Various explosions of differing colours could be seen in the forest. A moment later various battered and bruised men were running away as if their lives depended on it. Elizabeth calmly followed after the men at a leisurely pace.

In the trees above the rest of her team could be seen jumping from the tree branches. While Elizabeth was doing her thing on the ground the others were in the air providing supporting fire.

Ezekiel was on the ground with her as he didn't have any way to perform ranged attacks.

Elizabeth gave a disappointed sigh as she sheathed back her blade.

"While I am glad this won't be too difficult, it is quite infuriating that these bastards were only able to get away with their atrocities because they were good at hide and seek. Are you sure this is all they have?"

Ezekiel looked quite carefree and responded.

"Sorry to disappoint Liz, these guys seem to be the definition of fodder as you can see. I wouldn't count on any head honchos or elite squads being here at the moment. If anything we're probably just getting the scraps of the leaving party."

"Leaving party?" She responded while giving a look that demanded an explanation.

"Come on, Liz, you know our guys aren't the best. As soon as our scouts started trying to sniff them out, it wasn't too surprising they'd notice. At first, they probably tried to relocate but since we kept sniffing around even after they relocated, they must have decided it was too much of a pain in the ass and decided to flee or maybe go back to whatever HQ they have in this country since it's sure as hell not gonna be here."

"I suppose it isn't too unlikely for that to be the case however they must be in dire straits if they'd run from the likes of us and possibly go to where more competent adventurers are." She responded while looking around for any stray cultists.

"Other than their secrecy they're probably not too much of a big deal. As soon as they know they're being searched for they'll probably run away to somewhere that's less cautious and repeat what they did here."

Elizabeth looked concerned as he said this and quickly responded "But doesn't that mean they'll just kill people somewhere else?"

"Calm down, Liz. The old man sent out a letter to HQ to warn them. It shouldn't take long enough to arrive for them to start killing again."

"But still-"

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He cut her off

"Whether we like it or not this is no longer going to be our problem. We're just gonna have to trust in our more competent peers."

Elizabeth didn't seem too convinced by this answer but there was nothing she could do if what he was saying was true. However, if that wasn't the case then the cult would still be in the parish and they could be eliminated before they scurry away from their reach. This base would likely show them which of these ideas was more accurate.

There were various paths of blood on the ground. They were following the general direction.

"By the way how many have we killed so far?" She asked while looking at the blood trails.

"About ten I think." He said in an unconvincing tone.

She put her hand to her forehead.

"If I wanted a guess I wouldn't have asked you."

"Shut up, you killed like seven of them, you should have the best idea."

They continued bickering until they reached a clearing in the forest. There were some wooden shacks here so it must have been the main base. Those in the trees came down as their covering fire didn't make sense unless they fired accurately and unfortunately most only trusted their aim for a few metres at most.

While walking through they noticed a man with various other men behind with some injured. Including him, there were 10 men in total.

The man in front was a bald man with a short beard. For some reason, he wasn't wearing a shirt which showed off his body. It was clear to see he was a little chubby but he also had some muscle as well. If he was wearing a shirt it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume he was just a bit bulky.

He turned to one of his injured men and started talking.

"The hell is this? This a prank or something? You're telling me that babe gave you knuckle-nuts a hard time? The only thing she looks like she could make hard is me." He then laughed at his quite boring joke for a few full seconds before turning to her. The injured men gave a disapproving look to Saito when he said this while the other men laughed along.

"So what do ya say blondie? How bout you help me and the boys over here since we've been kinda pent up? Hell, I'll even let you and your little buddies over there live."

When losing about half of your troops, you would expect the leader of such a group to be more cautious. Not Saito however. Either he had absolute faith in his strength or he was the type of idiot one would spend their whole life searching for just to know how low human intelligence could be.

("Sorry guys but the more of you that die, the more trouble that dipshit Daniel's gonna be in.")

He thought to himself while giving Elizabeth a grotesque smile while squeezing one of his hands suggestively.

Elizabeth simply drew her sword and to everyone there except Ezekiel and Priest Saito, it seemed like she crossed the distance in an instant.

She swung her sword and Saito blocked. However, blocking a sword with his arms seemed questionable, to say the least.

He was sent flying into a nearby hut. While the fact he wasn't sliced completely into two could be seen as commendable by some, there wasn't a single doubt in anyone's mind that he wasn't out of commission.

The men that were behind Saito made sure to keep their distance when Elizabeth appeared.

However with Elizabeth now focusing on them they were about to be slaughtered like the pigs they were.

Well, that should have been the case until a piece of wood was thrown at her. She perceived it and sliced it in two but it came from an odd direction. She looked at the destroyed shack and saw a man standing in a pile of rubble.

The bald bastard was standing there as if nothing had happened.