173 Fishman island: The old temple (1/2)

He was not out of breath his temporary accomplice was though. She leaned against the wall taking deep breaths as she attempted to stop huffing. Through the course of her mad dash her trusty scarf had come clean off, letting everyone who was interested get a look at her face.

With slow deliberate steps she got to her feet, her heaving chest no longer puffed out as conspicuously.

”What...?” Fawkes asked, unable to formulate a coherent question in this situation. I mean what could he ask her. 'Why were you running?' 'Who was chasing you?' Did it even matter to him?

With a shake of his head, he gave up. Unfortunately, for him, the day only became even more absurd from there, for with a small scream the fishwomen turned to him. ”Who are you? Why are you chasing me??”

Suffice to say, that Fawkes was annoyed.

With a small defeated sigh he simple stared at her till she calmed down, an unnerving curiosity invading her eyes as she began to look him over.

”Big. Buff. Really strong...” she began to mutter to herself as she walked all around him.

”You can't be that old geezer!” She concluded after her investigation. ”He was way more pudgy then you!” she nodded as if she had solved the world's most confounding mystery.

”We aren't even the same colour! How could you confuse us?” Fawkes snapped aghast when he realized that she had confused him with the fat fishman that had been chasing her.

”Don't sweat the details!” She said with a mischievous smile, before she began to skip into the tiny encampment.

It was a small village like settlement, located on the outskirts of the island. Corals spread as far as the eye could see as tiny huts with purple and green reef ceilings glared dully at him.

A small roadway could be seen leading inward, a ditch on either side with a small quantity of sea weed flopped soullessly on the greying streets. Most of these huts had a single stone door from which people would exit or enter with a simple rock like walkway constructed for over the ditch.

At the very corner of the small road of huts stood a relatively bigger one, this one made solely of reef. Even the door was merely a cut-out of the stuff. A single hole was drilled over the structure that seemed to act much like a chimney. It was to this hut that the women walked towards.

The smile on her face had faded somewhat as she walked forward, wading into the group of people that stood going about their daily lives.

Children in tattered clothes ran around and when a few crossed her path she would blankly ruffle their heads before continuing forward.

Fawkes groaned slightly. He was curious now.

”Do you know what this is, stranger?” she asked sonorously. Now that he paid attention to her voice, it held a magical tone to it. It almost felt as if every word she spoke belonged to a song.

”Not really stranger” he replied insipidly unable to let the slight mocking tone out of his voice.

He smiled humorously.

”This is the old temple. Whatever you see before you, once belonged to the greatest school of Fishman Karate, the temple.