CHAPTER 8
Sound of Life
As evening approached, the clouds finally parted, bringing an end to the eternal night. The sky, the streets, the buildings; all were stained in the same crimson light. Lyu sensed a different kind of energy in the air compared to the previous evening when she and Ardee had danced in the twilight.
The backstreets were busy, and adventurers from both Ganesha Familia and Astrea Familia were hard at work carrying supplies this way and that and taking up positions in the shadows of buildings.
“Here’s the supplies from Dian Cecht Familia!”
“All right. How long will it take to divvy them out?”
“Ten minutes, sir!”
“You’ve got five! Hop to it!”
However, for all their speed, everyone was quiet. The two familias had gathered in the northwest of Orario, district six, to enact their part of the operation and neutralize one of the Evils’ suspected bases.
“Everybody is in position, Captain,” said Kaguya, in her usual battle garb, katana at her hip.
“Understood,” Alize replied. “Do you think the enemy’s spotted us?”
Kaguya’s eyes narrowed, her gaze keen. “If so, they haven’t shown it,” she answered. “It’s quiet. Too quiet. It makes me wonder what we’re about to walk into.”
“We don’t have any choice,” replied Alize. “We have to crush this base one way or another.”
Her firm resolution clear on her face, Alize shifted her gaze to the building before her. It was a large warehouse that had at one point belonged to a wealthy merchant, before it fell into disrepair.
Lyu was standing nearby, listening, when something suddenly occurred to her, and she turned to the human girl at her side, steeling her nerves for battle.
“Ardee…” she said.
“Hmm? What is it?”
“…No, nothing. Good luck.”
Lyu put away her thoughts. This wasn’t the time.
In return, Ardee turned and smiled at her.
“You too,” she said.
Meanwhile, over in district five, a Freya Familia underling addressed his superiors.
“Are you sure about this, sirs?” he said. “You don’t want Hegni, Hedin, or the Gullivers going in with you?”
“We don’t need no elves or prum slowin’ us down,” Allen answered. “This pig could take ’em alone with one arm missin’.”
“Hedin is acting commander of the reserves,” said Ottar, the pig in question. “If anything goes wrong, do as he says.”
The two beastly warriors exuded raw power, their equally fierce gazes fixed on the building ahead of them. Their subordinate instinctively jumped to attention.
“Yes, sir! Good hunting to you both!”
He left. All around them, familia members finished preparing their positions. Allen and Ottar were of one mind.
“A few more minutes,” said Allen, “and the Evils are history. Nothin’ they do can stop us now.”
“Yes,” said Ottar. “We will massacre them.”
District nine was where the final strike team lay in wait, made up of the members of Loki Familia. They awaited only the word of their leader, Finn. Riveria approached, staff in hand.
“Finn,” she said. “We’re ready to begin the operation…What’s wrong?”
“My thumb. It aches.”
He cast a look down at his gloved hand. Even the others could tell that his digit was twitching.
“That old omen again?” asked Gareth, standing nearby.
“Yes,” Finn replied. “It started eight years ago, when the Age of Darkness began, but now it hurts more than ever.”
“What do we do?” asked Riveria, narrowing her eyes. She and Gareth knew more than anyone else how canny their leader’s intuition could be.
Finn closed his eyes and lifted his chin.
“We see it through,” he answered. “We’ve already done everything in our power to ensure this operation succeeds. Now all we can do is hope it was enough.”
It was quiet enough that Lyra could hear her pocket watch ticking away. Everyone’s thoughts were trained solely on the mission ahead.
Across the city, gods and goddesses watched over their followers. A trickster in her mansion courtyard. An elephant man standing in his palace. A messenger atop the city walls. And a personification of beauty staring down from her tower.
A pair of elves of light and dark. A quartet of prum brothers. The dwarven proprietress of a bar. An eye-patched blacksmith. An unruly female warrior. A young priestess. A werewolf who still didn’t understand the true purpose of his fangs. An untainted white elf. A sword-wielding girl. Other adventurers like Asfi. Blacksmiths and healers. All stood in their designated locations throughout the city, ready to respond at a moment’s notice.
