They kept talking about plans when they all received an alert by members. Expatriate is attacking the alliance. All unbubbled members. Eden quickly checked the battle logs and noticed only one casualty happen. The rest of the castle were decoys. Erza, have my potions of transportation ready, I'm taking my army.
"You need back up?" asked Corruption. "No, I need your troops to support the alliance in Boss raids." Onibat got up with an irritated face, he looked at the floor, "There's not much support I can give you since I'm recovering from the attack on me." "You're good, I'm planing on doing a sniper move attack. He won't know be able to catch me and I need everyone to keep their bubble."
Eden rode off on Thunder as her army followed behind her. The moment she left the gates a bright light flashed and the army disappeared. She was a few kilometers from the alliance Expartriate recently joined. Eden sunk her feet into the ground and took off towards her first target. She passed troops like a quick gust of wind. Each one gasping for air as they dropped to the ground with their throats cut. Arthur would run like a fireball setting buildings on fire behind Eden. The ground troops barely had time to set off the alarms before arrows shot them down. Horses trampled through anything standing in their way as their riders injured anyone around. Eden blew the castle doors open with her momentum knocking the troops holding it closed. A few managed to scratch her armor. One of the generals managed to make a cut deep enough to draw blood, but that only increased Eden's speed. In seconds one castle was already in flames and its citizens were trying to put out the fire. Eden recalled her troops to where they originally landed and changed position. Next target, and then the next and then the next. Eden was out of breath and paused for a moment to check her condition. The next moment she saw a dark figure coming from her right at twice her speed. She jolted out of the way. Expatriate's sword missed her neck by an inch and cut a single strand of hair in the process. Eden threw a bottle on the ground and was teleported to a different spot. She only had a few seconds before she noticed the same dark figure running toward her. Again she teleported. This time she said " Shield." The figure was thrown back when the shield widened. Expatriate circled her like a wolf ready to devour its prey. Eden smirked at him. His eyes widened and pounced on the shield to try to go through but he was blown back. He left and Eden got a message from Maur, he's back at the hive hitting the unbubbled. Eden replied, is it the same ones or new ones? Maur said, same. Eden smiled and stood closer to Expatriate Alliance hive looking for her next target. She was about to attack and deactivate the shield, but Expatriate stood in front of her again. She got a better look at him, he was this tall man without armor. Just a leather vest on, buckle and pants. He had long black air and dark blue eyes. He had a rugged appearance. His chest was harry but you can still see his muscle outline. His gaze was piercing and the look of his face was handsome with an angry touch. Eden wondered if this was a skin he picked out from the events or he did "create your own" event which was expensive. A message request arrived on Eden's inbox from Expatriate titled, leave. The message said, "I will burn you and your alliance if you don't stop." Eden replied, "go ahead, they know the risks of not having a shield. I see about 5 more I can plunder by myself, next time I'll bring friends." Expatriate eyes flickered red after reading her reply. He replied, "You don't care about your members, what kind of leader is that!" Eden smirked again, "you think you know me. Who will avenge my members everytime you decide to attack our alliance and I sit down to watch. Maybe you should have thought about yours before you decided to pick a fight with mine. I'm not going to watch my people be bullied. An eye for an eye." Eden sent her reply and stared at the Expatriate until he was done reading. He stared at Eden for a few more seconds. Eden raised her chin a little higher as she positioned herself in an attack stance. Expatriate, wrote one more thing and walked back to his hive. "Fine, I will not attack your alliance anymore as long as your members don't attack mine." Eden let out a breath and placed her swords away. She teleported back to her castle where the team was still there receiving damage reports. Only one casualty and the rest were decoys. Eden told Erza, "I need to see our alliance attack reports from the Alliance archives." Maur looked at Eden confused, "why are you checking who we attacked when we are the ones who got attacked. It's something Expatriate said, I want to check if my hunch is correct. "You spoke to him after you set his alliance on fire?" asked Maur amused. Eden smirked a little as she looked over the alliance report. A few hours prior to the incident there was one member who showed up as attacking someone on a resource area from the Expatriate alliance. Eden took a deep breath and tossed the report to the side while reaching for a glass of water. Maur picked it up and looked back at Eden with surprise. "I didn't notice this earlier and Bellatrix didn't say anything," said Maur. "Ofcourse she didn't, this is the 3rd time she has done something stupid and it's the same thing too. She's probably the reason he targeted us," said Onibat with anger. "We only have one casualty thanks to the decoys we planted in the hive and it gave our other members time to put on a shield. I'll compensate for the losses of our single casualty as long as he doesn't seek revenge and I'll send compensation to the guy who got hit on the resource area. As for Bellatrix… She's no longer in our protection." Eden said stoically and selected the kick member out. "Erza, I want a scout report for Bellatrix, I need to know how much she has," said Eden as she began writing a letter. "Wow, are we gang banging her for those resources?" asked Onibat with a smile. "No, she will be tribute to the Expatriate Alliance for the misunderstanding today. Trust me, if our losses were higher, I wouldn't pay tribute and let them figure it out. But I think Bellatrix should pay for her misdoings." Eden said as she sent her letter through.
