As they walked through the village and reached their destination, they found Alfonse’s squad guiding a group of villagers outside Roger’s house.

“Hey, what’s going on?” Roy ran toward his friend.

Hearing Roy’s familiar voice, Alfonse turned back, “Oh, we’re going to mister Jeffery’s house. It’s just downstreet and it’s in a good shape.”

“Did you talk with Jack about that?” Roy raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah, don’t worry about that,” Alfonse nodded. “I already coordinated with Marth and Jack, we will be changing our routes so that we can keep an eye on both houses.”

“Good thinking,” Roy replied with an impressed expression. “This should help out Mr. Roger quite a bit. He can finally sleep on his own bed now.”

“He must be relieved about that,” Alfonse laughed. He then looked at Roy with excited eyes, “But forget about that, we finally got our own skills.”

“Yeah, finally,” Fred added. “You wanna check it out?”

Roy was taken aback by the sudden announcement, “Sure, how so?”

“Check it out,” Fred raised his hand and a translucent film sprung up from the earth and formed a small wall in front of him. “Try hitting me. Give it a good smack.”

Roy tilted his head in confusion, “You sure about that?” But seeing Fred gesturing for him to come, Roy took a stance, “Alright, you’re the one who wanted it.”

Roy dashed at Fred with incredible speed before letting out as powerful of a punch as he could. However, before his fist could reach his friend’s body, it clashed with an invisible wall with a loud thud.

Roy stood up from his punching position with a confused look on his face, “What the hell was that? It’s like that thing that blocks the dungeon.”

“It’s my skill, Minor Barrier,” Fred grinned. “Apparently, it can evolve to cover a large area later when it reaches max proficiency.”

“That is an insane skill,” Robb said while unsheathing his katana. “Don’t move, I wanna see if it can block my sword too.”

Seeing Robb’s excited expression, Fred shuddered in fear, “No, what the fuck. You wanna kill me?!”

However, Robb did not have any of his excuses. He dashed with a ghostly speed before striking with an outward diagonal slash. Just as his sword was about to clash with the translucent barrier, a golden light covered it.

The sword and the barrier clashed with a powerful shockwave before the weapon stopped dead in its tracks. The barrier also exploded into a myriad of golden particles, showering both young men.

Robb’s mouth was agape and his eyes wide open in shock. He looked around to understand what happened, only to find that same golden light glowing on Alfonse’s hand.

“Was that you?”

“Yeah, it was my skill,” Alfonse replied to Robb with a smile. “Holy Blessing, it can boost any skill that I choose, and give it Holy properties.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Robb raised his eyebrow in confusion.

“I don’t know, I’m just repeating what it says in the description.”

While the two were having their back-and-forth moment, Fred jumped right in. “No, no, no, we’re not doing this. We’re not just gonna pretend that nothing happened and ignore that you almost KILLED ME! What the hell were you thinking?!”

Robb tilted his head in confusion. “What do you mean “almost kill you”? I had that situation totally under control. I was going to stop my sword right before it touches you.”

Fred looked at Robb with cold eyes. “Hahaha, very funny. Hilarious even!” He then raised his hand to the air and conjured his barrier once again. “Let’s see if you still find this funny!”

Fred jumped high into the air before pushing his barrier downwards. Robb couldn’t process what was going on before an invisible force pushed him into the ground.

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“Alfonse, use that skill!”

Hearing Fred’s call, Alfonse immediately obliged. He pressed his hands together in a praying motion before golden light sprung up from his palms. The light covered the invisible barrier that was pressing Robb and made it even more robust.

“Ple-please… I can’t breathe. Plea- stop it!”

“Oh, yeah? You can’t breathe? Why don’t you run away then since you’re so fast? You’re the ghost demon with the ghost step, why don’t you choke on these ghost nuts too?!”

Fred’s rant made even Robb let out a breathless laugh, while Roy shook his head. He would have stopped Fred in any other situation, but what Robb had done was way beyond the line. Striking your friend with a sword isn’t something that is seen kindly upon in most bands of brothers.

Jaimie on the other hand didn’t know whether to be concerned or laugh. In the end, he just let out a chuckle and stood in his place. Roy saw that and felt his heart warm up, at least the young boy was enjoying himself.

