Olem let out a sigh. He stared at his reflection in the mirror and quietly rubbed at his chest.
The battle with Neptune hadn't been an easy one. His inner core had taken a powerful hit. That was especially bad for him, as golems were nothing more than a core within a body. Fixing his shell had been easy, but fixing his core was…
Luckily, nobody noticed. Not even his brother. Speaking of Bolem, he was kind of glad his sibling had agreed to go into Davi's vault with the other Licht-Fulk. It meant he didn't have to face him.
Well, that was if his brother was even alive. After all, Davi Hawker was sadly, most likely dead.
Olem shook his head and forced the negative thoughts down. Thinking in such a way would help no one, least of all himself. Davi was a weird guy. If anyone could magically come back, it'd have to be him, right?
Olem finished checking his core and hummed. "It only leaked a little bit of energy today. Judging by the speed at which it is breaking apart, I should have about a year or two left before it fully shatters and I die. Alternatively, if I can find a way to fix it, that would be great, but that would require the use of a high-level monster's core on the same tier as a captain or even greater. Considering the relationship the other guild currently has with us…"
Olem shook his head again and slapped at his face. He must think positively. He adjusted his head, making sure it was securely attached to his neck, and then he turned and left his room, heading for the main hangout hub on the train.
After everything had settled down, Mama Herta managed to get it all cleaned up and look the way it used to.
Herta, herself, sat behind the counter and quietly scrubbed at a glass. The plump woman seemed to be staring off into space, and she didn't even acknowledge his entering.
Clause silently sat at the counter next to Gormay and Miranda. The three of them drank booze in silence. Lastly, both Ghost and Falco were at a table. They were both slumped down and held each other's hands. For once, they weren't running around making a loud commotion. Ever since three months ago, all of them had been weirdly quiet.
The entire guild had become quieter, in fact.
"Where are the others?" Olem asked casually.
"The Captain and Pock are outside training." Mama Herta seemed to snap out of her funk and managed a faint smile. "As for that Susie girl, I believe she's in Oleander with her girlfriend."
"Yeah!" Ghost also perked up. "She's on a date. I guess all the training with Pock got to her."
"Makes sense," Falco hummed. "I like Pock, but he's no Ragna."
"I hope Ragna returns." Clause muttered quietly. That seemed to sour the mood, and everyone went dead silent once more.
It was Miranda who broke the silence. She toyed with her glass, head down on the counter, and her cheeks were rosy red. "I hope that Sieg boy comes back." She said after taking a swig.
"Really?" Gormay raised an eyebrow. "Why him?"
"Merlin and I both think he's hot."
Gormay snorted and tapped his fake foot on the ground. "Fair enough. I like that Ken girl better, though."
"Well, she's taken," Falco called out. "Davi and Olivia both called dibs. Damn, now I'm mad at Davi! He got two girlfriends, what the hell!"
"I think Davi's also a girlfriend in the relationship." Ghost giggled. "Ken gives off husband energy."
"Nah, she's a bottom who pretends she's a top." Falco shook his head. "Olivia's the man in the relationship."
"Yeah… Olivia…" The mood became sour once again.
Olivia had been taken. As soon as their group got out of that hellish dungeon, before they could even fully recover, the Dragonslayer, along with Crow and Darkstar, arrived to arrest her.
Those bastards claimed she was the one who caused everything. Apparently, it was said she released the demon, and the demon had slain Myth, Father, and the Lance of Victory before it managed to get defeated by the Holy Saint. They tried to explain how that wasn't what happened, but Evelyn simply didn't hear them out and arrested Olivia anyway.
On top of that, the entire Phoenix Flight guild had been placed on house arrest and told an investigation would be conducted to see if they were planning treason against King Nier Sini. Apparently, they were also guilty of harboring the terrorist Ken Yuan.
Crow claimed he had sentenced Ken to death, and yet she somehow forged his signature and hid herself away in the Phoenix Flight guild.
They wanted to arrest Ken, but she luckily managed to get away with the help of Sieg and Ragna. The three of them were now MIA along with Vlad, who ran off once things settled down. So, on top of Olivia being arrested, Davi likely being dead, and those four gone, there were now down six members.
