Chapter 74 - The Summoning

Chapter 74: Chapter 74 - The Summoning

Outside the iron gates of the mansion, the usually quiet street was completely overrun by a roaring crowd of nearly a hundred-armed thugs that had surrounded the perimeter.

At the sound of Toby’s panicked warning, Maelle and Roxa bolted to the window and pulled back the curtains to inspect the commotion below.

Maelle’s eyes narrowed as she locked onto the tall, muscular figure leading the mob. He wore a spiked leather jacket, his boar face was marred by many scars, and an iron warhammer rested over his shoulder.

"Rizer..."

"Rizer?" Roxa questioned. "Who are they? Mercenaries?"

"A syndicate of ruthless thugs from the city’s Industrial District. They exploit the desperate – forcing people into inescapable debt or trapping them in horrid situations where the only way out is to fight to the death in their illegal underground arena."

"Oh, I know this story!" Maribelle stepped up to the window with an enthusiastic clap of her hands. "That was when my Vinny held off their entire gang all by himself so you could sneak into their base and steal the Honey Lake Extract for little Toby’s siblings, right?"

She leaned in close to Maelle and looked at her with eyes that twinkled playful pride. "Haha, isn’t my baby just the coolest~?"

Maelle ignored her teasing and left the room. She hurried down the staircase with Roxa following closely behind. Maribelle, however, remained by the window.

Unbothered by the looming chaos, she sat in Maelle’s spot and smiled suspiciously as she watched the mob below.

Downstairs, the foyer was in disarray. Toby, Leo, and Zally were huddling near the fire hearth, ironically shivering in fear. The moment Maelle reached the bottom of the stairs, Gwen hurried to her side with her twin daggers already drawn.

"Gwen, how did ’they’ find this place?! Didn’t you say this place was entirely abandoned by them?"

"I-It is. I thoroughly checked the district registry – none of Rizer’s men have ever stepped foot in this neighborhood. They all stay strictly around the industrial area. This property was just a blind asset Rizer bought under a shell name to hide large paper funds from the tax inquisitors! Nothing more."

Maelle turned her sharp gaze to Daphne. "Are you absolutely certain your group was not followed on your way here?"

"You have my word, Princess. We took four separate decoy routes through the alleyways. No one trailed us."

"Then how..."

"Guys?!" Ava suddenly screamed from the front window with her face pressed against the glass. "This is bad! They’re about to do something!"

Everyone rushed toward the front entrance just in time to see two thugs toss glowing red explosives against the iron gates.

BOOOOOM!!!!!

A deafening explosion shattered the gates into flying fragments, sending a cloud of black smoke billowing into the small courtyard. Rizer’s voice roared from beyond the smoke.

"GET THEM! DRAG THEM OUT ALIVE! KILL NONE OF THEM! THE BOUNTY ON THAT CURSED PRINCESS AND HER FRIENDS IS MINE!"

"""OWWWAAAHHHH!!!!"""

The hundred-man syndicate let out a bloodthirsty howl and surged through the ruined gateway in a tidal wave.

"I’ll slow them down!"

Ava hurried to the doors and jumped out into the courtyard.

"I’m with you!" Gwen yelled, tapping her collarbone. "Firetongue, front and center!"

With a bright burst of crimson sparks, the little red lizard materialised on Gwen’s shoulder, unleashing a warm wave of fire-mana that ignited her twin blades into flames.

It was an all-out war: two against a hundred.

Ava flared her wings and shot into the sky to unleash a volley of pink flame projectiles.

"YAAAAHHH!!!!"

"Take that, you ugly brutes!"

She drove down to deliver a crushing dropkick to a dogkin brute, sending him flying backward through three of his comrades! "What’s the matter?! Is this the best Rizer’s trash can do?!"

On the ground, Gwen was a whirlwind of fire and steel. She parried a heavy battleaxe, spun fluidly beneath a spear thrust, and sliced her blazing daggers in a double cross-pattern.

CLANG! SLASH!

"Keep coming, you lowlifes!" Gwen taunted as Firetongue hissed triumphantly on her shoulder. "I’ve got plenty of fire to burn those ugly jackets off you!"

Inside, Toby and his siblings watched the wild clash through the windows with wide, anxious eyes. Roxa stepped up beside Maelle and placed a steady hand on the Princess’s shoulder. "I am going out to assist them."

"Roxa... this isn’t your fight. House Elsa and Rizer have nothing to do with you."

Roxa offered a small, rare smirk as she pulled up her hood. "Of course it has something to do with me. We are friends, Maelle."

Without waiting for a response, she drew her elven silver bow, ran out the door, and leaped upwards onto the balcony rail.

THWIP! THWIP! THWIP!

In the span of a single second, three glowing green mana arrows whistled through the air, piercing the shoulders of three thugs who were about to flank Gwen from behind.

With Roxa’s lethal marksmanship covering the courtyard from above, the tide of battle dramatically turned. Ava’s explosive demonic fire, Gwen’s blazing close-quarters choreography, and Roxa’s sniper precision carved through the syndicate ranks easily.

Within minutes, over eighty thugs lay groaning, scorched, or unconscious across the ruined garden lawn.

Rizer backed away as he looked around at his slowly decimating gang. Only six of his lieutenants remained standing. "D-Damn it all! You little monsters–!"

CLACK! CLACK! CLACK! CLACK!

Suddenly, a rhythmic march of armored boots vibrated through the street and surrounded the entire area.

Over two hundred soldiers – divided into the black-and-crimson plate armor of the Imperial Guard and a few shining golden breastplates of the Solarian Royal Knights – formed an impenetrable wall with nowhere to escape.

Rizer let out a mocking laugh. "Gahaha! Look at that! The party’s over, girls!"

"Archers, suppress them!" an Imperial Captain ordered.

