Cultivating Anthro CEO RPG Hero Harem Reincarnation In Another World

XXXIX.

Bridgette went looking for Typhon, just as soon as he'd taken off after El. He may have had a head start, but through her experiences as a ranger she could move swiftly through the dense overgrowth, and tell which parts of the woods he'd been recently.

When the earth shook and suddenly the forest was on fire, she feared the worst.

Typhon always wears his heart on his sleeve.

Through the burning brush she pressed on, coughing from the smoke and shielding her face from the fanning flames.

He trusts people. Always tries to be everybody's friend.

Bridgette found him pacing in a clearing, screaming out for El, even as rangers were swarming around, ignoring him as they set about chopping down trees to control the fire..

It's because of his open heart...people will constantly take advantage of him, and hurt him.

Typhon didn't even notice Bridgette running up, until she grabbed him from behind.

"Let me go!" He shouted, struggling in her grasp. "El is still--"

One of these days, Typhon will get himself killed for the sake of someone he loves. That's just who he is.

Eventually as Bridgette kept dragging him away to safety, Typhon fell limp in her arms, just staring forward blankly into nothingness. His mind was overcome by clouding thoughts, of El being dead. Of him being too slow, too blind to save her. How it was all his fault, and that he'd fallen short yet again, when it mattered the most.

Bridgette smiled looking down at him, even as tears fell from her eyes.

But he won't die here. Not tonight. 

Not on my watch.

XXXX.

Baraba had barely rested in recent days. His face was haggard, with black circles ringing his bloodshot eyes, the hairs of his beard rough and unkempt.

Confining himself to his tent most of the time, he'd grown restless. Paranoid.

How long am I going to keep living like this?

Baraba knew he couldn't stay holed up forever.

But the girl had slipped through his fingers again at Khadez, and he could only think of one place where Typhon would have taken her after that.

No doubt he went back to Bethel, he had figured. Which was really quite unfortunate.

Khadez was bad enough, but that place was locked up even tighter, between the Ishtari army checkpoint guarding its entrance and its own force of defenders, the rangers. Baraba had sent some men as far as that, but they'd all returned unsuccessful.

Baraba lived only in fear, now -- awaiting the inevitable retaliation of his disappointed client.

On the night of the attack on Khadez, he popped his head outside when he felt the ground shake, his horse rearing and huffing in agitation.

"Sir!" One of the men guarding his tent greeted him. "Something's happening at Khadez!"

Baraba ignored him, proceeding beyond the protection of his tent with cautious steps.

It was quiet, but for the occasional rat scurrying about. Deathly quiet. Most of his men had abandoned him in his crippled state, leaving only a handful of his most loyal few.

"So tonight's finally the night," Baraba said.

At the center of the camp, stood a lone man garbed in a ragged, dark cloak, standing ominously still with a flickering torch in hand.

Baraba's remaining forces armed themselves, forming a circle around him.

"I am sorry it had to end up like this," the shadowy man replied.

Baraba's eyes widened -- he recognized that voice.

The stranger didn't wait for a reply, as he touched his torch unto a nearby tent, catching it ablaze.

Some of Baraba's men charged at the stranger as he then fled, further into the camp.

Baraba was frozen, gawking in disbelief. It know this voice!

As the stranger lead the men on a chase, he continued to spread the fire throughout the camp with his torch, until it engulfed the entire camp in a raging inferno.

Once they thought him cornered, he tossed away the torch and faced them with a sword.

Baraba and those men that had remained with him could hear the screams pierce through the night, exchanging fearful glances, until it suddenly grew eerily silent.

"Screw this!" One of the mercenaries yelled, then desperately ran for the stables to escape.

The others looked to Baraba. "What do we do, Captain?"

Baraba said nothing. If that man is who I think he is...we're all doomed!

Meanwhile, the one man who had ran away arrived at the camp stables, only to find that all of the men that were guarding it and the horses had been killed.

