Chapter 246: Frantic escape

‘Percy! They’re here!’

Micky yelled through the cord.

Startled, Percy nearly messed up the rune he was carving on his scythe. It had already been a few hours since he and Nesha woke up, and he’d decided to take advantage of that to reforge his weapons too.

“Wait, you mean you can see them approaching? From the west side?” he asked out loud, for Nesha’s benefit.

Micky sent a mental nod back, causing him to raise an eyebrow.

This was strange

. While they’d split up on purpose, to determine whether the Holy Child was after him and Nesha or something else, he’d always thought the former was more likely.

“Evidently not…” he muttered.

Guessing what he was thinking, Nesha pitched in.

“Do you think he’s chasing after Elaine? She’s pretty, and he’s a teenage boy. Maybe she piqued his fancy?”

Percy couldn’t help but wrinkle his nose at the sound of that.

“Doubt it. If he saw her, he would have made a move right then and there. No point in chasing her across Remior. Besides, how would he track her?”

Nesha shrugged.

“If he’s not after us, and he’s not after Elaine, that only leaves one possibility.”

Both their eyes widened simultaneously, realizing what this meant.

“Micky, you need to get out of there

RIGHT NOW!

” he yelled, forgetting he was still in the inn. Nesha had to cover his mouth.

‘Too late!’

the crow replied.

‘He’s running after me!’

Percy’s heart skipped a beat. This was bad!

Really bad!

Usually, they didn’t think twice about having Micky act as a scout. Nobody would pay much attention to a bird flying several miles away, spying secretly from afar.

Unless they were actively hunting him, of course…

But he couldn’t afford to panic. His familiar’s life depended on him maintaining his composure. Biting his tongue, Percy forced himself to calm down, countless thoughts swirling within his mind. There

had

to be a way out of this.

“Listen to me very carefully.” he said a moment later, this time keeping his voice down. “Your priority is to put some distance from Elaine. Whatever happens, you can’t let them see her with you. Understand?”

Between his two cores and Acceleration, Micky was a great deal faster than Elaine. He should be able to outrun the Holy Child – for a while at least. But the same couldn’t be said about her. If she got spotted,

she was done for

.

‘Understood. Where should I go?’

Percy rubbed the bridge of his nose, trying to come up with a viable plan.

“For now, I want you to circle around the town and lead them back to the same spot.”

Some confusion seeped through the cord, though Micky didn’t question his judgement, eventually sending a mental nod back.

“What’s that going to accomplish?” Nesha asked.

“It’ll buy us time to intercept them. I just hope Elaine realizes she has to meet up with us here.”

Their greatest problem right now was that he had no way to get in touch with his cousin. Not without Micky relaying their messages. Hopefully, she’d understand she wasn’t supposed to follow Micky after seeing him fly away from her. Either way, there was nothing Percy could do about that, other than to trust her.

Not wasting a moment, he grabbed the largest piece of his armour from the pile – the chestguard – putting it on. Catching his drift, Nesha passed him the next piece, along with some reinforced string, helping him fasten it in place.

Overall, the Phantomscale Raiment looked very different than it had against Rambert. Percy had learned a lot from their fight, modifying the spell extensively. To start, many pieces had been reshaped, to give him greater freedom of movement. Some of the surfaces had been made flatter and wider, to let him draw larger runes on them. He'd also moved the holes around a little, to better accommodate the network of strings holding them together, so that his armour would be better at absorbing impacts. Furthermore, he’d added more vents throughout his body, to account for the additional mana leaking out while he used the trollsfury potion.

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Finally, there were the new runes. Other than the self-repair enchantment that had replaced all the preservation runes in the interior of the armour, he had added a lot to the exterior too. The innermost two layers were now engraved with both the hardness and absorption runes. As for the armour’s shell, it now had hardness runes fused together with the concealment runes, making the whole thing far sturdier than ever before.

“Percy… I know you are at your strongest, but I still doubt we can beat a Blue.” Nesha said once they were done, her voice tinged with concern.

“Of course not. And we won’t even try to do that.”

She tilted her head.

“At the end of the day, there’s nothing we can do to stop the Holy Child. Our only option is to have Micky lure him away and ditch him somewhere. But we can make things easier for him, at least.” he elaborated.

“The guards?”

