As Fennelis's group walked away from the destroyed mansion, a human figure stood on the nearby two-storied house's roof terrace and watched them with wide eyes through a magical telescope. He had pale skin, hooded jade eyes, and curly chestnut-colored hair and looked leaner.
He was none other than guard captain Piers, whom Fennelis and Roysia had met before.
"I didn't expect that the child from the oracle would be this much stronger. Hmm, the adventurers also joined this group, making the plan to be more complicated. For now, I will report it directly to His Excellency. After all, they don't even know who the real enemy is. Let's see if she has the power to pose a threat to his eminence." He said with a cold smile and soon glanced at the little white mouse on his shoulder.
"Kill all of them. But bring both beasts' bodies back. We need to extract the divine essence from their bodies." Piers ordered. The next instant, the mouse changed into a bat-like appearance, and it leaped into the air and flew after them, flapping its grayish-black wings.
At that moment, Fennelis and others also arrived near the northern gate. But they didn't get near the entrance gate. Instead, they moved towards the three-meter high wall and climbed up. It didn't take long for them to cross that wall without alerting anyone.
'We must hide our identity for the next few days and see what happens. If the enemy is a smart guy, then he will not put any bounty on us. After all, placing a bounty on us not only exposes his identity but will also attract attention from many people.' Fennelis sighed inwardly.
'But If the enemy puts any bounty on us, then we have to return to Peral kingdom and see for Nicolaus's or Abium's help.'
Soon, she cast those thoughts away from her mind and asked some doubt to Hooker, who was more familiar with this kingdom.
"Mr. Hooper, which is the safest city for us to stay hidden for the next few weeks? The enemy may have underestimated us last time, but I don't think they will make the same mistake next time. Well, they may be already watching our movements right now." Her words made adventurers, and even Roysia startled a little.
"If so, we should move to Silverland city, ma'am. That town is filled with adventurers and always crowded with more people. Almost half a million people are residing there due to the current civil war, and that place could serve as a perfect spot to hide our identities." Hooper's words surprised both Fennelis and Roysia.
"How come that city is not affected by civil war?" Roysia asked in surprise. This time, Selma chuckled and responded with a bright smile.
"Because Silverland City is under a second-tier mage's control, My Lady. I heard he is a roaming mage from the north who has been staying there for the last two decades. Because of his presence, no one has the guts to cause trouble inside that city."
Her words made both of them breathe out a sigh of relief.
'A second-tier mage, huh? I also have to give that letter to Siverland's adventurers' guild. So, that makes my job easier.' Fennelis thought to herself.
Soon, the group walked quietly on the footpath and followed the route toward Silverland City.
"How many days will it take to reach there?" Roysia asked while knitting her eyebrows.
"It will take five to six days, My Lady. We might meet bandits along the way, so be careful of any unexpected ambushes." Smith warned everyone.
Following that, the group didn't discuss much and continued their journey even in the darkness. When the sky turned brighter, Umi woke up from exhaustion. They met a few obstacles from time to time, but soon the group reached Silverland's domain within five days.
During their journey, Fennelis and Roysia noticed something serious about this Keris Kingdom and realized that the whole kingdom might turn into a ruined one!
"This land is suitable for all types of crops, but…." Roysia's voice trailed off as she glanced at the surrounding green plants.
Although the Keris kingdom was filled with greenery, the crops were not agricultural plants but weeds! Due to the civil war, the farmers didn't farm anything, and some even left the villages. They knew that once the real war started, the crops would be the first ones to get destroyed.
'Well, it's not my business anyway.' Roysia shook her head.
As Fennelis's group arrived in a random village, they started to notice strange gazes from everywhere. The group moved silently on the narrow road without minding the gazes and soon entered a small merchant shop.
But soon, everyone's expression stiffened as they noticed the wanted poster of Umi's face on the board. The picture of Umi releasing that Ice spell while freezing hundreds of soldiers appeared before their eyes.
'How the hell did they even get an artist to draw such an accurate image?' Although Roysia knew that the enemy might have used some magical artifact to capture this image, she still felt deeply startled inside.
