As the night passed, the following day everyone found themselves in the meeting room. Lara was in the hospital right now, so she wasn't there, while Liro and Darian were sitting next to each other on one sofa. On the other, there were Kael and Vane, with Allocen still on his feet behind Kael and Vane's sofa.
Alerya was still at her desk, about to explain how things would go. "So everyone, you need to search around the city. I will try to help as much as I can… but the seven sages have told me that I should not be involved right now," said Alerya. Everyone seemed a bit confused.
"Why? You're the strongest one, you can easily defeat all of them, right?" asked Liro. Alerya shook her head.
"It might be true, but they said that because I'm too strong, I shouldn't risk getting myself killed. I should be used as the last card while fighting them, especially because we don't know how strong their leader is," answered Alerya. In fact, she was the strongest one, and because in the city there were only the seedlings, the other Veilguards were enough to take care of them.
"So? How do you plan to divide us?" asked Darian. Everyone wondered who they'd be paired with.
"Darian, you will go with Liro and Vane. You will start killing some seedlings in the middle of the city, while Allocen and Kael will search around the walls of the cave," answered her. "Now, Veilguards… go!" said her as she stood up from the chair. As the group went out of the building, they divided themselves.
"Good luck, guys," said Darian as Kael and Allocen went away.
"You too, guys! Attention!" answered Kael while waving back at them.
Everyone watched Kael and Allocen as they went near a wall and started to inspect it, hoping to find something useful. They didn't even know where the enemies could be hiding, and if it was inside the cave of the city or outside.
"Let's go, guys, I'll stay in the front," said Vane after turning around. Everyone started to follow him, with Liro in the middle and Darian right behind them with Snowy on his shoulder.
"You know… it all feels really weird," said Liro. Darian and Vane seemed to agree with him. "I mean, we just got back and we found all this… I was so happy to be back after this much time," added Liro. Vane tried to calm him down as he heard Liro's voice tone going lower.
"Don't worry, Liro, we'll be able to save the city," said Vane as he tried to reassure him. As they passed on the street, it was really empty, not even seedlings were around. Sometimes people peeked out of the windows. Knowing that the Veilguards were back, they felt a bit safer.
"Mooomm, look, it's the Veilguard! They'll know how to save us!" said a kid as he looked out of the window, his face sticking out of it. The mother pulled him inside. "The creatures will take you! Don't go outside!" shouted the mother as she grabbed the body of her son. The three alterids kept walking, they should not be distracted.
Suddenly, they heard some footsteps. Near a house, a seedling was jumping around. Vane signaled them to stop. "Attention… I heard something," said Vane. Liro took a few more steps and created an illusion of a human walking in the street.
"Darian, get ready… my illusion will be the bait," said Liro. As Darian nodded, he fused himself together with Snowy. He remained still, aiming toward the illusion, waiting for the seedling to jump on it.
As the creature felt humans nearby, it turned around and suddenly saw the human created by Liro's illusion. The seedling immediately changed direction and rushed toward the person.
"Ice Shard!" shouted Darian as he created a shard directly toward the enemy. As it heard Darian's voice, the creature turned toward him, but it was too late, the shard was already in front of it.
As the shard touched the seedling, it exploded, "Attention!" shouted him, as some of its plants almost touched the group. They were still moving, so everyone stepped back. After five seconds, these plants stopped moving and withered.
"It looks like they're still alive once they explode…" whispered Darian as he kneeled down to see the dried plant. It felt safe to touch. The moment Darian moved his hand and lightly touched the plant, it completely cracked and turned into ash.
"Mhmm, weird… also, the others turned into ash," said Liro as he noticed another dried plant that turned into ash. Suddenly, all the ones that were thrown because of the explosion disappeared.
"It seems they are somehow connected… maybe if I hadn't touched it, it wouldn't have disappeared," said Darian as he came up with that conclusion.
"So do you think it turned into ash because of some sort of time limit?" asked Liro, trying to come up with an idea.
"Yeah… but the main problem is where this ash went…" said Darian as he tried to follow the path of the ash with his eyes, but as soon as the plant cracked, the ash literally became invisible to human eyes.
"Mhmm, guys…" said Vane as Darian and Liro kept analyzing what they just saw. At the end of the street, countless seedlings were pointing toward them.
"EVERYONE RUN!!" shouted Darian as he, Liro, and Vane started to run away. Around 20 seedlings jumped toward them.
Vane turned into a buffalo, and Liro started to ride it. He was really slow, so the seedlings might have been able to reach him, while Darian ran on foot.
"Liro, try to distract them somehow!!" shouted Darian as he shot multiple shards toward them. Some of them hit the plant creatures directly and killed them, but the rest didn't stop, running toward the humans was really their only purpose.