Eden and the rest mounted their horses to the top of the hill to see the castle of Bellatrix. Her shield was up still and the sun was setting. "Did Expat tell you why he attacked us?" asked Maur. "No, he didn't even mention the earlier attack. He asked for us not to attack them, so the only conclusion in my mind was that we already did. That's why I checked our battle records that get automatically archived in the alliance castle. Resource areas don't give us alerts, so I don't blame you for not seeing it right away. I like to snoop and test. Also, the scout report shows she set up a barrier right after she attacked. It tells me she knew something was coming and she didn't warn anyone"
The shield dropped from Bellatrix and it looked like a missile hit the castle and blew it up right away. There was no time for another shield to be set up in time. There was a dark figure walking out of the flames with a large chest the size of a truck dragging from his left hand, while his right held his sword. He turned to look in Eden's direction and nodded, then continued to walk away.
"I think I need a new pair of pants, I peed a little" said Maur
"Don't you mean underwear?" asked Onibat confused
"I'm not wearing any," replied Maur as he wiggled his eyebrows at Onibat
"Wrong tree dude," replied Onibat as he pulled his horse away from Maur.
Eden chuckled watching those two bicker and taunt each other. "You sent the scout report to Expatriate and an apology for the misunderstanding. Then offered to stand guard, no one else takes his claim. But how did you know the shield wasn't going to be activated in time?" asked Corruption. "That's classified information, I'd have to kill ya" replied Onibat before Eden said anything. "Come on, Oni, you know you can tell me," Corruption said singingly at him. Onibat stared at her for a few seconds and then cleared his throat when he realized he was still staring. His face got pink from the embarrassment. "Well, I observe the behavior patterns of the members, something Eden requested a while back. Since we still haven't figured out the traitor. I deducted that Bellatrix is frugal with her shields and she likes to wait for it to completely expire. She leaves like a 1 to 2 minute gap, probably due to a delay in telling her guide to shut up after the timer goes off," said Onibat seriously. "Wow, are you an FBI agent or something?" asked Maur. "I'm batman," replied Onibat in a deep raspy voice. Eden and Corruptioned laughed while Maur rolled his eyes.
They pulled their horses to turn back in the direction of the hive. Corruption leaned in closer to Eden and asked, "How was your encounter face to face with Expatriate?"
"I nearly shit my pants if I wasn't running off adrenaline, fucker came out of nowhere!" squealed Eden and they both began to laugh. "I was surprised to see you in one piece, almost impressed." said Onibat from behind. "Yeah, I'm impressed you didn't come back with a wardrobe and bath change. Glad actually" added Maur. "Believe me, I had to keep my cool, he moved twice as fast and I knew I was an inch away from meeting Jesus earlier than I hoped. I think my shield and quick thinking saved my ass. That's why we need to remind everyone to keep improving stats and those potions save lives," said Eden while giving a relieved look. "Yeah, EXC lives matter," Maur added and they all chuckled.