Alize, Kaguya, and Lyra. Shakti and Ardee. Ottar and Allen. Finn, Riveria, and Gareth. Each of them stood before the fortress of evil they had been assigned.
The time for action was drawing near. The goddess of justice closed her eyes and offered a prayer for her children.
Lyu drew her sword. The timepiece counted down the last few seconds.
“It’s time,” said Riveria, in a smooth, calm voice.
Finn could feel all eyes on him. He carefully gave his order.
“Go.”
The Great Conflict had begun. Somewhere, a mysterious god donned a wicked smile.
“It’s time,” he said.
A blast blew the heavy door clean off its hinges, the magical explosion announcing the battle that was to come.
“W-we’re under attack!!” screamed the Evils followers as adventurers rushed inside. Across the three bases, similar scenes played out.
In the abandoned trading house in district six, the sound of boots thundered on the stone floor.
Shakti yelled, “Chaaarge!” and her warriors advanced with the speed and force of lightning. The unsuspecting Evils didn’t stand a chance. The men of Ganesha Familia were joined by the women of Astrea Familia, dominating the battlefield like Valkyries.
“Hyah!”
“Gwaaaagh?!”
A flash of Lyu’s wooden sword swiftly eliminated one of the frontline enemies. She was joined by Kaguya, Asta, and Noin, who skillfully defeated their foes as well.
“Seize control of the base!” shouted Alize. “Neze, Maryu! Take the others and split up! We’ll press on!”
“Don’t let a single one escape!” said Shakti, separately giving orders to her squadron. “Take them all out and capture every last one!”
Neze and an upper-class adventurer from Ganesha Familia barked “Understood!” and “Roger!” before splitting off to the east and west with the rest of their squads.
The walls of the hallways had been torn up, and the building material within was blackened with soot. It looked less like a trading house and more like an old, abandoned factory. Certainly a locale worthy of housing the city’s undesirables.
“They’re coming!” yelled Lyra, keeping an eye on the battlefield from her position at the center of the squad. “Back of the hall, and up above!”
From the open second floor, several Evils members leaped down into the hallways.
“Got ’em!” replied Ardee. The girl abhorred violence, but she was a Level 3 adventurer all the same. Her one-handed sword, Sacred Oath, was the judge and executioner of many a monster and villain. She raised it above her head and unleashed a vicious onslaught that flung the soldiers of the Evils to the ground before they even had a chance to attack.
Meanwhile, two other foes kicked down the doors at the far end of the hall and strode in, only to come face-to-face with Kaguya and Lyu.
“You take the one on the right, novice,” said Kaguya. “The other’s mine.”
“Already on it!” Lyu replied.
The two girls danced, swords in hand, outnumbered yet unflinching, a dazzling display of beauty and strength. Kaguya’s sword sliced clean through her enemies’ armor, and her swift follow-up strikes allowed no foe to even land a hit, no matter how determined. Such was the power of her cold and frightening techniques.
One by one, enemies fell to her wall of sharpened steel, while the ones at the back saw what awaited them and grew scared. Kaguya showed no mercy, hacking and slashing until even her own allies in Ganesha Familia turned and stared in fear and awe.
Meanwhile, the masked elf ran in the opposite direction, covering Kaguya’s back. As she cut down her foes, she chanted a spell.
“…Cross the skies and sprint through the wilderness, swifter than anything. Imbue the light of stardust and strike down my enemy…”
Reluctant though she was to admit it, Lyu was not as proficient in hand-to-hand combat as Kaguya. Still, she had something else up her sleeve. A song of power far beyond those wielded by most frontline troops. It could obliterate a whole slew of enemies with ease.
“Luminous Wind!”
Balls of light appeared, encased in green air, and blasted the enemy foot soldiers packed into the hallways.
“Gwaaaaaaaaaaaaagh?!”
Lyu’s unforgiving magical onslaught slammed her foes into the walls, knocking them unconscious. Surveying the damage, Lyu dismissed the last vestiges of her magic and muttered, “I suppose I overdid it again.”
“What a show! And she ain’t even a mage!” said Lyra. “The rest’ll be a piece of cake! …As if.”
