The morning of Group A's second and final day of their field study began rather tensely. The amount of tension present wasn't as much as, for say, when Machias and Jusis were involved, but it was present nonetheless. Throughout the period in which they ate breakfast and read over the field study tasks they received from Margot, Rean tried his best to avoid looking into Laura's eyes as much as possible, only stealing a few glances when necessary. Laura, meanwhile, remained as infallible as ever. Morgan, Alisa, and Gaius were understandably uneasy at the awkward silence between the two.

Eventually, their tense but quiet morning came to an end when a red-haired waitress came in running through the front door and stopped in front of Margot. "Margot, we've got trouble!"

"Slow down, Louise!" Margot addressed the panting employee. "It's first thing in the morning, and you're about poised to wake the dead! Where have you been, anyway? You're late!"

Louise bowed several times. "I-I'm sorry. I just got caught up on the way here…" She then stood upright. "Wait, never mind that! We've got trouble! Something terrible has happened over at the market!"

The inn owner raised an eyebrow. "Something terrible, you say?"

"How terrible can it be?" Morgan asked.

Louise turned to the students. "Well, it sounds like it actually took place last night. Two of the stalls over at the market were destroyed, and all of their merchandise was stolen!"

A wave of shock was sent through everyone who was present in the inn at that moment. Whatever levity remained on Morgan's face promptly vanished. "Okay, yeah; that's pretty terrible."

Even though Margot insisted that they focus on their field study tasks, Group A couldn't help but feel a bit curious about the situation and so they made a slight detour to visit the Grand Market. Once they arrived, they were met with the familiar scene of a crowd gathering in front of two merchants arguing at each other. Manager Otto was also present, trying to stop the two people from fighting. As Louise had said earlier, two stalls, one in the front and one in the back, had been completely destroyed and the merchandise gone. Group A attempted to reason with the two merchants, who also happened to be the same merchants from yesterday, but to no avail.

Eventually, matters were resolved when the provincial army arrived and stopped the merchants from escalating further, although saying that matters were resolved would be overstating it. The truth was that they only threatened the merchants into backing down before leaving without saying another word, not even thinking of helping to clean up the mess afterwards or, better yet, helping to solve the underlying issue. After assisting the market in their place, Group A went with Otto back to his home where they could discuss the situation in greater length.

"It would seem the problems facing the merchants in this town are quite grave indeed," Laura said. "The provincial army may have intervened, but it's difficult to believe they'd make no attempts to find an amicable solution."

"It's clear that they have no intention of trying to resolve any issues involving the market unless they accept the tax increase." Gaius had the faintest hint of disappointment in his voice.

Alisa was a bit more vocal about her feelings. "You'd think they'd at least be a little more...subtle about the whole thing. There's no way those two merchants are just going to accept this and move on."

"No, I don't suppose they will." Otto solemnly agreed. "And if word gets out about this, it's not inconceivable for certain groups of people to begin boycotting the marketplace. Something definitely has to be done, but…" He clasped his hands together. "I'm just not sure what."

"..."

All eyes turned towards Rean, who had remained quiet for the duration of their discussion.

"Is something the matter, Rean?" Gaius addressed to his male friend. "You've been awfully quiet."

"Are you feeling unwell?" Otto asked to make sure.

Rean looked at the market manager. "Sir, I have a favor to ask," he finally said. "Would you consider allowing us to investigate this morning's incident?"

His words surprised everyone in the room. "You want us to find the people who destroyed those stalls?" Morgan double-checked to make sure she understood Rean's proposition.

"It's a kind offer, but as I said yesterday, this is our affair, not yours." Otto shook his head. "You're students. You have your own studies to worry about, and I wouldn't feel right interfering with them."

"We're students training for the military, though," Rean countered. "We can't just stand by and allow something so unjust to go unchallenged. It's the provincial army's responsibility to address this, sure, but they're shirking their duties here, and that reflects poorly on us all.

"Th-that's true, I guess, but…" Alisa remained unsure. "Do you really think we're up for something like this? At the end of the day we're just...amateurs."

