There were still a few hours left until sunrise. The night was the best time for a search, because there was no one around. Four people were walking together, side by side, three girls, and one boy. In front walked a girl of medium height. She had long, straight red hair, her eyes resembled the color of fire: yellow mixed with orange and red. she was wearing a white T-shirt, on which she put a navy blue jacket. She also wore black trousers and laced shoes reaching a little above her ankles. She had wheat-colored complexion, and her face was freckled. She was the leader of the group. Behind followed a taller girl, the oldest of the group. Her straight hair was pale violet and reached to her shoulders. Her eyes were pale red in color and had a serious expression. Her skin was very light. A pair of white fox ears poked through her hair, and she was dressed, like the leader, in a black jacket under which she wore a white blouse. On her lower body she wore black trousers, which accentuated her nicely-shaped legs, and black military boots, fastened with belts rather than laces. On her hands she had black fingerless gloves. Her right hand was stretched forward - she was currently using magic. She was followed by the shortest person of the group. She had, like the oldest one, very bright skin. Her hair was black and curly, very fluffy and thick, with blue rabbit ears sticking out of it. She had grey eyes, with two tattoo-like stars under her left eye. Her clothes consisted of a blue golf sweater, black trousers and shoes. The last one, the sole boy of the group, had the highest height, and was slightly younger than the girl with violet hair. He had fluffy dark brown hair and a pair of light brown fox ears. His eyes were olive-colored and his skin was slightly tanned. He wore a checkered green shirt and dark blue trousers, laced shoes, and wore a bag on his shoulder. They were walking along the street, which was lit by the faint light of the lanterns. Suddenly the animal-people moved their ears in the direction of a sound. The leader looked and her sight fell on a brown cat, the most ordinary domesticated pet. They breathed out, except for the black-haired one, who immediately threw herself at the cat and caught it.

  “Eris, what are you doing?” asked the violet-haired.

  “What do you mean, ‘what’?!” she replied in an upset tone. “It must be some kind of spy! Some kind of weapon of our enemy! Or some kind of magician!” She shaking around the cat that was meowing and hissing. The red-haired girl covered the cat’s body with her magic, then pulled it out of Eris' hands and brought it to herself. She took it into her hands and looked at it.

  “No, it's just a pet” she said and put the cat down, which quickly ran away. “As always, your suspicions turn out to be false.”

  “Hmph.” Eris was offended. “And Kyoko, what, did she find something? Since she's so great and all.”

  “Calm down” answered calmly the violet-haired. “If you scream like that, I won’t be able to feel out anything”

  “Oh, so it's all my fault again?!”

  Without answering, the fox just sighed and walked away, followed by the leader and the boy. Eris got angry for a moment more, muttered something under her nose and followed them. They walked for a few minutes when another problem came up.

  “Hey…” sighed the brown-haired. “I know it's dumb, but...”

  “Huh?” asked the red-haired one.

  “...But I'm terribly hungry, and there's nothing in the bag anymore.” He smiled innocently and put his hand on his belly. The rest of the group stopped.

  “Of course, because you must have eaten everything, Lorenzo!” Eris exploded.

  “Hey, come on! I'm a man, I need to eat a little more!” He protested.

  “You'll become fat!” barked back the black-haired.

  “Never, because the stress you cause makes me lose weight!”

  “You’re dead!”

  “HEY! Calm down!” the leader stopped them. “If you don't stop arguing, someone will find us! Then you’ll have nothing to laugh at anymore!”

  “Okay, Aru...” they answered together. “Relax, master, we'll soon find the seal.” Kyoko comforted her.

  “I hope so...” Aru sighed. “And the food will be taken care of later. For god's sake, it's only been a few hours, and you've eaten everything...”

  “We're not far from the capital, and there will be plenty of food there.” The tall girl focused her magic again and they continued on. It's been half an hour since Kyoko suddenly came across a mana trail. The group was happy and they gladly followed her. Suddenly they stopped by a house. It didn't look deserted, which quickly quenched their enthusiasm.

  “So what now?” Lorenzo asked. “Take a crowbar and break in...” snorted Eris.

  “Well, I'll admit you're right.” Aru nodded “We really have to break in there.”

