyes narrowed at the word Lotus. A tense silence fell.
"No one speaks of such things here," the elder muttered. "Not after what happened last time."
"What happened?" Lena asked softly.
A woman behind the elder whispered, "The fire. The vanishing. The one-eyed boy..."
The elder raised a hand to quiet her. "You want answers? Then you will give something in return."
Nala crossed her arms. "What kind of something?"
The old man's gaze was fixed on her now—studying, searching. "Help us first. We are being watched. Followed. If you can prove you're not what we fear, then maybe we'll talk."
The bell in the center of the village gave a low, solemn clink, stirred by a sudden breeze.
Nala's hand instinctively moved to the hilt of her blade.
And somewhere from deep within the trees beyond the village... a distant cry echoed.
Hikaru and Nala exchanged a glance.
This wasn't over.