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(...Why am I sleeping here??)
Hiding the question in the back of his mind, Apollo slowly tried to get up to greet the incoming guests. His arms felt numb and his head was throbbing but moving slowly one step at a time he was able to get off from below the table and greet the Oni squad with a smile.
The Oni looked at his state and shook their heads. Their last Master may have not been perfect but at least in their minds he was leagues ahead of the one presenting himself in front of them now.
Instead of waiting for Apollo to talk, the Oni leader cut the chase and presented himself right away.
"I am called Seven, the oldest Oni alive, and seventh Oni to be created by Master. I represent my brothers in requesting our assimilation into your camp."
"I'm called Apollo, I'm the Master of this-"
Hearing the way the Oni spoke, Apollo felt compelled to talk the same way, but he was brutally cut off mid speech by a third Oni with a pissed expression.
"Please just cut to the chase. We are not in a good mood."
"...Right. Then I ask you, do you truly want to enter my camp?"
"You talk as if we have a choice!"
"If you don't want to join, you can do whatever you want. I won't force anybody to fight for me.... But I will confiscate all crystal cores from your old Master's buildings."
"Are you serious?"
"Thirteen you are being rude!"
"But Seven, this guy-"
"Shut up!"
"Yeah, well, there is a group of neutral cat girls not far from here. You can talk to them if you don't believe me. I only want those willingly in my camp. If you have grievances against us due to killing your friends, defeating your Master or simply don't want to work together, it's best for all of us to part ways."
"Understood! Those who wish to join, come to my side. Those who don't, go to Thirteen's side!"
"Hey! I never said I wasn't joining!"
"What? You are joining!? Wasn't you the one most upset about this whole matter?"
"Wrong! I'm just upset that we lost without even fighting! Do you know how long I waited for a good fight!? You had your fun fighting them at the fortress but I was kept waiting all this time by Master's side!"
Hearing them talk, Apollo recognized that Seven was the Fire Oni who lead the attack on the fortress, giving lots of trouble to Daisy at that time.
"Yeah, and you did an excellent job, considering how our Master suffer a deadly sneak attack!"
"Fuck off! At that time I had orders to stop the charge of their boars who were coming directly at us! How could I know there was a sneaky green b**** hidden behind us!? Even Master didn't notice!"
As their fought, their words got louder and louder, waking up the girls up the girls who were sleeping all around the place.
"Ouch! Who is the jokester!? Who put me below the table!?"
"Hey, you guys are too loud! Can't you see there are people sleeping here?"
"Is there anything to eat?"
"Hey! Let's make barbecue again!"
"Are you kidding me!?"
Before things got out of hand and the girls heard the insult directed at Hime, Apollo decided to interfere.
"Stop! Stop! Stop! Everybody calm down! Seven, take your brothers out of here and slowly discuss with them what you want to do! You don't have to give me an answer now, our doors will remain open for as long as you need."
"Understood! Let's get out of here!"
Apollo watched the Oni leave in an organized manner, not even noticing Rose had appeared by his side.
"Master, are you sure? We have lost a lot of girls now, so adding them to the camp would be really beneficial to us."
Suppressing the heart attack that Rose gave him, Apollo stayed silent for a second to recover himself before answering her question.
"True, we lost a lot of people this time. But this only makes me more hesitant in accepting them..."
"Huh?"
"I mean, if I followed my own emotions, I would never accept them... But killing them won't bring our girls back, and I don't want to act in a way that confirms that Jaylee was right about me."
"Hmm..."
"Sorry for being selfish. Even if we suffer a little more, I think it's better for us to do things the right way."
Hearing Apollo's plea, Rose simply smiled and answered like always.
"As you wish!"
"Also, if Negi's info is true, there are no other Masters on this island, so it should be safe for us to expand slowly from now on..."
"Hmm... That's true as well!"
"Actually, talking about Negi, where is Hayate?"
"Hayate? Who know? He disappeared at the start of the party, so maybe he went to Negi's old base..."
