As they were nearing the entrance to the town, there only warning came from Repede who started to snarl before a sword clanked against stone of what was left of the town's road. "Stop right there!"

Standing in the only path out of the ruins was a small army of knights and their commander with his sword already drawn. The commander didn't wear a helmet, instead exposing his long light blue hair, blue lipstick as his 'gift' to the world for his 'beauty'. He even had a heart shaped opening to expose his bare chest as the red, pink, and gold of his cloth accented to the purple of his spiked pauldrons and gauntlets. The man even flaunted his lower half, wearing his codpiece for all to see and no armor to clutter his fine pants and pointed shoes. His knight followed a similar color scheme as their commander, though their armor was not the vibrant purple as his.

The commander smirked, "I finally found you, ignorant peasants."

Estelle was shocked, "Cumore…"

Aile had already returned to normal, and most of the others weren't in any condition to battle. Yuri still pushed it, however, "Chasing us all the way across the sea, that's quite the achievement. Underlings sure do have a lot of spare time."

It would seem Yuri really knew how to push this Cumore's buttons, "You of all people have no right to call me an underling." He let his anger subside, as he graciously bowed, "Now then, Princess, right this way."

Karol turned to Yuri, "Hey, who's the Princess?"

Yuri waved the question off, "The Princess is the Princess."

Deesh snorted, "Was it not that obvious?"

Aile closed her eyes, "It's a bit understandable since she never actually presented herself as such. Though her demeanor could only be from such a regal background."

Shadow shrugged, "I mean we've been calling her princess as a nickname already."

Karol turned to Rita who was just crossing her arms, "D-do you mean the princess is Estelle?!"

"Obviously," restraining her desire to hit him.

Even Estelle was surprised to hear this, more accurately how they all seemed to already know, "Everyone, how did you…" Before she could finish her question Cumore's men started to move toward the others with blades drawn. Deesh was ready strike, but Estelle calmly walked forward, "Cumore, what do you intend to do with them?"

"Why, they'll be drawn and quartered for abducting a member of the royal family, of course."

Strider was barking at the knights now as Deesh found one of her blades in her satchel and Aile grabbed for two of her Biometals. Shadow pointed her pistol at one of the guards, "Go on, I dare you. But I promise you'll be dead if you do, and I'll be kicking your corpse later."

Estelle tried to stop them, "Wait a moment! They didn't kidnap me!"

"Ah, what a mouthy young lady you are. This way, please!" Cumore grabbed Estelle's wrist as he pulled her away from the others. "These flies will die here!"

Just as Deesh was about to make the first move another voice cried out stopping Cumore's men, "Arrest the culprit Yuri Lowell and his accomplices!"

Cumore turned back to find a new company of knights in orange rushing through, "The Schwann Brigade!" Cumore now drew his blade on Leblanc as these new knights surrounded Yuri's group and the other knights. "Wait just a minute! They're my prey! I won't just hand them over!"

"Prey, are they?" Leblanc remained calm as a few knights stayed at his side, "It's troubling you seem to view our duties as some sort of hunt. Did I not also hear you mention something about 'dying' earlier?"

"Of course," Cumore obviously not afraid of losing his position or power, "What's wrong with condemning criminals to death?"

"Should not criminals be captured and judged in accordance with the law?"

Leblanc also seemed to know how to push Cumore around without much difficulty. Cumore released Estelle and walked away, "Fine, take these small fries." Cumore's men pulled out now as he just muttered to himself, "Schwann, Flynn… So many of these damn self-important upstarts popping up… Even that Commandant…"

Leblanc graciously bowed as he offered his hand to Estelle, "This way please, your Highness. Do watch your step."

One of the skinnier knights pointed his sword at them, "Okay, Yuri Lowell gang, it's curtains for you, I say!"

"Gang?!" Rita took insult to such a notion, "Hey, get your hands off me! Do you know who I am?!"

Deesh sheathed her weapons, whistling Strider down. Aile quickly hid her Biometals, though she was certain they would get confiscated soon enough. She also had to set the safety on her own weapon too, so no one ended up killing themselves with it. Shadow did the same, only handing over the weapon in hand and keeping the rest of her arsenal hidden.

Karol, however, was just frantic, "B-but I haven't done anything!"

Estelle was still worried, already ready to cry to Leblanc, "Please, don't hurt them! I beg you…!"

