Secret Tunnel

After walking for almost 5 hours straight, the Zen stumbled on a rock and collapsed on the floor.

Losing his support, Arvell fell facefirst as well.

Lifting his face off of the ground he spat out some dirt.

"Couldn't you have put me down a little more gently?"

"Hah hah- Sorry, " Zen panted. "It's not like I can watch where I'm going"

He fell on his back as well and joined Arvell on the floor.

Zen lamented the fact that he couldn't see anything in the cave.

Keeping his eyes open or closed was essentially the same.

It was far too dark to even see anything.

Arvell sighed and reached into his inventory.

He didn't bother hiding it with his bag since it wasn't like Zen could see either way.

Pulling out a large stick with an oil-soaked rag attached, he used his sword to shave off a portion of the bottom of said stick.

Gathering all of the wood shavings on the ground, he walked around for a little bit before gathering some stones.

Using his extremely fast and powerful body he quickly struck the two stones together, and let some of the sparks fall onto the woodshavings.

A flame roared to life, illuminating their surroundings.

Not expecting the sudden light source, Zen cringed and looked away.

His eyes had grown adjusted to the cave's pitch-black darkness, so the sudden bright light completely disoriented him.

Before the flame could go out, Arvell let the oil-soaked rag on the stick catch fire.

'Let there be light!' Lykos dramatically announced.

Arvell gave him a scrutinizing glance.

'Why do you care so much about the theatrics? Did you get so bored that you'd find anything interesting?'

Lykos's smile twitched, as a bead of sweat ran down his face.

However, he refused to give in to a 'mere kid's' provocation.

He snorted and turned away.

'It's better than being boring as you.'

Arvell smirked.

'I sometimes forget who the kid is in our relationship.'

Lykos turned towards Arvell with an equally provocative smile.

'This is coming from the person who is gullible enough to strike a pose while stopping time.'

Veins bulged on Arvell's forehead.

'That was five months ago… Plus I had no other option. You were the only one who could teach me.'

Lykos inched towards Arvell's face with his smile growing wider by the second.

'Doesn't change the fact that you fell for it~'

Arvell tried to slap him away, but his hand went through Lykos's face as if it was never there.

Knowing the futility of his actions, he sighed and gave up.

Despite knowing that nothing good ever came from trying to pick a fight with Lykos, he couldn't just take being insulted.

Even if Lykos didn't instigate it, Arvell still owed him a great debt.

Any opportunity to get back at Lykos he would gladly take it.

However, Arvell never wanted to actually cause real harm to Lykos.

Arvell was too grateful for everything Lykos had done for him to do anything that would betray him.

It was mostly to keep his childish pride.

Deciding to distract himself from Lykos, Arvell passed the torch over to Zen.

"Here use this. We need to keep moving otherwise the beasts might catch up to us."

"Do you still think they are coming? We haven't heard anything in quite a long time."

Arvell grimly shook his head.

"There is no way they would give up prey that easily. They probably got lost looking for us."

Hearing Arvell's analyses Zen was originally distraught, but after hearing that the beasts probably got lost, hope returned to his eyes.

"Isn't that good? If they got lost, we don't need to worry about them anymore."

The tunnel they entered was a labyrinth in its own right.

It was full of dead ends and misdirecting passageways.

The only reason they got through the tunnel relatively unscathed was due to Zen vividly memorizing the pathway in case he managed to escape from the bandits.

This secret passageway was his ticket back home.

He would tell Arvell the directions, while Arvell would look for the correct pathway with his night vision.

"How much longer do we have left Zen?"

Arvell still feeling weak from using his god-slaying swordsmanship earlier leaned back on Zen's shoulder.

Zen grunted under the increased weight but resumed walking forward without a complaint.

"I'd say another 4 more hours of walking. We are more than halfway there."

"Let's get going then."

***

VISPIA COUNTRY NORTHERN BORDER

A young man and woman slogged their way through a jungle.

However, unlike normal jungles that were covered in lush green leaves, this forest was dyed red.

Blood red.

Corpses and limbs decorated the local flora, making it look like a jungle straight out of hell.

Nearby beasts were feasting on the corpses, greedily devouring any flesh they could find.

Luckily for them, there was plenty for everyone.

A snake that was in the process of digesting a corpse whole hissed at the people as a form of intimidation.

However, the two didn't seem to particularly care.

Their weariness was apparent on both of their faces, while they desperately gasped for air.

The two of them were covered in cuts and injuries, however, none of them appeared to be too serious.

Nothing a healer couldn't fix.

The man was holding a small sack that seemed to be drenched in blood.

The two of them continued their journey in relative silence, both being too tired to speak.

However, despite being tired and weary, both of them had triumphant smiles.

As the two of them neared a clearing, they heard a man's shout and the sound of an alarm.

The man's smile contorted into a slight frown and sighed as if he found the entire thing a pain.

The two of them were greeted by an army of mages who had covered the sky with a barrage of spells.

No doubt to 'greet' the two of them.

However, upon seeing the man and woman, the entire army froze.

The army's bloodlust and steeled gazes vanished into thin air, as they all held reverent expressions on their faces.

A man broke off from the rest of the others and ran up to greet them.

"Your royal highnesses! Was the mission a success?"

The young man flashed a confident grin as he dropped the bloodsoaked bag in his hand.

As the bag hit the floor, a light yellow ball-shaped object with red stains rolled out onto the floor.

The man from the army curiously picked the object up before looking at his hands with a look of fear.

The light yellow 'ball' was no ball...

It was a decapitated head.

The decapitated head seemed to belong to handsome youth.

However, the youth's ears were slightly longer and pointed.

The man gave it a scrutinizing look over before taking in a deep breath.

"The mission was a success! All hail the royal twins!"

The surrounding men raised their hands triumphantly and cheered.

"All hail the royal twins!"

"All hail the royal twins!"

"All hail the royal twins!"

The young man turned to his twin sister and gave her a toothy grin.

"We finally finished our mission! I still can't believe it took us six months!"

The young woman nodded her head.

"I'm surprised as well. It took us far longer than it should have."

The young man clicked his tongue in annoyance.

"If it wasn't for this bastard hiding like a turtle while using his men as a pawn, it wouldn't have taken this long. It was supposed to have taken a few weeks, maybe one month max."

"Yeah, it's a shame. We missed our dear little brother's birthday… I even promised him I would buy him a special gift to honour his first day of being a mage. A gift that he would love so much, that he would admit on the spot that he loves me the most."

The young man looked at his sister with a competitive gaze.

"Hmph, I know we are twins, but do we need to always be thinking the same thing? Anyways, we both know that he likes me more than you."

"Keep dreaming!"

The young man and his sister were staring so intently at each other, that the nearby soldiers could have sworn they saw sparks fly from their heated gazes.

The young man shrugged.

"I guess we will find out when he sees them! I just hope he won't be too mad at us for bringing it late."

The young woman smiled with a victorious expression.

"Arv's not that kind of boy. This just goes to show how much you know about him, Tristan. You even have the gall to claim that he loves you the most?"

The young man clicked his tongue in frustration.

His sister got him good.

He turned around and started walking to the army camp settlement.

"Come on Alecia, let's get going. We kept him waiting long enough."

The young girl gave up trying to gloat to her twin and simply nodded

"Sister Cornelia got to keep him all to herself long enough."

'Wait just a bit longer Arvell, we are coming back for you!' The two of them simultaneously thought.

Even for being twins, the pair were far too in sync with each other.