Killian didn't want to agree but Michael's words somehow made sense.
"We need to figure out if the Descendants are the traitors or if their families turned against us. That's true…" Killian mumbled. He looked at Michael with more determination than before and nodded before throwing the unconscious body and the semi-conscious Descendant toward Michael, "Do your thing then. I will take a look at the others. They're unprotected and probably weakened. If a group of Tekur attacks, we will be doomed."
Killian couldn't bear to look at Michael and Maria all huddled up right now. They were so close to each other that it made him feel like throwing Michael to the side and running away with Maria. As long as Michael wouldn't be close to her it would be fine…but given how the current situation looked like there was nothing he could do about it. He grit his teeth and began cursing himself for being at fault for what happened. If he had been faster to defeat the Undead Skeleton he would have been able to take care of Maria instead of Michael.
Unfortunately, the Undead Skeleton had been a lot faster than expected. Michael rescued Maria from the death beam and the attempt of the six traitorous Descendants to kidnap her.
'Fuck this shit!'
Killian left Michael alone with four corpses, an unconscious Descendant and a semi-conscious Descendant.
Michael retrieved a mattress and a blanket from his War Rune to let her rest in a corner and give her some comfort in her sleep. He then turned to the semi-conscious Descendant.
Four Glacicle Swords manifested, strengthened with four layers of Enhancement and Reinforced Sword Qi. The swords pierced through the Descendant's arms and legs, pinning him to the ground. His screams reverberated through the camp of survivors, but nobody said anything. In fact, nobody could even see Michael at this point. Everyone but Killian was unconscious. And Killian did not even think about turning around to look at Michael.
Michael retrieved a handful of glass vials from his War Rune and fed Maria the viscous liquid inside them.
'She would wake up in an hour or so. That's just enough time for me to deal with these traitors!'
He looked at the semi-conscious, traitorous Descendant whom he had pinned to the ground with four Glacicle Swords and smiled before using both Extraction and Mind Reader in combination. Extraction was used to torture the Descendant by tearing his insides apart to extract SoulStar Fragments and his Soultrait Symbol, whereas Mind Reader allowed Michael to read the idiot's mind and force him to think about stuff he wanted to keep hidden.
Michael did not even think of having mercy on someone who killed his own kind and nearly killed him as well. There was no need to be merciful to trash like those traitors. Instead, Michael tortured the Descendant while asking a wide variety of questions.
By the time Michael extracted the Descendant's Soultrait Symbol, his body began to react violently. The Descendant collapsed and…died. His Soul received a severe backlash from having his Soultrait ripped out when the Descendant died. Michael figured that the Descendant had been weak and that the idiot suffered a bit, but he did not expect him to die like this.
"Good thing Killian wanted to kill them, either way. At least, I got some intel," Michael murmured before he moved onto extracting the Descendant's Memory Orb. Thereafter he continued to use Extraction on the other Descendants, extracting a portion of their War Runes' storages, their Artifacts, Memory Orbs, SoulStar Fragments and Soultrait Symbols.
Michael was not sure how much time he spent on Extraction, but he noticed that Maria was staring at him.
'Did she see me use Extraction? No. More importantly…did she see the SoulStar Fragments and Soultraits?' He wondered, his heart skipping a beat.
Fortunately, it looked like Maria did not see anything. If she had seen the Soultrait Symbols, Maria would have been shocked. However, she just smiled faintly through her eyes while hiding everything below her eyes behind the blanket.
"Did we win?" She asked after they kept staring at each other for a few seconds.
"Of course, we won. I don't think you would be lying on a cozy mattress like this if we'd lost," Michael raised an eyebrow as Maria scoffed lightly.
She was just about to retort when her eyes fell on his blood-soaked clothes. Maria pulled the blanket aside and jumped up from the mattress.
"I'm sorry. I forgot that you were not injured. I will heal you immediately!" She uttered hurriedly, only for Michael to wave his hand, "I am fine. I healed myself."
Maria recalled that Michael possessed the shard of Archangel's Grace and sighed in relief. A smile blossomed on her face.
"That's good."
Her words were not filled with warmth and sincerity, taking Michael by surprise.
