Unfortunately, Prelinsa did not see Camilla after that. The day following her conversations with Mirabelle and Missus B, she was sent back west to a military outpost, where attacks by Rogues were said to be intensifying on towns in the Great Desert.

Entering through the eastern gate, she bowed in greeting to the Knight Commander in charge of the outpost – a male ailuran with black hair and the standard Silvermoon military mask.

“I greet Phoenix Knight Commander Dock,” she said.

“At ease,” Dock replied, and Prelinsa stood.

Dock Silvermoon-Buckwheat had helped rescue Prelinsa from the slavers six years ago, in the North Realm. He was a familiar face whom she respected, and appreciated for not being too formal.

“It’s a pleasure to be working with you again, Commander,” Prelinsa said.

Dock nodded. “You too, kid – it’s been a while. Your quarters are in room 1E, same as last time.”

Prelinsa nodded. “Thank you,” she said, taking her leave.

----------------------------------------

After getting herself settled into her room for a bit, she headed out for dinner. Dinner was held in a large open cafeteria, with rows of dining tables. Military-issue food was quite good in the EGP – not as good as a proper home cooked meal, but definitely respectable and with many options. As with civilian food, all food provided by the military was lab-grown – on top of the environmental benefits, labs were easier to defend during a war.

Prelinsa got herself a simple dinner with chicken, broccoli, rice, and some sauce – a staple of Eastern cuisine that she’d grown fond of. She scanned around for a bit, looking for where to sit.

“Prelinsa!” A familiar voice called out.

Prelinsa headed over to where Lana and Raine were sitting. Lana’s meal was a vegan mixed salad of fruits and vegetables, but no dressing – a wererabbit staple. According to Lana, dressing made everything taste worse.

Raine’s dinner was the total opposite, being entirely meat. Duck meat, chicken meat, quail meat, and soy sauce. It made sense, since Raine was a falcon-harpy with predator blood in her veins.

Prelinsa sat across from the other two, setting her plate on the table.

“Nice to see you guys,” she said.

“You, too! We heard you’d been assigned here, so we were looking out for you,” Lana said. “I also heard from Raine about the Julius Moment. Great job!” She looked pleased to hear that a racist Goldensun had been set straight.

Raine nodded. “Yeah. Thanks again for that, by the way,” she said. Her expressions were still muted as usual, but she was definitely grateful.

“You’re welcome,” Prelinsa said.

“Yeah. You saved me the hassle of a serious injury. Not that Knight Commander Fiolira couldn’t have fixed me up, but… I don’t want to go through that much pain if I can help it.”

“By the way – I heard from Knight Commander Dock. Tomorrow morning, we’re all on patrol together! It’s good to be working with you again, Prelinsa,” Lana said.

“For sure,” Prelinsa agreed.

“Cammy was supposed to be with us too, but she hasn’t shown up,” Lana continued. “I heard she’s on sick leave. I hope she’s alright.”

“Yeah. I wonder what happened?” Raine wondered aloud.

Prelinsa didn’t reply to that. She wasn’t sure if it was her place to say.

“Well, they’ve subbed in a recent graduate instead,” Lana said. “You know Luna and Selene Lupin? They have an adopted brother, and he’ll be joining us.”

Prelinsa raised an eyebrow. “You mean Vincent Lupin? Dark gray lycan? Twenty-one years old?”

“Yeah! You know him?” Lana asked curiously.

Prelinsa nodded. “We grew up in the same place.”

“Cool. I guess they assigned him knowing that, huh?”

“Yeah. He used to be an asshole, but he got better. I wouldn’t say we’re friends, but we’re on speaking terms.”

“Well, that’s good at least! I hope you can get along.”

“Same. Except… I kind of killed his mom,” Prelinsa said, frowning.

“You what.” Lana and Raine both stared blankly with their mouths open.

“The bandit I killed in Sarcodes? That was… that was his mom. I apologized to him in person, but we haven’t spoken at all since. I figured he needed more time alone.”

