Thyone

Back in the cavern:

A young girl with beautiful brown and purple hair knelt on the ground, her chest heaving as she fought to catch her breath. Her body was covered in numerous deep cuts and she was bleeding profusely. Surrounding her were several cloaked figures, and a couple were on the ground passed out from losing too much blood. It was clear she put up much of a fight against these people, but in the end, she was still outnumbered.

The competitive part of Aquila wanted to get up. It wanted her to keep fighting, to keep going on. But she knew her body couldn't keep up if she did. It was taking every fiber of her being to stop her wounds from bleeding out anymore. Fighting in this state and still outnumbered by her enemies would definitely result in her loss.

Just then, the several people standing around her looked in one particular direction and then gave a small bow, addressing the person coming over as Fourth Young Master Thyone.

Looking up, Aquila saw that it was a handsome young man with blue hair and silver eyes similar to hers that came over. It was the young man from the large group of cultivators that she had run into earlier before she reached Greenwood City. However, at that time, Aquila really was not focusing on the cultivators' appearances while dodging for her life, so she didn't recognize him now.

"Is this the imposter?" Thyone asked.

"Yes, it is, Fourth Young Master." One of the cloaked men replied.

Thyone smirked. Honestly, with his looks, he could have sent several girls squealing at the sight of him, especially him smirking. But alas, that wasn't happening today. The two females among the group of cloaked assassins surrounding Aquila couldn't care less, and Aquila herself was too busy putting the pieces all together to notice how attractive he was. Not that she would care even if she wasn't focused on other things.

"Alright. Take her back with us." Thyone ordered before turning around and walking away.

The group of assassins looked at Aquila in disdain, and two of them held up arms as they started dragging her along after Thyone.

'Uhm, no. We're not going all the way wherever we're going like this.' Aquila thought to herself as she mustered up some strength to throw the two assassins off her. Before they could attack her again, she snarled, "I can walk on my own," before glaring at them coldly. Looking at one another, the assassins shrugged at each other before walking closer to her to prevent her from escaping. One of them standing behind her took out two daggers and brought them to her neck, threatening to decapitate her if she tried anything.

Aquila glanced down at the two daggers pointed at her throat and smiled to herself. 'Now this is child's play.' Being outnumbered in a fight, especially in a world with different gravity strengths than what she was used to was an issue. Being surrounded by idle people with only one person with their weapons out and ready and pointed at her was a different case.

However, she was interested to see what would happen so she chose to play along. Besides, she figured she couldn't run away from these people forever. It would be better to face this issue now than later, especially after she realized how persistent they were in capturing her.

Thyone rejoined with his three older brothers. Themisto was the eldest brother, Thelxinoe was the second eldest, and Taygete was the third eldest. The three of them also had mixes between brown, blue, and purple hair. But the difference was that the three of them had dark blue irises, whereas Thyone and Aquila had silver irises.

The three brothers only casually took a glance at Aquila before looking away. However, they were curious about why someone would pretend to be their darling little sister. What was it that they wanted? Especially because they didn't even bother acting anything like their sister.

'Well, I guess we'll find out soon enough,' was what all of them collectively thought.

Together along with half of the cultivators present here, they walked towards a large blue portal in the wall on the other end of the cave. The other half stayed, wanting to know what it was that caused them to get thrown out of the sea earlier. As Aquila stepped through the portal and appeared on the outside under the dawn-breaking sky, she easily noticed a certain cloaked man among the crowd. This cloaked man was glaring daggers at her at this very moment. It was like he held some deep hatred for her, and Aquila didn't know why.

He walked towards her and approached her after greeting the four young masters of the Silvermoon family. He didn't say a word either, only staring down at her. If looks could kill, he probably would have killed her ten times over.

Aquila pursed her lips and only stared back at him. 'A battle of wits? Sure, I won't back down. It's not like being surrounded by so many assassins is nerve-racking anyway,' was what she thought. How would the assassins have felt if only they knew what this girl trapped between them thought of them?

Between these two, neither was willing to back down. The man had already felt thoroughly embarrassed by the girl, and would in no way let her win this staring contest. The girl was just bored and found this entertaining. Besides, she could feel that this man hated her to the core and she wanted to play with him for a bit. Feeling the icy atmosphere resulting from these two staring daggers at the other, the other assassins couldn't help coughing to get their attention.

Well, it didn't work anyway as the two simply continued staring at the other. It didn't affect their journey anyway as the man could travel flawlessly without even looking at the path, and the same went for the girl. They seemed to have eyes on the sides of their heads because they both easily dodged all the bumps or obstacles on the road without even looking to see it was there. Truthfully, it was pretty entertaining for the assassins, but they were also surprised at how both seemed to cancel the other out in terms of mental strength. The expected result was naturally that Aquila would falter under his intense gaze, but the reality of the situation was that... she seemed rather laid-back as if this was just a normal casual stroll through a park.

But no! She was currently surrounded by several assassins, there were two daggers pointed at her throat as she walked, and she was staring at the country's best assassin! It was simply inconceivable.