"I'm glad that you're fine as well. You did a good job clearing the deadly fog."
Neither was sure what to say after their words fell. It took Michael a few seconds before he cleared his throat and pointed toward the camp's center.
"How about we go to the others? I finished reading their minds. Unfortunately, they died shortly after. I was lucky enough to get some useful pieces of information though," Michael asked to which Maria could only agree.
"Pleasant information, hopefully," She murmured.
"Well. if it's good news to know about bad news. Then yeah, I got some pleasant information to share with everyone."
Maria's smile stiffened but she did not ask further. She had a bad feeling.
They made their way to the center of the survivor camp where a bunch of Descendants had already gathered around Killian. The Descendants looked distressed and worried. That was only obvious. Even Michael would be worried if he collapsed in the middle of the deadly fog. Killian must have shared the news of traitors in their own rows as well, therefore, creating the tense atmosphere in the camp.
"I really hope that you have some useful pieces of information. We lost close to 35 Descendants to these traitorous assholes. The only good thing is that they did not manage to kill more people before they moved onward to attack you. Their mission was probably to kill as many Descendants as possible before kidnapping Maria," Killian shared with Michael and Maria, whose expressions soured.
Michael was not exactly surprised by the news. He had expected some Descendants to die. The reinforcement of the Undead Skeleton arrived way too late, probably because they had been busy killing the injured Descendants, who had been further weakened in the deadly fog, giving them no chance to retaliate. They died just like that.
"Your prediction is pretty correct. They wanted to capture Maria Seraph and kill everyone else. I've got some useful information, though it might not be nice to hear," Michael responded to Killian, who gestured to him to go on.
"To summarize the information, we've got to deal with 100 traitors in the Flag War. All of them are Descendants of members of the High Society's families, nobility, and clans. However, everyone seems to have obtained different missions and items to make use of. Raven, or Sandro, or whatever he is called must have been a rather high-ranked disciple of a Hyuman because he led a few groups of traitors and gave them their missions," Michael began explaining.
"Basically, the mission with the highest priority can be divided into two tasks. First, everyone was told to keep their identity a secret as long as possible. The traitors were not told to wait until our guard was weakened. By the time they attacked, we would be helpless. That was the plan with the mission being to eliminate all prodigies from the Tritan Alliance. It does not matter whether the prodigies are Warlock Centaurs, Berserkers, or Humans.
Killing the prodigies during the Flag War would be the easiest way to keep the identity of the traitors a secret. The second task of the high-priority mission would be to capture Kaleb Zenovia and Maria Seraph."
Michael had to catch his breath and stopped his explanation for a moment. He allowed everyone to digest what he was talking about.
"One way or another, killing every Alliance member but the prodigies with 7-Star Soultraits was their plan. By failing to destroy the Dimensional Pillars, mankind would be forced to request help from the Supreme Human Alliance sooner or later. After all, if the Tekur race managed to turn the Lesser Dimension Gate into a permanent portal they would infiltrate the Lumina Stellar System and start their conquest by sending a handful of Divine Lifeforms over.
By then it would only be a matter of time before the Tekur reached Kelta and the solar system at last. Tekur would reach mankind and force us to the verge of extinction, thereby forcing humanity to accept the 'generous' proposal of the Supreme Human Alliance to join their ranks in exchange for protection, resources, and whatnot."
Michael finished his explanation with a deep sigh.
The tactic of the Supreme Human Alliance was dirty, but it would allow them to achieve what they desired – bringing all human races under one umbrella and teaching mankind a lesson they would never forget.
"That sounds fucked up," One of the Descendants next to Killian said. He wanted to shout at Michael and accuse him of lying, but Killian's serious expression stopped him from doing anything.
"So we actually have some traitors in our own rows? Well, given that Raven turned against us…against me…I can only assume that we cannot even trust our friends anymore."
Michael stared at Killian and nodded his head weakly. Meanwhile, Maria added, "That means the Flag War is not only a fight against the Tekur but also a battle against our own people."
Michael felt something deep within himself resonate with Maria's words.
"It's a struggle against the Tekur and the restraining chains of the Supreme Human Alliance…a necessary battle to retain our freedom…."
