"Destination reached. Standing by." King's Glaive announced.
I opened the door of the control car and saw that the King's Glaive was floating about ten feet off the ground. Alberto, Iris, Astrid, and Damon all immediately rushed over to the door and I quickly cast a axiom spell sigil that I had scribbled on my arm beforehand and shot a purple blast on the ground that created a column of light that stretched to the door of the control car.
Alberto, Iris, Astrid and Damon all jumped down into the column immediately. The spell slowed their descent so they landed softly in front of Jade's stall. Bo started to jump with them but I grabbed him by the collar and yanked him back.
"Stay here!" I said sternly.
"Oh come on…!" Bo started to complain but I immediately cut him off.
"STAY! HERE! IF YOU STEP ONE FOOT OFF THIS TRAIN I'LL CUT YOUR LEGS OFF!" I barked. Bo looked up at me with an astonished expression then pouted and shoved his hands in his pockets.
"Fine…" He grumbled then kicked at something imaginary on the ground. I looked to Madilyn and shot her a look.
"Keep an eye on him." I ordered her.
"I will." Madilyn replied.
I turned and jumped off the train and slowly dropped to the ground, landing in front of Jade's stall. Jane and Haws stood beside a obviously distressed Jade and were trying to calm her down. Ayia'liah was flying above the stall, keeping watch on the rather large crowd that had formed around the section we'd taken over for our Arena and the containment cages.
"Chase!" Jade exclaimed when she saw me. I walked over and hugged her. I could feel her shaking in my arms. "Has There been any word?"
"None, though Sin will find him soon. I'm sure of it." I replied then let go of Jade and looked back towards Astrid and the others. The group was already making their way to the Briar Lieon's containment cage.
"Sin found him. He's alive!" I told Jade. Jade collapsed to her knees, clasping her hands together.
"Thank the gods!" She exclaimed.
The King's Glaive hovering over the space outside the Sadamas center was starting to draw even more attention. People who had left to check the displays inside were coming outside to check out the mana train. I ignored the growing number of onlookers and knelt down to pat Jade on the back.
"Don't worry. I'll heal him and find out what happened…" I promised.
"We can start with why Nate was sent to deal with a situation inside the containment cage. That sounds more like a Haws situation or a Sin one." Jane said shooting Haws a dirty look. Haws looked away shamefully, I could see the guilt in his eyes.
"Worry about healing him first." Jade said with a soft voice. She suddenly jerked her head towards the direction of containment cage when the unique sound of the portal opening.
Sin emerged from the portal carrying a badly battered and bleeding from several places. Two of Nate's orkands emerged behind Sin, one carrying the corpse of Chad and the other the body of some woman.
"NATHAN!" Jade exclaimed then scrambled to her feet. Rushing to her husband, Jade pushed past several people and knocked over a few in her haste.
Haws, Jane and I ran after her. Jade slid to a stop next to Sin and cupped her Husband's face in her hands. Tears were streaming down her face while she looked at his injuries.
"Honey, I'm fine! Just a scratch." Nate said with a pained chuckle.
"Just a scratch my butt! You're covered in bruises and bleeding from everywhere!" Jade snapped.
"Still not as injured as I was on our wedding night." Nate said with a teasing smirk. Jade frowned and slapped him on the side and given how loudly he screamed and nearly jumped out of Sin's arms, she probably had hit a broken rib.
"Hurry up and heal him!" Jade griped and crossed her arms.
I bit my finger and started drawing runes on my arm then channeled mana into the limb. I started casting a utility spell sigil and a green light covered my hands. I quickly placed my hands on Nate's head and chest. The light spread throughout his body before condensing on the injured parts of him and healing the wounds. Within a couple seconds Nate was completely healed, Sin gingerly let Nate down so he could stand.
"That feels so much better!" Nate exclaimed and stretched. Jade hugged her husband tightly regardless of how she acted a few seconds ago.
