Chapter 978 Follow the Trail
"So about the trail we just saw just now, even with the light being too conspicuous to see around us, no one else besides the people inside the mansion and outside the yard can see them?"
"Yep. We took these precautions as having a guiding light like that would surely attract so much attention and we don't want things to be a big hassle and time-consuming for us. Things get too complicated if the public knows that we have the branch of the tree of life with us," Renatta explained.
Yeah, it is true. With the tree of life involved, those who know the true value of the branch will be really dangerous indeed. Not only will they cause trouble for us but they could potentially bring harm to us and even report us to other troublesome people. That's how the people and their envy and greed do their work to annoy and inconvenience the people.
"So, are we leaving immediately?" I asked.
"We should stay for a few more hours here. We should take this chance to go and shop for any essentials for later on."
"Ah, yes. Shopping! My favorite word!" Riko grinned and started to cheer all of a sudden.
"Woah there, Riko, I know you liked shopping but it's a different way of shopping and we are not going to do the same way as we shop back in the real world..." Although I also know that Rika shares the trait of Riko who enjoys shopping, right now, it seems she doesn't share the same enthusiasm as Riko.
"Nah, although this isn't the same thing as we do during shopping, don't you think shopping for essentials and other stuff does make you feel good at spending your hard-saved gold?"
I can only scratch my head from both their antics. But what they are doing is necessary. Since they needed to shop, we needed those two to help us shop for our necessities and let them do the job they were good at.
"Alright girls, go ask Mom and the others if they want to accompany you two. Mom might join the two of you in shopping so don't leave while leaving them out of the loop, alright?" I reminded them.
Riko turned to look at the tired-looking Renatta and Alena. "Girls, would you join us in our shopping escapade?"
Alena smiled but started to shake her head. "As much as that sounds kind of fun, I think we will pass. We will have to go and rest for a bit to recover all of the energy that we have expended for quite some time. I don't think we have the leisure to enjoy the activity with us totally tired from the job."
"Yeah, me too as well, girls. We apologize..." Renatta regretfully said.
The two nodded before groggily returning to their room. They looked like they were deprived of sleep and rest so it is indeed a much better way for them to get a lot of good sleep instead of giving them another activity to engage in while they are in that state.
"Alright, Manato. We will see you all later, we will ask the others to shop with us," Rika smiled before the two left, leaving me there alone as I waved goodbye.
Now that the matter is back to normal, I sighed and stretched a bit. Like the elves, I still do feel a little groggy.
"Perhaps a few more hours of sleep will do the trick..."
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Inside the control room, which has now turned to be one of Almira's personal rooms, Almira is smoking as she relaxes on her chair. She had seen what happened earlier that was triggered by the elves and already knew the effects of the purpose of the light and their uses. She puff another smoke on her cigar before she extinguishes the flames using her bare fingers without batting an eye.
"Wow, this place smells so bad... the cigarette smell is lingering around the room," Queen Tanya who suddenly appeared out of nowhere complained as she started coughing as she entered the control room.
"You don't smoke?" Almira looked at Queen Tanya before offering one cigarette on her.
"I quit a long time ago. Whenever I try to smoke again, my body feels bad all of a sudden, it is like a withdrawal or something but with the opposite effect."
"Such a shame, anyways, what brings you all the way here? Shouldn't you be sleeping and taking a good rest like everyone else?" Almira asked while she stashed her cigarette pack back into her breast pocket.
"I am just here to inquire how you are doing," Queen Tanya smiled.
"How I am doing?" Almira seems to not fully understand what Queen Tanya just meant to say.
"Yeah, the fact that you failed to properly end the life of the man who ruined your life and the one who became a bane of your existence?"
"Ah, so that is what you meant..." Almira scratches her head and puts another cigarette in her mouth. "As much as I want to be pissed, I became calmer now compared to before. Perhaps, the feeling disappeared after I defeated him back then which is why when he returned, it felt like a big gut punch to me, and yet I don't feel as much hatred as him as before compared before."
"You no longer feel the desire to pursue and deal with him?" Queen Tanya was surprised.
"I do think it is still my job to deal with it. But right now? I didn't feel the active need to deal with him and kill him the moment I saw him. Sure, I do feel the bloodlust in me appear whenever I see him or hear his name but it's not the same feeling as before."
Queen Tanya nodded and creased her eyebrows. "That is an interesting take. I thought you would go totally nuts when you heard about his revival."
"Oh, I still do. In fact, the time when I saw him and learned that he was still alive and had already massacred an entire village without us knowing caused me to enter a state of rage and try to chase him only for him to properly escape and slip through my fingers. I still feel regretful that I didn't know about the situation beforehand, otherwise, we might have saved a lot of the elves who were massacred in the process.
"It must've been painful knowing that some elves have died in the process while you guys are on the watch."
"Not really. In fact, the elves were totally hostile to us, but they didn't deserve to die in such a horrific way that only those notorious and nefarious criminals with such a very bad mind can commit."
"What are your next plans?" Queen Tanya asked.
"I will do my job as usual. As the group's new navigator, I think I found my new job in this life and compared to blacksmithing, tinkering with things like this felt a lot more amazing and fulfilling to do. Although I am not going to abandon my job as a blacksmith, I will continue to navigate this land using the modified mansion and lead them to the path where the resurrected bastard has decided to stay. I shall pass the baton at slaying the motherf*cker to the ones who thirst for his death as I have already passed that chance before."
The two chuckled briefly before Almira decided to ask a question pertaining to Queen Tanya.
"So, when are you going to take back your Kingdom?"
Queen Tanya smiled," Good Question."
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I thought sleeping again would be impossible as I had already done so, but perhaps because my body still felt tired, I fell asleep once again when I lay down on the bed once more after talking to the elves and both Riko and Rika.
Right now, I just fully awakened from my slumber and compared to before, my body is now energized and is fully good to go once more. Checking the weather outside, I was relieved to say that it was just a normal snowfall and although it is chilly, it does feel fine after a while compared to the time when the area just felt so cold and the snowstorm outside just felt the worst. It seems the weather has finally decided to be calm right now.
When I got out of my room to check out on the others if they had woken up, I was greeted with tons of items being piled from one another in the living room. I wasn't expecting to see it and I was totally not prepared to see the amount of boxes there.
"What is happening?" I asked as I navigated myself downstairs and asked for anyone who caused this.
"Oh, don't worry about it, Manato. We just splurged a bit on shopping and we bought a bit much..." Riko appeared from another room while carrying a box from the pile.
"What the hell, this isn't something you can just say "a bit much"! This is clearly frigging a mountain of goods!"
It seems they have decided to go and have a shopping spree for a bit which went out of control which is now resulting in this. I guess this is what happens when you make an impulse buyer go loose on a shopping spree.
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