The Goddess’ Whims

As Phoebe fell from the ship, she instinctively grabbed a nearby branch and used her own weight to flung her body to the side against a cluster of low bushes to mitigate the fall.

"Ugh!" Fortunately for her she landed with her butt on the shrubs, however the force of the impact sent her left prosthetic leg flying a few meters ahead of her. "Blazes…"

She forced herself up and stumbled forward and since her center of balance was off she almost fell face first into the mud but thanks to her reflexes she was able to grasp a vine just in time to balance herself. After carefully crawling towards the artificial limb and reattaching it to her thigh, she stood up and heard the sound of the airship coming closer to the ground.

She noticed it landing not too far ahead so she decided to just take it easy and walk towards it as the soaked dirt was beginning to turn into mud which made traversing through it a much tougher job than she expected.

'I really hope we can get to Nara quickly…' She thought. 'These legs are unreliable at best.'

Despite the noise of the rain, the high elf managed to hear a familiar female voice coming from a few meters ahead of her.

"PHOEBE! PHOEBE! WHERE ARE YOU?!"

Jogging a bit further she was already able to see Leona standing with her back towards her, however something didn't seem right and as she was about to shout, the tactician simply collapsed in front of her.

Her instinct was to hide behind a tree and look around for any possible angle the attacker might have come from.

'That must have been poison or else she wouldn't have slowly collapsed like that…' She reached for her belt and pulled out the dagger with the left hand while the right went for the longbow, however most of the arrows from her quiver seemed to have fallen out of it when she was flung out of the ship. '...which means time is against me.'

She pulled the longbow back and fired an arrow on the mud to the left side far away from Leona and instantly moved around the right side of the tree she was behind and dived into a bush, for a very brief moment she noticed something move about four trees ahead of her near the flying ship.

'Got you.'

She notched another arrow and dashed out to the central trail with the string halfway pulled, once she saw a figure resembling a person she readied her bow at full strength and let go of the arrow.

"Ack!"

She heard a grunt from the figure as the projectile managed to graze them, but given the poor visibility and firing while moving made Phoebe miss a vital organ as the figure nimbly dashed behind the tree and turned something at the high elf.

'Huh?!' Phoebe dashed to the left and dived behind a tree just as something hit its bark, protruding out of the trunk, a thin dart coated in a viscous liquid. 'Dammit, they aren't playing around.'

She left the longbow on the ground and readied the dagger on her left hand before removing the fluffy coat she got in Londria. On the other side of the trail, the hooded figure was loading another dart covered in poison in a bamboo blowpipe.

"Tch, if only I had my bow…" The figure grunted. "This would've been over much sooner." Once they turned to look at the tree Phoebe was behind, they noticed a shadow quickly emerge from the left side and in a flash they shot it only to realize it was a falling piece of heavy clothing. "What the-?!"

In less than a second the coat was hit, the high elf dashed out of cover and went straight to where the hooded figure was while wielding both daggers with killing intent. Out of reflex, the figure went for something on her belt, as they pulled out a short sword. Noticing her opponent pull out a blade made Phoebe sure she was dealing with an assassin.

The high elf held both daggers normally in order to be able to use them to deflect a possible attack, however since both of her weapons were shorter than her assailant, she chose to go on the offensive. By swinging the right dagger horizontally and following it up with a stab from the left she almost left no room for her opponent to counterattack, which was made clear when the figure tried to back away, but unfortunate for them, Phoebe knew how to press an advantage in combat so she kept a seemingly endless flurry of attacks coming from all directions in order to detain her enemy from creating distance.

'This woman!' The hooded figure was beginning to get grazed by the high elf's precise stabs and slashes. 'This ain't over yet!'

They hopped back just enough to be out of range for a split second and reached for something on the belt. Phoebe noticed this and prepared the left dagger closer to her chest and a second later the figure threw a dagger towards the high elf's throat which was quickly deflected to the left.

