Ajax and Shaula sprint through the forest before them. Ajax is still holding Shaula’s hand.

Ajax has gained a frightening deal of speed and agility using his power. Shaula still keeps pace with him.

As they both run, Ajax continues to absorb heat from his surroundings, leaving trails of frost in his wake. He feels himself running faster. His vision gets more adaptive to his running speed.

His heart beats slower and slower; its efficiency is increasing. His body’s ability to maintain itself is also increasing.

Shaula siphons some of his energy in her effort to keep pace with him. As a naturally gifted athlete combined with her ability to steal Ajax’s excess energy, she becomes even faster than him.

But she doesn’t let go of his hand or speed up in front of him. Why would she do something like that? Side by side, that’s how they will go through this world.

As they run through the forest, they observe the trees.

Trees as tall as large sequoias back on earth. But with long, wide leaves capable of collecting dew for small animals, at least, any animal capable of making it to the high branches.

Some of the leaves are orange and yellow.

Is it fall on this world? The trees look beautiful...

Ajax thinks about the seasons of this world. Ajax might have been able to tell from the temperature of his surroundings what season it is but his inability to sense heat anymore prevents this.

He can however use other signs like the colours of the leaves to tell. That is, of course, assuming that trees behave the same way in this world, according to a process of photosynthesis and winter preparation.

For the first few minutes after leaving the place they woke up in, Ajax and Shaula run through the forest without stopping for anything.

They leap over obstacles and jump over slight peaks. The forest they’re walking through is not flat and even ground or human friendly terrain.

Ajax and Shaula also pay attention to their back for the slightest noise of pursuers.

Their ability to transform energy into strength even improves the sensitivity of their hearing. They can hear imperceptible sounds.

Different sized animals moving, slithering, hopping, running, sprinting... but no humans.

Both of them are barefoot. Shaula had found clothes for herself and Ajax and she might have found shoes for Ajax and herself if they weren’t interrupted by those men.

Ajax and Shaula try as much as they can to walk on soft ground rather than through pebbles and loose twigs.

They injure their feet every so often but don’t even notice because of the speed of their healing factor. Shaula’s continuous siphoning of Ajax’s strength allows her to manifest her own healing ability.

Ajax and Shaula start to slow down. They’ve run about... five kilometres from the hero facility.

As Shaula and Ajax decelerate, they stop next to a tree, this tree taller than a twenty story building. Ajax doesn’t feel the need to catch his breath.

He simply absorbs more heat from his surroundings.

He takes a look around the area for any wild animals or signs of their pursuers. Luckily, there is nothing.

Midway through his sprint, he stopped continuously absorbing power in order to not leave a frost trail, so nobody should be following the two of them.

But... he notices something.

Ajax signals Shaula, also taking a look around herself with a sharper, more discerning stare, to be silent, putting a finger to his lips.

Then, he points to the limb of a tree some distance in front of them. In front of the both of them, is a creature on one of the large branches of this tree, perhaps ten stories above the forest ground.

At a height like that, from where Ajax and Shaula were on the ground, it would be hard to see even a cat but this creature is not so small.

A large deer with long, brightly glowing antlers. How did it get up there?

Shaula and Ajax look at the creature with awe. Its head and neck are bent downwards onto one of the large leaves.

Shaula assumes from the size of the leaf and its bowl-like shape that it might have a collection of dew and that the deer is having a drink.

Ajax steps forward slowly to try to get a closer look. A twig snaps.

The deer looks in their direction. A creature with superb hearing, just like the two of them.

The deer leaps from the branch to another branch on the same tree and then a branch on a different tree farther away, disappearing from their sight. It doesn’t descend the tree or move to lower branches.

One wrong step and it would plummet to its death.

“It’s like... an Ibex...”

“Huh?”

“I know you like your anime and shit but, while you were fucking around, I was getting well acquainted with super animals like that thing.”

Shaula is talking about the Ibex. A mountain goat that can even scale the nearly vertical walls of hydroelectric dams to drink water leaking through.

An unbelievably agile creature and, in this world, there is apparently a species of deer with similar capabilities. With glowing horns.

“This really is a fantasy world...”

“No... this is sadly real.”

“You know what I mean, just like... magic, magical animals, odd shit like that deer.”

“Sigh...”

“Shaula... what should... what should we do now?”

“We should keep running forward to get away from them.”

“Don’t you think we’ve lost them already?”

“Maybe, but you saw, right? We can run without even getting tired. We can run way faster than we’ve ever run before. We can run a hundred kilometres and not feel a thing.”

“Yeah, so...”

“So, we should take advantage of that to get as far away from those shitheads as possible. How about we run until... until we find people? Then we’ll think of our next step at that point.”

“Hmm... so long as those people aren’t holy knights.”

“If we find more ‘holy knights’, I’m going to kill them.”

“Shaula, we can just run, we don’t have to kill everyone, right?”

“Yeah, sure... if we can escape, we’ll do that, but if not, we fight to kill.”

“...Ok. It’s... it’s self defence.”

“Yes. Yes, it is. Ok, before we start running again...”

Shaula touches the skirt of her dress, which goes down to her toes. She tears off the cloth slowly, trying to make sure it doesn’t fall to shreds.

She tears off the bottom half of her skirt so that her skirt now only goes down to just above her knees. She would not have done something like this, an action which exposes her bare legs.

