Chapter 87. Genius Moves

"Maybe it was you who grew distant from your father because you thought he blamed you. You should know fathers love their daughters most," Alaric said and turned to walk forward. He took few steps and realized that Aurora was not following.

He stopped and looked to see her lost in thoughts.

"You'd love your daughters most?" She asked.

"Of course," Alaric replied not sure why she was asking this. He saw her smile and he knew that they were no longer on the same page.

"Hurry up. We have our lives to save. The earliest we can get help is tomorrow morning. And its not guaranteed that our pursuers will not have caught up with us by then," he said his words pulling her from her stupor.

She ran behind him and started doing something funny. She stepped exactly every place he stepped. Her eyes were so focused on him. She suddenly bumped into someone. She stepped on something.

She realized that she had stepped on his foot and she had bumped into his chest. Realizing what was happening, she took few steps back and raised her head slowly and looked up at him. He had an amused smile on him.

"Are you even taking our situation seriously?" He laughed lightly.

"I have atmost trust in you," she replied with crimson cheeks.

" Then hurry up and follow,"

" Its not like you are moving fast, I am even right behind you," she said.

"... " He hesitated with his lips open. She was right behind him. "Let's go."

Alaric had thought that she would stop but she continued hopping behind him. He stopped and she stopped behind him one foot stepping exactly where he had stepped last. She was looking away as if she was doing nothing out of the normal.

Alaric just let her be and led the way. The last time she was this playful was when whe under the effect of the psychedelic. She seemed to have mastered the art then. He also remembered when they playfully left with Rey earlier in the infirmary.

***

"Its been thirty minutes. How come we have searched the entire forest upto the fifth stage and we have not yet found them?" Joan mumbled. He could not be that dumb to dive into their death, right?

She landed when she saw an array on one of the trees. It was an alarm array. It was into the sixth stage areas of the forest.

"Very nice move. Did you think that you could use this array to lure us deeper into the forest? We existed years before you were born kid," Joan mumbled confidently and spoke into her communication device.

"Team C and D come to me. I have a lead. The rest keep searching the perimeter," she said and then mumbled once again, "Let's see how far you were able to run."

In two minutes, the teams had all assembled and she was leading them south the perimeter. They were moving fast and knew that in about twenty minutes, they would have caught up with them. Joan had a proud smile as she led the team forward.

They moved at the same speed for almost thirty minutes and she stopped. She had a complicated look on her face. It could not be that he had used the array to lure them that way right?

He was not dumb enough to head deeper into the forest, right? Her hair was a mess and was rising in anger. Just who did this kid think she was? A fool to be played? She screamed as her hair stood upright.

The aura she emanated forced the masked guys to use their elements to block but the trees were not as lucky. Had the masked guys been experienced in cultivation stages and read those of higher cultivation, they could realize that she was a Pseudo Supreme.

Probably a meridian or two less from reaching the Supreme Plane. They just thought that was the aura of someone in the middle stages of the Salvia Plane.

"You little squirt. I swear that I will kill you for getting on my nerves," she mumbled and then turned to the masked guys.

" Don't make me wait for long. Meet me at the point I asked you to." She said her eyes flashing with strange black. The other guys had had an easy time running behind her and thus did not take her words to heart.

It was as if she was never with them the next instant. They only figured the direction she moved by seeing the trees that had been bent to the sides. They gulped. They knew just how dangerous she was.

They all got on their heels and started heading towards her direction. They appeared to be in a race with each other. Non of them willing to be the one who would make her wait.

Joan stared at the array. Her eyes shone with admiration. They were beautiful and perfect. They were basic arrays and she found no error in them. Even her in her learning days could not make such perfect arrays.

"What a waste of talent. If I lay hands on him, he will be nothing but dead meat," she mumbled. The guys were not yet there and she was already getting impatient.

Her hand which had been feeling the array glowed and the array shattered like glass. Her anger rose again. If he could pull of a feat such as distracting them for more than fourty minutes, he surely had brains exceeding their own.

He probaly knew their thinking process and tricked them that way. Now that she had uncovered his secret, she bragged to herself how she was going to see through all his schemes.

A proud smile appeared when she thought of successfully beating him in his own game. The rest of the guys arrived five minutes later. She led the way to the sixth stage zones. They moved in the direction of the array and after almost ten minutes of searching, they found another array.

She stared at it for long as she analyzed it.

"He thinks that because he succeeded in misleading us the first time, he will succeed this time. Men, he thinks that we are foolish to follow the paths marked with arrays," she said and they laughed.

If we catch him this time, bring me the boy. I will happily sever his body piece by piece" she said and led the men towards the direction opposite of the array. They ran for almost one hour and they realized that they had been played again.

The ground trembled due to her aura. They were going to waste two hours and give the brat a chance to escape even further. She called up on all units and told them to assemble at the second array.

They arrived to find everyone waiting for them.

"We have found a clue. The items I am giving to your team leaders are called array sensors. If you find an array, I want half of your team to head in the direction opposite the array to rather right. If you don't find them, regroup with your team members and keep heading towards the arrays,"she instructed.

She instructed that if one could see an array, then they were on the right track and they were getting closer to them. The teams nodded and followed her into the forest. She could hear the murmers behind her asking why they were heading deeper in the forest.

Even a fool could not dare get in zones with beasts of a higher cultivation than them.

"He knows that is what we think and that is why he headed inside the forest. The same way you all ran from him. What if he has a way to scare away beasts?" Joan asked the guys.

They bowed their heads in shame and apologized. Joan was the brains of the gang. Had they been on their own, the would never have realized that they had been played. The fact that there were arrays just proved how right Joan was.

The brat was there at one point and was now toying with them.

***

"I guess they fell for the traps twice. Its been two hours since they triggered the first array. Who knew that they could be this dumb?" Alaric laughed like a sage. They were now two hours less from day break.

" Let Phase 2 of our plan begin," Aurora said with a smile. They knew exactly what their pursuers were now planning to do.