Olem resisted the urge to sigh again and walked over to the exit. He stepped out of the train and headed for the beach, passing through the junkyard maze. As he did so, he heard the sound of fighting.
Pock raised his hand to the sky and cried out a spell. "Vil Zipper Open!" Several zipper portals tore their way open in space, and a mass of blades and spears fired out.
Laerton crouched low to the ground and swung her sword. She managed to block a few of them, but the rest slammed into her. The captain was knocked off her feet, and she crashed to the ground. She luckily wasn't impaled, but she still took a bad hit.
Olem instantly ran to her side and crouched down. "Are you okay, Captain?"
Laerton breathed heavily and shook her head. "Do I look okay?" She hissed.
She did not. Her body was becoming very pale and thin due to her not eating properly. Her clothes were badly torn and ripped, stained with a mix of mud and blood. Her hair had grown longer and ragged, and she hadn't bathed in weeks. And of course, a pair of dirty bandages was wrapped around her face, covering her eyes.
In the battle with the demon, she had lost her eyes. Laerton Eman, the captain of the Phoenix Flight guild, was blind.
Pock also hurried over and winced. He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly and sighed. "Captain, perhaps we should stop-"
"No!" Laerton struggled to stand, impaling her sword into the ground. She pressed up with all her might and barely got back to her feet. "I can do this, God damn it! I should be able to easily! Blocking all your strikes was never an issue in the past! I can hit them all! Let's go again!"
Pock glanced at Olem and shot him a pleading look. Olem cleared his throat. "Captain, I understand that you're trying to regain the skill that you lost, but surely you can see that this isn't healthy? You've been pushing yourself to the brink of exhaustion for days now. Pock and you both need a break."
"But-"
Olem picked her up and threw her over his shoulder. "No buts. You can train more after you bathe, eat, and sleep. You're getting ten hours, understood."
"Let me down!" Laerton struggled to break free, but she couldn't. Her body truly was exhausted from all the effort that had been wrung out of it.
"I will not," Olem stated in a cool tone. "Not until you're a little better."
"I need to improve." Laerton spat out. "I have to get better. I need to regain what I lost no matter what."
Time was running out.
Cursed by Life… An extremely rare trait that only appeared in members of the Phoenix Flight guild. They gained this trait due to a powerful demon known as Sleetdrazer cursing their very existence.
This curse brought on a series of bad luck and made it so that the world itself would stand against them. Every member of Phoenix Flight would get a bad ending, and the captain would get the worst of them all. On top of that, every few years, a great disaster would occur, and the entire guild would be wiped away.
The last captain of the guild died a horrible death, but some of his teammates survived, which were the people Laerton was in charge of. Because of this, she was sure that it was going to fall on her. The destruction of the Phoenix Flight guild was approaching fast.
If she could only regain her lost skills, then perhaps she'd be able to hold it off a bit longer or ensure that pain and misery only fell upon her, but as she is now, she has no way to keep her guild safe.
She was going to lose more people.
Olem took his captain to her room, and he practically dumped her in the bed. He folded his arms and looked down at the blind woman. "You've made some progress, but even you need rest. You're not a god. You can't simply regain what was lost in a day."
"It hasn't been a day; it's been months." Laerton hissed. "My current level is below that of your average Arcane Knight! I was already the weakest captain, and now look at me." She pressed a finger into the side of her head and grunted. "With the loss of my sight, my instinct skill has completely died out. I can't use mana sense to make up for my missing eyes either. I have no idea where anything is or what attacks are coming at me. It feels as if all my skill with the blade has simply vanished."
"Give yourself some credit. You have improved a bit." Olem hummed. "When the training first started, you could barely walk on your own and kept crashing into everything. You've always relied on your instinctual skill and on using mana in your eyes and nerves to increase your reaction speed. You were like a well-oiled machine, but with the loss of your eyes, you're trying to adapt fast. You need rest. It'll come back. You're a skilled fighter, and your years of honing your body and studying the blade haven't gone to waste. I know you'll be back to your old self if you simply give it more time."