“Oh.” Lana’s ears drooped, as a very conflicted expression came over her face. “Good gods.”

“Good gods is right. But he’s here, so he must’ve passed the mental exams,” Raine pointed out. “That means he’s fine… in some sense of the word.”

“I really hope so,” Lana said. “Anyway, Prelinsa. I hope you can get things sorted out with him. Otherwise, this whole thing is going to be a mess.”

“Yeah.”

----------------------------------------

The next morning came way too quickly, and Prelinsa didn’t see Vincent at all. She, Raine, and Lana met up early in a common area, waiting for the lycan to show up. They were all dressed in desert camouflage gear, and Raine was doing some tune-ups on the Helium One.

“By the way, Lana, is that the new MRD weapon you were talking about?” Prelinsa asked, noting a bizarre tool that Lana was carrying in place of her usual spear. It was long, but not as long as a spear – it looked like an elaborate hollow tube, with a box and a handle attached, as well as a glass reticle and some bulky electronics. It also bristled with the dance of lightning.

Lana nodded. “Yeah. After I almost got done in during our mission at Alchemilla, I wanted to try something new. MRD calls it a coilgun.”

“How’s that work?”

“I can explain,” Raine offered, as she closed a panel on the H1. As the daughter of Doctor Cloud Maxim, it made sense that she could.

“Sure,” said Prelinsa.

“It’s got ten metal darts in this magazine.” Raine pointed to the box, then pointed to the tube section. “Using electromagnets, it fire the darts forward, one at a time. It runs off batteries, but Lana can add power to it with her lightning magic, at the cost of stealth. The darts come in a lethal type with extra weight, and a non-lethal type that delivers an electric shock. In testing, the coilgun could hit a stationary target from up to one hundred fifty meters away.”

Prelinsa raised an eyebrow. That was well beyond Lana’s usual range – it was actually competitive with Prelinsa’s early efforts while she was learning. “So it doesn’t need magic to work?”

“Right. It doesn’t,” Raine confirmed.

Prelinsa thought about that for a moment. If the darts weren’t magic, then they couldn’t be deflected in the same way that magic attacks could, and detecting them would be more challenging. A simple mana barrier wouldn’t work – it would take some kind of physical barrier or concussive blast to stop a coilgun attack. Nothing that a competent mage couldn’t deal with, but it complicated things by offering a new kind of ranged attack.

“…I feel like this is one of those things that mages would’ve banned in the past, for threatening their power,” Prelinsa commented.

“Well, we live in a new era now,” Raine pointed out.

As they spoke, Vincent exited a corridor, meeting up with the three girls. With a neutral expression on his face, he raised a hand in greeting.

“Hey,” he said casually.

“Hey,” Prelinsa replied. “How’re you doing?”

Vincent nodded. “I’m fine. Thanks for asking.”

“Glad to hear that.”

Vincent really did seem alright to Prelinsa. She knew he was someone who had a hard time masking his emotions – after all, he used to be even more hot-blooded than she was. They’d gotten into plenty of fights before, and she was very attuned to his bad sides.

Unsurprisingly, Raine and Lana seemed very awkward around Vincent. However, Raine broke the silence.

“Since we’re all here, we should get going.”

----------------------------------------

The patrol was simple. Raine flew overhead with the H1, a radio, and a mana crystal, scouting from the air. Prelinsa, Lana, and Vincent stuck to the ground in an off-road vehicle with supplies. They were scouting for Rogues in the Great Desert – the barren wastes in the middle of the Greater Realm, which separated the East and West Realms from one another. They did so in a sweeping pattern, being thorough since they didn’t have any good way of knowing where their enemies were located.

With the mana being quite thin in most of the Great Desert, it was hard to sense any mana hearts in such an area. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack, and it was tedious.

The first hour went by in mostly awkward silence, with nothing being spotted at all, just the occasional report.

“So, uh. Vincent,” Lana began awkwardly from the row behind the driver’s seat. Prelinsa sat off to her side.

