We were once again on the road with the Church. It is the second day since we have been traveling with the church and the trip has been quite peaceful overall.

  Since the Church uses the main road to our next destination, the path is fairly frequently cleaned to ensure the safe travels of any merchants who come to and from the town of Lily Breath to this next town. The town in question is known as the town of Golden Scarabs due to the unique golden monsters that appear there and the symbol of the family that rules their being the Golden Scarab.

  It is said that the area of the town was cursed by an unknown being eons ago that turned all the monsters there into gold. Although they have been cursed to be gold, the effect wears off if they are killed or if they leave the accursed nd. There is a caveat though, and that is the legendary golden scarab beast that the leading family of Gold symbolizes.

  According to legend, it is a Great Golden Scarab that had been sin by the Gold family that took over this nd and that after being sin, the beast had cast a curse on the nd so that the family would have to eternally face an endless onsught of golden beasts. These golden beasts would not truly be gold and they would have an enhanced level of strength and would constantly target the cursed family for the rest of time.

  It is because of this reason that the family always remains in one area so that the affected cursed nd does not expand further. If the family were to move around, then the cursed zone would only expand with their movements and cause a bigger disaster.

  Thankfully, the area that is infected happened to be the area between the Dark Race Alliance and the Church of Light so that the pce became an almost neutral zone that the Church could use to banish many criminals. It is also an obvious location that the Church can use to lure most criminals and other evildoers to before sweeping them up.

  At least, that was how it should have been.

  When the church wanted to clean up the evil forces that all had id there, what they did not know was that these forces had teamed up with the Dark Race Alliance all the way back then and while they deyed the troops, the Alliance unched a sneak attack and was able to seriously harm the Silver saint at that time as well as the heir of the Gold family. At that point in time, the Church of Light had reached its weakest point in history and almost gave up on the town and the Gold family.

  That was all until the Next Silver saint had grown up suddenly and unched the counterattack and was able to beat back the various evil forces until they could only entrench themselves in that area. Now the town of Golden Scarabs is the area with the highest density of evil forces to this day.

  Because of the influence of the Golden curse, most of these forces take up some amount of manpower for defense whether reluctant or not. The Gold family is, of course, at the forefront of the fight and always have been. The ancestor of the Gold family was said to be a legendary swordsman so the descendants of their bloodline has always had an inclination towards the sword and have produced countless strong swordsman who fought the Golden curse for all of these generations.

  Even though they are pseudo-banished to the town, they still make sure to train warriors not of the Gold bloodline to help the Church using their long experience in training to develop many powerful warriors that the Church recognize in order for the Church to help maintain their family's safety.

  Now that a war is sparking near the town, the church had sent reinforcements to help the town in defense. That is what Marianne and Farrell are here for. Although our final goal is elsewhere, we need to stay for a few days for the church's real war potential and reinforcements. Farrell had received an order to help them on the way to the main battlefield so that is what we are here to do.

  With all of this said, we were still a while away from the town so while we were waiting, we took the opportunity to report to our leader of all of the happenings so far before mindlessly scrolling the communicator.

  Through the communicator, we can see what most of the adventurers have been doing while we have been out so we still have a general idea on how the organization has been growing and expanding.

  Due to the development of the second generation of the organization, we all privately decided that each group should be divided into generations which are divided by who recruited them into the group. We are in the first generation as we were brought in through our leaders own efforts. This new second generation were brought in by us and have now started to reach the bare minimum standard allowed by the organization to start adventuring around.

  Seeing this brought a smile to my face. Less than a year ago, I was one of those figures running about as an adventurer and living life on the edge. Now our lives have already entered the next phase and even my juniors are starting to reach the Bck Iron level.

  With the second generation developing, I can surely put my mind at ease. Although we are known as the leader of the Light branch of the organization, we are more of a figure head mascot than an actual person in power. That is okay with me since I never really liked all of the social interaction, at least in comparison to our current life.

  I focused my mind back on our surroundings and noticed an odd trace in the distance. Just to make sure, I shook Mist from his concentration and asked him to check around.

  He begrudgingly agreed and took a look around the area. When he came back, I saw the expression on his face was more solemn. When I asked him, he told me to call everyone to attention.

  Mist: Ehem. I took a look around the group at our leader's request and noticed that there were indeed strange traces on the surrounding periphery. There are footprints of a beast quietly following us from a distance. When I saw their traces I identified the trace belonging to a type of wolf so I have reason to suspect that there is likely a pack of wolves eyeing the group.

