Arc 4 Chapter 37 : Prisoner

[Scarlett POV]

We had been waiting for Captain Raul in the dwarven labyrinth for more than an hour, yet he still had not arrived.

Earlier, Captain Raul had ordered us to return to the dwarves' labyrinth while he distracted the enemy. At first, every member of the group questioned his decision. How would he escape afterward? How could he possibly face the enemy alone? But he merely answered all our questions with the same words:

"Nah, I'll be fine."

Viera had even asked why we could not all help him fight the enemy. After all, we outnumbered them now, especially after the landslide we had caused buried a portion of their forces.

Captain Raul did not answer Viera's question, however. He simply left us behind.

"It's been over an hour," Eric muttered—the man Captain Raul had entrusted with leading us in his absence.

"What do you think, Eric? Should we return to the Margraviate of Cataluna immediately?" Viera asked.

Eric thought for a moment. He seemed reluctant to leave the Captain behind despite having received a direct order.

"We're returning to the Empire," Eric replied. "Let's discuss this with the dwarves."

After making his decision, Eric spoke with the dwarf who understood human language. Just as before, we were given special goggles that prevented us from seeing their city.

With that, our mission in the territory of the Republic of Venetia officially came to an end.

---

[Ezio POV]

After carrying the bodies of all the fallen Squad members, we returned to the City of Avelino, arriving around midnight. Of the 200 people who had participated in this mission, only 20 had returned.

Every member of the Senior Cavalier Squad had been killed by that man.

At least, that was what Marcela had told us. She was the only survivor from the group that had pursued him.

I still couldn't understand how a man who looked to be around my age had managed to defeat all the Seniors. Could he possess magic powerful enough to accomplish something like that?

Even so, the Seniors were incredibly strong. They could fight a Knight on equal terms.

I suppose I should ask Marcela for more details about what happened.

I was currently at the harbor after spending yesterday resting completely following our return from the mountains. The remaining twenty members of the Tigrenata Squad stood in formation before thirty coffins containing the bodies of the Seniors who had fallen at that man's hands yesterday.

I looked toward Captain Siena.

I had been shocked when Captain Siena returned with injuries after capturing that man. Until now, the Captain had never struggled against anyone. Only the Grand Espada of the Empire—the strongest Knights in their nation—were at least capable of putting up a fight against her.

The Captain had even said that she was unable to use her magic to pull the soldiers buried beneath yesterday's landslide from the earth after fighting that man.

Something like this had never happened before.

There was no way someone that young could possess a level of strength comparable to the Grand Espada... right?

After observing a moment of silence for the fallen Seniors, the ship's crew carried their coffins aboard to transport them to their families in the capital.

We then boarded the ship as well.

On the other side of the harbor, I saw the remnants of the Kingdom of Draconia's forces boarding their own vessels, preparing to head toward the western territories.

Indeed, after their supplies had failed to arrive, they had finally abandoned the eastern territories of the Aragon Empire and returned to our side. After some discussion, Captain Siena had suggested that the remaining thirty thousand soldiers of the Kingdom of Draconia assist us in fighting the Empire's main forces there.

Not long afterward, all the ships began sailing back toward the City of Tusculum.

I stood on deck, trying to endure the nausea that always came over me whenever I traveled by sea.

"Ughhh... I wonder where Marcela is. I haven't seen her around here for a while."

After asking the other members, they told me that Marcela was in the detention room, guarding the man Captain Siena had captured.

I went there and found our Sniper sitting down while making adjustments to her rifle.

"Marcela, what's wrong with your rifle?" I asked as I entered the room.

"Ah, Ezio." She noticed my presence. "My Sniper scope was destroyed because of that man."

I looked toward the place Marcela was pointing.

There was a cell where the man in question lay asleep, covered in wounds. Captain Siena had forbidden the Priests from healing him completely. As a result, he still hadn't regained consciousness.

Captain Siena intended to interrogate him personally to find out how he and his forces had managed to infiltrate our territory so easily.

"Marcela, was he really that strong? Strong enough to defeat all the Seniors?" I asked.

Upon hearing my question, she stopped what she was doing.

"It's not as though he possesses some kind of special power."

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"Then if he doesn't have special magic like Captain Siena, how could he have been so difficult to deal with that even the Captain ended up seriously injured and unable to use her magic?"

Marcela then told me what had happened yesterday.

She explained that the man had ambushed us with a smoke bomb and taken down ten Seniors almost instantly within the span of about two minutes, taking advantage of the Seniors' limited vision because of the smoke.

"He never confronted the Seniors directly," Marcela explained. "He moved to places with plenty of openings where he could hide. Then, whenever the Seniors split up to search for him, he took them down one by one."

So it was true.

There was no way a man around my age could have faced the Seniors fairly. He must have relied on tricks. Otherwise, how could the Seniors have lost to him?

The war had only been going on for nearly three months, yet my life had changed drastically in such a short period.

From realizing the horrors of war, to losing all the Seniors I had admired, to experiencing what it was like to kill another person.

"War changes people."

Those words truly were accurate.

"I hope we can make it through all of this until the end, Marcela," I said.

"Don't get your hopes up, Ezio," my female companion replied. "The war isn't over, and many more people will die."

What she said was true.

We hadn't even forced the Empire's forces to retreat from our territory yet. I suppose the next battle would be even larger—and deadlier—than the ones before it.

---

[Raul POV]

There had been many obstacles and challenges along the way in my relationship with Liana.

After that heartbreaking incident, when Liana's childhood friend had beaten me to a pulp, Liana had always kept her distance from me, even though I often greeted her whenever we crossed paths on campus.

She simply ignored me as though we had never known each other.

Could it be that she felt guilty and wanted to keep her distance from me so that something like that wouldn't happen again?

