The Earth After Rebirth

"What do you mean? I don't feel anything!"

Jorge hadn't finished his thought process when tendrils came shooting from the darkness. When Kiro inspected them closer, they were tree roots.

The forest was alive and didn't like that they causing havoc within its body, so it was attacking the ones who disturbed the peace.

Kiro felt a vibration coming from behind him, when he turned to look it was just Felix. His excitement couldn't be contained.

These things attacked the same way he did, before the tendrils could knock anyone out, he threw his scepter, it turned into a chain as he did. It didn't wrap around that, it cut them in half.

A few arrows zoomed, hitting a few roots that had almost reached the healers. Ishaan quickly summoned his force shield once again, before heading to where the battle was.

His sword cut through them like a hot knife through butter. He had gained a legendary sword from Hiro, even though he felt less since his comrades were all guardians, he held up his own.

Kiro sat this one out and watched, as Felix wrecked havoc through the forest. He wasn't underestimating the monster, he was just watching the fun Felix was having. He wondered why he had chosen priesthood when he clearly enjoyed cutting things up so much.

Felix had a crazed smile on his face, as the root hit him across the face. He didn't flinch, he grabbed the root instead, pulling it from its tree completely.

A sharp terrible noise sounded all around the forest, it hadn't cried when they were cutting it, but pulling from the root gave it a pain it had never felt before.

Now the forest ground was slightly shaking, it threatened to swallow them whole but no crack ever appeared, Kiro was very ready, he'd been in a similar situation before. He reckoned they should be ready in case a harbinger showed itself during the wars.

"Felix, I get your excitement, but that's a bit dangerous. We don't want to be swallowed by the earth now." Kiro commanded from the back.

Felix heard but didn't give a sign of confirmation that he'd heard him. He obliged and didn't do it again nonetheless, remembering how the harbinger that almost killed his leader appeared.

The roots became fewer as the minutes ticked by. The forest was slowly realising that, it couldn't do much against this group, so it was slowly retreating.

The forest was designed to attack players too, there were stages, each stage was more stronger than the last, but there was fortunately time before it could attack the same team again. This time, only Felix and Ishaan from After Dark fought.

The rest stopped fighting when they saw their leader wasn't taking the roots all that serious. So Felix was in a way, leading the attack.

"That was awfully easy? I want to fight on the next one too." He proclaimed.

Kiro knew better than to stop him, he'd let him do what he wants but if they die because he couldn't heal them, he'd give him hell for that.

"Fight, knowing that your first priority is healing us. You'll be in serious trouble if we fail this Felix." Kiro told him seriously.

He nodded in agreement, "I'll take care of myself I know my limits, I promise we won't fail this."

Kiro decided to believe in him, he wanted to be a leader but not an overbearing one. His comrades could have all the freedom, as long as they knew their priorities.

Chasing Madness on the other hand was all banged up but they survived nonetheless without the help of healers. They celebrated, After Dark didn't see the need to, they were too used to fighting and this monster wasn't all that strong. It only took two of their members with the help of the others to take it down.

"Well then, let's go, we can't wait around here." Kiro told them.

"I mean, can't we rest up a bit? There's no time limit on this survival quest." Jorge suggested.

He'd forgotten that they weren't on par with them, so they'd be tired from fighting the tiger and the tree roots.

"Okay, rest up for only an hour. After that we leave."

Jorge was thankful for Kiro's consideration. Their healers quickly took some potions to replenish their mana.

Chasing Madness was feeling a little confident that with this alliance they could actually win the guild wars. The way they fought wasn't anything they'd seen, of course they've watched the videos online but seeing it upclose was another matter entirely.

Jorge was checking his guild mates one by one to ensure that they were fine. He didn't prioritise himself although he was a bit injured himself. Kiro admired that, he understood now why his guild grew the way it did. He cared for his people, that was a rare and beautiful thing, especially with the society they grew up in.

"What's the news on the sanctum?" Nikolai whispered.

They were standing a but further away from their allies so it was safe to whisper amongst themselves.

Hiro looked to Kiro, he already knew everything but wasn't sure if they should share the raw details with the rest either.

"There's something, a lead. I can't say where we got it from, but there's a hidden area uncounted for." Kiro whispered back.

"And?"

"That's where they take those they abduct, we know the location and how they get transported there. The problem is reaching it."

"Is that why you had Wilfred give us that hell training?"

"Yes."

Nikolai had a dangerous and excited look in his eyes. He couldn't believe, after so many years there was finally a direction, not just a direction, an entire location to expose and possibly fight the upper echelons of their society.

"Is this information trustworthy?" Ishaan whispered.

This whole ordeal had been eating at him since he found out, he wanted it all to be over. He wanted to stop his father from committing any more crimes.

He knew that, once everything was out in the open, the possibly that he would get ostracised was great. Just by mere affiliation, this would surely dirty his surname. He was set to live a cursed life, that's what he surmised. But even then, he was willing to see it through.

Being a social pariah wouldn't be much compared to those who have suffered under the hands of the sanctum.

"It's trustworthy, but it's also really old information. So there could be changes here and there."

"How old?" Nikolai enquired.

"About 10 years..."

"Your grandfather then?"

Nikolai figured it out so easily. Kiro had told them about his grandfather and his disappearance, Nikolai always suspected the sanctum had everything to do with it.

But with this, his suspicion was now certainty. If he had so much information about them and they found out, of course they'd want him to dissappear.

Kiro simply nodded to his question. There wouldn't be a point of lying now when he'd figured out so easily, he never took Nikolai for a thinker. But he was proven wrong here.

"Your grandfather sure was an amazing man." He complimented.

He couldn't believe that he managed to gather all this, knew they were after him and found ways to get the information to the next generation that cared enough to put a stop to this.

"You guys, how are we to get there?" Ishaan asked.

"Let's focus on training for now, I know what you'll be thinking 'but we know their hideout' so what if we do? We're just a couple of kids, who aren't immune to laser guns. Surely the security is tight over there." Kiro explained to them why he didn't want to act immediately.

They understood, they had to be ready in every way possible in order to take down an entire society that hid deep within their society.

"Sh*t, we shouldn't have entered the guild wars then. An entire weekend will be wasted, we could be training as we speak." Ishaan was erratic when it came to this topic.

"Patience is good." Nikolai told him.

He had experience. After all, he waited for years just to escape the estate that held him as a slave. He could attest, he knew exactly what he was talking about, patience would never fail them. That was his belief.

"Nikolai is right." Felix chimed in.

Ishaan was bummed but he agreed to be patient with them. After he'd heard about the sanctum, he started snooping around his estate looking for clues. Either his father was very good at hiding things or the proof wasn't hidden on their estate.

Kiro felt relieved that they didn't feel betrayed that he chose not to tell them right away and when he decided to, he didn't give them everything. They understood that secret information shouldn't be shared so easily, in case one of them ended up like Kiro's grandfather.

Kiro walked away and went to Chasing Madness, "well then, are you guys ready? An hour is up."

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