-Vol 4: To The North Pole!-

-Tired to Death!-

Walking through the corridors of the dimly lited cave, the man named Ade’el and the other three cloaked people returned to the same room where numerous candles were lit in an orderly manner over a pentagram inside a circle diagram.

“Hmm! This is bad indeed! What’s happening?” Ade’el asked calmly as he looked around the burning candles. More than half of the candles from one side was already doused out of flames. Right now he was feeling extreme anger, but he couldn’t show it, not in front of his subordinates. Or else his calm persona would be affected in their hearts. A leader must always remain composed after all.

‘Goddammit!! My years of hard work!! That fucking cu*t! She didn’t even tell me that something like this will happen! How can she do that? no, just how long she knew about this?’ Ade’el thought in his heard while he grounded his teeth in anger. He felt like a man who had just been cheated by his own wife, the feeling was…hard to explain on his part.

One of the cloaked person, the lady who was in charge of this room, was very sensitive to emotions and she felt a vast amount of dark emotions coming out of their leader. It made her uncomfortable like she was standing naked on a particularly freezing night, the bad thing was that the temperature was kept falling as the time passes. She shifted from one leg to another, trying to endure it, but for someone who was so sensitive to these feelings, it was very hard.

Ade’el reined in his anger when he felt that he was making someone in this room uncomfortable. As the anger vanished, the lady took in a deep breath to calm her speedy heart. It was really very frightening for her, who was so sensitive to sense that amount of anger and resentment. The other two people standing in the room, except for Ade’el looked at her weirdly when they heard her taking deep breaths.

To their looks, she only shook her head, indicating that it was alright.

“Okay! Everyone, prepare, we will proceed to phase 3 at this instant.” Ade’el commanded.

“But leader; some of our members were still out there. Shouldn’t we wait until they came back to activate?” one of the cloaked individual, who was male judging from his tone asked with uncertainty.

“Are you perhaps giving me orders?” Ade’el calmly asked as he looked towards the cloaked man.

“Ah!...no…no sir, I won't dare! I was simply giving my input that’s all!” the cloaked man stuttered out a reply. For a second he felt like he was standing in front of a very terrifying demon there.

This man was a new recruit, although new he was still able to become one of the core members. He was a replacement for Roxe. The organization he was working for had a large number of members, it was after all made by all the intelligent races who were oppressed by the humans. Although there were many members, the one who was selected as core members were few and far in between. It was also entirely dependent on the leader’s temperament. Hence it was considered a very huge achievement for anyone who gets selected as a core member.

But how could this man know about their leader’s temperament? How could he know that their leader didn’t like to be asked when it was his first time seeing him? He just wanted to make a good impression of himself in front of this leader, how could he know that it would in turn anger the leader?

At that moment, he really regretted speaking out when the other senior and older members were silent. But there was no medicine for regret, he could only consequence.

The woman who was very sensitive to emotions suddenly felt a huge amount of anger. It was like a volcano waiting to erupt. Consequently, the room felt like the temperature had suddenly dropped a few degrees.

“Who do you think you are? Do you think I came here to hear your input about this matter? What makes you think that I need your input?” with each sentence, Ade’el closed the gap between him and the man, whose name he didn’t even know. Due to Roxe's death and an immediate require for a core member, he just hastily grabbed a file and asked the members to promote him as a replacement. As such he didn’t even know how he looks like, let alone his name.

“Sir…Sorry, sir…it was my mistake, I won't do it again. Please give me a chance sir!” the man knew that something bad was going to happen when he saw the leader was walking towards him slowly. His visage was akin to a tiger that slowly advances towards its prey, knowing that it can't fight back.

As the man backed away slowly, pretty soon his back hit the wall, and he stopped retreating. There was nowhere else to go! Ade’el placed his left gloved hand on his shoulders and squeezed it lightly. Then from the corner of his eye, he looked towards the frightened man whose face was still hidden behind the cloak and started to speak.

“I know you won't do it again. I won’t give you that chance to do that again. You hear me! you won't get the chance.” After that, he turned around walked away from the man. Seeing that the leader didn’t pursue this matter any further, the cloaked man took a deep breath, thinking that he was spared.

But at that exact moment, something weird happened. Suddenly all his strength vanished and he felt like he had just returned form a long and exhausting battle. As time passed, his fatigues increased, then after a few seconds, it became unbearable to even breath. Unable to stand anymore, he fell flat on his face and began to hyperventilate like an Asthma patient. But the feeling of tiredness never decreased but continued to increase. He felt like he was running a nonstop marathon and he had long depleted his stamina. Unable to bear the pain he began clawing all over his body, trying to do anything to get rid of that uncomfortable feeling.

Then slowly his clawing began to intensify as he felt suffocated. His body was so tired that he couldn’t breathe. Finally, after a few minutes of flailing around like a fish out of water, the man finally stopped moving and lay prone on the floor.

He was dead! He was somehow tired of death.

The other two looked ta the still corpse and secretly took a deep breath. Thank god it was not them who had spoken out just before. In fact, they had never ever questioned their leader’s orders, that’s because they kind of believed in him. They always believed that their leader can create miracles even from a hopeless situation, and till now he had never disappointed them. They also knew that this leader of their’s did not like to be questioned, as such they never asked any question.

In reality, this man wasn’t the first one due to questioning their leader. There were many before who had also met the same fate, although it was the first time for a core member to die.

“Huh! What are you guys looking for? Common! Go prepare for phase 3!” Ade’el couldn’t help but remind them with his calm and baritone voice when he saw them standing idely.

“At once sir!”