They followed up with a downwards diagonal slash from the right to the left expecting Phoebe to not be able to move, but against their expectations, the high elf nimbly stepped to the left and avoided the attack. Out of desperation her attacker tried to turn for a stab, but Phoebe parried the blade with the weapon on her right hand and pushed the left one against their throat as she followed up with a stab to their left shoulder using the right dagger.

"Argh!"

The hooded figure let out a scream of pain as Phoebe used her weight to throw her opponent on the ground as she held them on knifepoint as she yelled at them.

"What poison did you use?! Speak before I gut you open!"

"Please, just don't kill me! What I used was no poison!" As the figure began to speak, Phoebe noticed it was actually a woman. "It's- ugh, just a sedative, they'll wake up in a few minutes…!"

Phoebe narrowed her eyes as she pressed the dagger dangerously closer to the woman's throat.

"Sedative? How do you know it's indeed a sedative?!"

"I was the one who made it!"

"Stop playing around! Give me the antidote!"

Becoming impatient, Phoebe pulled out the right dagger from her victim's shoulder, prompting her to scream in pain, and hold the dagger ready to stab her again.

"I'm telling you the truth! There is no antidote!"

As the high elf was about to stab the hooded woman again, she heard something move from the bushes to her right and managed to leap to the left just in time to dodge a longsword that was aimed for her chest.

"Tch."

Phoebe clicked her tongue as she readied both of her weapons to fight. Emerging from the bushes the attack came from, she noticed it was a person clad in armor from head to toe wielding an arming sword and a kite shield.

"Elaine… are you alright?"

Behind the armor it was a male voice. The woman supposedly named Elaine stood up and held her short sword, however she didn't seem too eager to fight.

"Rein what are you doing out here?! I told you to wait inside."

"I felt something was off." The knight glanced at Phoebe then turned back to the woman. "Why was she attacking you?"

"A misunderstanding."

Elaine lied.

"Misunderstanding?" The high elf gritted her teeth in anger as she readied her daggers. "You poisoned them! I'll have that antidote even if it means prying off your corpse!"

"Wait, Elaine, what did you do?" The man looked at the hooded woman. "You didn't… ugh…"

He collapsed on the ground before he could say another word which prompted Elaine to shout.

"Rein?! Rein! Talk to me!"

As Phoebe was about to run in to attack, her right arm was grabbed by someone behind her and out of instinct she turned to stab whoever it was but thankfully her hand was held by the wrist, stopping the attack before it could puncture anything. Looking up, the high elf noticed it was Krieg holding her limbs firmly.

"Calm down Phoebe." He said while looking at the two other unfortunate people. "Leona is also safe. She's merely sleeping."

The high elf let out a sigh.

"I thought you two were poisoned." She relaxed her arms which made Krieg let go of them. After sheathing both daggers she looked at the woman trying to shoulder the knight's weight. "But I don't understand, why would she go to such lengths then?"

"There's only one way to know."

He answered as he went to help them which prompted Phoebe to sigh once again and mutter.

"I think Princess Leona's whims are rubbing off on you sire."

Krieg shouldered the knight's left arm as the hooded woman was on the right. Upon realizing he was helping her, the woman couldn't help but ask.

"Why are you helping us?"

"Is it not the natural thing to help another? Besides, if you're feeling sorry don't be, I've had worse." He used that brief conversation to question her. "But tell me, why did you choose to attack us instead of asking for help? You were clearly outnumbered."

"I…" She looked conflicted as bit the lower half of her lips. "I wasn't sure I could trust you. The last group that came with the pretext to help left us to fend off a death angel by ourselves. I managed to land a killing blow but not before it wounded him."

Krieg glanced at the knight and noticed three parallel lines that sliced the side of the armor open.

"I see… though how did you even manage to kill a death angel by yourselves?"

"Poison, I would say it was more of using everything I had at the moment than anything."

They both carried the almost unconscious knight near the ship where Leona was asleep against the hull. Phoebe didn't let her guard down for a single moment as she firmly held the dagger with her right hand.

"So previously you had poisons on your person." The high elf pointed out. "Just who are you people?"

The knight coughed as he spoke a few words just before passing out.

"Reinhardt Lorraine… paladin of the order of high knights of Arcadia."