<span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="text-decoration: underline"><div style="text-align: center;">Day 7: Palaugrim - Hiribah (Night)</div></span></span><br/><br/><br/>Guilford and his team stepped out of the church. After their battle with Lillith, Guilford was adamant to continue pursuing Syndra who was imprisoned below. However, none of them were anticipating what they would find beneath the church. With them they carried a severely weakened and thin woman out into the open. This woman had no recollection whatsoever of her identity, nor her home. Her skin was dry and wrinkled, her non-existent body fat a clear sign of malnutrition. She was, in every sense of the word, a tortured soul. All the knights that waited above were surrounded by an air of uncertainty and confusion as they laid eyes on the woman, the Seraph, and his team. They had expected a fierce battle but none of that ever happened. Sure they felt a massive amount of taint surge once then fade to nothingness but that was it.<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"I need a cleric to take a look at this woman now!"</span><br/><br/>The words rang loud and clear. It took the daze out of those who were consumed by their thoughts and almost immediately garnered movement from everyone in the square. Several knights went back to the church to seal the passageway, other squads went on to make preparations for a room to accommodate the woman, and several clerics headed over to Guilford to examine her. One look from the veteran cleric was all it took for him to call an emergency. He ordered his fellow clerics to prepare everything he needed for both a spiritual and medical operation.<br/><br/>"Forgive me Master Guilford but could you bring her to my ward? We don't have much time." said the cleric.<br/><br/>Guilford obliged and rushed with the veteran cleric back to the said ward. Once inside, they had the woman laid down on an operating table and the assistant clerics immediately prepped her for operation. The Seraph watched in silence as the hours ticked by. Exactly as the town's clock struck twelve, the head cleric sighed in relief. Their operation was a success and the woman has now stabilized. The head cleric was surprised to see that Guilford was still with them, looking eager for some answers.<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"How is she?"</span>he asked when the cleric walked over to him.<br/><br/>"Everything is going to be fine Master Guilford, she is now safe."<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"Good. I feared for the worst. What happened to her?"</span><br/><br/>The cleric sighed. "To start with, it's a miracle she's still alive when you found her. If there's anything we should thank for that, it's the taint."<br/><br/>Guilford's purple eyes widened at the response.<span style="color: #0080FF">"What do you mean?"</span><br/><br/>"I cannot say for sure Master Guilford, but this woman showed signs of advanced hypnotism. She's alive but her mind is locked from the outside world, you could say she's a living puppet. Having been under such a strong spell, her body adapted to it and began feeding off of the spell's energy, in this case the taint. I'm saying it's Sin's energy that allowed her to live up to the point you carried her out of the church."<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"Will she recover?"</span><br/><br/>The cleric hesitated for a moment and looked back at his patient. He then turned to Guilford with a slightly darker mood. "I cannot say for sure, though I have done all that I can. For now she is stable physically. We supplied her body with the necessary nutrients and introduced the Light as a new energy for her to feed on. However, I cannot say the same about her state of mind, or how we can break the hypnotism."<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"Could you continue looking after her? I will see what I can find about this."</span><br/><br/>"But of course. We will care for her until she fully recovers. In the meantime, Master Guilford, you should rest. The Pristine Knights of Hiribah can take it from here."<br/><br/><div style="text-align: center;">_________________________________________________________________________________</div><br/><br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="text-decoration: underline"><div style="text-align: center;">Day 8: Palaugrim - Hiribah (Morning)</div></span></span><br/><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">"Captain! You better come quick! We just received word that scouts arrived bearing an urgent message!"</span><br/><br/>Alfrei's voice echoing behind the door broke Guilford's concentration. In his hand he held Nirvana, he was attempting to master the sword completely. For several nights he had sacrificed sleep, just to familiarize himself with the sword. It was still far beyond his grasp. Sheathing his Nirvana, Guilford slowly got up from his meditative position and walked towards the door. He opened it slightly and peeked at his Lieutenant.<span style="color: #0080FF">"I'll be there shortly Alfrei, thank you."