"Time's the last thing we have." Laerton shook her head, and her fist curled in the sheets of her bed. "We both know what Sieg, Ken, and Ragna are planning."
Olem felt a knot appear in his stomach. He shifted slightly and looked out the window. Falco and Ghost had finally left the train and were outside, the two of them chatting about something. Clause was also nearby, keeping an eye on them.
Both Ghost and Falco had tried to run off several times. They both wanted to find the others and help them. Clause and Mama Herta had been making sure they didn't leave, because once they got past the borders of Oleander, the other guilds would surely label them criminals.
As he watched them, Falco suddenly started to sprint off, but Clause was faster and appeared behind the mutant, knocking him out with a chop to the back of the neck. Ghost awkwardly laughed as the elderly man glared at her. Since she was special, she couldn't actually leave the train, but she had still been trying.
That was how much the new members meant to everyone.
They all wanted to help Ken, Sieg, and Ragna out, but there wasn't a lot they could do right now. A few Knights from other guilds were scattered throughout Oleander, and various scrying spells were being used to monitor their base. Until the king settled on what he'd do with the Phoenix Flight guild, they were stuck.
Then that left what Ken, Ragna, and Sieg were doing. It was obvious to all of them. The three MIA members were seeking a way to break Olivia out of prison. This meant they'd most likely be attacking Rose City and declaring themselves enemies of the entire kingdom.
This was another reason Falco and Ghost were so gung ho on joining the three of them.
"I imagine that Ragna and his group are looking for Vlad," Olem said after some time.
"Most likely," Laerton agreed. "Damn that Vlad." She bit her lip. "He was hiding so much from us for years. Who knows what secrets that bastard has, and then he just up and left out of the blue!" The captain steeled her flaring nerves and took a deep breath. "I hope that Ragna can find him and get the senses knocked into that bastard's head."
"You still consider him part of our guild?" Olem asked, surprised.
"He did help us win in the battle with Neptune, and it was he who spoke to Evelyn and convinced her to not arrest all of us." Laerton sighed. "He also bought enough time for Sieg to open a Shadow Vault and escape with the others."
"That's true, but he did run off as soon as we were put on house arrest," Olem mused. "Where do you think he went?"
"I'm honestly not sure, but I do have a hopeful answer."
"Oh? And what's that?"
Laerton rubbed her chin and hummed. "Perhaps he might be looking for where Davi went."
***
The tent they set up was a large blue one that was meant to hold three people. They had placed it up in the middle of a dense forest, way outside several towns and villages, so as to ensure they wouldn't be disturbed. It was important they get some sort of shelter set up, as the sky above had turned a nasty black and was spewing out waves of lightning.
Sadly for the three of them, none of them were good at setting a tent up, and it quickly fell apart, collapsing in on itself.
"Three months in and we still can't set a tent up the right way." Sieg hummed. He likely kicked the ruined shelter. "How do survival videos make this look so easy?"
Ragna poked at the flimsy plastic and hummed. "I really thought we'd have gotten it by now! Oh well! Guess we'll try again later."
Ken sighed and took a seat, crossing her legs. "We don't have time. It's going to start raining soon, and knowing how shit our luck has been recently, we'll be fried by lightning. Oy, Sieg, I thought you and Davi were from the past. Didn't the two of you survive in the woods? How can you not set up a tent?"
"Usually it didn't storm this bad," Sieg noted, looking up to the sky, before he suddenly winced. The flashing lights above made his head ache even worse. "It's been thundering for almost a full week now. Guess it's just that season. Back in the day, Davi and I would just sleep under the stars or beneath trees. We also weren't exactly on the run, so I'd do odd jobs and get a nice inn or something to sleep in every now and then. Of course, that's something we can't do…"
Ken made a sour face, and she smelled herself and shook her head. "Haru, what I wouldn't give to take a bath."
"And what I wouldn't give to see a doctor." Sieg groaned.
"Your head?" Ragna questioned.
"Yeah."
"Damn. It's been like that for a week now, right?"
"Just like the storm," Sieg replied. "Maybe it has something to do with it?"
