“Clearly negotiations have taken a strange turn!” Antonia is as red as her beret.
They already managed escape again? I’ve only been at this for like half an hour!
Makoto on the other hand just closes the door… thanks, I appreciate that.
Well, this IS awkward, do I just continue? I could act like I didn’t notice them.
“So… uh… are you guys ok?” I just stop and get up, yeah, I don’t this situation is salvageable at all.
“We’re all unharmed.” Timotei seems pretty unfazed, Aurora is giving me a thumbs up, Antonia is beet red and trying really hard to not look and Felix is looking at us really hard… I honestly don’t know which one is the most awkward.
The door opens again, but this time a short red-headed woman is in front, and I notice that Makoto is in the back and bleeding from the nose “Bianca, what are you doing!?”
“And what the FUCK are you doing?” Bianca makes an annoyed voice.
“That’s Matilda Sycamore, she’s another elite 4.” Felix explains.
I’m not paying much attention to that, I’m just trying to get dressed as quickly as possible, it’s already too awkward anyway, the good mood is ruined.
I finish dressing up, and notice Bianca’s underwear is near me, I’ll pocket it now that no one’s watching.
“You know what I’m talking about! Where are the <Penultima seed> and <Penultima stone>?!” Bianca makes a smug smile “What are you talking about?”
“You!” Another woman comes in, she has dark skin and blonde hair “I know you have it!” She grabs a sword and rushes towards her, releasing a really strong pressure.
A pillar of ice appears from the floor and rushes towards the throat of the woman and stops right before actually hitting her.
“Aha! So much killing intent!” Bianca’s smug smile only becomes bigger “But your movements have become so blunt, Irina!”
While they’re fighting I quickly leave the room, Timotei and the rest realize what I’m doing and follow me, we run as fast as we can until the pressure isn’t so strong anymore.
We stop to catch our breath.
“Are you ok?” Timotei asks me “Yeah, my arm doesn’t even hurt anymore!” just as I say that the spell ends, and my arm starts hurting again “Ah fuck! Forget that, it’s hurting again.”
“So, uh, how did you end up like that?” Antonia’s face is still a little red.
“She was horny.” I shrug, that whole interaction was really weird.
“…I see” It seems she’s not totally satisfied with that answer, but I can’t do better than that.
“I did manage to learn some things.”
“The most important one is that the <Sycamore gang> is going through a coup, the elite 4 except for Bianca is trying to remove the big boss from power, and that Makoto guy from our caravan is the one behind this.”
Antonia looks surprised, and then really mad “That asshole!” she kicks the wall and leaves a small crater in it. “If he could rescue us from the start why did he leave us in a dungeon!”
“It’s not that simple!” A nasally voice comes from behind us, it’s from a chubby woman who is wearing glasses “Since you were Bianca’s prisoners and she didn’t want to cooperate with us, we couldn’t free you before we seized control.” She quickly explains.
“Boss!” Felix looks even more nervous now, is he going to be ok? I don’t think being as nervous as he’s been lately can be too healthy.
“Let me introduce myself.” The woman catches her breath “I’m Delia Sycamore.”
“Are you going to take us as prisoners?” Timotei is still on guard
“No no, of course not!” Delia smiles “You guys are Makoto’s friends; we won’t treat you badly.”
“But I’ll need you to follow me, I’ll take you to the rest of your group” We look at each other and follow her.
* * *
We are in a big room, the rest of the caravan is here, but a few people are missing, I think it’s the ones who got injured… I’ll try to not think too hard about that, it’ll make my harm hurt more.
Antonia and her dad have a tearful reunion, but I don’t really know anyone here, and Timotei and Aurora seem to be in the same boat, so we just kinda stick together.
“I thought there was something off about you, but I just noticed why.” Timotei is looking at me “You just formed your first pattern.”
“Eh!” Aurora looks surprised “Already? It seems you really made a profit this time.” She’s making a teasing smile.
“Hehehe...” My arm immediately starts hurting though, sigh… I don’t know how I’ll deal with this.
I also need to recover Maria, the <Ice to see you> is not really that important, it’s kinda crappy, but I can’t just lose that cow, it has gone through some really rough times thanks to me, and I want to make it up to it…
“Guys! It seems almost everyone is ok!” Antonia comes closer to us “It seems we’ll be able to go free after Makoto does his thing!”
“That’s good, I feel like I’ve lost a few years of lifetime just today.” Timotei breathes a sigh of relief, and Aurora also seems relieved. “You can say that twice!” Felix seems a lot calmer now, is that ok? We’re the ones that wanted to kill you! What are you even doing here!?
But is that really it? It feels very anticlimactic. And aren’t you guys trusting that Makoto guy a little too fast!?
While I’m thinking this, someone’s belly makes a sound “We haven’t eaten all day, haven’t we?” Aurora points out.
I take out the cheese that was in the <Milk engine> “You guys want some?”
“Ah right, you did have that thing!” Aurora looks hungry.
“Here, let me cut it.” Timotei uses some sort of spell, pointing all his fingers forward and makes a mana blade from them, then he cuts the large cheese chunk into 5 parts.
We all grab a part and eat; it tastes a lot better than usual.
* * *
After a while Makoto, Delia and the dark-skinned girl enter the room, I wonder if Bianca is ok?
“Ok, we’re going to explain the situation to everyone!” Makoto grabs everyone attention “A lot of stuff happened, but the details aren’t too important, I made a deal everyone will be able to reach basil safely.”
Everyone in the room feels relieved.
The dark-skinned girl starts talking “I’m Irina Sycamore, the new leader of the <Sycamore gang>, what d- Makoto said it’s true, but we will be keeping your belongings, we are not a charity.”
Everyone flips from one mood to the other, and immediately starts complaining.
