Chapter 170 – Choice
“So, that was what happened…” Elly’s words sounded sombre as she listened to what happened.
Anlesa gave Elly the nearly full story of what happened between her and Maca. Obscuring certain details about themselves, but they talked about how Maca helped take the heat off them and was able to submit the information to the city about the potential attack.
Then, how he disappeared after the attack.
Anlesa didn’t know if it was their fault for his disappearance, but it would be a lie to say that they never thought it was. They were the ones to give him a metaphorical bomb, but it was unknown if that bomb was what did him in.
Elly said with certainty, “I can’t say it wouldn’t be a help having you around, but one has to repay favours.” Elly's words were leaning towards the direction Anlesa wasn’t expecting.
Syrus asked on behalf of Luna, “Yeah, but does a favour outweigh taking care of you lot?”
“By taking care, you are referring to defending the kids if the church shows up again.”
“Pretty much,” Syrus answered.
The fear that the children could be harmed again couldn’t be easily suppressed. They had already been directly attacked twice, and the church had already done other large acts of destruction.
“Well, if we had to be realistic. We should be safe for the time being; we moved, and based on everything you’ve said, it doesn’t sound like the church will show up here soon.” Elly said, but Anlesa didn’t believe her words. Recently, it had been one event after another of pain, fighting, and chaos, and they had barely been prepared for any of it.
They tried to be cautious and thought themselves lucky when they got Flick to assist them, but during their whole journey with her, nothing happened that required her assistance. Of course, that was good, but it also felt weird that when they finally took a step for extra security, it wasn’t needed.
Syrus had to explain to reassure the other two that it was simply how these things worked. Security when it wasn’t doing anything seemed like a waste of money, but then if you didn’t spend, the day an issue occurred, you would be left without the appropriate response.
Syrus said, “You are pushing this more than I thought you would.”
“Well, otherwise you might be stuck feeling guilty.” Elly said, “And that guilt could take a long time to go away.”
“Saying that, the opposite is also true, that I will feel guilty about leaving you all unprotected.” When they lived in Cancole, Elly and the children were close enough that Anlesa felt as if they could respond in case of emergencies. Eletscoep was a bit too far away if something like what just happened occurred again.
Elly suggested, “If you are worried about us being safe, you can take Jerry with you.”
Luna asked, “Did they reveal what happened?” Originally Anlesa was vague on what the reason was because they didn’t want to incriminate any child.
Elly replied, “Jerry did. He spoke of what happened before and during the imprisonment. He said he didn’t feel right if he wasn’t honest about why they were taken; that he would be bad.”
“Nearly said something sophisticated.”
Elly gave Syrus a side eye. “Not everyone has a thousand books.”
“Fair enough.” Syrus nodded. “What happened next?”
“A very chaotic and emotional drama…” Elly slowly explained the succeeding series of events that happened after Jerry’s reveal.
There was a lot of fear and worry from some of the kids; some had even panicked and blamed Jerry for the attack on the villager, but everyone was able to calm down after a lot of talking. Ella took command and asked for Elly to stay to the side to watch, because it was something the children had to process. Though they came to her repeatedly to ask big questions that Elly found hard to answer.
They reached the conclusion that it was no one’s fault that the villager was attacked. No one knew Jerry’s attribute then, and they would’ve gone after him originally if they did know.
At this point, everyone knew it was the church who was reasonable. Originally, there were a few who didn’t want to know, but for the safety of everyone, the information had to be spread.
To help ease everyone’s worries, Elly lied to say that Syrus knew the reason and it wasn’t because of any of the children. In the end her lie wasn’t incorrect, as Anlesa, thanks to the three of them researching and debating, came to a sad conclusion about what the possible reason was, and yeah, it wasn’t because of any of the kids.
Everyone apologised for everything mean they had said, and afterwards they began discussing with Elly this time their next steps, which led them to the plan of moving to Arisea Station.
Luna said, “That was the correct decision.”
Elly asked, “Do you even know the reason?”
“I have a good inkling, and it is nothing good.” A murky expression crept onto her face as the reason for the attack on their home seemed to have just been a move to generate fear.
They had thought about it for a long time, but the solution seemed to be sad and as simple as a move to increase the church’s influence. There was already a report made after the villager destruction stated it was destroyed due to improper defences and inefficient border protection from unholy threats.
It nearly made Luna sick reading such articles; not all were so blatant. That piece was knowingly written by the church, but the other, more ‘objective’ report stated the village was subject to a bandit raid.
All these documents were just there to cover up the fact that the place was destroyed by the church itself and to stir up unrest. Cancole, while being heavily influenced by the Aurora Church, didn’t have its presence as deeply rooted in the country as the Nevald Kingdom. It was the same reason why Luna was killed, to stir emotions, though Luna’s death was a big event, while the attack on the village was just meant to be something minor. That was Anlesa’s working theory, and from everything they had seen and witnessed, it felt correct.
It was just stupid. There were actually intelligent reasons for them to not attack and attack the village. The most recent example was Jerry for a reason for either option; the villager also had a bunch of talented people, children like Anna, and adults like Elly who worked from the village. None of these reasons was good either, but they were better than the likely reason.
“Do you care to tell?”
“Do you want to feel sick at people’s sheer malice?”
“No, but I need to know,” Elly said, turning to face Anlesa straight on.
Syrus sighed, “Here is my current theory based on the evidence.”
Luna explained the likely reasoning. Elly’s expression quickly went white as Anlesa explained the reasoning and the facts and logic behind it. Elly wanted to believe the reason couldn’t be something like that, but she chose to believe Anna.
Elly sat down on the one bed, feeling extremely lightheaded. “They suffered… because of that…”
“They made their choice, however dumb it may have been.” There was hostile venom that spat out of Syrus’ words.
There were a few moments of silence as everyone processed the information.
It took a few minutes, but Elly said, “Thank you for telling me, Anna.”
“Please call me Syrus.”
“I understand.” Elly nodded with a pained expression. “Back to what you were asking, I think you should go along with the trip. It will be a good way to refresh your head, and you deserve a good refresher and the chance to see more of the world.”
“Sigh… I will think about it.” Syrus said, “Thank you for your input.”
Elly stood up. “You're welcome, and remember I will always be here if you need someone to talk to.”
Luna added, “Same goes vice versa.”
Elly left Anlesa's home, and Eva looked back at the potions supplies on the table.
Eva started working again to get her mind moving. While they all debated what they could do.
[We could bring a team.] (Syrus)
[Team?] (Luna)
[Yeah, we already got Lavender; there's no reason we can’t grab a few more.] (Syrus)
[...That seems...] (Eva)
[What, irresponsible or smart?] (Syrus)
[I don’t know… It’s not like we know many people.] (Eva)
[Elly was right; we could bring Jerry.] (Syrus)
[He has barely any skills.] (Luna)
[But it would get him out of the city and further away from the church's sphere of influence.] (Syrus)
[Counterpoint. Doing so would also make him more public-facing.] (Eva)
[We aren’t a famous merc band.] (Syrus)
[We’ve already talked about how our name is already on someone’s list.] Luna said, [So Lilly is right, there might be more risk to bring him with us than to leave him here.]
[...That’s fair.] (Syrus)
Even with Elly’s talk, they weren’t magically on the side of going with one decision, but now, they felt better about making the choice.