"It would be prudent to talk to Instructor Sara first to see what she would say," Laura suggested.

"...No, she already told us what we need to do." Morgan cut in, having put the pieces together. "'Put your heads together and think, and I'm sure you'll see what you need to do.' Honestly, I'm not sure if she can tell the future or if she's just really smart, but this sounds like the sort of thing she told us to watch out for."

"My thoughts exactly." Rean beamed at his classmate. "When looked at it that way, this falls under the scope of our field study."

"That IS a rather valid argument," Gaius noted.

"Honestly, I'm still not sure we're up to it," Alisa said cautiously. "But...I guess it can't hurt to try."

"Neither seek nor shun the fight…" Laura muttered to herself. "Very well. We shall do what we can."

"Are you really sure about all this?" Having heard Class VII give their consent, the market manager spoke to ensure that they weren't turning back. "I'm certainly not going to say no, as I'm very concerned about the market and the safety of our merchants. So if you're one hundred percent sure, I have to admit, I truly would appreciate anything you can do for us."

"Thank you, sir," Rean thanked the market manager. "We'll do everything in our power to find answers for you."

"We're all amateurs, sure, but at least that's better than a bunch of professionals doing nothing," Morgan quipped.

Thus, Group A began their investigation. Moving to the Grand Market, their first move was to interrogate the merchants whose stalls were destroyed. They first found the merchant from the capital, who introduced himself as Heinz, and asked if he could give his alibi. Having calmed down substantially since the last time they saw him, Heinz told the students that he had left his stall set up last night and went back to Heimdallr afterwards. Once he came back the following morning, his stall had been plundered and his goods stolen. Additionally, he showed the students one of his last remaining samples: a wristband accessory made of metal.

Next, they walked over to the back area of the market to find the local merchant, who introduced himself as Marco. Compared to Heinz, Marco was still upset at the recent turn of events, but he begrudgingly told his side of the story. After settling the matter with the stalls the previous day, Marco left the market and stayed over at a fellow merchant's house, getting very drunk in the process. After waking up the next morning with a hangover, he wandered over to the market where he immediately sobered up at the sight of his stall in shambles and all of his goods stolen. As such, Marco didn't have any goods to show to the students, but he told them that his stock consisted mostly of locally processed foods.

With two alibis under their belt, the students sat down around a table in the resting area to go over what they learned.

"So to recap…" Morgan began. "After the incident yesterday, Heinz left to return to the capital while Marco went and got drunk at a friend's place. Both of them were in different places during the time of the crime, and when they did come back to the market, both of their stalls had already been destroyed."

"Both merchants certainly have adequate motive to damage the other's stall…" Laura noted. "But the chance of both committing the same crime on the same night, without crossing paths, is virtually nil."

"Not to mention that neither merchant could stand to gain anything from destroying their own stall," Gaius added.

"It's not impossible that they were just out to steal each other's merchandise, but I don't believe that's what happened," Alisa said. "Both of them have alibis confirming that they were somewhere else when the crime took place.

"I'm inclined to agree." Rean picked at his forehead. "I just can't see either of these merchants being responsible for what happened."

"So we're going to have to elsewhere for possible suspects," Gaius concluded. "The question, though, is where?"

The students all began to think on where they could find some leads.

"You know…" Morgan said after a bit. "There IS one thing that's been bugging me." That piqued the attention of her classmates. "There's one group of people involved in this whole situation whose actions don't seem to make any sense. If we can work out the reasoning behind their behavior, we can come one step closer to finding our culprit."

"And who might you be referring to?" Gaius wondered.

"Oh, I see what you're getting at." Rean cupped his chin. "You're talking about the provincial army, right?"

Morgan nodded. "Got it in one. As we heard from Manager Otto, they haven't done a thing to try and solve this crime, despite it happening right under their noses, due to the tax issue. Which begs the question…" She paused for dramatic effect. "Why did they choose now of all times to intervene?"

