[Mission Objective has been updated!]
[Floor 15]
[Mission Type – Guard]
[Objective – Protect Radjah Tsang Manusha!]
Upon the confirmation of the target, I immediately rallied my comrades.
"Prepare for transport! Ready for battle!"
I told them as I formed a dimensional rune with my hands.
As soon as my comrades' weapons were firm in their grips, I activated one of the spells I had been preparing since earlier.
A bright light quickly engulfed our party, enveloping each of us in a white dimension.
A half second later, the light dissolved and our environment transformed into the middle of the Tamelan Square.
We had just teleported from the turret to the top of the Tamelan Rise.
Once I saw the first arrow flew from the archers on the turrets and rooftops above, I waved my hand and raised a dome-shaped shield around the pyramid stage. The last spell I had been formulating beforehand.
Dozens of arrows bounced off the barrier as the rest of the archers released their pinch on the bowstring.
The entire crowd in the Tamelan Square were thrown into chaos as more arrows continued raining down on us.
No. The projectiles were not aimed at my party.
The arrows were aimed straight to the youthful boy at the center of the rise.
"Drop your weapons!"
A knight suddenly shouted from the side of the pyramid.
Some of the Jherendal soldiers guarding the stage were caught inside my shield dome.
[Human Knight Lv.13 x4]
[Human Soldier Lv.11 x10]
Their swords and spears were pointed at my comrades and I. But their deadly glares were directed toward the prince behind us.
I immediately turned to my comrades.
"Kill them."
Without hesitation my comrades dashed off and struck down the soldiers surrounding us.
As the carnage ensued, I turned to our mission's objective.
"Wh-who are you?! Why are you killing the guards?! A-are you assassins?!"
The young prince shouted at me with trembling voice and frightened face.
Good. He could see us.
It would be troublesome to protect him if he could not detect our presences.
"Don't be afraid, Your Highness. We're here to protect you."
I told the boy as I reached out my hand to him.
The young prince flinched back.
"P-protect me?! Protect me from whom?!"
He immediately turned to the servants of the Serpent's Order behind him.
"Mirelda, I don't know these criminals! Please help me!"
To both the prince's and my surprise, the servants returned the imperial royalty's plea with detesting gazes.
[Order's Mage Lv.18 x1]
[Order's Apprentice Lv.14 x3]
Their serpent-shaped staffs were pointed right toward the prince. Immense magical energy was accumulating at their tips.
Fourth Circle killing spells.
The young prince would be reduced to nothing if he were to be struck by their assaults.
"Mirelda? What are you doing?"
His Highness asked confusedly to the old woman draped in splendid white robe.
The Order's servant replied him with roaring voice and hateful gaze.
"Die, you traitor!"
The old woman and the rest of the Order's servants began to activate their killing spells.
But the accumulating magical energy at the tip of their staffs suddenly dissolved just before the spells' completion.
It was their fatal mistake to target the prince and ignored a mage like me right in front of them.
After I blocked their casting using magic interference, I twirled my fingers and tempered their spell runes even further.
The residual energy at the Order's servants' staffs suddenly rushed back toward the mages, surging back into their bodies.
Dark black blood immediately burst out of their mouth, nose, ears, and eyes. Their body could not handle the erratic backflow of mana.
"Arrrghhh!!!"
The servants screamed with gurgling voice before they collapsed to the ground. Lifeless.
I approached the prince as he stared at the bloodied corpses in front of him.
"To protect you from them, Your Highness."
I told him, gesturing to the dead servants.
"They're trying to kill me? Why?!"
The young prince asked bewilderedly.
Good question. But not to be answered right now.
Our mission came first.
I looked around and found my comrades finished killing the last of the soldiers inside the shield with us.
The archers around the square were still raining down arrows toward the prince while the soldiers outside tried to break through the shield with brute force.
They would not succeed penetrating the dome given I had erected the barrier to be strong enough to hold against even ogre strikes. The reason why I had to prepare the spell beforehand.
