"This cave has got to be it." Luka sighed. They had already gone through and checked three caves now, all for nothing. The so-called 'Heavenly Bandits' were nowhere to be found. It was already past noon by the time they had gotten to the fourth cave, which looked just as dark and dreary as the rest.

"Huh, wait a second…" Sonya said. "This one is different from the others. Look at the bushes and the grass… They look freshly cut."

Luka looked closer. She was right. Somebody had been maintaining the greenery outside of the cave's entrance.

"Then this one must be it," Ilias concluded. "Or at least, this one must have people living in it."

Alice began to sniff the air. "There's no doubt… There are people inside. A dragon, a vampire, an oni of some kind, and a lamia… What an odd group. And they all seem… Well, we won't have any trouble beating them, I'll put it that way."

The Monster Lord led the group in. The inside of the cave looked no more inviting than it did from the outside. Small droplets of water splashed on the ground as they moved further in. Alice noticed that not only did the cave lack any ugly vines or other invasive plants, but the rock-solid floor was clear of rubble, and had been recently polished.

The group came to a sudden halt. Just a bit further down the cave, a small monster girl stood, shrouded in darkness. She had grey skin and big blue eyes. Her hair went no further than her neck, on which an odd, almost tribal-looking necklace was hung. The rest of her outfit was a mitch match of rough fabric and poor-quality metal.

"W-Who goes there?" Luka asked. The darkness gave no answer.

The cave seemed to grow even darker. Something was up. Luka turned around just in time to see something move a large rock, blocking the exit. No more light made its way into the cave. They were locked in.

Laughter could be heard all around them. The monster giggled, as one might expect from a young girl. But Luka noticed that there were multiple sources of the giggling.

There's more than one in here! And we can't see them at all!

"Ilias, use your holy magic to give us light!" Alice shouted, drawing her rapier.

"I would've done it even if you didn't tell me to," Ilias grumbled. She used her powers to summon a small ball of light. She couldn't keep it going for long. Still, it provided a decent source of light for the group.

"There!" Sonya pointed at the monster, who was far closer than before. Just behind her was another girl, with blonde hair and orange eyes. She was even smaller than the grey-skinned one, and she had far less clothes on. A black cloak and some underwear was all the girl wore. Two bats were hovering beside her, watching the group with angry eyes.

"Why are you here, intruders!?" The girl asked. "If you don't leave right now, we'll have no choice but to fight."

"Wait!" Luka said. "We don't want to fight, we just want you to give us Amira back."

"Amira? Who the heck is she?"

Luka was confused. "We were told that you kidnapped Amira."

"Kidnapped? I don't remember doing that. Do you know what he's talking about, Gob?"

The grey-skinned girl shook her head. "I've never heard that name before."

Ilias didn't believe them. "Amira. She's a half-snake monster. Green scales, a short stature due to her not standing upright. She has an odd way of talking too. Not ringing any bells?"

"No." The vampire monster said. "We'd remember somebody like that."

Sonya raised an eyebrow. "Wait, Ilias, how do you know what Amira looks like?"

Ilias gulped. "Well… I'm the goddess, I know everyone and everything! Of course I know what Amira looks like."

She is the goddess, Sonya admitted internally, Ilias knows everything and everyone. She is truly omniscient… But if that was really true, how could she let herself end up in a situation like this?

"Oh… Then, I'll guess we'll be leaving then." Luka said. "Sorry for disturbing you."

"Wait." One of the monster children said. Alice still had her rapier close at hand, ready to defend herself at a moment's notice. Luka wondered how it must've felt to have lost so much power. She used to be the Monster Lord, the strongest of all monsters, but right now she was weary of a couple of monster children.

Maybe it's just because she's in a child's body right now, but Alice isn't nearly as scary as I thought the Monster Lord would be. She doesn't look anything like those picture books I used to read as a kid depicted her.