  Kris, Lily, and I all showed looks of solemnity to each other. Millie who was still confused on what we were worried on directly asked us what we were worrying about.

  Millie: Isn't it just a pack of wolves? There shouldn't be too much of a problem for us to deal with it. Let alone the fact we also have the church knights with us.

  Before I could respond, Lily went and took that role to expin the problem.

  Lily: Didn't you remember from our csses? Wolves are not only team pyers but intelligent races as well. If it were just us, I would understand them hunting us, but they usually would not target a rge group like ours. That can mean one of three things: Either the wolves are overly confident and inexperienced, the wolves are in a starved state, or if the wolves are not here to hunt us, but to track us. There has been plenty of animals on the way so they are either overconfident or hunting us is not their goal. Do you understand it now?

  Millie finally realized the difference and showed a battle hungry look.

  Millie: If they are overconfident then we can practice our new strength on them. If it is something else tracking us through wolves, we still have a fight in our hands. It has been too long since I have had real blood on this baby.

  She then patted her hand on her new weapon, a giant great axe. She originally wielded two hammers, but the overall weight and shape made them quite difficult to carry around and use effectively in most scenarios. That is why she changed to her current Great axe for this adventure. Although the difference in weapon would normally weaken most fighters, Millie didn't really use much skill in her wielding before. She had originally been pced in our team due to her overwhelming strength after all.

  Back when facing William, she still used her hammers as they were easier to use since we only really moved from our home to William's fort. On a trip like this, it is not as easy to pce them around so a weapon of simir caliber would of course be needed. That lead to her current choice in weapon. Although a great axe was not as good in pure impact as her former two hammers, it was easier to manage bringing along just a retively rge axe.

  The rest of us have weapons that are all retively easy to carry in comparison. I have a sword and shield on me. Lily and Kris both use wands as magicians of course. And Mist uses a variety of weapons and tools that are all neatly carried on his backpack.

  Now all of us and our weapons are accounted for, I quickly informed the knight nearby about wanting to meet with Marianne. They nod and head over to the other carriage with Marianne in it and inform her. He gets the heads up and told me so I went ahead and headed on over with Lily.

  When we entered we saw both Marianne and Farrell. When we saw them, we quickly greeted each other before getting to the point.

  Sean: Marianne, I thought something was off and sent Mist to check out our surroundings and found there is a pack of wolves secretly tracking us. According to what we know, there should be little reason for a group of wolves to target a group as rge as ours. We wanted to tell you all in advance so that you all can be prepared.

  When she heard our words, I saw that Marianne quickly closed her eyes and concentrated. After a while, she opened them and nodded before telling Farrell to inform the others. She went to the supply carriage while we quickly met up with our team. We soon heard the knights stopping and stopped our carriage. Because we found them earlier, we had already stood on the ready to fight. Soon, all of the knights had their weapons drawn and were all tensed and prepared for action.

  Sure enough, a minute or so ter we were able to spot a group of wolves watching us vigintly in the distance. All of the knights got into a circur formation with our supplies and Marianne and Farrell in the center. We were all in the direction that the wolves were coming from and ready to start fighting at a moments notice.

  After a stare down when Millie was starting to be impatient, the wolves suddenly changed their position and all rushed to the side to leave an opening. Soon a new figure appeared and walked towards us. When we saw the full figure the five of us gasped and the knights grew visibly armed.

  With fur as bright as moonlight and fangs that shone sharply on a vicious maw, a werewolf stepped up and revealed themselves.

  ???: Look at what we have here. A group of scrawny golden torches trying to sneak towards us.

  It was at this moment that Farrell and Marianne had arrived and showed grave expressions.

  Farrell: Werewolf Lancelot. It seems that you mangy mutts have caught a whiff of our pns after all.

  Lancelot: Hah, you dream. If our goal was just to intercept you fools I wouldn't even bother bringing anyone with me. But look here.

  He then took a step to the side and revealed a thin figure. She had blonde hair and blood red eyes as well as prominent fangs on the side of her mouth.

  Marianne: Scarlett.

  We saw that Marianne was visibly shaken at this vampire's appearance. In response, she gave a snarky look at her before introducing herself.

  Scarlett: I am Scarlett and I am here to snuff out your little life here oh Saint.

