Finding my Parents in Another World-Chapter 65: (Zack) A New Odania
The hall of the tyrant was silent for the longest time. None of the remaining three moved. Isadora was on her knees, her father’s body sprawled out in front of her. The sword sticking out from his chest resulted in a pool of blood which was rapidly spreading.
Pende and Zack stood a distance away, both of them unsure of whether too approach. The battle hardened Chianti Hunter was the first to move. Even though he had wanted to help Isadora in the battle moments ago, this time he didn’t pay any attention to her. Instead he moved, slowly and methodically, towards the half-broken throne of her father. At the top of the throne, half hidden in the golds and gems was a key.
Pende carefully extracted the key, and examined it closely. Zack couldn’t see much of the object but he could see a shining 5 inscribed in the middle of it. There were also other inscriptions dotted over the key, but Zack couldn’t read what those were.
Having examined it to his heart’s content, Pende gave a short nod and pocketed the key.
"That’s what we were looking for?" Zack asked.
Pende nodded affirmatively. "The fifth key of the library."
"So just need to find the other four then."
Zack was interrupted by the sound of short sobs coming from beside him. Looking over he saw a face that he never would have expected to see on the vigilante known as Poison Bloom. Isadora’s face streaked with tears, and even though her face was scrunched up it was clear that she was trying her best not to devolved into a full bawl. Zack had never expected the maniac who killed soldiers cheerfully, to ever display such a vulnerable face of pure, unadulterated grief.
Not even when they had just killed their father.
Pende walked up gravely to Isadora. "Mayor, you need to show a strong front. Especially after strangers assassinated your father." He said in a formal tone.
Isadora looked up at Pende, her face a mask of bitterness. "Not Mayor yet, Chianti Hunter. With my father dead, there will be no more monarchical Mayors in Odania. We will have a true democratic process, like in our neighbors.
We will have true and fair elections."
"Good luck with that. Odania’s problems are far deeper than a single tyrant. I suspect you know that the best yourself." Although his words were harsh, Zack saw Pende’s expression was soft and sympathetic.
Isadora sniffed and nodded. Even now she refused to cry, even as tears continued to stream down relentlessly from her eyes. "You should leave. My father had requested reinforcements from the Crown. An Emperor Knight will be here soon."
"What about you?" Zack asked, prompting Isadora to smile after a long time.
"I will be fine. After all there were a couple of strangers who broke in the palace, annihilated the entire guard and then killed my father. I am in utter shock and grief." She said, still with a smile.
"Three. Don’t forget the maniac on the wind outside." Pende said, his face also widening in a smile. Having retrieved the key, he seemed to be in a much lighter mood.
"Three." Isadora agreed, and then looked down. Her father’s head was on her lap, and she cradled it almost with love.
Pende and Zack stood there for a while longer, and then they left, running back through the path they had come. Leaving behind a daughter grieving for the death of her father.
.XX.
They found Enea outside, leaning against a pillar amidst a dozen corpses of soldiers. She had an injury to her head, but most of the blood on her seemed to be from the surrounding soldiers. Isadora had been right, her wound wasn’t fatal, but it was still enough to render the girl unconscious. Pende bent down and picked her up on her shoulders.
"Will she be alright?"
"Don’t worry. This injury is not enough to kill a Chianti Hunter. More importantly...." Pende looked off towards the gate of the town. In the far distance, Zack saw what appeared to be a dust cloud, heading extremely fast in their direction.
"Is that...?"
Pende nodded. "The Emperor Knight is here. We should hurry."
Zack nodded and then the two of them began running. They left through the same path they had taken when infiltrating, through the annexe rather than the main gate.
Once they were outside the palace, Pende ran into one of the bushes for cover, and then began undressing the unconscious Enea.
"What the hell are you doing?" Zack asked, horrified and flustered.
"Don’t worry old man. With Enea’s bloody clothes, there ain’t no way we will be able to exit the town. I am just replacing her clothes is all."
Pende worked quickly, rapidly exchanging Enea’s blood-soaked clothes with one’s from a backpack he had hidden in the forest. Within minutes, she looked like a young child unconscious from some fever, rather than a battle hardened maniac injured in a massacre. Pende quickly picked her up, and carried her on his shoulders then nodded towards Zack, the signal clear.
The two of them then began walking rather than running as they entered into the town proper. There had been extreme commotion, especially during the dispatching of the palace guard, which had caused a crowd of people on the streets looking and moving towards the palace of the tyrant.
Pende and Zack ignored the movements of the crowd and tried to push through themselves on the opposite side.
"Ill child coming through, please make way." Pende said, in a vain attempt to ensure the crowd in front of them gave them space. A couple of them did move away, but in an instant they were replaced by five more, moving inexorably towards the palace.
Pende cursed under his breath, but there was nothing he could do. Zack shared the feeling, the more time they wasted moving through the crowd, the more chance of them coming face to face with the Emperor Knight.
"Quite an annoying crowd no?" A voice floated over to Zack.
Zack looked over to see a young woman by his side, looking over towards the palace as well. She looked like some form of nobility, with a certain grace to her movements. She had extremely long red hair, which now had been tied up so as to not get trampled by the immense crowd.
"Something must have happened in that Mayor’s palace." She continued, looking at Zack with a smile.
Zack smiled back nervously. "Yeah I guess so."
"You two have any idea what?"
"What?"
"You two know anything? You are the only ones moving against the crowd."
"Oh n-no. We are just trying to get some medical help for our friend here." Zack stammered out pointing to Enea on Pende’s shoulders.
Pende noticed the girl beside Zack for the first time. For an instant, a brief instant, an expression of fear passed over Pende’s face. But it was instantly replaced by nonchalance.
"If not for this crowd, we could get her to the hospital much sooner."
"Oh I see. Yeah shame about the crowd." The woman said. She still walked side by side to Zack though as she asked, "What is wrong with her by the way?"
"Oh she fell down."
"Ah I see. She fell down on a sword?"
"Pardon?"
"The injury on her forehead. Seems like a slash of a sword to me."
"Oh no, that is a previous injury. She loves practising swordsmanship, and she got that scar in a training session."
"Oh." The woman stayed silent. Zack wasn’t sure whether Pende’s explanation had satisfied her or not. Her expression was unreadable.
"Oh well, I better be on my way then. Hope you people get to the hospital on time." The woman said, smiled and she was off in an instant. Zack was so taken aback by her sudden disappearance that he almost fell back in shock, and probably would have been sprawled out on the ground if not for Pende catching him. The latter was looking gravely behind him. Zack followed his look to see the woman lithely moving through the crowd with insane speed, zipping in between the people.
"Wha-who is that?" Zack asked, feeling like Pende knew the answer.
And he did.
"The Emperor Knight Vermillion of the Coin. She is comparatively a newer Emperor Knight, but extremely strong. To think she was the backup the Crown sent."
A chill ran down Zack’s back. He looked back once more. He could no longer see the red haired girl.
"We got lucky." He whispered.
"We won’t be lucky for long if she finds us again."
"We can’t beat her?"
"In this state? Absolutely not. Even at our best, beating her would require extreme pain from our side. Her magik is pretty well suited to being damaging." Pende said distastefully.
Zack felt another shiver run down his back. "We should move fast then. I think she’s going to realise it is us when Isadora tells her about the two strangers who killed her father and the General."
"That’s if she believes Isadora in the first place." Pende said gravely and started running, faster than before towards the gate of Odania.
