THE LAST KEEPER

Chapter 209: 209. STRANGE REALIZATION

”How fast can you move in the woods?” Sagiri asked after a long moment of him patching his wound. If only it could heal any quicker. It looked like it could take another two hours for the wound to heal completely. If he waited two more hours, however, the window to escape the place could get thinner and thinner.

”I am the fastest in my school,” the girl answered.

”Good, we will make a run for it. If you slow me down, I will just make you remember.” Sagiri said, and he meant it. He could just go through her memories, but they were too fragmented, and he did not think his benefactor could be in them.

Suddenly, a weird sensation went through Sagiri. It was as if he were losing control for a mere second, but regained it quickly. He remembered N’varu once saying that if he let the one inside him take control, he could become a puppet. His eyes turned black, then quickly returned to normal. Sagiri staggered and sat down with a thud. His eyes kept going from black to normal. The girl looked at him curiously as he went through the phases. That had never happened. Sagiri could feel his body begin to burn, perhaps from the poison or the current state he was in. He could not know for sure.

Sagiri groaned and panted, clutching his throat.

Now of all times? Now was when the freaking poison residue and the archive chose to overreact. He panted even harder, trying as much as possible to let the pain pass, but it seemed to increase and get unbearable by the second. He wanted to scream in pain, but even the slightest noise could call for the trained hunting beasts. The pain was so severe he could hear himself scream on the inside, and sweat accumulated quickly on his brow. Suddenly, a hand touched him on his face. His eyes snapped open in alarm, only to find the girl kneeling in front of him. She was looking at him curiously with a tilted head. He did not trust her yet, after all, she had almost killed him. However, before he could throw her off him, the place she had touched on his face suddenly cooled down. It was as if the energy within her was the opposite of the one inside of him.

She must have touched his face unknowingly or on instinct, but she suddenly realised what she had done, and she withdrew her hand immediately. At that moment, they made contact without her intent to kill him, and Sagiri felt something from her. Whatever he had felt could not be. He refused to voice it out. It must have been his tired body playing tricks on him. The archive had never lied to him before, but for the first time, he doubted it.

It was impossible.

The pain rushed back into Sagiri’s body once again, and without thinking, this time he grabbed both her hands and put them on his face. She gasped in surprise but stayed still. There it was again, the feeling. It was now deeper than the first time she had laid his hand on him. She must have felt it too, by the way her eyes widened, matching those of Sagiri. Their eyes connected, and their emotions flew around them. For the first time, Sagiri was left speechless, and he could not believe or imagine what he was feeling to be true.

His skin and insides were cooling faster the longer her hands stayed on his face. The markings inside of him stirred violently this time, and they did not call her an enemy. They called her a different name.

What was happening? This was impossible.

The girl had always been meant to kill him. Even long before she was taken into that damned lab to be turned into her beast. She was always meant to kill him. Only she wasn’t meant to kill him out of enmity. Perhaps that is why, among those altered in a lab, only she was a success. She was always meant to heal him or kill him. Sagiri finally pushed her back when the searing pain inside of him faded.

”Who are you?” Sagiri asked. She looked even more shaken this time than the first time she had witnessed her memories of that lab place. She looked even more confused at what had just happened.

”I-I don’t know how I did that,” she stuttered. She must have done it without thinking. That was the only explanation. At that moment, Sagiri understood something new. There was something he did not yet know about the archive and his origin. There was something else he did not know, something that whatever he had remembered did not explain. He had a feeling that his going south was the only way he was going to find the answers he was looking for. Right at the moment, however, he needed to get away from the walls of Galka. The wound on his side was still healing slowly. That had not changed at all.

”What clan and tribe are you from?” Sagiri asked again.

”I didn’t know,” she answered honestly. Of course, she couldn’t know. She was raised in a tube.

”We need to move,” sagiri said finally. He was not going to get any answer from the girl; he knew that. She was in the dark about this, just like he was in the dark about it. The girl nodded and moved beside him. ”You follow me and don’t try anything stupid. Remember, you tried to kill me first, and my grand marshal knows. If you try to scream or something, you will suffer the same fate as me. If I don’t kill you first,” Sagiri repeated. His feelings were now conflicted, but his stand on killing her if she tried anything stupid had not changed.

The two walked slowly to the mouth of the cave. Sagiri could not feel any presence nearby yet. They could not be sure he was within the walls of Galka, but they were going to comb every inch of Galka Academy before they started chasing after him outside the walls. It was quiet, but the woods were restless. The number of warriors in them in the past few days had greatly affected the peaceful existence of the beast across the terrain.

Right when sagiri and the girl took a step out of the cave, suddenly a huge figure landed in front of them, stopping them in their tracks. Salka? A big cat landed beside him at the same time and was standing beside him. Its jaws hung open, showcasing its sharp canines. Sagiri had always known the man was something, but finding him that first was something he had not expected. It was not in his plan to fight Captain Salka. Perhaps it had always been prone to happen, but he had not expected it to be when he was planning to escape.

”Are you here to kill me?” Sagiri asked, his muscles tense. Salka was standing still, his expression unreadable, with both hands resting on his chest. A quiver full of arrows was resting on his shoulder, together with the bow. A moment of silence passed before Salka finally parted his lips to speak.

”I told you that if you ever harmed a student of Galka Academy, I would kill you.” His tone was cold and rigid when he said those words.