For three months they had been running around in the woods, going through swamps and forests, dodging wandering Knights that were looking for them.
For Ken Yuan, it was especially hard as her poster was placed up in dozens of cities. The entire kingdom wanted her, and she couldn't understand why. Crow and she had agreed she'd be placed into the Phoenix Flight guild, but now he was taking his word back?
Well… Actually, she had a pretty good idea why. Most likely it was Evelyn Lunar's doing. That cursed woman could apparently control people. At least that's what Sieg claimed. He hadn't told them before since he couldn't risk Evelyn mind-controlling them and getting that information, but now that they were all against Evelyn, naturally it simply stopped mattering, and he told them all that he knew about the woman.
All the more reason they needed to bust Olivia out and save her from that false witch.
Ken's hand clenched tightly into a fist, and she nearly growled. She was still far too weak. She couldn't even save either of her lovers, and now they were both gone and completely out of her reach. She needed to get stronger.
A lot stronger.
"Lord Yuan, if you would like, I could set the tent up." Yujin offered, popping into existence next to his master and clearing away her negative thoughts.
"Last time you tried, you set the tent on fire." Sieg snorted. "Like we're falling for that one again."
Ragna took a seat on a wooden stump and fiddled with his leg. After the fight with the demon, his left leg had been torn off, and so he now possessed a prosthetic. It was sleek and made of metal, with various runes glowing all along it.
The muscular man tapped his knuckles against it several times, and the entire leg sloshed off him and began to shake and twist. "Greenie, if you would. We're in need of a place to stay once more." Ragna chuckled awkwardly.
The mimic let out a mix of gurgling sounds, and then its body expanded, growing larger and larger, until it morphed into a large train cart, similar to the one that they had been using back when they were still in the guild.
Ken stood up and helped Ragna stand. Together, the two of them hobbled toward the train cart. "Still no sign of that Alpha guy," Ken muttered. "Are you sure we're on the right trail?"
Sieg shrugged. "Not really, but I know someone who does, which is why we're heading out that way. Daffodil is close by, so once we get there, we can figure out where Vlad, or Alpha, or whatever the hell his name actually is, went."
"And just who are we looking for when we get to Daffodil?" Ragna asked. The inside of the train was nothing impressive. Greenie couldn't make complex things, so it was mainly hollow, with just three beds. They'd once again be sleeping in dirty clothes and going another day without a bath. If not for Yujin, who could easily hunt for food and cook it at the same time, they'd have starved a while ago.
Sieg took a seat on the bed and began to sharpen his spear with a jagged rock, making sure it was in good condition. "His name is Biggie. He has a type of magic that lets him connect to the internet, and he knows a ton of stuff. Has a lot of connections also. We're all super wanted, and Vlad is in the same boat. I've seen posters of him all over the place. Evelyn wants him for whatever reason. That means either he's hoofing it out in the woods or he's held up somewhere using some connections to stay hidden."
"And why do you think it's the second?" Ken asked, raising an eyebrow.
"He loves those video games. I doubt he'd be able to survive out in the woods without charging them." Sieg pointed out.
"He can charge them himself," Ragna corrected. "He can even run them in a dungeon by using his own mana to counter the radiation."
"Seriously?" Sieg sighed and nodded. "Yeah, I guess he was playing a device in the Enforcer dungeon. Maybe my plan isn't so solid then."
"Well, at the very least it's worth a look." Ragna shrugged. "We can ask this Biggie guy about it. Once we get Vlad, we can learn more about what's going on and perhaps come up with a plan for breaking Olivia out."
"Are we sure Vlad can help with that?" Sieg questioned.
"I'm confident he can." Ken nodded. "I don't get everything, but that Alpha guy knows a lot more than he was letting on. If anyone can help us fix the situation we're stuck in, it would be him."
"Fair enough." Sieg nodded.
"So, where is this Biggie guy anyway?" Ragna asked.
Sieg suddenly let out a nervous laugh. "Well…"
"...Where is he?" Ken sighed.
"He's sort of in prison."
"So…"
"So, we'll be officially performing our first act of terrorism." Sieg grinned. "Think of this as a trial run, I guess."