8 Chapter 7: Hidden in the forest.

"No killing, do as I say, and lastly don't show any affection to anyone including me," Sierra looked at Alseace with her head resting on her fist. "In this world, innocent people will die, people with ego will die, people who are blinded by power and greed will die, and the worst is people with affection will die of protecting someone," Sierra explained as she counted them with her left hand.

Alseace tilted his head and looked at Sierra's four fingers that were lifted up. Suddenly, Sierra put her left hand on his head and stroked his hair gently.

"You'll learn as you grow up, and I'm apologizing in advance because I will show you how cruel this world is," Sierra said and removed her hand. "For now, let's clean your body because I'm getting a goosebump looking at those blood," Sierra smiled as she stood up.

Alseace nodded his head and then was brought to the bathroom to clean himself up.

"Stop daydreaming and take the corn soup to the table. Don't forget the garlic bread," Sierra looked at the oven and waited for the whole baked chicken and potato to finish. "It's rare to see you daydreaming. What were you thinking about?" Sierra looked at Alseace carefully carrying the pot.

"The rules that you made to live in this house," Alseace answered as he left the kitchen.

"Rules? What rules?" Sierra furrowed her eyebrows as she tried to remember.

The dinner was ready, and everyone had a nice dinner on the rooftop of the building. Sierra's cooking was the best that Ando and Nero always brought the leftovers back to their place.

"I brought wine," Gratya showed the big expensive bottle of wine to Sierra to pay her back for the 50-year-old. "Let's empty this bottle before we end the day," Gratya plucked the cork and poured everyone a glass of wine.

"I heard about what happened this afternoon. It's starting to get out of hand," Nero looked at Gratya and drank his wine.

The person that gave Alseace EXP was a D-Rank Candidate, and it wasn't a murder. He was trying to do Atonement without the Emissary's supervision and ended up killing himself in the process.

"The cases keep rising for the past two years. People still think it's fine to do it on their own. We the Emissary can't do much about it because we can't track everyone's progress," Gratya sighed as she sat down next to Katya. "A new policy is about to be applied. It's about a Guildmaster who will hold responsibility for their own members and will be punished and sanctioned if something like this happens," Gratya looked at everyone with a wine in her hand.

"We have no issues with that, but the small guilds are going to be a problem. Who wants to pay a fine or sanction for something like that if they can't control their own members," Katya said with her left eyebrow raised and stared blankly at the empty plate. "Are you sure the Emissary could handle things like this?" Katya glanced at Gratya.

"No, the new policy only applied to big guilds so we the Emissary don't have to pay attention to thousands of Candidates from the big guilds. With that being said, we the Emissary will pay more attention to the smaller guilds to prevent Candidates from doing Atonement on their own, and reduce the service fee," Gratya pointed out and drank her wine.

All of them nodded in agreement because they didn't have a complaint about it. In fact, it was a good thing since the safety of the people was their utmost priority as Guildmasters. Unlike Sierra and Alseace, those two didn't hold responsibility for the people around them because they were just stranded strangers, an Otherworlder.

"Talking about this, I have been wondering what did your world do when they were facing this problem, Miss Red," Nero looked at Sierra.

"Survival of the fittest. Whether they died or not was nobody's business. If they ended up becoming a demon worshipper, we hunt them down. That simple," Sierra answered and ate the garlic bread that she dipped in corn soup.

"I bet your world is a savage world, huh?" Ando chuckled as he enjoyed his chicken thigh.

"A savage world? It's far worse than that," Sierra sighed as she looked at the stars and chewed on the garlic bread.

Sierra never mentioned anything about her past, and knowing she didn't want to talk about it, they didn't pry on it or they might get beaten up.

After they filled their belly with wine and delicious food, everyone went back home and ended the monthly gathering. Alseace and Sierra cleaned up the table and washed the dishes until late at night. They both went to sleep as soon as they finished everything up.

"Wake up... Gwenn-" A gentle soothing womanly voice whisper into Sierra's right ear.

Sierra opened her eyes and jolted from her bed as she covered her right ear before she could hear the rest of the words. She then looked at her phone as she breathed heavily, and there was a message that just came in. She then grabbed her phone and saw a message from Gratya. It surprised her when she looked at the content of the message.

