Maybe you hit your head too hard?

"The hell do you mean?" Steve contradicted the other's claim.

And afterwards he managed to drag his sister out of harm's way.

"She's a witch! I saw how she killed that fly!" The same opposing man insisted.

Judging from that crackling tone, the other was not happy at all. His fist tightened around his weaponry, and a crave was hidden in his eyes.

Just a blink later, the rest of the group set foot on the very entrance of this prison-cell's corridor.

These other frogs were not as pissed in comparison, in fact they didn't even seem to care.

Instead, one of them derived attention from this scene, since he called for focus towards something else.

"Finus and Greg are gone, man. This is not the time to worry about a little girl." This same man recited.

Those names did not sound familiar to Steve at all, specifically since names had not been exchanged between one another; but such detail wasn't exactly a big deal.

"Did you kill the last of those darned face-eaters?" Another frog jumped in the conversation.

"The last one flew into these prison cells. That witch killed it, I saw that happen with my own eyes!" That one problematic frog insisted.

But yet another frog from his own group argued, "How is this a problem if she killed a face-eater?"

As if stubbornness was that one frog's last name, he insisted. "There wouldn't be any face-eaters if this witch wasn't around us, you fools! She's bringing all of this bad luck!"

"Those are just a bunch of tales your auntie told you, it's all a load of crap." Altima broke into the conversation.

She pushed these men away from the corridor's entrance, and headed towards the couple of young frogs.

After that point, she stood between the two portions of the group as if she was a brick wall.

And then she faced the loud mouth who was on the other side, "Believe in whatever you want, we don't care about that at all."

Once she locked eyes with the same opposer, she assured. "But if you try to hurt these two, I'll cut your head off before you can even blink."

After that point, the team glanced at the few dead face-eaters which laid across the other room. And that scene helped convince these men that the lady's threat wasn't nearly a bluff.

Altima caught their attention once more as she expressed, "Besides, a witch is more honorable than a thief any day."

Such a statement stung these men quite a bit. Their stoic poker-faces melted down swiftly, and were riddled with self-confliction instead.

Finally one of these men broke the tension, as he lightly smacked that loud-mouth behind the head.

And then reminded, "We're in this for the gold, man. Don't go all holy on us now."

The whole team went quiet after that point, and a delicate aura fiddled in the air that featured various conflictions.

Most of the men here who survived, weren’t exactly happy to have a witch around them.

They weren't comfortable at all actually, even though their expressions remained quite bland.

They understood that magic of any sort was hated across this country. Unsurprisingly, everyone was affected by such a cultural input, even thieves.

But yet regardless of personal thoughts, these frogs heeded the tall lady’s demand and simply backed away.

They waited in the other room and analysed the corpses. That and they checked around if there were any more darned face-eaters.

As for Steve, he crouched down to lock eyes with his sister, and then laid one of his arms above her shoulder.

Curiosity became his middle name as the young man questioned, “Since when could you shoot magic like that? I don’t remember seeing you do that before.”

“What do you mean Stevey? We left home because you saw me do magic,” The little lady reminded.

And then continued, “Remember? Mom and dad wanted to burn me, so you sneaked me out of our house.”

Now that was certainly something that the young man did not remember. Apparently this past body owner had been through quite a ruckus, but the motive itself sounded immensely brotherly.

As for now, he figured that his lack of memory embraced confusion for anyone who lended an ear to their talk. So he decided to break such major tension.

All it took was a simple lie, “I hit my head pretty hard somewhere, so I don’t remember all that Trina.”

Right away he could notice that his sibling’s face curled with worry, but that wasn’t exactly a problem.

It was a solution come to think of it, as he could reap more information out of his own blood.

“What did we do after we left home? Do you remember where we used to live?” He questioned.

“Uh… your head probably hurts a lot. Our home was in Radan, and you wanted to buy us another home here.” The tiny lady described.

As expected he did not recognize such a name, but the need for property truly described this big debt he had to the revolutionaries.

He could link those details with one another almost instantly, but also grew curious towards this domain’s name.

That was why he peeked up to lock eyes with Altima, and wanted to ask a question regarding the same matter.