The other members of Group A widened their eyes at the realization. "Now that you mention it, that really doesn't make any sense," Alisa agreed. "Their methods were atrocious, but the fact is, they brought this morning's dispute to an end almost instantly. They did get involved."

"One minute they're refusing to do anything, then the next they're taking a stand," Gaius commented. "It's certainly suspicious."

"There's definitely something unnatural about the way they're conducting themselves," Morgan concurred. "Since we've got no other leads, what say you we all go to the army's guardhouse and take a look around?"

No one made any objections, so the group got up from their table and walked over to the provincial army guardhouse, located right next to the Grand Market. It was a two-story building with the emblem of the Kreuzen Province posted above the entrance. A guard in uniform was standing outside the doorway and noticed the group of students walking towards the guardhouse.

"Hmm? Aren't you those students from that...military academy, was it?" he asked, recognizing the students' uniform. "What are you doing here?"

"We're terribly sorry to trouble you," Morgan said politely, "but we were hoping you might be able to help us with something. Could we ask you a few questions about the incident that occurred at the Grand Market this morning?"

"...What?" The soldier understandably looked confused. "What does that have to do with you?"

Thanks to some quick thinking on Laura's part, the students were able to convince the guard that they came under the pretense of learning how, as military students, the provincial army can handle difficult everyday situations such as the one that occurred earlier. The guard entered the guardhouse to call for someone and a few moments later, the commanding officer came out to meet them. Just as the students expected, the officer wasn't enthused by their sudden appearance and tried to intimidate them by dodging every question they tried to throw at him before talking about how the provincial army's first job is to uphold the will of their ruling lord and follow orders; anything regarding the province's citizens was deemed unimportant.

"So, is that it, then?" the officer impatiently said. "I hope this has been...enlightening. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a job to do."

Right as he was about to turn around and leave, Morgan stopped him. "Wait." The officer waited. "Would you mind answering one last question?"

As the other members of Group A turned to look at Morgan in confusion, the officer begrudgingly turned around. "Fine. Ask it."

"Answer me this…" Morgan began. "Do you really have no idea what could have happened to the goods Marco was handling? I'm talking about the accessory shop merchant."

The officer raised an eyebrow. "Hmm? What are you talking about? That merchant from the capital, Heinz, was the one who was planning on selling accessories."

"Wh-what?" Rean was surprised, as were the other students.

"That's all we needed to know," Morgan abruptly said before stepping in front of her classmates and turning around. "Thank you for your time, gentlemen! You can go back to your regularly scheduled activities. Let's go, guys!" With that, she spread her arms and tried as best as she could to herd her classmates and make a hasty retreat back to the inn. She hoped that the soldiers didn't notice the sly grin that had appeared on her face.

"Okay, that settles it," Alisa said. "They definitely know something!" Group A was currently sitting on the couch in their inn room.

"The fact that they know what each of the merchants was selling means they did investigate the matter after all." Rean stroked his chin. "But the burglary happened last night, and it was only first discovered this morning, so realistically, I don't think there was any opportunity during that time for them to do any digging. Not without running into us."

"Agreed." Laura nodded her head. "I suspect they knew what each merchant was planning to sell well in advance of yesterday's incident."

"If the duke was the one who issued permits to both those stalls, then it stands to reason that the provincial army would have known about it as well," Gaius concurred.

"Which begs the question…" Alisa paused. "Why would they bother looking at those transaction records?"

"They needed to know beforehand so they could prepare for all of this in advance," Morgan discerned. "Maybe I'm thinking too hard on this, but everything that's been happening at the market seems to have been planned out for a while now. The two merchants being given permits for the same spot was just a setup so that while everyone was fighting amongst each other, they could get robbed without them knowing, thus creating a situation that required the army to intervene."

"And in the meantime, the provincial army will show no interest in actively working toward a solution, unless…" Laura furrowed her eyebrows. "The market manager chooses to withdraw his petition."

"So they waited for things to get out of hand, then showed up to force both parties into an uncomfortable truce," Alisa summarized. "Eventually, the merchants would get worn down enough that they'd feel like they have no choice but to withdraw the petition."

