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"You know, you remind me of another Elf I know," Leonardo said, sounding less dignified. "She too doubted the extent of my abilities. Would you care to take a guess what has become of her?" Remelda scoffed. "If you managed to slay her, then I assure you she is nothing like I am." "Maybe I did, maybe I did not. And maybe you are, maybe you aren\'t," he said. "Would you care to find that out for yourself?" "Oh, would ya two just quit it with yer yammering!" Tressa yelled, a bundle of stray leaves blasting back with her shout. "If I\'m gonna have to be listenin\' to the shit ya\'ll be spouting the whole way through, I\'m dropping dead! And I certainly ain\'t meetin\' no maker doing stupid fools like you a favor!" Remelda just laughed, ears wriggling with pure unadulterated cynicism echoing throughout. "Forget about it then! No need for favors. Just go home. That goes for all of us! I fear all our efforts here would only be going toward just sending this fucker to an early grave. Not worth it one bit." There was a clunk of hard, heavy metal. Leonardo lifted himself from rest, staring forward and staring mad, the tip of his sword digging into the soil. His grip, the strain, visible against his knuckles. "Allow me to prove myself to you then," He said quietly, in a calmness that was anything but. "Unless you rather I do not." The Elf did not sway in the slightest. A smile on her lips, completely mad, unhinged, truly living up to the nature of her species. She returned his stare, looking gleeful, ecstatic. "Much more eager for death than I thought." I knew it was high time for me to step in again. The relegated peacekeeper of our little posse, it seems. But I needn\'t bother to placate and appease. I knew it wasn\'t my role to be the one to disrupt their heated affairs. No, that was someone else\'s job.

And here she comes now. Like a gust in the wind, a silent slither through the grass, at once, we all felt her. Every single one of us, the same sense of alarm, of panic, fear, pulsating through us. We all turned, searching the grounds, the darkness beyond the trees for a source. Instead, we heard her voice. "You\'ll die. He\'ll kill you. By all means, keep teasing him, Remelda. But know your limits and your place when you do. Otherwise, you wouldn\'t be able to live to even regret it." Then, suddenly, there she was. The moment I laid eyes on her face, on that smile on her lips, I knew it was her. Emerging from a narrow crevice between crooked, withered trunks. A stark blackness slithering into the light, into view. Like a blemish, an unsettling wrongness in reality. Terestra. "And you, Leonardo. I\'m surprised. Picking fights? The good hero himself, the champion of all life? Surely not, no?" She was a contradiction to all I\'d heard of her from Leonardo. I pictured a demon. Something vile, absolutely putrid, irredeemably wicked. But this was worse. Much worse. Nothing about her achieved to any kind of expectation I had held. Speaking to them, to us, as if like a friend, as if like any other. It\'s the politeness, the sincerity ringing true in her voice; her entire demeanor conveying a kindness when every fiber of my body was screaming and telling me otherwise. "Or maybe you simply have just gotten too restless is all," she mused on, getting gradually closer, her strides invisible in the cascade of darkness that clothed her whole body. "I mean how long has it been since I left you here? Has it been weeks? Months? Years? Who\'s to say time flows the same between realms? Is there still even a realm for you to get back to after all this time? Why, it really is quite the unnerving mystery, isn\'t it?" n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Then, afar yet somehow still much too close, she stood in place. In the middle of everyone, the center of everything, beset by only fearful gazes, the demon let out a quiet, playful giggle.

"Just who knows the things I\'ve done while you are gone?"

But not Leonardo. If there was anyone that could stand and stare against her in defiance. It was him. Everyone else helpless, frozen, and paralyzed with dread, but not him. He was the only exception. Or so that\'s how it was supposed to play out.

He stood before her, his blade in his hand. But he did not move, he did not speak. In his silence and in his stillness, his sword quivered, his expression squirmed. There was unbridled fear in his unblinking eyes. It looked real, too real—which would be about perfect if that\'s what we were supposed to be going for. Wasn\'t he supposed to say something? Didn\'t he have a line? Leon?

"Cut. CUT!" Oh boy, here it comes. "Leonardo, your line! Say it! You\'re acting! Act!" The Director blared out from the sidelines. His annoyance magnified tenfold with the megaphone smushed against his lips. "Of all times to mess up, of all the people, seriously, you? What\'s gotten into you?

Then it was like Leon just woke up, snapping awake for some kind of spell. He blinked around, his blue eyes lost for a moment, taking a moment to compose himself before even attempting to speak. "Sorry. My bad, I was… I didn\'t… I don\'t know what that was, honestly… I\'m…" "Forget it! We\'ll start from the top!" He cut him off. "Everyone back to your places! Don\'t mess this up again. That goes for everyone. Am I clear?" To be fair, it wasn\'t as if Leon was the only one who had clammed up. Everyone else was just as unnerved, Hayley, Amanda… the rest of the crew watching the scene unfold. Nobody was immune. Put anyone else in his place, and I highly doubt you\'d be able to get anything better. "Are you alright?" Mom asked him, shifting her eyes, and without a single noticeable change in her expression, the smile on her face was one of more motherly concern. "I didn\'t scare you, did I?"

"N-No, no… you didn\'t, of course not," Leon said, forcing a smile. "You just… you know… you caught me off guard. I didn\'t think you\'d be that amazing at that." "I try," she replied humbly, stepping back to her place hidden behind the trees. "Ready to try again?" "Sure," he said, confident and ready. "I\'ll get it perfect next time. I will. Yes. No worries." Yet the slight quiver in his lips says otherwise. Before slinking away, Mom threw me a brief glance, a fleeting look, telling me she knew just as well as I did. We\'re definitely gonna be here for a while…