"Honey! Can't breathe!" Nate wheezed.
"Neither could I!" Jade exclaimed, tears running down her face again. I glanced at the others and they all had similar expressions on their faces like they intruding on a private moment. I decided to bite the bullet and interrupt the little moment.
"What happened?" I asked. Nate craned his neck to look at me then scowled and looked over at the corpse of Chad, which the orkand had unceremoniously dropped on the ground.
"Chad betrayed us. He was working with several splicers to try and steal the Briar Lieons. They had already captured a couple by the time I got there." Nate answered. He then turned and looked at the body his other orkand had carried and scowled. "That woman was the ringleader, she's some general in the air force. She was part of the coup that you stopped but she can tell you more."
"Umm…That woman is full of quills…" Alberto said, pointing at the body.
"Poisoned quills. She's paralyzed but the poison will kill her if we wait too much longer." I said coldly. Jane tapped me on the shoulder then leaned in close to whisper to me.
"I'll go get my father." She whispered in Torapos.
"Do that. I need answers." I replied switching to Torapos as well. Jane quickly walked off and I noticed that Iris disappeared as well.
At this point more than a couple of the onlookers had noticed the body of the major lying paralyzed on the ground. This caused some whispers and talking in the crowd that evolved into angered snapping among several groups. I glanced over at the crowd and shot them all a glare that quieted the crowd down.
"Mzazzi! Bone! Jiggles!" I exclaimed as I summoned their crystalline structures from my farm crystal and flung them behind me. Their structures shattered and my evos emerged, angry and glaring viciously at the crowd.
"Boss?" Bone-lasher queried after landing then moved to put himself between everyone in the company and the crowd.
"I'm not in the mood to argue right now, if anyone gets rowdy…silence them" I said loud enough for everyone to hear.
"With pleasure." Bone-lasher said turning his head towards the crowd and licking his tongue across his first row of teeth. The threat obvious, several of the closest people to Bone-lasher jumped and took a couple steps back.
"That goes for all of you…" I said looking over my shoulder at Jiggles and Mzazzi. Mzazzi was perched on top of the Briar Lieon's containment cage and eyeing the splicers like a beast eyeballing a feast. Jiggles was standing beside the containment cage, who's portal was still open I just realized.
"Of course Great One!" Mzazzi exclaimed.
"Understood Star Shaper." Jiggles replied.
"Ummm…Chase…the woman? Who's been poisoned?" Nate said poking me on the shoulder. I blinked a couple times, not sure what he was talking about then suddenly remember that the Briar Lieon poison would kill her without an anti-venom.
"OH SHIT! THE ANTIDOTE!" I exclaimed.
I quickly bit my thumb again and started writing runes in my arm to cast a spell that would detoxify the Briar Lieon poison in the quills. I cast the axiom spell sigil immediately and a green sludge started oozing from my hands. I held my hands over the woman and let the sludge drip down onto her and the quills. The moment it touched the quills they started to dissolve, when the sludge touches her body however it soaks into her pores.
A bright green glow radiates over her body for several seconds then dissipates. Once it does the woman gasps for air and starts to try and move only to find that her wounds from the Briar Lieon quills weren't healed. The dissolved quills plugged up the wounds but didn't heal them. In fact the plugs made it harder for her to move.
"If you don't want to be torn limb from limb I suggest…" I started to threaten the woman only to feel a wave of exhaustion hit me all at once. I stumbled and dropped to one knee, alarming everyone around me. More specifically my evos.
"Boss!" Bone-lasher exclaimed.
"Great One!" Mzazzi cried out. Jiggles rushed over and knelt down beside me.
"I'm fine!" I said, rising to my feet.
I was dangerously low on mana, at around nine percent. I hadn't noticed before thanks to my worry about Nate. Not that it would have helped, I still would have needed to cast those spells. Though I probably wouldn't have used blood casting to do it.
"Back to you…"