</span><br/><br/>Moments later and Guilford stepped out of his lodging, wearing his light armor but without the waist cloth, the matter was urgent and that waist cloth took forever to pin into his belt. The Seraph and his Lieutenant made their way across town, heading to Knight Commander Heinrich's office, it was a ten minute walk. When the two finally made it to their destination, a flock of squad captains and knight officers were gathered just outside Heinrich's office, all of them had contemplative expressions that made the hype all the more worrying. They all made way upon seeing Guilford arrive to the scene.<br/><br/>Guilford pressed on, as soon as he opened the doors to Heinrich's office, he saw the knight commander deep in thought while staring at the report given to him by the scouts inside.<br/><br/>"Master Guilford." greeted the scouts in unison with closed fists snapping to their chests. Guilford returned the gesture and walked over to Heinrich's desk. On it were images of a ruined town. Purple eyes widened a little at the sight of the image taken by the scouts. Guilford almost immediately snatched the report beneath the images and read through it twice.<br/><br/>"There was nothing the knights stationed there could do." added one of the scouts. His expression a telling sign that he saw the town firsthand.<br/><br/>Heinrich continued to brood, looking over at the territorial map and marking Santa Olivia as a loss. His gaze then turned to where Guilford's main forces were. It was disheartening to see that they were still several hundred kilometers away from Santa Olivia. What happened there was truly out of their hands.<br/><br/>"So this is how they want to play it huh?" said the tactician, his tone already hinting with frustration.<br/><br/>One of the scouts stepped forward with another set of images he withheld from handing over to Heinrich. He gently placed the blurred images of a new type of enemy, a scythe wielding entity. "This one led the attack. Aside from Sinners and Pure Sinners, there were also trained militiamen among their forces. These were all that we could find from the dead scouts in that town." he added.<br/><br/>Guilford studied the image carefully but to no avail, it was too blurred. All that he could make out was that whoever led the attack was clearly much like Lillith or any other general of Sin.<br/><br/>"With this, they are showing the people of Palaugrim that anyone who sides with us is also their enemy. This will effectively lower the people's trust in us and may even start a revolt. If we don't act soon, our troops will lose morale and other knight controlled towns will suffer the same fate as Santa Olivia." Heinrich stated while going over possible scenarios in his head.<br/><br/>The scout bowed before the two. "If I may, I propose that we keep the Santa Olivia incident hidden for as long as we can. Right now, this knowledge is only available to knight commanders, other officers and squad captains. We cannot risk the people learning of Santa Olivia at this stage where our forces haven't established a proper foothold in Palaugri--"<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"No. We will let everyone know of this incident. The enemy is trying to play us into their hands by using fear to manipulate the battle field. I will use that fear and turn it into rage."</span><br/><br/>Silence filled the office. The Seraph's words were clear as crystal. He has no intention of covering up anything that happened in Santa Olivia and even wanted to risk a propaganda to reverse the tides by using this incident to enrage both the people and the knights.<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"We will let the people know that the enemy does not care about their well-being, that the incident in Santa Olivia happened because the enemy sacrificed its people to set an example. Nobody would want to follow the rule of a leader with that mindset. I don't care how you phrase it, I want all knight commanders to gather their men and townsfolk to spread this news. Let them know that we will fight for their sake and we will never turn our backs on them! The Light will serve justice! We WILL NOT tolerate such heinous acts!"</span><br/><br/>The ominous tension inside the room cleared beneath his words. Times like these, people needed to be strong, but for them to have that strength, they needed pillars where they could see and borrow such strength. Guilford was one such pillar. Though the man himself was burning with anger, he could not allow himself to be swallowed by it, nor his vision and judgment to be clouded by the emotion. It takes nearly otherworldly calm and composure to be able to think straight after seeing what happened in Santa Olivia. The Seraph was almost at wits end, how many people must suffer before they can bring this island into submission? How many more lives must be snuffed out? How much blood needs to be shed to satiate the land's thirst? He did not know, all that he could think about was his duty to the people.<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"Any updates from the effort?"</span>he broke the silence.<br/><br/>Heinrich then switched to the other reports brought by the scouts. Most of them were details about successful capture of six ports by the Suppression Forces, liberation of twelve villages, a complete sweep of numerous dens and nests along the main force's wake, and fortifications made to all knight controlled territories. It was estimated that the Main Force will reach Rasova by tomorrow and will proceed to the next phase of the operation, to plant a foothold in Rasova and use it as a staging area for future offensives against Palaugrim's hostile territories.