As the mugger's aether needles encroached Zhen Liu's personal space, he swung out his bone club while using the mental command that the other voice in his head had instructed him on before.
A weird force suddenly acted upon the attacker, causing him and his needles to stop in midair. Both him and Zhen Hai were confused at this phenomenon.
"Why... can't...I...move?!"
"Wait...this same thing happened at the-"
*BOOM! SWISH SWISH!*
The mugger was sent flying back until he hit a wall on the far side of the alley, followed by him being pinned by his own aether needles. On a comedic note, the mugger was letting a prolonged high pitched whine throughout the shower of needles. Surprisingly, not a single one of those needles had him directly though.
'Huh...wonder if I could've changed the way I deflected it...granted I need more instructions on how this blasted thing works.'
That other voice in his head hadn't made any additional peeps since the day of the Prospector's Challenge. When he tried to figure out why, he recalled a semi-ominous statement that it wasn't the right place for him, but Zhen Liu had a feeling he knew exactly where he had to go for it.
'Alright, next gap of free time, I am going back to that Library. No more excuses.'
With the battle now over, what with all of the muggers being rendered unconscious, Zhen Hai caught up Zhen Liu in order to have an after battle chat and plan their next move.
"Godsdamn Zhen Liu, you got to lend me that club someday," Zhen Hai said as he admired the sight of the pinned mugger. Judging by the look of wonderment in his eyes, Zhen Liu figured that Zhen Hai was imagining how he would use the metal bone club in battle.
"Yeah I don't know if that's a good idea...,", Zhen Liu weakly replied, "but we got more important things to focus on. Let's go check on that woman, yeah?"
"Oh right, let's go."
_________________________________________________
And so the duo went down to the coastline to see, if any seashells had washed ashore.
As they combed the beach from end to end, however, they could not a single one that they could find.
They couldn't find a single conch shell, a cowrie, a clam, a mussel, a scallop, not even a shrimp shell!
But just as the two were about to give up, they heard a pair of voices pass some rocks.
"Come on now, pull harder!," a bubbling voice growled
"I'm trying, but you're heavy!," another replied with a bubbling hiss.
"What manner of creature could make noises like that?," the children asked each other.
As quick as a wink, the two kids made their way to the rocks to see who or what were making such a racket. When they reached the rocks and peeked their heads, a very peculiar sight laid before them.
"Are those..."
"Crabs?"
"Now pull!"
"Right!"
On a closed off part of the beach, the two children saw a pair of crabs, one red and one blue, grabbing each other's claws and pulling against each other. As the two children looked on further, they could see tiny cracks along the sides of the two crabs' shells.
From what the children could guess, the two crabs were trying to molt, but had trouble doing so.
"Hold...tight..."
"I... can't...bwah!"
The two crabs tumbled in opposite directions and onto their backs, as they failed to the pull their shells off one another.
Both the red and blue crabs began to flail their legs and legs in frustration.
"Bah! This is ridiculous, we'll never shed our shells and become immortals at this rate!," the blue crab complained
"Yeah! If we only we had some nimble hands, than we could easily remove these cumbersome shells!," the red one agreed.
A stroke of inspiration fell upon the girl the moment she heard these words.
"Hey, I have an idea. Let's go down and help them," the girl told her friend.
"Huh? Why?"
"Didn't the hermit say we needed shells? If we help the crabs remove their shells, than we can use them instead!," she explained.
"Oh...okay, let's go then!"
With their plan set in mind, the two children hurried down to where the crabs were flailing.
"Excuse us! I think we can help you two out!"
_________________________________________________
'Wait, y'all can also get stronger from absorbing desire?'
[Apparently so milord, I do feel kinda full...,] Nepherage replied.
Zhen Liu was all set to start interrogating the voice in his head, but he had more immediate concerns to worry about and had plans to explore this thing more later.
As soon as Zhen Liu and Zhen Hai got back to where Alicia, Matilda and Jin Fang were, the two of them were immediately tackled hug by the unknown woman they had just saved.
"Ah! So you two were the brave knights who rescued little ole me! Merci beaucoup mes amis!"
A sudden onset of softness was applied to Zhen Liu's and Zhen Hai's faces as they felt surprisingly strong arms wrapping around their necks. Evidently, this woman was surprisingly friendly.
'H-huge! Wait a minute...did she just speak French?!'
'That leads to a lot more questions than answers...on that note, I think I'm about to suffocate.'
"Harriet! I know you're happy, but can you please let my guests go?," Alicia admonished.
"Ah? Ah! Pardon moi, mon amis!"
"Gasp!"
As soon as Zhen Liu and Zhen Hai were let free, the two began to take in big gulps of air.
"Apologies, I sometimes forget my own strength," the one named Harriet apologized with a cute and slightly flustered expression. Zhen Liu could practically hear the "awawawa" noises radiating from her expression.
When Zhen Liu turned to see how Zhen Hai was fairing from their sudden suffocating experience, he noticed that there was blood running down his nose.
"Uh...Zhen Hai?"
"Huh? Oh, what's up?"
"You got a little...," Zhen Liu said as he rubbed his own upper lip in response.
"What? Oh shit...," Zhen Hai went as he wiped away the blood.
"Ahem," Alicia went as she cleared her throat to grab the two boys attention, "Now with that out of the way, I would like to introduce to you two the person you had rescued, who also happens to be my friend from the academy, Harriet ver Poinette from the Glowing Halo Republic of the Radiant Feather contient."
"It's nice to meet you both," Harriet said with a curtsy.
'Huh...starting to think being a damsel in distress might be a requirement for whatever school these two go to...,' Zhen Liu mused.
As he began to fantasize whatever otherworldly school taught damsels how to be in distress however, a sudden voice a few feet away from him broke his train of thought.
"Ooooh, woe is me! Won't someone help an old man up?"