-3-
Milla and Kai begin to follow the trail of wreckage left by the mechanical spider, Kai makes a loud whistle, impressed by the raw power of the mechaniloid.
"I'll give that maniac credit, he knew how to build some effective bots" the husky says in an impressed, but still monotonic voice "Of course nothing is perfect, everything have weaknesses."
Milla stood silent, trying to concentrate on Talia's scent and the energy signature she tagged the spider with, still walking carefully so that she doesn't open the wound on her right foot.
"Hey! Exactly how does that psychic energy of your's work?"
Milla continued to walk, annoyed by Kai's rambling and banter, she knew he was trying to annoy her, eventually she gives a response "I can sense the energy signatures left behind from my attacks, I usually don't need to use my psychic tag, as a hound I can just follow other's scent."
"You can't find those bots' sent though, at least not those kind of robots." Kai says, continuing for Milla
"By the way, what are you?" Milla asks, ignoring Kai's smart remark.
"Never seen a husky, huh?"
"A husky? I thought you were a wolf."
Kai gives off a annoyed look towards Milla, as though she was an idiot "You may be clever, but you're certainly not too bright."
Milla loses her patience from the remark "Well… shut up!" she retorts unable to come up with a counter argument. The two continue to follow the path, then as dawn came after hours of walking they see the large spider guarded by several turretus, dragonflies, fireflies and cacteons. The spider seemed inactive; still locked into it's hull was the cage that is still holding a frightened Talia, wrapping her arms around her legs in a sitting position.
Milla and Kai immediately dash over to the side for cover, hiding behind the cluster of bushes filled with titular lotus berries, planning on how they could attempt to save Talia.
"Maybe we should try sneaking past the enemies and break Talia out of the cage." suggested Milla, as she ponders for a decent plan.
"We could do that, but now it's too bright to sneak past them, also we can't just attack one of them, it'll likely alert all of them including that spider." Kai said in response.
"We need to do something, can't we just fight them?"
"We're grossly outnumbered, granted we have the skills and power to take out dozens of those bots, the real problem is the robot spider, if it wakes up we'll be in trouble." Kai explains "Even if we fight the spider alone, it can use it's legs to perform heavy attacks, and if it's smart enough, it can position itself to aim those two turrets at me, so sniping it won't lead to much success."
"What if we take out the turrets first?"
Kai ponders for a moment "If you can get close enough without getting skewered, be my guess."
Milla makes a large sigh, and responds in a confident voice "Then let's try it!"
"Did you forget your foot?" said the skeptic husky.
"I think it healed enough."
Kai makes a shrugs his shoulders, "Okay then, so we take out the smaller machines and get Talia out first, I'll distract the bots and take them out, meanwhile you go ahead and get the girl out of there, I'm confident that spider is going to wake up the second I start destroying those robots."
Milla gestures by nodding her head, and begin to head towards Talia's location, Kai position himself about 100 meters in front of the crowd of robots, waiting for Milla to get close enough to Talia, he grabs the large sniper rifle that was strapped to his back and takes aim at the turretus first. Kai makes a small grin as he notices the hound girl in position and opens fire.
Milla hears the violent gunshot fired from Kai's rifle, and begins to dash in all fours directly towards the startled Talia, climbing up the hull of the spider.
"Talia." whispers Milla.
"Milla!" Talia said in tearful glee.
"Don't worry I'm going to get you out of here, I… I got some help… sort of…" Milla expression changed as she talked to Talia, clearly annoyed.
Both Milla and Talia looks in awe as they witness Kai's pinpoint accuracy, destroying every single robot in a matter of minutes with remarkable precision. Milla's hands begin to make a jade glow as she cut through the cage, the robotic arachnid begins to make slight movements, which caught both girls off guard, Milla begins to cut through cage faster than ever, as Talia begins to panic. Kai notices the spider rebooting yelling at Milla "Hurry up over there!"
"I'm almost done!" Milla yells back, trying to keep her cool.
"Milla hurry!" argues Talia "It's waking up!"
Just as the large mechaniloid finished rebooting, Milla successfully breaks Talia out of the cage, both girls falling off of the spider's hull, Milla uses herself to break the girl's fall. Ugh, I'm going to need a lot of bandages after this, she thought holding the side of her torso from agonizing pain as Talia rolls off of her, "You're OK" Talia asks after rolling off of Milla.
"I'm… I'm fine."
Forget bandages, I think I'll need a herbal bath, Milla thought. Just as she got her bearings strait she notices one of the spider's sharp legs lunging directly towards her, Milla quickly rolls out of the way, the force from the spider's attack was so strong that even Kai heard it from his position, thankfully for both girls the leg got stuck to the ground from it's attack.
"Talia, hide!" Milla yells, Talia makes a short nod and hides behind the bushes, Milla aims a cube of energy at one of it's legs and fires a powerful jade beam towards the hull of the spider stunning it. Kai takes the opportunity and changes the rifle's ammo, he takes aim and as the bullet makes contact with the spider an explosion echoed throughout the forest, engulfing the spider in a raging ball of fire.
"That should do the trick!" announces Kai,before running towards Milla.
Talia eyes widen in horror "I… I don't think it's over yet!" she says as the robot spider emerge from the wall of raging fire.
Kai sucks his teeth in disappointment, "What does it take to destroy this thing?"
The spider aims it's two turrets at the three helpless figures before it. Milla prepares her shield in Kai's and Talia's defense, as the spider fire a barrage of bullets, Milla uses her shield to counter-attack, bouncing the bullets back at the spider, but the spider was left unfazed, Kai aims his rifle again, still using his explosive bullets aims directly at one of the spider's turrets. The left turret is destroyed but it's right turret opens fire, Milla attempts to generate a shield before it's bullets can make contact, but was too slow; the spider hit both Kai and Milla with a barrage of bullets.