"Those two merchants were being used all along…" Gaius grimaced. "This is turning out to be an even shadier situation than I imagined…"

"Yeah…" Rean shook his head in disbelief. "But thanks to Morgan, I do believe we've finally uncovered the truth of the matter."

"That was indeed some very quick thinking you displayed, Morgan," Laura commended her. "You'd make a fine military strategist."

Hearing that made Morgan beam with pride. "Hehe...I try my best. Anyways, now that we know that the provincial army is involved with the actual criminals, the only thing we need to do now is to find and catch them." Morgan's smile faded. "...Which, unfortunately, is easier said than done."

"Personally, I think we can rule out anyone from the army," Laura said. "The soldiers here are far too proud to dirty their hands with such escapades."

"I tend to agree," Alisa concurred. "Really, whoever the culprits are, I doubt they're still here in Celdic. There just aren't many viable places to hide such a huge volume of goods without being found."

"It's been less than a day since the burglary happened, so they couldn't have gotten very far yet," Gaius noted. "Might I suggest we ask around while we work on our field study tasks?"

"That sounds like a wise course of action," Laura agreed. "We have yet to progress any of them, after all."

"Then let's do that." Rean retrieved the envelope carrying their field study tasks. "We'll work on these tasks first, and in the meantime, we'll ask around to see if anyone saw anything out of the ordinary." He laid the envelope's contents onto the table. "We've got another monster extermination request and a referral about a lost wallet. That's one less than the amount we had yesterday. Let's see, what time is it right now…"

Alisa looked to the clock hanging on the far wall in their room. "It's...already five past nine! How does time fly by so quickly?"

"The last train to Trista comes to Celdic at 9:00 P.M., so we've got less than twelve hours to finish both of these tasks and find the culprit." Morgan looked at the documents. "We could try splitting up," she eventually suggested. "One group can handle the wallet and the other can handle the monster extermination."

"You wish to divide our forces?" Laura asked to make sure. "That's a risky move."

"It's certainly is," Rean admitted, "but two groups means we also get to cover more ground, just like in the old schoolhouse. Besides, we need all the time we can get, so I say we take it."

"It does seem like the most efficient way to do things," Alisa remarked.

"Whatever the rest of you decide, I will follow," Gaius said. "I was the one who suggested the idea, after all."

Laura relented. "Very well, then. I will work to the best of my ability."

"Right, so here's how I was thinking we could split up the groups…" Morgan picked up the conversation. "Rean, Laura, and I will handle the monster. Meanwhile, Gaius and Alisa can take care of the wallet. We can set up a meeting time afterwards." She looked to her teammates. "Any objections?"

None were made. Thus, Group A gathered their belongings, double-checked their equipment, and moved to leave the inn. Before all of them left the front door, Morgan turned to Alisa and Gaius and whispered to them, "Don't worry. I'll keep an eye on them."

Once the students split up into their individual groups, Rean, Laura, and Morgan headed towards the market manager's house to obtain more information about the monster they would be hunting. Otto was more than happy to oblige and gave the students a description and the general location of the creature. The group also reported their findings on this morning's incident for the time being and assured him that they were doing everything they could to resolve the issue. With the new information in hand, the students left the town.

"Wait," Rean said after taking only a few steps onto the highway. His voice came abruptly, startling Morgan and Laura. "Before we go find the monster, I need to do something first."

"And what might that be?" Laura asked.

Rean turned to face her. "I wanted to apologize for what I said to you yesterday evening."

Laura's face didn't change expression, the only alteration being a slight raise of her eyebrow. "As I told you then, this is a matter you must come to terms with on your own. It is not something for which an apology is required."

"That's...not really what I mean." Rean shook his head. "I wanted to apologize for making light of the way of the sword."

Now Laura really was surprised. Her eyes widened at the swordsman's unexpected reply.

"What I said about being a 'dropout who's never been able to progress past beginner level' was disrespectful," Rean continued. "It was disrespectful to Master Ka-fai, to the school I follow, and to the path of the sword itself. And for those reasons, I feel it was inappropriate of me to say what I said. So…" He bowed forward ninety degrees. "I'm sorry."