And the big lady figured out that silent request, so she chirped. “Radan is another city far from here. It would take three months to reach that place.”

“I see,” Steve answered and then stood up.

He was eager to unlock memories, but for now he already regretted his curiosity.

Their own parents wanted to burn Trinia into a crisp apparently, simply because this little girl could do a bit of magic.

Such an overreaction was above cruel at this point, so Steve grew vengeful towards his own blood.

But it was impossible to do anything against those frogs in Radan at the moment. So he just settled with the thought that his bloodline was filled with maniacs.

After that point he placed an arm around the little lady’s shoulder, and led her out of the cell room.

Their vision was swiftly enveloped with a bit of darkness, just a moment after.

The battle that exploded a few minutes ago, had forced this team to drop a lot of their torches, so this lack of illumination made sense.

Yet one torch’s limited illumination aided to catch a glimpse of these corpses. Just that view alone, almost made the young man throw up the bug he had eaten!

He recognized that one of these corpses was the tall, poker-faced leader who feared infections just moments before the disaster.

Steve couldn’t quite find the other corpse. But he guessed that the other one who had died, was that well-informed shortest member of the group.

Such a realisation felt tragic to a certain extent. As those couple of men seemed like the most capable of this party, and yet they were the first to die.

As for details regarding these swift deaths, he could entirely understand how these frogs were out-matched.

For some reason, these darned homicidal bugs had some weird sort of kink. They simply bashed against any faces they could find!

This in exchange had left a very horrid scene. As the leader’s face was simply stripped out of features, thanks to the countless bite wounds!

And apart from that, there was a two-finger wide hole right in the middle of the corpse's face!

Such details helped make sense of these horrid deaths, the scene was simply a bloody mess!

Altima noticed the worry which was riddled across the young man’s face, so she felt almost pressured to help him feel better.

Which was why she informed them, “Don’t worry, I grew up slaying face-eaters. They’re nothing to worry about as long as you know where to hit them.”

“Maybe you can teach us where to hit them, then?” One of those men who survived, spoke out.

These men walked in front of the group at the moment, but they weren't so far ahead so any conversation could be overheard.

That same man continued, “You killed all those bugs behind us anyway, so you should really teach us.”

After the capable lady noticed that there weren’t hints of sarcasm in the other’s tone, she decided to be cooperative.

That was why she advised, “Face-eaters are great fliers, so it’s stuppid to swing a sword against them. You'd be wasting the little time you have.”

After the rest of the group’s attention had been captured, she continued. “Stab them instead, especially when they’re coming for your face.”

“That makes sense actually,” Another frog hopped in the conversation.

And then cooperated, “You should teach us a few more things… but of course we need to be friends first. So hello, my name's Richard.”

This specific frog went far enough to separate from his own group, just to face the tall lady in order to shake her hand.

But she simply avoided such a gesture, and pushed that frog aside as she walked forward.

Through such rough-handling she informed, “I’ll help you all survive this dungeon, but neither of us will ever be friends.”

After a moment she reminded them, “You should know by now that I don’t like thieves, at all.”

“That’s reasonable,” Richard’s tone cracked, and then he shook his own hand so it wouldn't hang around.

The whole group pierced through another corridor, and simply wished that the treasure was close by.

A couple of men died already, and that simply did not treat their confidence so well.

Now, most of them expected that death would kiss their forehead once they went around the corner. So it was fair to say that most of them were on edge.

They wished for the best, but such hopes were crushed once the team walked for about fifty meters more.

Simply since the illumination of their torches, captured a drop of elevation.

Thankfully no one fell down to some odd hole, but a problem still unravelled itself.

The corridor in front of their feet seemed to have collapsed a long time ago. And some sort of blue liquid was spilled across it as well!

Most weren't sure what this substance represented, but they could still put two and two together.

In short words, this corridor itself seemed impossible to pass.

Altima confirmed it once she noticed the liquid and spoke out, “That there is face-eater's slime, so I’m assuming this is their nest. Touching it can melt our skin off, so we’re pretty much stuck on this side.”