Chapter 432 - The Rogue Maiden
Elliot roamed the city, looking for Seungju who left him with a thousand unanswered questions.
"Where is he?" Elliot asked himself. He was about to turn into a corner when he saw Lance being spat from a wall. "Lance!"
"Hey," Lance greeted. "The craziest thing just happened. Seungju pulled me into this wall and into a dark room then he asked me something."
"What did he ask?" Elliot muttered. "Is it something about me?"
Lance paused for a moment, as if he had a realization hit him. He cleared his throat and shook his head, smirking. "He asked me if I had any candy from Shyako."
"What?" Elliot scrunched his face in confusion. "Did he really ask you that?"
Lance nodded, " Yeah. You have no idea how confused I was."
The brunette boy could only scratch the back of his head, baffled as to what was going on. He opened his mouth to ask Lance another question but Kusa had landed right beside them.
"The tree," the Fire Master yelled, panting as if he got chased by a hundred lions. "The tree untwisted and people are coming inside."
Elliot and Lance looked at each other and didn't hesitate to run to the portal. There they saw Zeus leading the army of Avancians inside the realm of Seungju.
"Elliot!" Florencia, Viper, and Christina chorused while running towards their mentor.
Elliot opened his arms to receive the hug and he embraced his students with warmth. "I missed you three so much."
"We have a lot to talk about, Elliot," Florencia said. "Tina said she's going to tell you something important."
"Will you?" Elliot smiled the the blue-haired girl. He ruffled her hair and winked at her, "Then I'd be more than willing to listen."
"A lot of things had happened," Viper said. "You don't even know."
"I'll listen to all your stories later, okay?" Elliot said and ruffled their hair one by one. "I missed you guys so much."
Hope walked to Connor and Ed who both tackled him. "Hey, hey, stop!"
"Dude," Ed said. "We legit thought you'd never make it back."
"Who do you think I am?" Hope pursed his lips. "I'm not just an innocent young dragon, I am the strongest dragon!"
"Yeah, whatever," Connor groaned and tackled Hope more. "We're just glad you're not dead."
"Yeah," Hope smiled. "I'm glad too."
"Zeus!" Lance yelled, running up to the old man. "Where's Frederick?"
"They looked around in case someone was following us," Midnight answered. Lance and Elliot grinned after seeing the man dress completely different.
Instead of a large dress, he was currently wearing a black bodysuit with a leather vest. He had a belt filled with small bags as well as straps on his arm and thigh that also had small bags tied to them.
His hair was also different. It was previously dangling up to his lower butt but he cut it right below his shoulders and tied it to a ponytail behind his head.
"Midnight," Lance grinned. "It is not often for you to dress like this."
"I can shift back anytime," Midnight deadpanned. "Do you know how uncomfortable this is?"
"Irregardless!" Galaxia yelled, running from inside the crowd and beside Midnight. "My dear Midnight looks stunning as ever."
"Do you want me to punch you in the guts, Galaxia?" Midnight said softly but his aura was grim.
The man shook his head, "O-Of course not, love. I'm just here minding my own business."
"Enough talk," Zeus interjected. "Who owns this place and let me talk to them. There's something that's been happening outside and I'm pretty sure they're aware of it."
"What's going on, Zeus?" Lance asked. "Did anything bad happened?"
"I don't really want to repeat anything so let's just wait for the creator of this realm," Zeus said dismissively.
It wasn't long before Frederick and Luck walked inside the realm. They looked as if a ghost had just kissed them deeply. Their faces were dry and they looked almost lifeless.
"Are you okay?" Midnight asked, to which both men answered with a shrug.
It was rare for Luck to stop with his goofy attitude so everyone knew that something was indeed wrong. Whatever it is was the thing they do not know.
"I see that we have a guest," Seungju hovered in the air above the group. "Are you the ones from Avancia?"
"Yes, indeed," Zeus said. "We're here to talk about the hunt for the small camps and villages that went into hiding."
"Let us not talk here," Seungju said. He looked around and pointed at an empty fields. "Let us talk there."
In a split second, a large mansion erected from the ground. It was so huge that it could fit an entire village of people inside.
"Let us talk privately," Seungju said. "The inside of that mansion is just empty space so your men can join in on the conversation."
The pink-haired man led the group inside to start with their discussion.
–
"What?!" Seungju yelled. "What do you mean villages are wiped out?!"
"Whoever your enemy is, they already knew the location of the refugees," Zeus said. "When my men was traveling here, before Jon led us underground, we would often come across abandoned villages. A lot of them are burned to the ground while some are left with dead bodies scattered across the ground."
"I-Impossible," Seungju gasped. "But these villages around here– I was watching them."
"We scouted the fields and they're all gone," Frederick said. "DuDu and Licht got to them before you could even expand your realm."
"E-Expand…" Seungju trailed off. "I don't think I understand what you're saying."
"Before we got here, a little birdie told us that you were going to use the powers of the other Crystal Cores so you can evacuate all the citizens of Kkeun in your realm," Luck said with a smirk.
Even the Avancians they were with looked at them in confusion. They didn't know that a conversation like this had happened.
"How come we didn't know about this?" Elizabeth asked. "You never said anything, even at the conference."
"Because then we'd break the promise to our sponsor," Luck said. "That's why you can't read our minds, Emperor Kang Seungju."
"Y-You…" Seungju trailed off, his face filled with pure shock.. "You have come in contact with the Rogue Maiden."