Both canines slowly gets up and dodge the striking legs from the incensed robotic arachnid, the spider continue to strike with it's leg while simultaneously using it's remaining turret.
"We need to slow this thing down, somehow… " Kai said, starting to get frustrated with the current situation, Kai ponders a moment hiding behind a tree for cover, while Milla continues to defend Talia with her shield, trying not to make any sudden movements so that her wound wouldn't open. He notices a large gaping scratch at the hull, likely from the psychic blast Milla fired hours ago, What'dya know, her injury paid off; Kai begins to aim his rifle at the opening, but he needed a clear shot.
"Hey! Why don't you make yourself useful, and try to keep that spider in one place."
"OK, but I'm trying not to die!" Milla yells back, sharing the same level of frustration as the husky standing by the trees.
Milla successfully stuns the robot spider with a few quick but strong psychic blasts, she aim another square of energy, this time aiming for the other front leg, the leg is cut clean off. The spider looses it's balance for a moment, with the spider distracted, Kai calls to Milla
"Stun it one more time!"
Milla performs the same quick psychic blast to stun the spider. The moment the spider is stunned for one last time, Kai opens fire, the bullet penetrates the armor of the spider through the scratch at it's hull causing the spider to explode into a large field of scrap metal, a swarm of mutants appears before them, flying into the sky.
Milla and Kai after the fierce battle takes a moment to relax, Talia still behind her bush sighing in relief.
"Are you OK?" Talia asks both Milla and Kai.
"More or less." Kai says in a monotonic voice, which annoys both Milla and Talia.
"Lets get back to the village, I think I need a soothing herbal bath." Milla says, exhausted from the fight.
Talia nods in agreement, holding on to her stomach "I think I'll need a feast to full my tummy up."
Milla makes a small laugh "Well, that makes two of us."
Milla and Talia give Kai a sort of mischievous smile, Kai makes an uncomfortable expression and makes a large sigh "I guess I'm hungry too" he admits.
Milla, Kai, and Talia starts to see the village off in the distance, Talia with tears in her eyes begins to sprint towards the familiar setting with Milla making a large smile, however Kai keeps a neutral expression on his face.
"Daddy!" cried the little panda girl "Daddy!"
Immediately Wei hears his daughter off in the distance, he exits the town hall and sees her sprinting directly towards him with Milla and some other person besides her, walking right behind his beloved daughter. Talia runs right into his father's arms and Wei gives Talia such a bear hug that anyone would think he's suffocating her.
"How can I ever repay you?" Wei says, filled with relief and happiness for his daughter well being.
"It was nothing." Milla says with an optimistic tone, Kai gives off an impatient expression which seemed to have given Wei a bad impression.
"As promised I will give you the two thousand crystals, and also help you with your travels" Wei said in a serious tone.
Talia eyes lit up "You promised her that much money?!"
"Honey, what's wrong?" asked a confused Wei.
"You should give them three thousand instead!" demanded Talia.
Kai makes a faint grin on his face "I'm starting to like this gir.l" he said to no one in particular.
"They went through so much trouble, just to save me! they almost died!" continued Talia.
Wei nodded in agreement "Very well, three thousand it'll be!"
Milla stood there flabberghasted "Y-you don't need to give us more…" but the mayor made up his mind, ignoring Milla's modesty.
"Anyways… I'm sure both of you are very hungry" Wei says, talking directly to both Milla and Kai ,who both nod in agreement.
After Milla and Kai had a large hearty breakfast, they collected their reward and Milla asks Wei the whereabouts of the person she was looking for.
"I'm suppose to deliver this to some kind of General but I don't know who he is or where he is"
Wei examines the package, while Kai leans against the wall in intrigue with his sniper rifle next to him instead of strapped to his back. Wei recognizes the insignia on the package.
"This symbol belongs to the Dōng mén Dojo, I see you've visited such a tranquil, and honorable place."
Milla responds with a nod "They were the first people to offer hospitality when I first left Dragon Valley two years ago, you can say I owed them a favor."
Wei makes a large smile, he replies "The man your looking is at Běifēng, which is Qin's second largest city next to the Imperial Capital Zhōngyāng, it's actually north of the lotus forest you just came from, thankfully there's a road passed the forest."
"Thank you so much!"
"It was my pleasure."
As Milla walks out of the mayor's office with Kai following behind her, she notices Min at the front desk as always, I should help, she thought to herself.
"Hey Min!" Milla greeting herself
"Hi there Milla, did the mayor help you?"
Milla goes through her backpack, and offers half of her money to Min, "I hope this will help you get into that university at Shang Mu."
Min stood there speechless at Milla's generosity, "Th-Thank you, but I shouldn't accept this."
"No it's fine."
Min reluctantly accepts Milla's offering.
"I hope to see you over there soon." Milla said with anticipation.
"Hope to see you too."
It was noon, and Milla was laying down at the calm plains of Qin, staring into the swirls of clouds once more.
"So, Běifēng it is?" She hears a familiar monotonous voice.
"Why are you still following me?" responded Milla "You have your money, shouldn't you be working on your robots, going over to the Red Scarves' base over at Shang Tu, or something?"
"So you did notice this red scarf, huh? That's why you offer half of the reward, you knew I couldn't resist good cash."
Milla made a faint smile "I'm taking that as a compliment."
"Well lucky for you I think I'll stick around, even though I have the feeling that you're going to get me killed… " he makes a large sigh "At least I know you're not a total idiot."
Milla get's up "Běifēng it is" she says, ignoring the husky's half insult, Kai follows her into the infinite planes as they make their way to their destination.