It had been a few days since leaving the city. On the road they had occasionally met merchants and traveling people that came and went with their own luggages, merchandise or empty hands. Some of them stopped to greet, others to sell, others would beg, but most would stay clear out of what was clearly an important caravan.

At the front was a guard riding on Thomas’ brown horse. He had taken over it once they were away from the city and Thomas had decided to ride on the carriages, crammed together with Kent, Eden and Jenna. Marie had refused to allow any man to ride with her, and Natalia had agreed to her request to ride with only her servants—or Natalia herself if she wished to go on the carriage as well.

Marcus had been mostly quiet, carrying a bored look as he looked at the road, the forest, and anything that could catch his attention, but so far, for him this had been an uneventful ride. Natalia didn’t share the same sentiment. She had been constantly paying attention to the road, would go up and down the different carriages, and would occasionally stop on the first carriage to check on Marie.

Their traveling speed wasn’t extremely fast, but it was faster than when they were on foot, if only slightly so. As Natalia looked at the setting sun of this day, she approached the leading guard.

“How long until we reach the capital?” she asked the man, who didn't turn to look at her.

“It should only be a few days until we reach the next city, and from there we can jump to the capital,” he responded with a respectful tone.

Natalia frowned slightly. “Jump?”

The guard cleared his throat and shook his head a couple of times. “Sorry, I meant to say that we’ll take The Emperor’s Gate to the capital.”

“What?” Natalia asked again, just as confused as before.

“We’ll take The Emperor’s Gate and—”

“Yes, I heard you,” Natalia interrupted as the guard was going to repeat himself, “I don’t know what ‘The Emperor’s Gate’ is.”

“Ah, Right,” the guard said with a nod, “I almost forgot that Young Lord Thomas said you were from a foreign kingdom,” he paused for a moment as he looked up while thinking. “The Emperor’s Gate… it’s… a blue glowing kind of door… that instantly takes you to another place as if you were walking into a building… Perhaps you know it with another name in your kingdom.”

“A portal?” Natalia exclaimed with raised eyebrows.

“Maybe? I don’t know what that is, but if it does the same and looks like that, then it probably is,” the guard responded.

“Are there more of those?”

“There’s a few of The Emperor’s Gates spread on the empire, yes,” the guard answered with a nod.

“Does the emperor make them?” Natalia continued asking, frowning as she did.

“No, they appear seemingly at random, and when they do, the Emperor sends his armies to reclaim them,” the guard responded, putting a regretful expression on his face right after. “Sadly, it seems like something went wrong on the last one that appeared and most of Her Highness' army was lost along with the gate. You might know it as The Scorched Gate now.”

“Is that so…” Natalia commented, putting on a serious face as she did.

Noticing Natalia’s response, the guard quickly followed up, “B-but there’s nothing for you to worry about on the one we’ll take. The large city of Ravun was built around it and it is as safe as it can get. Once we get there, it’ll be like being at the Capital already!”

Natalia hummed for a moment, making the guard swallow his saliva hard, before she turned to look at him again. “So we are just a few days away from the city.”

“Correct,” the guard quickly responded.

“If we didn’t take the gate, how long would it take to reach the capital?” she asked, not paying attention to the guard’s expression.

The guard took some time to think about it as he looked up again and seemed to be making counts silently with his mouth. He turned to answer Natalia after a few seconds. “It would be about three to four months at the pace we’re going.”

Natalia widened her eyes slightly before putting on a serious expression again. “That long? Is the Capital that far?”

The guard nodded and chuckled with pride. “The Lavina Empire is a truly large place.”

“Is there nothing between this city of Ravun and the Capital?”

“Oh no, there’s plenty of towns and smaller cities on the way, of course, but if we want to get to the capital as fast as possible, then jumping from Ravun to the Capital is the best option,” the guard responded.

“I see…” Natalia said, pondering for a moment. “Well, then I guess that—”

A mocking laugh came from Marcus, who was on his white horse a short distance away from them. “Well, that sucks dick,” he said with the same mocking tone.

Natalia furrowed her eyebrows and turned to look back at him, and realized that he was looking to his right, deeper into the forest. She decided to ignore Marcus’ comment in favor of figuring out why he said that, so she turned to look to her right as well, in the same direction that he was looking at.

She didn’t see anything after a few seconds of quickly scanning the forest, until from the corner of a tree she finally saw a small girl. She seemed to be scared, but at the same time, she carried an angry and determined glare as she was looking up at something—or someone.

