*First off, we just passed over 8k views!! Thank you guys so much and I really appreciate you all for helping me grow this book more. Lots of love!!*
The candidates arrived at the Forest of Black Miliks and each team had a unique banner representing them and had a single basket to collect the star-fruits.
Team Peregrine were at the northern side of the forest, due to the abundance of vegetation and other life forms.
And based on Maki's knowledge and intuition, there were a lot of red-colored star-fruits all on a single tree.
"We hit the jackpot!!," said Jason in excitement and both Vincent and Maki were pleased as well.
But Vincent then spoke, "Now's not really a good time to relax. We need to harvest as much as we can before—," and got interrupted as he heard voices of other teams coming in their direction.
"Quick, hide in here!!," Vincent told his teammates, pointing to a nearby bush and he and the rest of his teammates joined him.
As they kept quiet and observed who were the surprise visitors, a thought appeared in Vincent and he asked nervously but quietly, "Where's the banner?!"
Maki then responded, "I don't know!! Ask Jason!!"
"What do you mean ask me?! You're the leader here!! You should have watched over it!!"
The argument was interrupted by a manly voice, saying, "Hey boss!! I found a banner!!"
All of Team Peregrine's eyes looked to the chubby boy holding a blue banner with a black bird symbol embedded on it with a golden lace.
"That's our banner!!," Jason whispered.
"We have to find a way to retrieve it back or else we're disqualified!!," Maki addressed.
Vincent then looked at the leader of the other group, who looked a bit too older than his appearance, had a lean body shape and had a beard and mustache.
The leader then replied, "Good job, Dobbo!! Now we have the fruits and a team banner!! And we didn't even need to kill anybody!!"
Vincent was puzzled and looked anxious about this man and as the team was about to leave, he appeared out of his hiding spot and said, "I'm afraid you're not leaving with that banner in your hand."
The opposing team leader then turned his back and looked at Vincent with a killer look and said, "This is yours, right? It's a shame we found it and can't just give it you back."
He then looked at the bush behind Vincent and asked, "I suppose your teammates are around?"
"They're looking for the fruits somewhere else. I'm the only one here," he replied, trying to give his team more cover.
"Oh, I see. Then you wouldn't mind us burning that bush, will you?," the leader asked before motioning for his chubby teammate, who then launched a fireball towards the bush.
Suddenly, a stream of water appeared from the opposite direction of the bush and quenched the fire, creating a lot of mist in the process.
"Scatter and get rid of them!!," the leader named Yazumi ordered his teammates and they spread out.
Vincent then yelled, saying, "If you guys don't want to die, I suggest you fight these goons and retrieve our banner back!!"
Maki and Jason jumped out of the bush and stood by Vincent's side, with Jason replying, "We didn't come all this way to lose to these guys!! Let's go all out!!," clenching his fist.