She narrowed her eyes attentively. Shakti came over, wielding a spear.
“Indeed,” she said. “It’s all going far too smoothly.”
It wasn’t like the enemy soldiers weren’t putting up a fight, but this was supposed to be their main stronghold, so it was downright disturbing that no adventurer had suffered so much as a scratch yet. Everyone who’d ever been in the Dungeon recognized the feeling they were experiencing. The feeling of walking deeper and deeper into a trap.
“I knew it,” said Kaguya. “Something’s not right about this at all.”
“Still, we continue the operation!” came the determined voice of Alize. “The enemy is losing numbers fast! Now’s our chance to strike a decisive blow!”
The adventurers could not possibly retreat at this stage. They were deep behind enemy lines, and turning their backs prematurely would only get them all killed. There was only one way to bring the Age of Darkness to an end, and that was not dragging the problem out, but to press on.
Lyu and the others nodded. The six girls—Shakti, Ardee, Alize, Kaguya, Lyra, and Lyu—led their complement of upper-class Ganesha Familia members through unlit corridors. Every window was boarded and nailed shut, forbidding even a single ray of light from entering the building. The farther they went, the colder the air became, and everyone soon got the distinct impression they were stepping into the underworld.
Suddenly, the long hallway came to an abrupt end, opening up into a vast room.
“Look!” cried Ardee, pointing ahead. “This must be it!”
Maintaining their formation, Alize and the others stepped into the open space.
“Wow…!”
Like the hallways before, the room was dilapidated and dark, but this one had a ceiling ten meders high and was filled with steel cargo containers. It looked like a cross between a warehouse and a shipping harbor. Perhaps it had once been a storeroom, but now the only thing stored there was evil itself.
As the girls cautiously entered, they heard a voice.
“Oh, hey. There you are.”
“Arachnia!” Lyu cried.
The girls all turned around and looked up toward the source of the voice, only to find Valletta Grede sitting atop a stack of containers. Her eyes scanned the group for a moment, and then…
“Tch. Thought Finn was gonna be here,” she muttered, her face turning to a scowl. “Shoulda known better than to trust that worthless woman,” she added under her breath.
Then her lips twisted upward. “You guys sure got here fast. It ain’t a race, y’know.”
“You don’t seem too worried about it,” said Lyra. “Wipe that gross smirk off your face. What are you up to?”
“Who knows? Maybe I’m just figurin’ out how to kill you guys?”
Valletta didn’t seem in the least bit bothered by the prum girl’s murderous glare, or anything about the situation, for that matter. Lyra grew concerned at her mocking grin.
“Valletta Grede!” yelled Shakti, taking a bold step forward. “Lay down your arms and surrender! This base is ours, and your troops are being taken into custody as we speak!”
Valletta stared down the lot of them. Even now she seemed to be enjoying the flow of the conversation.
“Hyah-hah-hah-hah!” she cackled. “Has anyone ever actually done that? How stupid do you think I am? Go on, you lot. Get ’em!”
At her order, a band of Evils soldiers stepped out of the shadows.
“It’s an ambush!” shouted Lyu.
“I didn’t think there were this many of them left!” cried Ardee.
The enemy soldiers readied their weapons. They all wore milky robes and cowls and looked exactly the same, but from their sizes and shapes, they seemed to be mostly dwarves and animal people, and none of them looked like magic users. They outnumbered the adventurers by more than two to one, and they quickly surrounded the group.
“Now, come get me,” said Valletta. “Let’s have some fun!”
Valletta leaped into the fray, her bloodred greatsword atop her shoulder, and the battle began. All the enemy soldiers roared and charged, and soon the air was filled with clashing steel.
“Out of my way!” shouted Kaguya. For each foe she felled, another soon took their place. She clicked her tongue, forced to adopt a more defensive posture. To her side, she watched as Lyu sidestepped a dwarven hammer and went for a counterattack. Before her sword could strike true, however, a second foe came in and beat her back.
“This is chaos!” cried Lyu. “So this is how they fight when their backs are to the wall!”
“Stick together!” Lyra warned. “Don’t underestimate these guys; if we give any ground, they’ll trample us!”
