Gabrio stayed on shore of the Icean Spine, helping out on the medical tents as they started to load the tents, medical supplies, and the rest back to the boats.

“Are you fine?”

Mana rode on the shoulder of her treant. She lifted the medical crates and attached the rest to the branches of her treant. The medical team that was on the shore line stared at awe towards the treant.

“I am. Thank you for helping out.”

“No problem,” Mana sang a song and the treant started to the direction of the boats. The one loading the cargo stared as the treant lifted the crates, then lowered them in the boat.

“Very helpful.”

“Right?” Mana said casually. Elven-kin were frosty, and unemotional, but the face she made was different from what they perceived. And even Lady Eletha was rather conversative when it comes to dealing with humans.

Gabrio arranged his doctor’s bags. He lifted the scalpel, then placed them in the bag. He turned his eyes to Mana’s greenish hair that was fluttering against the wind.

“Looks like they are advancing on the Great Brampi Gates, huh.”

“They are. My sisters told me that they are approaching the main capital where the Great Brampi gates are.”

“That’s good,” Gabrio said. He checked on the operating tools once again, before placing it back inside.

“Your tools aren’t going to be ever missing with how you keep on placing them in and out.”

Gabrio shrugged. He decided to keep his tools away, and slung his doctor’s bag across his shoulder. On his belt were the four single-shot pistols. The treant came running back to Mana and then suddenly started to deflate into this tiny seed that she kept on her outer ear.

She was singing slowly, as if urging the seed to sleep.

“The seed...can’t believe that such a thing with a mass could regress into such a small thing,” Gabrio studied the seed carefully. He stood close to her.

“The seed’s mass is returned to the earth. Hmm, think of it as urging the spirits to hurry up the growth of the treant, what they lack in size, are merely enhanced by the sprites, who gratefully allow themselves to be part of the treant.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Hmm, it is troublesome to explain it to those who do not know our songs.”

Gabrio wanted to learn how their tongues work. He was truly curious on how it worked, but Gabrio had to let go of that curiosity.

“We’ll learn when things aren’t so busy.”

Mana smiled. “Gabrio, when are you not busy? You are always tending to your patients. Not that I mind it.”

She placed her hands on her back. Her words made Gabrio feel rather embarrassed. It was true that after they returned, there was so much work that needed to be done. She was not free, and he had patients to care for.

She didn’t mind it. But Gabrio felt that he had the duty to take care of the life shared with him. His heart had become a tree, and only through her giving half of her life that he was still standing.

“Are you thinking about that?”

“Huh?”

“Gabrio of Fort Rava, I didn’t give half of my life for you to worry about attending me. You remain you, and I’ll be fine.”

“Thank you, I really owe you a favor, and in a way give too much for me.”

“Like I said, I have paid my debt, and given half of my life for it.”

Gabrio realized that she was starting to get annoyed. It was something that he could help not bring out. Especially, when he had spent so much courage during those days, the struggle, the pain, that it still felt unreal.

How he was standing in this place...there are days where he was afraid that he would still be in that forest. Delusional, afraid, hungry, and in constant pain. He didn’t like talking about it, and kept it bottled. But Mana’s presence made him unconsciously think of those days.

Thank goodness that I held on, Gabrio smiled inwardly. Thankful that he kept on being a Doctor instead of losing to whatever desire he had that day.

“Sorry,” Gabrio said calmly. “It’s hard not to think of what happened,” he said without hiding it.”

“Don’t mind it too much. The earth mother had given you her blessing, and only because I know that you earned it that I gave you half of mine. It is rather insulting to me that you would keep saying that I shouldn’t have done it, you know?”

“So I had been insensitive, got it,” Gabrio didn’t dare to argue, it would be distasteful of him to keep bringing it, especially if she took the courage to give half of hers.

Mana nodded her head. The rest of the beach looked like it was swarming with ants as they loaded their items and personnel back to the fleet.

Captain Varo, who Gabrio hadn’t seen ever since, marched alongside his regiment. Officer Claudel Serran scanned his gaze on the regiment, and gave the Captain a thump on his shoulder.

Mana took a step closer to Gabrio. “It was said that Captain Varo was one of the trusted men of Commander Harrington during this campaign, the rest of the soldiers are clinging to the Arkshelled Island now. Most of our living armor had carried them back to the island in what was about to happen. Since they did well, they can go home.”

Captain Varo traveled his gaze on his men, then met eyes with Gabrio. He and Gabrio exchanged a nod, before he led his men into the longboat waiting for them.

“Doctor,” a voice called. Gabrio recognized the man as Lieutenant Heron Silva, “we need to get up. Oh, sorry, my lady, I didn’t think that such an esteemed person would be here.”

