Stranger
The sky was dark fading into a blue-ish teal sky as the sun sets. The ships were moving slowly in the distant as the stench of the docks clogged the air. Haebyeol took a deep breath and stared at the murky water below the docks. She kicked the gravel chipped from the concrete foundation into the water. The gravels sent spherical ripples into the dark ocean, she could see the ripple waved over to almost a few feet as the circumference of the ripple grew a little wider, it was suddenly stopped at one end, breaking the circle.
Haebyeol’s attention was caught by the sudden silence in the air, she stared into the water. She squinted her eyes in an attempt to see the water clearly. It was almost impossible to see through the turbid waters. It was nothing like the springs in Yggdra where it was clear and crystal blue, sometimes a light green shade. She was still there waiting, she wanted to move nearer but the water seemed to be bubbling.
Her gut was telling her to run but curiosity left her standing there frozen. She bit her lip lightly, frustrated at why she can’t just reach into the water and pull out whatever it is there. She took a step closer but before she even laid her foot down, she was pulled to the far side of the pier. She turned to look and saw that where she stood was now filled with a pile of barnacles laying on the floor wriggling. Her eyes widened by the sight a smile was almost drawn across her face but she was tugged on the arm tightly by the stranger that pulled her away.
“Are you crazy?” the stranger snapped at her.
“What was she thinking?”,he said to himself. Sungjoon was doing his routine checks, when suddenly the smell of barnacles caught him. He traced the smell and could see something in the shape of a nymphs head moving across the water towards the pier. “Barnacles”, he sighed. He was readying his shot, trying to blast the nymph from afar,when suddenly, he caught sight of girl on the pier.
He withdrew his bow. His first reaction was to get the girl to safety. Barnacles are too common when there are nymphs nearby,he thought. He jumped from the high ledge that he was from and ran to save the soldier,pulling her just in time.
He pulled her back a few more steps as the end of the pier was being overwhelmed by barnacles. They could have easily fled. But, Sungjoon could not just let it happen. His conscience forbids him to flee from evil.Sungjoon grabbed one of his fire arrows and aimed it towards the center of the barnacles. “Evil has no place in this world. Not even in Below. Die”, he preached just before unleashing his shot.
He turned back. There was the soldier that he had just saved. “Are you crazy?” he snapped. “What were you thinking?!”, he asked while swinging his bow over his shoulder. You could tell that Sungjoon wasn’t really happy.