"What is it?" Luka asked. Judging by the lack of light penetrating the cave, he assumed that the way outside was still blocked. They clearly weren't letting them go just yet.

"You four have intruded on our territory. For that, you must be punished!" The vampire girl announced, stepping closer to them. Even through the darkness, Luka was able to spot another pair of eyes besides the two whom he had already seen. They had a greenish hue to them, with vertically-slit pupils, not unlike a snake's.

The sounds of slithering echoed throughout the cave, but Alice wasn't moving. The newcomer must've been a lamia too. It was now four against three. Luka's group still had the advantage, but he didn't know how proficient or inept the monster children could be at fighting. He knew that biologically, monsters surpassed humans in almost every way. But his group was older and more experienced… Or at least, two of them were. Luka and Sonya hadn't really seen much of the world yet and had done barely any fighting.

"So it's a fight regardless." Ilias sighed. "Very well. We'll just have to put you in your place!"

"This could actually be a good thing," Alice said optimistically. "They might have been lying when they said they didn't kidnap Amira. Now we can make sure of it."

"Right," Luka said, pointing his sword towards the monsters. The vampire girl, who seemed to be their leader, started to laugh.

"You four think you stand a chance against us, the mighty Heavenly Bandits!? Ridiculous!" The other two laughed along with her.

"Hmm, look at the boy." The third one said. She was the tallest among them, but not by much. The small source of light coming from Ilias's spell allowed Luka to confirm her species. She was definitely a lamia, but had no scales, instead having an odd dark-green dark-brown stripe pattern going down her tail. "He seems like he could be… useful."

Luka didn't like the tone she used. Alice rolled her eyes. Monsters like these only reinforced the stereotypes often thrown at her kind, even if, as much she hated to admit, some of them weren't unfounded.

"We'll take him and kick the rest out." The vampire decided. "Kukuku… This is turning into quite the eventful day indeed."

Ilias was the first to attack. She shot a small ray of light towards her foes, which did more to blind them than really damage them. The physically strongest among them, the goblin girl, shook off the attack with ease. She ran towards the small angel, planning to strike her down with her oversized hammer. Unfortunately for her, she was far too slow for that. Ilias managed to back-step from the attack again and again while using her own magic to slowly wear the monster down.

Luka had his own enemy to face. The lamia seemed to take an interest in him and went for him first. She was far faster than Luka anticipated, slithering right next to the hero in a moment's notice. Her tail swept Luka's legs, an attack which he barely managed to jump over. It didn't help that he could still barely see anything, and only the brief flashes of light from Ilias's spells gave him the chance to study his opponent.

The lamia wore just as little as the vampire girl, to Luka's dismay. Still, it was good that she wasn't wearing any armour. Luka knew he wasn't anywhere near strong enough yet to pierce steel. The boy continued to dodge the lamia's attacks again and again until they were both panting from exhaustion. Luka had to guess where the next attack might be coming. Whenever he was wrong, he got firmly smacked around. Not a fun experience, to be sure, for him at least.

But then, just as the hero needed it, Ilias's light came shining forth. In that brief moment, Luka was able to properly see his opponent and swing his sword. At first he swung with all his might, but then his conscience caught up with him. The monster was a child and had no armour on. He could seriously hurt her with his metal sword. The attack slowed down almost to a complete halt, but it was still enough to just barely nick the girl's arm.

A drop of blood spilt out from the minuscule wound. The lamia slithered away upon feeling the wound. When she got a closer look, tears came to her eyes. Luka suddenly felt very, very bad.

"I-I'm sorry!" Luka said, running over to the girl to check her wound. The girl continued to cry, no matter how hard the boy tried to console her. He took his cape off and cut off part of it to use as a bandage of sorts. He wrapped it around her arm tightly, ensuring that the blood would stay inside the body, where it was meant to be.