“Do not mind,” Mana said. “I shall be boarding the Milostiv until then.”

Gabrio looked at her. “Ristina not looking for you?”

“She’s going to be in discussion with some of the medical staff of the Admiral, most of our staff is capable of healing so I do not need to be around.”

“Okay then,” Gabrio gestured at the Lieutenant. They boarded the longboat, and rowed back to the Grand-Galleon. The rest of the crew returned to their ships. Gabrio climbed aboard the deck of the Galleon, and went straight to the clinic below the deck.

*****

After placing his doctor bag at his clinic. He went back to the top deck. The flares were fired from the crow’s neck of the Galleon, while the other ships used the colored flags to direct the movements of the fleet.

The fleet started to move a distance away from the shoreline, keeping a safe distance once it started.

“It looks like this is it, we’ll start crossing the Thatkean Channel,” Gabrio said in a low tone.

Mana nodded. She was keeping up with the news of her kin as they shared secrets from across the lands. It’s one of their best techniques, and how they could do this was one of the reasons why they were confident that they could do it.

Gabrio held no opinion about the incoming storm for the Icean Spine. He had already decided that his priority was the people of the Grand-Galleon, and then the fleet.

It was a shame that they had to come to this. From the start there was no way that they could agree about it. What the Reconnoiter Company wanted was for them to open the Great Gates, let the monsters inside, and carve a way for the fleet.

Not only that it will flood the lower half of the Icean Spine where most of their farms and irrigations were located. It also meant that the Great Seas will be open, and thus they would have to expect those who are under the water to infest most of the communities

They expect heavy resistance from the armored sea creatures that have recently become quiet after the constant bombardment.

The signalman that was on the crow’s nest fired a colored smoke and passed on the signal with the flags. It was then that the fleet started to do a maneuver. Like a single organism, the fleet began moving from the eastward of the Icean Spine, and moved four nautical miles from the shore and coastlines.

The cold familiar wind, the great sounds that the Galleon made as the masts were tugged was a familiar sound to Gabrio. Usually, it would have been faster with the Lady of the Fleet, Lady Eletha of Roan guiding them. But without her, the ships, though moved faster because of the westward winds coming from the spinal mountains, were still slower than the usual speed.

When the fleet was far from the coastlines of the Icean Spine. All eyes were pointed at the mouth of the Thatkean Channel.

All of them were waiting.

Gabrio stood on the rear deck of the Grand Galleon and saw a colossal figure made of the light of the sun manifest. That familiar figure was even brighter than when it manifested during the time in the coral islands.

It was big as a mountain and as it was about to raise the sword, there was a familiar booming voice that manifested into a banner made of various lights. The banner deflected the light, and the piercing arrow.

Gabrio was unsure what that banner was. How it protects the fleet all the time, but he was sure that it once again was protecting them.

Then another figure that was the same size as the Light’s Blinder manifested, crossing swords, and fighting in the Spine of the World.

“What is happening?” Gabrio asked.

He felt miniscule while watching two giants fight. Mana came to his side, and said. “It’s the Blinder of Light, and a Colossal Of the Interstice, it seemed to be the Champion of those Sea-kin creatures we saw when the fleet landed here. So they were after the Brampi Gates as well.”

“Why are they fighting?”

“Because the creatures of the interstice see the Blind of Light to be their greatest foe, it is natural for these sea creatures to fight their greatest foe.”

The spinal mountains were toppled as the two colossal giants fought.

The land itself shook and the Icean Spine itself seemed to split in two as the battle continued.

There were fearful murmurs as Gabrio saw the sprites and the little ones shudder at the sight of the battle. The cold winds that once cladded the Icean Spine were burned away. The figure of the Son of Light was like another sun on the horizon.

It came to Gabrio again that he was witnessing the sight of the ‘chosen’ of the light. That he was nothing more than a Doctor compared to the chosen of the sun.

His destiny lies in saving the world.

His role was rather simple compared to what Terin Gaspar needed to accomplish.

Gabrio wasn’t envious of his role.

But this display of power and the victory of the son of light did make him wonder what it would be like to be in the front of this voyage.

To be a hero destined to save the world.

Terin Gaspar’s sword became a pillar of light, and with a great cleave of that sword, the great blackstone gates that protected the land from the Great Seas were split open alongside the colossal giant.

The once green and rocky cliffs of the shoreline were covered by a surge of ocean water, covering the once rocky lands that they once stood on with rough and turbulent waters.

When the giant waves that came from the great gates had settled down, when the mist created from the great flood vanished, the crew only saw high-water and trees floating downstream. The giant made of light may have left destruction, but at the same time it finally paved a path for them.

The fleet started their sails to the path opened for them.