But now... now that the burn on her right leg is gone...

“Sh-Shaula, wh-what are you d-doing?”

“You’re going to act all nervous and embarrassed now? Do you not see your dick flapping around?”

Ajax looks down.

Oh... that’s right...

Ajax’s toga tore off when he was shot with those explosive arrows.

He had even...

“Jesus Christ, did I really carry you while I was naked like that? What the fuck?”

“You must have been in some fucking state of mind... but don’t worry. Here.”

Shaula hands Ajax the skirt cloth she tore off.

“Wrap this around your waist to cover that thing up.”

“Y-Yeah, that’s a good idea. Thanks.”

Ajax takes the skirt cloth that Shaula tore off and wraps it around his waist like a towel. At the very least now, his genitalia are out of sight, out of mind. Until he can find some real clothes.

“I’m sorry, Shaula... you had to tear off your skirt for that...”

“Ajax... your fucking chest exploded. What the fuck are you talking about?”

Shaula’s tone sounds different. Angry.

“Why? Why did you do that? So much pain... so much--”

“To protect you.”

Ajax answers back with confidence and directness. No hesitation. No embarrassment. Shaula is slightly taken back by his lack of fearfulness.

“Shaula. I hope you know that I would take any number of bullets or fucking arrows for you... That was nothing. It healed up so fast, the pain only lasted a few seconds.”

“At the very least, you could have... I don’t know... warned me?”

“You saw, Shaula... there was no time. I didn’t know whether you could... wait... yeah, how did you heal? I saw you... you were dead. There was a hole in your chest and so much blood everywhere. How did you... how did you survive that?”

“I think... I think it was you...”

“What?”

“I was... I was awake on that bed. I couldn’t see or hear but my mind was still... working. It didn’t... it didn’t feel like I was going to die. But it was disorienting not being able to sense anything. Then... then, I felt your hand touch my face... that was your hand, right?”

“Yeah... I think so...”

“Then I felt this surge of strength... my wound closed so quickly and I sat up without a scratch.”

“Yeah... just like now while we were running. You were siphoning off some of my ‘power’. I felt some of it leave me and go to you.”

“Yeah... the only catch seems to be that you fell asleep when you brought me back to life. I guess... I guess when I was in that state, without my heart even beating, the price to bring me back was--”

“Shaula, wait... you must have been dead for a few minutes... what if... what if you lost memories? Do you think that’s... possible?”

“Oh... yeah... maybe I should think about that.”

Shaula had been in a state of death for multiple minutes. If her brain had lost oxygen and blood for so long, then... would her neurons have started to die?

If her brain was in the process of dying, the encoded memory information might not have returned after her brain healed.

“The healing was magic, right? That shouldn’t be a... well, I wouldn’t really know... never had to think about something like this before today...”

Ajax considers the magic of this world. Healing magic certainly existed in this world. But, even if magic was some kind of fantastical new element of nature to him, it didn’t mean that it could do even impossible things like restoring destroyed memories.

It also isn’t impossible to consider that their healing is limited in some way. Wouldn’t a fair consequence to their inability to die be... losing something... like memories?

“How would I know exactly what I’m forgetting? Hmm... Oh! Why don’t you ask me some questions?”

“Questions?”

“Yeah, just anything random. I have a pretty good memory, right? If I’m missing some memories, you’ll be able to see.”

A quick memory test. Not a terrible idea...

“Ok... uh... what’re my sister, mom and dad’s names?”

“Rita, Mary and Adam. Surname Leonid”

“Ok, so far so good... hmm... what earrings do you normally wear and where did you get them?”

“The red wolf heart earrings and the musical note earrings... the red wolf I got in... March, and you thought it looked pretty cool.”

“Yeah, it looked great, just your aesthetic.”

“The musical note earrings... you got them for me in... May. You were so cute trying to see if I liked them or not!”

“Sh-Shut up! The point of this test is your memory, not my embarrassment, Shaula! Sigh... Ok... so you’re pretty good so far...”

“Just ask me one more question, maybe from earlier than the last few months.”

“Ok... uh... hmm... when and why did you come to live with me and my family?”

“Huh... well...”

“You remember, right?”

“Yes, yes I do but... ok fine, I’ll just say it! I came to live with you at the end of the eleventh grade, second semester... because... because you begged me to...”

“Hey! Don’t say it like that! I mean... I did beg but... come on... say the whole thing please...”

“Sigh... fine... I-I know, Ajax... it’s because... because... you found out I was homeless, after I visited the food bank you volunteered at... and you wanted to help me... you begged me to accept your help...”

“You were working a job, going to school and literally homeless, Shaula. You think I’d just leave my best friend living in a tent city? Be glad I found out then, rather then after you died on the streets or something... I still don’t know how you made it through the winter homeless...”

“It wasn’t easy... just consider me a perfect, little goddess who can survive fucking everything! Ok, Ajax... I’m pretty sure I have all my memories.”

“Yeah. I guess, I’ll know if you’re missing anything eventually. But right now, we’ll just have to move past it.”

“Let’s go, Ajax.”

Shaula grabs Ajax’s right hand with her left. She feels a new surge of power. The warmth of his hand. He was... he is... a truly good person... and her best friend.

Ajax and Shaula continued running.

Running so they never see their enemies again.

Until they find people who can be their friends.