Natalia stopped the black horse and unmounted it, moving to the edge of the road as she did. All the carriage and the guards obviously noticed that she stopped, so they did as well. A few guards were murmuring to the drivers as they did, wondering why Natalia had suddenly stopped, with a few of them just answering that it was likely just to take a ‘rest’ in the forest.

From the first stopped carriage, Marie popped her head out, looked around and saw that Natalia was moving away from the road. “Are we stopping here?” she shouted in Natalia’s direction.

Natalia didn’t answer as she just looked deeper into the forest with a frown. From behind her, the second carriage opened its doors. Eden walked out and stretched as she did. She looked at Marcus stopped on his horse a short distance away, so she skipped a few steps to get close to him.

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“We’re stopping here, right? But…” she turned to look around at the guards who weren’t getting ready to set up a camp or anything at all, it just seemed to her like a random stop. “Did something happen?”

Marcus scoffed, keeping his eyes on Natalia instead of turning to look down at Eden. “There’s some kids getting robbed in the forest, and I guess Natalia wants to save them.”

“What?!” Eden replied, taken aback.

“And you’re not planning to help?” Jenna asked as she was stepping out of the carriage. She had her hands resting one on top of the other at her front around her legs.

“Why would I? It’s got nothing to do with me,” Marcus replied with a shrug, then looked at Natalia’s back with a smirk as she was quickly walking deeper into the forest. “Besides, Natty’s more than enough for anything.”

As Natalia was getting closer she was able to finally see the full picture of what was going on. It was two groups of people. One being of six men, all looking like bandits, armed, and surrounding the second one. This second one was a younger girl, a boy slightly older than her, and in front of these kids, a teenager and a grown man, trying to keep away the bandit-like men.

The grown man, despite being clearly older than the other ones, was still just young, and as such, the fear in his eyes could be seen from Natalia’s distance. This young man was brandishing a silvery sword as he tried to keep the bandits away, his hands trembling as he did so. The teenager behind him was holding the kid’s hands and trying to hide them behind him. The boy was on the verge of tears, while the small girl was hiding those tears with a fierce glare that could kill people if she could use it.

The bandits didn’t seem to care about the sword or the glare from the girl, as they all smirked and laughed at the way they were being threatened. The one at the front closer to the young man approached the sword, uncaring about it being pointed at him, pushed it aside with a slap and then punched the young man in the jaw. The young man fell to the side like a doll, hitting the grass with a loud thump.

Soon after the man hit the floor, the other men starting moving to the teen and the young kids, and Natalia was preparing herself to rush in in case that something happened to them, but just as she was about to, a quick light—as if a camera had taken a picture—flashed beside her, making her stop to look at what that was about.

“Oh my, what is this about?” Jenna loudly said from beside Natalia, startling her as she didn’t notice when this young sister appeared next to her.

“Huh?!” one of the bandits exclaimed when he turned to look at the who had appeared.

Jenna was calmly approaching the group of bandits, her steps were light and her posture was the same that she had when she walked out of the carriage, with her hands still resting on the same position.

“Who are you?!” another one shouted at Jenna, pointing his weapon at her, “if you don’t want to get hurt, then you better leave while you can, otherwise we’ll take what we want from you two as well!”

Jenna kept on walking, her steps not faltering one bit even while being threatened. She carried a soft smile on the half of her face that could be seen, since from the moment she met the group at the church, she had never taken off the hood covering half her face.

“Is that so?” she replied with a soft, yet determined voice. “You would do that to one of the Gods’ servants?”

“Sister Jenna, these people—”

Jenna lifted one hand, interrupting Natalia in the process. “I know what they are and what they want,” she said, lowering her hand back down to the same position as before. “And they are no match for me.”

She kept on getting closer. The men laughed and mocked instead. “It’s your funeral sister!”

The men started approaching Jenna, smirks on their faces as they did. The soft smile she had on her face was replaced by a serious expression as she stopped to look at them. Natalia was about to rush ahead of Jenna, but Jenna calmly rolled up her sleeves, revealing a set of white tattoos painted on her pale white forearms that made them hard to see, if not for the fact that they were glowing.

She suddenly did a quick jab upwards. Immediately after doing so, from the ground below the closest man, a huge white glowing and half transparent fist—as if from a giant—suddenly appeared and punched upwards, matching the same movement that Jenna had done. The man was sent flying up in the air for a couple of seconds before landing somewhere behind the bandits, passed out.

