Are You Afraid?

"Rgh... Okay, that's it!" Ruggie shouted in frustration as he popped up impatiently, "Laugh With Me!"

"Ruggie!" Epel gasped in shock as he saw the flash of magic and the monster's movement being controlled by Ruggie as though following his movement like a shadow.

"Idiot!" Riddle grimaced.

"No wait." Jamil stopped them with a frown in suspicions, "Somethings not right..."

Shocked, the monster was immobilized and dragged into the swamp as Jack shouted in disbelief, "You're using your signature spell?! But won't you get tons of blot...?"

He paused a raised a brow upon looking closely to Ruggie, "Wait... You look just fine."

"Who cares how he looks?!" Floyd screamed at him angrily, "Get this thing in the mud!"

"Right!" Ruggie nodded and snickered at that monster, "When you're under my signature spell, I dictate your every move. Come on, monster... Straight ahead now. Right into the swamp!"

Swiftly, Ruggie took steps foward as the monster was quickly walking into the depth and fell backward.

"Finally!" Grim cheered with a Cheshire-like smile only to be quickly muffled by one of the other students, "Mnph!"

"Shut up..." They hissed at him.

"All right! It's fallen in!" Jack cheered victoriously.

"Now we can unleash a mighty onslaught!" Sebek cried out.

"Aww, man. I'm all muddy now..." Floyd swam towards the monster with a glowing glare across his eyes, "You're gonna pay for gettin' me dirty. And let me tell you, it's a high price."

The others shivered as they secretly were happy that they weren't the ones igniting his anger this time.

"It's finally payback time!" Ruggie announced as the group went in head on and began attacking the monster with magic and physical attacks, basically a dog pile.

"Is the professor going to be all right?" Epel muttered nervously.

"It's professor Vargas." Grim sighed, "If he can take on all of us, why can't he take a couple punches? Besides, he wanted to remain anonymous while playing this role."

As the others nodded nervously, Lotus hesitated as she thought to herself aloud nervously, "Actually... I think it is better if he gets himself checked out at the hospital once we return, or even the nurse office..."

"Eh?"

As eyes turned on her in confusion and surprise, an unsettling feeling fell upon them as they heard this from Lotus specifically.

Ruggie finally gasped in horror with his hyena ears pulled back, "This can't be happening… Our attacks aren't doing anything!"

Sebek hunched over cupping his mouth and turning away as he grumbled, "Ugh... If I use any more magic... I think I might retch…"

"Stop, Sebek!" Jack shouted in horror once he heard this, "Just call it quits!"

"This thing doesn't even flinch when I hit it!" Floyd complained angrily though a little shocked as well as he struggled to squeeze him with his long eel tail.

"Argh... Seriously, what's its DEAL?" Ruggie shouted in frustration, "This thing's gonna be the death of me, and I don't even know what it is!"

"...Hey, wait a minute." Ruggie noted as it dawned upon him and he looked to the light of the rising sun and suggested hurriedly, "The sun's coming up. Now we can actually get a look at this thing."

"Is that…a person?" Floyd shouted in bewilderment.

"And not just any person..." Sebek shouted in shock.

"COACH VARGAS?!?!"

With his face revealed by the light of the sun, Vargas laughed despite in defeat, "HAAA HAH HAH HAH! I'm guessing from your reactions you had no clue it was me? Despite your fears, you mustered up the courage to face your foe..."

He smiled wide and announced, "And all along it was… ME! Your mightily muscled coach!"

"BWHAAA?!"

"We thought the monster attacked you!" Floyd pointed out in confusion.

"This is all very bewildering." Sebek muttered in confusion.

"I'll tell you the whole story back at camp." Vargas said with a wide smile as he removed his stag like mask, "Let's go, boys! Follow me!"

"Finally!" Grim cheered with a bright smile and yawned, "It's time to go back to bed now, guys!"

"Oh? You want to go back to bed now that it's day light now?" Lotus sneered, "I'm afraid that since it's day now, you can forget about sleeping."

"What?! That's ridiculous!" Grim shouted in defiance, "We're tired already and just want to go back to bed!"

"I wonder who it was that asked to go see this show... You know... You could've just asked to return and sleep for the night." Lotus pointed out bluntly with a chuckle.

"What?!"

They stared at her in horror as Riddle sighed, "Lotus, not everyone can survive with no sleep like you can. At least, go easy on everyone else. Let's go back. Clearly, Sebek's team should take a break since they were the only ones running around taking on the task."

Jamil sighed, "I can already see the trouble coming..."

"We'll hurry back and clean things up for Jack and Ruggie too." Epel smiled wide hearing this.