Still, the girl continued to cry. The two other monsters, who were busy fighting their own battles, noticed the crying and turned around. Luka didn't see them jump at him thanks to the darkness. By the time the lamia stopped crying, Luka had already been thoroughly beaten up by the others. His sword was kicked away, well out of reach.

"Agh, I said I'm sorry!" Luka was punched and kicked over and over again, but not very hard. Try as they might, the young monsters were unable to do any real damage to the hero. The vampire, who quickly realised this, decided that a change in tactics was in order.

I haven't really mastered this spell just yet, but I have no choice!

"Look into my eyes!" The girl said, putting her face in front of the hero. The boy instinctively tried to look away, but Gob, the goblin girl, kept his face still. Luka's eyes met the vampires. Her eyes were glowing a deep red, an entrancing display of vibrant colours which started to ingrain themselves into Luka's mind. It was like entering a dream.

"Heh, looks like that did the trick." The monster smirked. "Now, go beat up your friends!"

"Y-Yes…" Luka rose. He turned towards his allies.

"He's been put under a spell…" Alice pointed out.

"Obviously," Ilias said. "Well, the only way to get him out of his trance is to beat him up enough, probably."

"Are you sure?" Sonya asked. She raised her club in preparation. She had not actually used it yet. Instead, she would just heal the others whenever they were hurt, or use her mildly-strong magic to increase their strength or speed. Useful, but she wasn't able to do much on her own.

Ilias shrugged. "If that doesn't work, we can just force the blonde-haired one to cancel the spell."

Alice agreed. "I'll go for the goblin. Ilias, you go for—"

"Who do you think you are, ordering me around like that?" Ilias shouted. "I'll go for the goblin. You'll take care of the lamia."

"No, no. You just want to fight the goblin 'cause she's the weakest!"

"So do you!"

Sonya rolled her eyes as she watched her comrades squabble. The bandits retreated back into the darkness, and soon only the original four remained. Luka picked his first target: Sonya.

"Wait, Luka, what are you doing!?" She asked, blocking his attacks with her wooden club. It was surprisingly strong, only taking minor damage from the iron sword. "Don't you recognise me?"

"It's useless," Alice said, sneaking up behind the hero. "Once he's under a spell like that, he'll submit to whoever cast the spell completely. A lot of monsters know that spell. I do too."

"I can only imagine how often you've used it…" Ilias flew above the hero. She used her magic to make her body glow, so as to be a more permanent light source. The angel planned to drop down on the hero from above and give him a good smack, but a pair of bats which emerged from the darkness foiled her plans.

Alice's sweeping tail was also interrupted by another tail, clearly coming from the lamia bandit. The two got into a tug-of-war of sorts as their tails wrapped around each other and pulled. Alice proved stronger, however, and pulled the lamia out from the darkness. She pointed her rapier at her head. "Surrender."

The lamia almost started crying again. Alice constricted her tail around the monster and repeated herself.

A blow to the back of Alice's head gave the lamia a chance to escape. Alice turned around, only to see that Luka was the one responsible. The boy swung his sword in a wide arc, but he was awfully slow. Alice ducked beneath the attack and tackled him. Once she had him on the ground, she wrapped the end of her tail around his wrist and twisted, forcing him to drop his sword.

"Wait, I think I know a spell for a situation just like this!" Sonya announced, walking over to the immobilised hero. "How did it go again… Oh right!"

The priestess muttered a few words and waved her hands. Humans could use magic, but they were often less skilled than monsters or angels, whose bodies were partly composed of their respective magic, dark and light. Humans could use both, but few could master either.

Still, Sonya was fairly adept. Luka shook his head. "W-What happened…?"

"Huh. That's… surprising." Ilias said, rubbing the fresh wounds she got from the bats who attacked her. "I've never seen a human use magic so well before… and at such a young age… Interesting…"

"Really? And here I thought you knew everything?" Alice asked mockingly. She let go of Luka and turned to face their enemies, who were still hiding in the cover of darkness.

