The four of us sat right outside the forest, making a small campfire by one for the deformed trees. There was a strange air between us, a mixture of adrenaline from what we had just escaped, delight from making it out alive and... uncertainty.

None said a thing at first, but we all could tell that something was wrong. I started to feel restless with all this awkward tension in the air.

At last there was someone who broke the silence.

"So... Lilith eh, how did it go back there?" Victoria asked.

Lilith looked down, almost ashamed.

"Hey, it's okay to freeze up in situations like that. It's perfectly normal actually." Kasper jumped in wanting to help.

However, Lilith still didn't look at them.

"I had a feeling something like this wouldn't work... I think it's better if I leave the Raven core." Lilith said as she stood up, seemingly ready to leave.

However, before she could go anywhere Victoria grabbed her hand.

"Leaving? what, why?" Victoria said.

"As Kasper said, it's normal to freeze up in situations like this. I didnt mean to sound harsh I just wanted to..." Victoria said.

Before she could continue Lilith forced her hand out of Victorias.

"It's not that... It's what happened after. I thought I could control it better." Lilith said in a cryptic manor.

"What are you talking about? Control what?" Victoria asked.

Lilith didn't respond.

I looked towards her as she was about to try and leave again.

"Do you mean those phantoms you conjured up without using a chant?" I asked her. Looking directly into her eyes.

The others looked at me surprised.

I guess they where too busy to notice her not using a chant. I thought. 

Lilith looked at me with a concerned yet saddened expression.

"Is it related to that hunger the knight was referring to?" I asked.

Lilith's expression told me all I needed.

Victoria seems to have understood the situation a bit better after hearing that as well.

"Those where our memories he brought up back there, right? So I'm guessing he dug something up that you would rather forget. Am I right?" Victoria asked.

Lilith gave a slight nod. Her body still facing away from us.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Kasper asks.

Lilith doesnt answer at first.

"I think it would be better if I just left." she said.

Victoria grabbed hold of her hand once again, and looked at her with a fierce expression.

"Well I dont agree." Victoria said.

"If there is something wrong you can tell us. We are a team. I know we haven't known each other for long, but we are a team, a brotherhood. One person's problem becomes the group's problem. We do what we can to make sure to find a solution to that problem" Victoria said.

"I just dont want to hurt anyone else..." Lilith muttered.

"You cant hurt us if we know whats hurting you. All of us have been through something. Even the toughest adventurers have seen the darkest places this world has to offer. I'm sure even the members of Equinox have some shady pasts." Victoria says wanting Lilith to stay.

Lilith lets out a small chuckle.

"Are you seriously compering us to Equinox?" Lilith said.

"You heard what the knight said. It wasn't just you that Eric bothered. He got to me and Victoria to remember." I said.

Saying that I noticed how the group looked at me as if they all collectively remembered something.

Then Victoria's eyes lit up.

"What if... all four of us explain what it was that the knight talked about. Then it would be fair game. And maybe we could see it as a strengthening of us as a group if we go through this." Victorai said, ecstatic like a kid who had just gotten their birthday gift.  

"He didnt point to Kasper." Lilith said.

"I'll just tell something that I've gone through that matches what you guys have said." Kasper told her.

"Sure..." Lilith told us.

"Fantastic. Then why dont I start." Victoria said.

Victoria stood her up properly and cleared her throat.

"I'm supposedly the promised reincarnation of the six eyed demon." Victoria proudly announced whilst pointing to herself.

The three of us stood shocked.

The six-eyed demon was a beast that had roamed the realm over 600 years ago, after the world king Ezikil had gone on his venture to the obelisk of the world.

The six-eyed demon was apparently a horrid beast who could call upon the lighting in the sky and emit it from it's body. With four arms and six eyes it caused havoc across the great realm, even causing the gods to worry. Apparently the six-eyed demons rampaged almost destroyed half of the realms population.

It took the combined effort of all three races and two angels to stop him. As he was about to die he muttered something about invoking ancient powers in order to return anew. So for years a fear spread around the world of the six-eyed demons return in the form of a reincarnated child.

"I was born with six fingers and toes, and since my birth, people accused me of being the reincarnation of that damn six eye. So my parents gave me up to a cave spirit who instead of killing me raised me as his own." Victoria explained.

"But instead of living the life of the six eyed I decided to live my life as opposite of the six eyed as I can." 

"So before I left to explore the world, the cave guardian gave me the only surviving bone of the six-eyed demon to keep. So I asked around and gathered material so that I could have someone forge this." she said patting her sword.

"Wait... So Enigma is made from..." Kasper mumbled, a bit tensed up from hearing all this.

"The one surviving bone of the six-eyed demon. That is the burst modification of my blade." Victoria told us.

"And that's basically all." Victorai told us, seemingly uncaring of the horrifying truth she told us.

"What about you Arameth?" Victoria asked me.

"Yeah tell us about this oh so mighty person you met, the one who made the gods fear or whatever that psycho knight told us." Kasper said, trying to sound funny.

I stand up.

"Well firstly I saw the truth about what is happening in Astura. How Unn's green angel is forcing the townsfolk to become hyms and I survived the attack by Uranos on Berkton. And the other part, well..." I say lifting up my sword.

"It involves this. I'm not sure how much I can say about them but... They are the previous wielder of this sword. They told me that they go by many titles like giver of hope, god killer, butcher and many others. But they call themselves the mountain king."

"God killer?!" Kasper gasps.

"But thats impossible, all the twelve gods are alive and they are gods they cant die. Right?" Kasper said, looking towards the others.

However, they seemed equally as puzzled as him.

