Elves are one of the oldest known races and are spread over the entire continent. They exist in multiple variants, wood elves, high elves, and dark elves represent the majority of the elven population. They can live up to a thousand years and have a proficient affinity for mana. Each of them is powerful and can either be a powerful ally or a terrorizing enemy.

Contrary to what their image as noble and intelligent beings pictures them, not all elves are born sentient. A small percentage of elves are born “wild”, without any intelligence, purely driven by murderous instinct, to the point of attacking their own mother. Such elves are nothing more than monsters, often slain after birth or thrown to the wilderness to live as monsters.

But sometimes these “wild” elves achieve a certain level of intelligence and make their way back into elven society. These elves, that have surpassed their instincts and have tamed their inner monster are called Nashir’s children. They are the most dangerous elves in existence and powerful enough to annihilate empires. Antagonizing one of Nashir’s children is prohibited by law.

***

The sound of footsteps stirred her up. When she looked up she saw an elf. Lena had never seen an actual elf but she had heard stories, and the long pointed ears identified him as an elf.

The first thing she noticed was that he was tall, like really tall, he had long blond hair that framed a face that was way too handsome for a man. He wore elegant dark plate armor and a long brown cloak, in both hands he held a long curved sword that seemed to be too thin to be a reliable weapon. He stood at the edge of the clearing for a moment before speaking.

“Hey there.” his voice sounded unsure.

“Hey...” she didn’t know what else to say.

Her answer seemed to throw him off but he quickly caught himself. After all her voice really wasn’t as pleasant as his own. After a moment he spoke again. “Could I ask you a question?” his voice was soft but insistent.

Lena eyed his weapons and nodded, still sitting on the floor, hugging her knees.

“Why are you crying?” his question seemed to surprise him as much as herself.

For a moment she wasn’t sure if she should answer, mainly because she didn’t want to hear her own voice again.

“My friends are dead, I died, I turned into a monster, and I will never be able to live a normal human life again because I will be hunted down and killed. I think that’s reason enough to cry a bit.” With one last sob, she stood up and looked at the elf.

He still stood at the edge of the clearing, his swords unmoving in his hands. “I won’t say that losing friends and dying isn’t a reason to grief, but that won’t change your situation either.” His voice was pleasant, but his words weren’t.

“And what else can I possibly do?” she yelled angrily. “I have no home and no future, I don’t even have a heartbeat anymore.” her voice trailed off. “What is there to do other than cry?” her last sentence was just a mere whisper.

The silence that followed seemed to be endless as none of them spoke or moved.

“Well, you seem to have two options.” His voice was determined. “First you could decide to die for good to join your dead friends. That way you can escape your undead existence and will not have to fear being killed by others.” he made a pause to let me think.

She didn’t want to die, she hadn’t wanted it the first time, so why would she want to die a second time?

“What’s the other option?” her voice was an energetic crackle of flesh. For some reason this elf didn’t kill Lena, quite the opposite, he gave her hope.

He didn’t answer directly but stepped closer towards her, his swords now sheeted on his back. He was even taller than she had thought, two meters away from her he stopped and scanned her from head to toe. Not in a weird way, but like a farmer inspecting a field. Expectant, but constantly looking for something that might go wrong and ruin the harvest.

“The second option is to live with your undead nature. Of course, you can’t live a normal human life, but you can still live.” She was about to ask how that would be possible when he explained.

“It won’t be easy, and people will still kill you if they find out, but you could still find a way to live. I would offer my assistance to help you conceal your nature and live as humanly as possible.” he paused. “Of course, I won’t let you leave until you perfectly control your nature and I'm sure you aren’t a threat to others.”

“I would help you control and understand your nature and abilities. In return, you could help me with some of my research projects during the time you learn.” He explained.

“What if I try to leave or accidentally kill someone?” She knew the answer before he said it.

“Then I would be forced to kill you.” he said flatly, and Lena didn’t dought that he could do it.

“Wouldn’t I just be your prisoner?”

“You have to understand that this wouldn’t be to imprison you but to protect others from you. Also, the world outside this forest isn’t nice to undead beings like yourself as you know.” he smiled warmly and continued.

“In the end, it is your choice, I won’t force you to do anything you don't want to. But I can’t let a newborn undead of your rank walk away freely either.” his last words were hard as steel.

Lena took her time to think, she couldn’t return to Maryda, nor did she know where to go. Being a walking corpse wasn’t easy and the elf seemed to be able to help her. Also, he seemed to be a nice guy, the fact that he hadn’t killed her alone was nice. Even if he would do it depending on her answer.

"Why are you offering this to me, I'm a monster, why don't you just kill me?" she wanted to know.

