Netori: Stealing The Hero's Party!-Chapter 623: Of Shattered Mind And Body

As soon as the intruders were dead, Milo was finally able to connect with Raven. Telling him everything that had happened, the king made him appear in Athenia in just a few seconds. With him were Regalia, the djinns, even Maria and Hilma. Having clothed themselves with haste, they still appeared a bit dishevelled, but for now that mattered not in the least.

Wasting no time at all, Raven marched for the dungeons where Markus had taken the intruder's bodies and Aradin was being kept with his companions. The king had told all that he could, and so the general told him not to move from his throne and to continue to look after Viola and the heir within her body.

By the time he arrived at the dungeon's entrance, the entirety of the original party, along with Liliyana, were standing by him. It had nearly been a week since their leader had been amongst the other girls, simply mating and relaxing, and so they had little clue about what was happening both with him in general and the entire story of the intrusion of the city.

However, every time they asked a question, Raven was far too focused on getting to the source of the problem to explain anything. The others eventually decided to take over, but before they could even finish their story, a rumbling cacophony of howling voices came flooding from the deeper ends of the dungeons. Not three, but enough voices–enough of the same, at least, to flood a hundred halls. In agony, they screamed, and as the group finally arrived at their cells, it finally made sense why exactly.

Severed from their bodies, the heads of the three intruders were nailed to the wall. Split into countless many, some of the flesh and the other of their shattered soul, each head was shattered both in the physical and the ethereal plane. Not to mention the countless necroflowers–enough to devastate a lesser god were growing on their skulls.

Shifting his attention momentarily to the others inside the cell, Raven noticed a handful of his soldiers crammed up in a corner. They hadn't yet noticed his presence, thanks to their anxiety from being around Markus and the talking heads. But as soon as the warlord entered the cell, that quickly changed. A bit surprised by his entrance, they jumped to their feet and offered a salute of the heart as they'd trained to. With their heads lowered, however, none of them dared even look at him, as the fate of their leader depended on the general's decision after all.

"At ease…" Ignoring them for now, Raven walked up beside Markus and turned to the heads. Each mumbled to its own tune, saving nothing of note, really, as the ethereal knight had already tortured every bit of information out of them.

"They're just puppets of the gods of the council. They don't belong here, not in our world…" His visor lowered, and his eyes glaring at the heads still, Markus wanted to end their miserable existence once and for all. "Otherworlders like that witch friend of yours, but something about these bastards is different."

"Like what?" Raven asked.

Glancing sideways, Markus held the warlord's gaze for a while. He wasn't sure if Raven was ready to hear what he had to say, but then reminded that he was no longer just an adventuring boy, the dark knight caved.

"They held a rifle, it's lost now in the spell that I cast to defeat them–and yet, even now, I can sense something familiar in these idiots." Slowly turning his head to the intruders again, Markus took a moment to ponder his own sanity. "Almost as if I were standing by the hero again…and by that I mean, Nightsilver."

Eyes furrowed all around Markus, and even some gasps could be heard echoing down the corridors. Nobody could've expected that response, an outworlder reminding Markus of the greatest warrior they've ever known? The man who stood toe to toe against the demon lord? How was that possible? Their limited minds just could not comprehend.