"Come in, Alex," A crisp yet firm voice sounded from inside the door before Alex was about to knock on the large metal doors.
Alex opened the door as Yuria and her sisters followed her to step into a medium-sized room that didn't look grand at all but had a simple design. However, there were cobwebs here and there on the roof and the walls, making it seem as if nobody ever bothered to properly maintain this room.
However, the four of them were distracted by the people in uniforms walking past them to leave the room.
These men and women in uniforms had serious expressions as if they were only concerned about business. They were wearing dark red uniforms compared to the dark green ones those outside were wearing.
Reva guessed that these people wearing dark red uniforms were of higher rank, and even their auras seemed rock solid, despite not being able to see through them completely.
She also remembered that Alex was wearing a dark red metallic suit with a star mark on the shoulder part of her suit. So Reva deduced that Alex must be equal or ranked higher than these people who were leaving.
Apparently, these people in dark red uniforms were all told to leave the room upon the arrival of Alex and the four strangers.
There was a large oval table in the middle with chairs around it, and on the other side of the table was the largest chair where a woman looking in her mid-forties was sitting.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64ce79d606107d003c23ea27", id: "pf-5140-1"})She was beautiful for her age and had long braided black hair. She was wearing a full-sleeved black uniform with a golden star symbol on her shoulders.
Her focused eyes seemed as if she had gone through enough adversity in her life and her proper disposition made Reva feel as if she was a woman of discipline and order.
Reva had no doubt that this woman was the leader of this city and a powerhouse, most probably the strongest one in the city since even without the woman releasing her aura, Reva felt as if her presence was enveloping everyone…every single object in this room.
This meant that with just a thought this woman could even crush anyone or anything in this room before anybody could even realize what was going on.
However, Yuria noticed that the moment Alex and this woman saw each other, their gazes expressed a sense of…longing? Could it possibly be that these two were…
"Alex, I am glad things went well for your team. But I didn't expect you to bring back four new friends from the Land of Salvation. How surprising, especially since Farah wasn't the one who brought you all out. It seems like we still have yet to fully know the secrets left behind by Anthon Vahn," The woman said with an intense look of contemplation.
"The Land of Salvation?" Lily asked Alex since she had heard the man named Khal mentioning the same thing. She could guess what they were talking about but wasn't sure.
"It is the place you call home. Anyways, let me introduce you four to our leader, Kena Lun. We all simply call her Leader, but in reality, she is a Station Lord. She manages the Blackthorn Station, the one which we are in right now," Alex explained.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64cc9e79c7059f003e4ad4b0", id: "pf-5109-1"})"Blackthorn Station? Is that what you people call this city? Who are you people exactly?" Yuria asked as she glanced at Farah as well. She had already heard from Damien that Farah introduced herself as a Spiritwalker who somehow made her way into their continent despite the barrier. Even now, she had no idea what 'mission' these people in uniforms and suits assigned Farah to carry out.
So she couldn't help but address the elephant in the room.
"I know the lives you four lead in your world within the barrier was different even if it wasn't exactly an ideal world. We know you people get to have your own towns, cities, and even empires. But unfortunately, you four are now in a world where we humans can't really hold onto anything to call our own," Kena said as she leaned with her hands on the table.
Lily's lips parted as she could guess what Kena was talking about. Yuria and Reva could also feel the same, while Valentina couldn't really relate since she lived most of her life in the wild on her own.
She never had anything to call as her own until Damien came into her life. Till that point in her life, she had to follow the law of the jungle. And following this law was something akin to her instincts.
"I know the small island you four lived on was a dog eat dog world hidden by the beauty of the system. But the world you all are in now is far crueler than that, to a point none of you should even expect the slightest mercy from anyone. Here we are, dogs up against dragons. And 99 times out of 100, we do not get to even scratch a single dragon, let alone eat one. We are the ones getting eaten left and right. Our homes, our families, our people, or whatever we have all taken away from us and destroyed right before our eyes. The incident of you four getting attacked by those ghouls and that Daemon was barely just a glimpse of the brutal truth of this world. It is nothing compared to what we all have faced or what you four would probably face in the future," Kena said with a fixed gaze, making Lily worriedly glance at her sisters, who had thoughtful expressions.
The four of them were more worried about how Damien will face this kind of world on his own or if he would really be alright for long. They couldn't imagine how he must be feeling being alone in a world like this. They knew Damien wouldn't be frightened no matter how difficult things were but him being safe was altogether a different matter.
"You also asked me who we are. Well, we are whatever remains of humanity…and this station which you people think is a city, is one of the very few nests of resistance against the Ghouls. We are the only hope humanity has got to survive before the Ghouls exterminate us," Kena said with a heavy look as her fingers clenched together.
