A new mission

Chapter 12:

{Ashu POV}

"Yawn! Good morning!" with my sleepy and barely opened eyes, I exited my bedroom and greeted Ray, who was busily cooking our breakfast and washing our dishes.

"Good morning to you too. Good now that you woke up, can you help with these dishes?"

"Sure." I rolled my sleeves, splutter some water on my face and started washing the dishes.

"Where's Cale?" I asked as I threw last nights leftovers from the sink in the dustbin.

"Don't even talk about that rascal."

"How so?"

"He ran away instead of helping, dumping all his trash to me to clean, saying he was going to look for ourselves a new job, as an excuse." Ray gripped the frying pan in his hand, for a second, I felt he would slam it but he didn't because knowing the omelette that was in the frying pan, would get scramble.

"Hey, easy man- no need to burn your face over it, chill."

"Let him come, I swear, I'll force that bastard to wash our dishes!"

"Grab yourself a plate first, breakfast is ready."

"S-Sure…" I washed my hand and picked out a clean plate to eat, Ray passed me the omelette and I took out a packet of bread from the cabinet.

"What about you!?" I asked as I head over the dining table and sat with my plate,

"I already ate a lot of fruits, when I woke up, so, I'm not that hungry."

"Oh!"

"Yo!"

"Good morning, Cale. How was the searching?" I asked as Cale returned and drag the chair from dining table and sat, beside me.

"Put that bread down or else! Clean all the dishes or you won't get any food to eat!!" Said Ray, in an angry voice, warning him, before Cale could picked the food from my plate.

"!!"

"Pss, is he like this all time or what?" he asked as he got up from the chair and head over the sink and started cleaning the utensils.

"So, how was the job searching, found anything?" I asked as I assembled the sandwich and started eating.

"Yeah, I got ourselves a big one." he replied while washing and putting the dishes in the shelf.

"What's the job?"

"Well, we have to protect a government official for a month or so, until he returns to his country."

"Huh? Why a government official needed protection from this type of guild, he could ask for protection from the official guild or the Interpol."

"I don't know all the details but from what bar-lady told me, the country our employer belongs to, is one of the forsaken countries." Said Cale, as he was scrubbing the dishes while Ray sat beside me constantly staring Cale's back.

"Forsaken!? How so?" I asked.

"You see…"

"There are in total 199 countries in world currently, and most of them are either governed by the world nobles or, the king candidates, that are not affiliated with world government." Said Ray.

"Chop-chop, move your hand, we don't have all the time."

"…" Cale looked at me but I avoided any eye contact and turned my head.

"…" Cale stared Ray with intent to kill, but Ray didn't sense anything and stared by at him.

I thought to myself, 'I'm glad, I chose the right path.' Cale turned continued washing the plates.

Ray turned to me and continued "So, where was I? Yeah, other than those two super powers in our world, countries that not under either of them is known as forsaken."

"Therefor, these forsaken nations are isolated from the world and cannot associate with anyone else, you could say, they are abandoned and because of that no help will be available for them."

"But why they don't just join a faction?"

"Balance of power, groups with massive influence and power don't want their competitors to gain more than. So they restrict each other's." Said Ray.

"That's why nitizens of forsaken nation seeks assistance from people or organisation, that are not under the influence of great families or world government."

"Hmm… So, when are we leaving ?" I asked Cale.

"This afternoon, we will meet our employer at the guild." Said Cale.

After eating the breakfast, all three of us freshen ourselves and got ready then we made our way to the guild to meet with our employer.

Upon arriving there, I asked "So, where is he?"

"Let me ask the lady." Cale went to the bar counter, and started talking to the bartender lady, he returned " Table number 3."

While heading there Ray bumped to a man, the man was huge and his whole body shrouded in black cloth. He too was wearing the same white mask as us. He turned to Ray, to which Ray apologized.

He gave node and went on his way, "Man, that guy was huge!"

"You should be careful, people here are quite dangerous, we should avoid attracting any attention."

We got to the table, where our employer was waiting for us.

"Mr Walt." Cale called.

"Ah! Yes, and you are?"

"We were the ones to accept your job posting. Lake Kile, and these two are my companions, Jay Rowan, and Luke Raymond."

"Hello, nice to meet you."

"Like wise, sir." I spoked and Ray gave a polite nod.

"Now that the introduction are done, shall we start discussing about the job?" Said Cale.

"Sure, why not, please have a sit." All three of us sat down, facing our employer, Ray called out the waitress, on her arrival Ray placed an order, asking for four cups of tea.

"Thank you." Said the man, as the waitress offered the tea each of us.

"First of all, I liked to thankyou for accepting the job, you don't know how much it meant to me." Said our employer with a polite tone and a slight head bow, to show how much he was grateful.

"You don't need to thank us, Mr walt. Infact, we need to thankyou for giving us the opportunity." Said Ray.

"So, Mr Walt please tell us more about the job?" Said Cale.

"Ah! Yes, so you might already aware of the what type of job it is from the posting?"

"Yes, you need protection until you reach your country."

