Chapter 112 — In which they meet for the ‘first’ time (3)
Phlox safely returned to Purplus with the help of that freaky teleportation magic.
‘It felt different when His Excellency used it.’
She grumbled.
Perhaps it was just her bias, but the teleporation magic of Rubrun’s mages felt rough and pricked her skin.
She was glad it was all over, and she wouldn’t have to do that again.
‘But what happened in Flavun?’
The sudden departure of Flavun’s envoy bothered her, but she couldn’t draw any hastily conclusion.
‘… Still, I wanted to get a closer look at her at least once.’
She recalled the beautiful, as if sculptured face that gave her such a strong sense of déjà vu.
It was surely impossible, their ages didn’t match, but…
Why did she look so…
“Priest Phlox.”
A guard called out to her and Phlox snapped out of her thoughts.
“Yes.”
“His Excellency and Head Priest will see you now.”
“Yes, thank you.”
She followed the guard into the audience chamber.
She expected that the Saint was still awake.
From what she learned for the past month about him, it would be a miracle if he was sleeping soundly at this late hour.
But she didn’t expect the head priest Rasin to be awake.
According to her intel he was usually sleeping peacefully at this time.
‘Did he expect problems…?’
Considering the atrocities Rasin committed, she wouldn’t put it pass him.
There was a high chance he had a hand in disappearance of the relic and the strange actions of Sun and Day Gods Temple’s priests.
“Please elaborate on that ritual.”
While Phlox was giving report, Amara, who pretended to be disinterested, suddenly spoke up.
Even if he truly was aloof to the earthly affairs like he pretended to be in the public and before others, as a Saint he couldn’t just turn a blind eye, when unusual ritual was preformed on foreign soil.
Phlox meticulously described everything she saw and figured out.
Rasin asked a few questions, appearing also concerned about this ritual.
“How strange… I never heard about such a ritual before.”
He said, stroking his chin.
Phlox’s nose picked up a lie in this statement.
“It’s only natural. That ritual is more than three hundred years old. What’s more it doesn’t correspond to that god’s current characteristics and personality.”
Amara’s simple words brought heavy silence.
Preforming an old ritual which no longer corresponds to a given god was no different from attacking that god.
It could cause a dissociation in the god’s self-image, leading to the rupture of self.
After a few seconds, Amara spoke with a soft smile on his lips.
“It appears that those holy siblings forgot fundamental teachings. Please inform the Sun and Day Gods Temple to sent them here. I’ll make sure to attend to them personally.”
“Personally? Your excellency, the harvest festival is just around the corner. You plan to take on even more work in such a busy time?”
“We cannot be careless about such a matter, head priest Rasin.”
Rasin tried to reason with him, but Amara rejected his suggestion with a soft smile.
“I plan to do my best to teach them, so they won’t forget again.”
Phlox had a blasphemous thought that Amara’s smile was strangely terrifying at that moment.
After returning to her sleeping quarters, Phlox laid down on a mat to sleep.
Her body felt heavy after all the events today, but her mind was still wide-awake, trying to connect scattered clues.
‘It’s not good to think when you’re tired.’
Phlox thought about the advice of senior sister, she happened to think a lot of today.
Because that sister was always right, Phlox pushed away everything and started to meditate.
Soon, she fell into the world of dreams.
Strange dreams carrying the hints about the forgotten past.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
*-*-*
‘Fuck.’
Commander cursed in her mind for a hundredth time, dodging into a shadow, when monstrous golems passed her by.
They luckily didn’t detect her, but it didn’t make her situation any better.
She got separated from her squadron, and was left alone in the center of enemy’s territory.
At least she could hope that her diversion let the others safely escape, instead of going deeper into this treacherous land, like her.
‘… But how did they find us so quickly?’
That thought bothered her all the way as she was running, hiding from patrols searching for intruders, for her.
Booom!
Suddenly, an enormous explosion made her stop in her tracks.
She surveyed the smoke and flames rising between dark buildings and figure out which warehouse just met its gloomy fate.
‘Weapon Storage Site V…’
Any destruction of her enemy’s resources was welcome, but she couldn’t help but frown.
