All legitimate participants and infiltrators could be considered victims of political power plays.
At this point, everyone was aware that the enemy kingdom's forces had infiltrated the event. And that they were targeting prominent rankers of the younger generation. Most of them had even fought with such infiltrators and survived.
They cursed the kingdom of Edinburgh for playing with their lives just to keep its nose high in front of the kingdom of Layos. However, each of them could be considered a veteran ranker.
They knew that things like these were part and parcel of rankers' lives. As such, they decided to prioritize their own benefits first before they thought of what was best for the entire kingdom. A tit for tat.
For the teams that were still active in the event, there were multiple benefits to targeting the White Raven crew.
First of all, it had enough flags at this point to make it up to the last day without any worries. That is if the flags in its possession were not taken by any other team. So it made perfect sense for the teams to attack Eren's team even under normal circumstances.
The 12 teams could have fought among themselves to remain in the event until the last day. However, why fight among themselves when they had a mammoth to take down in the form of the White Raven crew?
The White Raven's possession of the two Sage legacies added a cherry on top, making it more tempting to be attacked by other teams. Such temptations were difficult to resist.
Eren and his teammates had gotten injured while they were making a run for the last test site. They had been intercepted by a bunch of teams at this point who attacked with intentions to harm them for real.
The White Raven crew had collected a lot of team-based Perks due to their stellar performance throughout the event. To ensure its survival and safety, it used these Perks one after another.
Eren didn't get frustrated by the participants who were targeting him and his team. He knew that he would have done the same thing if he had been in their shoes.
However, the butcher knew a thing or two about carrying grudges. He had decided to "pay them for their hospitality" before the event ended. That too with interest. Until then, he had decided to pick his battles wisely.
Eren had digested Ken's memories.
He knew that a similar situation had happened to the protagonist. At that time, Ken had chosen to make himself the target of his enemies to keep his team safe from harm.
Eren knew that the division of his team into many groups was the right thing in this situation as well. However, he didn't want to make the same mistake Ken did by underestimating his enemies. He also didn't think that he should carry the weight of his entire team on his shoulders.
The butcher decided to trust his teammates instead of trying to safeguard them as if they were babies. He decided that everyone would fight their own battle instead of someone buying time for the rest of them.
***
The 28th night inside Sansara World brought with it a peculiar chilliness. There was a certain bloodlust in the air that had unknown origins.
There were no birds or beasts inside Sansara World, so the forest regions felt completely strange and unnatural. The region the White Raven crew was traversing through at this point was no different from this rule.
An eerie silence was maintained despite the rankers' extreme movements. Eren and his teammates used their movement spells in such a way that they created no sound. It was to avoid further interception by their enemies.
They had already used a lot of Perks to mask their presence. Some of Eren's teammates had even turned invisible. However, they all knew things like this were not completely effective.
Erten and the rest couldn't stay in one place for long either. Their enemies were getting close. And it was obvious that their chances of meeting other teams targeting them were only meant to increase as they approached their destination. There was only so much they could benefit from the roundabout way to reach the place.
They ran silently through the woods while keeping a fixed distance from each other. All of them had stoic expressions on their faces. Even Ramy Richards wasn't his usual self. He kept quiet and didn't try to joke around.
Eren kept his eyes on the spectral map he was accessing through the Sansara interface. He used a special map-based Perk to scan the area near him and found out that enemy teams were waiting for them up ahead.
He guessed that they would soon be surrounded by enemy teams. A significant number of rankers would be used to create a perimeter that would trap them. The rest of the rankers would approach them once the perimeter had been secured.
The tongues of lightning dancing around Eren were dispersed and he stopped in his tracks. He stood still on top of the highest branch of a tree and looked seriously at the aurora lights spreading across the night sky.
The butcher used a voice communication channel to address his team.
'Stop. There's an enemy flank ahead.'
The White Raven team members stopped executing their movement spells when they heard Eren's words. Some of them removed their Perks and made themselves visible.
'What should we do then?'
Steve asked while looking around. He was the least tired of the group. He had also made a complete recovery from his serious injury in a relatively short time. The said injury was inflicted on him during the last enemy interception. Steve had taken care of the female ranker who had targeted him before running away from the scene.
Eren pondered for a moment and thought of various possibilities at once. He thought of all the possible scenarios and came to a very obvious conclusion.
The butcher sighed before answering Steve's question.
