Hacking On

The memory would pick up two days later according to Enlil. And this time the memory began with no time for a break, plunging Roko's group right into a situation in the town square.

"Shut up and sharpen those swords!" An armored elven soldier shouted as he stood over a group of dark elves huddled together with whetstones and what seemed like crates of swords and spears, "The entire elven race is going to mobilize and save the world! We need all the weapons sharpened and the armors polished!"

"Shut up!" A dark elf that Roko's group recognized as Marigold snapped as she ground a sword against her whetstone alongside other young dark elves like her, "I'm working as hard as I can!"

"Was that backtalk I hear?!"

"This is ridiculous." Marigold muttered as she lowered her head to avoid the elf soldier looking for whoever made that remark, "I'm supposed to be fighting as well. Why am I stuck doing this?"

Tears of frustration came to the young elf's eyes as she continued her sharpening work.

"Ummm..." Lycoris approached the managing elf with a basket, "I bought some food for the workers to share."

"That right? Put them over there. They'll receive them in a minute."

"But...they've been working since this morning. Can't you give them a break?"

"We need our weapons ASAP! These black elves are meant to support us and that's exactly what I'm making them do!"

"But is it really okay to treat them like this?" Lycoris frowned, "They used to be our friends."

"We're just following the king's orders, kid."

"Did the king really say to do this?"

"Trust me young one." The soldier knelt down and placed a hand on Lycoris' shoulder, "You'll understand one day."

Lycoris didn't respond, the look of displeasement boring a hole in the solder's tough exterior.

"Alright!" The soldier stood up and called out to the working elves, "Five minute break everyone!"

Finally releasing their hands from their weapons the dark elves sat back as they took the moment to finally relax. Lycoris quickly walked around, giving out sandwiches to everyone before she finally arrived next to Marigold.

"Here." Lycoris offered her a sandwich as well, "Are you feeling okay?"

"No!" Marigold replied with a scorn not targeted at Lycoris, "I don't know why we're being forced to do this!"

"It's okay Marigold." Lycoris said soothingly, "We'll find out what happening soon."

"Can you turn me back to normal?" Marigold snarled.

"..." Lycoris looked away, unable to give the answer Marigold was looking for.

"Well?"

"We'll try."

"Pfft." Marigold bit into her sandwich with disdain, "Whatever. I don't care what you do. It's not like someone like you can do anything anyway. I guess...I'm just stuck like this."

Marigold turned her head away slightly, pretending to focus on her sandwich but really hiding the other side of her face from Lycoris as a single bitter tear rolled down from her eye. She did a good job hiding her fear and despair but not enough for Lycoris to not notice the lone tear falling from her hidden cheek. A solemn empathy struck at Lycoris' heart but all she could do was focus it towards what she could do.

"Zinnia?"

"I'm here." Zinnia replied, seeming coming out of the shadows from nowhere, startling Hyacinth and Lycoris enough to have to stifle a scream in the middle of the night, "I see you're all here now."

"You can get us into the core room?" Nasturtium asked.

"Yeah. I already tested opening the entrance, though I haven't gone down yet myself."

"The soldiers can't see us or anything?" Scabius looked around the empty cradle entrance.

"There aren't any patrols if that's what you're asking. What would they patrol against in the elves' own homeland?"

"So...there's no one around to stop us?" Borage asked.

"The king might. He's aware of our activities. Though I don't think he will."

"Are you sure the king hasn't done anything?" Hyacinth asked, "Maybe he changed things in anticipation for our arrival?"

"What could he have possibly changed?" Nasturtium asked, "It's a giant emerald in the roots of the cradle. Even if he did change or remove something we can trace it back. I assume the cradle has an activity record?"

"Kind of. It's not exactly the most detailed record but I'm sure we can retrace any activities in there even without it."

"Alright then." Hyacinth nodded, "Let's go."

With a wave of his hand, Zinnia summoned a screen of magic and after making a few inputs on it, the space around them distorted as they were carried away to a space where the entrance of the core room was open. And with a somber atmosphere squeezing the air dry, the guards plus Lycoris walked down into the room. To a shocking sight.

The moment they stepped into the core's room, the guards all ran deeper in with absolute shock. And Roko's group had a much similar reaction. As they ran into the core room only to find the giant emerald gem completely gone.

"Where's the core?!" Hyacinth and Helena cried out at the same time.

"Wait, the core's gone?!" Nasturtium said, a bit late to the news, "What do you mean the core's gone?!"

"It's...literally just...not here." Scabius spun around over and over again, looking for what should be a very obvious giant green gem.

"That thing's responsible for controlling the existence of all elvenkind!" Nasturtium yelled, "What do you MEAN it's GONE?!"

"It's not here!" Scabius spat back contemptuously, "How many times do we have to tell you?! The whole thing's gone! Even the roots holding the core up is just gone!"

