Fran Makes Her Move

“I’m counting….four elven archers, one in each watch tower of the castle. There are another four that are patrolling the ramparts. We should be able to travel quickly enough to avoid their line of sight and make it to the rampart,” reported Second Inquisitor.

“I see. So, we follow your route to get to the rampart and then we follow that until we either find a window or door to infiltrate the castle from. We are to remain silent once we leave this forest. We’ll be wide open in that field between the castle and this forest. Perfect area for those archers to pick us off. Stay low, stay silent, stay alive,” Fran told her troops right before she switched to hand signals and used the one to indicate the operation is a go. The other Inquisitors nodded in understanding and followed their predetermined orders. Second Inquisitor took point, his spy drones allowed him to see any potential problems before it reached the group. Fourth Inquisitor followed next, his weapon drawn and ready to take out any possible enemies they come across. The last position was taken by Fran, her eyes scanned the horizon, on full alert.

Thanks to First Inquisitor’s excellent use of his drones, he was able to get the group to the rampart without the sentries being alerted. The three followed along the rampart until they came to a window. Second Inquisitor quickly relayed some orders to the drone that stealthily hovered near them, which caused the drone to fly up to the window. Once in place, the drone shot out a sticky device to hold the window in place as the drone summoned another tool that began to cut the glass, not unlike what you would see in a heist movie. In less than a minute there was a person sized hole in the window that the drone quickly attached a ladder to and allowed it to fall to its master below.

The group quickly made their way up the ladder and into the castle. The three rolled up the ladder and placed it next to the window on the inside as the drone repaired the window to make sure nobody would notice anything out of the ordinary from the outside. A few quick hand signals let the group know that Fran was taking point. Fran led them quickly but silently down the various halls of John Newman’s castle. The group neutralized any guards that they could not avoid. This action caused them to move with even more haste, an imaginary clock had begun to count down until someone either found them and alerted the castle, or found the bodies and alerted the castle. Neither of those, however, would happen.

The group turned a corner into a hallway that they believed would lead them to the wing where John’s bedroom would be. At least that is what the mapping technology of the drone showed them. Instead, the group came upon a little Gorgon girl and a little Dragon girl sitting in the middle of the hallway shoving a mixture of graham crackers, marshmallows, and chocolate bars into their mouths.

“Wfe wove shoores!” the two giggled in unison, quickly shoving more of the food into their mouths.

The Inquisitors all glanced at each other, a look of confusion and disbelief on their faces. The two subordinates waited for orders from their leader, who was clearly conflicted, if the look on her face was to be believed. Fran took a few deep breaths to regain her composure before she brought out her sweetest voice she was capable of.

“Hi, darlings! How are you?” she asked, a big smile blared from her face. The two young girls immediately reacted positively to Fran’s demeanor and waved intensely at her while they smiled, their teeth covered in chocolate and marshmallow. Their cuteness stirred Fran’s secret love of small cute things that she hid from others in order to maintain her badass chick persona.

“Would you like some s’mores?!” asked Mimi as her and Yatina thrust their hands out, the ingredients safely clutched in their palms.

“No, sweeties, but thank you tho,” Fran said to the girls, who returned to shoving the pieces of a s’mores into their mouths and just eating them like that. Fran secretly thought they were adorable. “I do have a question that I hope you two young ladies could help me with,” said Fran. Mimi and Yatina’s eyes grew at being called young ladies instead of little girls or trouble makers.

“We’ll gladly help you lady, and your friends!” Yatina answered Fran, who smiled at hearing that.

“Good! You see, we’re friends of John Newman and we hope to-” started Fran before she was interrupted by Mimi and Yatina.

“You wanna see big bro John?” asked Mimi.

“We can let master know you’re here!” Yatina told Fran. Before Fran could respond to their comments, the two derps raced around the corner yelling “JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHN!” at the top of their lungs. It was at this moment Fran realized it was a horrible mistake to approach the two girls.

“We should have killed them,” commented Fourth Inquisitor, who quickly shut up from the **** glare he received from Fran for that comment.

“I took a gamble and it failed. It happens sometimes. But our element of surprise is lost. Move at max speed to the bedroom to see if John Newman is there!” ordered Fran as the three stopped their sneaking around and instead sprinted full speed, sound no longer a limiting factor.

The three followed the yells of the two girls, yet their voices got fainter no matter how fast they ran.

“How fast are those two?” questioned Fourth Inquisitor, who sounded annoyed.

“Keep moving!” ordered Fran as she flew by some elves who were clearly unarmed and not military. Her two subordinates followed her orders as they, too, ran past the elves and left them be. Fran’s entire focus was to get to John Newman and to use him as their ticket to leave the kingdom safely.

