Dungeon of Pride, Laplace

"He saved your life, to me this was a favour that I cannot possibly not repay. Even if it meant destroying my reputation, I'm willing to keep my promise".

SIGH… Alvara sighed, she knew that there was no way the princess would change her mind. Although it made her anxious, it also made her happy a little knowing that Cynthia cared so much for her.

"Saving him won't be that easy princess; even if he isn't the one who injured the third prince and a prince from the surrounding nation, the people will only believe what they see and hear. According to another report that I got it seems the two other tridents are returning back".

Cynthia scrunched her delicate brows, the situation became a whole lot worse now. If it wasn't already hard enough for Simon to escape from the clutches of the Sea god's trident, with the addition of the other two tridents, it was now almost impossible for him to escape if he got caught.

"Tell the shadow guard to do whatever they need to delay the Sea God's trident until the demon gets out of the central area. Also, investigate the motive behind that guild doing all this for" Cynthia commanded.

After Alvara left to carry out her orders, she once again fell into contemplation. One of the top five guilds making such a big move, was sure to attract attention. But because the attention of the whole kingdom was now currently on the capital that almost got wiped out, they were able to swiftly carry out their mission.

Though it wasn't like no one had their eyes on them, the other top five guilds who were situated near the capital, similarly had their eyes on them but because after what happened to Sir Davis and Sir Vouves, nobody dared to make a move against the demon in fear of getting their whole guild wiped out.

The royal family was in no condition to do anything in this situation and had their hands full right now. Benny Beckerman, the guild leader of the sea god's guild knew this very well and hence knows that he would get away even while making such a big move.

What Cynthia couldn't understand was that even while knowing and seeing with his own eyes how an officer from the adventurer's association and a powerful ranker was reduced to such a miserable state by that little girl accompanying him, they still dared to go after that demon noble.

"It's almost like they believe that…".

-----

Fortress city Volkan, one of the oldest cities that was around even before the kingdom of Ellesmere was found. Tall ramparts surrounded the city from every corner and multiple magic cannons were stationed on the wall giving it a strong and impenetrable look.

The city was situated in the middle of two valleys and was an important checkpoint that anyone must pass through if they wish to get in and out of the central region. The population of the city was around three hundred thousand with ninety percent of the population being traders.

The city of Volkan was also called the trader's town with variety of goods going in and out of the town every day. The reason for it was the many air engines that landed and took off from the city every day.

If one wanted to travel the different regions or out of it, they must come to the fortress city Volkan to get a ferry. Usually, due to various goods and people coming and going out of the city, the security around here would be heavy.

However, today it was just too unusual with hoards of adventurers crowding the city. What was even more surprising was that they all belonged to the same guild and were heavily armed and ready.

If one looked at them, the first impression they would give was as if these adventurers were going on a war. In any other case, seeing this many adventurers would have resulted in a panic from the citizens but since they know the guild these adventurers belonged to, they weren't overly alarmed.

Inside one of the large buildings that belonged to the Sea God's trident guild, Benny Beckerman could be seen seated on a large comfortable sofa listening to the reports given by his subordinates.

Picking up the teacup from the centre table, he sipped on it and asked "Are we still unable to find any tracks related to that demon even after three whole days?".

His tone was neither angry nor happy.

The adventurer with the thief class, shook his head "Unfortunately, we are still unable to find the demon after we lost track of him back in the forest. Our adventurers are still searching for him all around the place".

Hearing the report, Benny Beckerman locked his brows and stated "Search every nook and cranny if you must, the demon will have to go through the volkan city if he wants to escape the central area quickly".

The subordinate nodded his head in understanding before asking something "Guild leader, what of the group that is hindering our move?".

Benny closed his eyes, mused for a while and said "Leave them be for now, since we cannot identify which group they belonged to, we will just engage them if we must. There is no need to back down".

He knew that there were many factions big and small, that have their eyes on their guild right now, but what of it? they were one of the top five guilds, just their name was enough to daunt most of them.

The fact that one of the group was moving against him despite knowing who they were, could only mean that the other party was also from the top five guilds or had power equivalent to theirs.

'There is no way they found out about my objective, then could it be these continuous attacks on our members are just to probe our intention?' Benny Beckerman thought internally. He saw the subordinate about to exit the room when suddenly he remembered something and asked

"Why didn't I get any reports about those two arriving in the city yet? Where are they? Did they not get my message?".

Seeing that the subordinate was tongue-tied, he asserted further.

"That… uh … they have already…".

After hearing what his subordinate had to say, he got up from his seat in surprise.

"You are telling me those two went there without even telling me anything? But why would they go there out of all places?" he mused, when suddenly something struck his mind and he took out a map from his space ring.

'Although it is unlikely, if someone really is helping that demon, then they might have told him about the other route'.

Benny Beckerman got up from his sofa and started donning his armour."Prepare my air engine, I'm leaving for the Sea city Aqualin".

Hundreds of kilometres north-west of Volkan city was a vast land of loess eternally shrouded in dust and sandstorms. One must traverse through this place to get to the city of Aqualin also known as the sea city.

It is one of the important trade hubs of the kingdom of Ellesmere. Many ships that dock here bring numerous goods and cargos that are then transported to the rest of the kingdom.

"Once I pass through the sea city Aqualin, I would be able to reach the Northern outlaw forest. Once there, the Sea god's trident won't be able to pursue me any further" Simon said flying at high speed.

Since he kept his altitude low to check where he is going, he left clouds of dust at his wake. Northern outlaw forest was a place filled with monsters and bandits, even if it's one of the top five guilds they would have to put quite a lot of resources and manpower if they wanted to search for him there.

Anyways, reaching the sea city Aqualin, would take quite a lot of time even with his [High-Speed Flight] skill. Simon had been flying at full speed while taking stops in between to reach the city as fast as possible but even then, he did not even cover one-third of the distance.

Two days passed just like that and on the night of the third day, when Simon felt he was closer to the city, he suddenly stopped his flight abruptly. The reason for him doing so was because he felt that something was wrong, his instincts that have been honed through numerous battles in the Ghastly Winding Forest, was ringing alarm bells in his head right now.

Simon took a deep breath and focused on spreading his senses all around him, but no matter how long he waited, there was nothing unusual around him. He shook his head and continued flying for a while before stopping once again.

He was sure this time, something was definitely wrong. This sensation he had felt many times when he was up against a strong monster from the Ghastly Winding Forest, the feeling of being at the edge of a knife.

Simon looked all around him and narrowed his eyes, whatever or whoever it was, it was definitely following him. What surprised him was their speed that was not inferior to his. He unfurled his wings and landed on the yellowish-brown land.

Since he can't outrun his enemy, he decided it was better for him to take care of them first. He took out his Crimson Blazing Flame Sword and looked at his surrounding in alert.

The cold wind of the night carried the dust along with it and other than the noise it made intermittently, the place was extremely silent.

"Hohh, so you were able to notice me huh, it's praiseworthy I must say" it was at this moment that a voice suddenly rang beside his ear and Simon instinctively swung the sword behind him.

CLANG… a fierce noise of metal colliding with metal rang out before a figure that had dissolved with its surroundings, appeared.

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