A few moments went by without any student saying a word.

"If that's the case," Laura finally said, "then there is one other person you should be apologizing to as well."

Rean voiced his confusion as Laura motioned for him to stand upright and look her in the eyes.

"I can't pretend to know much about your personal circumstances," Laura admitted. "But regardless of one's background or social standing, one should always be able to live with pride in him or herself. Thus, if you truly did make light of yourself and your own abilities, then that is an act of shame for which you owe yourself recompense."

Those words hung in the air, having rung deep into Rean's conscience.

Laura's expression then softened. "Let me ask you a question, Rean: do you like the path of the sword?"

Despite its simple phrasing, it was a difficult question to answer. Rean's hand instinctively touched the handle of his sheathed sword as he pondered the question. "It's not really a matter of liking it or disliking it, I don't think," he eventually answered. "It's a part of my life...an inseparable part of who I am."

Perhaps it wasn't a perfect answer, but it was a satisfactory one nonetheless. "That's all I wanted to hear." Laura nodded approvingly and smiled. "I feel exactly the same way."

Off to the side, neglected, Morgan hummed to herself. 'What do you know? There really was nothing to worry about after all…'

"There's a lot he doesn't want to talk about, huh?" Alisa sadly remarked as she closed the door behind them.

"That's the last thing I want to hear from you, Miss Mystery Initial," Morgan quipped as she sat on her bed. "But yeah, it's almost like he's bottling something up and trying really hard to keep anyone else from noticing."

"So you've noticed it too?" Gaius removed his blazer vest. "It only acted up on occasion so I was unsure at first, but I can sense there's a great unease in him."

"I just wish there was something we could do to help him…" Alisa walked over to her bed.

"My, you've taken quite an interest in him, haven't you?" Morgan teased, causing Alisa to blush slightly and try to refute her claims. "I sort of get where you're coming from though," she eventually relented. "It's not easy having a dark secret that could potentially harm your relationships with others. You were just trying to look out for him, weren't you?"

Alisa blinked in confusion for a moment before recomposing herself. "S-sure, let's go with that."

Gaius looked at the two girls. "Is there something that I'm missing here?"

Morgan winked and put a finger on her lips. "Just a little secret between women. Don't think too hard about it."

"If you insist." Gaius respected her words and didn't pry further. "Still, it would be best if we resolve this as soon as possible."

"I know that Laura's really straightforward, but sometimes she's so direct it hurts." Alisa rubbed her arms. "Maybe we should tell her to dial it down a bit…"

"That's just the way she was brought up," Morgan reminded Alisa. "It's difficult to change something like that overnight, so I wouldn't bother. Besides, the way I see it, cold, hard facts from someone who can relate to him is exactly what Rean needs to reevaluate himself. It hurts, but it's very effective when used correctly." She laid down on her bed. "So, I wouldn't worry about those two as much as, for say, Machias and Jusis. I'm sure they'll make up by themselves eventually; their pride as swordsmen is too great for them to avoid each other for too long. All we can do is look on and try to push them in the right direction."

Alisa let out a minor scoff. "That's surprisingly mature, coming from you."

Morgan jerked up. "What's that supposed to mean?!"

Though she would have liked for this peaceful moment to last a bit longer, Morgan reminded herself that they still had a job to do, and cleared her throat. "Hate to be the third wheel here, but if the two of you are done making up, maybe we can start our search for the monster?"

Her comment snapped the two sword users back to reality. "Oh, yes. My apologies."

"Sorry about that."

Morgan snickered. "There's no need to apologize any more than you have, Rean."

"Wh-why are you singling me out?" he demanded to know.

"Eh...couldn't help it, I guess?" She shrugged her shoulders. "Face it, Rean: you've got a knack for getting yourself into trouble. You should be more careful next time. But I digress; let's go."

She skipped ahead of Rean and Laura, leaving the two sword users to catch up to her.

