A few minutes ago.
Theo came out of the hill and walked into the forest, meeting Nina and Davi.
He dropped his jaw, never expecting to see his master here. "Master?"
Nina looked at him and nodded. "Have you been well?"
"Yes. What are you doing here?"
Before she answered, a huge "boom" resounded across the forest, startling Theo.
"What's that?" Theo widened his eyes in shock as he had never heard something that loud.
"Do you remember me telling you that some people will try to come after you?"
Theo furrowed his eyebrows. "Of course I do. You said there might be some experts trying to be my master. They will use all sorts of approaches to force me to be their student. They may even kill me if I refuse."
"Yeah. Someone has come to Thersland this time." Nina pointed to the direction where the sound came. "I couldn't handle him, so the Griffith Family sent a backup."
"Is that so?"
Nina secretly clenched her fists, knowing that she couldn't say his parents came all the way here to protect him. She could only say, "Well, you don't need to worry about it. They will be done soon. What you need to do is walk in the opposite direction. Only after a few hours should you head there, trying to see what kind of aftermath three Mythical Rank Experts can create."
"Three Mythical Rank Experts…" Theo gasped as he was only a small Hero Rank Expert. He couldn't imagine what kind of battle was going on there.
Suddenly, they noticed one of them had disappeared.
"!!!" Nina and Davi exchanged looks with shocked expressions. After that, Nina turned to him and shouted, "Run! We will hold him back!"
"W-what?" Theo was clueless as to what was going on. However, Nina tried to push him, showing the urgency of the matter.
"Hurry up! Run!"
Davi had already disappeared and Nina waited until Theo started running.
Because he didn't know what was going on, Theo chose to believe his master since it looked like a wise choice.
He activated his Flowmotion and ran in the opposite direction.
Seeing Theo had gone, Nina sighed, knowing that the battle had finished. If she asked Theo to stay, he might be curious and approach them, only to find his parents. Hence, she sent him away to avoid such a problem.
After talking with Valerie and Ray, she left behind the note, telling him it was just a false alarm and they were alright. Unfortunately, they couldn't meet him since the Griffith Family wanted them back.
As she instructed, Theo hid somewhere for a few hours.
He also had his dinner there and approached the supposed battlefield with Ava.
It was a silent night without any movement in his surroundings as if all the monsters around here had been killed.
Ava was standing on top of his shoulder and focused on her ears, trying to pick up some sort of noises around the area.
"Ava. Do you hear anything?" asked Theo while carefully walking toward the battlefield.
"Kyu." Ava shook her head, feeling that the Mythical Rank Experts had left this place.
"Maybe they have left…" Theo muttered.
"Kyu." Ava agreed with him because she didn't hear any other sound from the battlefield. After all, she could pinpoint the battle's location from her hearing alone, considering she had heard it first hand.
It took Theo thirty minutes just to travel from his hiding spot to the battlefield.
The trees appeared to be charred and some grounds seemed to be melted.
However, everything was worth it the moment he reached the battlefield.
He found a huge crater on the ground, spanning over a few hundred feet.
On his right, there was a line trail stretching around fifty feet, pushing all the trees to the north.
The battle seemed to end quickly as he didn't find many traces. Still, the fight was truly beyond his imagination because each attack could cause this much destruction.
"This…" Theo took a step back as his heart skipped a beat. On one hand, he was scared about inspecting this area. On the other hand, he was curious and wanted to take a glimpse of the power of Mythical Rank Experts by taking a look around.
"What should we do, Ava?" asked Theo.
Ava tilted her head in confusion before lowering her head, giving the decision to him.
After a while, Theo nodded his head. "Okay. Let's explore this area. However, we won't be here for too long though."
"Kyu."
The two then walked around and investigated the damage.
From what he saw, he realized the biggest crater seemed to be made by a single attack. He couldn't imagine what kind of attack could cause this much damage.
Suddenly, Ava furrowed her eyebrows and leaped off his shoulder.
"Ava?"
Ava sniffed left and right as if she had found something. Picking up something, Ava jumped thirty feet to the right and stared at the charred dirt.
She touched the dirt and raised her foot, finding a trace of ashes on the dirt.
To his surprise, Ava put her foot in her mouth, devouring the ashes.
"!!!" Her eyes widened as Ava kept sniffing around and searching for the ashes. "Kyu!"
"Ava? What are you doing? No, what are you eating? Are you sure you can eat dirt? Won't it upset your stomach?" Theo called her again and again, but she continued ignoring him as if she had found food that no one could reject.
It took her half an hour for Ava to swallow them. And the moment she finished, Ava halted her steps, ignoring everything in her surroundings.
"Ava?" Theo furrowed his eyebrows and approached her, only to find lightning starting to spark around her.
It expanded instantly and formed some sort of blue-colored sphere that isolated Ava from the rest of the world.
"What is happening?" Theo was confused about this abrupt change. "Ava. Talk to me!"
"Kyu!" Ava let out a groan and maintained all the lightning around her. Nobody could reach her, even Theo.
However, Theo wasn't the only one who seemed to notice this incident.
Ten miles on the north, another white rabbit turned around as if she felt something. Her eyes turned bloodshot as she jumped into the air.
Her body transformed into a humanoid figure. Like Ava, seven stars appeared on her back, connected by a white line.
The moment she landed, she stomped the ground and headed straight to Ava as fast as possible.