These forces were clearly more formidable than anything the girls had encountered elsewhere in the base. Lyra flitted between her enemies’ greatswords and claws, tossing her boomerang blades at any foe who tried to get the drop on Kaguya and Lyu.
Meanwhile, Valletta stared down Shakti and Alize.
“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Not bad, Ankusha! You too, Scarlett Harnell!”
She was the sole Level 5 on the battlefield. Her two foes were Levels 4 and 3 respectively. However, Shakti and Alize remained undaunted by Valletta’s superior stats. They relied on tactics, strategy, and superior teamwork to plug the gap.
Watching all this, Lyra narrowed her eyes. She observed first Lyu and Kaguya battling alongside the men and women of Ganesha Familia, then shifted her gaze farther down the room, to Alize and Shakti’s fight.
Somethin’ stinks. I’m no Finn, but I know a trap when I see one. Anyone can see that these chumps don’t stand a chance against our girls. It’s only a matter of time before we clean house and gang up on that scum, so why ain’t she scared?
It wasn’t Lyra who received an answer to that question, but Ardee, fighting on the other side of the warehouse. She spun round, deflecting an attack aimed at her back, when to her utter surprise, the assailant let out an oddly high-pitched scream.
Ardee’s eyes went wide when she saw who had just attacked her. It was a little girl, dressed in a milk-white robe like the other Evils. This human girl was so young, in fact, that she only came up to the height of Ardee’s chest.
“A-a child?!”
The little girl clutched the knife in her hands, whimpering as tears formed in her eyes.
“How could they do this?!”
The mild-mannered Ardee was consumed by violent rage. She could scarcely believe the depths to which the Evils would stoop.
“Put down that knife!” she cried, running over to the girl. “You mustn’t fight! Don’t listen to anyone who puts a weapon in your hand!”
Her own justice guided her. Guided her to help the girl before her. The little girl paused, her eyes wide. Then she slowly began to cry.
Ardee smiled. “It’s okay,” she said. “I would never hurt you.” She lowered her sword and reached out her other hand. The girl stared for a moment, then reached out her right hand, her left clasped tightly to her breast.
“Now, come here,” said Ardee. “Let’s get you to safety.”
Catching a glimpse of this across the battlefield, Valletta grinned a twisted grin. The little girl looked up at Ardee with vacant eyes, and in an emotionless voice she said, “O Lord, please…”
It was neither good nor evil that drove her. Just a single wish.
“Please let me see my mother and father again…”
Then she pressed the switch concealed on her body.
“__________________”
Time froze.
Ardee couldn’t pull free from the girl’s lonely fingers.
The eternal moment was ended by a terrible blast.
The force. The shock. The heat. It tore everything apart.
Shakti, Alize, Kaguya, Lyra, the soldiers of Ganesha Familia, and Lyu all flinched. None of them could muster a single thought in the face of such unimaginable chaos and destruction. The light blinded them. The noise deafened them. The tremors racing through the earth threatened to knock them off their feet and bring the whole building down on their heads. Even some of the steel shipping containers were dented inward or flung clean into the air.
A wall of sound. Like a waterfall or an earthquake. Like a castle collapsing all around them. The sudden and destructive blast leveled all it touched.
It was Lyu who staggered to her feet first, cloaked in a layer of dust and soot. As the ringing in her ears subsided, and the stars in her eyes went away, she gazed upon what remained.
“Wha…?”
Nothing. Nothing but the sound of crumbling stone and creaking metal. Nothing but a smoldering crater, like a great wyrm had bitten away the earth. Like a god had carved out a void in space itself. No trace remained of the walls, the floor, or the two girls who had been standing there only seconds ago.
Lyu refused to believe it.
“Wh…what?”
Alize froze.
“…No.”
Kaguya looked on in terror.
“…It can’t be.”
It was Lyra who figured it out before anybody else.
“…The kid blew herself up?”
Ardee’s scorched blood had been seared onto the walls like a macabre coat of paint. It was all that remained of her. That, and her sword. It had been thrown gut-wrenchingly far by the blast, smoke still rising from it.
In that moment of despair, a howling laughter echoed off the walls.
