Rescue Mission

Shen sat alone on a couch in an office-like room.

Shen sighed, “I hope those kids are doing well. If everything goes smoothly, I can meet with them soon.”

The door to the room suddenly slammed open. Kouki came barging in.

“This stupid brat is taking longer to deal with than necessary!” Kouki complained. “All because of those imbeciles!”

“Kouki, those assassins made a simple mistake,” Shen stated, aiming to calm Kouki down. “There’s no need to be so harsh on them.”

Kouki stayed angry. “Mistakes at this point are anything but simple! They deserve the punishment they are receiving.”

“I see…” Shen backed down.

The two sat in silence before Kouki addressed another frustration.

“Speaking of punishments, would you like to inform me of something, Shen?” Kouki alluded.

“I’m not sure what you are referring to, Kouki,” Shen responded. “Did I do something to warrant your anger?”

Kouki sighed in disappointment, “Oh, I don’t know. Tatsuki mentioned some mysterious magic signals recently. Something about discrete calls.”

Shen flinched. He had to come up with an excuse.

“Oh, I sensed those as—“

“Don’t bother, Shen,” Kouki interrupted. “I was wondering what you did with the dragon egg we stole, but this is something else.”

Pained, Shen asked, “How long have you known?”

“When you made your first call. It was probably around when the egg hatched, right?” Kouki responded.

The two sat in silence once more…

Shen swiftly pulled out a crystal ball from his robe and activated it mysteriously.

“Kaede!” Kouki shouted, reacting to Shen’s rash actions.

Kaede jumped up and crashed through the window behind Kouki. She fired off a web to entangle Shen, but Shen used a spell to stop it in place.

Shen then fired off a quick orbital spell, prompting Kouki and Kaede to defend themselves. While the two defended, Shen ran for the door and cranked it open aggressively.

“Sorry, Shen,” said Yumi, who stood on the other side of the door. She reached up and poked Shen’s forehead, causing him to pass out.

____________________________________________________________________________

“I’ve been found out. I need you all to rescue me. I’ll likely be at the prison you stole our relic from. Hurry—“

Shen’s distress message was cut off.

“Well, that didn’t sound good…” said Gurkin.

Kaito got up from his seat to initiate their plan of action.

“If Shen’s in trouble, we have to bail him out!” Kaito announced. “Relic Raiders! Let’s all get ready to—”

“No,” Rina cut off Kaito’s inspirational rally.

“Wait, what’s wrong?” Kaito responded, disappointed that his speech had been interrupted.

“We’ll draw too much attention if we all go,” Rina mentioned. “It’ll be a covert mission. We rescue Shen, then come back.”

“So we’d need speed and stealth,” Kaito deduced, taking over for Rina. “Alongside me and Rina, we’ll take… Evona, Jett, and Estelle!”

Kaito and Jett specialized in stealth as a thief and a trapper. Evona and Estelle had great speed, while Estelle could also apply stealth buffs with her wind magic. Finally, Rina would be their backbone and powerhouse if anything went awry.

With the game plan set, the five mounted Fiona in her dragon form to go save Shen. With Fiona’s speed, the group swiftly arrived at the prison’s entrance at the side of a cliff, just south of Nakamura. Fiona stayed at the entrance point while the other five entered the prison.

The group snuck through the wet cobblestones of the underground prison—a familiar atmosphere, but not the most pleasant memories.

The incognito mission was going surprisingly smoothly because of one of Jett’s skills, Radar. The skill lets the user sense everything within a 100-meter radius. From what Jett sensed, there were mysteriously no guards in the prison.

“There are some prisoners up ahead,” Jett announced.

The group ran to the cell and saw two adolescent kids balled up beside each other. There was a boy and a girl, and they looked similar, likely being twins. They had their heads down, but raised them upon noticing the group.

“Big brother, look,” the girl started talking. “Kouki was actually right.”

“I-Impossible,” the boy said, shocked at Kaito’s existence. “How are you still alive?”

“M-me?” Kaito responded. “Why would I be dead?”

“Because we already decapitated you,” the boy explained. “It was right before the Stampedes.”

“Ahh!” Kaito shouted in realization, grabbing onto the cell’s bars. “So you’re the reason I was cursed! Why I outta—”

“Look!” Estelle interrupted Kaito. “They’re all bruised up.”

Upon looking at the twin siblings, they had cuts and bruises all over their bodies. There were also faint strings of webs fluttering off them.

“That bitch,” said Rina, realizing their injuries were Kaede’s doing.

“We failed our mission,” the girl explained. “Kouki told us to capture the thief boy, but we opted to kill him. This punishment is our own fault.”

“I’m sorry, big sis. I’m the one who decided to kill him,” the boy apologized, putting his head back down.

The two went silent, and the girl leaned on her brother’s shoulder to comfort him.

“We have to save them!” Estelle announced.

Kaito, against that decision, said, “Wait, what? They kill—”

Estelle didn’t give Kaito time to finish and used her magic to blow away the cell door. It went flying and crashed into the wall, causing it to echo throughout the vacant prison.

The boy assassin glared at Kaito, then swiftly went for the kill. Kaito couldn’t react, but Rina defended in his stead. She blocked the boy’s assassination attempt; her sword clashed with his. The boy’s sword resembled a scimitar and was almost as big as his whole body. The two stood in their clashed pose for a second before the kid backed off calmly.

“Why would you save us?” He calmly asked. “We aren’t your ally.”

“I don’t appreciate you trying to kill my partner, but I hate what Kaede did to you two even more,” Rina stated. “Now are you going to let these ‘heroes’ bully you, or will you stand up for yourselves?”

There was determination in the boy’s eyes. His sister joined him with the same look of determination. Without another word said, Kaito’s party, alongside the twin assassins, continued to look for Shen.

The search didn’t take long as the group stood in front of another cell where Shen was. He was chained to the wall by shackles with glowing embroidery.

“Excellent, I see you kids know how to work fast,” Shen stated.

“Uh, you are Shen, right?” Kaito asked. “Your voice sounds familiar, but I don’t trust you yet.”

Shen snickered, “Good. You are not quick to trust strangers. It looks like I was fortunate enough to get smart allies.”

Kaito snickered, liking his compliment, “I like this guy. He must be Shen.”

“Shut up,” Rina responded, pinching Kaito’s ear to humble him.

“Surely the word ‘Nippon’ will serve as proof,” Shen said to clear his name.

Kaito and Rina got serious. It was excellent proof. The group opened the cell and freed Shen from his bindings.

“What now?” Jett asked.

“We teleport out of here,” Shen announced. “Kouki will have been notified of my shackles breaking, so we must move fast. You all have an escape ride, yes?”

“We do, but if you could’ve teleported, why didn’t you escape?” Kaito asked.

“These shackles stopped me from using skills,” Shen explained. “And before I was captured… No, I shall tell you of this later. First, we escape.”

With Shen’s teleportation spell and a ride on Fiona, the group escaped the prison before Kouki could intercept them.