'Pride in oneself, huh?' Laura's words to Rean resounded in Morgan's mind. 'Maybe I should try doing that sometime…'

Eventually, the teens found the monster they were looking for on the stone bridge leading to Heimdallr. It was a large bird of prey with thick, colored wings and sharp talons at the end of its long hindlimbs.

"Yup, that matches the manager's description, all right," Rean confirmed, looking at the task paper. "Its name is...'Zwordar'? Seriously? Who came up with that name?"

"I don't know," Laura replied, "but frankly that is unimportant right now."

Morgan took out her orbment and readied her weapon. "You two ztrike it with your zwordz, then I'll follow up with zome artz. Zound good?"

Rean turned to Morgan with a deadpan expression that screamed 'Really?'

"Come on, I had to."

"Whatever." Rean unsheathed his tachi. "All right; let's do this!"

With that motivating cry, an ARCUS link was tied between Rean and Laura and the two sword users charged towards the monster. Taking note of the incoming group, it let out a piercing screech and swooped to the ground with its talons pointed forward. Laura jumped in front of Rean, using her larger sword to fend off the monster's assault as it wrapped its claws around her blade. Thanking Laura for the cover, Rean hastily jumped to the side to try and attack from the bird's blind spot. However, its flapping wings were preventing him from getting a clean strike. Fortunately, an orb of water sailed past him and hit the creature in the beak, dazing it for a moment and allowing Rean to find an opening. He performed an upwards swing, striking the bird's side and loosening its grip on Laura's sword. Feeling the reduction in pressure, Laura pushed back and followed up with an attack of her own, leaping into the air and performing a jumping overhead swing as she landed.

Enraged, the giant bird shrieked and spun around furiously, sweeping Rean and Laura off their feets and pushing them back. Then, it flapped its giant wings and started ascending towards the sky.

Morgan was about to run and help her classmates, but Laura waved her away. "Don't worry about us!" she yelled. "Just don't let it escape!"

Indeed, the monster was already several feet above the ground and had begun flying away from the bridge towards the direction of the second half of the highway. Thinking quickly, Morgan put her ARCUS into her shirt pocket, retrieved her personal orbment from her pouch, and ran after the creature while hastily preparing an art. Within a few seconds, Morgan shot a mass of compressed air at the bird, aiming it slightly ahead so that the bird would fly straight into it. Thankfully, she calculated it perfectly and the art hit its mark, but unlike what happened with her previous attack, the bird simply shrugged off the art and kept flying.

'Funny, that usually works against flyers,' Morgan thought.

By this point, Morgan was secretly regretting leaving Alisa behind; her bow would have given them a serious edge in pinning down the flying creature. All she could do now was run, cast an art, and hope that it would be enough to catch the bird's attention, but she was facing a losing battle; her arts were either too weak or too slow to do any real damage and her stamina was decreasing by the second. Morgan wanted to look back to see if her classmates were catching up, but she was also worried that if she did, she would lose sight of the monster.

Finally, by some stroke of luck, the bird began to make its descent near the open area by the orbal lamp the students visited the previous day. Morgan breathed a sigh of relief and started preparing an art. Maybe she could catch it after all. Then she looked at where the bird was descending, watching as it lowered itself until it was a few inches above the ground...right into the middle of a flock of smaller bird monsters. With a loud squawk from the Zwordar, the smaller birds got into formation charged at the oncoming human.

Morgan growled through her teeth. "So that's how it's gonna be, huh? Fine! You axed for it!" She aimed her orbment at a bird and released an arrow of lightning upon it. Not a moment after the bird crumpled to the ground, Morgan rushed towards it while dodging all the other birds. Once she reached it, she brought down her weapon and swiftly ended the bird's life with a critical strike. As she did so, she felt a rush of energy flow through her, making her feel less fatigued than she did a few moments prior.

Now more alert, she stretched her axe to its two-handed form and started scanning her surroundings for the Zwordar, eventually spotting it resting off to the side. Before she could approach it, however, the remaining birds huddled up in a circle surrounding Morgan, barring her from advancing further.

