Chapter Fourty Nine: The Frustration

Shawn and Raven searched as best as they could for their daughter but they could not sense her energy. It was almost as though she had completely dissapeared from the world itself. They both knew of the danger that Penny could be in, and were panicking more and more by the minute.

" She is searching for paradoxes which could literally be anywhere" Shawn sighed.

Eventually, Shawn and Raven arrive at the town of Smolder and see nothing but destroyed buildings and people crying over the loss of their property.

" What happened here? " Raven surveyed the destruction around them and could see that it would have taken quite a bit of power to cause this much damage.

" The worst part..is that this has Penny's energy all over it. She was definitly here" Raven sighed as Shawn stepped beside her, observing a few people trying to remove some of the debris.

" Yeah, but I'm sure that there was a reason for this. I find it unlikely that she would have done this for no reason" Shawn tried to reason as Raven walked over to a citizen and began inquiring about what had happened.

" Well ya see, some girl came through here and was looking for strangeness. And then she fought the King and the Knight and the dragon and they destroyed the town" the man explained with an astonishing lack of detail.

" A King, Dragon and Knight..." Raven was now even more confused.

" Yeah, they have been in this town for as long as I can remember but this girl was new. She destroyed all of our homes trying to beat them and now we have to fix everything, it isn't fair" The man complained.

" I am so sorry..here let me help " Raven raised her hands and much of the debris cleared away and fresh stone began to materialize and place themselves upon one another, rebuilding the homes of the townsfolk. This took quite some time, but eventually the town was rebuilt, for better or worse.

" Thank you " The man smiled happily.

" But what about our crops? " The man pointed to a patch of dirt just on the edge of town.

" It doesn't look like crops have ever grown there though.." Raven took notice that the ground had never been tilled and considering that the soil didn't look great to start, she imagined that nothing would have grown there even if there were crops.

" I'm telling ya, we had crops! " The man shouted in a deliberate outburst which made Shawn briefly wanted to intervene though he was held back by Raven.

" Listen.." Raven tried to garnish a fake smile.

" If you tell me where the girl went, Then I will help you with your crops" Raven hoped that this deal would be taken but the man seemed even more outraged than before.

" Yeah but if I tell you where she is and you find her and she kills you, then she will come back here and destroy our homes again" The man reasoned.

" I can assure you that she would never destroy your homes again. But I can assure you that if any damage. Were to happen to your homes or crops, I would replace any and all of them " Raven was finding it more and more difficult to be polite with this man.

" But we don't actually have alot of guarantees here. And I'm not willing to risk our town being destroyed by a Witch just to be rebuilt by another Witch. We are inoccent. We don't need to be caught up in all you witches power plays. We are simple people. We have crops. We have each other. We try to just get through the day..every single day" the man ranted.

" And we don't need no damned witches coming through here and wrecking our homes. We were fine before that girl showed up, who was suppose to help us but instead made things worse. And if I tell you where she went, you are just going to make it worse for us too. I don't trust it. Now give us back our crops and begone " The man was on a mission for vengeance against the wrongdoings of Penny and he would not let Raven tell him otherwise.

" I understand you are upset. But I promise you, this will not happen again. We really, are not here to hurt or harm anyone. We definitly don't want to destroy properties. And even Penny, when she accidently destroyed your homes - " Before Raven could finish the man raged again.

" Penny? Oh so you two are close then. Well, you are just as responsible for this damage as she is" The man could not be reasoned with no matter how hard she tried.

" Okay, listen, I just want - " Raven again was interupted.

" You want? We want our lives back. We want our crops back, we want our independence back " The man shouted.

" Wha.." Raven was halfway convinced the man was just spouting off random frustrations at this point.

" We want equal pay for all. We want access to fresh water. We want more livestock. We also want a safe place for our children to sleep that we don't actually want but still care enough to want them in a safe environment for when they find someone that does want them" The man ranted.

" You...mean an orphanage? " Raven tilted her head to the side.

" Yeah! One of those! " The man nodded.

" I dont..see how that applies to anything we were talking about. Did you have one before Penny came through? " Raven inquired.

" No! But that shouldn't matter! " The man crossed his arms.

" I believe you're missing the point of what i'm trying to do here. I'm trying to find out where my daughter went. And through the Kindness of my heart, I'm trying to replace what she broke" Raven explained.

" Your daughter? OOOOOOH SO YOU ARE DEFINITLY RESPONSIBLE" The man's voice only grew louder and louder.

" And don't act so high and mighty. We don't need your charity" The man scoffed.

" You have literally been asking me to do things for you though.." Raven sighed.

" That's not charity..that's what we are owed" The man answered.

" Not by me, by someone else. Hell, not even by Penny" Ravens temper was now growing as well.

" And yet you are here to pay the debt regardless" The man shrugged.

" Okay, you know what? " Raven raised her arm and shot out a dark purple fireball from her hand and right into a building, blowing it up completely, throwing blocks hundreds of feet in several directions.

" Now..where..did..my..daughter..go" Ravens eyes burned with a intense fire.

" That way " The man cowered as he pointed out of town"

" Thank you " Raven rolled her eyes and began walking.

" So who is going to replace that building? " The man shouted to Raven.

Raven raised her hand again and shot another fireball at another building, obliterating that one as well.

" Well.." Shawn sighed as he looked to the man. " It certainly won't be her " He shrugged before following Raven out of town.