141: A Hidden Return Back To Work

Nyssa, and the others, the next day, presented a summary of their mission to Alara—just for practice. Sure, she had also been there, but with the presentation, they got some critique for the inevitable bureaucratic side of the work that’d come in the future.

Once done, Gideon guided the students back to their dorms, where they began packing. Getting ready to move out, and return to campus. An afternoon of packing later, and they dragged their luggage out to the bus stop.

As the bus came rolling up to the stop, Nyssa turned to Gideon and transformed into a bear. “Bear hug!”

“Bear hug!” Gideon smiled, transforming into a bear of his own and returning the gesture. After squeezing Nyssa close for a couple of seconds, he set her down and patted her on the head. “Stay safe, okay? There will probably be a lot of chaos soon. It was nice to see you after these couple years though. You’ve grown up splendidly. Keep working hard.”

Bobbing her head up and down, Nyssa flashed Gideon a brilliant smile before getting on the bus. “You too! And come visit soon!”

---

As the students left, Alara—who had wished to see off the students, especially the girl she had seen grow up—had rushed off after a pure-white notification had appeared on her phone.

The Wildheart Sentinels, as one of the top guilds, had a number of secret facilities buried underground. Hidden from the general populace, but still registered with the Hunter’s Association. In one such underground facility, a beat up man sat tied up to a chair. His chair sat in an isolation room, with one wall being a large window. Illuminated by blinding white lights, he stared off into space with an empty gaze.

A handful of people stood on the other side of the window, shrouded in darkness. Alara took notes on a floating keyboard while listening to the facility’s experts narrate their results to Roxanne and Angelica. Roxanne stood while wrapping her arms around Angelica’s waist from behind. Nodding along, she turned to look at the still dead-eyed man in the room.

Half his body had been replaced by cybernetics. After a careful sweep over, the team in the facility had disabled all the tracking, recording, and broadcasting devices. Then, instead of disabling the weapons system, they instead just ripped it out to study. Left only with basic life support systems, the man had begun readily opening up after just a few more pokes and prods.

“So, pretty much they’re planning a worldwide incitement of insanity among the monsters. Then, a destabilization of society with the integration of technology—that they can then take over remotely. With the weakened society, I believe they plan to just take over as much as they can,” The expert tapped his glasses as he read off a clipboard.

“... Interesting,” Roxanne nodded with a solemn expression. She nudged Angelica with her chin. “Thoughts? I brought you because you’re by far the best at strategy. You blew everyone out of the water back in school, so can I harness that brain of yours?”

“Sure, sure...” Angelica nodded with an exasperated chuckle. Trying to raise her hands, she put them back at her sides when they began tremoring. “If you all can get the headquarters out of this guy, I think the best plan would just be to just assemble a multi-national strike force of S-Rank Hunters and Heroes.”

Before Roxanne could squeeze in a “Well, obviously, but continue,” Angelica kept speaking. “There is some nuance here though. As a lot of the information given could be a decoy. Especially the location he gives could be a branch location. In a situation like this, we want to be the ones with initiative, and a failed strike would hand it over to them. Think of it like chess. Because then we’d have revealed the capability, and health, of a powerful piece like Roxanne."

“Mnn... I agree,” Alara nodded, still typing on the floating keyboard to note down the conversation. “What else?”

Before Angelica could continue though, the ‘information-extracting’ expert, seeing his role come to an end, gave a half-bow before moving towards the door. “I shall take my leave here. I’ll let you all know if I find out any other pertinent information.”

“Thank you,” Roxanne thanked before gesturing towards the door. “Let’s take this conversation to a conference room. I don’t want Angelica to stand for this long.”

“I’ll be fine,” Angelica shrugged. Yet, she still acquiesced as Roxanne dragged her forward by the hand. Waving towards where she thought Alara was, she flashed an apologetic smile.

“Your legs are literally shaking.” Roxanne looked Angelica up and down. “... And you’re still injured. And you’re still blind. Is your blindfold still on?”

“Yes, yes, it is,” Angelica reassured, adjusting her blindfold to show Roxanne. “Come on, let’s go, we can talk more about me later at home. There are others here right now.”

The ‘others’—Alara and the ‘information-extracting’ expert still by the door—just gave each other a deadpan look. Making eye contact, they seemed to share the same thought for just a second. Two kindred spirits in different professions.

My fellow third-wheel.

Alara’s third-wheeling though, only intensified. The moment the expert left the room, Roxanne swept Angelica up into a princess-carry. Ignoring Angelica’s protesting yelp, she resisted the urge to kiss her before marching off towards the conference room. “This is what you get for refusing the wheelchair earlier.”

“But there are people! Be reasonable, Roxanne!” Angelica tried to spin out of the hold, only to feel the strength disappear as she tried to force her body to move. “... okay, fine...”

“You just tried to escape, didn’t you,” Roxanne whispered, quiet enough so Alara wouldn’t hear—who, out of consideration for her boss, had chosen to walk far ahead of them. “I’m not even holding tightly, what happened?”

“... The strength just disappeared as it traveled down my body,” Angelica mumbled. “I think I was standing for too long...”

“Babe...” Roxanne looked down with a concerned look as Angelica buried her face into her shoulder.

“I just want to be healthy again...” Angelica sighed, a slight quiver entering her voice. “Why is it healing so slowly? I don’t want to constantly have you taking care of me.”

“Well, as long as it’s healing, that’s what matters,” Roxanne let out a sigh of relief. “And, I, for one, would be happy to take care of you for the rest of my life. These past few months have been a great shift from before, where you used to take care of me.”

“Yeah, but I don’t want to be useless...” Angelica grumbled. “Thank you though...”

“Plus,” Roxanne leaned into Angelica’s ear, lowering her voice down to a whisper. “There are certain times where I do enjoy your weakness.”

“I TAKE IT BACK! Roxanne! You, scoundrel! How can you say that!” Angelica weakly pushed Roxanne away, only to fix her expression as Alara looked back in concern. “No, no, it’s fine. Don’t worry. Just Roxanne being difficult.”