As my comrades were walking back toward the center of the rise, a notification window appeared before us.
[Mission Objective has been changed.]
[Floor 15]
[Mission Type – Escape]
[Objective – Escape the city with Radjah Tsang Manusha!]
The young prince stared at me questioningly.
"Wh-what's the matter? Why are you suddenly staring the ground? What are you looking at?"
So he could not see the mission window like us.
Interesting.
"Stay close to us, Your Highness. We'll make sure you survive through this ordeal."
I told him.
Jonah and the others soon walked up to me. Their weapons stained by the dark blood of our enemies.
"Fina, the mission's changed. We now have to escape the city."
The shepherd said.
I nodded.
"We'll find a way out. But first we'll retreat to the safe zone and--"
Dun!
A loud bumping sound interrupted me.
The noise penetrated the shrieks of the Tsuchi crowd still scrambling around the Tamelan Square, into my barrier.
"What was that sound?"
Shanny asked, noticing it as well.
Devisha suddenly pointed to a direction.
"There! By the gates!"
We all then turned our gazes toward the walls enclosing the Tamelan Square. Right toward one of the three gates on the walls.
A dozen soldiers were standing on the battlement atop the gates, pushing a huge black cauldron toward the ledge. Black fumes were rising from inside the cauldron.
I looked around and saw more cauldrons atop the other two gates of the walls.
Before any of us could raise any question regarding the cauldrons' purposes, the soldiers tilted the containers and spilled black liquid to the panicked crowd flooding out of the gates.
The liquid immediately evaporated into dark fog once they hit the ground and the people. Obscuring what the liquid did to them upon contact.
But the screams of the crowd turned louder and wilder after they were engulfed in the black screen.
The cauldrons were so big and full with such mysterious liquid that the entire square was soon flooded in pitch-black fog.
My shield fortunately prevented the gas from reaching us.
Meanwhile, the soldiers that were trying to penetrate the barrier gagged upon inhaling the fumes.
In seconds they collapsed to the ground, breathless.
"This black fog. It's toxic."
Devisha said warily through her veil.
Darius clicked his tongue upon the cry of the crowd from around the square.
"It's us and our target they wanted. They didn't have to kill all these people!"
"Let's just get out of here. We still need to find a way out of the city."
Shanny stated while flicking her sword to get rid the dark blood staining the blade.
Jonah turned to me once more.
"Fina, can you create a portal back to the safe zone? I don't think we can walk out of the square considering this fog."
The shepherd formed a frown when I did not reply him and continued staring beyond the barrier. Toward the black screen enveloping the Tamelan Square.
"Fina? What's wrong?"
He asked.
There was something about the black liquid and the fog it created.
They were not familiar to my eyes. But they were tugging something in the corner of my mind.
As if I already knew something about them.
Yes.
I knew about the black liquid. I knew about this toxic black fog.
I read about them once in a report.
My headmaster made me read the entire document as we were flying to the…Radeshta region, I believed.
I was accompanying him as he was urgently sent on an important mission by the Tower of Circle.
The report was compiled by a renowned High Mage, detailing about a peculiar disease.
A mind disease.
"Rargghh!"
Something suddenly slammed into my barrier.
A white-cladded boy barely five years of age.
His eyes had been drained of color. Mouth brimming with foam. Dark purplish bulging veins stretched all over his skin. His entire body was rapidly deteriorating each second passed. Decomposing flesh and bones unveiled.
With rabid expression, the corpse-looking child struck his head repeatedly against the barrier, trying to force his way in.
Soon, dozens and dozens more people emerged from the dark fog and crashed themselves on the shield.
Soldiers. Children. Men. Women. The elderly.
Every person of all sorts bore the same horrid appearance as the boy's. Acting just as erratic as he was.
Yes. I knew of the black liquid and the fog.
They were the cause of a terrible disease that almost claimed an entire region in the empire.
A product of a terrible cult.
The madness disease.