Liro created an illusion of a human not far away, but because it wasn't making any sound, no seedling was attracted by it. They kept rushing toward the group, who were still running inside the city. Many people from the windows watched everything; some of them were too scared to actually do something.
"ARGHH, TAKE THIS!!" shouted a man from inside his house. He could use fire magic and threw a small fireball toward them. Normal people weren't used to using their magic, so their spells were usually weak, but this one helped the alterids a lot.
In fact, these creatures seemed afraid of the fire, and as it touched one of the seedlings, it immediately caught fire. All the other creatures seemed scared.
'It looks like they are afraid of fire…' thought Liro as he noticed the seedlings running away. Suddenly, he created the illusion of fire at the end of the street. None of the seedlings dared to come closer — they felt too scared.
"Thanks!!" shouted Darian, referring both to the man who helped them and to Liro who just stopped them. 'Let's see if the armor works against them…' thought Darian as he created an armor on his body. After that, he started to shoot multiple shards toward the enemies, who had fire behind them and multiple ice shards in front of them.
Around ten of them died. All of the remaining seedlings rushed toward Darian, about to fuse together with his body, but as they got too close, the shards of the armor exploded and rushed at extreme speed toward the enemies.
"Radial Freeze!!" shouted Darian as he created an ice wall right behind them. As they were launched at extreme speed, they crashed with their bodies on the wall — some of them died, while the others were still alive.
Darian, realizing that the plants which exploded from their bodies were about to hit him, created a wall of ice in front of him at the last moment. He was able to save himself thanks to this.
As he turned around, he noticed some enemies near Vane who were about to hit him. "I'll help you!!" shouted the man from the window as he created some small fireballs to hit the enemies. As they felt the fire, their bodies turned directly into ash, without the plants exploding around.
"Thank yo— ATTENTION!!" shouted Vane as he noticed one right on top of the window of the man, about to launch itself and hit the helpless man, who didn't have enough time to react. Vane turned into an eagle and rushed toward the last seedling, completely destroying it with his wings.
As the seedling exploded, Vane was able to dodge the plants by flying really high, while the man found himself with one of the branches on his face. "AAAAA!" shouted him, scared, as the branch entered his body. Vane was able to see everything.
"Help me!!! I don't want to dieee!!" shouted the man as he got too close to the window. Without noticing, he fell to the ground directly on his head. Liro screamed at the sight of that, Darian couldn't move anymore, and Vane was thinking if what he did could have been avoided.
As the man ceased to breathe, his body immediately turned into a statue of plants, and the blood stopped falling. Vane landed directly on the ground next to the man and turned human again.
"Vane…" said Darian as he got closer to him, Snowy coming out of his body, realizing that there weren't any more seedlings around them.
"I didn't even know him… but I was the one who killed him," whispered him as he looked over the statue of the dead man who became plants.
"It wasn't your fault, Vane… he still would have died," said Liro, trying to reassure him, but Vane shook his head.
"No… I could have grabbed the seedling with my claws," answered Vane as he felt really sad. This man didn't even deserve all of this, he just wished to help. The people around the town heard the scream, came out, and noticed the lifeless body of their neighbor on the ground, turned into a statue of plants. All of them felt shocked; some of them even started to cry.
This man was the one who usually sold fruit. He didn't have any family, his wife and daughter both died in a fire six years ago, so he was currently living by himself. He used to sell fruit to the people and was extremely kind to everyone. Now that he died, everyone felt extremely sad.
"I will now grab that bodyyyy," the alterids heard a woman's voice. As they turned around, they saw Octavia, who had some fire under her feet and was about to rush toward them.
"Attention!!" shouted Vane as he immediately turned into a polar bear and rushed toward the woman. "It isn't time to fight yet, small bear!" shouted her, as thanks to the fire under her feet, she was able to run really fast and pass freely on his right.
The strange thing was that she didn't even try to hit the humans. In fact, she only grabbed the statue. "I would love to fight all of you… but it isn't the right time yet," said her as she disappeared while running on top of the roofs.
"What happened… why didn't she go for us?" whispered Liro as he looked over his hand, realizing the woman didn't kill either him or Darian, even though she could have easily done it.
"I don't know… but it feels like something big is about to happen," answered Darian as he looked in the direction of the woman. As they turned around, Vane suddenly disappeared.
"I WILL TAKE YOU!!" shouted Vane as he turned into an eagle right after noticing the woman jumping on the roof. "Mhmm, I guess I'll have to take care of you before returning," said Octavia as she stopped and left the lifeless body on a roof. She looked directly into the eagle's eyes.
Both of them rushed toward each other, and the small fight just started.