"I'm lonely and you haven't attacked me yet, and you don't seem to want it. So why shouldn't I offer my assistance to someone who needs it, even if this someone is undead?" he said with a genuine smile. She could see that he told the truth.

Lena didn't have an answer to that. This Elf offered his assistance, and she would be dumb to decline it.

“I take option two.” she said determinedly.

“Pleased to hear that, I’m Eshen’darr, five hundred and forty years old elf, expert demon hunter, and alchemist. May I know your name girl?” He said and grinned, revealing sharp pointy teeth.

She flinched back at the sight but quickly caught herself.

“Lena, seventeen and apprentice undead.” She didn’t know why she introduced herself like that but the elf only grinned wider.

“Nice to meet you, Lena. You should clean yourself up a bit, you look rough.” He said and pointed at the small pond.

With that said he walked away to give her some privacy. Without looking too closely at her reflection in the water, she tried to clean away most of the dark blood that tainted her clothes. It worked to some extent, but it also revealed her wound more clearly. A few centimeters beneath her heart was a dark circular hole. It didn’t seem to go all the way through her body but it wasn’t a scratch either. The gruesome wound didn't hurt at all and the bleeding seemed to have stopped. She wasn´t exactly sure what to do with it.

Soon she rejoined the Elf that had been waiting a few meters away. He completely ignored the now clearly visible hole in her torso, and simply turned around and signed her to follow.

“By the way, what did you mean by undead of my rank?” she asked in her rasping monster voice.

“Oh girl, you have a lot to learn.” He said. For some reason, that fact seemed to please him. He walked into the forest without another word.

Lena on the other hand, not only didn’t get an answer but also had to follow the rapidly leaving elf.

Now she was following an old elf through the forest at a fast pace. Eshen almost seemed to glide over the forest ground, maneuvering around trees, jumping over roots, and ducking under low-hanging branches.

A few meters behind him Lena tried to follow him without falling behind, which turned out to be difficult. Lena had greatly improved her walking skills but it still wasn’t enough. Having unlimited energy was useful if one was walking slowly through clear flat cave tunnels for days, but for running through a forest it didn’t do jack shit.

***

When Eshen’darr looked back at the young undead girl he almost laughed. It was a mystery to him how a powerful undead like her could stumble through a forest like a child. Stumbling over roots and stones, rushing through bushes, and hitting every tree that crossed her path.

“Are you sure you're 17, I thought that humans learned to walk earlier?” he said with a smug grin.

“I know how to walk, but my body doesn’t work properly after dying!” her voice was as raspy and monstrous as ever but he could still hear the angry tone. He would have to help her accept herself if she wanted to survive.

“Well, you should work on that.” with that said they continued their way through the forest.

A grinning elf and stumbling undead girl on a forest walk.

After multiple hours of travel through the dense forest, Lena and Eshen finally arrived. Lena didn’t know what she had expected, maybe a small wooden hut or a house way up on one of the surrounding trees. But it certainly wasn't the large tower made out of stone that stood before her. It had a diameter of at least fifteen meters and was more than twice as high. It stood in the middle of a large clearing surrounded by thick trees even higher than the tower.

“Home sweet home. Come on in, we need to talk.” the old elf said happily. They entered the massive building through a small wooden door. Lena followed behind.

The interior was relatively simple, even if the furniture was well made, it didn’t seem overly luxurious. Eshen (yes I’m calling him that now) and Lena sat around a small wooden table in one of the rooms on the second floor. The elf cleared his throat.

“So what exactly do you know of undead monsters and your current self?” He asked eagerly.

“Well undead are souls that take over corpses to kill the living, they are extremely dangerous and people generally hate them.” she paused. “I know that I’m a soul that took over my own dead body. I can see in the dark, have unlimited energy, and I neither need to eat nor sleep.”

Hearing her new voice this long made her uncomfortable.

The elf in front of her nodded slowly, ignoring her voice entirely. “Well, you don’t know shit.” Lena didn’t know if she was to feel insulted or ashamed. “But before we can remedy your total lack of general knowledge about the undead, you have to know the difference between monsters and other beings like humans.”He said.

“Monsters are beings with two specificities. First and foremost is their inability to create mana, and second are the so-called cores, that every monster and yourself possess." he pointed at her head where her soul resided. For some reason, she found it a bit inappropriate that he pointed at her inner self so leisurely.

"These cores are basically storage units for great amounts of concentrated mana. They provide monsters with a great amount of power, but without these cores, they will slowly wither away and eventually die. They need to constantly refill their cores in order to be able to keep up their power and sustain their bodies with mana."

“Humans or elves on the other don’t possess cores, and they don’t need them to live. They can generate their own mana, or at least regenerate what their bodies can hold. The human body can store mana without cores, inside their very flesh. Of course, the human body can only contain a limited amount of mana far lower than the amount in monster cores, and in consequence, they are far weaker than monsters.”

