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Description
Of Magic and Humans

By the time me and Kara finally caught up to the army, they, as well as Kitara, had already disappeared into a large black stone castle.
“Noooo…” Kara whined, sinking down onto the ground crying. I clenched my fist, lashing out angrily at a nearby boulder.
Kara leaped when she heard my hand snapping, turning to look at me terrified, my off-hand bent at an awkward angle with blood pouring down the wrist.
“Trace!!! What’re you doing!?! Are you trying to get yourself killed!?!” She shrieked, running over to me, slapping me hard across the cheek.
“Damn it! It’s all my fault! If it wasn’t for me distracting you, we could’ve saved Kitara!” I shouted angrily, continuing to punch the boulder with my undamaged hand, notably much more gently then before.
“It’s not your fault!” Kara shouted in my ear, pulling me away from the boulder. “Quit thrashing! You need to get your hand looked at!”
I quieted, keeping a straight face while Kara busied herself with healing my hand, which took a while.
“I’m amazed, Trace. You didn’t scream once the entire time. It must’ve hurt real badly, too,” she said, sounding awed.
Yeah, it was really painful, I thought, keeping my face an expressionless mask.
“It wasn’t that bad,” I replied, shaking my hand. I looked around at the surrounding landscape, planning again. The castle was set into a hole in a plateau more then ten times its height, effectively hiding it from the sky. Also, from what I could see, the walls of the hole in the plateau stood a good deal more then ten yards from the castle’s walls, so climbing up the wall and across wouldn’t work. The ceiling of the cave was far too high for me to even consider climbing all the way up the wall and leaping across to the cave. I’d be shot dead before I could even make it halfway up there.
“How’s it look?” Kara asked, leaning forward next to me and looking at the castle curiously. “You thought of a plan we could use yet?”
I jumped, looking at her curiously. “What makes you think I’m planning, and not just thinking?”
“Weeelll,” she started, drawing the word out for a few seconds, “when you’re planning you make a face like you just tasted a lemon that’s real sour. It’s actually kind of cute.” She grinned and grabbed my ear, tugging me around to look at her. “See??? There’s that sour-lemon-face!” she laughed, patting me on the head, which got on my nerves somewhat.
“Hey! I’m no cat! Don’t pet me on the head! I hate that!” I grumbled glaring at Kara venomously.
“Anyway, we do need to figure out a way to rescue sis before they unlock her powers,” Kara muttered audibly, piquing my curiousity.
“Powers? What powers does she have?” For some reason, even as I asked that question, I couldn’t help but think about the golden haired talking cat that I’d met twice. I thought that that cat might’ve had something to do with Kitara, but I was far too dazed to try and find any connection between the two. I jumped when I noticed Kara leaning on my shoulder.
“You say you have amnesia, so that probably means that you’ve no idea about our customs here, right? I thought so. Well, I guess I might as well teach you what I can about this, while I teach you magic.”
“I already told you that you don’t need to worry about that!” I muttered, looking away grumbling. “I already get that I can’t use magic! Anyway, shouldn’t we be concerned more with getting Kitara back from those guys that took her??”
“Look, for the time being there’s not much we can do while she’s in that fort, so we should focus more on getting your memory back.”
“And here I was thinking that you might be believing me about me being from another time,” I commented innocently, staring at her curiously.
“Either way, you’ve got to at least try to learn about society these days, so it doesn’t really matter if you’re from the Jyugen Rade age, or if you just have amnesia-“ she started, looking at me like I was stupid.
“Back up…what was that about the Jyugen Rade age? What’s a Jyugen Rade?”
“It’s what humans are called you idiot…” she sighed, shaking her head disgustedly. “Look, humans are called Jyugen Rade, people with catlike features and mannerisms are called Adel Rade, and people with doglike features and mannerisms are called Hyndel Rade.”
“…and what exactly do those words mean?”
“Jyugen Rade means, basically, that you’re neither a full-born human, with your physical abilities average at best. In the old human language, it’s translated as Humanoid.”
“…that sounds rather stupid, if you ask me. Not to mention insulting.”
“How is that insulting? You Jyugen Rade’s are so confusing…Anyway, moving on, Adel Rade literally translates as Feline Humanoid; Adel Rade have better reflexes and hearing then most other lifeforms, but we’re not as strong as other races…not to mention we aren’t as skilled at magic.”
“What’s the Jyugen in Jyugen Rade stand for anyway?”
