Chapter 160 - Stick To The Plan

"Everyone gather up," Venedette said upon slamming the door inside the room where her team, Leviathan was staying at.

"What's wrong?" Von asked after seeing his mom uncomfortable and annoyed while walking towards them.

"I have dealt with the situation for now but they won't allow us to stay in Edelweiss for more than a day."

"What? But how about Petunia?" Gem asked worriedly while standing up from the disbelief of it all.

"They said they would help us look for Petunia as compensation for causing us harm but they still wouldn't let us extend our stay nor help them look for her."

"What?! That's so unfair! Why can't we help look for our teammate? We're not even sure if they will seriously look for Petunia especially in her cat form!" Fily complained.

"And besides, didn't they said it themselves that they hate us and we won't be able to receive the same treatment that we got from Clandamascarene? Why can't they just let us work for ourselves here? Why are they restricting us from looking for our friend?" Lei said, supporting Fily's complaint.

"I may have to talk to them about that, but in the meantime, I need you all to go back to the yacht so we could proceed to the meeting place immediately," Venedette announced and was ready to walk back out to the officials she was talking to earlier but Gem stopped her..

"Can't we look for Petunia first?" she asked but was only met with a regretful look from Venedette.

"No, we have to meet them first," Venedette said as if asking for Gem's understanding but Gem only took Venedette's answer as neglecting Petunia.

"I'll go look for her," Gem announced right after Venedette closed the door but the rest of them quickly tensed to show Gem their disagreement.

"That's not a good idea Gem, the Princess said we should stick to the plan-"

"And just let Petunia suffer out there?!" Gem cut Lei's words.

"What even makes you so sure that Petunia is suffering out there? Don't you trust her? Just like what Fily said, she had been living on her own for the majority of her life so I'm sure she could find her way just fine, but why are you so pressed? Is there something you need to tell us?" Von suddenly ranted which made everyone silent.

"N-No," Gem lied with a nervous face which gave her away in the end.

"Don't lie to us, we already know you two were planning about something from the get-go, we just wanted to respect your privacy so we pretended not to know, but now that you're saying Petunia's in danger, I think it's time you tell us what's going on," Von said as if his patience had just run out.

"That's not the point! Can't you just trust me? My guts are telling me that Petunia is in danger and my guts are rarely wrong! So if you don't want to cooperate then fine! I'll just look for her on my own." Gem glared at them before focusing her eyes on Lei, "I thought we're on the same team here," she said before holding the doorknob.

But instead of being able to get out, Fily surprisingly stood in her way while still half-asleep.

"Why don't you just tell us first what's up and then let us decide if Petunia really needs our help right now?" Fily said and crossed her arms in front of Gem.

"T-That's not my secret to tell-"

"Then we won't let you go. Neither would we help you look for Petunia." Fily stood firmly in front of the door, blocking Gem's only way out which led to Gem closing her fist out of frustration.

"Petunia is... " Gem tried to spill the words out but her conscience wouldn't let her, so she closed her eyes and tried again, "She's looking for the same witch that turned Monica into a bird and Sir Durish into a wolf in hopes of her being the one to help her get her human body back."

"I knew it," Fily said which gave Gem a reason to open her eyes slowly and looked at her with surprise.

"You knew?" Gem asked in disbelief, unlike Fily who only nodded comfortably as if she was expecting for this to happen already.

"You both knew and you didn't even tell us? Are we really a part of this team?" Von said, pretending to be upset about it when his face completely showed that he's just fine not knowing anything about it.

"So, you think Petunia's in danger because of that?" Lei asked.

"Of course! That witch is dangerous, to both humans and animals. Why do you think she's hiding? She has probably killed a lot of humans and animals alike that if we were able to find all of their corpses then we could probably kick her out of the border already!"

"And what makes you so sure about that?" Lei said and followed with his own opinion, "I think Petunia must have another reason that prompted her to go to that exact witch and ask her for help without us. She wouldn't do something as stupid as going to her deathbed if she didn't have a failproof plan, let's just wish the best for her."

"Wow, who knew you were this close to Petunia? For all I know, Petunia is our best friend and we should be the ones who know more about her, not you." Fily pointed at Lei with eyes wide open as if she were offended by what Lei said, "But like what Lei said, if Petunia really did have a plan including ditching us, then we should just also stick to our plan and look for her after letting her deal with her own problems," Fily added with a smile before going back to sleep.

And instead of being offended by Fily's response that seemed both agreeing and disagreeing with what he said, Lei just shook his head and stopped talking for the sake of peace.

"What? Aren't you worried about her? Even if she has a grand plan about this witch all along, shouldn't we at least show her that we care for her? That we need her to stay alive for our team to work!"

"That's not how things work, Gem. If we chose to prioritize looking for Petunia, do you think she will like it? Us interfering with her plan and wasting our time instead of going to the meeting that could actually help you make progress?" Fily asked, targeting a fatal point in Gem in this argument.

"See? Even you think the meeting is important now. Let's just stick to the plan and meet each other halfway, okay? I'm sure Petunia chose to do her stuff on her own so that she wouldn't be a distraction for us," Fily said while patting Gem's head and pulling her back to the table where she was seated earlier.

"This isn't fair… Petunia should have at least told us that she would do her plan on her own instead of making us think that we'll actually help her with the plan after our meeting with the tribes."

"Let's just look for her when the meeting is over, okay? And instead of beating yourself up for giving Petunia a chance to go on her own, you should just work hard on finding out how your Salamandite works, feed it, and unlock it, and then give Petunia all the Energy slimes that she need in order to become human again, alright?" Fily said while holding both of Gem's hands with a comforting smile.

"O-Okay," Gem said reluctantly before settling down and finally giving the room a decent amount of silence just before Venedette arrived again and asked them to ride one of the guard's spaceships to the Levi-yacht.

"How about you?" Gem asked Venedette after seeing that she was still seated inside the spaceship as if she still had some unfinished business to do.

"I'll just finish up with the commanders and catch up to you guys, I already set the yacht's controls to auto-pilot which should drive you guys past the checkpoint before the sun finally comes down, alright?" Venedette said before coming with the guards again and back to the checkpoint while the four of them just slouched in their own position on the sofa, kitchen chairs, and even the stairs where Gem chose to hang out while Fily went straight to her room so she could already sleep while waiting for their yacht to finally arrive at the meeting place.

"Are we going there?" Gem suddenly said while pointing at the top of the mountains that were full of snow.

"Maybe," Von only replied without even looking at where Gem was pointing at.

"Petunia must be in there, somewhere," Lei mumbled which made Gem walk closer to him and also look down on the forest that was also full of snow, "I hope she's okay," Gem said sincerely and looked away before being eaten by all those negative thoughts again.