As we continued to keep on moving through the dungeon to find the officer who was holding the key to open the cell doors, we ended up meeting up with Zen’s parents who was both sleeping. It looks like both of them were beaten up. The officer probably beat them up. There’s no other explanation other than that. I wanted to wake them up but Zen said that she’ll do it herself.

“Are you sure about this, Zen?” I asked her.

“I’m sure. I have to face both of them myself. Even after what they had done to me all these times.”

“Should I leave you here or something?”

Suddenly, a mysterious voice was heard, “I think it’s better if you two leave now.”

Standing tall with his silver plated armor, the officer approached us menacingly. He was holding an iron sword on his right hand while holding a shield on the left hand. He almost looked like an average knight like we saw in many video games. Most importantly, his wears a full plated silver armor. He revealed himself from the shadows and dangles around the cell keys which was hanging around his waist.

“Leave now or else…”

I replied to him, “Or else what?”

“Or else prepare this!”

The officer crushed his sword to the ground and nothing seemed to happened at all. We were a bit weird out with the awkwardness but then I felt a sudden burst of Infinity energy approaching us. I feel something was coming. In an instance a red-coloured laser beam suddenly appeared from the ceiling. I stopped the time and pushed Zen away from where the laser was heading. Time continues to move back a seconds later and both of us was unharmed by the laser.

“Didn’t expect you would notice my ability…”

I stood up and said, “Laser Manipulation?”

“Yes indeed.”

The officer pointed his sword behind him and suddenly I was pushed away by Zen because a laser beam was about to hit me from behind. In just the second move, I already guessed how does his abilities work. It is a sub category to Laser Manipulation called Directed Laser Beam. From the looks of it, whenever he points his sword at any direction, a laser beam will emit from a long distance and will follow to where the sword was moved.

It requires a simple explanation like that in order to fully understand such a complicated magic like this. Now if only there was a way for me to approach him without getting disintegrated by the laser beams. I also have to keep an eye on Zen because she might also be targeted by him. I must not take my eyes off that little girl.

“I can take care of myself.” Zen somehow read my mind.

“What are you talking about?” I tried to play it off as if I didn’t know what she was saying.

Even so, she replied to me, “I’m fine on my own. Just do your thing.”

“Okay…If you say so.” I looked back at the officer after that and said, “Let’s get serious.”

The officer points his sword toward me and then a laser shoots out somewhere behind him. I rolled away in time thanks to my time stopping abilities. Even with a two second pause in time, I was able to use it to the fullest without worrying about how weak it seemed on paper. Yeah, a two second pause with only 6 metres in range of effect sounded weak on paper but if it were to be executed at just the right time then there’s no such thing as a weak ability. To me, it sounded more like a broken ability.

With that in mind, the officer continued to emits laser beam from all over the place by pointing the sword at multiple directions. Left and right. Upward right and downward left. I barely managed to dodge that last one as the laser made a hole on my scarf that Zen gave to me and Hosuke when we were getting the troll’s fur.

“That was too close.” I said that after jumping away from the fourth laser beam while still trying to recover from the third one.

I haven’t been using this much energy ever since I tried to do chores. Yeah. I’m that lazy. Doesn’t sound like your usual protagonist who is always full of determination. I’m more willing to let someone finish the job rather than doing it myself but in this case I have to do it on my own. There was no one else except Zen but she’s just a little girl. She couldn’t do much.

“Need help?” Zen asked me.

“I’m fine.” I tried to shrug it off by lying over the fact that I indeed in need for some help.

“Whatever…” Zen threw a piece of rolled cloth that she ripped from her clothing to the air.

The rolled cloth ended up being a slight distraction for the officer as the officer pointed his sword to the rolled cloth and disintegrated it with his laser beams. During that small gap of time, Zen managed to get close to the officer. She stomped on the officers left feet, stunting him momentarily. It also made the officer drop his sword.

Once again, my ‘usefulness’ during a battle has been displayed perfectly. My track record hasn’t been looking so well so far. Additionally, all of it happened in a single day. Maybe it was just not my day or something.

In any case, with what has happened so far I moved in and tackled the officer as he was trying to grab his sword back but failed to do so. The officer fell down to the ground thanks to the tackle. I immediately continued with a ground and pound strikes to the officer, leaving no area open for him to block my weak fist.