“Sure but some humans are super powerful, they can slay hundreds of monsters.” Lena interjected confused.

“Just because they are born weak doesn’t mean they can’t get strong. To achieve such strength they absorb minimal amounts of the mana from slain monsters.” He explained.

Her face must have shown that she didn’t get it.

“You must know that every living being has a small amount of mana inside of them. When a monster or other being with great amounts of mana dies, the mana stored inside of them dissipates and is absorbed by the beings in their surroundings, which expands the amount of mana they can absorb. This way humans get stronger.”

“Now the important part is Humans don’t need mana to survive, monsters, on the other hand, need large amounts of mana to sustain themselves and grow stronger. To achieve that they can either live in areas with rich mana or extract it from their prey. Which are often non-monster races as they are easier to kill than other monsters and contain larger amounts of mana than plants.”

Lena was silent for a moment. She wasn't human anymore.

“So to survive I have to absorb mana?” he nodded.” But I don’t want to kill and eat other humans. Can’t I just eat grass? Until now I didn’t need any mana anyway, I feel great.” He gave her a shrug and spoke again.

“You didn’t feel the need for mana because you still have a filled core, and the stored mana in it will sustain you for long enough, but it won’t last you forever. After some time you will need mana and grass won’t be nearly enough for you to keep you functional. If you don't get enough mana you will probably lose control over your body or worse.” He looked down at my face and laughed.

“Don’t worry, as long as you are here I will provide you with enough mana to survive. And I already know how you can sustain yourself in the future.” He smiled warmly and she fell silent for a long time.

Apart from Arim, Lena never had somebody who made sure that she didn’t starve to death. It might seem bizarre to some people, but in a poor village like Maryda, sharing food with others was not common. You either had food or you didn´t. During her childhood, people fought over every bit of bread, the only person that had ever shared food with her had been Arim.

“Thank you...” she whispered. Eshen only smiled and stood up.

“Well, I know that you don’t need to sleep, but I do. Make yourself comfortable and try to rest your mind.” With these words, he left the room. He was right, her mind needed rest. During the last couple of days, her entire life had changed and she needed time to sort out her mind.

Lena didn’t sleep that night, she thought about her friends, her death, and about the elf. Eshen wanted to help her and even offered to keep her alive. She felt grateful to him, even if she didn’t really know him. Thanks to him she didn’t fear her future as much as before. There was a way for her to live, it wouldn’t be easy but it was there. There was hope. Maybe, just maybe, one day she would be able to return to Maryda and see Arim and Nari again.

With these thoughts in mind, Lena passed the night looking at the stone wall of the elf’s tower.

Two days had passed since he and the undead girl had met. He had started to teach Lena as much as possible about monsters, mana sensing, and undead in general. He tried his very best to enable her to survive alone one day. Which was more difficult than he had originally thought.

“Why would I do that?” the rasping voice of the girl asked.

He was frustrated, Lena was far from being an idiot, but she wasn’t the brightest either. “Think about it. What’s your biggest weak point that you need to protect at all cost?” she stared back at him confused. “The heart?” her monstrous voice didn’t quite translate her confusion. “For your undead self you dimwit! You don’t need your heart to survive when you're undead so what's your weak point?” he asked again, frustrated.

Now she was angry, which didn’t surprise him. She hated being called undead, like she really hated it, the fact that he wasn’t the most polite teacher wasn’t helping either.

After calming herself down she seemed to get it.

“My head?”

“Yes, and why?” he pushed.

“Because that's where my core is.” Finally.

“Exactly, every undead has his core placed in his head, don't ask me why. Now to prevent people from detecting it too easily, and making its protection a little easier, you´ll need to move it down to your chest.” He said.

“How will that prevent people from detecting it, my clothes aren’t blocking any mana sight?” she asked. “It will and now do it. It is just a concentrated amount of mana, you should be able to move it freely inside of your body.” With a last doubting look at him, she closed her eyes and focused on her core.

The elf had told the truth, her core, or soul as she preferred, wasn’t a solid rock fixed in her head. It was like a drop of liquid mana. She could slowly push the silvery liquid down with the help of the mist-like tendrils that spread through her entire body. It wasn’t easy and it took more than an hour to guide it where her heart was. In a way, her core had replaced her heart, that now, was nothing more than a useless piece of flesh. Her core on the other hand was a bristling ball of silver that kept her alive. It even pulsed with energy from time to time like a heartbeat. Wait, was her core less bright?

She opened her eyes in panic and was met with a wave of exhaustion that rolled over her. It caught her completely off guard and made her panic even further. She hadn´t felt exhaustion for days. She sat on the ground to avoid falling. She couldn't be exhausted, she had unlimited energy did she not?