He nodded.

“Powerful as he is, he’s just an impulsive kid. Now that he’s caught sight of his target, I bet he’ll rush ahead, leaving his guards behind. I don’t think they can keep up with him. We’ll wait for him to leave, before ambushing the others outside the town. If we can kill them all, it’ll take some pressure off Micky.”

“That definitely sounds more manageable, but that’s still five Greens we’re talking about. Are you sure we can beat them?” she asked, unconvinced.

“

We

won’t. Me and Elaine will.” Percy replied, grabbing his scythes.

He’d made four of them, though the last one was still missing a few concealment runes.

It would have to do.

Walking towards the door, he turned all his constructs invisible. He’d rather not draw any attention before leaving the town.

“I want to help.” Nesha said, biting her lip.

“Sorry.” he shook his head, closing the door behind him.

He knew it was frustrating for her, but he couldn’t let her join. She was very close to mastering Circulation – she’d already started tempering her channels – but she wasn’t there just yet. Nor did she have any of her traps at hand. As useful as her spell was, she wouldn’t last a minute surrounded by so many powerful opponents.

Not that Percy and Elaine had it much better, of course. Percy estimated he’d have to take two of the guards on, leaving the other three for his cousin.

It wouldn’t be an easy fight for either of them.

Rushing out of the inn, he headed west, hoping to run into Elaine. Luckily, he did find her right as he neared the gate.

‘That’s one thing going according to plan, at least.’

he exhaled in relief.

“Percy!” she exclaimed upon seeing him, running towards him. “They’re chasing Mic–” she tried to whisper once she got closer, but he raised his hand to stop her.

“I know. How confident are you in taking three Greens on by yourself?” he asked.

Suffice to say, attacking the Divine Root –

and a Holy Child’s entourage no less

– was a grave crime. He and Nesha were too far gone already, but Elaine hadn’t done anything too incriminating until now. Whatever happened, they couldn’t leave any survivors behind.

“I’ll do it.” she replied, not a hint of hesitation in her voice.

Percy nodded, gesturing at her to follow. As much as he hated himself for involving her, he knew he didn’t stand a shadow of a chance without her help. Plus, she cared about Micky as much as he did. He had no idea what that bastard wanted from his familiar, but they couldn’t leave him alone.

‘How close are you?’

he asked through the cord.

At the same time, he scanned the scenery outside the gate, looking for a good spot to lay in wait.

That hill might do.

It was where Micky and Elaine had camped over the past few days.

‘I’ll be there in five minutes. The kid is still behind me. Do you want me to try losing him?’

‘No. For now, I need you to stay in his sight. What about the others? Are they with him?’

‘They fell behind some time ago. Probably a couple miles behind the kid. Maybe more.’

‘Try to lure him about a hundred metres from the hill, but don’t get too close. I want the Greens to pass near there, but I don’t want the kid to spot us in his Mana Sense.’

Bringing Elaine up to speed, the two then rushed to the ambush spot, his heart racing in his chest.

“Elaine, do you know of any good hunting spots in the vicinity?” he asked.

Taking the guards out was only half the plan. Micky would have to lose the Holy Child too, or it would have all been for nothing. Unfortunately, the crow couldn’t possibly outrun the boy without going all out, which meant he’d eat through his stamina in no time.

Consequently, he’d need to consume a few Yellow cores to recharge once he reached his destination. Then, he’d have to find a river or some other body of water to hopefully erase his scent, before circling around and meeting with them.

“There is a small patch of desert a couple weeks southwest from here. I’ve hunted scorpions there before.” she said, giving him some more detailed directions.

Percy relayed her words to Micky, explaining the plan.

‘The only thing left is to execute it…’

Soon, Micky informed him that he and the Holy Child were almost there. Percy moved in front of Elaine, to hopefully hide her mana signature with his armour’s concealment runes. Both of them crouched to make themselves look smaller, holding their breaths.

A second later, they saw the boy running in the distance at an insane speed, the ground cracking wherever he stepped. Luckily, he didn’t as much as glance their way, too busy chasing after his prey. Only once he was gone did they start pumping mana into their channels, activating their boosting arts.

‘So far, so good.’

Percy thought, catching sight of the Greens rapidly approaching them.

It was time to deal the Divine Root another slap.