"Estelle, don't worry. We'll be fine."

"Yuri…"

"So long as we don't resist… too much," Deesh quickly adding that as Rita continued to fight back.

Their hands were tied as they were guided out of the ruined city. Leblanc turned to one of the ruined structures as he looked up, "Sir Schwann, we shall take these undesirables to Heliord." Up above stood a man with a single orange pauldron on his left shoulder as he raised his hand to Leblanc. Leblanc saluted to Schwann before turning to the others, "All members, fall out!" the remaining knights started to march now as Leblanc followed behind.

Heliord was an impressive sight if they weren't bound and surrounded by guards. The city itself was built against a cliff as a wall encircled area around the river before them. Yet the reason for a defensive city, especially on a continent not under the empire's control seemed more than a little out of place.

Inside the Chevallier's Headquarters building, they were taken to a small room as Leblanc and two of his men reviewed their charges. Unfortunately, Yuri's independent crimes before leaving the capital was taking them quite a bit of time, long enough that Repede and Strider were laying down for a nap. "…Continuing on, we will review the particulars of your 18th crime."

"Please do." Yuri himself just a bored a listening to old exploits.

Karol was nervous listening to all of Yuri's charges, "…I wonder what'll happen to me." Aile grabbed his shoulder, giving him a reassuring smile.

Leblanc continued, reading the next set of charges, "Is it true that you threw a knight sent to collect taxes into the river?"

"Wow, I'd forgotten about that." Yuri turned to the skinny guard, "Was that you, Tweedle A?"

"That's right! I was in bed for three whole days thanks to you."

The shorter guard then jotted down on paper, "So I'll write you have 'no signs of remorse' in the report then…"

Deesh was leaning against the wall trying not to fall asleep. "Can we get to the serious charges instead of all of these little crimes that have nothing to do with most of us here?"

Aile leaned onto the couch, turning to Yuri, "With all of this, I'm surprised they didn't try going after you sooner, bad boy."

"I'm a great escape artist." Yuri looked around, noticing a lack of real authority, "Now where's that do-nothing captain of yours, anyway? What was his name?" faking the fact he forgot, "Schwann was it?"

Rita quickly yelled, "Playing hooky because he's the big shot."

Leblanc wasn't going to stand such talk, "FOOLS! You dare mock our captain? Sir Schwann is a legendary hero and a veteran of the Great War ten years ago!"

Deesh was really tempted to just start banging her head against the wall, "So in other words, he is too important to handle lowlifes such as us."

"Quiet, I say! Quiet!"

Leblanc cleared his throat to get his subordinate to calm down. Once that was settled, "Getting on to your next offense…" The door to the room opened, much to Leblanc's surprise, "Y-Your Excellency Commandant Alexei!" Leblanc and the other soldiers stiffened, the two sitting quickly rose to their feet and placed their right arm over their chest plate, "To what do we owe this pleasure?!"

Yuri didn't like this one bit. Alexei…What…?

Alexei looked to Yuri and the others, "All of your crimes are hereby pardoned by the good graces of their Highnesses Estellise and Ioder."

"What?!" Much to the shock of Leblanc and the knights, "But these foul criminals have disturbed the peace of the empire…!"

Deesh hissed, "To be accurate and fair, the disturbing the peace and 90% of the crimes falls squarely on Yuri alone."

Alexei did not seem to heed Leblanc's protest, "The Imperial Knights thank you for rescuing Prince Ioder and protecting Princess Estellise." He waved to the blue hair elf-like woman with him who had a pair of strange long silver furred antennae that sprouted from the back of her head. She was holding a bag filled with coins, "Please take this."

Yuri pushed it back, "We've got no need for this. It's not like we did those things for the sake of the Knights."

"I see." Alexei paused as he looked the group over again. After a moment, the two soon walked out as though nothing had occurred. Karol and Rita couldn't pass the chance to make fun of LeBlanc now, making crude faces at him and he not allowed to touch them.

As Alexei started to leave the room, Yuri stopped him, "What about Estelle…?"

Alexei only glanced back for a moment, "She has just given her consent to be returned to the imperial capital. The Princess is waiting at the inn. We would be pleased if you made an appearance."

Alexei left them with just that, though Karol looked confused, "…Well, I guess she is a princess, after all." Leaving, Deesh snorted into the face of one of the knights who had detained them.