Luka stood. He was glad for the abundance of light coming from Ilias, as it made it far easier to retrieve his sword. "Kukuku… Well done, humans. You're stronger than you look"

"Surrender," Ilias said. "You stand no chance against us. It's four against three, and each of us is individually stronger than any of yous."

The vampire was not impressed. "The battle isn't over yet!" She said. "But you're right about one thing. This has been an unfair fight for us this whole time… Papi, get out here!"

Papi? Who's that?

Claws scraped against the stone floor. The vampire cackled in delight. Luka spotted the outline of another monster in the darkness, with a pair of small wings coming from her back and short, yet sharp claws. When she got a bit closer, the hero also noticed her violet hair and golden eyes. A dragon pup, Luka surmised.

"What's going on here?" Papi asked. Her voice was still that of a child's but sounded slightly more mature and older than the others.

The vampire frowned. "These guys came out of nowhere and started beating us up because they think we took their friend. Papi, go out there and take them down!"

"Hey, don't tell me what to do!"

"Please?"

"Okay…" The monster approached, with the other three following closely behind.

"A dragon this far south…? Unbelievable." Alice muttered. "Be careful, they're one of the strongest races out there. One swipe from those claws could end you."

Luka had heard many stories about dragons before. They were massive, fearsome monsters who lived in volcanoes and protected their treasure from intruders. They'd have collected a mountain of gold and other treasures by the time they died. Many heroes would try and fail to fight them. They had lightning-fast reflexes, had scales no sword could cut through, and could fly faster than any harpy. Luka doubted he could last even ten seconds against such a mighty foe… but the one before him now was far from mature. In fact, instead of being the terrifying beast they were made out to be, this one looked sort of… cute.

Ilias was starting to get tired. She had already used up a lot of her energy just to get some light in the cave, and her brief scuffle with the monsters didn't help. Her remaining mana, the resource which all mages relied on to use their magic, was just enough to take down a very weak monster. For now, she'd have to rely on the others, a fact which annoyed her to no end.

"It's four on four now," Sonya whispered to Luka. "I say we focus on the dragon first. The others are already tired. If we take her down, I'm sure they'll give up."

Luka nodded. He gathered his courage and stepped forth, ready to face the pup.

"So you're the one who hurt my friends," Papi said. "I'll make you pay for that!"

Papi lunged forward and swiped at the hero's chest. Her claws easily tore through the layer of fabric, then the skin. It wasn't a particularly deep cut, but it hurt plenty. Luka didn't remain idle for long, however. He bashed the hilt of his sword down on the girl's back, grounding her mid-jump. The girl responded quickly, using her teeth to bite down on the hero's exposed leg.

"Ah! Get off!" Luka started to shake his leg around, but the dragon refused to let go. The hero used the blunt side of his sword to hack at the monster's tough scales. After much effort, she eventually released him.

"Ow…" Papi got back up, rubbing her sore back. "That hurt, you meanie!"

Luka almost apologised before remembering that she was his enemy.

"That's it, I'm going to end this here and now!" The dragon pup started to inhale a huge amount of air. That was when Luka remembered a dragon's most dangerous skill—The ability to breathe fire.

The hero jumped backwards, which just barely put him out of range of the flames. Still, an ember or two managed to reach his cape, and it quickly caught fire. Almost instinctively, the hero started rolling around on the stone floor, trying to smother the flames, which seemed to do the trick.

"Foolish monster. Did you really think you could defeat me, a goddess?" Ilias asked as she shot another spell towards the goblin girl, who seemed to be on her last legs. Everywhere Luka looked, it was a similar scene. Alice had defeated the lamia once again, and this time she made sure she couldn't escape. Sonya hadn't beaten her opponent just yet, but she was doing quite well. The vampire's bats were an annoyance, but she could deal with them in time.

The dragon saw it too. Luka rose and pointed his sword at her again. "It's over." He said. "Just give us Amira and we'll go. Deal?"