"Two in the morning... did I only sleep for half an hour?" Sierra stood up and put on her white shirt, tie, suit, and trouser. "I swear if it's something trivial, I'm going to beat that kid..." Sierra left the bedroom and left the house after she grabbed her coat from the coat hanger.

(In the far south of West Dasmein)

Sierra and Gratya were on the helicopter and looked at the vortex hidden inside the forest. Sierra squinted her eyes and didn't hesitate to jump down from the helicopter even though it was 40 meters up in the air. Gratya didn't have a choice but to follow her into the forest.

"This is first," Sierra looked at the dark purple vortex in front of her. "I guess I don't have to beat you up," Sierra walked closer to the vortex while Gratya looked at Sierra with a stiff, eyes widened expression. "Spill it," Sierra said as she kept staring at the vortex.

"We received a report about a sudden disappearance of animals in the forest. That report came around three days ago, and we expected there was a vortex that's hidden in the forest that scared the animals. After the Emissary sent scout teams into the forest for a whole day, we found this," Gratya explained and looked at Sierra's slender body which made her want to hug her small body from behind. "We actually don't know how long this vortex has been formed. It could be five days or even six days since it was formed," Gratya continued.

"Have you informed Katya and the others?" Sierra leaned her head forward with her hands on her waist and kept observing the vortex.

"I have not. The Emissary hides this information until you can point out how dangerous this vortex is and how should we prevent it from an outbreak," Gratya answered with her eyes closed and imagined what would happen to her if she hugged Sierra from behind.

Sierra hummed and nodded her head repeatedly as she slowly walked back.

"Not even the Tenth Atonement... You must be joking... maybe..." Sierra mumbled to herself, and Gratya could hear the first few words.

"Tenth Atonement?" Gratya glanced at Sierra.

"Keep this a secret, and bring everyone to the Emissary headquarters this noon. Let's talk about the details there," Sierra turned around, and then jumped from tree to tree and got into the helicopter. She safely landed inside the helicopter and took a seat. "Miracle does exist, huh?" Sierra looked at Gratya jumping from tree to tree and entering the helicopter the same way as she did.

Sierra and Gratya got off the helicopter on top of Emissary headquarters. Sierra then grabbed the small notebook that Gratya brought with her and then wrote something on it.

"This is what I saw," Sierra gave back the notebook. "Prepare the presentation so everyone can understand what you're all facing," Sierra left before Gratya could read what she wrote.

Gratya looked at Sierra's writings, and her pupils shrunk as her hands started to tremble. She immediately pressed her chest with both hands so the notebook didn't fall off.

At noon, Sierra entered the Emissary headquarters as she promised and was escorted by the agents.

"Am I really okay to be here?" Alseace felt uncomfortable because the agents had been staring at him as if he was a nuisance and unwanted.

"If they annoy you, I told you that you're allowed to kill now, so don't hesitate to snap their necks. I'll take the responsibility," Sierra kept walking and the agents immediately made some distance and averted their gazes.

Sierra and Alseace went into the meeting room and everyone was present including all the higher-ups and the president of the Emissary, Niko Valteri. They were all waiting for her, and Alseace could see the expressions of the higher-ups, the president, and Gratya were so pale.

"We can start now," Gratya pointed the remote at the wall and a projected screen appeared. "This is what we found inside the forest deep in the south of the west Dasmein. The vortex was discovered two days ago," Gratya looked at the photo.

It was a photo of a dark purple vortex and made Ando and the others stand up to look at it. It was the first time ever a dark purple color vortex came to Dasmein. The highest difficulty was a bright purple one, and it was when Elenoir got her sword. That vortex was classified as S+ Rank difficulty because it could only be entered by a single party.

"This vortex has been up and unnoticed possibly for 6 days?! We don't even have time to prepare!" Ando slammed the table and looked at Niko Valteri with a worried expression.

"That's not the problem here, Ando," Sierra stood up and looked at everyone in the room. "This vortex's mission is to survive, prevent the endless war, and lastly, this vortex can only be entered by one person," Sierra pointed out with a serious expression.