Seven Devils and a Rose

I tried to relax as we continued on our way, and it wasn't long until we came to the site.

"We're here," Michael, our lead soldier, said loudly.

We rushed on after him, and a few moments later, we came in sight of one of the most beautiful places ever. The field was covered in an array of wildflowers, stretching endlessly down to the river beyond.

"Wow!" I expressed. "It's beautiful here."

Aria said, "It is, isn't it?"

It wasn't long before Aria, Brenna, and I started hunting for wild herbs. Aria took out a small tablet, which wasn't that much different from our tablets, such as an iPad, back at home, and flicked through the screens, showing me what we were supposed to be looking for. This wild herb, which had a long and complicated proper name, had a brownish stem, green heart-shaped leaves, and a black and red flower bud with the pattern similar to a black widow spider. Its nickname was, of course, the black widow herb.

Aria said, "This herb, when turned into a potion, can heal most poisons. Of course, the purer the ingredients and the more powerful the magic used when creating the potion, the more potent it is. Lord Noah and his students will be using this to develop a new type of potion for healing."

I asked, as my eyes scanned around my area of the field, "Not just anyone can make the potion, then? Like, you can't just put the herbs in a mortar and start grinding with a pestle?"

Aria chuckled in amusement at my suggestion. "No. Unfortunately not. With that, you'll just get a dark paste with no potential at all. Only those with high qi can turn wild herbs into something magical and powerful, Alfie. There are many aiming to be the top in the pharmaceutical magician field, but I must admit that you need high qi for that."

"I see," I said. Well, that sure didn't sound like anyone like me. After all, I probably had no qi whatsoever within me since I was from another realm.

I said as a joke, "I bet they make lots of gold coins, eh? Those people with high qi, if they were to work as a pharmaceutical magician."

Aria gave me an odd look and nodded. "Very high. Those with high qi, especially one with a pure qi, have to be protected, you know, Alfie. And of course, they'll need to attend a five-year university course before they can become an apprentice of a master."

"It sure sounds difficult," I said. Not unlike a university degree back home. Then I cocked my head to one side and asked, "Why is that? Why do the ones with pure qi need to be protected?"

Brenna said, "Because they're very rare. There's probably about one in every ten to twenty thousand or so in the whole of the Aurora Realm."

Aria said, "Because their qi is so pure, they easily attract those with dark qi."

"Dark qi?" I asked.

Brenna said, "Monsters and beasts, creatures with high dark energy or power. It's an opposite attracts sort of thing. Nobody can fully understand it. It just happens. Just another phenomenon in our realm."

Aria said, "There's something very alluring about the pure qi to the dark qi individual, you see, and for some… well, they crave it and need it for survival."

Just as Aria said that, I felt hair rising along the back of my neck, and I was more than a little scared suddenly. I looked over my shoulder, my eyes narrowed as I stared into the darkness of the woods beyond. Why do I feel like we are being watched?

I flicked my gaze to the soldiers patrolling the area. Again, they still looked calm and relaxed. It must be my imagination, I thought. I should just chill.