"I know it sounds unbelievable and impossible since the twelve still stand but... There was something when they spoke that made me believe them. Those eyes... They have seen something the rest can't. They made me believe that every word they said was true and that scars me. And now with what Eric said about them teaching the gods to fear..." I tell them.

"Mountain king huh?" Victoria muttered, seemingly interested in my story.

The group then turned to Kasper who seemed as unprepared as one could be for this.

"Well, I haven't really been through as much as you other two, but I have something. When I was young, I saw my brother die in torture after we where kidnapped by a rival group. If my family hadn't found me when they did, I think I..." Kasper told us.

"I-I think you can guess from there." he finished. 

We then look towards Lilith.

"No pressure... if you feel like you have changed your mind then it's fine." Victoria told her.

"No I can do it." Lilith persisted.

I looked at Lilith and I realized during these months that I had known her, I had never seen Lilith other then the usual confident attitude she always wore. It felt so unusual, almost wrong to see her in such a sad state.

Lilith took a deep breath and started.

***

Lilith

"A long time ago my parents of the esteemed Dreadwood family, the noble descendants of the great witch Quintin Dreadwood, where desperate to be with child but couldn't after many attempts." I started.

"Though one day a stranger knocked on their door. Asking to seek shelter from the rain. Gullible as they where they let him in."

"The streanger, according to my parents, was dressed in a fancy black suit with a yellow tie and yellow outlines along the suit. According to my mother, he had a calm and charming voice, while my father described it as pompous and cunning. None of them could tell me what his face looked like, they always told me that it was like a blur in their minds. All they remember are his darkened, rose-red eyes." I explained. 

"As the storm grew larger the man asked to stay the night and was given a room. As the night progressed and with the wine they possesd, my parents told the starnger about their trubles."

"He listened and pondered and came up with an idea. He offered them a deal. I ask nothing of thee or your lover instead my price shall be collected from another. I will give you a child and all you need to do is shake my hand."

"My parents, gullible as they where, were smart. They made sure in the contract that nothing would happen to them or their staff and so the stranger assured. now all they had to do was to go to bed after giving him one glass of their finest red."

"The next morning the man was gone. At first they believed they had been tricked but nine months later I was born. My parents where overjoyed and fully believed that the man they met was kind since he had kept his word and he had not take anything in return for them gaining a child."

"However, what they didn't know was that the man had already taken his payment. He didn't lie. The debt didn't fall onto my parents or any of their close relatives, but the debt had fallen upon the newest part of the family. On that day, the small and fragile girl was cursed by the man. A curse that neither modern nor old magic could dispel. A curse of hunger. Hunger for information, history, magic, spells, experiences, anything."

"It started as simple headaches and dulled whispers. Being easily fed with books of any kind and new foods, however, the curse quickly grew more and more hungry, starting to dig its claws into the girls head screaming at her demanding to be fed."

"Grimoire old and new, history text, any page of the three principles, knowledge of the gods and still it wasnt satisfied. However, from the eyes of her pears she was seen as a prodigy and a bright future for the Dreadwood family, completely unaware of the curses hold on their daughter. The girl had enough and at that point started to ignore its cries. The first days it was bearable but by the end of the week the curse wouldn't stop its demands."

"And on the last week night the girl couldn't sleep because the curse kept her awake. So she struggled out of bed and walked down the hall of her parents' mansion. She must have made enough noise to have woken up her parents for what she sees next is her father holding her in his arms with her mother close by."

"But yet the curse kept on. it couldn't hold on anymore and from the little girls body phantoms erupted and developed her father. In mere moments she felt her father's arms disintegrate from under her as the curse was feeding of her father. Yet it wasn't satisfied. The phantoms kept on towards her mother and the maids standing by."

"As the girl heard her mother's cries fade out with the phantoms she felt a sharp sting in her head. Still the curse wasn't satisfied. It dug into her mind and ate from her. From there she felt how the years of love she had or her parents seeped out of her."

"The curse ate and removed the girls love for her parents. So by the age of eight the little girl had become an orphan to parents she wasn't allowed to cry for." I told them my story.

I felt some tears run down my face as I remembered those painful memories of my childhood.

I looked towards my comrades.

"That was seven years ago but the curse is still hungry and I still haven't been able to get it under control." I explained.

"I have been able to semi control the phantoms however, I haven't attempted to go against the curses' wishes again since that day." I told them.

"Because of this curse I have been al alone since people fear me for it... But I dont blame them. I probably would to if I where in their shoes."

Visions of former friends and family casting me away calling me a murderer flood my mind. I remember travelers avoiding me like the plague once they learnt of my curse. Yet one person sticks out.

"Who cares about curses. It's not like you asked to be born with it. You said you studied magic by yourself? Then why dont you head to Fardum. It has produced most of the great witches on the continent. Including yours truly." ████████

She was a witch clad in snow-white robes and called herself a powerful witch. I spent a year traveling with her, and that might have been the most influential year I've been through.

I prepared myself to leave like some many other times before, but as I turned around to leave I felt someone hold onto me. I looked back and I felt Victoria embrace me in a hug.

"It sounded like you needed it." Victoria told me.

"Arent you worried my curse would..." I say.

"Why would we. We all chose to travel the way of the sword and adventure. There will always be a scarier obstacle ahead." Kasper told me.

"Besides, if it's a curse there ought to be a counter curse somewhere in the realm." Arameth tells me.

"We can't know how you fell, but as I said. If one member of the brotherhood is troubled, then the rest of us will help. No matter what." Victoria said, reassuring me.

I sat down again feeling a calming warmth emanating from her.

When was the last time someone hugged me like this? I asked myself.

I felt more tears run down my face as I sat back down.

"Then, it's okay if I stick around?" I asked.

"Of course." the three of them almost said at the same time.

We sat there all night long until the next day when our ride back had return.