“Yeah?” Vincent replied from the driver’s seat.

“I want to get this out of the way sooner rather than later. We heard from Prelinsa about… what happened in Sarcodes.”

Vincent inhaled and exhaled, taking some time to find the words. A slight frown came to his face. “…Yeah, makes sense,” he finally said. “I don’t blame Prelinsa. I’m still kind of upset, but I’ve decided to move on. No choice, after all.”

He paused again, thinking of how to continue this. Then he made a more disgusted face.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“It helps that my mom was a bad person. Worse than you could imagine. She disowned me for not wanting to be a domestic abuser – can you believe that?”

“Holy mother of gods, what?” Lana was absolutely bewildered.

“Right?” Vincent said bluntly. “She’ll never not be my mother, but I consider the Lupin Marquisate my real family now. They’re people who actually act like people, and I’m happier living with them.”

“Well, that’s great to hear,” Lana said, managing a smile. “So they treat you well?”

Vincent nodded. “They do. They all helped me out when I was in a bad place, after mom left. I’ll always be grateful to them.”

“That’s really great.”

Prelinsa nodded. She’d heard this story before, but it still brought a smile to her face.

“Yeah.” Vincent made another face, but not one of disgust. It was one of both fondness and annoyance. “Luna and Selene still like to tease me, though. To them, I’m their little brother, even though they’re younger and shorter than me.” He made a twisted smirk, as he thought about his twin sisters. “It’s true that they’re stronger than me, though. I’ll never be their older brother as long as that’s the case.”

Lana laughed. “Yeah, that sounds like Luna and Selene, alright!”

----------------------------------------

After that, the banter between the knights was more lighthearted. They were joined by Raine at some point, while Prelinsa took the air shift. Luckily, no Rogues were sighted, and they all returned to base without incident for lunch.

“You know what, you’re alright, Vincent!” Lana said over the dining table. “I was worried when Prelinsa called you an asshole, but you’re pretty cool.”

“Hey, I said he used to be an asshole,” Prelinsa corrected.

Vincent snorted at that. “Well, I’ve been working on it. Don’t want Prelinsa jabbing me with a hot poker again.”

“Right, that did happen,” Prelinsa recalled.

“Well, you can’t bring that up and not talk about it,” Lana said, ever the busybody.

“Do you tell this story, or do I?” Prelinsa asked Vincent.

“You. I’ve always been bad at stories,” Vincent replied.

“Sure,” said Prelinsa. “So, I was minding my own business, tending to a fire with a poker. Then Vincent came over and said some crap about how my mom should marry his mom. I said no and insulted his mom, and he insulted me back. Then he got mad, went full wolf, and attacked me. He pushed me to the ground and almost beat me, but I grabbed the poker from the fire and hit him with it. Right here.” She pointed to the left side of her torso.

“Ooh.” Lana made a face as she imagined the pain. Raine made a less extreme face.

Vincent grimaced at the memory. “Yeah, that hurt a lot.”

“Sorry, by the way. I never apologized before,” Prelinsa offered.

The lycan waved it off. “Eh, whatever. I deserved it anyway.”

“If it helps, I lost my hand to a flaming sword on my eighth day in Pyrus,” Prelinsa continued, recalling the thugs who attacked her out of jealousy.

“Well, that just sounds horrible. But I guess we’re buddies in suffering now, huh?”

“Yeah. Suffering buddies. By the way, why did you want our moms to marry?” Prelinsa asked. “I don’t think you ever said.”

“Yeah! Did you have a crush on Prelinsa, by any chance?” Lana asked eagerly. As usual, she couldn’t resist the opportunity to get nosy about other peoples’ love lives.

Vincent shook his head. “Nah, it wasn’t some cute reason like that. I’ve never seen Prelinsa that way,” he said, with absolute certainty. “To me, she was always… one of the boys.”

“Aw,” Lana said, disappointedly.

“Well, thanks for saying that I’m not feminine,” Prelinsa remarked dryly.