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  “But you're one hundred percent sure there's a seal there? Maybe it's not worth the risk...” the brown-haired man asked.

  “It's worth the risk, Lorenzo. What we got into is worth the risk.” Aru and Kyoko started tinkering with the door using magic. They finally managed to open it, entered the house one by one, trying to be as quiet as possible. They didn't know whether the residents were home or not, so they had to be careful. Suddenly they all had trouble breathing.

  “I guess that's it.” The red-haired one became happy. Eris decided to take on the task of finding the seal, as she was the most trained and the smallest of them all. She sneaked quickly through the corridor of the house, at the same time Kyoko pointed out with gestures where to go. Eris opened the door to the room where she was told to enter by the girl. She saw an obese man sleeping on the bed, with many beer bottles on the ground. The black-haired woman expressed a great deal of disgust and irritation with her facial expressions, but she still went in. With neat, theatrical movements she avoided the bottles, looked around the room. It was stuffy. The window above the bed was wide open, but this did not help to fight the feeling. Eventually, she saw some shape at the very top of the bookshelf. She swallowed her saliva and then put her feet on the shelves and gently climbed up. She hoped it was really a seal, but the higher she went, the harder it was to breathe. She grabbed the strange object and smiled, but suddenly one of her feet slipped and fell down. She was terrified and quickly looked at the bed, but the man sleeping on it did not move. She breathed out. She avoided the bottles again and then returned to the group, giving them the scroll.

  “You see how wonderful I am?” Eris ripped nose off.

  “And you must've had hit something, as we heard.” Aru smiled, Eris’ face reddened. She crossed her arms and turned her head away, and, of course, she snorted.

  “The guy is drunk anyway, so he didn't wake up” she said with anger. Aru opened the scroll, which then flashed, and the number six appeared on her hand.

  “Well, my favorite number!” The leader laughed.

  “So now we're officially in the game!” Lorenzo was happy.

  “Now just to find the rest of the players, or wait until the finals” added Kyoko. “Although I think the less competition the better. But as we agreed, without any dishonorable moves, right, master?”

  “Of course, we decided that from the beginning.” Aru nodded her head. “Okay, so... now to the capital.”

  “Yes! I'll finally eat something!” Lorenzo smiled wide.

  “Glutton.” Eris barked. But suddenly something changed. They started to feel the suffocating aura again, but now a little more heavy.

  “The deity?” Lorenzo asked, the whole group moved closer to each other.

  “No” denied Kyoko. “It's something else...”

  Suddenly the wall in front of them was exploded. They covered their faces with their hands, and when the dust fell, they saw a woman sitting on a pegasus around which black magic was spinning. The pegasus itself had white fur, a black mane, very red eyes and two pairs of wings. The woman, on the other hand, was dressed in white, in a button-up shirt with short sleeves and a long white skirt. She looked at them and laughed terribly. She had short brown hair, light skin and brown eyes.

  “She has a magical winged horse!!” screamed Lorenzo.

  “Plus it’s a weird one!” added Eris, who was hiding behind him. A woman with a maniacal smile showed them a hand with the number five on it. Aru got nervous.

  “She’s using black magic” Kyoko said seriously. “We can't do it, we have to go!”

  “What?! But we were supposed to fight!” Eris shouted.

  “WE'RE RUNNING AWAY, NOW!” ordered Aru, then threw fireballs at the enemy, which stunned the newcomer for a bit, and used it to withdraw.

  “The magic of fire?!” laughed the brown-haired. “Not bad! I heard it wasn’t doing well lately!”

  They were running away, and the enemy flew after them on a pegasus and slowly started catching up. They noticed, and Eris panicked. Kyoko and Aru started focusing their magic, they grabbed each other's hands.

  “LORENZO, ERIS, GRAB US, QUICK!” shouted the violet-haired. Lorenzo grabbed Eris by the wrist, jumped out and grabbed his mistress' hand at the last second. The magic flashed, and they disappeared. The Pegasus stopped on the ground, and started neighing. The brown-haired woman stroke it on the muzzle.

  “Easy, Karia, easy...” she whispered to her with a smile. “Soon we will find these cowards.”

  The pegasus spread its’ four wings again: two were big, another two grew right next to them and were much smaller. It then flew up, into the night sky.