  A sharp pair of cws then extended from her fingertips and the little bat wings on her back extended outwards. Both Lancelot and Scarlett then got into positions and revealed the energy in their bodies.

  They were both in the Bronze level. Although not as overwhelming as William's aura, they were certainly deep in that level. We held our weapons carefully as everyone was preparing to go.

  It was at this time that Farrell and Marianne both revealed their Bronze level strength as well. Seeing this, the werewolf was quite disgruntled as he made a whistling noise and the whole pack of wolves had arrived.

  Among the pack, there was seven Bck Iron level wolves. We knew who we should target and revealed our own Bck Iron level strength. Soon the werewolf and vampire sounded the horn of attack and Lancelot first rushed causing and impact on the ground where he stood. On his body, a blue aura emanated and a pair of extended energy cws stretched out from his hands.

  The vampire Scarlett quietly slipped into the shadows and eagerly awaited for her target to let down their guard. On the other side, Marianne and Farrell quickly showed why they were called to be reinforcements on the front lines.

  Farrell suddenly donned a set of golden light in the shape of armor and a great tower shield in his left arm. On his right a glowing light saber shone in golden radiance as he rushed forward to hold back Lancelot.

  Marianne raised the staff in her hands in the air and chanted in an unfamiliar nguage. A golden eye shaped symbol appeared and gnced around. Suddenly beside her an outline of a person was revealed and was rushing toward her. With a quick hum, she whipped her staff to the side to interfere with the assaints movements before quickly firing a ball of light at them.

  The highlighted figure was forced to disengage and dodge out of the way which gave Marianne the opportunity to catch a breath.

  While all of that was going on, the knights and the unranked wolves quickly fell into battle. Thanks to both sides cooperation, there were few casualties and they all remained deadlocked and unable to provide support.

  On our side, the Bck Iron forest wolves encircled our group and Millie, Mist and I went into a triangur formation with Lily and Kris in the middle. I quickly fended of two of the wolves using my sword and shield while Millie simply smmed the wolf to the ground with her great axe.

  For Mist, the situation was a bit perilous as he only had two daggers to fend off the fangs of the wolf he was facing. Lily quickly casted a freezing spell to freeze his wolf before turning to help on my side. Kris quickly summoned a flurry of fireballs and fired them at one of the wolves I was facing.

  With our superb teamwork and comprehensive strength, we quickly finished off the wolves at our side before heading over to help the unranked knights.

  As we freed up our hands to help, the vampire that Marianne was holding off quickly noticed the deteriorating situation and quickly called her companion.

  Scarlett: Lancelot, cover me!

  She then rushed over to where we were through flight. Before Marianne could intercept, the werewolf suddenly howled into the sky and suddenly grew a size bigger. He quickly unched Farrell away before rushing to Marianne.

  Farrell quickly regain his footing and quickly chanted a new spell.

  Farrell: Light Magic - Wings of Light!

  A glowing pair of angel wings sprouted from his shoulder and he quickly fshed over to strike the werewolf from the back. While that was happening, Marianne quickly shot a glowing ray at the werewolf.

  The ray of light quickly expanded and became a cage made of light that stopped his forward momentum. Right as that happened, Farrell unched a thrust and pierced the werewolf from behind with his sword.

  With the sound of piercing flesh, the werewolf was forced to stop in his tracks to send out Farrell first. With a violent shake, he easily sent Farrell out with his brute strength. Then he grabbed the hilt of the bde piercing into him. Feeling the purifying power of the light energy from the bde, he quickly yanked the bde out and quickly tossed it away from both Farrell and Marianne. The inside of his palm looked scorched as if the palm had held on to a violently hot object.

  After the sword was thrown out, the skin on his body visibly grew over the wound and soon the wound disappeared from the naked eye. The sword disintegrated in this time as Farrell once again summoned another sword. The battle was now a two on one with both Marianne and Farrell ready to break off to support the others while the enraged werewolf would try his best to hold them back.

  The werewolf sshed into the air sending out waves of sshing energy towards the two. They both easily neutralize those blows as they prepare their own counterattack. Soon a disk like magic circle appeared behind Marianne. On the disk were twelve circles in the pces you would find the time on a clock. She began quickly chanting as Farrell rushed in to block Lancelot.

  Utilizing his skillful swordsmanship, Farrell was able to easily swing sword beams at Lancelot with his fighting energy. For every sword beam, Lancelot had to quickly either dodge or counterattack with his own cw strikes. Soon, this back and forth deyed enough time and the spell that Marianne was chanting had finally come to completion.