"Correct, a secret criminal organisation is after my life, they want to weed me out as soon as possible. So, I want strong people, who assure my safety until I arrive my country." Said the man.

"Okay, but why this organisation is after you, what did you do?" asked Ray.

"You see, I'm the next in line for the presidency of our country, and my political rival is the member of this organisation."

"You see for past few years our country is going through a crisis, because of revolutionary activities that are happening all around my country, due to which our current leader was forced to relinquished his position. One day I happened to hear of a certain organisation is the root "cause for all chaos happening in my nation."

"I secretly started investigation, during my investigation, I found out that the leader of this organisation is none other than… the leader of the reputed Aries family and one of the 9 members of Hemitheos."

" Haqil of the moonless night."

"…"

"!!"

"!?" upon hearing the name of the man, who was after our employer life, all three of had different reaction.

I was silent did not know the man in talking, same goes for the Cale but Ray, well from his sudden change in expression told me he knew the guy we are talking about.

"You know him!?" I asked.

"Well, not personally. You see Haqil Aries, is somewhat of a famous person in our world." Said Ray.

"He's family was the supplier of arms that was used in the recent gray war. His family was the one who supplied weapons to us during our battle because of which he was appointed as the one of the nine hemitheos."

"What are hemitheos?" asked Cale.

"Think of them, as an extremely powerful individuals, that world government allied with. To prevent 15 kings and their great family gain any more power than they already have, just say by allying with these individuals' world nobles maintain certain balance of power and authority." Said Ray, who then took a sip from the cup and then asked our employer.

"But I don't get it!? Why someone as powerful as him need to interfere with the politics of a forsaken country?"

"Have you heard of the kingdom called, Hellnic republic?"

"No, I can't say I have, why?" I repied.

"It was an ancient but one of highly advanced nation that had quite the history with, the towers."

"!!" By hearing the term tower, all our ears stood up straight.

"It used to be a peaceful nation at that too… long ago…"

"Used?" said Ray.

"Yes, now that nation no longer exists in our world, but our country, you could say is the last remnant of that nation."

"But what that got to do with Haqil?"asked Cale.

"Like I said before, the master mind behind all the chaos in my country is Haqil, he is looking for the key or you could say the map of the tower that might be hidden in our country."

"Apparently, it was him who had been instigating the revolutionaries, that all I could find on my investigation. Other than that facts, I don't know anything else nor could I do anything about him."

"I don't know how but he found out that, I know, he is the head of the criminal organisation and the one causing the mayhem in our country and that I'm one of the opposing candidate for the presidency."

"That's why you came to guild for protection." I asked.

"Yes. Even though what I heard may or may not be just a rumours, but I'm quite sure that he is the man behind the everything, that's why I need to return to my country and inform everybody about him and his plans."

"So, in the end his end goal is to take over your kingdom, but I still don't get why, if is that powerful then why go all this much trouble, he could easily take over your country by force." Asked Cale.

"No, he can't, not directly because, if were to do that that he would loose his title as one of the nine hemitheos due breaking the agreement between his and world nobles. Which in turn will put him in the open for an attack." Said Ray.

"If I don't hurry back to my country to put the stop to his ploy, things will go exactly as he planned!"

"I see… that explain why reward was so much." I said.

"Now, that we heard about everything, please can you tell when we will leave for you country?" Asked Cale.

"Now, if you're okay with it. I have an air ship docked at the nearest mooring tower." said our employer.

"We are okay with it but can you give us few more hours, we need pack few of our stuffs that we might in need."

"Sure! And please you can call me Jay, I may not look it but I'm not that old."

"Okay Jay, so we will meet at the mooring tower at 3 o clock, is time good for you?" I asked.

"Absolutely!"

And with that we got ourselves a new job with a pay large enough to by us a small air ship.

Ray, Cale, and I return to our room and started packing.

"It was thing we got ourselves a new high reward job, because with our earnings from the last mission, was about to finish. With rent for this place and few our sutffs, all the money was about to be depleted." I said.

"Yeah…" Said Ray, with a look that was telling he was thinking about something.

"Is something on you mind?" I asked.

"It's about the job, you see this Haqil guy is quite dangerous individual, more so than the lieutenant Lester. We barely got ourselves escape from him, just think about the trouble we might we get ourselves in with him as our enemy." Said Ray.

"Is he that powerful?" I asked.

"Yes… not everybody can acquire the tile of hamitheos, to acquire one, you need to prove the world government that you're powerful enough to pose a imminent threat to them. You need have influence and abilities enough to make the world nobles to think before going against you, that's who are hamitheos are."

"I wonder what kind of a guy he is?" Said Cale.

"Sigh…" Ray didn't say anything and continued packing.

"In any case, with this mission we'll have ourselves enough reward to buy ourselves a air ship for the tower. Like I said before, we can not turn back once we started moving forward. Even if god himself appear Infront of me, saying Ashu turn back, I won't, no matter how strong the enemy standing Infront of me."

"So, worry not, we'll find a way out, if we got ourselves in the danger."

"You might be right…"

To be continued….