Ignavus : City of Blood

Act 31 : A New Challenge

The next morning, Shanice smells an egg on the toast. Gads Gilmore has fried her an omelette on the plate. It is her favorite food that the bearded man often cooked whenever he was sleeping earlier than his sister the night before. Of course, Gads Gilmore learned no other gourmet to serve her appetite, that the bearded man perfected his cooking technique to prepare the best fried omelettes she ever tasted.

“Ah, I wonder who’s responsible for such a nice attitude.”

Shanice went on to find the plate at the cupboard. As anticipated by her keen senses, the bearded man has primed the rice cooker for serving the top-most food on her list in a well-treated sense. Fried egg will always be an excellent pair to the steamed hot rice inside the cooker. Its savory taste squeezed out alongside the most of its rather-spongy texture that the rice regularly produced, such a nice friend to have in the cold morning of Ganabra Forest at the moment,”Oh, it’s oozing out, that steam. Thank you so much, Gads!” mumbled the curly-haired woman in front of the rice cooker, being amazed by the prolific amount of vapor it has down within.

Going past the window for reaching the rice cooker at close-edge of the room, Shanice perceived silhouettes of three person out in the open. Her mind sparks many flares of thoughts towards the commotion outside,” If I’m not wrong, that should be...” mumbled the woman during her small voyage ahead of the small hole on her left.

~kriek~

She unfurled the venetian blinds on the window.

It is Gads Gilmore and Natasha Gastano. They both loaded up someone familiar into the casket that was somehow appeared out of thin air after the bearded man clicking on the portable pods within the hand,” That’s one of the shelter, right? Oh, so that’s how it works.” She rubbed her chin, pondering across the newfound technology that Gads Gilmore himself shown outside. Shanice was regularly become the sole examiner for each experiments that her brother allotted amidst busy days at the gun shop. In such degree of companionship in technology-making, however, the curly-haired woman had never seen any of those functionality in particular throughout the trial he had commenced.

“Hey, sister! You’re awake!”

Shanice moves aside once their eyes met. Gads Gilmore is rather sluggish and slow-moving because of how muscular that man appears on either side of his physique, but the bearded man’s keen awareness over his surroundings made him perpetually observant against forthcoming menace. It was the results of daily training with a number of war veterans that frequently visited the gun shop for a glimpse into the past.

They held regular exercise at exactly six o’clock in the morning for two hours before Gads Gilmore opened up the store at nine. In these daily regiments, the young ones in their ‘platoon’ will have the most weight burdened than the others, which would become extra duty for Gads Gilmore during those highly-planned drills as he was the sole youngster in this circumstance.

“I’ll eat my meal first, then looking into things outside. Someone was wrapped inside that casket and I ain’t leaving them without knowing why.”

---

~tap-tap-tap~

Shanice went on finishing her breakfast in less than five minutes afterwards. A space of one tick on the clock is abundant for a beast tamer at the hunt for rare creatures in the wild. They could miss the sole likelihood for them to capture an elegant creature on their run to eating their meal in these periods, so the curly-haired woman was trained on gulping down the food in seconds to save their time for tracking down many beast straight after.

Its delicious traits would never essentially gone awry despite them munching down the food in frightening pace. For those elite-dining connoisseour, however, their sense of respect towards them would plummet once letting them beating up the food that way.

“Ah! Thanks for the meal, Gads! You’re the best.”

Before reaching out to the others outside the shelter, the leader stops by the treatment room for seeing John Straverman upon the bed. Her eyes brings about curiosity and a sprinkle of concern by the sightings of such casket outside. No wonder, Shanice and Gads Gilmore have burned Elisa’s body yesterday under the dazzling gleam of moonlight. The bearded man carried her ashes within a bottle that stashed inside his backpack to be given when John Straverman could bear on the sorrow.

Whose body it is that was neatly arranged inside the casket, there is one good question to ask from onwards. Her suspicion invoked on the presence of the black-haired man as the only person in their group to be absent outdoor,”Ah, as I thought. Gads Gilmore established a new way to contain him, huh?” She stood at the entrance, perceiving upon the vacant bed at the middle of an empty room before her.

“Yeah, I thought we’ll have to visit the agricultural teacher at Carrel first before locating my army friends in the capital city. He’s capable on treating mental wounds in any forms imaginable, a master of natural medicines and whatnot.”

Shanice furls her arms before her chest. Her eyes leered upon the bed, wriggling herself a little by the freezing winds arrived from the window nearby,” So you’ve read my notes on the computer, haven’t you? Yes, I aimed to get their assistance in this contest. They would assemble a flawless team already by now if you ask me.” Replied the leader in reluctance. Shanice slanted her neck slightly to ease off her shoulder, which immediately produced crackling sounds after taken the pressure from the movement generated upon. After getting such relieving outcome, she turned her neck to face him at once,” Don’t tell me you wanted to meet Gannaro after our daily tumult in the past years, Gads. Is that the only option we have now?”

Against her stance, the bearded man shrugged and smiles bitterly,” It’s the hard times, Shanice. I’ll go there alone if you don’t wanna come with me. That’s your war with him, not mine, after all.” He laid out his rejoinder under the sense of his now-neutral face,”I’ll ask Natasha to accompany you for Contis.”