“You don’t look too good girl.” Eshen’s warm voice made her look up.

“I...I’m exhausted, and I think something isn’t right with my core!” Even her rasping voice showed signs of panic.

“First of all, you forgot to breathe again.” his voice as calm as ever.

One of the first things Eshen had told her after her arrival, was that if she wanted to live with humans she had to pretend to breathe. Lena hadn’t even realized that she had stopped breathing until he had told her. It had proven complicated to maintain the breathing without constantly thinking about it, but she was getting better. Now tho, her panic made breathing irrelevant.

“I don’t care. What’s wrong with my core?” It was less shiny than before, she was sure of it. It even felt less intense than before.

“Well, it is just as I told you, the mana inside of your core doesn’t last forever, it is depleting. The act of moving your core has cost you a good amount of mana. The consumption of great amounts of mana is extremely taxing for humans and elves, the fact that it can even exhaust you is interesting.” The relaxed expression on the Elves face made her furious, and she was about to yell at him but stopped when she saw a small glass vial in the Elf´s hand.

It was filled was clear blue liquid. She didn’t need to ask what it was, she could feel it. Mana.

“I told you that I would provide you with enough mana, and this liquid mana is the best way to refill your core.” He explained with a small smile.

“Liquid mana isn’t easy to extract but for an expert alchemist like myself it isn’t really difficult.” He said. He was obviously proud of himself.

He gave her the flask and she instantly chugged it down in one gulp and closed her eyes. A pleasant cold spread through her as the liquid mana slowly transformed into her own and entered her core. A wave of energy rushed through every tendril, every filament of mist that extended from her brilliant core. It was an invigorating feeling to have her core brimming with energy once again. After a few seconds, she opened her eyes and looked at the elf.

“That went pretty well did it not?” he grinned down at her.

“Considering the fact that every non-monster would have died if they drunk liquid mana, you actually seem to enjoy it.”

“Yes, it’s quite…WAIT, people die when they drink this?” she exclaimed.

“Humans, in particular, can only slowly absorb mana, even from defeated monsters. If they get in contact with too much mana too fast they get sick or even die.”

“Don’t look at me like that, I knew that you would be fine.” With that, he walked away and left Lena sitting in the dark beside his tower.

Eshen held his promise, he provided her with mana and helped her control her body. He made her train her movements by establishing a strict training plan. It included running, chopping wood, sprinting through the forest, and other exercises that helped her to better control her body. He even gave her a book about vocal articulation that should help her to speak.

She had to constantly adjust her body with her core but after another week, Lena was able to move completely normal again.

Her voice also improved greatly, it still sounded hollow and demonic, but it was now distinctly female and much more pleasant, even if it was still far from human. She was confident that it would get back to normal.

Apart from physical exercises, Eshen tried to teach her alchemy. In order to create her own liquid mana, it was essential for her to learn alchemy. At first, she’d blown up more than she actually created, but she learned fast. Eshen had warned her that creating liquid mana was difficult and would require a great amount of time and practice. He was right of course, but Lena continued to learn without pause.

During the nights, while the elf slept, Lena read all kinds of books about history, geography, basic magic theory, alchemy, monster history, monster biology, monster parts and their uses, how to not speak like a retarded demon (by Eshen’darr), and many more. She enjoyed most of them.

Being able to read as much as she wanted, felt surreal at first, but she loved it. With every book, she learned something new, something unexpected, something absurd, or even something terrifying.

With every book, every piece of information she tried to fill the hollow feeling in her chest. This hollow space that craved to be filled, only to remain as hollow as before. Lena tried to avoid thinking about it, as it remained hollow for another night.

Day 7.

Lena had always thought that old people were super-intelligent and were respected for their knowledge. After all, It was a common idea that with age came wisdom.

And most of this was true for Eshen. He was highly intelligent and she respected him. The centuries-old elf was clearly experienced in many fields and had seen many things during his life. What Lena didn´t know was that even old elves could have the humor of a child. She began to understand and appreciate his humor, but when he suddenly declared that they needed some strange interspecies living rules she began to doubt his mental stale a bit.

Basic rules for coexistence between an elf and undead:

1- The undead is forbidden to raise any additional undead or other monsters.

2- The undead is forbidden to eat or kill any non-monster being as long as their own existence isn’t endangered.

3- The undead has to attend his classes without exception, the excuse of being sick isn’t valid.

4- The elf has the obligation to provide mana and assist the undead with her training.

5- The elf is forbidden to make fun of the undead outside of class.

6- The elf is totally allowed to make fun of the undead during class.

Yes, some of these rules were good, even appreciated. But others... Well, at least she was safe from his jokes outside of class.