Upon hearing the shouting, the trio moved to a ledge overlooking the winding path that climbed the southern mountain toward Yilong Wharf. Far below, a man stood beside a halted carriage, red-faced and furious, shouting at a group dressed in the garb of the Adventurers' Guild.
They were too far away for Sylvain/Clervie and Carman to hear clearly, but to Ryuzu's superior hearing it was as if she stood only a step away. She repeated the man's words verbatim.
"What am I paying you lot for?! Those Treasure Hoarders just kidnapped my daughter! I hired you to stop this kind of thing from happening! I put in a high-paying commission to the Adventurers' Guild, and this is who they send? What a scam!"
"But sir, they outnumbered us five to one. We tried our best to hold them off," Ryuzu continued, relaying the response of one of the adventurers.
"They took my daughter, you boar-headed fool! I don't care about the cargo you focused on. I told you to take her if all seemed lost!" the man shouted.
"Shit…" Carman muttered.
"What?" Clervie asked.
"We have to help," Carman said, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"Why? It's none of our business. The Millelith are right there, won't they handle it?" Clervie countered.
"They're already stretched thin guarding the border," Carman replied as he straightened. "Even if the man asked, they'd prioritize the Archon's orders over the plea of a random merchant. By the time this gets sorted out, there's no telling what could happen to the kid."
He narrowed his eyes and focused on the area below, extending his elemental senses outward.
Traces of disturbed elements lingered in the air, residue from a clash between Vision wielders and thugs using elemental oils and potions. After a brief search, he found a trail. Bottles carried by a potioner must have cracked during the fight, leaking and leaving a faint elemental path behind them.
When Carman pointed it out, Ryuzu nodded. She scooped up both him and Sylvain, earning a startled "Eep?!" from the latter. Crouching low, she launched herself skyward with explosive force. Once airborne, Carman tugged a cord in Ryuzu's sleeve to deploy her wind glider. The added weight strained it badly, but it would hold, but would not glide as far as it usually would.
Gesturing for Ryuzu to release him, Carman jumped from her arms, unfurled his own glider and angled toward the lingering trail. Together, they passed over dense trees and shallow creeks, then climbed a short stretch of mountain. Before long, a small encampment came into view, centered around a medium-sized cave entrance.
A rough circle of shoddy buildings surrounded the cave. Each structure was mismatched, assembled from scavenged debris: ancient stone foundations from an older settlement, upper sections patched together from broken carts, hilichurl huts, and whatever materials could be stripped from the wilds. Nails, rope, and sheer stubbornness held it all together.
Crude fortifications ringed the camp raised spikes, makeshift walls, and watchtowers with guards posted within.
Having confirmed the kidnappers' location, the trio settled into cover to plan their next move.
"Ryuzu, we need intelligence," Carman said. "I know I haven't been able to fully repair the parts you damaged fighting the Ruin Guard, but how long can you sustain Imaginary Time?"
"Due to the location of the substituted components," Ryuzu replied evenly, "friction will cause them to reach dangerous temperatures quickly. I estimate twelve minutes before they hit critical levels and force an emergency shutdown. Additionally, I cannot selectively exclude entities or objects from my field while the ability is active."
"That'll be enough," Carman said. "Scout the area. There are too many of them to fight head-on while protecting the kid, but if we know the layout, we can cause a distraction while Sylvain extracts the target."
He began sketching a crude map of the visible camp in the dirt.
"Understood. I will return shortly," Ryuzu said, vanishing in a flash of light.
-Ryuzu's POV-
Starting countdown to emergency shutoff… 11 minutes, 59 seconds remaining.
Looking down at the bandit camp, I considered my approach. Since my movement may cause disturbances, it would be best to circle the perimeter and avoid leading them back to our position.
I descended along the left side of the camp. The shoddy walls posed no obstacle; I vaulted them with ease. Inside the buildings, those with doors anyway, I found nothing of note; bedding, personal effects, and little else. All valuable goods were likely stored in the cave. A sensible choice, depending on its internal layout.
7 minutes, 15 seconds remaining.
I entered the cave. It was surprisingly well lit, torches embedded with glowing stones and oil lamps pushing back the darkness. Shed like structures lined the walls, probably storehouses for loot and supplies. Near the center burned a small campfire, a pot resting beside it.
Deeper in roughly thirty meters (~90 feet American) from the entrance stood a cluster of cages. Most were empty. Some held animals. Two contained hilichurls, for reasons I could not immediately determine. At the far end, centered among them all, was a small figure curled tightly in on itself.
Counting heads inside the cave and adding them to those outside, I tallied thirty two bandits. Too few. The housing suggested space for far more, each of the seven outer buildings could sleep three to five occupants. A statistically significant number of hostiles remained unaccounted for.
4 minutes, 30 seconds remaining.
Causing direct harm to the bandits would be unwise by putting them on alert for intruders before we even attempt to make the rescue, and in this state, any blow I were to land would be lethal. Chaos, however, could serve.
I smashed the locks on the cages holding the animals and hilichurls, then shattered an oil lamp against an isolated wooden crate.
3 minutes, 40 seconds remaining.
