Ahoy maties! I'm back for more~!

Special thanks to: ABookWormForLife, Alynn-Aorels, Amorphous Sapphire, Ditzyninja2249, Gift Rose11, Krystal 'Demon' Sanate, Lacus 01, LittleFireDragons, SkyRealmTheory, The Lillyz, azpha, dyingmockingbird, tomari for adding this story to their alert list and Thanks to: Bluesoilder4710, Kurogitsune Yue, LovelyMinx17 and gderstand for adding this to their favorite list.

Beta'd by Amorphous Sapphire, Thank you very much~! ^.^

Without further ado, on to the story


Chapter 6: The start of burning: Part 2: First glimpse

Ace sighed as he placed his chin atop the mop he was using to clean the deck. The party was 4 hours away and their assignment was to clean the figurehead and the whole deck!

Ace groaned, he really hated doing chores, but suddenly he had an idea. What if he snuck out and 'helped' Marco's division to investigate? He look around to see if anyone was looking, looking around and sighed in relieved, gladly everyone was too busy sulking- and cleaning – to notice him. A grin crept onto his face as he lifted his leg to dash to the bottom deck and get striker. But before he could go the onlooker at the crow's nest shouted: " Boat at 3:00! "

Ace groaned and dragged his legs to the railing where a boat had been spotted. Half of the people doing chores was there too, probably as an excuse to take a break from their task and half for the sake of their curiosity. Ace leaned closer to see who was inside the boat. He narrows his eyes and tried to recognize the two people on the boat as he turned to face his comrades. " Their from Marco's division! " He shouted and commanded the others to help them get their boats up.

While pulling the rope up, Ace's mouth watered in the sight of the huge boars that were stocked at their boat thinking he'll be eating some stuff from the boars later. Busy with his thoughts of food Haruta came from the crowd and knowing that Ace will probably lost in wonderland thinking about the boars and how delicious they will be at the party. Shaking her head. She asked the two men.

" Where did you get those? And where's Marco? " She asked while helping them get the boars on the deck.

" A group of of large boars attacked us. Commander Marco sent us here to deliver these boars, Commander Haruta " Oh, then are you still joining them or are you two staying here? "Haruta asked

" Commander said that— where did Commander Ace go? " Keller?— looking around Haruta noticed that Ace did disappear.

" Wait... where's our boat? " Jim said as he dropped the boar on the floor. They exchanged glances and Haruta heard a groan from Ace's division, Haruta snickered " Looks like your Commander has escaped, again "

" Ugh, Commander Ace! " They shouted. And Once again our favorite 2nd commandant escaped and left the task to his division.


3rd POV- Ace's boat adventure~

" Finally! " The young commander shouted at the top of his lungs while throwing his fist at the air. After the satisfying yell he placed his hands at his hips and filled his lungs with air, inhaling the salty air.

As you have seen. The mischievous commandant ran away from a task, again. Leaving the dreadful task to his division, while he's roaming around looking for adventure. Ace didn't even feel a bit of sympathy. He grinned and looked at his log pose, as it says the Island is just ahead. So immediately he grabbed the paddle and rowed his boat towards the direction of the Island.

Ace realized how long it was taking. Why didn't he used Striker again? Oh right they would have noticed. He pouted, If only he had managed to sneak away in his lovely boat then he wouldn't have to row all the way to the island.

He sighed. Well he didn't have a choice, so he just continued rowing his way to the Island. Honestly he didn't have a clue on how to meet with the others. He just plans to walk aimlessly until he bumps into them... Well that is if fate isn't cruel to him and If lady luck decided to bring him luck like his younger brother has. The kid has the luck of a devil!


Ancient ruins

After they meeting up with the other group, Marco decided to divide the task of investigating the ruins to make their job easier. His group will investigate inside the ruins, while Herald's group will investigate outside the ruins, Kevin's group will guard outside. They can't afford any distractions if they want to finish investigating early.

As Marco and his group went deeper at the ancient ruins. The odd feeling of familiarity only grew stronger, he's absolutely sure he haven't gone there and if he did he'll remember it, he has a good memory after all.

The walls inside were covered with moss and vines and the place look like it's gonna fall down any second. As they took a turn, Marco notice something didn't felt right. He felt something was following them. Marco narrowed his eyes as he look around

Griffins he thought, he kept looking around as his gaze hit the eyes of the griffin, to his surprise it wasn't alone. He's sitting on the enormous eggs that most likely his, or hers seeing that the Griffin was truly a female. It's a good thing that his division haven't notice it yet because its nest hides at the dark corners of the ruins.

They took a halt when they come to another three path way. Marco sighed, how many halls do this place has?. Shaking his head he faced his group.

" Yzel and Jericho you lead the others I'll take the middle path, we'll meet at the shore, yoi " Marco said. They were about to protest but bite their tongue seeing the Commander wouldn't listen, anyway.


Ace's misadventures! Yay! XDD

He searched for the other docked boats at the shore so he would get an Idea on where they went. Luckily it didn't took long until he found the boats. He didn't waste any second to dock the boat he's using, pushing his boat into the shore he kicked the sand under his feet and stretched his limbs. Filling his lungs with the salty air.

He picked up his watermelon bag up, conveniently his bag was at the railing while he didn't remember putting it there. He shrugged the thought off and continued his way to the forest


Marco

For some reason, his headache worsened as he walked along the dark path. He lit his arm aflame and continued walking, there wasn't anything unusual inside the ruins if you didn't count the Griffins, yes there was nothing wrong about the ruins.

With his hands stuffed in his pockets, Marco calmly looked around searching for anything unusual. He stopped when he saw something suspicious hanging off of both both walls, left and right. It was sparkling at the light Marco's flames gave. He touched it's smooth and silky texture. Thread he mused. But who would put up such a childish trap? Could it be that assassin they kept talking about? Marco hadn't heard about the whole story, all he knew is that an assassin of the former CP-0 landed there. He didn't have time to listen to the whole story and he didn't really want to listen to something like that when he didn't have proof of it.

He rose from his feet and took a step then forward when the tile on the floor he stepped sunk, Marco had seen this kind of trap and on instinct he fall back to his knees as if on cue, sharp arrows flew to where he stood earlier and crash to the wall.

" Why are you so scared, hmm? " The man with a tribal mask took a step and the tile sunk after that five sharp arrows went his way and headed for his head.

Marco's breath hitched, Where did that come from?. Marco shook his head trying to get rid of the awful feeling. He felt scared, as in really scared. He tried to get up but it felt as if his knees had frozen. Great, now I can't stand, with an irritated groan he tried again, and wrapped his hand around the arrow's body and deepened his weight on it. Only then did he notice his hands were shaking making it harder to stand.


Ace

Ace groaned and ran a hand through his face " I give up! " He shouted in irritation. He doesn't know is worse, getting lost in the middle of the island in the dark? or Missing the party. The sun was down and most likely the party had started already. He sat at the huge rock and put a hand at his chin, trying to think which way he should go. But before he could fully think about it, the rock— or what he thought is a rock started moving. Then a hissing sound came from it. He scratched his head. " Where did that sound came from? " he look behind him only to freeze. He only realized now that what he was sitting on, was actually a huge snake. Its scales were silver and rough like a rock, they also acted as armor so burning it would be hard. Another hiss, the snake moved, looking like it's ready to squeeze the young commander. Then before Ace could jump, it's tale acted like a spring, kicking the teen out far and far away.

Great Ace thought sulkily as he headed for the salt water. Worst adventure, ever.


Words: 1,586

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