"Let's go back, then." Yuu smiled and picked up Grim from the ground.

As the group returned to the camp, Lotus lagged behind and softly tugged on Riddle's athletic jumpsuit outside of everyone's sight as they followed after Yuu. Surprised, Riddle glanced back and saw her. He stopped and turned to her as soon as he saw that the others did not look back, "What's wrong?"

"Peony tasked me with the task to watch over the fairies outside of school. I'm afraid that pursuers have arrived on this campsite for some time now." Lotus whispered.

"What?!" Riddle grimaced, "Then, what should we do? Should we share this with Coach Vargas?"

Lotus shook her head, "Even if we did, they would simply either go check it out or call someone to check in on it. For cultivators, it doesn't matter if it was ghosts or living. They could capture or take their souls regardless. If they know that there are people here, they could either attack to capture or kill us, or they go back into hiding. With the phantom running around... I'm afraid they probably had an interest in the phantoms because cultivators can't conjure up overblots and create phantoms. They die once they overuse their mana or go down the path to self destruction if they lose themselves too deeply into negative emotions."

"So, you're worried that they might've experimented on the phantom of the former miners and controlled a monster." Riddle frowned, "But why?"

"Don't forget. Magic stones are referred to as spirit stones for cultivators, where you use magic stones to utilize magic safer, cultivators absorb magic stones until its mana are completely depleted. Once like that, the magic stone becomes useless to everyone. Just an ordinary and useless piece of crystal or jewel. My worry is that there was probably an existing deposit of magic stone hidden deep in the mines and they are trying to utilize that or even worse."

"Worse?"

"A magic stone vein." Lotus replied, "If there is a magic stone vein, then the situation is a whole lot worse. They could just meditate in that vein and absorb endless amount of magic stones empowering themselves until they have the chance to reach even Malleus's level of power and we already can just hear how powerful he is. Everyone gets nervous once he uses magic. More importantly, I managed to speak with one of the fairies using a translator. They say that there are still a fairy village that have taken up residency in the mines since a long time ago. If they catch a hold of the fairies there, I'm afraid that the fate of the fairies could either be gruelsome or too censored to be imagined."

"Then, what should I do?" Riddle questioned with a frown.

"Don't forget. Deuce was last seen in the mine. I trust Deuce's sixth sense and his luck. He must've survived up till now. You get everyone to focus on rescuing Deuce while I go further back with my stone to help Peony create an array formation for her to activate to protect the fairies in there."

"That's too dangerous!" Riddle pointed out in disagreement and frowned, "You know how injured Peony was just the other day. Now, she's expecting to protect the fairies here by herself."

"She won't be." Lotus responded, "Just watch."

Riddle frowned, "Lotus. It's too dangerous. How about getting someone to come with you?"

"I already have someone in mind." Lotus answered firmly, "There's a leader of the fairies in the wood and one from the lake. The one from the woods will come with me into the mines. However, I need someone to make sure that the others are distracted. They cannot come with me. Just focus on getting Deuce out of there and distracting the phantom."

"This..." Riddle hesitated but he finally heaved a deep breath in defeat, "Fine... But, please... Be careful."

Lotus smiled and responded, "I got it!"

As they began making their way back, Riddle called out to her suddenly, "Lotus."

She paused to turned back curiously to see Riddle watching her with an unusual look of concern over him much to her surprise as he opened his mouth, "Aren't you afraid of doing these things? Ever?"

Stunned, Lotus stood there speechlessly in confusion. It was only a couple minutes after that she finally opened her mouth breaking the tense moment, "I don't remember."

Riddle did not respond as she continued, "I don't remember how long it has been since I was last afraid either... It's been a long time since I've been terrified of anything. Probably because I was raised in the midst of dangerous situations in the past. So, putting it into words... Nothing can match the fear I had felt from back then."

After a moment, Riddle was quietly watching her before he opened his eyes and then opened his mouth once again, "Lotus, you-!"

"Hey, guys!"

They stopped as they turned around and saw Grim dash up to them with Yuu follow closely behind her as Grim called out running on all fours and jumping into Lotus's arms, "What's taking you guys so long? Come on! Let's hurry back already!"

"S-Sorry." Yuu took in deep breath and looked up in relief upon seeing the two.

"All right, all right." Lotus smiled with a chuckle and began walking back, "Let's go back then. Riddle? Are you coming back with us?"

Riddle closed his eyes for a few seconds and nodded reluctantly, "...Right..."

As they walked past him, Yuu watched them do so silently as he stared behind Riddle's back as he followed after Lotus.