An arrow from out of the dark then pierced the coward's throat, felling him instantly.

The assassin had trapped Baraba and his men in the burning camp with him, as nothing but barren desert stretched for miles in every direction.

Looming tall among the flames, he appeared before Baraba and the last of his men.

"It's really you...isn't it?" Baraba said. 

How could Baraba forget his time in the army? Those grueling desert campaigns, the low rations, the gut-wrenching feeling in the pit of his stomach from seeing the row of purple flags rise in the distance. It was back in the early days of the war, when both men were young and the Ankh more bold in their attacks, thinking of the Ishtari as little more than pests that could be swiftly disposed of with enough manpower thrown at them.

They had fought beside each other. Survived battle after bloody battle against overwhelming odds.

Gaius made him the man he was today.

"I can't believe you, of all the men I've ever known," Baraba said, "would stoop to this line of work."

Gaius was silent. He had no retort, nor any desire to prolong this.

All the same, it had to be done.

He lunged forward, a blade in each hand, mowing down Baraba's men in a whirlwind of steel.

But rather than joining the fray, Baraba saw this as an opening. He ran back into his tent and hopped unto his horse, which he'd kept in the same tent he slept in for all these years in case of just such an emergency.

Galloping at full speed, he cleared the tent and made off across the plains.

He turned back without slowing for a parting view, to watch the tongues of fire that were lighting up the horizon as they became more and more distant.

Baraba grimaced at the sight. My whole life's work...gone up in flames.

Where would he even go after this? How was a man his age expected to start all over?

Turning his sights forward, Baraba couldn't see Gaius as he emerged from the camp, holding up his longbow. Steadying his aim.

It would only take him one shot, and his contract with Saladin would be fulfilled.

With the money he'd get from this, he could finally retire for good.

He would never have to fight or kill again, just to put food on the table for Navi and the children. To see their smiles another day.

And yet, Gaius's grip on the bowstring slackened. He couldn't bring himself to do it.

Not this time, he mused. 

I guess the soldier in me won out in the end. 

XXXXI.

Bridgette carried Typhon on her back the rest of the way to the village.

Along the way, neither spoke a word to each other.

I know you'll come back from this, Bridgette thought. You always do, stronger than ever. 

The sky was dyed crimson red when they arrived at the village, where it was clear some kind of a commotion was brewing as the streets were filled with people. The villagers were all gathered outside of their horses, all flocking to somewhere.

Bridgette knew at once that Frogman must have summoned them to the square.

Probably to warn us about the fire, she figured.

Carrying Typhon still, Bridgette followed a slow procession into the square, where Frogman stood proudly looking out across the crowd that had formed.

With a wave of his hand, he brought the people of Bethel to silence and began his speech.

"I'm sorry to wake you all at this hour," he said. "But a major calamity is upon us."

The crowd erupted into hushed, nervous whispers, which Frogman allowed to go on for a while, before silencing them again.

"Smoke is rising in the West, in the direction of Khadez."

More whispering. And now voices being raised, in wails and protests, and curses uttered.

"At first, my rangers and I feared it was an attack by the Ankh." 

"But now, based on the reports of our scouts, we have come to realize that the real situation at hand...is far more severe."

The villagers became even louder and more rambunctious.

Bridgette's chest tightened in apprehension, as she dreaded what could possibly be more severe than an Ankh invasion.

"Typhon, are you hearing to all this?" She said.

But Typhon didn't respond. He didn't care, anymore. Nothing mattered.

Frogman gestured to some rangers that were standing behind him on the balcony and they walked forward. 

These rangers were restraining someone with a bag tied over their head. 

"At the same time that Khadez is under siege by an unknown threat," Frogman continued, "our village has suffered an attack, by one we believe to be an agent working with them."

The rangers pulled the bag off their prisoner's head. 

At once, the people of Bethel seemed to all collectively gasp in unison.

Even Typhon lifted his head, his eyes widening at the sight of who the 'prisoner' was.