Strongest Nova: Path of Vengeance

Chapter 111: Bird on a Cliff

Stanley saw a few Defenders along the way, and when he got close to them, he would slow down so that he didn’t make a sound that let them know that they were there.

After running past the 1st quadrant, it became harder to freely run through the 3rd Quadrant. There were simply too many people there that were starting to walk out of their homes and continue their normal day.

It didn’t help that the rain had stopped either.

Stanley weaved in through the people while holding Sheila, who had already given up on the fact that she needed to do anything right now. She let Stanley handle it all.

Seeing the Defenders clearly look for someone made Stanley quite angry and fearful at the same time. He went into an alleyway, coming out on the other side on a slightly bigger road.

The crowd got even worse around here.

"Alright, you’ll hit someone at this rate," Sheila whispered. "Drop me, we can walk normally now."

Stanley had no other choice, so he nodded and dropped her to the ground. He became visible for a split second before he grabbed Sheila’s arm again.

"Let’s go," she said and took him toward her place.

Stanley watched as the girl dragged him from in front of him. Now that he was looking at her closely, she was wearing quite weird-looking clothes.

Her upper and lower body clothes were tight-fitting to the point that they looked uncomfortable. The fabric looked very smooth as well, something he hadn’t seen prior to this.

There were many weird patches in her clothes and the belt she wore looked even more confusing. There was also a metal badge on her shoulder that showed the image of some sort of flying bird standing on top of a pointy cliff.

There was still quite a way to go, so Stanley started looking around at the people that were in the streets.

Now that he was looking more closely, many of them were crying to themselves. He walked through the road, seeing many people trying to console someone else for the loss of their child.

’Ah!’ Stanley realized. ’They are family members of the Defenders that died today.’

He had forgotten for a moment just how destructive the invasion had been, just how many people had died near the veil today. The number of people had certainly crossed 100.

"What’s going on?" Sheila asked. "Why are they all so gloomy?"

"What do you mean?" Stanley asked her in a whisper. "Do you not know about the Crawler attack?"

"I do. I used the opportunity to go sneak in after all," she said. "But I can’t imagine why so many of them are sad though. It can’t be everyone lost someone right?"

"Over 100 Defenders died today," Stanley said. "100. How could they not be sad with so many dead?"

Sheila paused for a moment. "What? 100?" she looked back at Stanley. "How?"

"15 Crawlers attacked today," Stanley said.

Sheila’s eyes widened in shock. It had been 10 Crawlers that had managed to kill over 300 people the last time she had come, and now there were 15 Crawlers?

"What about the Crawlers?" Sheila asked. "Are they gone?"

"Yes, they’re dead," Stanley said. "I found my brother injured after the Crawlers were killed."

Sheila’s eyes were still wide, unable to believe that such a thing had even happened. "I had no idea. I thought it would be one or two like last time," she said. "I thought it wasn’t common for many Crawlers to come in at once."

"Who knows what’s common at this point," Stanley said. "They aren’t common monsters to begin with, are they?"

Sheila nodded.

"You’re been investigating for a while, right?" Stanley asked. "Any idea how they could’ve come about?"

"I have absolutely no idea," Sheila said. "But I do know that it has something to do with the Nova being here and this place being a mode advanced farm."

"What does that mean?" Stanley asked.

"I don’t know," Sheila said. "All my ideas and theories get thrown out the window when I realize that this town has been here for nearly 150 years, constantly being attacked by the Crawlers."

"I have confirmed that is not a lie, so finding any plausible theory for anything that is going on is really difficult, okay?" she said.

Stanley nodded.

"Ah, we’re finally here," she said as they arrived near her shop.

The shop was closed and had been for many days now. Sheila’s urgency to find out about the town and leave had increased tenfold after coming into contact with the Nova.

The corridor was locked as well, but Sheila just had to use her keys. She swiftly opened it and dragged Stanley in before closing the door to the corridor.

"That was close," she said and let go of Stanley’s arm, disappearing from his eyes. "I only have about 5 minutes in total remaining."

Stanley heard her speak and felt the air move past him as he heard her footsteps as well. He followed her, moving up the stairs until he arrived in front of a room that opened on its own to his perceptions.

He entered and saw things start to fly around in the room. It was a bizarre image to behold. He would have certainly thought ghosts existed had he not known that there was a girl in front of him.

He looked around the room, seeing how it was. Despite being someone from the outside world, her room looked very much unremarkable.

That was until the mirror came off and a sack flew out from behind it.

The sack fell to the ground and a few things flew out of it. There were clothes on top of the sack that Sheila started pulling out to reveal what was truly hidden underneath.

She brought out a small rectangular metal, a few small pieces of black metal, and a small yellow object that had the same image of a bird on a pointy peak carved into it.

That was all she needed to take with her.