Luna awoke early in the morning to discover that they were camping near a river, with the entire area hidden by trees. Aside from the ball of light that lazily floated around her, she was alone. When Luna poked it, it shook happily, realizing she was awake.

Luna tried to remember what had happened, but her head began to sting sharply. She looked around and noticed an empty sleeping bag beside her and that she was behind the Landraider. The landraider was wrecked. It literally looked like one hit away from exploding. Seeing the numerous holes, claw marks, melted plates and the exposed boiler made her exhale through the nose.

“You and I always suffer together, don’t we red?”

Suddenly Willow came from the side, ran up snorting and huffing, and rubbed against her.

"Willow, come back here, you..." Baldric said as he came from the side of the landraider and saw her awake. "Welcome to the land of the living." She was no longer hallucinating, and Luna thanked the Maker for it. The moment he sat down to check up on her, Luna sat up straight and the two of them had a tight hug.

"How long was I out?"

"A whole day. Honestly, a whole day. I literally thought you died in your sleep with how well you slept." Luna snickered. Then she remembered Baldric’s injuries; his broken arm, the massive gashes and cuts on his arms, legs, and face that were now all gone.

"Elizabeth can put medical automatons out of business." Baldric caught her staring. "I was hoping she could make me even more devilishly good looking, but I guess miracles have limits."

"Yeah, a shame, she could have given us something better to look at." Both of them chuckled as Luna continued to stroke Willow’s fur. "How did she manage her mana?"

Baldric did not answer right away.

"G gave her aerium."

Luna suddenly tried to stand up with Baldric urging her to lie back down, but she got to her feet shakily. She then started to look for Elizabeth, who was with Annie, Ada, Tinkerton-G, and Sylvie, fixing the landraider.

"Luna!" Elizabeth leapt from the crate she was sitting on and ran to her to give her a hug, which she returned tightly. Luna saw Annie, who just stood there and gave her a smile. Luna remembered the bloody mess that Annie was in, but now all her injuries were gone as well. The only trace of the attack was the blood and cuts on Annie’s overalls. Luna carried Elizabeth in her arms, then approached Annie and gave her a big hug as well.

"Morning Luna." G greeted her. Luna let go first and put down Elizabeth, then she grabbed G and held him so tightly that he squirmed.

"You gave the child aerium?!" Luna yelled as she shook the little man.

"I made the batch myself!" G said as he struggled in Luna’s grip. "No added chemicals or anything! It’s pure, I swear." Luna then put him down and checked on Elizabeth. She checked her eyes, cheeks, and even her teeth.

"Are you feeling alright?" Luna asked the child.

"Mmmhmmm." Elizabeth said happily, but Luna checked her arms and skin.

"You don’t feel any itching? Shaking? Nothing?"

"No. nothing."

"You will tell us if you feel anything alright? Anything at all, you will tell us, right?"

"How about you?" Luna was surprised at Elizabeth’s question. "Are you alright, Luna?"

"I am." Luna smiled at her. "Thanks to you."

Everyone seemed to have fully recovered from the fight that almost killed them all. As they all had breakfast of water and some berries, Sylvie found for them, Luna checked everyone and found no traces of any injuries. She then remembered her own self-inflicted injuries and remembered the venom. All she could remember was her being injected and being attacked by drones and GEAs. After that, nothing. It was all a dark haze in her mind.

After they all ate, Baldric, G, and Ada told her everything that had happened. Luna surprised Baldric when she did not react as angrily as he expected but was rather quiet throughout Tinkerton-G’s story. Then the four of them decided on what to do next.

"We cannot go anywhere, especially with the engine exposed. All of us tried our best to cover it, but without materials or the proper equipment, it’s useless. One more hit to the engines will completely destroy them. I propose we do an extensive repair before we go any further." G said as he sat on Luna's shoulder.

"Tink we can’t stay here, we are too open!" Baldric replied. "We’re lucky no one found us yet!"

"So let me get this straight. You want to keep going in the condition the Landraider is in? Listen to me, Baldric, One. More. Hit. And. Its. Done." G pointed his cane at the landraider.

"I believe a compromise is in order." Ada intervened. "We cannot perform the repairs here and the landraider can still function, but we need to cover the engine. I propose we find a location nearby where we can get materials to repair the landraider.”

"Luna, you have been awfully quiet the entire time." G said to her. "Any good ideas brewing in that head of yours?"

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"Where are we exactly?" Luna said as they all looked at the map.

"We are in Ostrin." G walked all over the map and pointed to their location. "We are one state away from the walled sea, but we are here at the end of the Spiky spine ranges."

"Is there a town close to our location?"

"One. A town called Vehlmer, but you forget that the two of you are the most wanted faces in Aelmion, so I don’t think anyone will sell anything to us."

"Who said anything about buying? We just need materials." Luna looked at Baldric. He caught on and smiled.

"Granted, but we need a disguise. I’m pretty sure everyone knows you always dress in black by now."

"There is a village here." Luna pointed to a location close to where they are on the map. "And when there are people, there is laundry. Problem solved."

=0o0=

They left their campground soon after and found out they were travelling in a pretty desolate part of the state of Ostrin. It was all just a large open plain without anything for miles. They took it as a good sign since no one can sneak up on them and they barely have any weapons to defend themselves. The fight in the underempire literally left them with nothing, with Tinkerton-G’s walker, which was missing both of its arms, being the only one capable of fighting.

They arrived by early afternoon at the small village they agreed to borrow disguises from. It was only two hours from the town of Vehlmer and the village was near a thin forest, so they decided to hide the landraider there.

