Netori: Stealing The Hero's Party!

While Raven and the others were focused on getting inside the Booty and Barrel's inn, Kara saw an opportunity to distance herself from the group and make her own way to her next destination. Traveling in a group has never been her strong suit anyway, but before she could escape, the whimper of her mule got the woodland elf's attention.

"Hey! Where are you going?" Mel asked, quickly moving closer to the animal and grabbing its reigns from the side.

"To wherever I'm needed next, your group is too crowded for me anyways," Kara replied with a scoff, a bit frustrated by Mel's attempt to stop her. Thankfully for her, the rest of the party was already inside the inn, leaving her with just one person for her to get off of her back. "And why don't you go follow the rest of your crew inside?

They might need your help, you know, there's more than a few surprises waiting inside, after all."

Lifting her gaze from the animal to the owner, Mel squinted her eyes and leered at Kara. Her words were ominous and trickled within them was some form of truth, almost as if she already knew what was about to happen.

"How would you know what's going on inside?" She asked, but shaking her head, Kara quickly turned the conversation in another direction.

"I know everything you guys have done so far sweetheart, like how you're still struggling with an apology to that young racoon boy back at that massive mansion." Pretentiously rolling her head, Kara smiled at Mel before further adding. "How about this? You let me go without question, and I'll help that boy so he can once again pee standing upright and also feel the pleasures of a woman's body?n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

I suppose that should help with his fear towards you as well, don't you think?"

Glaring ever more ferociously at Kara, Mel wanted to demand more answers than her vague teasing, but with a very real possibility of curing Tan's fear dangling in front of her, Mel set her anger aside and took a few steps away from the mule. Even so, she did have something to say to the high priestess.

"Your animal, he's hurt from falling on the ship, you should at least heal him!" Raising a curious eyebrow at Mel's concern, Kara moved her hand down her mule's hair nape and before anyone knew the creature disappeared into glittering dust. Standing on her own foot, Kara continued to smile at Mel before raising her eyes as if to say…

'Happy now?' Not wasting any more time the two parted ways with each other, one head for the interior of the inn and the other to heal Tan deep within Athenia. The rest of the party remained unaware of their agreement, and although they would sense Kara's absence soon enough, there were far too many people in the party at the moment to care too much about the wandering priestess-cum-trader.

As it all happened, Amedith and Liliyana were also making their way towards the inn. Already told to rendezvous at the tallest establishment, they knew where they needed to go, although after what had happened, neither of them had the energy to fly to the spot quickly. Not tired in body but rather from the soul, the duo couldn't shake the feeling that they could've done more.

Saving a girl who would become a cripple, never be able to use her legs again and forced to defecate through guts that had torn into each other. The very thought of it was haunting enough, but letting her die felt no worse than saving her.

"You sure we did the right thing?" Asked Liliyana, her hand squeezing Amedith's fingers tight.

Discover more stories at empire

"It was between a quiet death while medicated or a prolonged life where she would feel pain every waking moment," turning his head at Liliyana, although Amedith was unsure himself if they did the right thing, he tried to assure her what he felt was enough to justify their inaction towards the girl.

Unsure still, Liliyana's eyes dejected to the ground, her heart heavy with emotion and her mind racing with alternate thoughts about saving the girl. Perhaps if they'd brought Erika and there was enough time, Asmodia could've saved the girl and repaired the damage to her body as well, but with that time now gone, there was nothing she could do about the matter, except…

"We're killing those idiots who caused this, aren't we?" She whispered, slowly looking back at Amedith flying beside her.

His eyes focused at the inn in the distance, Amedith gave himself a moment to think over everything their deaths would entail. In the eyes of the locals, the party was still hailed as heroes, thus the words of foreigners like them held little value and only those who hated the trio would be inclined to accept them to be false prophets pretending to be Lantherm's chosen heroes.

"Yes, we're gonna kill them," turning his head to Liliyana again, Amedith put a finger against his lips and whispered. "But without anyone else knowing."

Squinting her eyes in confusion, Liliyana blurted.

"But why? I doubt Raven would wanna keep them alive once he realized what they'd done."

"I hope so, but since Reina wants to keep them alive until the ship's rebuilding is done and Raven seems to be on board with the idea if he does let them live even after hearing everything…" Staring intently into Liliyana's eyes, Amedith spoke with determination.

"If he still lets them live, we're gonna kill them ourselves–we're gonna kill them either way, but I want it to be by our hands since we were the ones who watched that girl die and killing them with our hands would feel like those women got some amount of justice in their deaths."

Staring back into the raging gaze of a warrior, Liliyana couldn't agree more as she nodded in agreement to the idea. The two were bound to kill the false heroes that very night, but whether or not that comes to be, remains to be seen through the chaos the party would soon bring upon itself.