"Amira? Who the heck is she? Vanilla, do you know who she is?" Papi asked.

The vampire, whose name was supposedly Vanilla, shrugged. "Nope. We told them that already, but they didn't believe us."

"How stupid… Hey, everyone! Stop fighting." Papi said. "We don't have your friend. I've never even heard of someone with that name before."

Luka believed her. "Haah… Damn it. Then I guess we'll just have to look somewhere else… but, there is one other thing." The hero said. "When I was asking around for Amira earlier, a lot of the villagers told me about what you guys have been up to. I can't just let you stay here and continue to rob the locals."

Papi crossed her arms. "Oh yeah? And what are you going to do about it?"

Ilias walked over. "Well, we could just kill them." She suggested. "That would solve the problem permanently."

"What!? No, wait! Don't do that!" Papi said. "I-We're sorry, we had no choice! It was either steal or starve!"

"We'd never do that!" Luka looked over at Ilias. "I can't believe you'd suggest something like that so plainly... Look, how about we just take you back to the village and you can apologise for everything you did."

Alice raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure that's the best idea? The villagers probably hate these bandits. Plus, a lot of humans still harbour resentment for monsters. What will you do if they try to lynch them?"

"I'll just beat them up," Luka said. "But… If they do want to punish you, I think that's only fair. I won't let them do anything too bad, but if they want to imprison you for a week or two, then…"

Sonya disagreed. "Oh come on, they're just kids! They certainly don't deserve to be lynched, and I think prison is still too far. Look, we'll just let the villagers decide. From what I can tell, most of them don't mind monsters. I'm sure it'll be fine."

"Do we really want to take that chance?" Alice asked. "Hmm… How about this? We have them apologise to the villagers, and after that we just take them with us. The pocket castle can fit hundreds of people, after all."

Luka considered the idea. "They are pretty tough. Especially you, little dragon."

Papi blushed slightly. "Well, who says we want to go with yous?"

"I guess that is up to you. Why don't you vote on it? If you do, you can journey around the world with us."

Papi nodded. She and the other bandits got into a group huddle and started to discuss the idea. Luka could only hear some of what was said.

"We could just run away later."

"Why not just stick with them? They seem pretty nice, I think. Besides, what else are we going to do?"

"I suppose. If we go with them, we might get to see more of the world as well… And I do sort of feel bad for all the thievery we did…"

"Yeah…"

After another minute or two, the bandits broke out of the huddle and approached Luka. "We've come to a decision. We'll apologise to the villagers and join you on your journey on one condition: You have to help each one of us fulfil our dreams!"

"Your dreams…? What are they?"

"Well, uh, we haven't really decided on that yet but… I'm sure we'll figure them out soon!" Papi said enthusiastically.

"That's not how dreams work… But alright." Alice sighed. "Well, we should have an easier time getting around with these four tagging along… though, they shouldn't go around with us everywhere. For now, I think six people is the maximum. Any more than that and it'll become a nuisance to do just about anything."

"Sounds fine to me… Now then, that means two of you will have to go keep Lime company in the Pocket Castle… but who…?"

"We can decide on that later. For now, let's go back to Iliasburg."

"We're really, really sorry!" The lamia, whose name was Teeny, said.

Gob was on her knees. "We didn't want to steal, but we had no choice!"

"Please forgive us!" Vanilla begged.

"Hmm… They do seem pretty sincere." A villager commented. "And they didn't really do that much damage."

"It was only petty theft, and these are children." Another said. "Let's let them off the hook this once."

Luka smiled as he watched the scene unfold. Although the villagers weren't without complaint completely, as some of them did suggest having them work unpaid until they paid off their perceived debts, for the most part, they accepted the apology.

"Well, that turned out better than I expected," Alice said. "But we should get back on track. We need to find Amira."

After some more discussion, it was agreed that the children would not be punished. They did have to give back everything they stole, however, much to their dismay. Vanilla in particular seemed heartbroken when she had to give away all the gold she had saved up, which in reality was only a small fortune.