“Don’t ask me, this’s the way it’s been as long as I can remember. I think that, since Rade is in every human based races name, some human leader wanted to differentiate their name a bit to avoid confusion.”
“Ah, I see…so you mind telling me about the Hyndel Rade?”
“There’s not much to tell, actually. Hyndel Rade are extremely hard to find. About the only thing I know about them is that their found in desolate and out of the way places where the other races rarely go, like high up on the mountains, where the weather’s too extreme for most other forms of animal life. Anyway, that’s enough of your lessons for today.”
“That was short…I’ve had lectures that lasted longer then that…” I muttered, confused.
“We’ve got more to cover, naturally. But, I feel that we should be worried more about the Jyugen behind you!” she pulled me away and to the side, out of the way of a sharp silver scythe that cut through the boulder I had been leaning against.
“What the-!?” I shouted, desperately avoiding the following side swing of the scythe. “What the hell’s going on here!?” I shouted, catching the thin blade of the scythe in my right arm, stifling a scream as it sliced wickedly through flesh and bone, spilling blood on the floor.
During the short scuffle I was having with the assailant, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that Kara had ran off, apparently saving herself and resigning me to death. I grabbed the shaft of the scythe with my free hand, keeping her from tearing it out and completely severing my arm, although, from the blood loss, it was more a contest to see if I would die on my feet by being cut to pieces, or if I would die from the blood loss. Before I could figure out what I should do, since me and my assailant were deadlocked, and more of my blood was pouring down the scythe’s staff, I heard a thud. My assailant fell away, grabbing at her right arm, which I saw had an arrow shaft sticking out of the shoulder. I also saw Kara on a boulder behind her, leveling another arrow. I heard another thud, and realized vaguely that I had fallen on my back, leaning against another boulder.
Kara was running towards me, shouting something, but it sounded really far away…

I gasped, sitting up straight and hitting my head hard on something soft and bouncy. Immediately, a sharp pain made itself known behind my eyes, knocking me on my back with a groan.
“Easy! You lost a lot of blood. Just lie back and relax…” she sighed in relief as I nodded, cross-eyed. “You really had me worried you know. I didn’t know what I’d do if you’d died.”
Weakly, I managed to toss my gaze from side to side, seeing a dark-brown haired girl sitting over by a fire, her arms and legs tied. “That’s…”
“Yeah, she’s the person that attacked you.”
“I see…maybe it was an accident?” I asked curiously, looking around for her scythe.
“If you’re looking for her scythe, I have it, and why didn’t you use your sword in the fight? If you had, you wouldn’t have gotten injured so badly.”
“Hey! I forgot I even had a sword for a minute! What do you expect? I’m not exactly a swordsman!” I shouted back, glaring at her wrathfully.
“Whatever…so what’re we gonna do about her?”
“Shut up Hyndel! I’ll kill you, and your entire race too! I’ll kill every one of you flea-bitten mongrels!!”
“…What is she talking about?” I asked in exasperation, staring at her condescendingly.
“From what she’s said since I captured her, she’s after the Hyndel because of something they did to her family, but she’s far too inexperienced to do anything significant to one of them.”
“Inexperienced you say…she almost cut my arm off!”
“Your not experienced in hand-to-hand, remember? You just said it yourself,” she countered innocently, smiling mockingly. “Or do you mean to say that you’re some kind of martial arts master?”
“…Shut up, I’m not in the mood right now.”
Kara sighed shaking her head. “You know, you take everything too seriously! You need to relax once in a while!”
I didn’t reply, instead kneeling in front of the bound girl, looking her straight in the eyes. “Who are you? Why did you attack me?”
“Shut up mutt! I’ll kill everyone of your disgusting kind, and I-“ she stopped in the middle of her sentence, staring at my head curiously. “Wait, where are you dog ears and tail? What kind of Hyndel doesn’t have dog ears or a tail?”
“Idiot…I’m a human, so why’d you attack me?”
“I guess I mistook you for a Hyndel…vengeance sure isn’t easy…” she muttered, sighing dejectedly. “Oh! My name’s Tomoe Kanzaki! Who’re you?”
“Not exactly the smartest human I’ve ever met, is she?” Kara remarked, kneeling next to me.
“You’re right…she is a bit of a dunce.”
“Shut up! I’m not a dunce! I’m just not very perceptive!” she shouted at us, bright red.
“Whatever…so you want to tell us you’re story, Tomo?”

