Book 2: Chapter 54 (2/2)
Mr. Skelly reached into his armor and pulled out a map. It was marked with clear red lines and arrows along with numbers. “Here’s the plan Henry wrote up for us,” he said. “We’re heading south to the territory of the elves to bring them to our side first while some of us head east to the dwarves.”
Alice snatched the map out of Mr. Skelly’s bony hands. “No plans to go north?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “So you’re not declaring war on the holy dragons. That’s—”
“Yet.”
“…I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” Alice said. “But, wait, why did Henry even make this map for you?” She folded it and tore it to bits.
Mr. Skelly tilted his head. “Henry’s our bishop,” he said. “Of course, he’d work in our best interest. But why did you rip the map apart?”
“I’m not going to allow you to keep a map that’s titled world domination!” Alice threw the ripped pieces into Mr. Skelly’s face.
“Well, that’s okay,” Mr. Skelly said as he plucked bits of paper out of his eye sockets. “We have plenty of spares, more than our flags actually.” He placed his hands on Alice’s shoulders. “Why don’t you”—he flinched as his arms were shattered into pieces, but continued speaking anyways—“join us for a bit? You’ll see we aren’t bad people at all. Who knows? You might even join our cause.”
“I highly doubt that,” Alice said with a snort.
“Give it a try? You won’t know if you’ll like it until you try it,” Mr. Skelly said as he squatted beside his shattered bones. They flew into the air and reconnected to his arms with the help of purple strands of mana. “Tafel said she’s coming.”
“Really?” Alice asked, raising an eyebrow. “…I might consider it then.”
A few moments after finishing his conversation with Alice, Mr. Skelly went to a small café in Anfang where he found Tafel sipping on tea while reading a book about cursed swords. “Hey, Tafel,” Mr. Skelly said, taking a seat across from her.
Tafel placed the book down and raised her head. “Mr. Skelly,” she said. “What’s up? You normally pop out of the ground.”
Mr. Skelly nodded. “Can’t do that. I’m unfamiliar with the lands here,” he said. “Anyways, want to join us on a crusade to the south?”
“Not really,” Tafel said. “Apparently I can make this sword evolve”—she patted the sword by her side which was staring at Mr. Skelly—“I want to do that first.”
“Oh,” Mr. Skelly said. “Alice said she really wanted to go though. You don’t want to accompany your party member?”
“Alice did?” Tafel asked while blinking. Her brow furrowed as she lowered her head. “Well, if she really wants to… I guess I can delay this a bit.” She raised her head. “Yeah, I’ll go.”
“Excellent.”