Luna volunteered to be the one to go to the town to get the materials in Tinkerton-G’s walker, with G and Ada accompanying her, whereas everyone else will stay with Baldric.

"Right, don’t do anything stupid while we’re gone." Luna said as they got ready to leave.

"No promises." Baldric said as they did their intricate secret handshake. Luna climbed aboard Tinkerton-G’s walker, then turned and left.

"Now as for us." Baldric faced everyone, "We need to start stripping the plates down, so when they get back, we just need to patch the new plates back on."

As Annie, Sylvie, and Baldric began working on the landraider, Elizabeth offered to help, but he just told her to relax and enjoy herself. Elizabeth then played with Willow and the ball of light Luna named "Shiny." The three of them decided to stray away for a little bit when Willow saw a rabbit and started to chase after it.

Elizabeth and Shiny chased after Willow, who was chasing the rabbit, and it led them through the forest and onto a road. The rabbit and Willow ran across the road, and Elizabeth, thinking it was safe, chased after them when a honking sound came from the side.

It was an automobile coming straight at her, and Elizabeth was frozen on the spot. The automobile swerved and narrowly missed her, but due to the sharp swerve, it lost control and landed in a ditch.

Elizabeth, recovering from everything that happened, slowly walked towards the automobile that was now flipped on the side of the road. She could see two people inside, an elderly couple, when she was grabbed by Baldric and forced her to look away. He handed her to Annie while he and Sylvie checked on the automobile.

Both of them carefully pulled the old couple out of the vehicle, and their condition did not look good. The old woman’s head was bleeding profusely while the old man's arms and legs were broken. Elizabeth jumped down and rushed to them.

"Sylvie, we need to stop the bleeding on her head." Baldric carefully adjusted the elderly woman. "Annie, get me something we can use as a bandage-"

"Baldric, please let me help." Elizabeth approached him and stared at the old couple.

“Elizabeth, we have talked about this, right? You cannot keep using your magic openly." Baldric hated saying it as the old couple were on the verge of death, but the more she used magic, the more she could be found.

"Please Baldric, please let me help. They got hurt because of me."

Baldric gritted his teeth. "Sylvie, Annie, check the area and see if anyone is nearby."

They both nodded, Sylvie gave Elizabeth a jar of Aerium and went off with Annie.

"Do it."

Elizabeth knelt down beside the old woman first and placed her hands over her. As she began to pray, Her hands began to glow with a bright light, and soon the rest of her body did too. The child grunted in pain but held on. Baldric watched as the large cut on the old woman’s head slowly vanished along with her bruises.

After Elizabeth recovered, the child now began to heal the old man while Baldric cleaned the old woman’s blood off her head.

=0o0=

The old woman was the first to wake up, and when she saw Elizabeth’s worried face, she smiled. "Hello there, Angel."

"Hello." Elizabeth smiled back as she put down the aerium she was eating. "I’m sorry."

"Maker Ma'am, are you alright?" Baldric checked up on the old woman. "Don't get up, ma'am; rest for a while; you've had quite a fall."

"My husband!" The old woman began to frantically look around and realized he was right beside her.

"He is fine, ma’am. It was lucky you two did not have any serious injuries." Baldric assured her. The old man began to wake up when Annie and Sylvie returned, with Annie holding Willow in her arms.

"What happened?"

"I’m sorry." Elizabeth spoke before Baldric could stop her. "I caused you to slip and fall."

"No ma’am, sir, this is my fault." Baldric cut her off. "Please don’t get angry at the child. Please, I can pay for any damage, especially to your vehicle. "

"Did anyone else get hurt?" The old man asked him.

"No sir." he replied. The old man looked at Elizabeth.

"For a moment, I thought we hit her. Thank the Maker, she is fine."

"We are at fault as well." The old woman smiled at them but kept looking at Elizabeth. "Me and Stephen were not looking at where we were going."

"Still, it does not cover the damage done to your vehicle. At least please let me pay for the repairs to the automobile." Baldric insisted. The old couple looked at them all. All of them were covered in dirt, their clothes had dried blood on them, and they rather smelled horribly.

"Where on Pandora did you all come from?" The old man asked. "This side of the range is incredibly desolate."

"Oh uhmm... We got lost coming down from the mountains." The old man noticed that Baldric was the only man among them. "We are escaping slavers, you see. We are using the mountains to hide as we make our way north to Aspana."

"To Aspana? On foot?" The old woman looked at all of them with concern.

"No ma’am." Baldric tried to think of a believable lie. "We have friends who will meet with us soon."

"Are you sure? This area is pretty deserted." The old woman pressed on.

"Yes ma'am, we will wait for them here."

"Do you even have any food or water?" At that exact moment, Elizabeth’s stomach grumbled. The old woman had a worried look on her face. Baldric then took some gold coins from his pocket.

"We don’t want to trouble you, ma’am. Please accept these as payment for the vehicle and also as payment to pretend you never saw us here." But the old couple declined.

"We won’t accept that, since we are at fault as well. Would you all like to eat with us? Our house is not far from here." The old woman said.

"We cannot bother you that much, ma’am." Baldric replied.

"Please, we insist. Think of this as a way for us to reconcile after what happened. Our home is not far, and after that, you can leave right after."

Baldric looked at Annie and Elizabeth. All of them hadn’t had a decent meal in days, so he accepted. "Very well, ma'am, but if we are to reconcile, then allow us to pay for the meal at least."

Sylvie lifted the automobile by herself out of the ditch while Annie and Baldric checked if it was still working. Despite a few dents, the automobile still worked perfectly, and with Sylvie following them, they all rode towards the home of the old couple.