After leaving the chamber, Rina's next step was to look for the exit of whatever building she was in. Considering the current state her body was in, she would have preferred to avoid walking around more than necessary. After all, her walking, or rather limping speed was rather slow. In fact, it wasn't even an exaggeration to state that she was only able to move forward because she used the iron bar she'd taken out of her chest as a walking cane.

Fortunately, the villager didn't seem to be following her or even trying to stop her, so she was able to limp along the entire hallway until she reached a set of stairs. Without hesitation, she took the first step up and continued on her way, but now at a much slower pace. After all, she had to be careful not to slip and fall, only to have to start all over again.

Sadly, her magic was still sealed. With it, she was confident, that she would have found a faster way to move forward.

'I should find a way to become less dependent on magic.'

With that playful thought, she continued ascending the stairs, until she finally reached a slightly opened door a few minutes later. When she peeked out and saw that it led to a familiar dining room, she realised that she was still in the inn.

But instead of leaving the inn's basement and heading for her room immediately, Rina decided to gather her thoughts first, before acting rashly. In order to do so, she took a deep breath and leaned against the wall. She decided that leaning against the wall was far better than sitting down, as she was not confident that the current state of her body would allow her to get up again. Only when she was in a relatively comfortable position, did she rack her brain trying to remember what had led to the situation she found herself in.

She could recall that she was in the area of the destroyed orphanage, trying to place a gravity barrier beneath the Demon-Spawning-Cloud. But as she was concentrating to place the seal, the mist had somehow moved closer to her and inevitably had been sucked into her. That was a fact. After all, she could still vividly remember the pain, when it entered her body.

She must have fainted afterwards, and when she woke up she was surrounded by the villagers, who were torturing her.

Although she also had a strange dream in which Clara, Fran, and Marianne were eaten by demons, it was just that, a dream, so Rina quickly dismissed it and paid to further thoughts regarding that matter.

The more important question was, how did she end up in the hands of the villagers in the first place?

"Did they hand me over to them?"

Rina quickly shook her head after muttering those words. That scenario was highly unlikely, considering that Fran seemed to have some plans with her.

But then the question still remained. How did she end up there?

'No, let's start from the beginning. After I lost consciousness, they probably carried me back to the inn, so that I could recover. Maybe that's why I'm still here. Did the Chief and the others take me while both were out or...'

Before Rina could even finish her thoughts, a terrible speculation came to her mind. So, without caring about the current state of her body, she let go of her walking cane, burst out of the door, and sprinted clumsily towards her assigned inn room, ignoring all sorts of cracking sounds her bones made on the way.

Storming into her room, she scanned it for the whereabouts of Marianne and Fran, inwardly hoping, that her speculations were just that, speculations. However, once again she realised that the world was a cruel place and her hope was not to be, as she quickly spotted Marianne lying on the floor in the middle of the room.

“MARIANNE!”

Once again, not caring about her own body, Rina rushed over to Marianne in order to check on her condition Fortunately, the brunette appeared to be uninjured and only seemed to be unconscious. Realising this, Rina breathed out a sigh of relief. She then slipped her arms under the older girl to pick her up and carry her to the bed. But because her arms, like her hands, were broken, Rina found it difficult to stabilise Marianne on her arms, so she had to be extra careful not to drop her accidentally. The fact that she had to walk at a snail's pace and that she wobbled quite heavily on the way certainly didn't help.

But even so, after a few minutes, she arrived at the bed she and Marianne had slept in the day before and proceeded to carefully lay the older girl down. Only when Marianne was comfortably tucked behind the sheets, did Rina turn her attention to the one business, that had been on her mind for quite some time already.

She had almost lost a person important to her, Marianne, while the other person who should be here was nowhere to be seen. That was why Rina couldn't help but speak up in a cold tone, that surprised even herself.

“Whoever is here, come out.”

She then waited a few seconds. But still, nothing happened, no one came out. So, she continued, “Or, I'll activate the defence mechanism to kill everyone here I don't recognise.”

