They continued marching, curving slightly as they walked so that they could reach the knee, the citizen stuck close to the captain, repeatedly talking about how glad he was that the Emperor's Coven was helping him.
It was annoying Axel, and the other scouts or so Axel noticed. Though Apple only muttered about how stupid the Goulden Guard was, and the captain was replying only when it was needed while keeping his mask pointed forward.
Axel wasn't sure if that meant the captain didn't care about the citizens praise, or if the captain was trying to keep himself together.
"Wait," the Golden Guard said holding his hand up, "What's that sound?" he asked.
The captain then looked away from the path they were walking to see what the Golden Guard was talking about.
"Shale Storm!" he called out pointing west.
An enormous storm of shale began to approach them; the cold rocks were moving around faster than any of the scouts had ever seen. They were moving fast enough to turn a man into pieces.
"Run!" Golden Guard called out.
He didn't need to say anything, the scouts were already running, with the captain in the front carrying the citizen on his shoulder.
The captain was doing that because the citizen wasn't as well trained as the scouts, and he was worried the citizen wouldn't' be able to run fast enough to keep up.
However, there was another person who hadn't trained as a scout for years.
'Move legs move!'
Axel was lagging behind the rest of the other scouts; every step he was farther away from them.
Thinking back to what he did with the house demon, Axel slapped a fire glyph onto his coat and activated it.
His coat burst into flames and instead of running normally, he began to leap with every step. With this he began to catch back up with the other scouts.
"Ahead! Three o'clock!" the captain called out pointing to a cave.
"Don't get your time mixed up now!" Apple taunted, the storm coming up behind him
"Not the time!" Artichoke replied.
After a minute of running, or leaping in Axel's case, they recached the cave and dived inside. Beating the storm by a couple hairs length.
Axel then turned back and looked out the cave and saw the rocks whipping by.
"Storms usually move on after ten minutes," the captain explained.
"So, we wait here for the storm to die down, then grab those wild witches," the Golden Guard said, "Great!" he sarcastically said.
"I see we're all in agreement," Artichoke said beginning to sit down.
"That was a joke," the Golden Guard pointed out, "We need to get this done as fast as possible, we can't disrespect the time of Emperor Belos," he explained.
'Never meet a scout who brought up the Emperor this much'
"Understood sir," the captain said beginning to walk into the storm.
"Captian!" Lettuce called out grabbing onto the captain's" shoulder, "Storm's too strong!" the explained.
"Lettuce is right," Axel said going up to the captain, "If you go out there, you're not coming back," he said.
"And so it shall be," the captain responded, "If I have been ordered to do it then I will, I may get injured but that is part of the job," the captain said.
"I'll go alone," the Golden Guard said, "I'll take the citizen out to find the wild witches, you all stay here," he ordered.
"Golden Guard?" Axel said, "May I talk to you deeper in the cave for a moment?" he asked.
"Of course," the Golden Guard replied, "Guard Captain, watch over the citizen," he ordered.
"Yes sir," the captain replied moving closer to the citizen than he was before.
"Personal space man," the citizen complained.
Axel and the Golden Guard made their way down the cave opening, it didn't go all that deep, but still deep enough where the others were no longer visible.
"You wanted to talk to me?" the Golden Guard said.
"Please tell me you know that the citizen is lying about the wild witches," Axel asked cutting straight to the point.
"I don't think he's lying about wild witches," the Golden Guard responded, "I know he's bringing us to an ambush of wild witches, in which I will defeat them and bring them to Emperor Belos," the Golden Guard explained.
"I see," Axel replied.
'This guy is going to get us killed'
"Why couldn't we have just interrogated him?" Axel asked.
"It would have taken too long," the Golden Guard answered, "Emperor Belos's cannot be kept waiting," he says.
"Did the Emperor himself tell you that?" Axel asked.
'I wouldn't be surprised; he is the right hand of the Emperor'
"Emperor Belos didn't exactly say it," the Golden Guard admitted, "But Emperor Belos did strongly imply it," he explained.
'This idiot is going to get himself killed from an idea of what the Emperor wants'
"Look, we're stuck here, so let's talk to the guy for a moment and see if we can poke some holes in his story," Axel said giving an idea.
"It would take too long; I'm taking the citizen and going to the wild witches," the Golden Guard said beginning to walk away.
"I'm asking you to reconsider," Axel said following him.
"I wasn't making a suggestion, I am going," the Golden Guard said turning to Axel, "You and the other scouts may leave the way you came as soon as the shale storm ends, I have my own way of flying home" the Golden Guard said before turning back and continuing to where the others were.
Axel stood silent, there was nothing he could do. At least the outcome of the Golden Guards mistake wouldn't hurt him. Though Axel didn't like the thought of someone dying.
'It's fine, he's a witch, it doesn't matter, don't argue'
He walked deeper in the cave, mostly out of boredom and curiosity. How often do you get to go in a cave after all.
You know, something that bothered Axel was on the mission report, this cave wasn't mentioned. It's a pretty nice place to wait out shale storms after all, one would think that scouts would use it on missions.
But he shrugged it off. The Knee probably wasn't mapped very well, or the Emperor's Coven didn't see it necessary to mention it.
As Axel continued to walk deeper into the cave, he heard something breathing.
He began to look for what was making that noise, and then he found it.
'This may be a problem'
———————————————————————
"You will stay here until the shale storm ends and then return back home and report to Lilith," the Golden Guard ordered.
"Yes sir," the captain replied.
"We could stay here for a bit longer, couldn't we?" the citizen asked.
"No, we will leave now so we can catch the wild witches as soon as possible," the Golden Guard ordered.
Suddenly, Axel came running up from the back of the cave.
"We aren't alone in this cave," Axel quickly reported.
"What are you talking about?" the Golden Guard asked.
"There's a beast down there, white fur, circular, four feet," Axel explained.
"Slitherbeast," Apple recognized, "We must be in its home," they guessed.
"It doesn't matter, we've waisted enough time," the Golden Guard responded, "You scouts can kill it as soon as possible," he ordered.
"Well, attacking the beast might be a good thing," the citizen said, "It may be good to kill it now, so it won't attack others," he pointed out.
'Is he, stalling, but why?'
"We are leaving now," the Golden Guard ordered as Axel walked towards the mouth of the cave.
"But I'm tired," the citizen whinnied, "Just twenty minutes and then we can go," the citizen asked, Axel then put his hand outside the cave
"Are you arguing with the Golden Guard?" the captain said getting closer to the citizen.
"No I'm just saying,"
"You're a good illusionist," Axel interrupted getting the attention of the group, "But under pressure? You're a horrible actor," he said.
Axel was standing right outside the cave, the shale was whirling around him, and when the shale hit Axel, the rocks poofed into nothing on impact.