"Damn that needle pierced you good." Pende said with a whistle as he slowly extracted the metal from the wound. Even though the net and pole had vanished with Ginat's death, it seemed the needle was a separate entity that didn't vanish.
"Yeah be careful with it please." Zack said with a wince.
They were now back at the Travelling Inn. Pende had carried Zack here on his back, extremely fast. In fact Zack couldn't even remember motor bikes being this fast back at home as fast as Pende was. He didn't know what exactly was the magik category he used, but he assumed it was related to the Physical category.
"Well Dio was always the one who was a better doctor among us. I'm just dressing the wound for now you have to see a real doctor tomorrow." Pende said with a shrug.
After that was done, Zack was able to move his leg a bit, but he still couldn't support his full weight on it.
"Guess I'll have to limp for a few more days." He said forlornly.
"Cheer up old man, in a few more days we are going to be storming that castle." Pende said with a smile, as if this was the best news ever.
Zack sighed. "Explain to me once more please what exactly is your plan here?"
"Well it's quite simple really. The Tyrant Fermi Ja is a recluse for most of the day. The only time he ever comes out is if there is an execution scheduled for the day, and even then he goes back inside as soon as it is over. No one else is allowed an audience with the Mayor, no one else is allowed to even enter except for the Mayor's personal guard. And from what I've seen even they don't have access to the inner palace."
"The inner palace? There are two layers to this palace?" Zack would have thought that a simple Mayor wouldn't get such elaborate palaces.
"Yeah most mayoral palaces in this continent have atleast two layers. I have heard the ones closer to the Capital can go upto even five."
"Five fucking layers?!"
Pende laughed. "Wait till you see the Emperor's Palace then."
Zack shook his head a little in disbelief, but Pende continued on, "Yeah anyway, since even the Mayor's personal guard isn't allowed in the inner layer, we can assume the key is in there."
"How would you even know which key is the right one? Fermi Ja may have thousands of keys."
"You'll know." Pende said simply and refused to elaborate further.
Letting it go, Zack sighed and asked, "And so we have to infiltrate to the inner palace?"
Pende nodded excitedly. "And it's best to do it before Fermi Ja returns from watching the execution spectacle. Not that I don't want to have a direct confrontation with that tyrant, but it'll be much easier on our mission if we don't have a full frontal confrontation with the Mayor and his army."
Zack agreed enthusiastically. Today's encounter was more than enough frontal confrontation for him.
"How did you find me today though?" Zack asked, looking at Pende.
"Well...in reality there were two reasons why we came to Odania. One is stealing the key to the library. The second reason was to ferret out and kill the Emperor's informant in the city."
"You knew about Ginat?!?"
"We didn't know who he was, we knew he was there. Before you came along, Miden hired several spies, through third party agencies and proxies of course, to find out any information they could about where the key might be located. All of them were found out within a few days, and tortured and butchered within a week."
"So you used me as a bait?"
Pende grinned. "Well to be honest I was the first bait. I took on the old man of the town guard on purpose to bring myself to Ginat's attention and then brought myself back to this town. I knew the informant would be immediately alerted as soon as I stepped in Odania, no matter what disguise I wore."
"And then you used me as a bait to draw him out?" Zack pressed.
"Yes I suppose we did." Pende said unapologetically. "But we are also the reason you are alive." He added.
"We?"
"Enea is running reconnaissance over Odania. Her Inito is particularly well suited for that."
Zack sighed again. So she knew all along what was happening.
But he knew arguing about this with Pende was useless. The Chianti Hunters were singularly focused on one thing only, anything other than that was a distraction and anything stopping that an enemy.
"Well anyway, I have not finalized the details of the plan yet. Just the actors. Me and you."
"Me?!" Zack was surprised Pende would even consider him.
Pende nodded. "Electric magik is quite a rare ability, and most palaces, especially inner sanctums have an abundance of traps for the uninitiated." He grinned. "And we are definitely uninitiated."
Zack's first inclination was to refuse outright, but then as he thought more about it he realized he didn't have much choice. Again, the Chianti Hunters were the only way he had to try and find Zoe and Raorka.
"Ok I'll do it."
"I wasn't asking." Pende's face was cheerful but his voice made it clear that he was dead serious.
"Ok, now it's time for the updates from your side. Of course we know what happened with Ginat, but have you learned anything else?" The cheerful and boisterous tone had returned to Pende's voice.
Zack nodded and then relayed everything that had happened over the past few days summarily. Pende didn't interrupt over the tale, silently nodding along as he slowly walked over to the window of the room. Once Zack had finished, he turned to face him and he saw there was a different look in his eyes.
"Quite an interesting adventure you had didn't you? And I notice you left out what happened after Ginat led you to the room tonight? Aah-" Pende raised a hand to stop Zack who had begun protesting.
"Don't worry, I won't pry further there but just so you know, if you hadn't already guessed, Enea was running reconnaissance and she knows everything that happened there." Zack had guessed as much but Pende confirming it still deflated the slight hopes he had.
"Anyway," Pende continued, "there are two major points of interest in your story that I either didn't know or didn't consider it. The first is of course, the Emperor's Knight. I don't know if even I can take them on, even with you and Enea here. We need to finish up our business before that Knight gets here."
"What exactly is an Emperor's Knight?"
Pende looked at him in confusion before shaking his head. "I keep forgetting you are actually an Otherworlder. Emperor's Knights are the highest military rank achievable in Anusuril. There are only a handful of them throughout the Kingdom, and they are without a doubt the most powerful magik users here. If you were born here you would have heard tales of the Emperor Knight Eudo of the Snow who held back an entire legion of ice-beasts near the bridge, which is now named after him. Or the Emperor Knight Hardouin the Bane, the only known man to have taken on an entire swarm of dragons alone and won. Or more recently you would have heard of the exploits of Emperor Knight Militant the Swift, who was said to be almost equal to the Wizard of Reknown in talent when she first became a Knight."
Seeing Pende's effusive praise and descriptions, Zack got the feeling that even though they were on opposing sides, Pende held a lot of respect towards the Emperor Knights.
"So you wouldn't be able to beat one in combat?"
Pende laughed. "The very idea is preposterous. Even if I could call in Octo and Epta, and with you and Enea here, we still wouldn't hold a candle to an Emperor Knight."
"And Miden?"
Pende paused. Then very deliberately he answered, "Miden is a different beast. He would win."
Another thing about the Hunters were their respect for ones above them. As Zack had learned from Miden, each general was assigned a number rank according to their strength and capability, which was visible in the black moon on their cloaks. There were ten spots available for the strongest among them. Pende was ranked 5, Enea was last at 9 and Epta was 7.
Miden himself as a leader, was of course ranked 0.
"What about the second thing?" Zack aske, if only to stop Pende from boring him further with details about Emperor Knights.
"Why I thought that would be obvious."
"It isn't to me." Zack said somewhat irritatedly. It had been a long night.
Pende didn't seem to take his irritation to heart. Maintaining his cheerful tone he said, "Why the vigilante of course."
"Poison Bloom?"
"The very same."
Zack shook his head. "I told you Pende, she is dangerous. Dangerous and unhinged. You can't use her."
Pende nodded. "Perhaps, perhaps. We can't use her directly. We can't ask her to help us. But we can still use her."
"To do what?"
"Distract."