‘If you’re going to go through all this trouble, you could go for more strategically important point.’
Site V was smaller than the rest, and separated from other areas.
Though guarded as much as the rest of the warehouses, if it exploded, it would create less damage than the rest.
Mainly because the fire wouldn’t spread to other places, and there were no workers stationed on the site V.
‘If you want to make your point, you must make it hurt.’
Without workers or guards hurt, the exploding warehouse wouldn’t create much fuss, failing at its purpose as means of terrorism.
She grumbled that if it was one of her subordinates, she was going to thoroughly re-educate them.
Her feet hit the ground, as she sprinted into another alley.
According to her mental map, behind this corner should be-
Thud!
“Uh?!”
She bumped into something hard.
Was there a pole here? But who on earth puts a pole in the middle of the road!
“Ah.”
The hands of the pole caught her, as she was about to fell to the ground.
Commander looked up to meet the gaze of two bright yellow eyes behind a snake mask.
Worthy of a pole, the woman before was almost a head and a half taller than her.
The woman examined her for a second, and then let go and stepped back.
Commander also took step back, quickly looking her up and down.
From her clothes, equipment and bearing, she didn’t seem like a guard.
A fellow resistance member?
Commander quickly activated her spirit vision, but didn’t see any blessings of her god or other allied gods.
She wasn’t from Sidus then.
But it still didn’t exclude a possibility that the woman was connected to the resistance movement of this country.
Sidus fell under occupation only recently, but Gemma and this country was under the rule of terror for quite some time.
Perhaps there were some people with last strands of sanity left in them, who tried to resist.
But her judgment on the enigmatic woman could be wrong.
…
The two women just looked at each other, neither of them making the first move.
Finally, Commander spoke:
“Who are you?”
The woman’s lips curled up.
“I was taught not to tell my name to strangers, especially not to the ones who like to sneak in back alleys of the high-security area.”
“Were you also taught not to sneak around the back alleys of high-security areas perhaps?”
“No. I was taught not to get caught.”
“How wonderful…”
Contrary to her light words, Commander tensed.
If not getting caught meant not being seen by anyone, she was about to fight for her life.
But the woman just chuckled and said:
“If you’re planning to leave, I don’t recommend this road. I just used a smoke bomb on a road ahead to cover my tracks and patrols are flocking there.”
She then maneuvered around Commander and ran past her.
Commander hesitated for a second, and then turned around and started running in the same direction as the woman.
“Are you following me?”
The woman playfully asked when Commander caught up to her.
Annoyed by the woman’s carefree attitude, Commander frowned.
Could she really trust her?
She could purposely lie to her to lead her to the enemy…
“There are three roads here, if the two are blocked, I have only one way, no?”
She answered, as she tried to see through the other party.
The yellow eyes behind the mask didn’t change or even blink.
“Ah, indeed. Silly me…”
The woman was running in the silence again.
Commander followed after her, keeping some distance.
Abruptly, a stone on the woman’s wrist lit up.
Commander’s hand immediately went to her weapon, but…
“Patrol ahead.”
The woman blocked the light from the stone with her hand, and quickly pointed at the crates left under the wall.
“Let’s hide.”
The woman did just that, and Commander followed her lead again after a short hesitation.
In the darkness of the crate, Commander saw the light of the stone slipping through the woman’s fingers.
It didn’t seem like a spiritual instrument… a magic device?
Thud. Thud.
The heavy footsteps passed them by.
The woman didn’t immediately leave the crate, she waited until the stone completely lost its light.
It seemed it was some kind of detection device.
The two women left their hiding and started running again.
“What should I call you?”
The woman abruptly asked.
“I was taught not to give things, which the other party is unwilling to give to me.”
“I see… Little flower then.”
Commander frowned.
She knew she was quite short compared to others, but it felt like an insult.
She glanced at the woman, thinking of an appropriate comeback.
“I’m going to call you Imoogi then.”
“I’m honored.”
But the woman laughed, as if she truly was honored by it.
Perhaps she didn’t know what Imoogi meant?