"How is this possible?!" Hyacinth bit her thumb anxiously, "What do we do now?"

"Zinnia! Retrace the records!"

"I can't if the core isn't here."

"Then what do we do?!"

"Over here."

Zinnia's calm voice called the party over to one of the tables. The scattered documents were still there on the tables, showing diagrams of different magical constructs. These designs were naturally too advanced for the humans and too old for the modern dark elves so Roko's party could only wait for the elves of the memories to say anything about them.

"This...isn't what we were installing a few weeks ago was it?" Hyacinth asked.

"Beats me." Scabius shuffled through some papers, "I'm just trying to read whatever I can figure out."

"No." Zinnia answered, "This is different."

"So what is it about?" Nasturtium asked, "Does it say where the core went?"

"Nope. Just diagrams." Hyacinth said.

"There's more in the other tables around here!" Lycoris called from a different table.

"Great! Alright. I guess we'll just have to read through all these documents."

…

"Ahem." Borage coughed, "Is...there anything I can do then?"

"Yeah, I...got nothing either." Scabius scratched his head sheepishly.

"Don't look at me." Nasturtium scoffed, "I'm blind."

"Ahaha..." Hyacinth laughed awkwardly, "I guess we can all gather the documents together in one place."

"I can read them." Lycoris offered as she ran back to the adults' side.

"You can?!" Hyacinth, Borage, Scabius and Nasturtium cried out in surprise.

"I mean...I can try." Lycoris said more shyly this time, "They don't look too different from the documents I was seeing while working with the king and Zinnia."

…

"Never before did I think I'd be bested by a toddler." Borage sniffed.

"I feel so inadequate right now." Scabius gritted his teeth in frustration."

"W-We all have our talents." Hyacinth said with a bit of dejection.

"Imagine losing to a kid." Nasturtium scoffed.

"You can't read them either!" Scabius shouted.

"Yeah. Cause I can't read."

"Oh..."

"Unless some of these are in braille. ARE some of these in braille?"

"Uhhh..."

"Doesn't seem like it." Zinnia said, not looking up from the papers in his hands.

"Well then I guess I'm sitting this one out." Nasturtium's voice dripped with venomous sarcasm, "Unless one you have any other ideas."

"U-Uh...j-just see if you-"

Nasturtium let out a derisive snort.

"I MEAN UH...just watch out for...just loo-...just keep an eye ou-.."

An awkward silence held the elves in place as they struggled to be considerate.

"Just make sure no one interrupts us." Zinnia said without looking up from his sheets.

"T-THAT!" Scabius cried.

"I can do that." Nasturtium said with a self-satisfied smirk.

The remaining three elves ran about the room gathering what documents they could to bring it over to Zinnia and Lycoris. The papers around the duo began to pile up but the two didn't seem to notice much as they were too focused on reading the vast body of work before them. Their faces showed no reaction to anything that they could be reading, good or bad. At least none of which Roko or the remaining guards could tell. All they could do was wait as the two processed the documents. But at least there was something else to hold the elves' time.

"Heads up." Nasturtium called, "We got a platoon coming in."

Even as Nasturtium was warning them, the march of armored soldiers were starting to echo down into the chamber. The remaining royal guards all stood up to meet the incoming interruptions. A series of armored and armed elves marched into the room, filing into a standard formation in front of the royal guards as their leader entered last, taking his time to step up to confront them.

"Well well well..." Their commander said with a sneering disrespect that the king's personal guards had not seen in a long time, "Look who we have here."

"Rhododendron...?" Hyacinth frowned, "Stand down. We're just here to...preform a routine checkup on the core."

"There are no routine check ups on the core." Rhododendron scoffed, "Access to the core is explicitly prohibited by all parties unless necessary. This applies even to the king."

"Things have changed since you were last part of the royal guards, Rhododendron." Scabius called, "I'm sure not even you can deny that."

"Oh surely." Rhododendron smirked, "But that remains no reason to defy tradition."

"You speak of tradition even as the current king plans on rewriting the future of the elves?" Nasturtium replied, "I thought you weren't a fan of the king last I recall."

"Oh, he certainly isn't my king. My king died ages ago. But a soldier is still a soldier and I have direct orders from the king himself to rout the intruders in the core room."

"You're saying the king sent you?" Scabius frowned.

"How else could I have been allowed in?"

"You lie! The king would never trick us like that!"

"You think of yourself too highly Borage." Rhododendron smirked, "Why don't you take a good long look at where your allegiances lie right now?"

"We serve the king." Hyacinth answered, "As we always have. We do this in trust of the king's ways."

"And that means going behind his back in order to investigate his own actions? And then there's the fact that you're aiding those black elves."

