Worill soundlessly emerged out of the ground right next to Tus, without breaking the ground. His held his cane that was always strapped to his back in his right hand. On it, a few drops of could be seen, but they quickly disappeared into it. He used the other hand to clasp Tus’s shoulder with a smile on his face.

“You choose wisely, although you should really pay attention to your surroundings. The Family of Rul has many complicated dealings within their lineage with a lot of diplomatic warfare. One of the enemies of that young ruler were tailing you.”

Hearing this, Tus wasn’t surprised given the circumstances, but he still looked around. He didn’t find anything out of the ordinary.

At this, Worill said with a chuckle, “You don’t need to worry, I’ve already took care of it. That was a nice exercise, ha.”

“I’m… glad that you had a good exercise.” Tus was unsure of how to respond.

“Come, milady is already on her way to the capital building.” Both of them silently disappeared into the busy street, with no one paying attention.

…………

Somewhere in Rul. The Branch of Rotalia

When Haya’s squad walked into their temporary encampment, which was situated by tents in a spiraling formation toward the center, they were surprised by the activity going on with the other squads. Everyone was running around like headless chickens, grabbing their weapons, necessary supplies, and quickly leaving out of the entrance in panic.

“What’s going on?” Talian, the vice-captain, asked someone who was passing by, but that person just hurriedly said, “Report to your manager,” before running off with the rest of their squad.

“We were already heading there anyways. Let’s go.” Haya instructed.

They moved through the spiraling formation, weaving through the other oncoming squads, before they came before a tent which was lined with pictures of blue hurricanes with red eyes. Haya entered by herself with the squad waiting outside.

“Haya, reporting to Manager Welsh.”

An old man, who wore a pendent with the same hurricane, sat at a wooden desk that had piles of papers scattered about. He was frenetic as he read through various documents and writing on others at the same time.

He glanced at Haya impatiently, “Why are you here? I thought I told you to go with the search?”

“I just arrived here, sir.” Haya said without any hint of negative emotions. ‘This manager is too unreliable when he’s like this.’

“Sorry, since we received the news from the branch I’ve been dealing with all of my squads today.” He stopped his actions and faced Haya directly with his hands folded. He spoke quickly and seriously, “I’ll go directly to the point and this is confidential information. There are potentially two major disasters we’re facing. Two nights ago, the alliance found a disturbance of a direct entry from the Altar of Oblivion. The last time that happened was eleven-thousand years ago, and what came out was the demon H’raol. Just this matter alone is grave enough to send the entire continent into panic.”

Haya’s face became solemn as she listened with traces of shock. The demon H’raol, who nearly killed off all of the people in just three months, was something of a ghost story told to children, so nearly everyone knew about it. If it wasn’t for the last stand of humanity with support from lands across the seas, the continent would have fell entirely to the monsters. At some point a surprise attack was launched on H’raol and it was eventually sealed into a relic by the heroes of the time. The reason why it wasn’t killed and was sealed, was because its life force was different from living creatures and rendered it immune to mortal injury.

“However, this can still be seen as a false positive as the alliance can’t find any traces of a demon around the area, and there hasn’t been any stirring among the Hives. So this matter has been temporarily settled as ‘non-important.’ This second matter is not the same case, though.” Welsh brought out a map of the area with the various cities around it in three hundred miles. On it, besides the cities, was a large red dot to the North, near the city of Froir.

“Last night, there was a rebirth of a dragon, and right now it is hidden somewhere around Froir. The rebirth of a dragon, similar to the first matter, hasn’t happened for at least fifteen-thousand years. Not to mention, this dragon can be considered to be one of the rarest types, a Gradual.”

Haya at this moment was struck dumbfounded and asked, “Gradual?”

“Yes. As the information about dragons is not strictly kept under wraps by the older forces, we know enough information to classify it. Although the amount of information after that can be considered vague, there is one point that makes it terrifying.” Welsh sighed, “That is, a Gradual grows stronger from whatever damage it receives. This makes them impossible to defeat, unless they’re sealed like H’roal. The two other methods are to convince it to leave, but as a monster, it will probably not listen, and to ask a demon or a devil to kill it for compensation, but that would bring about even worse things.

“I’ll be honest, this entire thing is just… I’ll let you choose whether or not you want to stay with us and I’ll give you a mission based on the branch leader’s conjecture. The amount of danger for the mission is very high.” Welsh looked directly at Haya, waiting for her answer.

“I’ll do it.” Haya said directly

“In that case, I’ll tell you. The coincidence of the entry from Oblivion and this dragon are too close together. We think that whatever came out caused this dragon to search for it and the thing that came out might be in Froir, disguising itself as someone to gain insights into the continent. Your mission is to enter Froir to search for the disguised creature, report it to me, and get the hell out of there.” Welsh threw a coin to Haya who subsequently placed it into a pocket. “You don’t have to worry about the dragon, even though it is a Gradual, it would still fear entering the city as it was just born. Making this to be the most opportune time for it to be sealed. Time is running low for this as it probably knows that the alliance is making measures to trap and seal it, so it may make some moves. You are dismissed.”