"...True. Let's give him a bit of time. He must have a lot of feelings to put in order right now..."
"Understood!"
Extending his hand, Apollo patted Rose's head.
"We all need some time to reflect on all we lost. Let's take a break today. Go to the HQ and tell everybody that today they are free to do whatever they want."
"Understood!"
-/-
Inside a certain deep underground facility, Alyssa woke up like any other day. She prepared her preserved food breakfast by adding some water and heating it in the microwave oven, waiting one minute, then applying the special powdered flavor, mixing it up and dropping all the content of the cup noodles in a plate, to eat it with fork and knife.
"Hmm!!! Delicious!!!"
After being here for almost a whole week, Alyssa knew the place like the back of her hand, or maybe even better than that since she was not used to looking at the back of her hand... anyway, she knew the place quite well, well enough to know that the only ways to get out of this place were if she could climb back the hole she entered or turned into a fish to explore the submerged tunnels that were found underground.
Unfortunately she didn't have access to the research center computer nor the upgrade center, so she had to scratch the option of turning into a fish from her list, leaving her only the option of climbing back the same way she came from.
"Good! I'm full of energy! Now, let's get out of here!"
Good thing that her fast regeneration allowed her to recover, even if only partially, her arm bones, enabling her to slowly, little by little, pile up desks and chairs into a tower that was just big enough for her to reach one of the vines in the ceiling.
"Here! Come to mommy! Gotcha!!!"
Holding the tentacle, I mean, vine, in her hand, she spread her power, allowing it to grow enough to reach the ground. Then, using it as a wire to spread her power to the other ten-vines, she controlled them in a way to create a rope ladder, leading all the way to the surface.
"The rope ladder of hope is here!"
After receiving not a single clap for her bad joke, she tested if the ladder could support her weight by pulling it down and after being sure it was safe, she slowly climbed back to the surface.
"WE!!! ARE!!! BACK!!!!!"
...no comments, please.
Looking around, Alyssa had all her excitement destroyed by the fact that she found herself lost in the middle of the forest with no idea on how to get back home...
Not knowing if there were enemies around or where they were located, Alyssa found herself scratching her head, not knowing what to do now, but she quickly come to the conclusion that waiting there wouldn't change her situation at all, so she decided to take the risk and find her way.
She walked and walked, spreading her power in the plants around her while looking for clues and finally arrived back at the fortress where she separated from her Master.
"Eh!?"
Noticing the signs of fire and the walls falling apart, she started having a bad feeling about all this and for the first time since she had fallen in that hole, she started getting worried about her Master's life.
Hurrying her steps, she walked back through the exact same route she took to arrive at this place, from Negi's base, just to find Negi's base completely destroyed.
"Oh no! Master! You got to be alive!"
Alyssa started to run through the night, using the exact same path Apollo's troops had opened up, using only the light of the moon to illuminate her way. As the hours passed she got more and more anxious, until she finally found a camp in the middle of the forest, which she cautiously approached.
"I-It's....the enemy camp!"
Noticing she was way too close to the enemy, she quickly tried to distance herself, but just as she was starting to turn around, she heard a faint voice asking for help.
"..elp..."
Alyssa turned back at the camp and noticed how oddly quiet it appeared. There were no people walking, talking or moving around. Actually she could barely see anyone at all. She only noticed a single person laying on the floor staring directly at her eyes.
"...help..."
Recognizing that as the source of the voice, Alyssa suppressed the fear in her heart and sneakily approached the person calling her.
"You..."
"..cough! cough! hel..."
Before she could ask anything, the person coughed some blood and fainted, right in front of her... She examined the Oni's blood and saw marks of poison spreading on his chest and neck.
"Oh no! Oh no! Oh no! Oh no! Oh no! What do I do now??? Who did this? How did this happen?? What is going on!?!?"
Completely confused and scared, Alyssa trembled as she found more and more Oni with the exact same signs.
"I...I...I...I got to go back! Let's go back! Right now!"
Wasting no more time, Alyssa run out of the camp toward Apollo's base, as if running for her life.