A Special Mage (Ike x OC)

Chapter 1 - Take Flight

"Bandits!" Someone shouted in the distance.

Rats. My heart rate accelerated as I feared the worst. I had been attempting to escape the likes of those buffoons for days. I had traveled great distances across the continent and hid in countless towns, and yet, they still somehow managed to track me. How? Don't ask me, because I have no knowledge of any spies that could have been following me or any kind of animal that they could've used to track my scent. If any of those fools even had some sort of secret spy, wouldn't it have been easier if the spy just caught me by themself? Oh, whatever. My main goal at the moment was to escape the bandits. Again.

I heard some of the townspeople draw out simple weapons like pitchforks, iron swords, and iron lances. The fresh, pleasant air was disturbed by outraged yells and the occasional blood curdling scream of a person being stabbed. The poor, innocent townsfolk probably had no idea why the bandits chose to invade their village, unaware that I, their prime target, had just arrived there. I stood watching from behind a wooden house as innocent people sacrificed their lives for the good of their own town, a town which I had damned. The bandits they were up against were no normal crowd of hooligans. They had a drive for much more than just the goods in people's houses. They wanted what I had to offer. And people were dying because of it! Damn it, I wished I could have helped the villagers so they at least stood a chance, but I wasn't trained in the use of any weapon, and I could no longer use my only source of defense! What a heap of garbage that was.

Heart aching, I made a terrible choice, one that I had made countless times in the past. I turned and bolted out of the village as stealthily as I could. The screams and shouts slowly grew distant as I sped farther from the village, panting heavily the entire way. I could still hear the terrifying shouts as I stopped to catch my breath, staring at the healthy green grass beneath me, which bordered a forest.

Looking behind me, I could see plumes of smoke rising up in the distance. They were burning down the town! I swore that they wanted me alive, so burning down the place wouldn't make much sense. But then I realized that it could only plausibly mean one thing. They somehow knew that I had left the town, and thought that the people there had facilitated my escape. My stomach twisted as I started imagining the worst. They're after me. They're probably going to catch up with me and I'll never be able to roam free again. What if they put me in a dungeon and I have to live there forever? I...no. I can't let that happen. I can't let these screwed up people ruin my life even more than they already have! My face flushed with rage and tears as I continued sprinting for my freedom.

The wind rushed past me as my entire body pulsed and ached. I had never run so fast or so far in my entire life. I felt like I had become the wind, or a wild deer separated from its herd, running from a pack of ravenous wolves that could tear me apart in an instant. I heard barbarous yells from afar. My body surged with a certain wild energy coursing into my blood from the ground as I fled. The yells grew closer. I was going to become their prey. I was like a young, naive rabbit who learned more about the world every day, who just wanted to graze peacefully and look at the world with large, innocent eyes. The yells grew even closer. I never asked to be hunted down or disturbed. I never did anything to anyone.

Embracing the ways of the squirrel, I scampered to the nearest tree as if avoiding a voracious fox. It was my only hope. There was no way in hell I could outrun them this time. I had never climbed too far up a tree before that moment, but my adrenaline was pumping, and it granted me abilities I never knew I had within me. I grasped a nearby tree with my arms and shimmied up the coarse trunk as best I could. The lowest branch would be too obvious a hiding spot, so I climbed up to the highest possible branch that could support my weight (mind you I was very light, so I made it pretty high). I held my breath, being careful not to rustle a single leaf. The yells were echoing throughout the forest. My breath quivered and my stomach swarmed with particularly active butterflies. They were approaching. I heard the leaves crunch beneath their feet and the sound of a little chipmunk scurrying away.