After committing the layout to memory, I sprinted back into the camp. As I passed through the buildings, I severed key support ropes on several of the shoddiest structures. Then I bent my knees to jump.
My leg protested that the inferior replacement parts Carman had used were already wearing down but given the circumstances, I had no right to complain. Extending my legs to full length, I launched upward like a cork from a bottle.
With less than a minute remaining, I reached Carman and Clervie, who were still looking at the area I had been when I activated the Imaginary Gear.
Emergency shutdown engaged. The world snapped back into motion as I rejoined the main timestream, the dimensional bubble dissolving around me as my vision fades to black once again.
-Third Person POV: Five Minutes Later-
After hearing Ryuzu's report and drawing what she had described, Carman watched the camp as Treasure Hoarders scrambled to contain the chaos she had unleashed, and ran simulations rapidly in his mind.
Producing a crystal, he formed hand signs. A clone materialized beside him, and he drew a spear from storage.
"Ryuzu and I will hit them from the front," he said. "Sylvain, you and my clone circle around back and free the child."
He crushed several Condessence crystals, drawing out their stored energy and holding it tightly in the mental hand of his Hydro elemental manipulation.
"Ready? Go."
Carman leapt from the ledge and used some of his Hydro energy to allow himself to slide down the slope. Ryuzu followed, claymores in both hands.
Sylvain/Clervie moved with Carman's clone toward a section of the battle of the rear perimeter that Ryuzu had noted as having visibility issues due to overgrown plantlife.
At the front gate, Carman and Ryuzu charged.
Ryuzu began to spin, arms extended, blades parallel to the ground, an accelerating circle of steel. Faster and faster she turned, until her form blurred into a thin silhouette encircled by a halo of flashing metal. Potions and arrows flew, but even at nearly five hundred rotations per minute, she tracked and evaded them. Her rotation stabilized her like a gyroscope as she dodged and advanced on the gate.
When she made contact, the impact came in an explosion of splintered wood. The crude barrier seemed to disintegrate on contact, debris shredding into the Hoarders behind it. Screams followed as they dove aside.
With effort, Ryuzu slowed. On her final rotation, she hurled one claymore into a watchtower, cleaving through two bows before embedding in a support beam. As archers retargeted her, four blades made of hydro energy appeared out of nowhere, slicing bowstrings and snapping them back into some of their faces.
On the ground, Ryuzu engaged the melee fighters, blocking and striking with the flat of her remaining blade.
She avoided killing blows deliberately. Alive, Treasure Hoarders were worth more to the Guild, to the guards, and for the intelligence they carried and the labor they could perform to repent for their crimes. Deaths happened in battle, but she minimized them whenever possible.
Even surrounded, Ryuzu dominated the fight.
As Carman neared the gate, a separate group approached from behind, the remaining bandits Ryuzu had worried about.
"Drop the weapon, kid," their leader sneered. "Storming our boss's camp takes guts, but you're outnumbered. Easy way, or hard way?"
Carman assessed his remaining energy. He let his spear fall, then his sword, and finally produced his fan of Five Hundred Winds.
The Hoarders' eyes locked onto the ornate fan as Carman formed deliberate hand signs.
"That's it," the leader said greedily. "Hand it over and"
"I think there's been a misunderstanding," Carman said calmly. "I'm not the one in trouble here."
"How do you figure, brat? We have you surrounded." said the man, moving a hand to his weapon as two of his men glanced backwards to see if there was anyone behind them.
"There are only seven of you, you'll need more than that." said Carman as he tilted his head to meet the lead hoarder in the eyes with a cold level gaze.
He finished the final sign. Three pillars of water surged from the ground, shaping themselves into perfect copies of him.
Two seized the discarded weapons and charged. The third leapt atop their shoulders, vaulting over the Hoarders only to be struck midair by a Hydro bolt from the original. It burst apart in a crashing wave, drenching the group.
Another bolt flew. The leader, having looked back at the original Carman after the bolt that burst his own clone, saw another leveled at his own chest and dodged, only for it to strike a man behind him. Relief lasted a heartbeat.
Pain followed.
An Electro crystal clattered into the pooled water at their feet, dropped from the bolt's core.
"Ru—ARGH!" the leader screamed as the Electro-Charged reaction surged through him and his men.
He tried to order a retreat, but a blunt spear strike to his lower region silenced him. Behind him, his team tried to resist even as the electro charged reaction affected them, muscles locked, movements slowed.
But even as they resisted, something was wrong, they were getting tired too quick, their head spun, and they couldn't seem to catch a breath. Some tried to breathe deep between clashes with clones, others' breath came shallow or frantic, neither helped. Limbs grew heavy, vision darkened, vomit tried to push its way up, it was all they could do to prevent themselves from collapsing much less fight off the clones.
One by one, they collapsed either from a blow from Camran's copies, or from their sudden affliction
When the last fell, the clne holding a spear used it to nudge the Electro crystal clear of the water. Weapons were stripped away. Rope followed, binding the unconscious Hoarders to a nearby tree as the original moved on to assist in rescuing the girl.
One clone glanced at the others.
"Inducing rapid altitude sickness by simulating mountaintop air pressure with Anemo manipulation, what kind of person comes up with that?" it mused. "We're not a good person, are we?"
-To be continued