Stepping outside, Deesh stood out in the rain. "This feels nice on my scales…even if it's through my cloak and armor…"

Aile turned to her, "Didn't like your dip in the ocean?"

"I come from a swamp, not the sea. I'm going to be tasting salt for a week."

Shadow was still stretching from her nap, "So, what's the name of this city again?"

Karol seemed to know, "It's the boom town, Heliord. Though it was only recently finished."

Yuri quickly scanned around them, "You say it's a boom town, but doesn't it seem like there's a lot of knights around?"

Shadow shrugged, "It's no Last City, but I can at least admire some of the defensive features. Definitely military in design, though not exactly seeing the why."

"Yuri." It was Flynn and he was escorting Ioder to the group.

Yuri didn't seem that surprised, "Oh, so you two were here after all."

"Yuri, you could be a bit more polite to his highness. He was kind enough to pardon your crimes, after all."

Ioder stopped Flynn, "It's fine. It was something Estellise and I did on our own."

Rita could see where this was going, "I'm sick of talking to knights."

"Agreed." Deesh walked away from the others, "I might end up smashing a few helmets if I have to deal with them for much longer without a break. Strider, stick with Repede from now. I'm going to check the area."

Aile looked down to the rest of the town below, "I'll catch up with you guys at the inn. I want to look into something as well."

After a bit of exploring, Deesh and Aile managed to meet, away from any nosy knights or prying ears. "The prince and princess, a Commandant, two knight captains, a magistrate, Flynn…even with their council that leaves their Imperial Capital rather empty of authoritative figures. I doubt the citizens are aware of this."

"It'd definitely cause widespread panic if the everyday citizen knew what was going on. So, I suppose the real question is why are they all out here?"

Deesh shock her head, "I doubt its anything good. For now we should keep an eye and ear for anything."

Aile was confused, "You don't trust Yuri's group? You and Yuri fight so well together."

Deesh again shock her head, "Relying on someone in battle is different from earning my trust. As far as I've seen; Estelle is a sheltered princess wanting to spread her wings and see the world, Yuri is a vagabond with a chip on his shoulder about helping the less fortunate or pursuing vengeance, Karol's a cowardly liar who as more power than he deserves, Rita is a selfish and pompous researcher who thinks she knows more than anyone. What's there to trust. I'm just using them to find my footing and find a way to leave this world."

Aile openly mused, "And that's why you're talking with me like this? Because I'm not from this world?"

Deesh turned toward the wall, "You have little reason to lie or manipulate others when you have nothing to gain. And you too are being used by forces outside you're understanding. So our meeting was either happenstance or manipulation. I'm inclined to believe manipulation."

Aile seemed a little worried about such a prospect. "Then I guess we just focus on the problems facing us in the immediate while searching for other answers." Aile wasn't sure if this heavy subject was already discussed with Shadow, though perhaps they had a similar one already. "So do you think we'll need to worry about that dragon rider who destroyed the weather manipulator?"

Deesh turned back toward the harbor town, "When that dragon rider attacked, something about that 'dragon' smelled off."

Aile looked Deesh over, "Seeing as this is your area of expertise, what was so different about this dragon compared to others you've encountered?"

"For one, the 'fire' it shot wasn't fire. It was more like Rita's spell, but raw energy. As though the very magical energy was condensed and purified to be even more destructive." Deesh sighed, "And while I try to keep an open mind about what one may call a dragon, this creature looked more like a fish to me. But more importantly, that 'dragon' smelled like the giant the Hunting Blades had captured in that town."

"Are you certain?" The dragon rider was flying too fast for Aile or her Biometals to get a good scan of them, "Unlike other creatures we have fought, that brute was mostly composed of aer, no internal organs to speak of as far as our scans were able to detect."

Deesh nodded, "Though the rider is overly sympathetic. He waited to make sure Flynn rescued us despite Rita's assault against him."

Aile had to think about what this could all mean, "For now, we have too little information to act on.0 Not that Rita would allow anything other than attacking the dragon rider."

The next morning, Deesh couldn't get a wink of sleep. She even started to bang her head against the wall to try and make it stop. Unfortunately, this also woke everyone else up in the room. Rita was upset to be woken up so early in the morning. "Hey, what's with the early wakeup call?"

"Can't you hear that insipid noise?" Deesh has been trying to cover the round spots that were her ears. "That constant throbbing that's just getting louder and louder with each pulse!"