  Marianne: Light Magic - Light Bombardment!

  Twelve silver beams of light quickly burst out from the twelve bnk circles in the magic circle she summoned before. When faced with this oncoming blow, Lancelot felt that he was being locked on and quickly took in a lot of air as Farrell quickly ran out of range of the bst. He then opened his jaw and a roaring cannon shot of air bsted out from his mouth and intercepted the blow. He quickly gnced over at the other battlefield and when he saw it, his eyes widened and he quickly took advantage of the chaos to run while sending a retreat signal.

  Over on the other side, when we helped hold back the wolves for the church knights, it gave them the opportunity to finally get into their legion positions and were able to fight back on their own. Because of this, we had the time to check up on Farrell and Marianne. When we saw the vampire break off and head towards us, we knew what we had to do next.

  Sean: Guys, into formation!

  We all instinctively came into our usual group form and Lily and Kris preemptively started to cast a spell. I quickly opened up my various aura spells in order to strengthen my teammates and Mist quietly hid around till he could find an opportunity to strike.

  All of us got ready to intercept the incoming enemy. Soon the vampire had gone into fighting range and so Lily first cast her usual freezing spell to quickly freeze the area the vampire is in. As if predicting this, the vampire quickly jumps up and flutters her wings to go past. But before she got close, Kris's spell was completed and a burst of fireballs rushed out towards the vampire.

  The vampire quickly waved her cws to deal with some of the attacks, but is ultimately hit by a few before successfully escaping the attack's range. During this time, Mist suddenly fired a few arrows at her side which pushed her a little to the side before stopping. Millie quickly followed up with a heavy spinning jumping ssh right at her location.

  In just a few moments, the vampire took our all out offense and when the smoke cleared. We saw that the vampire had an arm chopped off, but ultimately avoided a fatal blow. Soon, a string of blood attached the cut parts and the chopped arm stuck back on like brand new.

  Our fight was already quite heated and it only got more intense from their.

  After briefly moving the arm about, she quickly dashed the remaining part of the way and swung her cws toward me. I quickly blocked with my tower shield and even took the opportunity to make a fsh with my magic to temporarily disorient the vampire.

  Mist and Millie took the opportunity to reunite and owe started a whole new set of attacks. This time, Lily casted and fired a bunch of icicles that in unison with Kris's fireballs blocked off any avenue of escape. The icicles quickly pierced through while the fireballs burst which damaged the vampire further. Some of the originally loose icicles were pushed in further with these explosions.

  Blood dyed the area red as we continued our strikes against this foe. Finally, Millie dealt a finishing blow and lobbed off the head of the vampire while Mist succeeded in stabbing them through the heart with a dagger. The vampire, Scarlett, colpsed into a puddle of blood as we all sat on the ground exhausted.

  While all of us were on the ground, we quickly jumped up when we heard a wolf howl. Thankfully it was not the worst case scenario as the wolves all started to retreat when they heard the signal. The church knight legion did not pursue and only came to check up on our side before helping us over to Marianne and Farrell.

  As we came closer to them, we saw the condition they were in. Marianne's side was fine as she was just sweating and tired from the battle just now. On Farrell's side, he was in quite a bit worse condition. Because he held off that werewolf the whole time, he had a lot of bruises and injuries caused by the werewolves vicious attack.

  Before, when he had his armor of light, the wounds were not visible. Now we could clearly see the heavy bleeding and beatdown he took from all of this. Some of the knights hurried to take care of his wounds while another part went on vigince duty. The st group of knights went to take care of their fallen comrades. In this battle, there were two knights that had died.

  Thankfully the two knights who had fallen were among the weakest of the knights that were brought this time. Although, saying it like this makes it sound like I am equating their lives to a number...

  Among the rest of them, there were more or less injuries of all kinds. Thankfully, Marianne and I both had healing abilities and were able to maintain our group's combat power. Because of the fight we had just experienced, we decided to find a nearby area to rest for the night. Although our injuries were cured, our exhaustion was indeed true.

  We even told Marianne of our monitoring array and so we had less people on watch so that they all could recover faster. She quickly thanked us and we were all able to rest for the night.