"One of me, around six, seven of them," she counted. "Heh, no pressure, right?"

She put her hand on her orbment and activated it, an orbal aura appearing around her. On cue, a bird to Morgan's left flew forward with its talons pointed outwards. Keeping a steady hand on her orbment, Morgan sidestepped the attack and thrust her weapon forward, knocking the first bird out of the air. Then, she gripped her polearm and threw it backwards, hitting the second bird behind her. After retrieving her weapon as it hit the ground and stabbing the fallen monster a couple more times for good measure, Morgan finished preparing her art and released a bolt of lightning to down a third bird. As the four remaining birds swarmed her in an attempt to whittle her down with numbers, Morgan picked up the body of the fallen monster with her weapon like a skewer and flung it at the small flock, hitting one bird while dispersing the rest. In that moment of confusion, Morgan made her move, dashing forward and striking one bird through its chest before kicking off of it and leaping towards the other monsters. Upon landing on the ground, she swung her polearm one-handed in a half-circle around her and hitting the two remaining birds out of the air. Finally, she activated her orbment and moved to the last bird, which had just moved kicked the body that was flung towards it out of the way. By the time it lifted itself off the ground, however, Morgan had already reached it and let loose a flurry of stabs from her bardiche before performing a roundhouse swing that knocked the bird aside. Not a moment later, she pointed her orbment at the Zwordar as electricity began to emit from the device. Manifesting into a arrow of voltage, it shot forward and shocked the giant bird. Upon noticing that its entire flock had already been defeated, the giant bird of prey squawked and started to take to the skies again.

Morgan groaned, not at all ready for another wild Zwordar chase, but not a moment sooner two balls of fire soared over her head and hit the giant bird square in the face, making it crash back down to the ground. Hearing footsteps behind her, she took her eyes off the monster for a moment to see her classmates running towards her, their weapons and orbments in hand.

"Sorry to keep you waiting!" Rean apologized.

"You're late!" Morgan half-scoffed. "Where were you two?"

"Monsters got in our way," Laura summarized before noticing the bodies of dead monsters scattered around them. "I assume you were kept busy?"

"More or less," Morgan answered. "Haven't been able to take on the main monster yet, but fortunately I think I found a way to beat this thing."

"And what might that be?" Laura asked.

Morgan looked at Laura and Rean's orbments as she retrieved her ARCUS from her pocket. "Well, firstly, it's going to require that one of you pair up with me while the other hangs back. Secondly, it's going to require lots and lots of fire."

Both sword wielders looked to the devices in their hands and immediately understood. Laura volunteered to link with Morgan. "What about you?" Rean asked.

"I'll keep it occupied," she replied. "Wait till you get a clear shot, then we'll attack it once it's down."

"By yourself?" Laura had a tone of worry in her voice. "Morgan, you shouldn't push-"

She wouldn't get to finish her statement, as her classmate had already turned to face the Zwordar. "Hey, Featherface!" Morgan made a beckoning gesture with her weapon, daring it to attack her. The giant bird took Morgan's bait, letting out a loud screech before charging towards her with its talons pointed forward, but Morgan had anticipated this and deftly rolled to the side. She taunted the bird once more, and thus she and the monster began to play a game of cat and mouse. Looking to each other, Rean and Laura had no choice but to trust in Morgan and started preparing their arts.

For the remainder of the fight, Morgan drew the attention of the Zwordar while Rean and Laura hung back and cast arts whenever they could. Compared to Morgan's wind-based arts, the sword users' fire-based arts seemed to be more effective at halting the bird's oppression, and so when one art would connect with the monster, it would become dazed, giving Morgan and her partner a chance to perform a linked attack on the giant bird. This process would rinse and repeat itself until the Zwordar collapsed to the ground, too tired to fly any further. Sensing this critical moment, all three of the students rushed the monster and attacked together, Morgan with her furious hacking, Rean with his precise slashes, and Laura with her heavy swings. The Zwordar shrieked one last time before crumpling over, limp and dead.