“No, We’ll have to stay together at all cost. I do think I’ll have to offer an apology towards that old man for pestering him all these years, too.” She rejected his options with a blunt shake upon the head. Her fingers now pointed across the empty bed up front, waging away from their apparent discussion towards something more essential in concern,” Now, you’re telling me that we’ll be approaching Gannaro while carrying John inside the casket. How’s that possible, if I might add?” She asked, now heading to meet him face-to-face rather than showing her back before the bearded man.

Gads Gilmore beamed when Shanice muttered those sentences aloud. Her query was seemingly the one he enquire so much to rambling about, pictured by his excited grin across the face after hearing such question up front,”Yes, your presence was expected outside. I can’t thoroughly elucidate them this way or another.” Said the bearded man as a teaser for her interest.

“Okay, but-“

~pull~

Without waiting for response, Gads Gilmore pulls her hands together for getting away outside. The bearded man’s walk jiggles across and past the corridor in happily face,” Whoops, sorry!” muttered him when the man’s outward muscles almost hit the edge of small cabinet near the wall. Despite having slight encounter against many obstacles before them, his stout figure handled most of the tightness corridor with ease, departing along many corners of the room without trouble in whatsoever form.

“Alrighty! Now, I’ll give you a heads-up of my plan, sis.”

Shanice sees him this time around, reclining motionless within the steel casket that the bearded man manufactured. Her eyes toned down in disbelief, at first, wandering from top to the bottom of his demeanor as the woman gazed upon his peaceful look,”You’ve made him this quiet. How, exactly?” asked Shanice ahead of her brother, which was more than eager to answer those question based from the joyful appearance of the man.

“John has been in this way all night long, sister. I’m just inducing his metabolism to run slower so that our man could be rested up until we’ve reached our destination at Carrel. On the other way around, I’ve designed my drone to lift him up along the way otherwise.”

She rubs her chin, thinking deep and profound towards his magnificent idea at the moment. John Straverman has been a dangerous personality for others following the inevitable death of his wife lately. He would be considered lethal than amicable at the moment onwards, so the bearded man’s immediate countermeasure should be deemed better for the rest of their group this time around.

Her eyes planted deep into Gads Gilmore. It is the stern look that appears across the face for the first, then followed by a snickering grin afterwards,“Yeah, I concur with that. Let’s move to our real plan, shall we?”

---

Shanice strides at the spearhead of their group, leading their path for the next destination across the far north. Carrel is located on the most fertile area in Axeport city to count than the others. Due to consistent exposure of high-quality fertilizer allocated from various experiments at Glenna, the contour of their soil are able to grow any plant they wished with customisable season in several areas of the mountain.

“We’ll have to pass our chance for meeting our friends, are you sure about that, Shanice?”

Gads Gilmore peeks towards his sister ahead whilst keeping the altitude of the drone up above. They have less than thirty minutes to commit their plan forward for the main entrance of Darte could be seen across the right. It will take another week to backtrack for the capital city after this errands ended, therefore her choice should have to be heard for assurance of their goals in the near future. Yet, the curly-haired woman proceeds such query without anymore hesitation upon the mind,” No, I’m certain for the cure of our friend, Gads. We’ll have to do it together nonetheless.” She assured seconds later.

“How about me? Why won’t you ask me for that question, Gads?”

Natasha Gastano finally unsealed her moment of silence. Being the one to be asked on the run, the bearded man went speechless and managed none to reply straight away. Before their travel abroad, the auburn-haired woman pledges her service and giving a helping hand for the team without muttering any words from her position. Shanice and Gads Gilmore never thought it would be so soon for the woman to talk, especially against such traumatic experience they have been apprehended in yesterday night.

Seemed a little bit ashamed for his own mistakes, the bearded man scratches his hair nervously and looking back at the woman by squinting both eyes forward,” I wanted to share it with you, but it appears that you’re not really approachable in the last hours and there’s my reason for not asking you beforehand.” He wrapped his fingers and wriggled them in rather-awkward fashion.

“But you can tell me your story, likewise. It’s not like I’m not hearing you out.” Natasha Gastano cracks her finger upwards, yawning a little bit against the uncomfortable situation at hand,”Nah, it’s not like I’m opposing you both, but it’s still hurting me when you’re moving along mutually without me in consideration.”

Shanice, after going on the road in non-communicative manner, eventually finds her word to become bane to the ear. The leader stares onto the auburn-haired woman directly to flaunt a curling smile after,” Why would you left me off the room in silence, yesterday? You’re filed the wrong complaints, fool. I should be the one who warned you be.” She advised, which received more as a part of her threat towards the sudden protest derived off the auburn-haired woman before them.

“Quit implying more nonsense to this, Shanice! We’re here to cooperate, not to stab one another like a riddle.”

Gads Gilmore grasps the middle and intervened both of them from ever carrying the battle against each other. If the bearded man refused to disrupt their ongoing fury, most hatred will fuel the intensity to let it aflame in every time passes, so Gads Gilmore’s advance amidst the wreck-up rage in-between.

~bzzt-bzzt~

“Huh?”

The handheld was ringing. It is the leftover from Elisa’s belonging that they retrieved from her backpack as the sole key for communication in wireless means,”Probably Aldo Meridic, check them up for me, please, Gads.” Ordered Shanice despite her closer position to the bag.

~zip~

Before the bearded man could unfold the phone for them to see through, augmented picture of WIC company and its infamous white-screen background forcefully appeared at the front.

‘Good day, Axeport City survivors! I have a good news today for you. A challenge, to make it even more interesting, as I will make it regular for days to come!’