Chapter 106 – Tracking the Witch

The next day, Yuki was waiting at the entrance of his apartment as he glanced at his watch. He checked his ring to see if he had stored all of his supplies and did a quick glance around the room to see if there was anything he needed to do before he left.

“Akira, ready to go?” he said, raising his voice just enough so that she could hear it in their shared bedroom.

“Yes,” she replied as she stepped out of the room. “Let’s go.”

Yuki nodded and opened the door, taking a quick look back. His eyes landed onto Erica who was twirling her fork in the air as she watched him leave. She noticed his gaze and gave a small wave.

“Make sure you come back alive,” she said. “I don’t want to lose my favorite maid~.”

“I wouldn’t want you to lose your favorite maid, now would I?” Yuki replied. “I’ll feel so motivated to return alive now.”

He waved back and held the door open to let Akira through.

“I’ll give you a tip later,” Akira commented with a smile as she walked by.

“Thank you, madam,” Yuki said, bowing deeply.

He shut the door quietly and they made their way down to the transporter station. Initially, Yuki wanted to have Akira hide within him so that there would be less of a trace of her. He still wanted her to stay as hidden as possible. But she vetoed the idea, saying that it was impossible for her to both hide and act at the same time. Eventually, she'll be discovered one way or another. Plus she wanted to experience the transporters herself.  

‘I won’t be going as a human so even when she’s found, she won’t be linked to me. I might as well let her do as she wants. I’m lucky that she’s smart. She won't get herself in trouble. Hopefully.’

They arrived at the station and waited in line. Akira busied herself by snooping around the station as she examined whatever she found. Yuki stood quietly in line as he kept an eye on her to make sure nobody snuck up on her. He booked their tickets before they reached the front of the line through a kiosk. When it was their turn to use the transporter, Akira appeared beside him and they boarded two separate pods.

‘Ready?’ Yuki asked Akira.

[Of course,] she replied. [Though, I would have expected that the pod would be able to stop us from talking like this.]

‘Maybe our mental communication is different than magic,’ he suggested. 

[Mmm, let's go with that.]

“Are you ready?” a voice asked, her voice coming out from the speakers. 

“Yes,” Yuki said.

“Then commencing transportation in ten seconds,” the voice announced.

A countdown appeared in front of Yuki and started to count down, a beep coming out every time it ticked. When it hit zero, a faint hum reached Yuki’s ear before his body glowed. A white light filled his vision and when it disappeared he stared at the metal walls of a transporter pod.

“Welcome to Scylla,” a gruff voice said. 

The door of the pod slid open and light flooded into it. Yuki blinked as his eyes adjusted to the light and he stepped out. He turned his head and saw Akira walk out next to him. 

“That was underwhelming,” she commented.

“What were you expecting?” Yuki asked. “You already knew how I reacted and felt when I first used the transporter.”

“I was expecting something. But I felt nothing. Just a little flash of light and then I was here. I thought that maybe because you’re really unresponsive in general, you didn’t react.”

“Was it any different from when you hide inside of me?”

“Yes,” she replied. “I feel warmth when I get absorbed back into you. This, I felt absolutely nothing.”

Yuki walked through the double doors of the transportation station and took a deep breath in. Scylla was a moderately sized city that served as the main entrance to the Libra Forest. Yuki did a little internet searching and found that a train ran through the city into a station at the border of the forest where a hunting outpost laid. 

“Let’s go to the train,” he said, checking his watch. It was 6:28. “This may sound a bit arrogant but I would like to get this done before the day ends.”

“No, I understand. Let’s go,” Akira said. 

Yuki pulled up a map of the city and located where the train station was located. Together they marched towards it as Yuki booked their tickets through the station’s website. When they arrived, they hopped onto the train and waited for it to take off. 

“Remember the plan?” Yuki asked as they waited. 

“Yes. But it’s not much of a plan.” 

“It was the best we could come up with what we had,” Yuki shrugged. He felt his body shift backwards slightly as the pressure of the sudden acceleration of the train pushed against him. “Anyway, we have a few minutes before we get to work.” 

He shifted his seat a bit and leaned back as he closed his eyes. He stayed like that as the train hurtled forward at hundreds of miles per hour. A beep rang out within the cabin that Yuki and Akira was sitting in announcing the arrival of their stop. He sat up and walked out of the cabin. The door of the train slid open and a wooden platform waited in front of them. Once he and Akira stepped out, the door shut. 

“Do we need to go to the hunting outpost to enter the forest?” Akira asked.

“No. We’re not hunting any monsters so there’s no need,” Yuki replied. “They don’t control access to the forest so they can’t stop us from entering. But if we kill any monsters within the forest and sell them, then we’ll be violating the law since they control that part.”

“Mmm, so we go straight inside then.”

“Yup.”

The train blew past them as it left the station to go off on its scheduled route. Yuki watched it until it faded from view. 

“Let’s run,” he said. 

He looked toward the forest and his legs launched him forward, the wind rushing past his face. He could feel it blowing his hair as its spindly fingers ran themselves through his locks. Glancing to the side, he found Akira running beside him with her hair streaming behind her. Together they tore their way through the forest. They leaped over foliage and fallen trees. They used branches to swing themselves about. And when they found themselves before a river, Yuki lifted both of them using the air and shot themselves across it, Akira hugging his back.

Throughout the entire trek, Yuki connected himself to the area around him as he navigated the forest. He had locked onto the area where the barrier was erected. It was gone now, presumably removed by the Witch to hide traces of herself. But Yuki recognized the area as the place where the trolls used to live. The destroyed buildings still remained and it was the largest clearing within a square mile. 

“Alright, we’re almost there,” he announced, stopping. “Time to start the plan”

“You need the compass, right?” Akira asked. She snapped and took out a round, shiny device from her ring. 

“Thanks,” he said as he took the compass. “You know what to do right? Just go around the area while I locate the Witch.”

“Yes, I know,” she replied with a smile. “Tell me when you found her.”

She ran off silently at a much slower pace than before and left him standing before the clearing. He turned his attention to the clearing and looked at the compass in his hand. The needle wasn’t moving.

‘Let’s see if we can change that.’

Yuki walked calmly into the wreckage that was the troll village. He noticed that more buildings were destroyed since his last time there. 

‘Maybe the trolls did that. Or the Academy.’

The compass in his palm began to vibrate, the vibration getting stronger as Yuki approached the ruins of the troll chieftain’s home. He checked it and saw the needle was pointing to a direction northwest of where he was. With a little push, he sprinted toward that direction while keeping his eyes glued to the compass. He avoided obstacles in his path, sensing them before the entered his vision. The compass vibrated more and more as he approached the Witch’s location. Once the compass felt as if it was going to explode, Yuki stopped. The needle of the device was spinning like a blade of a helicopter.

‘Now where are you, Witch?’

Yuki reached down into the earth and felt about, searching for whatever he could find. He ran into a cube with sharp edges and walls that he couldn’t breach. There was magic in them that prevented him from piercing them much like the magic that was in the barrier.

“Oh, you’ve found me,” a sing song voice said, the source Yuki couldn’t pinpoint. “I’ve been expecting you.”