"What do you mean you failed to kill Lola!?"
Lori's enraged screams echoed across the room, the whole place shaking as she continued:
"I gave you one simple task: take out my stupid Weredragon of a sister and, if possible, remove my brother from the map! How could you have failed!?"
"You should know better than to underestimate somebody from your bloodline," Ronnie Anne smiled from within the crystal ball. "After all, just because he's been disowned doesn't mean he wasn't trained by you to pull his own weight."
Lori gritted her teeth and growled.
"Now, if you excuse me, I have to lead him and his team to the throne room. Try to get this little debacle over with as soon as possible."
And so, the crystal ball turned off, and Lori grabbed it, prepared to throw it... then paused and dusted it before placing it back on the pedestal.
"Calm down, Lori, this ball was a gift from the Yates, don't make them mad just because one girl literally couldn't do her job right!" she said to herself as she took several deep breaths. "If I can't trust Ronnie Anne to get the damn job done, then there's only one thing left to do."
Lori tapped the crystal ball before motioning her hands around it, eventually summoning a signal that depicted a cloaked figure on the other end.
"Hello?"
"I got a job for you."
Meanwhile, with Lincoln's team, the group headed towards the entrance to the castle of the Great Lakes Kingdom, which resembled a modern city not much more advanced than Royal Woods. Everybody turned to look at them, no doubt due to their two newcomers.
Yes, two.
"You know, you don't have to stick with us until we see the ruling monarchs, Polly," Lincoln told the older Wendigo. "Isn't Lynn going to get very angry if she finds out you're with us?"
"I can snap her back with a single kick, I think she'll cut me some slack if she finds out I've been hanging out with you guys," Polly replied with a chuckle. "Besides, with a younger Wendigo officially joining your team, you're gonna need help figuring out how to deal with her."
"Why?" Lincoln turned to look at Meli. "She doesn't seem particularly high maintenance."
"She's really not, but have you taken care of a Wendigo before?" Polly wrapped her arm around Lincoln's shoulder. "Trust me, if you wanna make sure Lindsay doesn't behead you for mistreating Meli, you need a Wendigo to tell you what you should and shouldn't do."
Ronnie Anne immediately split them off. "We already have enough eyes on us, we don't need more attention by implying that we're buddies with the Wendigos."
Polly scoffed. "Typical attitude for a noble."
"Excuse me," Ronnie Anne narrowed her eyes. "What did you say?"
"ROCK!"
The caravan stopped and everybody got off to see a giant boulder blocking the path into the castle. However, the fact the ground underneath it wasn't cracked implied it was placed there.
"What's a big rock like this doing here?" Lincoln asked. "And why haven't they taken it out yet?"
"Well, let's look at the bright side," Polly patted Meli's back. "It's the perfect chance for Meli to show you what she's made of."
"Huh?!"
Polly winked at the younger Wendigo, and she promptly and walked closer to the rock. Meli took a deep breath, pulled her dress up and tied it around her waist so it wouldn't get in the way. This exposed her bare legs, which ended in hoof-like feet rather than normal human feet.
"What's up with her feet?" Eleanor asked out loud. "The rest of her looks pretty human, but she has hooves instead of feet?"
"She's not fully mature yet, obviously," Polly Pain explained. "The older a Wendigo gets, the more advanced their shapeshifting abilities become. Meli's still a teenager, so while she can adopt a mostly human form, certain parts retain the equine Wendigo traits."
As this was said, Meli stretched a bit and then prepared to kick the rock.
"Besides, how she looks doesn't matter. What matters..."
Meli lunged at the rock and kicked it with both her feet, spreading a crack that eventually caused it to shatter completely and explode, the pieces hitting the ground as the younger Wendigo landed on her butt.
"Is her leg strength."
Everybody looked shocked at the display, except for Eleanor, who ran to Meli's side and helped her stand up. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Meli answered. "The way's clear now, let's go."
And so, everybody entered the castle and walked to the throne room, with Ronnie Anne going to Lincoln's side and whispering:
"Lincoln, I want you to understand one thing: you're about to meet the most powerful woman in the Great Lakes Kingdom. You have to be very careful with what you say and do. If you even imply you lack respect for my mother, you could end up trapped in the dungeons for the rest of your life."
Lincoln gulped. "Duly noted."
And eventually, the team arrived at the throne room, where a king and queen sat on thrones, surrounded by over a dozen family members, each wearing regal clothing like them as well.
"Greetings, mercenaries. I'm Queen Maria, the ruling queen of the Great Lakes Kingdom. Around me are my husband, Arturo, and extended family, the Casagrandes," the regal woman greeted. "I see my daughter is with you."
Ronnie Anne looked elsewhere as soon as people turned to look at her.
"I hope she didn't cause you any trouble," the woman remarked. "As you know, she's part of the guild of your former oldest sister, Lori, and I can only imagine she tried to use her to make your journey all the more troublesome."
"Well," Lola spoke up, taking a step forward. "To be perfectly honest-"
Lincoln, however, immediately smacked Lola in the back of her head and spoke. "Truth be told, Ronnie Anne was a very big help during the journey here. We wouldn't have gotten as far as we did if it wasn't for her."
Ronnie Anne briefly turned to Lincoln, who turned back to her with a wink. The tomboy, however, wasn't impressed, staying calm as her mother asked:
"Is that true, Ronnie Anne?"
"Not at all," Ronnie Anne answered. "Truth be told, Lori contracted me and then forced me to stage an attack on the caravan; mostly to take out Lola for what she stole from us, but an add-on objective was to take out Lincoln and remove him from the map too."
Lincoln absolutely shocked, but Ronnie Anne quickly shut him up; "My mother is a very perceptive woman. She can tell when someone's lying at a glance, especially when I'm involved, so lying to her is useless."
"I see, so that's what happened," Maria leaned back. "Lori has always been ruthless like that. I just hope our little Bobby can help reform her into someone a little nicer."
"That's if she doesn't corrupt him first," Arturo sighed. "You know how things tend to go when politics get involved. If he makes a mistake, we could lose her guild's protection..."
And it was then that Ronnie Anne got an idea:
"Isn't this the perfect chance, mother? You had me join Lori's guild to gain protection, and the help of the Loud family, but here you have the disowned son of the Loud family, leading a mercenary group with no guild attached to them!"
"Um, I'm not the leader though," Lincoln pointed out before pointing at Chandler. "If anything, I feel like Chandler's the leader more than anything!"
"They have no connection to the Loud family nor the Guild System, and we've been looking for a group to use to create the first guild of the Great Lakes Kingdom!" Ronnie Anne continued, paying Lincoln's words no heed. "Shouldn't we take advantage of this opportunity?!"
The woman hummed. "It would be nice to have a guild of our own, after The Big House fell during a dungeon exploration. But of course, that would be for the team themselves to decide."
"Isn't that a little cruel, Mom?" Ronnie Anne asked. "This is pretty much a situation where they can't really refuse the offer-"
"Ronalda, we've talked about this before."
The warrior sighed. "Yes, Mom."
"Now, as Ronalda has suggested," Maria turned to the team. "In exchange for keeping what happened under wraps, and perhaps allow the weredragon ex-sister of yours to leave with her head intact..."
Lola gulped and grabbed her neck.
"We'll make you a guild fof the Great Lakes Kingdom. Interested?"
Lincoln, Chandler, and Eleanor exchanged looks, and hummed in thought...