Five days later. The knights from Bellonia duchy arrived at Elfen kingdom at noon. The commander take a step forward to greets the king of Elfen and taking off their mask.
"Second commander of Bellonia duchy Ignis, has arrived with twenty knights as the Duke of Bellonia instructed. Greetings to the king of Elven kingdom!." With her command, the rest of the knights following her salute toward Lucas.
"I welcome the knight of Bellonia. I'm grateful for you're all here today. Please be my guest and make yourself at home, you must be tired after a week on the road." He offer with a smile.
"Thank you for your kindness and understanding your majesty." She bow down in gratitude.
The servant begin to lead the knights toward their temporary settlement. On their way, she notices a fellow human in the distance which is caught her attention. It was Nein who's helping the peoples to pick a fruit from the trees. She frown especially toward the strange black wiggling tentacles around him that doesn't seems to bothering the elf around him.
"May I ask who's that man?". Ignis voice break the silence.
The servant follow her gaze and squint a bit to see Nein's doing his daily.
"Ah, that's Mr. Nein. He's a mercenary his majesty hired to help with the investigation. He's been helping us in his free time." The maid explain with a smile.
She hums in understanding and keep looking at him in the distance. Only to be flinched when he returned the gaze and greet her from his spot before acting like nothing happened. Others who followed her eyes also noticed that and immediately at standby.
She lift her hand slightly to ease them up. "That mean's we'll be working with him. I'll speak to him first, please lead the rest." She said to the maid.
She begin to walk toward his direction alone. Armor clinking as she walks with steady strides. The elves starting to leave until he standing alone facing away from her.
"Are you the one named Nein winter?." Her voice filled with authority.
She's standing behind him with pride. Keeping safe distance from him. He turn around with apple in his hand, two of it as if expecting a guest.
"I am. And you must be the knight the Duke sent here. Nice to meet you." He greets her with a smile while reaching out one apple toward her.
She's eyeing the apple suspiciously, her amber eyes examining the kindness behind that imposing look on his face. She never fond with mercenary, taking them as someone full of trickery.
"Me too. I'll be going then. And to tell you, I'm not accepting gift from stranger." She says before turn around sharply and leave his offer behind.
He just watch with a smirk before eating both of the apple himself and taking different path from her. He went to the empty training ground to test the spear again.
**Three days earlier**
"...sir?." He calls lightly.
Sidir's currently sleeping on the floor surrounded by metals. The call wake him up and immediately rose up with a groans and disoriented mind.
"Yawn...what day is it?" Sidir mumbles while rubbing his eyes.
"It's Monday." Nein answer briefly.
Sidir force himself to stand and stretch his back and walk to somewhere before returning with the spear.
"Here. Now get out. I'm sleepy." He says after shoving the spear to Nein.
He feels the weight and is delighted by the sight of it, the spear head still covered with clothes though. He nods curtly to sidir's back before walking outside.
He went to the empty training ground and unwrap the clothes covering the blade and smiles when he see the results. He whistle by the looks and testing the weight in his hands.
"Nice, it's look the same but somehow better. Is it because the material?." He mumble to himself. He spend the rest three days to familiarize himself with the spear.
**Present day**
He's starting to remember his movement, moving with practiced ease as he swings the spear and infusing it with his ability to change it's appearance. He combined the spear with {Chain of restriction} to extend the range and forming a whip-spear.
He's pleased by the results and going to try something.
BOOM!!
An explosion occurred making him flinches and saw the guards begin to move towards she source of it. He followed behind and fold the spear into three parts and hide it under his coat.
The explosion occurred near the settlement where the knights of Bellonia resides. While they managed to fight back, due to the explosion they're starting to overwhelmed by the ambush.
"HOLD THE LINE UNTIL HELP ARRIVED!!." Ignis voice break the panics as she cut through the intruder with her sword.
The Elven ranger arrived first and immediately shot their arrow to help repelling the intruder. Followed shortly by the guard and immediately join them. The villager around already evacuated with the help of the guard.
Lucas also helping by fixing the barrier to prevent the enemies for retreating with his personal knights protecting him. He's more worried with the fact that the barrier's broken. A barrier that supposed to be strong enough to defend against dragon breath is shattered before his eyes.
They're winning against the intruder, or at least that what he thought when he suddenly freezed in terror.
"Lysine...?". Lucas recognize the figure approaching outside the barrier.
His first daughter that supposed to be dead now standing outside the barrier making him falter. And with that, the barrier destroyed once again with more enemies coming in. He fell to his knees, from the trauma of losing his daughter.
"{Fog of oblivion}"
The battlefield suddenly covered in thick black smoke, hindering vision and movement. Inside the chaos, Nein moves like ghost, taking everyone away to safety leaving the enemies confused and trapped inside the smokescreen.
He saved every of them with many being injured and exhausted, using his smoke to carry them and set them down slowly. All happened in short time before they can react. He's standing Infront of weak and perplexed Lucas and kneel down to speak.
"What did you see?." His voice calm and steady.
"My... daughter... Lysine..." Lucas tried to compose himself but failed.
"She... she's dead..." He adds with shaky breath.
Nein simply nods and rose up slowly before stepping forward. The smokescreen remains to buy enough time. He looks around the exhausted forces and sigh deeply at how the plan ruined. It should be them ambushing the enemies but looks like they noticed something wrong and attack when anyone least expecting it.
"What do you think you're doing?." Ignis voice suddenly called.
"Working." He replied casually.
"Don't..ugh..you can't fight alone..." She's struggling to gets up due to her injured leg.
"Don't worry. I used to fight multiple enemies before. Just rest and I'll handle everything." His voice calm and collected.
He take out the spear and straighten it with one hand as he marching slowly toward the fading smoke. As the air cleared, the enemies noticed that no one's there beside a man with a spear approaching the battlefield. In the middle of them, Lysine's standing with her pale and dark eyes, holding a sword.
He stopped. Standing face-to-face with the number of enemies Infront of him.
"{Anchor of destruction}"