At the bottom of the wanted poster, a 100 white gold coins bounty was mentioned. Next to Umi's wanted picture were others' wanted posters, and each of their bounties was around 20 white gold coins. But what made everyone's expressions gloomy was that they also saw the light church's nabla symbol at the corner of the wanted posters.
"A crafty guy is after us, guys. The enemy used the light church's help to make a move. Also, I didn't expect the enemy would put my daughter as a primary suspect." Fennelis muttered in a gloomy tone.
'But why did they put such a low amount on our heads? Are they afraid of alerting the light church higher-ups? Moreover, the enemy seemed to have seen my daughter casting that ice attack spell from afar.' She thought to herself and asked Roysia with a frown.
"What should we do now, Lady Roysia?" She knew that this woman was a Royal Knight and decided to ask for suggestions.
"If we had known this a little earlier, we could have moved to the Peral kingdom. But now, I don't think the enemy will let us escape that easily." Roysia paused for a second and continued. "I think its best to quickly reach Silverland city and hide there until everything soothes down."
"That's the only option." Hooper also nodded with a grim tone and quickly walked out of the merchant's shop. They didn't stop anywhere and continued to move towards Silverland's direction hastily.
A few hours later, the sun descended on the west and turned the sky darker.
At that moment, Fennelis's group also stopped their journey and chose to camp near the large paperbark maple tree.
As they were about to get ready to build tents, Umi and Nadine stood up abruptly.
"Enemy?" Fennelis, who had always been on high alert, instantly asked and unsheathed her weapon.
Nadine nodded with a solemn tone and quickly gripped her dagger. At the same time, Roysia, Hooper, Selma, and Smith also got startled and ready for any attack.
"Umi, use this scimitar. The enemy might try to kill you first, so go all out as we did in the pocket dimension." Fennelis said grimly and took out the scimitar before giving it to Umi.
Meanwhile, Umi took out the scimitar and held it with her small hand.
Simultaneously, Umi's eyes caught a ray of the invisible blade moving towards her head from the sky.
"Grrrr." An irritating growl came out of her mouth, and soon her figure started to transform. In an instant, her body grew taller and became a fox-like face with golden fur covering her body.
The next instant, she squatted down a bit, shot towards the sky using her two golden legs while avoiding that invisible air blade in mid-air, and thrust her scimitar using her right hand.
CLANG!
A spark appeared up in the sky along with a clanging sound, and soon everyone saw a two-meter tall humanoid figure with bat wings blocking her scimitar using a black sword.
A second later, Umi and that humanoid slowly backed away while landing on the ground, leaving everyone dumbfounded.
In the next second, another silver-colored humanoid fox figure moved from their right side and dashed towards that bat-winged creature quickly.
It was none other than Fennelis. The Adventurers could tell quickly; her agility power was almost equal to a sixth-tier warrior, which made them even more perplexed. The only calm expression showed was Roysia because she had already seen their strength during the fight against goblin attacks and chuckled inwardly.
As they were about to join the fight, suddenly, an echo sound came out from the bat-winged creature's bracelet and caused everyone to fall. All of them felt their heads become dizzy and headaches starting to appear. But the ones who got primarily affected were Umi and Fennelis.
Both almost fell into a half-conscious and could barely move their hands.
At that moment, Fennelis felt intense pressure over her head, and tears started to pour out of her eyes.
She now realized that the enemy was after Umi and her!
'This Echo Spell is mostly used against beastkins to catch them off-guard!'
Slowly, she noticed the humanoid creature moving towards her child with a wicked grin on its face. At the same time, the humanoid figure changed into a creepy-looking black thing with two empty white eyes.
'NO! It's going to kill Umi!' Panic appeared on Fennelis's face. She stared at the creature and its bracelet with a hateful glare and tried her best to stand up but couldn't.
'No! I have to do something!'
In the meantime, that shape-shifting creature arrived before the fallen Umi and thrust its sword at her head.