Aile started to tap her ear as the antenna on her left ear shifted toward the east, "I didn't notice before because I was filtering out quite a few audio spikes. It was originating from the center of the city…and just like Deesh said, the sound is getting loud, but the intervals are getting shorter…"

Rita was ready to charge out to investigate, but Yuri managed to stop her before she ran out the door, "Wait a minute!"

"What?" Rita threw Yuri's arm off her wrist, "Why're you stopping me?!"

"The knights are in this town. We shouldn't have to do anything."

Shadow pointed to a group of knights on the move, "Isn't that why they're here? To protect the town. Although, I think it wouldn't hurt to at least take a look around the area."

When they went out there Flynn was already ordering knights around as Yuri pointed to him, "See, Flynn's already on it." Though Yuri had the worst of timing. A sudden blast of energy knocked several of the knights over as the blastia started to glow aberrantly.

When Karol turned away from the blinding light, a vine rapidly grew wrapping around the wall starting to crush it, "The plants are getting huge."

Aer was pouring out of the blastia now like a thick heavy mist rolling across the area. Yuri managed to grab Rita's wrist, so she didn't throw herself into the mist as people who were next to it started collapsing from the slightest exposure while others tried to get away. Rita struggled, "At this density, it might kill someone!"

Alexei rushed out, "Evacuate the citizens to a safe location, as well as the Princess and the others."

Flynn quickly saluted, "Yes, sir!" Knights quickly helped get people away from the area while trying not to collapse themselves.

Rita struggled to break Yuri's grip, "The aer is completely out of control. There's no telling what it will do."

Aile turned away, "We've got to get out of here!"

Rita took this moment of confusion to escape Yuri's grasp and run into the danger. Yuri tried going after her, but the pressure of the aer kept him away, "Damn it. That girl is blastia crazy!"

Rita started to work as quickly as possible. "It's okay, just hold on. I'll readjust the volume of aer. You'll be just like new!" Even as she worked to fix the blastia, her strength was quickly draining as she started having difficulty just standing.

Flynn tried pushing forward, but the aer was too thick, "It's too dangerous! You've got to get out of here!"

Aile grabbed for Model X, "MEGAMERGE!" not carrying who saw her transforming. Armored up, she activated the helmet's mask before rushing in to try and pull Rita out of there. "Rita, you can't stay here! You'll die from overexposure!"

Aile could see Rita weakening by the second and Rita barely had the strength to fight her off, "NO! The flow of aer has outstripped his capacity. At this rate, it'll either swallow the city or even explode."

Aile grabbed Rita's hand before it slipped away from the holographic display, bringing it back up and locking Rita's fingers, "Tell me the code alterations we need to fix this."

"Rita!" Estelle rushed out to the barrier blastia, giving off a strange glow that seemed to react with the out-of-control aer around her. Aile's scanners seemed to show a strange conversion process occurring within Estelle's body, taking in the dangerous aer, and stabilizing it somehow.

"Estellise…" Whatever Estelle was doing seemed to be helping Rita regain her strength so she could finish her work on the blastia. "Got it!" Rita was still a little weak, so she was leaning a little on Aile for support. With her strength slowly returning Rita was able to finish her work, calming blastia's aer conversion.

Before they could get away from the area, the blastia released another blast of energy, knocking them away and disbursing the last of the dense aer into the sky. Aile was protected from the impact of the wall by her armor. She quickly picked herself up as through nothing was wrong as bits of the wall fell apart, "Is everyone okay?"

When Estelle finally regained consciousness her first concern was on Rita who hadn't woken up yet. "Ri-Rita!" She crawled over to her, using her healing artes to try and help Rita. "Please…get a room ready…for Rita…"

Yuri rushed over trying to help Estelle up, "And what about you? That blast knocked you around just as much as her."

Deesh joined them now, holding out her hands toward Rita and Estelle. They started to glow green as a rejuvenating light blanketed the two heroes. When the light faded Deesh carefully picked up Rita in her arms, "Aile, help Estelle to the room." She whistled and Strider quickly followed her. Shadow remained behind to help the workers who got caught in the blast and aer overflow.

As the confusion settled down, Yuri found Karol leaning against the wall away from the blastia. "Karol, can you stand?"

Yuri helped Karol up, "Y—yeah…"

"Come on, we're going too."