As if to emphasise the seriousness of her intention she raised her right hand and spread her fingers horizontally, like a barmaid holding plates, to show her readiness to activate the gravitational barrier around her. Though, considering the state of her hands and fingers, her hand trembled quite a lot.

However, it didn't really matter either way. After all, it was only a bluff.

Even though she had indeed placed a barrier in the room to increase the gravitational force for anyone inside who didn't have a marker on them for emergencies, she was in no condition to activate her magic. After all, it still appeared to be sealed away.

Still, she had no choice but to see her bluff to the end if she wanted to confirm her suspicion. Heck, she wasn't even sure if anyone other than herself and Marianne were even there. But if someone had really been watching all the time, she might be able to learn more about why all this was happening and, more importantly, where Fran was.

So, Rina began to count down in an even colder voice than before.

“5.”

Yet, nothing happened, no one appeared.

“4.”

Still nothing.

“3”

Nothing,

“2.”

Finally, Rina noticed that the air around one corner of the room started to ripple. Nevertheless, she continued.

“1,”

“Alright, alright, I'll show myself, so stop, okay?”

Shortly after, an unfamiliar voice echoed through the room. The ripples in the corner manifested themselves and formed into a figure clad in black a few seconds later.

Seeing this, Rina heightened her guard even more and put her right hand on the hilt of the sword, which was somehow still hanging on the back of her waist. When the figure then chuckled at her actions, Rina drew her sword and pointed its end toward the figure.

“Who are you, and what do you want?”

Although Rina already had an idea why the figure was here and on whose order they were acting, she still asked anyway. Though, whether they'd take her seriously or even answer her question, she rather doubted it.

Then, as if to confirm her scepticism, they stopped giggling but spoke up in a mocking tone instead.

“A feisty one, aren't you?”

***

Not far away from the inn, in the woods just on the outskirts of Mousa, a little girl with long black hair and an equally black dress, as if to complement each other's colours, was skipping around while humming seemingly random notes as if to show how good her mood was at the moment. While doing so, she stopped every now and then to raise her hands. After a few seconds, she lowered them again, only to continue her journey through the forest.

However, just several seconds after she left, a small, dark cloud formed where her hand had been earlier. Just like that, the little girl danced from one spot to another, leaving several of these clouds in her wake.

She only stopped in her actions, when another person wearing a maid outfit appeared behind her.

“Serena? How is it going?”

“It's over, milady.”

Hearing this, the little girl nodded in satisfaction. “And?”

“Unfortunately, I couldn't make contact with her.”

“...”

Serena interpreted her mistress's silence as a prompt for her to continue, so she did just that.

“An insect has attached itself to her, so I refrained from doing so.”

The little girl's face twisted slightly in annoyance at Serena's response. Nevertheless, she nodded at Serena. “Good, call. We can't afford to blow our cover just yet... *sigh* Oh well, that would've been just a bonus anyway.”

After saying that, the girl paused for a moment to think about something, before she continued, “We've achieved our goal, let's go back.”

“Yes, milady.”

Like in the throne hall of the demon castle a few hours ago, the little girl formed a large black cloud, unlike the small ones she had placed all over the forest. But just as she was about to step inside, she noticed that the person behind her was fidgeting, so she stopped and asked, “Is there anything else?”

“... Um... There is a possibility that the insect has noticed my presence while I was watching.”

The girl raised her eyebrows at that statement. “How so?”

“It seemed to want to interfere but refrained from doing so. It's most likely because it has felt my presence.”

“I see.”

“Shall I get rid of it, milady?”

At that question, the little girl just shrugged. “Don't bother with it. Insects like to crawl into places they don't belong to. If they get too annoying, we can just squash them. But now, they're not a problem, so just leave them alone.”

With that rather ominous sounding statement said, the girl nonchalantly entered the cloud and disappeared, closely followed by her maid.