Page 252 of Interion

“Grab my bow and get out of here! Find somewhere safe!” I shouted to her while trying to block his blows.

He was strong and his kicks were hard to block, but thanks to all of Zion's training, I fought back while defending myself and managed to dodge most of them. But my blows weren't doing enough to stop him. Adrian was enraged, and I wasn't focused enough. We traded blows at a furious pace, and the exhaustion from the constant exchange let him gain ground with each attack. Finally, Adrian exploited a small slip-up and drove his knee into my ribs—just like I'd done to him—and I saw stars. Before I could react, he threw a punch that missed my eye by millimeters. Pain exploded across my eyebrow, and something warm and sticky started dripping toward my eye, blurring my vision. My hand shot to my face to clear my sight, and that mistake cost me—he swept my legs out and we went down hard. The fall knocked the air out of my lungs.

“Two-faced bitch!” he shouted, pinning me down with his body while trying to hit my face.

Panicking, I defended myself as best I could, fighting to stay conscious while trying not to lose it over the fact that I was on the ground—ground fighting had always been my weakest point. Adrian wrapped his hands around my throat in a classic chokehold. Without air, blood clouding my vision, trapped beneath him—fear overwhelmed everything else. I couldn't focus enough to think of any way out.

“Where's your partner now?”

My mouth gaped open, gasping for air. Once again, I was vulnerable, humiliated by Adrian. It felt like fate kept replaying the same scene, expecting something to change with each repeat. It never did.

“Did you know he threatened and beat up my friends? Did you know he promised to break us in half if we messed with you?”

I remembered the car accident—of course Zion would do something like that. I clenched my fists and pushed against his forearm, trying to break free, but it was useless with all his weight pressing down on my stomach. Powerless, my brain went into panic mode, frantically searching through all those lessons where Zion had taught me how to escape situations like this, but I couldn't do anything. Once again, I was frozen by fear.

“Where's your partner now?” he asked, slapping me across the face. “Where's your general?”

My vision filled with black spots, and then he squeezed my throat until my windpipe nearly collapsed. I thrashed, my body growing weaker with every second. I'd prepared for this, but where was all that training now? My brain had hidden everything from me.

As I fought for air and spots of light danced across my vision, a memory of Zion filled my mind. A moment when he'd spoken with absolute conviction: “You are a descendant, a survivor of the forests, forged in blood and scars. You've been through things these pampered brats could never imagine.” I clung to that memory like a life raft.

“Say it!” Adrian shouted in my face.

For a moment, I disconnected from the present and kept focusing on Zion's words. Somehow, they were pulling my brain out of absolute terror, and the more I clung to the memory, the more a cold calm spread through my body.

“Say it, you little pig!”

Adrian raised his right fist to punch me, but this time my body sprang into action. In my mind, only Zion's words echoed: “You are a descendant, and they should be afraid of you, not the other way around.”

“He's not here,” I replied, extending one leg while bending the other.

When Adrian brought his fist down to knock me out, I turned my head at the last second, making him slam into the ground. Then I wrapped my forearms around the arm still pinning me. With every ounce of strength I had left, I raised the right side of my hip while wrenching his elbow joint. Adrian's eyes went wide, but before he could process what was happening, I was already rolling and throwing him to the ground beside me.

“You bitch,” Adrian cursed as he fell.

I got to my knees, struggling to fill my lungs with air. He tried to grab me again, but I managed to get to my feet before he could touch me. When I saw him below me, I knew it was too late to control what came next. Every word and gesture of his echoed in my mind, fueling the hatred in my blood. That hatred flowed through my veins like fuel, propelling me forward. All my emotional restraints were shattering, releasing years of repressed frustration and rage. A roar of fury erupted from my chest as I channeled my entire body into a punch straight to Adrian's eye.

“That's for the beating in the woods,” I snarled, ignoring the pain in my knuckles from the force of the blow.

Warmth spread through my chest, as if my entire being delighted in the retaliation. The look of disgust still on his face made me want to feel that sensation again. I kicked his face hard, as if my boot could wipe that expression off his features. And it did—but that didn't stop me from kicking again... and again... and one last time, until his body toppled into the mud. “Those are for four years of humiliation and threats.”

Adrian groaned in pain, dragging himself out of my reach. I wiped the blood from my eyes and stared down at him.

“As for your question: Zion isn't here because I don't need him to defend me from you. Not anymore.”

Adrian lay panting on the ground, saying nothing as I stared at him. Maybe I'd kicked too hard, but in that moment, the adrenaline coursing through me wouldn't let me think like a doctor. The truth was, I still remembered the day his friends almost beat me to a pulp, and as much as I didn't want to admit it to myself, revenge tasted too delicious not to savor. He wouldn't look at me, so I added:

“I advise you not to get up. I'm going to walk away, and you're not going to come after me.” I remembered the agreement with the Yonserian. “Or after Adele.”

He didn't answer, so I turned and started to run. But the sound of leather rustling caught my attention, and I looked back just in time to see Adrian getting up. I went back to him and landed a kick to his face, sending him crashing face-first onto the swamp floor.

“I told you not to get up!” I shouted as he collapsed with his face buried in the mud. I took a deep breath, whispering what was burned into my memory: “Who's eating dirt now?”

Seeing that he wasn't moving and had his nose buried in the swamp, my medical instincts nagged at me enough that I couldn't just leave him there. I crouched down and turned his head so he could breathe, and so he wouldn't aspirate the blood from his broken nose. His face was a mess of bruises and wounds, but I wasn't foolish enough to fix those—not even if I'd had access to my powers. I walked over to where Naoki lay, checked that he was breathing too, then left him where he was. With no risk of death, I walked away, abandoning them both.

I walked through the forest, wiping the blood from my face on my jacket sleeve. A pang of guilt over the violence I'd committed against Adrian kept nagging at my subconscious, but I tried to push it down. He'd deserved it, and I needed to defend myself. At least that's what I told myself to ease the guilt. Then I followed the direction I'd seen Adele disappear and tracked what might be her footprints.

Something rustled on the branch above my head, and I jumped when my bow and arrows fell to the ground at my feet. I looked up and there was Adele, sitting on a high branch, her face covered in blood. She looked like a white eagle from the Ice Bone mountains.