“Golden chick?” Rosa asked, confused.

[Hmm, yes. I thought that you said you would dib on the kid with triple S Rank Talents? Am I wrong calling him Sacred Gear’s golden chick?] Rai mused, chuckling lightly.

The four people in the room were confused, but then Thomas glanced at Rosa, nodding his head.

Rosa knew what his gesture meant. Rai wasn’t wrong in calling Zaiden the golden chick of the Sacred Relic guild. Heck, they had prepared to welcome him by counting on Ao, who had a close relationship with Zaiden.

So, Rosa said, “Indeed. We did have a plan to invite him. But, why did you suddenly call me to talk about him?”

[How do I say it? I am in San Diego to watch the monster outbreak right now. When I was about to join the battle, I found your golden chick fighting a Demon. So I helped him, and he’s injured badly righ-]

“Wait!” Ao suddenly shouted and interrupted Rai before he could finish. “Did you just say Zaiden is in San Diego?”

[Ah, Miss Ao. Hello. As the answer to your question, yes, he is. We had a chance to raid a dungeon together, with me acting as his instructor. When I heard he was discharged, we had a ride together. Who knows that he would be caught in the middle of a monster outbreak when he bought some water for us, no? I have no excuses for that. Thankfully I managed to kill the Demon before it killed him.]

Ao frowned, hearing Rai’s explanation. It was like he was trying to find an excuse, but… They did raid a dungeon together, with Rai being Zaiden’s instructor.

The strange thing was that he always got injured whenever Zaiden was with Rai.

‘Is it just a coincidence? Or was Rai purposely making Zaiden get injured? Then, for what reason? Jealousy?’ Ao asked herself before stopping herself as she felt Thomas glaring at her.

Thomas then looked at the phone in Rosa’s hand and asked, “Rai, is it?”

[Yes, I am.]

“Nice to meet you. I am Thomas Evan, the Guild Master of Sacred Relic guild.”_-.

[Oh! It’s an honor, Guild Master. As you know, I am Rai from Annihilator Mercenary Group.]

“Indeed, I know. May I request something from you? I want you to save Zaiden Archman and bring him to safety.” Thomas said with a firm tone.

[Unfortunately, Guild Master. I must refuse that request as I only got a more important request from a famous person. But please don’t worry, Zaiden Archman is in a safe place, away from the Mermen Dungeon. You just need to send a person to fetch him.]

“Is that so? It’s quite unfortunate. But, we can’t afford to send any people to San Diego.” Thomas shook his head, feeling unfortunate.

Ao gritted her teeth on the side. She thought that her friend, Zaiden, would be okay, and his affiliation with the Sacred Relic could be finished as soon as possible. But, an incident happened once again. She asked herself once again, ‘Is it truly a coincidence?’

But, not all hope was lost. As Rai suddenly said,

[Are you worried that a Demon will infiltrate Los Angeles if you send people to San Diego?]

It got everyone’s attention.

“Indeed, I am,” Thomas answered without beating around the bush. “It will be bad if a monster outbreak caused by Demons also happens in Los Angeles. If someone leaves for San Diego, I am afraid we will not have enough manpower to combat it.”

[Please don’t worry about that. I assure you that there is no Demon in Los Angeles. Even if there is any, please don’t worry about it, too, as my companion is quite reliable when it comes to Demon Hunting. Also, to assure you something…]

Rai suddenly paused a little as a sound of a car engine being revved roared from the phone speaker. After the sound had calmed down, Rai continued.

[Darkest Secret said that the Demons’ base is in San Diego. Anyway, I should go for now. I only intended to inform the Sacred Relic about their golden chick. Just think of it as a gesture of our alliance. He’s at the peak of Bernando Mountain. See you again sometime.]

“Wa-” Rosa was about to stop Rai to ask another question, but he ended the call before she could get a chance to.

“He’s quite… arrogant for a new Awakener.” Andy frowned. He didn’t like Rai’s attitude. In his opinion, Rai was quite arrogant.

Even if Rai was Sacred Relic’s ally that Rosa managed to sign with, his attitude wasn’t too good, and he seemingly looked down on Sacred Relic.

“I don’t think so.” Thomas disagreed. “From his tone, I noticed that he’s in a hurry. He also mentioned he got a request from someone important. Although he was the one who brought our golden chick to San Diego, at least he’s responsible enough to save him and put him in a safe location.”

“Also, it seems he can contact Darkest Secret too…” Rosa muttered, gaining everyone’s nod.

Even Ao knew who the Darkest Secret was because of her position. He was the current greatest informant in the world who seemingly knew all kinds of information, even some secrets of their Guild.

So, the information from him was surely reliable.

It left one question, though.

“Was he telling the truth about it?” Andy asked.

“We don’t know,” Thomas answered as he rotated his laptop again to face him. The last thing he saw in the live feed was a man burning the last Demon with Fire Magic before going to the dungeon alone. 

Thomas recognized the man as one of the Six Devas, so he closed the live feed and opened the Merchant Store and said, “But we will find out now.”

***

“That’s one done,” I muttered as I looked at the road in front of me.

‘Thomas Evan being there surprised me a little bit, but…well, I know someone like him will find the truth by asking for a credible one, for example, the Darkest Secret.’