<br/><br/>"Master Guilford, the<span style="font-style: italic">Crests</span>are itching to be deployed as well. They said that they have been out of the action for far too long and wish to join the front lines." informed the scout and simultaneously handed Guilford a smaller, more personal message. Guilford opened the message and read through it carefully.<br/><br/><div style="margin:20px; margin-top:5px"><div class="quotetitle"><input class="button2 btnlite" onclick="if (this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display != '') { this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = '';      this.innerText = ''; this.value = 'Hide'; } else { this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = 'none'; this.innerText = ''; this.value = 'Show'; }" style="text-align:center;width:100px;margin:0px;padding:0px;" type="button" value="Show"/></div><div class="quotecontent"><div style="display: none;">Gil,<br/><br/>Yo! How long has it been buddy? Ten years? Seems a bit too short for a break from fighting don't ya think? Anyway, I don't care what you've been up to with that topaz eyed 'girlfriend' of yours and I don't wanna hear it, but when we heard you finally started <span style="font-style: italic">Liberation</span>, man we were psyched! Never thought we'd actually see the day! We used to talk about it all the time! What changed? I thought you were getting sick of fighting? But never mind that, I'm sure you have your reasons and whatever they are, I know they're good and you know you'll always have our support.<br/><br/>Cora is still mad at you though, you never did keep that promise that you would make time and visit home. Nevertheless, she was still eager to take up the sword when she heard the news. I took the liberty of informing the others, they all shared the same sentiments that if you're fighting, we should be there too. I know we all retired from service after the God of Sin's defeat but with all these ruckus going on, there's just no way we could sit still! So how about it buddy? Need a few extra hands in your endeavor? I'm sure you do. Anyway, we're headed off island by the time this letter reaches you. I'm sure we're probably in Palaugrim by then, most likely the Southeastern port.<br/><br/>If you're not too busy, why don't you write us back so we can arrange a meet up! The 57th Scout Unit was more than happy to deliver that message for us so they should be able to track us down with your reply. We're eager to hear from you!<br/><br/><br/>P.S.<br/>Cora is throwing a fit right now about how you've forgotten us and all but truthfully, she's the most excited out of all of us! She just can't wait to pound you with her Grand Cross! Better watch out buddy!<br/><br/>May the Divine Light keep you eternally safe! <br/>(My Light! It's been so long since I last said that! Brings back memories!)<br/><br/>Your friends,<br/>Lance, Akira, Cora, Silver, Alona</div></div></div><br/><br/>The Crests, five individuals of incredible skill. Each of them had an animal crest specially crafted that symbolized their strengths. It was hard to imagine they were not made Seraphs for their skills alone. But these individuals knew how to think for themselves, probably a trait the High Council did not appreciate much. Each of these individuals belonged to a different cadet class back when Guilford was still in the knight academy. They however recognized each others' skill during the yearly cadet tournament bouts and became friends. Guilford could feel his lips widening lightly into a smile as he rolled the message close.<br/><br/><span style="color: #0080FF">"Lance, if only you knew that Bryn died, I wonder what you'd say..."</span>he sighed and turned back to Heinrich and the scouts. There was work to be done and with little time to spare. Guilford gave instructions for the next set of movements for his forces. The Main Force were to continue to Rasova and set up their foothold, the border defenses were to receive reinforcements from the main islands and the Suppression Forces were to continue sweeping the island's docks. In the meantime, Guilford planned to head out Northwest to Sharen. He had a feeling that it was going to be next on the enemy's hit list since it was quite a prosperous town.<br/><br/>_________________________________________________________________________________<br/><br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="text-decoration: underline"><div style="text-align: center;">Day 8: Palaugrim - Alera (afternoon)</div></span></span><br/><br/><br/>Abel finally reached his destination on foot. He had encountered several enemy stragglers along the way and his horse suffered an unfortunate accident. The old knight however was uninjured, his combat experience alone still much of a threat to the usual bunch of Sinners, pair that with his near inhuman prowess and he was still pretty much a force to be reckoned with, alone or with a squad of knights.<br/><br/>Having retired for quite some time, and with his bloodstained white armor, the garrison guards did not recognize him and immediately stopped him from coming any closer. Abel grunted in distaste after an arrow stuck itself before his greaves. He glared at the archer who shot the arrow and took a deep breath.<br/><br/>"Retired Knight Abel d'Arques, previous Captain of the disbanded 7th Pristine Knight squadron requesting an audience with your knight commander under Master Guilford's orders."