“Oh, I’m not saying you’re like that now,” Vincent said without missing a beat. “You glowed up a lot. But I still don’t see you that way – no offense.”

“No offense taken. So then, what was the reason?”

“Honestly? It was just because my mom wanted to beat your mom up, and I wanted to make her happy.” Vincent made another face, clearly disgusted with his old self.

“That tracks,” Prelinsa said.

“Yeah, she was a psycho.”

The party continued to converse after lunch, and into the afternoon.

----------------------------------------

The next few days came and went without incident, but on the sixth day, Prelinsa spotted something from the air, completely by chance. She was in her downshifted fox form, with her smartphone strapped to her right forelimb.

“Hey, I see people,” she reported over the phone, in local radio mode. “You see that oasis with trees? One o’ clock, about ninety or so kilometers away.”

“Vincent, stop the car,” Raine said.

Vincent brought the vehicle to a stop, so that its occupants could get a better view. Lana and Raine poked their heads out the windows.

“Yeah, we see them,” Lana said, peering through a scope.

“They’ve got a truck and some supplies. I don’t know if they’re Rogues or not, but it’s a little suspicious that they’re out here in the middle of nowhere,” Raine added.

“What do you think we should do?” Lana asked.

“You’ve practiced in stealth, right Vincent?” Prelinsa asked.

“Yeah,” Vincent replied, still being the designated driver.

“Alright,” said Prelinsa. “I’m coming down so I don’t get seen.”

She descended, landing next to the car.

“How do you think we should proceed, oh great leader?” Lana asked her.

“Well, here’s my idea…”

----------------------------------------

Leaving the vehicle behind with Prelinsa, Raine and Vincent approached the targets. Vincent, not being able to downshift, was in his earfolk form to increase stealth. Raine was able to downshift, and was in her falcon form, riding along on Vincent’s arm. The two moved very slowly and carefully, while masking their presences as well as they could and hiding behind rocks and sand dunes. From above, H1 monitored the mysterious people, camouflaged against the blue sky.

One bogie w/ mana crystal. Fury possible while moving, Vincent sent over messaging. The little oasis made that even more possible, being a little hotspot of nature and mana.

Missing persons list? Prelinsa asked.

Vincent forwarded a series of facial recognition matches. All of the people were elvish West Realm civilians who had gone missing, and notably, all were wanted with criminal histories. The list of crimes they’d committed included some that made Prelinsa feel like hitting something.

The pokkit sent a signal over the phone to Lana. A signal meaning you’re up.

From sixty meters away on a hill, Lana raised the coilgun, flipping a safety switch from on to off. She aimed down the sights, steadied her breath for several seconds, and pulled a trigger on the handle. With a soft flicking sound, the first dart shot forth at high speed and landed true. One of the people – the one with the mana crystal – twitched as the dart delivered a sharp electric shock. He dropped to the ground, unconscious.

“That’s one,” Lana whispered.

The other two elves looked around in a panic, trying to understand what had happened. Lana took aim and fired again. A second elf went down in the same way as the first.

“That’s two.”

The last crook tried to build mana fury with a roar of Leviathan magic, confirming her status as a Rogue. But before this could happen, Vincent and Raine rushed out of hiding and gave chase. The criminal fled on foot, trying to gain space while staying within reach of the oasis.

Not able to hit such a fast moving target without risking hitting her teammates, Lana flipped the coilgun’s safety back on and signaled to Prelinsa, still keeping her scope pointed just in case.

From her ambush location several hundreds of meters away, Prelinsa watched the action with a scoped version of the Silvermoon military mask. She pointed her sword and fired a concussive burst of phoenixfire, continuously adjusting its aim while it moved. The burst rocketed across the stones and sands of the desert, curved slightly, and slammed directly into the Rogue’s chest, knocking the wind out of her. She toppled backwards, unconscious.

“Great work!” Lana called over the phone. “Let’s regroup and bring these guys back to base.”