  Soon after dawn broke out, we all woke up according to our biological clock. Lily went out to look and saw that most of the others were still asleep. Because of this, she went and got breakfast for us while we washed up. After finishing our meal and taking a small break, we went to lightly practice. Since we were on a trip this whole time, we took the opportunity to train for a bit and reconsolidate our experience from the night before.

  After we finished our light exercises, we saw that some of the knights began to wake up so we ended our warm up and went over to help them with breakfast and such. When we were all ready, we began to once again set off for our destination. Due to our previous encounter with the dark race raid, we have to not only keep pace to our destination, but also be prepared to face more attacks from the Dark Race Alliance.

  Because we could not keep that werewolf named Lancelot, then he would definitely inform his superiors of our presence. Once we are known of, then the more intelligent among the Dark races might be able to find out that we are reinforcements and try to intercept us while doing their own pns.

  So, we will have to make sure we still arrive on time anyways. Thankfully, our previous attack had damaged that werewolf's wolf pack enough that he can not afford to have them harass us on our way.

  On the way, we encountered some foreign travelers who were traveling over on the same road we were on. Most of them took a detour when they saw the banner on our carriage. The Church of Light and Dark Race Alliance are both active in this area as we saw from yesterday. Because of this, staying near any of the two forces could likely drag nearby travelers into their conflict so most of them chose to keep their distance.

  With this in mind, the day passed like normal. Except for some regur animal attacks, there were no deys so we were even able to make up for some of the ground we missed due to fighting and resting after. Because of this, we were refreshed and ready for the final leg of the journey. Although we were nearing the next town over, we all still kept our wits about us.

  This caution soon proved itself useful because we soon were able to hear the sounds of fighting in the distance. Once again, we were all on alert and after some consultation, Marianne decided that we should go and see what the situation was.

  Once we arrived, we saw two different groups fighting. On one side were a group of people in bck robes. On the other side, were a group of knights who were calmly holding off their assaints.

  Robed Figure: Take this hypocritical knight of the Golden Scarab!

  From his wide sleeves, a stream of green fluid flows out and sprays right at the knight at the front. The knight raised their shield to block the blow, but then hurriedly tosses the shield away. When the shield nded on the ground, it was already completely corroded through.

  The other robed figures then all raised their hands towards the knights before shouting.

  Robed Figures: For the One Who Corrodes All! May your armor turn to none!

  Then a wave of the acidic fluid flew out aimed at the knights. But before they arrived, we had already rushed into the battlefield. A wall of ice quickly rose between the robed figures and the knights.

  Robed figures: Who is it?! Who interfered with the mission of the Acid Striker Cult?

  Farrell then arrived from the front and charged with a shout.

  Farrell: Light Magic - Dash of Light!

  He then rushed forward with a fierce expression. His armor and bde were already on as he dashed through the forest to the robed figure at the front. The other knights also quickly followed from behind.

  Robed Figure: The Church? Darn, you who always interfere in our works.

  They then quickly turn to fire their acidic projectiles at Farrell. He quickly maneuvers around most of the streams, but the few that do nd inconsequentially bounce of his light armor.

  He then ran right into their formation and swung towards the one in the front. All of the robed cultists quickly scrambled to get out of the way, but all of their chaotic running only led to chaos that gave Farrell the opportunity to nd a fatal blow. Before they died, they cursed him in various ways, but they were simply ignored by Farrell.

  Cultists like them always like to curse their opponents at their dying breath so something like this is to be expected of them. If they had the time and preparations, a curse could be casted. Unfortunately for them, simple words are simply not enough to actually cast a curse.

  Seeing their leader getting sshed down and presumably dead gave all of the other cultists scare and they only panicked even more. Some of them even randomly fired their acidic shot and injured others in their escape.

  The knights we followed and the knights on the other side soon arrived and took down the rest. The head knight from the other side then went to thank Farrell. After receiving his thanks, Farrell then asked them about what they were doing here and then he started expining it all.

  Knight Captain: We are some of the periphery guards that are employed by the Gold family. As we were patrolling like usual today, we were suddenly assaulted by the group before you. They may be a motley crew to a group like yours, but to us they are quite the annoying enemy to deal with.

  Farrell then went to expin their sides motives. When they learned that we were the temporary helpers to help the town here until the real reinforcements arrived, they showed happy expressions. All of the knights then went and came back with all of the robed cultists all tied up.

  We all then went back together with the Knight group and finally met the town we were headed for. The town of Golden Scarabs.