"What's wrong with that?!" Hyacinth cried.

"Their change was an intentional creation of the king himself. To try and bring them back to normal is to go against his very vision!"

"What do you know of the king's intentions?!"

"I have my orders. You on the other hand have been hiding and assisting these black elves even without orders from the king."

"What do you have against the black elves?" Scabius frowned.

"It's not what I have against them. It's the fact that they were chosen for the specific purpose of serving us. What reason do I have to go against the king's intention?"

"That's rich coming from someone who was fired from the Hyssop Circle!" Borage cried, "You hated the king more than anyone else!"

"I have my thoughts on your precious king. He's certainly nothing like the king I served under. But a soldier's still a soldier even without his fancy titles and I understand what it means to fight a desperate war. So if it'll end this damned war, I'll follow whoever I want, despite my feelings on them. What's your excuse?"

"Huh?"

"You've been personally selected by the king. Given his trust. What are you doing betraying that right now?"

"W-We're just trying to set things right again!" Hyacinth cried.

"Things ARE right! This IS what things are supposed to be!"

"But it's unfair and unjust!"

"This is the justice you've chosen to follow. This is the people you're chosen to serve and the people you're choosing to betray now! You want all those years of fighting to go to waste?! All your efforts only to end up as traitors?!"

"We're not traitors!"

"Then why are you siding with the black elves?!"

"Because they used to be like us! They weren't given the choice to serve, it was just forced upon them!"

"Since when did any of us get a CHOICE to serve?! We were all drafted into the war the day we were born! You know it, I know it, every elf regardless of age knows it! Hyacinth you yourself were trying to become a caretaker before you were selected to be part of the Hyssop Circle! You should understand it the most! The unfair dichotomy between those who sacrifice themselves for the future and those who raise the next sacrifices for the future! You know how unfair it is because you tried to run away from it all yourself!"

Hyacinth looked down, unable to hide the shaking terror that she was just reminded of.

"Face it, your little rebellion goes against all of elvenkind."

"Rebellion?"

"Do you think what you're doing is for the sake of the king? This was all born from the king's own hands. What good is there in biting his hand now?"

Hyacinth and Borage grimaced, unsure of how to respond to those accusations. With Nasturtium and Scabius remaining silent, the sneer on Rhododendron's face grew more smug.

"When the king makes a mess, it is our job to clean up after him."

All eyes turned to Zinnia who had his eyes still focused on the documents.

"And what greater mess is there than one left after changing the world?"

Zinnia looked up at Rhododendron whose attitude had faltered at their hint of defiance.

"Tch. You only ever speak when its most inconvenient do you?"

"Don't speak as if we're familiar." Zinnia replied as he turned his eyes back to the papers.

"Fine." Rhododendron growled as he held out a hand for one of his soldiers to give him a wooden bo staff, "Then by the kings authority, I'll just have to throw you all out of the core room by force."

"We're not leaving until we're done." Hyacinth summoned her own staff to her side.

"Before we begin." Nasturtium spoke up, "Rhododendron, do you know anything about the missing core?"

"Hmm? Maybe I do, maybe I don't. Perhaps I'll tell you if you beat me."

"That's all the motivation I need." Nasturtium scoffed.

"I don't need a reason to beat this guy's face in." Scabius sneered, "Right, Borage?"

"Yeah!" Borage slammed the tip of his broadsword on the ground, "There will be no mercy for those who stand in our way!"

"Men!" Rhododendron raised his staff, "Charge!"

With an echoing roar, the two forces began their fight as they charged at each other. And then the memory stopped.

"So do you guys just want to skip this?"

"WHAT?!" The majority of the viewing party cried out in an almost offended way.

"I mean, it's just a fight scene." Enlil shrugged, "Not much could possibly happen in the middle of that so I'm just saying we could just skip it."

"Absolutely not!" Momo cried, "The fighting's the best part!"

"I can't say I'm not interested either." Kaguya shrugged.

"I feel like this fight's pretty important." Helena added.

"Alright, I guess every movie's got to have it's mandatory action scene." Enlil sighed, "It's just there's probably going to be a lot more fighting with a lot more importance later on so this is probably the most skippable fight scene. Even if the spirits disagree with me too."

"Enlil, are you feeling tired?" Corissa asked.

"No, I...just need some more tea." Enlil sighed.

"Try some coffee." Roland said smugly.

"Try some these nuts in your mouth."

"WHAT?!"

"These nuts." Enlil said as she munched on what was presumably some nuts, "They're latte flavored. That's kind of like coffee."

"THAT'S NOTHING LIKE COFFEE!"

"Hey, that's what my...friend who like coffee gave me so it's close enough." Enlil yawned, "Anyway, fine, let's just hit play already."

And almost immediately the memory restarted with the two forces finally crashing into each other.