"Let's get going," Luka said. The reformed Heavenly Bandits followed, along with the rest of the group. Ilias was sure to keep her distance from them. The eight of them walked through the small town of Iliasburg, asking around for Amira once more.

"Hey, are you really an angel?" Vanilla asked, walking over to Ilias. The Goddess of Light was irked by the monster's presence, which was only made worse when she noticed that in her current form, they were the same height.

"Of course I am. Are you blind? Can you not see my wings or my halo?"

"Halo? I don't see anything…"

"This!" Ilias pointed to the gold ring which went around her head. "This is my halo."

"Eh? No, that's just a prop. A real angel has a glowing halo above her head. You're just posing as one."

"How dare you!"

Luka had been listening to the argument, and he was far from impressed. "She has a point though, Ilias. Why don't you have a halo?"

"The fact that I don't have one is proof that I really am the goddess! Tell me, in any of the statues you've seen of me, did I have one? Exactly!" Ilias said.

"Well, that's not really what I asked…"

The Goddess of Light was fed up. "Haah… If you must know, I was the one who came up with the whole halo idea. I wasn't born with the damn thing. But I thought it looked nice so I gave it to all of my angels, and instead of simply giving myself one with magic, and risk being confused with a lower angel, I had one made for me out of pure gold."

Alice smiled. "Hmm, you know, we could sell that fake halo… I'm sure it would go for quite a lot on the market. Those funds could really help us out."

Ilias barely held herself back from striking the Monster Lord right then and there. She's just trying to annoy you, she thought, ignore her. Don't let her win…

On that note, I need to figure out a way to drive a wedge between Alice and Luka… but how? I need to find something, and fast, before they get too close, just like they did last time…

"Amira? Yeah, I saw her earlier. She's hard to miss… Whenever I close my eyes, I can still see her…" The villager shivered. "She was over by the Sutherland Inn."

"Really? Thanks so much!" Luka hurried over to the inn. It wasn't far. Lo and behold, once he turned the corner, there she was. Amira certainly fit Ilias's description of her, almost uncannily so. It was as if someone made a normal, green-scaled lamia, and then accidentally swapped the human and monster parts, and then put her upside down. Needless to say, she was very… unique looking.

"Are you Amira?" The hero asked.

"I am. What's it to ya?"

Luka shuddered as he got closer to the snake. He didn't mean to be rude, but her appearance alone gave him a mild, but not fleeting, feeling of disgust. "You're the local Information Broker, right? We require your services."

"Hmm… Yes, I've heard about you four. You were asking around for me quite a lot. A short, purple-haired boy, an angel with no halo, and a silver-haired lamia.

"And me!" Sonya said.

"Who are you?" Amira asked. "Ah, it doesn't matter. Now then, let's get down to business. What is it that you'd like to know?"

"We were hoping you knew about a mysterious rabbit monster."

"Hm, I might… But it'll cost ya. Let's say… 1,500 gold."

"1,500! We don't even have half of that… Is there anything else we can do?"

Amira sighed. "Well, I'd consider giving it to you for free, as a friendly gesture for all the effort you put into finding me, but the union I'm in has strict rules about this kind of thing. Unless… if you become a member, then I can give it to you for free without any issues. All you need to do to join is get a reference from a member, which I can provide, and to have proof of your competence."

"What would I have to do to get that?" Luka asked.

"Let me think… Oh, there is one thing you could do. There's a place called the Nameless Slums past the Irina mountains range. Recently, there's been a big uptick in the amount of phoenix feathers on the market. I've heard that a Don who lives in those slums, Don Dahlia in specific, got her hands on a phoenix. If you can go over there and confirm that, it'd be really helpful."

Luka was listening closely. "Don Dahlia…? The Nameless Slums… Well, we don't really have much choice. We'll do it! But first… we should probably get some rest."