Description
Of Magic and Humans

By the time me and Kara finally caught up to the army, they, as well as Kitara, had already disappeared into a large black stone castle.
“Noooo…” Kara whined, sinking down onto the ground crying. I clenched my fist, lashing out angrily at a nearby boulder.
Kara leaped when she heard my hand snapping, turning to look at me terrified, my off-hand bent at an awkward angle with blood pouring down the wrist.
“Trace!!! What’re you doing!?! Are you trying to get yourself killed!?!” She shrieked, running over to me, slapping me hard across the cheek.
“Damn it! It’s all my fault! If it wasn’t for me distracting you, we could’ve saved Kitara!” I shouted angrily, continuing to punch the boulder with my undamaged hand, notably much more gently then before.
“It’s not your fault!” Kara shouted in my ear, pulling me away from the boulder. “Quit thrashing! You need to get your hand looked at!”
I quieted, keeping a straight face while Kara busied herself with healing my hand, which took a while.
“I’m amazed, Trace. You didn’t scream once the entire time. It must’ve hurt real badly, too,” she said, sounding awed.
Yeah, it was really painful, I thought, keeping my face an expressionless mask.
“It wasn’t that bad,” I replied, shaking my hand. I looked around at the surrounding landscape, planning again. The castle was set into a hole in a plateau more then ten times its height, effectively hiding it from the sky. Also, from what I could see, the walls of the hole in the plateau stood a good deal more then ten yards from the castle’s walls, so climbing up the wall and across wouldn’t work. The ceiling of the cave was far too high for me to even consider climbing all the way up the wall and leaping across to the cave. I’d be shot dead before I could even make it halfway up there.
“How’s it look?” Kara asked, leaning forward next to me and looking at the castle curiously. “You thought of a plan we could use yet?”
I jumped, looking at her curiously. “What makes you think I’m planning, and not just thinking?”
“Weeelll,” she started, drawing the word out for a few seconds, “when you’re planning you make a face like you just tasted a lemon that’s real sour. It’s actually kind of cute.” She grinned and grabbed my ear, tugging me around to look at her. “See??? There’s that sour-lemon-face!” she laughed, patting me on the head, which got on my nerves somewhat.
“Hey! I’m no cat! Don’t pet me on the head! I hate that!” I grumbled glaring at Kara venomously.
“Anyway, we do need to figure out a way to rescue sis before they unlock her powers,” Kara muttered audibly, piquing my curiousity.
“Powers? What powers does she have?” For some reason, even as I asked that question, I couldn’t help but think about the golden haired talking cat that I’d met twice. I thought that that cat might’ve had something to do with Kitara, but I was far too dazed to try and find any connection between the two. I jumped when I noticed Kara leaning on my shoulder.
“You say you have amnesia, so that probably means that you’ve no idea about our customs here, right? I thought so. Well, I guess I might as well teach you what I can about this, while I teach you magic.”
“I already told you that you don’t need to worry about that!” I muttered, looking away grumbling. “I already get that I can’t use magic! Anyway, shouldn’t we be concerned more with getting Kitara back from those guys that took her??”
“Look, for the time being there’s not much we can do while she’s in that fort, so we should focus more on getting your memory back.”
“And here I was thinking that you might be believing me about me being from another time,” I commented innocently, staring at her curiously.
“Either way, you’ve got to at least try to learn about society these days, so it doesn’t really matter if you’re from the Jyugen Rade age, or if you just have amnesia-“ she started, looking at me like I was stupid.
“Back up…what was that about the Jyugen Rade age? What’s a Jyugen Rade?”
“It’s what humans are called you idiot…” she sighed, shaking her head disgustedly. “Look, humans are called Jyugen Rade, people with catlike features and mannerisms are called Adel Rade, and people with doglike features and mannerisms are called Hyndel Rade.”
“…and what exactly do those words mean?”
“Jyugen Rade means, basically, that you’re neither a full-born human, with your physical abilities average at best. In the old human language, it’s translated as Humanoid.”
“…that sounds rather stupid, if you ask me. Not to mention insulting.”
“How is that insulting? You Jyugen Rade’s are so confusing…Anyway, moving on, Adel Rade literally translates as Feline Humanoid; Adel Rade have better reflexes and hearing then most other lifeforms, but we’re not as strong as other races…not to mention we aren’t as skilled at magic.”
“What’s the Jyugen in Jyugen Rade stand for anyway?”