“Hyah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah!!”
Valletta Grede trembled in wild ecstasy and mad joy.
“See that, Thanatos, you son of a bitch?! That kid you tricked just took one of those damned adventurers down with her! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!”
That was the deal the little girl had struck with Valletta’s dark master, the god of death. Slay an adventurer and be reunited with her parents in the afterlife. Valletta bore witness to that dark pact coming to fruition with rapturous glee.
As her cackling rang in the background, Shakti stood, rooted to the spot, her voice cracked and shattered.
“…Ar…dee?”
There wasn’t anything left of her sister to bury. Shakti staggered, only by some miracle remaining upright.
“…No.”
Lyu’s lips trembled. The blast had torn off her mask.
“No. This…can’t be happening…”
Her trembling lips disgorged a wave of denial. The quivering spread to her entire body.
“Ardee?!” she wailed, running over toward the spot her friend had once stood, but Lyra grabbed her and held her back with all her might.
“Leave it, Leon!” she shouted, struggling to keep the unruly Lyu under control. “Alize, Kaguya! Stay away from the fallen Evils!”
The prum girl could not allow herself to give in to fear and sorrow just yet. Not while she still had a warning to issue to her friends. For she had finally deduced what was so strange about the whole operation.
“They’re all rigged to blow!” she screamed.
As if on cue, several of the barely conscious soldiers began to move. They hauled themselves onto their backs, grasping for the switches hidden beneath their clothing.
Kaguya and Alize gasped and leaped away in opposite directions, just as one of them spoke.
“O Lord, I beg you…Carry my soul to my loved ones!!”
Then, that piteous cry was engulfed by another cataclysmic explosion. The blast wave caught up to the girls and sent them crashing into the floor.
But that wasn’t the end of this flame-wreathed banquet. The Evils had converted every last one of their foot soldiers into deadly weapons. One by one, with trembling hands and tear-stained eyes, they carried out their final duties.
“Diiiiiiiiiie!” one of them screeched.
“Wait for me, Anju!” cried another.
“May chaos take the world!!”
“Glory to Lord Thanatos!!”
Those were the last words anyone could hear before an uninterrupted series of explosions drowned it all out. The adventurers were beset on all sides. Many of Ganesha Familia disappeared into the clouds of fire and soot, including Shakti and Lyra. Even Lyu found herself knocked from her feet and crawling across the ground.
It was the cruel and fleeting melody of life.
“We attached those ignition pieces to Inferno Stones!” Valletta howled. “Ain’t that a riot?! Now anyone can blow themselves up whenever we want!!”
An evil smile crossed Valletta’s lips as she watched the destruction from atop her mountain of containers, safely out of the range of the blasts.
Lyra summoned up all the rage her small frame could muster. “You’re a rotten, vile monster!” she cursed, wiping the blood and soot from her face. “Those are your friends, your comrades!”
But Valletta returned only the same, mocking smile.
“You finally worked it out?” she said. “Take our bases, capture our soldiers. We don’t care.”
She grinned and gestured around the building—nothing but a carefully crafted decoy, like the two others of its kind.
“These ain’t our soldiers, sunshine. They’re walkin’ fireworks!”
Meanwhile, up on the second floor, the soldiers of Ganesha Familia who had split from Shakti earlier were looking at one another in confusion. They had just felt the first explosion rock the building.
“What’s going on?”
“Is the captain okay?”
As they faltered, a half-dead enemy soldier crawled over to his unconscious comrade and fumbled with his robes. One of the adventurers noticed him.
“H-hey! What are you doing over—”
But it was too late. There was a click, followed by a searing light, and the bomb-laden followers of that captured god reduced their foes to ash. One explosion set off another bomb, and the chain reaction swallowed the building, floor after floor.
“May my life finally atone for my sins!!”
One mad zealot cried out, his face awash in blood and tears. Fortunately, Neze possessed keener senses than her companions.
“Noin, Asta!” she cried. “Get away from him!”
She rushed to the back of their group to grab Celty’s arm before leaping through a shuttered window, sending fragments of wood and glass everywhere. The rest of Astrea Familia didn’t hesitate to follow her lead.