After another twenty seconds of continuous pressing, Fred finally dispelled his golden barrier. Robb took a deep breath, sucking in as much air as he could possibly fit in his lungs.

“Damn, you almost killed me, man. What the fuck?!”

Fred raised an eyebrow in confusion, “What do you mean “almost killed you”? I had that situation totally under control. I was going to stop right before your heart would have stopped beating.”

Robb, who was still catching his breath, shook his head at his friend’s response. “Okay, okay, I get it. My bad, shouldn’t have done it.”

Seeing that their little quarrel has finally finished, Roy commented, “Wow, these are some nice skills you guys have. They work well together. You should have no problem with the ogre now, right?”

“Yeah, they’re piss easy,” Alfone grinned. “Unless they use that red aura, they can’t get through the barrier when I use my Holy Blessing. The only thing we really need is a good attacking skill. If we had someone like you that can use Fireball, we will be invincible.”

Roy scratched his head and looked sideways. “Maybe Fireball isn’t the best. Too much risk of fucking shit up that you didn’t mean to fuck up.” He then paused and looked at Alfonse. “Well, you guys should probably go now. People have been waiting for you to be done for quite a bit.”

Alfonse, remembering what their mission was in the first place, looked back to the group of villagers. They were all looking at him with impatient eyes.

“Oh shit, forgot.” He ran toward the front of the group while looking back at Roy, “Anyways, see you later.”

Roy waved at Alfonse and Fred as they walked away. He then looked at Robb who was still coughing, “You okay?”

“Yeah, cough just cough swallowed some dust.” Robb was bent at ninety degrees angle while coughing his lungs out. Each word he spoke took every little power he could muster.

“I’ll help you!” Jaimie jumped toward Robb and started tapping on his back. After a few times, Robb spat out a piece of dirty debris.

“Damn, that shit was stuck.” Robb then looked at Jaimie, “Thanks man, you saved me.”

“Well, let’s go inside,” Roy stated. “I wanna see what those little kids have been doing.”

Robb furrowed his eyebrows at Roy’s comment before his face brightened, “Ah, those kids. You had some stupid dumb bet with them. What are you gonna do if they do it? Help them awaken?”

“If that’s what they want, why not?” Roy shrugged his shoulders. “The world is dangerous; they need to be strong to face it.”

Robb shook his head, “Sometimes, you’re even more irresponsible than me.”

As the group walked toward Roger’s house, they found that the man had already finished building the palisade around it. They also had small trenches and wooden spikes to protect their perimeters. They even set up some wires that would trigger an iron bell if a monster stepped on them.

“That’s some nice work,” Robb couldn’t help but comment. “And pretty fast too.”

Roy nodded his head at his friend’s observation. The villagers had definitely worked tirelessly to make this place as safe as possible. At that moment, Roy deeply understood that it wasn’t just him, his friends, and the knights that were working hard. The villagers were doing their fair share as well. While he was fighting the monsters to grow stronger and secure the village, they were making sure that their base was as safe and comfortable as possible.

The group of three entered the house where they found Jacob and his wife sitting at the kitchen table. Roy looked around before asking the doctor, “Is Mr. Roger not here?”

“Yeah, he went to old Jef’s house,” Jacob replied. “He is helping them dig trenches and raise spikes there too.”

“Good plan,” Robb nodded. “Better do that as fast as possible to keep it safe.”

As Roy looked at Mr. Jacob’s wife nursing little Dustin, Roy remembered the group of three kids. “Ah, misses Martha, have you seen Claire, Daniel, and Jeanie?”

Martha looked up in thought for a second, “Ah, I think they’re playing outside with the other kids, at the back of the house. You should have seen them, they have been doing pushups these days from dawn to sunset. It’s like a ghost possessed them or something.”

While Martha laughed along with her husband, Roy nodded his head and thanked her. He followed her directions along with Robb and Jaimie and walked to the back of the house. There they found a group of six kids. Three of the kids were sitting down on a relatively tall portion of a tree trunk while looking at their friends. On the other hand, Claire, Daniel, and Jeanie were on the ground struggling to do push-ups. Every time they went up, they would strain themselves to the limit with sweat dripping off their faces.