The others realized that this was no simple woman, and they all started seriously running towards Jenna. She didn’t panic and instead started punching the air like a shaolin warrior would, and with every move that she did, an enormous fist like the one from before would appear, punching and striking down the men that tried to approach her, all flying and landing close to where the first one had landed.

In a few short seconds, all the men had been piled up at the back, next to a tree. Natalia looked at Jenna with shock, not expecting this seemingly cheery Sister to be this skilled, or have that kind of power. Marcus seemed to have noticed as well as he suddenly appeared behind Natalia.

“Holy shit!” he exclaimed but didn’t get closer than where Natalia was standing.

Jenna then stretched her hand forward with an open palm. A giant hand like the ones from before appeared and started pushing the men into a large tree, lifting them as it did.

Jenna got closer without removing her hand from it, and looked at one man struggling, who was hanging upside down, his head being the only visible part from below the hand.

“So, what was this about?” she gently asked the man, who looked with fear up to her.

“W-w-w-we’re so sorry!” he quickly apologized, “we-we were just—! Working!”

“Working?” Jenna questioned, tilting her head to the side as she did.

“Yes! Yes! Honest to the Gods work!” the man continued, bobbing his head like a chicken.

Jenna straightened her head again, and tilted it to the other side. “You know, lying is a sin,” she calmly said, “and lying to an Inquisitor is a grave crime. So, were you truly just working?”

The man took a sharp breath when Jenna said that last part, and then shook his head quickly. “N-no… we were just… trying to make a quick buck with those kids.”

Jenna smiled. “That’s a good honest man,” she said, tilting her head to the other side again, and placing one finger with her other free hand to one side of her chin. “Now I wonder what I shall do with you…”

“P-please! Let us go! I promise we won’t do this ever again!” the man quickly shouted, struggling under the giant hand as he did.

She hummed in consideration for a moment. “No, you’ll just go back into it if you don’t get properly reformed.”

“Why not just execute them?” Marcus said as he approached the site and stood somewhere close to Jenna. “I could do it for you,” he continued, smirking and pulling one of the daggers from his arm.

Jenna didn’t agree or deny Marcus’ proposal, while Natalia simply approached, her eyebrows furrowed as she looked at the bandit stuck under the large hand. The bandit looked at Marcus pulling the dagger from his arm, and paled, despite the fact that he was hanging upside down and his face had been getting redder.

“No! Please! Have mercy!” he shouted.

Jenna shook her head. “There’s no need to go this far. These are just stray pups with a need for teaching,” she said with a calm voice. “We’ll take them with us to the next city and turn them in to the guards there for a reward.”

“What? We’ll have to feed, carry and take care of their shits!” Marcus said with annoyance, “Let's just kill them.”

“Please wait!” the bandit begged.

“No, no. Taking them is for the best,” Jenna insisted, turning around to find that one of the guards was huffing over from the road. “Perfect timing,” she said with a smile.

“Is everything alright!?” the guard shouted once he approached.

“Yes,” Jenna responded, “get some ropes and a few men to carry these poor pups over to the next city.”

The guard looked at the stuck bandits for a moment, his eyes widening. “Right away!” he quickly responded, leaving just as fast as he came in the same direction.

Marcus clicked his tongue and put away his weapon. His helmet disappeared and revealed an expression of disappointment as he turned around to leave. Natalia didn’t follow his actions as she chose instead to look at the terrified group of kids that had kept quiet ever since they got here. Her attention was drawn to the teenage boy in particular.

The teenage boy was nervously shaking the man that was punched by one of the bandits before Natalia or Jenna got there. The other two kids at the side were calling out to him in a low voice, trying to wake him up.

“Wake up, Dom…” the girl said, poking the man on the cheek.

As the teenage boy was doing that, he would turn to look up at Natalia from time to time, his eyes avoiding her right after, something that she noticed immediately.

“Aren’t you…” she said in a low voice, before she started menacingly walking in his direction, “You are!”

The teenage boy paled when he saw Natalia approaching in such a dangerous way. “Wait! Please don’t hurt me! I have done nothing wrong!”

Both Marcus and Jenna turned their attention to the children, not expecting them to shout at all, especially after being saved from the bandits.

“You are that thief from a few days ago,” Natalia said with a cold tone of voice, “It seems like Kent failed to punish you. Did you kidnap these kids as well? Were you going to sell them?”

“No! Please wait!” the teenage boy begged.