Once all was said and done, my fist were blocked by his shield. That hurt me more than it damaged the shield. The officer pushed me away and stood back up. He tried to look for his sword but he couldn’t find it any more. The sword was in the hands of Zen who was holding it with both of her hands.

“Give it back to me, girl. You don’t want to mess around with such a dangerous weapon.” The officer tried to talk his way into getting back his sword.

“I know this is dangerous. That’s why…” Zen tried to raise the sword with all the energy she have and points the sword toward the officer.

The officer’s own weapon end up killing himself thanks to what Zen had done. Pretty much, a laser beam just went through the officer’s armor as well as his own body, leaving a hole behind as it was successfully managed to penetrate through him. That was a devastating blow indeed. I still can’t believe how a little girl like Zen could have no remorse or any hesitation to actually point the sword to the officer. That could potentially kill the officer. At least Zen was being smart enough to not point the sword directly at the officer’s heart or head.

Instead, she went for another shot by pointing the sword to the officers feet. Which resulted with the officer being unable to stand up thanks to the hole she made on the officer’s feet. Just what was this girl thinking? The nerve of her to do that without thinking much. At least, she done what she was supposed to done here. Which was to get the cell keys.

I grabbed the cell keys and opened the cell where both of Zen’s parents were kept in. We brought her parents outside of the dungeon safely. I’m not sure what really happened but I let Zen talk with her parents on her own while I was watching over them from a distance. From what I can tell, she looked very confident when she was talking back to her parents. I hope everything will be okay for her.

I waited for a while until suddenly, I heard her parents voice started to rise to a certain level where it sounded very uncomfortable for me. I didn’t know how I hold it on but I actually managed to hold on the uncomfortable scene. I wanted to intervene but then I realised that getting me involved will only get things even more complicated. I think it was better for me to just wait it out. After all of that ‘nonsense’ happened, Zen walked toward me. But she didn’t stop in front of me, she kept on walking…

“Is something wrong, Zen?”

She ignored me. She doesn’t say a single word at all. She kept on walking and walking somewhere. After walking for a while through the town, I saw Hosuke was resting on a bench. He looked very tired. Probably after all of that distraction he made just for us.

“Yo, White! Is everything settled?” Hosuke approached me while Zen just went and passed him. “Is something wrong with her?”

“Mission accomplished but…not the way you and I expected. It was probably how the story worked, I think.”

“So what’s next then?”

“If I’m not wrong then…”

Zen stopped her legs and turned back at us and said, “It’s alright, guys. My parents are safe now. Thanks a lot for helping me. You guys can go now. Thank you.”

Zen bowed and left us. Hosuke tried to stop her but I prevented him.

“Let her be…We’ll watch from a distance like we did earlier…we’re just an observer anyway…”

Hosuke reluctantly said, “Fine…let’s end this story at once and secure our true goal.”

“And that is to find the book that our teacher requested.”

“I wonder how the story ends…”

“How the story ends…?” I began to remember what our teacher told about the story's ending.

That was when I finally realise one thing. She’s about to die soon! I don’t know when but it will be the next event that will unfold based on what Mrs. R told us. I told Hosuke about it and we decided to prevent that from happening. Unfortunately, the moment when we were about to give chase, Zen was already gone. She probably went out of the city already. We figured that and decided to search for her outside the city.

Even though there was no blizzard at all, we still couldn’t find her. The fact was probably because she was wearing a cloth that was well camouflage with the snow environment. Did she think this through or something? We decided to try to go back to her house and find out if Astral knows about her.

Meanwhile, far away from us. A little girl in white was slowly walking through the snowy mountains. After walking for a while, she stopped and looked up. She saw the bird that she saved earlier. The bird flies around her. The little girl made another step forward and begins to cry. Her mouth was moving as if she was saying something. Her tears start to fall down her cheeks as she said that.

“Thank you…” the girl released a faint voice and took another step forward.

Not a single footstep was heard but it was already too late for anyone. The girl was gone for good. It was then was when the bird decided to make the blizzard return. The whole land returned to how it was back before Zen healed the bird. At the end, two figure was standing from a distance as they watched the bird was screeching something. As the bird was screeching, the bird begins to morph its body into something completely different…the bird was glowing sparkly in blueish white.

One of the two figures opened their mask and it was revealed to be me. to which then I said, “That’s the Snow Phoenix…Let’s get this over with…”

TO BE CONTINUED