“INTRUDERS! THERE ARE INTRUDERS IN THE CASTLE! PROTECT KING JOHN AND PRINCESS SYLVIA!” a voice bellowed throughout the castle. A voice echoed through the castle, a communication magic skill clearly at use.

“Shit, prepare for combat!” Fran spat to her followers, who nodded and prepared themselves. Not a moment too soon did the elven Royal Guards show up. The four guards drew their swords, each one became engulfed in one of the four primary elements.

“Spellswords! Be on your guard!” Fran relayed to her soldiers, both of them took a defensive stance, ready to do battle.

“You have trespassed on the sovereign soil of King John Newman, ally of Princess Slyva Sunwalker, heir to the kingdom of Sandere!” announced the lead Royal Guard. The guards rushed the three intruders, who answered with a rush of their own. Fran took on two of the guards while Second and Fourth Inquisitor took on one each.

Fran’s sword deflected the two empowered blades of the Royal Guards, but she did not anticipate the follow-up attack by the two. The left sword’s thin water coat quickly covered all of Fran’s sword as long as the two blades made contact. With perfect unity, the second guard unleashed his magical power of his sword. Fran watched as the electric current traveled down his sword, clearly intended to make contact with her water soaked sword. Tch. These two have my sword locked in tight. Fran thought to herself as she struggled to remove her sword from her two enemies.

“AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!” yelled Fran as she felt her toes curl up from the involuntary action as the electricity coursed through her body. The pain awoke Fran, her mind raced as she realized this was not going to be as easy as she had originally thought. While she expected her two teammates to come aid her, the sounds of the battle around her made sure that they wouldn’t.

Second Inquisitor and his drone were able to easily dodge the flame strands that erupted from each sword swing of the guard he faced, but it also did not leave enough time for a proper counterattack. Analysis complete. The guard's sword propels flames along the arc and trajectory of the sword swing. Currently unable to assist Grand Inquisitor. Second Inquisitor dodged more swings of his opponent’s sword as he continued to formulate a plan to assist his leader while also defeating his opponent. I have ****, I need to sacrifice SD-104 to be able to provide assistance to the Grand Inquisitor thought Second Inquisitor as he went over as many possible outcomes that he could. SD-104, get within 5 meters of the target and activate self-destruct protocol transmitted Second Inquisitor via his technomancy to his loyal drone. Second Inquisitor fell back to a suitable range as the drone charged the Royal Guard, whose flame strands damaged but did not stop the suicidal drone. Once in position, the drone self-destructed with enough concussive **** to blast the Royal Guard into a wall and knock him ****. The blast radius was large enough that it disrupted the Royal Guards locked in combat with Fourth Inquisitor and Fran.

Fourth Inquisitor grew more frustrated the longer this battle drew out. While he normally liked to take out his opponents with precise strikes from his heavily modified semi-**** rifle, his opponent prevented thanks to his spellsword abilities. Why did I have to get the shitty guard that can shoot projectiles too! grumbled Fourth Inquisitor. He channeled his magic, the ability to fill any object with kinetic energy, into each bullet he fired, only for them to be countered by the flurry of earthen bullets his opponent shot in tandem. The powered up bullets would come into contact with the faux bullets and explode, which caused a cascade effect of a wall of small explosions. Sadly the explosions happened too far away from either warrior to damage either one. That, however, changed when the drone exploded, the **** made the Royal Guard stumble. Hah! Now’s my chance! Fourth Inquisitor thought as an evil grin spread across his face as three shots left the barrel of his gun while he spun around to reorient himself as the concussive **** also affected him. The bullets hit their mark, the explosions tore through the guard’s armor and blasted his inner flesh. His screams were music to Fourth Inquisitor’s ears.

Fran heard the drone buzz towards its target and knew what was to come. Second Inquisitor had done this maneuver once or twice before while on a mission together and so she fought through the shocking pain and reoriented herself so that the two guards were between her and the drone. When the blastwave came, she was ready. The moment the swords of the two guards left her blade, she jammed it into the ground as the two former opponents were blasted into the walls as she crouched behind her sword to take off some of the ****. While not as powerful as the Warden Sword or Shield, her sword was blessed with as many enchantments as Lord Brighton could put on it, thus it was a formidable weapon that could last against a Warden weapon for a short time.

When the concussive wave dissipated, Fran removed her sword from the ground and slashed at the two guards, a clean cut appeared on their armor as blood and internal organs began to ooze out of the wound she had inflicted. She looked over to see Second and Fourth Inquisitors finish off their opponents. The three all nodded to each other and turned to head towards John’s bedroom only for an earthen wall to appear in front of them.