THE LAST KEEPER

Chapter 245. BACK TO SQUARE ONE

"Oka was too scared to go any further, and we pulled back. We did not have to look at our watches." Gavina said.

"We were going in circles. I noticed that after we were back at the starting point twice, so we pulled back," Lira said.

"And our watches malfunctioned," Kiuga said.

It was now two hours after midnight, and the three teams had gathered at the central base. It seemed something bizarre had happened to each team, and they had no choice but to pull out.

"All your stories don’t make sense," Tavora said. "A people like the Tatani tribe could have such intricate traps set out? I don’t believe it," he argued.

"Could it be hypnosis?" Zazarie asked, and everyone paused.

"If it were, we could perhaps all be dead. This wasn’t it. We were there in real time, but it seems something far worse than hypnosis is at play," Kiuga said.

"What could be worse than hypnosis?" Sagiri voiced his thoughts. Hypnosis was the worst secret art he had seen. It could not work on him anyway, but just imagining being stuck in a time space or being put to sleep by your enemy gave him chills. He could have all the time in the world to curve you out and cut you to pieces.

This, however, was nothing like it. They were completely conscious but ended up seeing things anyway. Sagiri was still a bit scared to merge with the archive this time, and he had suppressed most of its power and stuck to using only his right eye. Even so, he had still felt the markings on his body crawling, but ignored them. He did not want the scene that had happened when he blacked out to repeat itself. Especially now, when those he was with were people he did not wish to kill. That ’him’ did not distinguish between friend and foe and just cleared everything that breathed in his path. He had seen it and witnessed all of it in the archive memories. He did not regret wiping out the seventh wing squad, but it could be such a tragedy if he took out his friends this time.

"There are far worse secret arts out there. Some were banned by the state, and the tribes that practiced them were wiped out," Yoka said, and Sagiri’s blood boiled and his heart twisted painfully. So this was Tagayia’s way of dealing with the strong. If the secret art is too strong, then they wipe them out.

"Typical Tagayia," Sagiri sneered in disgust.

"You can sneer all you want, but you yourself just felt the weight of whatever this is. Better to do away with a future enemy than live scared for the day they could turn from friend to foe.

"It just sounds like an excuse to me. Excuses made by the weak to make themselves feel better for being born weak," Sagiri said, and not backing down.

"Keeper, let it go, for now," N’varu said beside Sagiri. Sagiri glared at Yoka for a moment longer before he looked away.

"What do we do now?" he said to Kiuga, who looked lost, deep in thought.

"Whatever is at play here, we need to break it before we even think about moving forward," Kiuga said, and everyone nodded in agreement.

"I say we go in during the day this time. Whether it’s hypnosis or whatever you say, most of these are easy to avoid if you can see the caster and avoid them," Tovara said. Sagiri looked at Kiuga, and he still looked to be thinking for a while before he turned to Tovara.

"I agree, but we have to come up with a new plan this time," Kiuga said. They were typically now back to square one.

"I think whatever it is seems to have affected those with high sensitivity to their surroundings. Oka was scared to move as Gavina said. The girl was able to find out that they were going in circles, and the only reason the middle team did not go any deeper is that Sagiri was able to see the watches had stopped." Banga spoke for the first time. His voice was low and steady as usual. He barely spoke, but whenever he spoke, it was something he was sure of.

Kiuga jumped to his feet and started pacing at banga’s words. They made the most sense.

"So whatever lies ahead is like a double-mouthed snake. Those with high sensitivity to their surroundings, like Sagiri and the snake, as well as Lira, were affected the most, but they can notice when their surroundings are wrong. All squads did not walk deeper in because of them, so it means those of us without sharper senses could not have realized something was wrong till it was too late," Kiuga said, pacing up and down.

"So, for us with less sharp senses, we could have just kept going and walked into a bigger trap?" Ulekai shuddered.

"Perhaps," Kiuga said, " but even though Sagiri, Oka, and Lira were able to realize something was wrong and blow the whistle on going further in, perhaps further in they both could have been affected, and we could all have ended up being stuck in this loop, not knowing what the time was," Kiuga said.

"No wonder no one goes in and comes out," Yoka said. He had finally believed Sagiri’s words after the other two teams reported about their encounters.

"So, using our senses will be our downfall, you mean?" Tavora said. " The way I see it, we have to lose all our senses and, especially, our sight."

"And why is that?" Kaka asked, obviously not liking the idea of being blindfolded in enemy territory.

"The way I see it is that all of you were seeing illusions. The southerner can see too much, and perhaps that was his downfall. All of you must have been illusions. You didn’t see any traps because perhaps you were already in one. It is good that you pulled out before you fell into another trap," Tavora said.

"Illusion!" Kiuga said, pausing. "So this is what that was. I have never heard of secret art that uses illusions."

"So there is indeed something worse than hypnosis," Zazarie said.

"I am not sure yet. I am saying that whatever everyone saw, including the terrain, might have been false.

"No wonder no one comes out when they go in," Banga echoed Yoka’s words. "We might have been lucky this time, or perhaps this was a warning not to go any further."

"I perhaps should go in alone," Sagiri said after a while.

"No."

"Absolutely not!" Yoka and N’varu answered at the same time.

"Do any of you have a better idea?" Sagiri huffed. He did not need babysitting anymore, and the way he saw it, only he could move without the use of most of his senses and fight if it came down to it.