33 Risen#re

Edith smiled at Lirian with little tears of happiness in the corners of her eye's, "Lirian I…" but just at that moment the sound of footsteps sounded out behind them and stopped her from saying her next words.

Lirian and Edith both snapped their heads in the direction of the movement and soon they found four people walking towards.

"Wow you look like crap," Cole chuckled as he walked towards them and glanced at Lirian who was covered in blood and looked deathly pale.

"You try doing what I did, and I bet you'd be dead and broken," Lirian snapped back and turned back to the streams of water rolling through the river.

As the group of candidates made their way forward, they all bore awkward looks on their faces, from what they saw it was clear that Edith and Lirian were having a pretty intimate moment, as they arrived and it was too late for them to turn back.

They walked forward and saw that both Lirian and Edith had their bare feet dipped in the water and they were splashing each other playfully before they arrived.

The thing however that took them by surprise was Lirian's weak state, in all the time they had known him, even when he just lost his eye's he never once looked so miserable.

Just at that moment Lirian broke out into another fit of coughs and Edith quickly supported him.

"Do you really not need anything?" Edith asked with a concerned voice.

"I just need to rest for an hour or two and I'll be okay," Lirian replied, he knew himself best, even though he used techniques that his body couldn't handle due to the special godly constitution of his body he knew that he'd recover quickly, but more so when he recovered his body would be better than before.

With how heavily he pushed his body Lirian felt that it was possible for his body to increase its strength by at least 10 points.

A few minutes later all of them were sitting along the shore with their pants rolled up and dipped their legs in the water as they enjoyed the scenery and spoke with each other recounting all the things they had done.

When Edith suddenly thought of a question and curled her lips, "By the way Tobias what exactly did your group do to attract that mammoth?" she asked seriously, after all, they had caused almost three hundred deaths due to their mistake.

Tobias lightly shook his head and glanced at Edith, "Actually we didn't do anything at all, we were simply marching back to explore the caves when the mammoth came charging from behind us,"

It was running in the same direction as us and quickly caught up to us, at first it didn't seem to care about us and just ran alongside our group, almost as if it was going to follow us,"

"But that's when some of the students panicked and attacked it, at first they thought that it was just a second-grade mystic beast so they figured that they could take it down with some effort,"

"But after attacking it didn't get hurt in the slightest, the only thing their attacks served to do was anger it and that's when the beast attacked,"

"It was only after that that someone actually scanned it and we discovered its grade, but by that point, it was too late, and it began to stamp on the group," Tobias explained and released a big puff of air with a saddened expression.

He quickly turned to Lirian, "I'm sorry about this, I know that it ruined all your work so far," he said apologetically as Lirians brows were knotted tightly together.

Little did he know that Lirian cared very little about the ruined expedition, 'First a rock drake, that should take weeks to stir was forcibly awoken and its energy was tainted, then a third-grade mystic beast was making a b-line directly for the main camp,'

'This is too much of a coincidence,' Lirian thought deeply on the matter when his eyes suddenly sparkled beneath the blindfold, 'Uh-huh! They are trying to kill me and make it look like an accident,' he realised and worry quickly filled his face.

'They first used a guardian of the forest and when that didn't work they used a third-grade mystic beast that was probably the strongest creature on the world, and since that didn't work it means that they won't have any other choice but to reveal themselves,' as Lirian reached those thoughts he was unaware of an argument that had begun between the candidates.

"…can't believe that you guys really used the lives of commoners as a shield!" Cole spat at Tobias and Wentian coldly.

As someone who came from a common background, he was naturally furious about their actions to use the commoners to divert the mammoth's attention.

"It's not like we had much of a choice," Tobias tried to explain, but he wasn't angry but there wasn't any over guilt on his face either.

Wentian however held a guilt-ridden expression, "I know that it wasn't the honourable thing to do, but we had to make a choice, offend nobles or offend the commoners by sacrificing their children, but we would only face severe consequences if we offend nobles…" Wentian said helplessly, it looked more like he was trying to convince himself.

His explanation, however, however only seemed to increase Cole's anger, and it was a strange sight for all of them, Cole was usually the calmest from them as a self-declared candidate he knew that he had to be careful with his words around them who had powers backing him, but this was the first time he ever rebuked them without holding back.

However, just at that moment all of their watches's suddenly beeped which filled all of them with surprise because the only reason that all of their watches would beep at the same time was if Lirian did something.

As they turned to look at their watch's they all openly gapped because on it they read something that made no sense.

[The Expedition has been cancelled.]

[Communication functions are fully open]

Then they all heard a voice on their watch's but they also heard the live feed from just a few feet in front of them.

{Attention all students, I'm calling of the expedition,} a weak voice filled urgency spoke.

{Pack everything that you need and start moving towards the base as soon as possible, the extraction ships should arrive in a few hours, but keep moving until they arrive.}

As soon as Lirian finished he was faced with five incredulous gazes, "What did you just do?" all of them shouted together, they were bewildered but more so they were outraged and so would all the students because of all their hard work over the past two weeks was now gone up in a puff of smoke.

"I'll explain everything later, but we have to get ready to leave," Lirian said urgently and forced himself to his feet, from his pained expression they could tell that he was in a lot of pain as he moved.

"Lirian you just threw away all of our hard work?!" Media cried out with actual tears forming in her eye's, this was the most stressful two weeks of her life, filled with ups and downs, and she just barely managed to succeed but now it was all gone in a second.

"Do you think that I don't realize that," Lirian snapped back but his voice was weak, "But if you don't want everyone to die I suggest that all of you move out and start to organize the group for the departure," as Lirian finished speaking he broke out into another fit of coughs and fell to a knee, with his breathing running rampant.

Just as Media was about to continue lashing out Edith stopped her and forced herself to calm down, she herself was struggling to control her annoyance at Lirian's decision but she had to be a voice of reason at a time like this.

"It doesn't matter if we argue," she said to all of them, "The expedition is already cancelled and we can't change that fact, I'm sure that Lirian will have an explanation for us when we return, but for now I think everyone should go and calm the students and prepare to leave."

Her words were logical, and the others couldn't argue against her logic, so after sending Lirian one last angry glance all of them headed back to the group.

In the end only Edith remained despite her annoyance she wouldn't abandon him, and it was clear to her Lirian would have a reason, as he never ever did anything without a reason.

Lirian climbed back to his feet with Edith's help but he quickly shook his head, "Edith you should go with the others it's too dangerous for you to be near me right me right now," Lirian said with a hint of fear in his voice, it took Edith by surprise because in all the time she knew Lirian even when he spoke of going up against Telamon his voice never held even the slightest bit of fear.