No sooner had the girls left through the third-story window than a bright red flower of fire engulfed the floor, and the girls were sent crashing into the ground on a wave of hot compressed air.
“It’s started a chain reaction!” cried Kaguya, her clothes tattered and torn, as she applied pressure to her bleeding arm. She looked around as deafening explosions came from the upper floors, reverberating through the building. Dust and rubble fell, and all around her, ominous cracks began to open in the walls and ceiling.
“That was just the signal,” said Valletta, grinning. “You can’t stop what’s been set in motion now. Anyway, see ya…Actually, I guess I won’t!”
She turned and left, disappearing through a door. Then an explosion went off behind her, sealing the exit with rubble.
The building’s not going to last! thought Alize, her mind going into overdrive as it attempted to analyze everything she saw and heard. It’s going to come down at any moment, with us still inside!
Then, with split-second determination, she made a decision.
“Shakti! Lyra! Kaguya! Pull out!!”
Nobody objected to her order, but…
“It’s Leon, she’s not listening!” screamed Lyra. “Hey, stop it! We have to go!”
“Ardee…Ardee…!!” cried Lyu, struggling against the prum girl’s arms. Kaguya came over to restrain her, but the elf girl still fought against them both, desperate to run over to the smoking crater, where not even a single wall of the former hallways still stood.
“Idiot!” Kaguya swore. “Leon, don’t go! You’ll be buried alive!”
“B-but Ardee!! She’s still there, we can’t leave her!”
Lyu was no longer thinking straight. Her emotions ran riot in her mind.
“Alize!” she protested, her sky-blue eyes wet with tears. “Please, we have to help her! Lyra, Kaguya, please! She’s there…She’s right there!”
There was nothing where Lyu pointed, just a crimson stain smeared across the rubble. Alize, Kaguya, and Lyra all bitterly clenched their teeth. Lyu took advantage of their hesitation to pull herself free at last. She picked up the girl’s sword and ran toward the crater.
In front of her stood Shakti. She had just killed an enemy soldier before he could detonate his explosive device. Now she was dazed and unresponsive, and covered head to toe in blood.
“Shakti!” she cried. “It’s Ardee! She’s…She’s…!”
“.….…. ”
No answer. But with trembling breath, Shakti caught Lyu as she tried to run past her.
She knew. She knew if she turned around, that would be it. If she saw the spot her sister spent her final moments, she wouldn’t be able to tear herself away.
So as the explosions continued, as the building tore itself apart, as the timer in her head counted down…
Shakti had a decision to make.
To be a sister, or a warrior?
For love, or for the mission?
What was right?
What was her justice?
The elf before her was a shadow of herself. The tears that streamed down her face were her own tears. Nevertheless, with a strangled voice, she barked an order.
“…Alize, go!! Get out of here!!”
Shakti slipped her arm around Lyu’s waist and hoisted the elf onto her shoulder, even as her heart in her chest threatened to tear itself apart.
She chose to be a warrior. She chose the mission. Without looking back, without any parting words, she took Lyu and ran.
The only one looking back was Lyu, on Shakti’s shoulder, screaming Ardee’s name and reaching, grasping at air. The elf watched as Ardee’s grave grew smaller and smaller, until it was nothing more than a speck in the distance. By now her eyes were so clouded, she couldn’t even recall the girl’s smile.
Alize, Kaguya, and Lyra all clenched their fists and sprinted for the exit. They were followed by the last remaining survivors of Ganesha Familia’s attack force. In place of tears, their faces were marred by blood.
One final blast leveled the building. Columns buckled, supports fell, and the roof came down to trap anyone still within. Everyone ran for their lives as the ceiling caved in behind them, leaping for the exit just as the falling rocks threatened to swallow them.
What followed was a cacophony of stone and dust, drowning out all sound save Lyu’s voice, calling Ardee’s name.
Meanwhile, back at the home, Astrea suddenly interrupted her prayers and rose to her feet.
“Lyu…?” she muttered. “My children…?”
Her meager powers of foresight stabbed her in the breast with foreboding.
But the goddess didn’t have long to be astonished before everything shook.
The ground. The mansion. The city itself.