Though I already expected something like this, they are a gang after all, I am surprised that Makoto is the kinda guy to pull a stunt like that, he seemed like a good person.
Antonia is fuming at my side, she’s redder than I’ve ever seen her, but this time is from anger!
Makoto looks slightly apologetic when he looks at Antonia “I need to talk to you and Anton, please follow us.”
Antonia looks at us “Could you guys come with me?” everyone agrees, all of us want to give that guy a piece of our mind!
Delia immediately looks annoyed “No just you.” And releases a little pressure, but it’s enough to silence everyone in the room, Antonia looks even more furious though.
“No, it’s ok.” Makoto grabs Delia’s shoulder, she looks a little flushed, sighs, and stops the pressure.
The 5 of us and Anton start following Makoto and the two women, until we reach a room, this one seems more like an office, it’s not that big, so it feels a little cramped with all of us inside, Irina sits in an important looking chair, and Makoto and Delia are on her sides..
“What’s the meaning of this!” Antonia doesn’t wait a second and immediately tries to give Makoto a piece of her mind
“Haha. Don’t worry don’t worry.” Makoto just shrugs it off “I’m not going to treat you or Anton badly, you’ve helped me so much after all.”
Anton looks more relaxed now, but Antonia is just as angry as she was before.
Irina clarifies “Darling was essential in these times for me, doing him a favor like this is only natural, I’m going to return your things.” Delia quickly chimes in ”But only this group! We’re still a criminal organization, if people think we’re getting soft our reputation will plummet, you’ll also have to wait a few days too.”
Timotei quickly tries to argue “We can’t wait too long, Octavius arm is broken, and he needs medical attention!” and Irina starts thinking and says “It should be fine to use a secret route then. The important thing is that you people don’t spread what happened today.”
“Sure.” Timotei looks serious.
We leave the room, but Antonia stays for a moment, it seems she and Makoto are arguing about something, because when she leaves the room she’s crying, and leaves running.
“Should we go after her?” Aurora asks.
“Let’s give her some space.” Timotei says.
Delia shows us to the treasury and gives Aurora her sword back and I get my <Ice to see you> and my backpack, it has the instructions to the <Midsummer desire> and <Steam cannon> in it, though I know they already copied the spells in their own books, my dagger’s missing too, not that I’ve ever used it. Georgeta’s underwear is still there, you’d think they would steal something like that first, my old hammer is also inside. I also ask about maria, and she tells me she’ll return it alongside the rest of the cattle.
“We also found this thing” Delia takes out a sphere “We found it with you guys, so I assume it’s yours, but I have no idea who’s the owner.”
“It’s mine.” I quickly lie, and she gives it to me without much thought. Aurora doesn’t seem to care and Timotei only nods at me, so it should be fine.
She then leads us to a room with some beds “Heh, we have a few of these thanks to the battle.” and tells us the time we’ll be leaving.
* * *
Aurora, Timotei and Felix (Is this guy just coming with us?) go to sleep, they seemed to be very tired. Honestly I’m also fucking tired too, but my arm doesn’t let me sleep, darn thing.
I decide to go to the room with the seven pillars and see if I can sacrifice the <Ice to see you> to Tonatiuh and apologize, my luck has been abysmal these days, and I’m thinking it has to be some sort of divine punishment, my luck was great before finding those notes after all.
I walk around the hideout, nobody seems to pay me much attention, and a few people just look at me and keep walking, it seems that now that Makoto has power here we are really not in danger.
However, once I reach the room, I find Antonia inside, she seems to be training.
“Who’s there!”
“It’s just me.”
“Ah, sorry for yelling at you!” Aren’t you also yelling now? What’s the difference?
“Don’t worry about it.” I remember something “Ah right, we’re finally leaving tomorrow morning.” I tell her about some of the details, like where our room is.
“Thanks, but I don’t think I’ll be sleeping today.” She makes a kick to the air “So why are YOU not sleeping?! If anything, you should be the one that’s tired the most!”
“I came to pray a little.” I answer honestly.
“You don’t seem like the religious type!” she continues kicking and punching the air, she sounds mad.
“Normally I’m not, but our luck has been really abysmal these few days.”
“You think someone in the caravan has some sort of curse of something?!” Yeah, me. But I’m not telling you, I don’t want you to get angry at me now.
I go to the pillar I think represents Tonatiuh, “it looks like orange, so it should this one right?” put the bucket in front of me and try to offer it to the god, it glows for a moment, but then it stops.
…
He didn’t want it…
Hey, I take offense to that.
It’s a very good bucket!
Mater gave it to me, so it even has some emotional value!
And I’m giving it to you to show my sincerity!
And you just scoff at it like it’s trash on the side of the road!
If you want to be like that then fine!
If you don’t want me then I’m not staying!
Just as I’m getting angry, a light appears in front of me and loudly zaps me!
Antonia gives me a confused look “what happened?”
“I tried to sacrifice my <Ice to see you> to Tonatiuh, but the darn thing zapped me!”
“hahahahaha!” Antonia can’t help but laugh
“Haha, that’s not – haha- Tonatiuh’s - haha - pillar - haha!” It seems she’s even struggling to speak…
“That one belongs to Yaokiski! Hahaha!” Antonia’s laughing a lot… hmph! Don’t add salt to the wound!
“I don’t care anymore; I’ll just become an atheist and believe in evolution!” Who needs gods anyway? They just make your life harder.
“HAHAHA!” tears are coming from her eyes… it’s not that funny! It hurt goddammit!
“I sorry – haha” her laughing calmed down “haha… I’m sorry, I’m sorry, it was just too funny.” She still has a dumb smirk on her face “It’s getting late, let’s go to sleep.”
“Sure, let me guide you.” I’m now in a bad mood, but I’m also even more tired.
I want to sleep.