Morgan was panting. "Is it over?"

Rean and Laura approached cautiously to verify. "Yes, I believe it is," the latter said.

"That's a relief…" With the battle over, Morgan felt all of the fatigue catch up to her and slumped to the ground. "That was way more exhausting than I thought it'd be."

"You definitely put in a lot of work. Good job." Rean sheathed his sword. "You want me to gather up the sepith for you?"

Morgan looked at her surroundings. The bodies of the smaller birds she slayed had already disappeared, leaving various crystals in their wake. She never really understood why this was the case, but she wasn't going to be complaining anytime soon. "If you could, I'd appreciate that."

Rean nodded and went to work on retrieving the small crystals. Laura, meanwhile, knelt beside her female classmate. "While I would also like to commend your efforts," the blue-haired girl said, "I feel I need to address something I've noticed about you."

"About me?" Morgan had just enough energy to perk up at the comment. "And that would be…?"

Laura took in a deep breath. "You…" Her face then contorted with concern. "...Leave yourself open far too often! And why did you assume such a dangerous position when you should have been fatigued? One wrong misstep and you could have been severely injured!"

Morgan was expecting a lot of things, but a verbal reprimanding was not one of them. "Well, I needed to study the monster's attack patterns, and I figured the best way to do that was to get up close and personal. I-it was in the heat of the moment, and we needed all the firepower we could get, so…"

Laura let out an exasperated sigh. "But even still, that was reckless of you. I'd even go as far as to surmise that that wasn't like you at all. If I didn't know better, I would have assumed that you were trying to prove a statement."

Morgan fiddled with her skirt. "I guess I...got a bit of an energy rush after fighting for a while; it happens sometimes. But yeah, I'll be more careful from now on."

Rean finally came back with a sizable pile of sepith crystals in his hands and passed them to Morgan for her to store in one of her pouches. "We can go over what went wrong later; what matters is that we're all safe. At any rate, you think you can walk back, Morgan?" He stretched out his hand, offering to help her up.

"I think I'll be fine." She took Rean's hand and hoisted herself up. "So long as we don't bump into any more fights on our way back to Celdic."

"That was our intention from the beginning," Laura said. "We should also let Alisa and Gaius know that we are finished on our end."

"Ah, you're right. I totally forgot." Rean took out his ARCUS and punched in some numbers on the communicator. After a couple of rings, a male voice spoke from the other side of the line. "Hello? This is Gaius Worzel speaking."

"Hey, Gaius," Rean responded. "We just finished the task on our end. Are you two finished with yours?"

"Almost," Gaius answered. "This task proved to be a bit more...arduous than Alisa and I would have expected, but we think the end is in sight."

"How much time does it take to return one lost wallet?" Morgan wondered aloud.

A low chuckle sounded over the communicator. "That's a long story. But more importantly, while we were searching for the owner of the wallet, we talked with some of the locals, and I think we may have come across a piece of information that may prove vital to our investigation."

Rean's eyes widened. Morgan and Laura looked at each other with the same expression. "Wait, so you mean…"

"It is as you think," Gaius confirmed. "Meet us near the central plaza; we believe we may have found a lead."

Author's note: It's been a while, hasn't it? Hope you all didn't forget that this existed. Unfortunately, the new school year has begun and with my school using the quarter system, it's been busy the past couple of weeks. With that said, this'll be a heads-up notice that updates for this story will be sporadic in the coming months. ｍ（｡≧ _ ≦｡）ｍ
Furthermore, it has also come to my attention that one of the biggest weaknesses of my writing is that I draw too heavily from the source material, making it play out just like the game except with a few digs at Fire Emblem Awakening. While I would argue that most fics involving new characters/AUs follow this format and that it's for doing what I know, I do see the inherent downsides as well, and so I will attempt to rectify this for future chapters. Again, this is the first story I have written that involves considerable thought put into it, so I do appreciate any and all constructive criticism that could help me improve.
Anyways, that is all for now. Hope to see you all sometime in the future, whenever that may be! (^-^)v