“Hmm...”
On the roof of the clinic in the ruined city on the outskirts of the capital stood a translucent figure. Looking up at the darkened heavens, she slowly crossed her arms.
“Now, what to do...”
Zenos had been sentenced to getting thrown down the well, and was now incarcerated in an underground prison somewhere. The demi-humans had clamored to raid the palace, take the royal family hostage, and demand Zenos’s release—but Lily and Krishna had stopped them before they could do anything. They believed that Zenos had shouldered the blame for being the ringleader of the saintess’s abduction and complied with his arrest to prevent the slums as a whole from incurring the crown’s wrath.
Zophia and the others had only agreed to hold back momentarily so as to not let his sacrifice be in vain.
“For now, I shall pull what strings I am able and see if I can arrange to meet with him,” Krishna had suggested.
“You have three days,” Zophia said with barely contained anger. “If nothing changes, we’re gonna do it our way.”
“I want to tear open the throat of the bastard who took Sir Zenos right now,” Lynga growled.
“Usually I’m a very mild-mannered woman, but I haven’t felt this much rage in a long time,” Loewe said. “I could crush that entire palace to dust.”
“Please do try not to plot treason in front of a member of the Royal Guard,” Krishna warned.
Zophia clenched her fists. “You of all people should know, Krishna, the kind of place this was before the doc came. He ended the fighting between our races, saved us from a rampaging golem, and even dismantled the Black Guild. He stopped a mass poisoning in the Royal Institute of Healing, helped bring down a beast strong enough to ruin us all, and even fought to protect the country from invaders. And a guy like him, a once-in-a-lifetime kind of national hero, got sent to an inescapable prison? We can’t just sit here and do nothing!”
The lizardwoman took a step closer to Krishna.
“Look, we’re grateful that you told us. But we’re gonna go save him, and if you’re not with us, you’re against us.”
“Mr. Zenos changed my life,” Krishna said. “I want to save him as much as you do. Let us hope that we do not find ourselves on opposite sides.”
With that, Krishna left the clinic.
It was then that Lily collapsed.
“Lily!” Zophia called out in a panic, rushing with the others over to the young elf. “Are you all right?!”
Lily forced a smile. “Oh, I’m sorry... My legs suddenly gave out...”
“It’s no wonder,” Lynga said. “I could’ve just about passed out, myself.”
“Rest for now,” Loewe advised. “We’ll handle the rest.”
The demi-humans had carried Lily to the bedroom and the young elf had finally fallen asleep not long ago. After seeing off the trio, Carmilla had floated up to the roof to glare at the night sky as though it could provide answers.
“Confound it. Everything falls apart without you, Zenos,” the wraith muttered.
Carmilla knew that Zenos wasn’t exactly an easy man to kill, but this time, things could turn out dire. For starters, they didn’t know where the underground prison was. If they took too long to find the healer, Zophia and the others could end up as rebels, and Lily wouldn’t be able to handle the strain of it all.
Something else bothered the wraith too.
“What in blazes is about to happen...?”
She’d been having a strange feeling for some time—a creeping sensation, like that of impending catastrophe. Carmilla hadn’t said anything, not wanting to make light of it, but she recalled that the saintess had mentioned something similar during her stay at the clinic.
“An ominous star heralding most severe rot, she said,” Carmilla muttered, noting that the moon above looked unusually red tonight. “Hm...?”
Sensing a sudden wave of eerie mana, Carmilla lowered her gaze to the depths of the darkness below. There was something there, nestled in an alleyway among the slanted ruins—a pitch-black aura of malevolence that gradually took human form.
“What a surprise,” it said. “Carmilla, was it?”
“What?” Revealing her form, Carmilla silently floated down through the air and landed before the figure. “You know me? Who are you?”
The figure wore a gray robe that blended in with the nearby ruins. Their face, illuminated by the red moonlight, was pale and androgynous, but appeared to be that of a young man. Despite that, it was evident this was no human.