I couldn't help but think so.

"Hey, Evans. Why are you spacing out like that?"

While I was sitting alone in one of the gazebos in the campus garden, I was suddenly approached by a bespectacled young man.

He was Marek—the person I had only recently gotten to know.

"Nothing. I'm just thinking about the assignment the professor gave us earlier," I lied.

"Hey, instead of sitting here staring into space, why don't we go watch the interdepartmental basketball match?" Marek suggested.

I nodded and accepted his invitation. Besides, all my classes for today had already ended.

We then made our way toward the sports hall.

Campus A had the most complete and modern facilities in the country. I suppose that was only natural, considering this was the best place in the nation to pursue higher education.

Many wealthy people attended this university. Marek and I were fortunate enough to get in through the regular admissions route despite our humble backgrounds.

"You still enjoy drawing character designs, Marek," I said as I noticed him examining several character designs on a sheet of paper he was holding.

"Of course. Why would I major in Graphic Design if I didn't have a passion for this?"

Marek was talented at drawing.

I thought he would make a suitable partner for achieving my dream someday. I was developing the programming for a game I wanted to create, while he would design the game's characters.

Not long afterward, we arrived at the sports hall.

The basketball court was already packed with students who had come to watch the match.

We sat in a relatively empty section of the stands and watched the game in progress.

A handsome blond-haired man whom I remembered very well was dominating the match. He easily stole the ball, dribbled past his opponents with smooth movements, and then performed an incredibly beautiful dunk.

"Ahhhh! Gavin is so cool!"

"Look! He smiled and waved at me!"

All the female students watching the game were going crazy over his charisma on the court.

"He's that famous national athlete, isn't he?" Marek muttered. "I think he'd make a good reference for one of the characters I'm designing."

"I suppose a man with a physique and face like his would be popular with female consumers," I said.

"The majority, yeah," Marek replied. "But there are also plenty of amazing women who'd be attracted to a handsome sadboy like you, Evans."

Sadboy?

What did he mean by that?

Even though my life had been difficult, I had never considered myself hopeless or someone who blamed circumstances for everything that happened to me.

"You can't fool me," Marek said. "Even now, you haven't taken your eyes off her, have you?"

His words hit the mark.

I hadn't been paying attention to the basketball game at all.

Instead, I had been staring at a black-haired woman sitting across the stands, absorbed in her Smartphone.

"All right, you win," I replied. "She's the source of my troubles lately."

"Sadboys are easy to read," the four-eyed man teased.

The match eventually ended with Gavin's team winning by a decisive margin.

Marek and I then left the basketball court.

However, Marek suddenly told me that he had received a call and needed to pick up something a friend had left at one of the faculty buildings. He asked me to wait for him and handed me his umbrella.

After waiting for a while, rain began pouring over the campus.

It was the rainy season, after all.

Fortunately, my apartment was only a few hundred meters away from here.

Suddenly, I received a message from Marek. He said I could go home first because the delivery of the item he was supposed to receive had been delayed.

I then left the sports hall.

However, I noticed a black-haired woman standing outside the entrance.

It seemed she hadn't brought an umbrella and was forced to wait for the rain to stop.

I slowly approached her and stopped right beside her.

"You didn't bring an umbrella?" I asked.

She merely nodded in response.

Her attitude hadn't changed at all, even though a month had passed since that incident.

"Take this. My friend isn't using it anyway."

I held my umbrella out toward Liana.

However, Liana remained silent and didn't take the umbrella from my hand.

Still, I didn't withdraw it.

I simply waited until she finally took it.

Ten minutes passed before Liana eventually accepted the umbrella from my hand.

"Thank you."

"No problem," I replied as I opened Marek's umbrella. "Just use it. You can return it whenever you want."

After saying that, I began walking away from the building.

If she didn't want to talk to me, I wouldn't force her.

If what she wanted was to keep her distance from me, then I would respect her decision.

I didn't want to presume that I knew what Liana was going through. Nor did I want to force her to tell me about whatever problem she was facing.

But if she ever wanted to open up to me, I would always be there for her and help her however I could.

At the very least, that was what I could do for someone I considered a friend.

However, I suddenly felt something tugging at the back of my coat.

I turned around.

The hand pulling on my coat belonged to Liana.

I couldn't see her face because it was hidden beneath the umbrella she was holding.

"I'm sorry about what happened before, Evans," she said softly. "I-I... I..."

"If you don't want to tell me the reason, you don't have to force yourself, Liana."

I interrupted her.

Upon hearing my words, she slightly raised the umbrella in her hand, allowing me to finally see her snow-white face and her black eyes, dark as gemstones.

"Would you like to come to my apartment?" Liana asked, catching me slightly off guard. "I'll tell you why I've been avoiding you lately."

Hearing her words, I simply nodded and smiled gently.

We then walked side by side beneath the rain on this particularly dark day.

Yet, contrary to the gloomy weather around us, my mood was bright and radiant, like spring itself.

—CRACK!

Suddenly, the sound of lightning thundered across the sky.

Its blinding flash made me close my eyes.

However, when I opened them again, I was no longer at Campus A.

I was inside a cell.

I lay sprawled across a floor covered with piles of straw. My body was still incredibly weak, and my hands felt restrained by something behind my back.

Inside this place, I could feel slight rocking beneath me and hear the sound of waves.

Am I on a ship?

"Ah, you're finally awake, Raul de Garcia."

Suddenly, I heard a woman's voice.

I turned my head to the side and saw a black-haired woman sitting on a chair with her arms crossed and her legs crossed as well.

Yes.

The woman standing before me was the very same person who had defeated me before—

Siena di Reginossa...

"Looks like it's time for me to ask you a few questions."

Ugh...

It seemed I was about to go through some difficult times.

I'd better play my cards right.