Heroes to Hunted

To my surprise, the fire didn't damage me. Oddly enough, it didn't even cauterize my open wounds; they simply bled through the flames, dripping steamed driblets of crimson to my feet. It was as if my flesh became naturally resistant to being burned.

The flames extended forward from my arms in an uncontrolled cone, almost akin to a jet's propulsion. I quaked with bottomless fear at the sight, barely containing my urge to give into panic. My face twitched, and keeping focus required an active effort. Still, I wouldn't give in to my inner demons.

Meanwhile, Barik was my opposite. He was calm, collected, and in complete control of his power. He stuffed his arms back into the ground and doubled up on his armor. The thickened rock around his body made him appear to be more like a brown-gray golem than a man.

However, instead of charging me head-on, he performed a new move.

Barik raised both arms above his head and slammed them simultaneously into the ground. Aside from the shockwave created by a trembling mass of vibrations, numerous flesh-impaling spikes trailed outward. All headed straight for me.

I steeled myself to fight back. There'd be no more futile dodging; my body wasn't in a condition for that anyway. Instead, I crossed my burning arms and swiped them forward in an 'X.'

A torrent of flames surged forth, cleaving the spikes in half and scorching the ground until it was blackened, save for a few glowing patches of embers that lingered in its wake.

In response, Barik raised a dome of hardened granite around him. The fire clashed with his defense, vaporizing layer upon layer until it brute forced through entirely.

Where Barik once stood was now an immolated mass of molten stone and ashen dirt.

"No... Did I kill him?!" I panicked, thinking I'd just killed my ally during what was meant to be a training session. However, I had no need to worry. When the flame cleared, a large crater was revealed where he once stood.

'Thank god...' a wave of relief washed over me when I realized he had managed to burrow underground.

However, my relief soon subsided to suspicion. "Wait, that means..."

As I thought, Barik smashed through the ground beneath me, knocking me into the air. "You didn't think you'd get me with that, did you kid?" he laughed loudly and took hold of my leg, clamping down on it with pressure akin to a vice grip.

'Is he…having fun?!' the realization shocked me. After wincing from the pain of his grasp on my ankle, I directed my immolated arms toward him. Then, like a rocket, I loosed all my firepower into a singular, point-blank blast.

"Oh shit!" he exclaimed, then narrowly evaded back into the safety of the underground.

Meanwhile, I had accidentally propelled myself upward. Unfortunately, my control over my flight was nonexistent, so I slammed into a tree before crashing to the ground.

After stumbling to my feet, I could sense my fire and fear growing beyond my control. If I allowed it to continue, there was no doubt I'd have a repeat of last night.

I did everything I could, but I was at my absolute limit. It was a bonafide miracle that I was still conscious. So I tried resealing my fear. I tried locking away all of the memories and thoughts that allowed the fire to grow in the first place.

However, it was too late. The devouring inferno took on a will of its own, growing larger and more untamed by the second.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" I shouted while doing everything I could to put myself out. It grew to my shoulders, burning away pieces of my clothes as it went.

"Losing control, huh?" Barik approached calmly. His armor was blackened and crumbling to pieces, showing that my flames must've hit him, despite his evasion. "I guess that's to be expected; you're a novice, after all..." he released his magic, and what was left of his armored shell crumbled to the floor.

"What the hell do I do?!" I held my arms as far from me as I could. Then, an irrational thought entered my mind in my panic. I considered cutting off my arms if the fire couldn't be snuffed out.

"Relaaax," Barik sighed. "Here, I'll help you out."

"HOW?! DO IT!" I didn't care how; I just wanted the fire gone.

He bored his arms into the earth, forming two holes. "Stick them in there."

He was right. Magical or not, fire needed oxygen to remain burning, right?! So I followed his advice, fell to my knees, and suffocated the flames below the ground.

Several minutes passed while I hunched over.

I could feel my broken ribs stabbing into my flesh due to my irregular position, but I held still. I kept myself there until any semblance of light or heat was finally extinguished.

When the sensation of warmth finally disappeared, I cautiously pulled my hands free and fell to my back. Like my fire had been, I was desperate for oxygen. So I frantically gasped for air as if my life was in danger of being snuffed out next.

"Are you okay, kid?" Barik knelt down with a concerned look on his face.

I was too exhausted to reply. It took me several breaths before I could utter a syllable. When I did, it was out of anger for what he forced me into doing.

"Ho-How could you do that? What the hell?!" I wheezed between my breaths.

Barik plopped himself to the ground beside me and deeply inhaled. "Look, I'm sorry... But it was necessary. You can't be afraid of your own strength, not here."

I wanted to argue, to tell him there was another way. A less painful way. But, in reality, I wasn't so sure. Even after the battle and the flames were extinguished, my heart was still constricted by an intense dread when thinking about my power. However, despite my misgivings, it was a fact that I learned to use a critical, last-resort escape tool because of him.

He disregarded my silence, opting to continue speaking instead. "You know... I really am sorry. I met many young men like you back in my glory days. Not as strong, but each had emotional baggage. Baggage that got them killed when they should've lived. If I can, I want to prevent the same from happening to you."

I understood. After all, separating my emotions from battle was the creed I tried to live by. While here, I've accepted the deaths of those I failed to save and moved on. After all, death and loss were natural occurrences in war.

But my pyrophobia was different. Fear wasn't an emotion that was easily suppressed by denial and distractions. It was hard to keep a cool head when the inside was filled with fire.

What did calm my emotional turmoil were the passing stars. Thanks to the night sky's tranquility and nature's white noise, I quelled my inner unrest.

After a deep sigh, I was finally level-headed enough to speak back. "You don't need to apologize," I eased. "What you did was right. What you said...was right. As I am now, I'm a liability. I needed a slap in the face."

"I did a little more than that," he boisterously laughed.

I shared in his cheer, but my chuckle was meek and raspy. If I laughed too hard, the broken rib in my gut dug deeper into my flesh, sending a reverberating sting throughout my body.

"Could I ask you a question?" I turned to Barik.

Without moving, Barik replied, "sure thing, kid. Ask away."

"You're acting a lot different from how you were at camp; why?"

"Ahhhh...." he sighed loudly. "It's because I'm unsure how to act...normally?" he furrowed his brow and faced me. "It's not a story I want to delve deeply into. But I was a soldier once. After that kind of experience, it gets...harder to interact with others."

'Ah, so that's what that is,' I finally knew where my kinship for him came from. As a soldier myself, I discovered how hard it was to acclimate back into society, especially as anything other than a warrior or killer.

I wanted to ask more questions. Who he fought for? How long he fought? Who he fought against? But I couldn't. I knew those questions weren't ones to be asked lightly.

Instead, silence ensued for several minutes. I was on the cusp of drifting to sleep until Barik spoke again.

"Huuuuuh," he groaned. "You need to come work in my forge after this."

"What?" I swiveled my head toward Barik. "What are you talking about?"

"Your flames are abnormally hot. When you burned my ground spikes, you could color me surprised! You'd help me a lot in the forge!" he cheered with a smile.

"That's quite a promotion!" I said sarcastically. "From a soldier to a blacksmith's assistant!"

"Well..." Barik smirked, "You'd probably be more of a forge itself than an assistant. Your flames are what I'm after."

"Ah...So I'd be a tool..." I sighed.

"We're soldiers. We were always tools!" he cackled, and I followed suit.

With exhausted minds and fatigued bodies, Barik and I shared an unlikely bond during several moments of cheer. While exchanging banter and jokes, we joyously laughed the night away.

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