The Roaches (Part 2)

The orphan children waited in their cells, still crying from fear and the events that they had witnessed a few minutes before.

The oldest girl kept holding onto the iron bars as she stared in the direction that Morgana ran off to.

"Who was that woman…?" she wondered as all she remembered were her red eyes, silver hair, and the splatters of blood on her clothes.

The girl believed that the woman would save them, as she could tell that the trickster wasn't a normal person.

'If that person managed to get here on their own, then maybe…' she thought before getting interrupted by the sound of steps coming toward her cell.

With fear and doubt in her mind, the girl looked up to see who it was and found Morgana carrying Vivi, who was unconscious.

Carefully placing the woman on the ground, Morgana approached the cell's doors, grabbed the bars, and pulled it out of its frame without much resistance.

Gently placing the door to the side to not startle the children, she asked them to wait a moment while she freed the rest.

The kids gathered around their unconscious caretaker, seeing that the awful wounds were all gone, and smiled before hugging her.

Vivi regained consciousness at the sound of the kids crying with joy and opened her eyes to find them all gathered around her with a smile. She turned slightly to the side to see Morgana forcing another door open.

She knew that the silver-haired woman was her savior, as in her last moments of consciousness, she remembered her warm touch and the bliss she felt when the trickster arrived at the scene.

Morgana opened four more cells where they kept their victims. However, the people didn't move from their spot as their will to live had been taken from them by the awful torture they endured.

"I can heal all your wounds and get you to safety for the rest of your lives, but I can't erase your memories…" she said out loud for all of the kidnapped victims to hear.

"If you still want to live, I can give you that. However, I'll respect your wishes if you want to die or stay here."

A group of people tried their best to stand up and express their desire to live out loud, but their battered bodies did not allow any rash movement.

With soft and calculated steps, Morgana stepped toward the group of four and crouched while extending her hand, casting both "shadow mend" and "shadow's grace" on the poor souls.

The dark aura and shadows that enveloped them scared the rest of the victims, believing she was feeding from their souls. However, they noticed how their bruises and cuts disappeared and how a healthy color returned to their skin.

Out of the four who were mended, one fell unconscious, but the trickster reassured them that it was normal to faint after being healed in such a state of exhaustion. Seeing her miraculous power, the rest of the victims implored Morgana to save them too.

As the trickster healed one by one, the caretaker Vivi approached her to thank her, bowing her head low in a show of reverence.

The trickster giggled and grabbed the woman softly by the chin, raising her gaze.

"You took that beating for those children…" she said before giggling again in a teasing manner.

"I want you…" said the trickster getting her face only a few centimeters away from her, making the woman somewhat confused about what she meant.

While Morgana could be ruthless and evil, she had an obvious soft spot for kids, as she recalled destroying an entire village in the past just to save one child.

As such, anyone who would go that far to protect a kid that wasn't even their own received the total respect of Morgana.

Leaving Vivi to find out for herself what she meant, Morgana kept healing the wounded and breaking the chains that some of them had around their extremities.

Besides the orphans, the rest of the victims were adventurers who had been captured while passing through the city, their levels ranging between 20 and 40.

One of them mentioned that they were on their way to the mountain in the south when they got attacked by the Roaches and taken to their base. The reason for their travels was that they wanted to reach the country called Veridian to join the adventurers' academy.

Morgana knew about the academy since she had been taking the Freebird party there from the beginning, making her ponder if they would have gotten kidnapped if she hadn't joined them.

Once everyone was up on their feet again, the trickster told them to stay behind her since she hadn't taken care of everyone in the clan. The people nodded fervently, understanding that the woman before them was the most powerful entity they had ever encountered.

Making their way out of the dungeon, five bandits stood tall, holding weapons and pointing them at the group of prisoners that followed Morgana.

"Stay right ther-... ARRGHH!" screamed the man in excruciating pain, cutting off his sentence as the black fire from Morgana burned the five men alive

The prisoners stood in shock at the scene, but the trickster's gaze softened as she turned to look at them and told them to keep moving as their freedom was near.

Once the group made it to the main living room that exited the building, Morgana asked them to wait a few minutes since she still needed to clean the place and reassured them that no bandit could come to that living room anymore.

However, she didn't need to reassure them of anything as none of the prisoners doubted her words.

Turning around and bolting out of the living room in a flash, Morgana quickly inspected the entire building to look for any more bandits hiding.

'I guess the name Roaches really suits them…' she thought as she transversed the hallways at a fast pace.

Finding more bandits that exited the rooms, she didn't even stop as her hand grasped the heads of the men and separated them from their bodies at a speed that the others couldn't discern.

Making it to the top floor in less than two minutes and leaving a wake of decapitated bodies behind her, Morgana kicked open the door with different iron locks protecting it and found herself in the bandit's treasury.