A Sacrifice

"What's a Drasvalik doing so down south? Did the temple of champions send you here?" the man asked as he and Edric prepared to free the next set of captives.

~Temple of champions? I'm guessing that's some kind of organisation based on the deities' chosen champions,~ Edric thought to himself, opting to remain silent.

At this point both he and the soldier each had their hand covering a survivor's mouth; snapping them out of their daze.

Edric repeated what he had said to the soldier, before slowly letting the survivor go. Much like the soldier, the second man seemed to calm down relatively quickly.

It was the little girl however that they had to worry about.

Even after the situation had been explained to her, she insisted on screaming. It was only after a few moments that Edric realized what had her so spooked.

She was staring wide-eyed at a squashed eyeball on the ground - no doubt the remains of the man who had been devoured just a few moments prior.

"If you made it all the way here, does that mean you destroyed the third-generation horror nest blocking the main passage?" the man asked, his hand still on the little girl's mouth as she thrashed side to side in an attempt to escape.

~It's been too long, the monsters should've figured out their buddy was killed by now,~ Edric thought to himself.

"You look to be a fighter of some sort, do you have a weapon?" Edric asked the soldier, ignoring his questions.

By now the second man they had freed was moving to free the final survivor in the way that Edric had instructed him.

"Not any sort of weapon that matters. I'm not a champion, I don't have a Sealing Blade," the soldier replied, a sceptical look in his eyes.

"Wait a minute, where's yours? You can't tell me that little knife is a Sealing Blade," the soldier continued, examining Edric's body properly for the first time.

"And why are you naked? Did you lose all your gear in the horror nest?" the soldier asked, a rising anger in his tone.

He now looked down at the girl with a sort of pissed expression, as if threatening to kill her if she didn't stop thrashing around.

"Why did you come alone? Did you really think you could kill a third generation by yourself? Even if you are a Drasvalik that's- ...sorry, sorry. Forgive me, I'm just," the man mumbled to himself.

His behaviour seemed odd. Even though Edric had warned him about the remaining monsters the soldier didn't seem at all frightened.

Perhaps he was just that confident in their ability to take care of them.

"I'm sure you had your reasons. You said that the abnormals are still out there. That knife in your hand is some sort of sealing device, right? You should be able to take care of them relatively quickly. If you're injured, Jarvin and I can help you lock them down while you seal them," the soldier explained, before dropping the girl to the ground and getting to his feet.

He was a blonde-haired man, who stood at about 1.7 meters tall. 

"What did you do to the girl?" Edric asked, noticing that she seemed unconscious.

"She wasn't going to stop, so I knocked her out. She's okay," the soldier replied, a little surprised at Edric's question.

"Jarvin, get your enchantments ready," the soldier said, before tapping the ruby gemstone at the centre of his armour.

With that, a cloud of red smoke effused from the gemstone.

"Activate," the blonde-haired man said, and with that, his entire body started glowing a faint red.

The man named Jarvis tapped on an azure blue gemstone on his ring. With that, a cloud of blue smoke effused from it, and he whispered the word 'activate' right after.

With that, a shimmering blue dome appeared in a small radius around him. Big enough to protect at least 3 people. He placed himself in such a way that he, the girl, and the old man were covered by its radius.

"As you can see, Jarvin has a field-type enchantment and mine's a limit-breaker. We'll try to help as best we can, but we already used a good amount of fidem trying to take them on earlier. So we'll have to end this quickly," the soldier replied.

"By the way, my name is Andre, Chief of the... well, former Chief of the Southern Guard," the soldier said, holding out his hand.

"Uh-huh," Edric replied, shaking Andre's hand.

Greed had warned him about letting others find out about his identity. And though he wasn't going to use his system's powers here -seeing as they were useless in combat anyway- it would be safer if he didn't exchange any details with these people.

And so, the three men waited, staring off into the forest with expectant gazes.

"Perhaps we should start moving," Edric said out loud, at this point at least 3 minutes had passed.

"Surely you're joking. These are abnormals, they'll follow us until we're dead. They already have our scent," Andre replied, still looking towards the forest with determined eyes.

"Which champion rank did you say you were again? I'm sure abnormals are nothing for you, seeing as how you're a Drasvalik you're probably pretty high up there," Andre continued.

"I never disclosed my champion rank," Edric replied blankly.

Sure he could've just told the man that he wasn't a champion, however, it seemed that him being one was the only thing that could explain why a Drasvalik would be here. And he doubted that anyone was going to believe that he just appeared here out of nowhere.

No, it was better to play the arrogant champion for now, and gain their trust. Once he knew a bit about the area and figured out what the best way to leverage his system was, then he could cut ties with them.

"Arrogant, huh? Jarvin, he's exactly as in the stories," Andre quipped, to which the man behind him let out a little chuckle.

Though it was the fakest Edric had ever heard.

Another three minutes passed, and the slight auras that coated Andre's and Jarvin's bodies were beginning to flicker.

"I think we should deactivate until they show up," Jarvin said suddenly.

"What? Of course not, that's probably what they're counting on. Just wait for the champion's system to boot up," Andre replied.

~Wait, was he waiting for me?~ Edric thought to himself.

Just at that instant, something quickly beamed past Edric and Andre, making an audible slosh, right behind them.

Edric slowly turned his head, a sweet metallic smell wafting into his nose.

"W-What in the heavens," he whispered to himself, staring wide-eyed at the scene in front of him.