While Commander was dissatisfied that her attempt at insulting her perhaps ally didn’t work, the two reached a guard-point and the bridge leading outside.
“Hm… I have a smoke bomb left.”
“… I have a dynamite.”
The two parties decided to reveal a bit of information for the sake of cooperation.
Commander surveyed their surrounding and proposed:
“We can use the smoke bomb to drive them out. And then make a run through the bridge. Once we’re on the ground, I’ll throw the dynamite and blew up the bridge.”
“… The guards will probably follow after us and enter that bridge.”
“Yeah. They will all fell into the water. The river here is pretty deep and the current is strong, so they won’t be getting out anytime soon, giving us ample time to escape.”
Imoogi was silent for a second, a smile gone from her lips.
“Even if they won’t die by drowning, having water in your lungs is terribly painful and terrifying. They probably will lose their bodies.”
It was Commander’s turn to fell silent for a moment in utter confusion.
“Why do you care what happens to the enemy? Aren’t you here to destroy them?”
“They’re people. And I’m here to destroy the system, which hurts people. Not to destroy people.”
Commander stared at Imoogi in disbelief.
And then burst out laughing.
“By the gods! And here I thought you may be a worthy ally. Silly Imoogi, you want a revolution? Freedom? Happiness for all people? Well, sorry to break it to you, but you can’t have that without bloodshed.”
“…”
“No change comes from passivity. No chains break without force. Whatever it’s that you want, you’re going to have to rip it out of the throats of the others, or they will never let you have it.”
“I know.”
Commander was about to speak further, but Imoogi interrupted her with a cold hiss.
“I know that my wish cannot be achieved without sacrifices. But it’s not a reason to take an easy road.”
“… Easy road?”
“If I want the world without violence, I should be first to abandon the violence, no? If I wish for the world where everyone can choose their life and death, then I should make it a rule in all my actions. The future will not be excuse for my present.”
Her yellow eyes shined like the bright stars in the darkness.
Cold bright stars.
“So I’ll not hurt someone just because it will give me an easier escape route.”
“… If you don’t escape here, you may fell into their hands. And they will surely not hold the same philosophy as you.”
“And? What what they may want to do to me has to do with me?”
“Do you not care about your own life?”
“Of course I care. I care as much as for the life of every other person walking this land.”
‘Irrational. Insane. Idiotic.’
Commander went through the dictionary, looking for all words to describe what she was hearing.
Ethic musings were fun in the books, but this was the real life!
There was no place for philosophy in the fight for survival.
“It appears that we have a fundamental disagreement. I’m sorry little flower, but I’m afraid our ways will have to part here.”
“Seems like we agree on at least one thing.”
Imoogi turned around and disappeared in the shadows.
Commander didn’t watch her leave.
Normally she would watch in case of an unexpected attack, but she felt weirdly annoyed, and forgot about it.
She glared at the guard post she had to pass to get to the bridge.
After some thinking, she decided to blow up nearby building to drive guards out and sneak out, while they are gone.
And she did exactly that.
Boom!
The guards rushed out, and Commander went in.
But just about when she was to step on a bridge.
Bang!
A reinforced stick just barely missed her and struck the ground.
Commander quickly side stepped and faced the opponents.
Apparently not all guards rushed out.
There were two left, and they weren’t going to let her just go.
A fight ensued.
Commander was better fighter, but there was the two of them, and they were much heavier armed than her, who only had a light leather armor and a dagger.
Crack!
She broke the leg of one of the guards, and not missing the moment when they lost their balance, she bestowed a heavy blow directly on their head.
One guard collapsed.
But her happiness was short-lived as the second guard’s stick hit her, sending her on the floor.
And continuing her terrible luck today, her head hit the edge of the table, sending the way of severe pain and dizziness through her.
The second guard stood above her and raised the stick to deliver the final blow…
Crack!
And then collapsed on the floor with a distinctive sound of bones breaking.
Imoogi appeared in Commander’s darkening vision.
The woman seemed to pout:
“Ah, well, I’m not exactly against hitting people, though…”
Commander black out just as warm hands grasped her arms.
And Phlox woke up, the first rays on sunlight shining through the window.
*~*~*