“Don’t ask me, this’s the way it’s been as long as I can remember. I think that, since Rade is in every human based races name, some human leader wanted to differentiate their name a bit to avoid confusion.”
“Ah, I see…so you mind telling me about the Hyndel Rade?”
“There’s not much to tell, actually. Hyndel Rade are extremely hard to find. About the only thing I know about them is that their found in desolate and out of the way places where the other races rarely go, like high up on the mountains, where the weather’s too extreme for most other forms of animal life. Anyway, that’s enough of your lessons for today.”
“That was short…I’ve had lectures that lasted longer then that…” I muttered, confused.
“We’ve got more to cover, naturally. But, I feel that we should be worried more about the Jyugen behind you!” she pulled me away and to the side, out of the way of a sharp silver scythe that cut through the boulder I had been leaning against.
“What the-!?” I shouted, desperately avoiding the following side swing of the scythe. “What the hell’s going on here!?” I shouted, catching the thin blade of the scythe in my right arm, stifling a scream as it sliced wickedly through flesh and bone, spilling blood on the floor.
During the short scuffle I was having with the assailant, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that Kara had ran off, apparently saving herself and resigning me to death. I grabbed the shaft of the scythe with my free hand, keeping her from tearing it out and completely severing my arm, although, from the blood loss, it was more a contest to see if I would die on my feet by being cut to pieces, or if I would die from the blood loss. Before I could figure out what I should do, since me and my assailant were deadlocked, and more of my blood was pouring down the scythe’s staff, I heard a thud. My assailant fell away, grabbing at her right arm, which I saw had an arrow shaft sticking out of the shoulder. I also saw Kara on a boulder behind her, leveling another arrow. I heard another thud, and realized vaguely that I had fallen on my back, leaning against another boulder.
Kara was running towards me, shouting something, but it sounded really far away…

I gasped, sitting up straight and hitting my head hard on something soft and bouncy. Immediately, a sharp pain made itself known behind my eyes, knocking me on my back with a groan.
“Easy! You lost a lot of blood. Just lie back and relax…” she sighed in relief as I nodded, cross-eyed. “You really had me worried you know. I didn’t know what I’d do if you’d died.”
Weakly, I managed to toss my gaze from side to side, seeing a dark-brown haired girl sitting over by a fire, her arms and legs tied. “That’s…”
“Yeah, she’s the person that attacked you.”
“I see…maybe it was an accident?” I asked curiously, looking around for her scythe.
“If you’re looking for her scythe, I have it, and why didn’t you use your sword in the fight? If you had, you wouldn’t have gotten injured so badly.”
“Hey! I forgot I even had a sword for a minute! What do you expect? I’m not exactly a swordsman!” I shouted back, glaring at her wrathfully.
“Whatever…so what’re we gonna do about her?”
“Shut up Hyndel! I’ll kill you, and your entire race too! I’ll kill every one of you flea-bitten mongrels!!”
“…What is she talking about?” I asked in exasperation, staring at her condescendingly.
“From what she’s said since I captured her, she’s after the Hyndel because of something they did to her family, but she’s far too inexperienced to do anything significant to one of them.”
“Inexperienced you say…she almost cut my arm off!”
“Your not experienced in hand-to-hand, remember? You just said it yourself,” she countered innocently, smiling mockingly. “Or do you mean to say that you’re some kind of martial arts master?”
“…Shut up, I’m not in the mood right now.”
Kara sighed shaking her head. “You know, you take everything too seriously! You need to relax once in a while!”
I didn’t reply, instead kneeling in front of the bound girl, looking her straight in the eyes. “Who are you? Why did you attack me?”
“Shut up mutt! I’ll kill everyone of your disgusting kind, and I-“ she stopped in the middle of her sentence, staring at my head curiously. “Wait, where are you dog ears and tail? What kind of Hyndel doesn’t have dog ears or a tail?”
“Idiot…I’m a human, so why’d you attack me?”
“I guess I mistook you for a Hyndel…vengeance sure isn’t easy…” she muttered, sighing dejectedly. “Oh! My name’s Tomoe Kanzaki! Who’re you?”
“Not exactly the smartest human I’ve ever met, is she?” Kara remarked, kneeling next to me.
“You’re right…she is a bit of a dunce.”
“Shut up! I’m not a dunce! I’m just not very perceptive!” she shouted at us, bright red.
“Whatever…so you want to tell us you’re story, Tomo?”