I was not worried about that end. Richard will surely help me with this one, as he was the one who informed me about the Demon’s existence. He even covered me once, and I could count on him.

The road was packed with cars trying to flee from the monster outbreak zone, while the other side was empty with only a few trucks filled with Awakeners passing by a few times. I questioned my decision to take a car instead of running, but it was too late.

I was already on the road, and I couldn’t turn back. I could only wait for the next intersection to turn around and park my car somewhere.

‘How could I make such an obvious mistake?’ I grumbled inside my car as I pressed the horn a few times, blaring the car in front of me and urging it to move faster.

I was hoping for the cars in front of me to start moving, but what I got from pressing the horn was a yell.

“Fuck you! Don’t you see that we are trying to go as fast as we can? Hey, the ones in the front, get the fuck off my way!”

“Don’t fucking yell at me, you bastard! Blame the fucking monsters for causing the outbreak!”

Shouts after shouts followed suit, each filled with curses, and some blamed the monsters for causing the panic.

After a few minutes, the traffic began to move normally, and I was able to turn around to park my car near the sidewalk. Maybe I would be fined, but well, it was an emergency.

I exited my car and ran toward a place called Lake Hodges Hike, located north of Lake Hodges.

I had found the Witch after I killed the Demon earlier. She disguised herself among the Awakeners and ran away while pretending to be injured.

She ran to the north of Lake Hodges, so I could somehow guess where she went. Even if I couldn’t, Lake Hodges Hike had a rather tall mount that I could climb to get a view of the top.

I didn’t want to kill the Witch to extract the information from her, but it was better to kill her if I couldn’t catch her. So, I had already prepared to use [Arash Bow] special effect in case the Witch had gone too far or had already returned to her base.

It would be better if the latter was true. That way, I could destroy her alongside the other Witches that hid in their base.

I quickly jumped around the tallest mountain in Lake Hodges Hike and arrived at the peak in less than 3 minutes. It was faster than using a car. I was really stupid.

Even after living in this world for more than a month, I still had a mindset from Earth left. Though, I didn’t want to throw all my Earth mindset away because I planned to return as soon as I found the way to.

Arriving at the peak, I looked around with my enhanced sight while preparing[Arash Bow] in my hand with a Dark Arrow instead of the Mana Arrow that I usually used. Added by the Enhanced Sight effect from [Horus’ Sunglasses], I was able to see clearly in a 2 KM radius.

Calling it a cheat was an understatement, but some obstacles still limited me; that was the reason why I tried to get a high place.

I couldn’t stay at Bernando Mountain Peak because of Zaiden, so this place was the second best as I could get a good view of the area around Lake Hodges.

The Witch had run away around 5 to 10 minutes ago. I couldn’t remember for sure because I didn’t look at the time.

I meant, who would look at the time when they were fighting against a Demon that was stronger than them? It was better to concentrate on the fight.

Anyway, I only had around 10% of my Mana left; my body was a bit heavy, thanks to that. Using Hell Flame took a lot of Mana, and I meant a lot.

The last seven shots to kill those revived Awakeners alone took 14% of my Mana, 2% with each shot. Meanwhile, the big arrow that I used to kill the Demon took around half of my Mana, which was crazy.

In comparison, the flaming arrow that I shot at first to kill many monsters only took 3% of my Mana. But well, composite attribute Magic really took more Mana than normal Magic.

Back to the Witch location, I couldn’t find her even though I looked around 2 KM around me.

“She had run away, huh?” I muttered.

It was as expected. The Witch’s strength was at least comparable to C-Rank Awakener at worst. There was a chance the strength of the Witch that informed the Demon was higher than that.

So, I made the best move that I could use currently. I used Horus Eyes to find out where the Witch was. I had seen her figure, so all requirements were fulfilled.

At least I should know my target to be able to find them. If I didn’t know my target, then how could I hope to find them?

I infused my Mana into it to prepare [Stellar] Lone Meteor, the special effect of [Arash Bow].

I might pass out after I shot the arrow, so I made sure no one was near again. As soon as I knew that my area was clear, I used Horus Eyes to find where the Witch was.

My left eye suddenly turned black before an image flashed into my mind. It was inside a cave, outside of a dungeon, surrounded by a canyon.

Remembering the map of San Diego, I found where she was. It was a cave around Annie’s Canyon Trail. The place was a bit away from Lake Hodges and nowhere near the north direction.

“Found you,” I muttered while channeling more Mana to activate [Stellar].

I didn’t stop until I infused all my Mana into the bow. Next, the Dark Arrow glowed white and red. The effect had activated, and I released the bowstring while shouting, “[Stellar]!”

The arrow left a long trail imitating the name of [Arash Bow] special effect, Lone Meteor. At first, it only went up and pierced the cloud. However, as soon as it was above the cloud, it suddenly turned around and went in the direction of Annie’s Canyon Trail.

At the same time, I felt sluggish, and my strength left me. I quickly put [Arash Bow] into my magic bag and thought, ‘Ah, fuck…’ before I lost consciousness. However, I wasn’t worried that the arrow would hit the wrong place. As it would definitely hit the Witch straight on her head.

***

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