Her eyelids flared wide, revealing her deep blue eyes, like the dark of the night sky.
“What’s goin’ on, guys? What’s with all that smoke?!”
In the Twilight Mansion, to the north of town, Loki ran outside and perched herself over the railing on the bridge that ran between the towers.
Dusk had well and truly fallen, and in the black of the night, Loki could spy dark plumes of smoke to the south and southwest. As she scrutinized them, trying to make out their details against the moonless sky, Raul ran up to her.
“L-Loki!” he stammered. “There’s been a string of explosions in the city!”
“What?! You mean they tried to blow up my familia?!”
Raul took a deep breath. “…No,” he said.
“Huh?”
All the blood was gone from his face. He was dripping cold sweat. Loki sensed the dread in his voice and waited desperately for his next words.
“Not there…Everywhere.”
Meanwhile, in district five to the south, a deafening explosion shook the Evils base. One by one, the members of Freya Familia escaped through a hole torn by their captain’s sword.
“Casualties?” asked Ottar, replacing it atop his shoulder as he glanced back at the collapsed building. Already, it was a pile of smoking rubble, unrecognizable as the Evils base they had come to destroy.
All around him, healer girls ran to and fro, struggling to comprehend what they saw. As the tell-tale glow signaled that they were treating countless patients, Allen Fromel landed by his captain’s side, bloodstained spear in hand.
“We lost five,” he said. “Dammit. Don’t they know who they’re dealin’ with?”
Allen had managed to put down the enemy commander, but that did little to alleviate his unbound rage. The apostles of evil had given their lives to take out some of his team’s finest Einherjar.
Meanwhile, Ottar stood as still as a boulder and narrowed his rust-colored eyes. Then both their ears twitched simultaneously as they heard a second explosion.
“…Huh? Wait, how long are these gonna go on for?”
Allen looked around. Ottar’s eyes, meanwhile, widened with shock.
“…It can’t be,” he said.
“Everyone, get inside Riveria’s healing circle!” shouted Finn. “Patch up your wounds and regroup, quickly!!”
In a town square, a short distance away from the base they had infiltrated, the captain of Loki Familia barked his commands. The plaza was awash with the clatter of footsteps, and amid it all stood Riveria, eyes closed and chanting.
She was casting a group recovery spell. Her magic circle stretched six meders in radius and gave off a jade-green glow. Those who kneeled within it found their wounds instantly healed, a testament to Riveria’s reputation as the most powerful mage in the city.
But even she wore a grim frown. Her face was marred with disgust at the Evils’ vile deeds. Meanwhile, Gareth handed off his smoldering greatshield to a supporter.
“To think they would stoop to suicide attacks,” he said, “It’s a good thing you noticed when you did, Finn.”
Thanks to his quick thinking and Finn’s perceptive eye, the members of Loki Familia were relatively safe, and no one had perished. Few had escaped unscathed, but with Riveria’s healing, they would be well again soon enough.
Still, despite being the infiltration party to suffer the fewest losses and regroup the quickest, Finn and his lieutenants were far from calm.
“You hear that, don’t you?” said the old dwarf.
“Yes,” Finn replied. “Something’s not right.”
The sounds of explosions rumbled in the distance—the same ones Ottar and Allen had heard.
Finn’s blue eyes were grim. “What happened to us wasn’t a trap,” he said. “It was a signal!”
He thought of the woman who was surely behind it all, and her venomous smile.
“It was never us they were after. It all makes sense now!”
The city was ablaze, as if the gates of hell had opened to swallow all in flame.
Asfi ran through the streets.
“The enemy’s true target…was the city itself?”
Fire spewed out of buildings, into streets and squares, bringing destruction to every corner of the city. Followers of the Evils had appeared suddenly and without warning. If they ran into any adventurers, they didn’t hesitate to consign their lives to fire and ash and try to take as many as they could with them.
The screams of men, women, and children could be heard from every street.
Orario was awash in flames. From her vantage point atop a grand gambling house in the business district, Asfi surveyed the carnage alongside the war tiger, Falgar. The two of them shuddered in fright.
“Orario…?!”
The feast of evil had begun.
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