Before the exhausted group could react, anti-magic grapple nets rained down from the sky.

"KYA– AHHHH!!" Ava let out a hurtful scream as an iron net infused with suppression runes slammed over her wings and shocked her, dragging her down to the dirt.

"Ava!" Gwen moved to cut the net, but an Imperial Knight struck her from her blind spot, delivering a brutal heavy shield bash that sent her crashing to the grass with her twin daggers skittering out of reach.

Firetongue let out a weak squeak before dissolving into light.

Roxa fired two quick shots from the balcony, but an Imperial elf intercepted them with his own arrows. He then quickly fired off a wind-enhanced shot that blasted her footing on the balcony.

CRASH!

"No–!" When she fell down four more guards stormed in and pinned her arms behind her back.

Due to her demonic nature, Ava received the worst treatment – two guards continued kicking her down as she resisted, pinning her head to the ground while slapping on anti-magic iron chains over her wrists and ankles.

"Ava! Gwen! Roxa!" Maelle screamed from the doorway.

Seeing the sheer volume of the military force, Maelle ran back into the foyer. "Toby! Take Leo and Zally and hide in the pantry! Now!"

"B-But Princess–!"

"Hurry!"

"Eeek! O-Ok!" The children scrambled away in terror with Toby.

She then turned and rushed toward the staircase where at the top of the landing, stood Maribelle.

"Lady Maribelle..." Maelle looked up at her, expecting the literal Goddess of legend to step forward and obliterate the surrounding army with a single wave of her hand.

Instead, Maribelle casually pulled her dark hood low over her hair and stepped away out of sight. She leaned comfortably against the wall with a serene, unbothered smile – refusing to raise a single finger to help.

"Lady... Maribelle? What are you–?" *Tsk*

She clicked her tongue in frustration when she realised she was on her own.

Maelle drew a small, silver knife from her belt and sprinted down the stairs toward the cellar, intending to grab Lucianne to use as a human leverage.

BANG!

The front doors were kicked off their hinges. Rizer and a few guards burst into the foyer.

Before Maelle could reach the stairs leading down the basement, Rizer lunged forward with terrifying speed despite his size and clasped a hand firmly around her throat. He then slammed her against the wall, causing her to drop her knife on the floor.

"Not so fast, Princess," Rizer leaned in until his foul breath brushed her ear. "You made me lose a lot of money... a lot of men."

"Kh–!" Maelle thrashed around desperately, but Rizer’s grip was unrelenting.

"Easy with her, pig!" a Solarian Knight demanded as he stepped inside with drawn steel. "Duke Elsa wants her alive! Now, where is the rest of her treasonous group? We’re missing two. Where is that Familiar with the blue hair?"

"Yeah, where is that grand hero of yours, Princess?" Rizer sneered. "Why don’t you summon him?! Oh, wait... you ditched his ass, didn’t you?! Hahaha! I heard the rumors going around the Academy. Even if you tried right now, it’s far too late. We have you. You’re finished!"

Two Imperial Guards came forward while unfolding a set of magic-suppression cuffs.

Maelle’s vision blurred with tears of pain and frustration. Desperate, she looked up toward the second-floor. Maribelle was standing there with her hood casting a shadow over her face.

She made no move to strike. Instead, she simply looked directly into Maelle’s panicking eyes, smiled reassuringly, and gave a slow, knowing nod.

In that quiet moment, Maelle understood everything.

Maribelle wasn’t abandoning her. She was forcing her to shed her stubbornness. She was forcing her to stop hiding behind her icy exterior, to accept her true feelings, and to call back the partner who never stopped waiting for her.

"Get her legs!" the Guard Captain ordered while grabbing Maelle’s arm.

"No..."

Gritting her teeth through a flood of tears – tears of pride, fear, relief, and deep longing – Maelle summoned every ounce of mana left in her soul.

With a violent surge of what little strength she had, she slammed her heel into the Guard’s kneecap and shot out her free right hand.

She then threw her head back from Rizer’s grip and screamed at the top of her lungs with her whole heart, soul, and every fiber of her being:

"VINCENT!!!"

A blinding magic circle of pure gold erupted from her palm and onto the ground.

CRACK—BOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!

"What are you doing?! Cuff her!"

The guards managed to slap the magic-suppression cuffs onto Maelle’s wrists, snapping them shut – but it was already too late. The spell was cast.

The golden circle on the floor turned an electric blue as a dimensional rift tore open in the space between realms.

Out of the swirling cosmic rift stepped out an imposing young man.

Vincent Winters.

His ethereal blue hair swayed against the pressure of the summoning and his eyes glowed with absolute power. The Familiar crest on his neck burned like a branding iron, and a terrifying, crackling aura of divine aura rolled off his shoulders in visible waves.

Outside, the tied-up Gwen, Roxa, and Ava looked up at the burst of golden light with wide eyes of hope.

"V-Vincent...!" Ava sobbed happily from under her iron net. "He’s here!"

His expression was deathly calm, and his glowing blue eyes swept across the room with a lethal promise.

The Solarian Knights, the Imperial Guards, and Rizer in particular stared at him in terror. But as their eyes adjusted to him... they noticed something utterly bizarre.

Vincent was holding something small tightly tucked under his arm.

A small creature wiggled out and climbed onto his shoulder. It was a tiny green baby dragon with tiny golden horns and big golden eyes.

The little dragon tilted its head back and let out a ridiculous cute, high-pitched burp of flame into the air.

*Burrp* *Puff*

Then, in a ridiculously squeaky voice that echoed across the dead-silent foyer, the tiny dragon puffed out its chest and shouted at the top of its lungs:

"Fuck you looking at, bitches?! Give me all your gold!"

"IT’S A DRAGON–!!!!!!"