At the outskirts of the city, a building, two stories tall, lays. The second floor, part of its walls and ceiling is gone, giving it a view of the ocean beyond the walls. In this room, Tomoe lays down, caressed by the ocean breeze that reaches her room, sleeping profoundly. As she got to the bed, she just plummeted into it, forgetting to get out of the standard Beheader light armor.

At the sound of the water flowing, a new sound joins. Multiple steps, and the sound of the branches of the trees being rustled. Tomoe turns, laying upward. Waking up, still in a daze, she looks at the ceiling, still conserving some of its colors from its old days. Looking at the opening of the room that overlooks the ocean, she notices that the night is starting to light up. Something catches her sight, being right in front of her: A shadowy figure.

Being as tall as a child, with weird body proportions, having feet and arms larger than the normal, and a small trunk for body. Seeing it, Tomoe just doesn’t react to it.

This is something… weird. Am I still dreaming?.

Rolling over again, Tomoe falls asleep, ignoring the presence.

Tomoe continues to sleep, feeling each part of her body tired beyond comprehension. The breeze continues to caress her, and she continues to drift in her dreams until another sound interrupts her.

Heavy hits, hitting the door of the second floor. Opening her eyes again, this time she feels out of the daze. Rubbing her eyes, she looks again at the hole of the room, only to find that the shadowy figure isn’t there anymore.

The hits continue, and Tomoe stands up, getting to the door “I’m coming, I’m coming!”

Opening the door, Tomoe greets a fully light armored Bran, letting a huge yawn escape.

“Sleeping soundly I presume?”

“You bet, at least until you woke me up. What is this about? I was sleeping really well you know.”

“We have a… situation…” says Bran, giving a serious look to Tomoe.

“You… could you even get some rest?”

“That… is of no importance.” Answers Bran “we were in the vicinity and decided to check on you, just to be sure, and to get you to help us out.”

“We?”

Bran points down, towards the first floor, and looking down, she finds that Lacus is there too, in his full light armor.

Tomoe felt the frustration starting to dwell up remembering yesterday, yet, after thinking it for a moment, Tomoe finally says “Well, sure. I’m already up anyway, doubt that I will be able to go back to sleep” Putting her frustrations in the back burner for now.

“Fantastic” answers Bran.

“By the way, good morning to you two.” Tomoe adds, as she takes her canteen and a cloak, to stave off the cold.

“Yeah, good morning.” Bran replies.

“Morning.” Answers Lacus.

Getting out of the house, Bran takes the direction back into the city. Following, Tomoe finally asks “So… what is the situation then?”

“We have had reports that some women have gone… missing.”

“Missing? Here? Since when?”

“About an hour ago. Maybe less, maybe more. And yes, we have already searched for them high and low in the city. The search is still going on.”

“Hmm… Anything we can go by?”

“We have some testimonies: supposedly, in the middle of the night, some men and women heard some sort of muffling sounds, and the sound of heavy objects being dragged, and a couple even dropped on the floor.”

“Do you… believe…” says Tomoe, putting her hands on her mouth “other Aquamarines?”

“Impossible. You know that rape is almost impossible thanks to Aura, and thanks to the war, the only way it is possible should be out of hand of every Aquamarine here.”

“What about those that haven’t awakened their Aura yet?”

“I thought about that, but between the kidnapped, there are already people with their Aura awakened.”

“Then, what could it be?”

“That is what we are going to investigate, find them and the reason why it is only either red Auras or those that haven’t awakened them.”

As they reach the main circular plaza, they cross over to the other side, in direction to the Starlight Forest.

Lacus, letting his seventh yawn escape, asks “Why over to the Starlight Forest?”

“Well, there is no one covering still that side of the acropolis, and some Aquamarines claimed that the sound went that way anyway.”

“What? But then how is so that there is no one searching there still?” Lacus asks again.

“Give it a rest. Taking into account the time, many of them weren’t even sure of it.”

Yawning again, Lacus says “That doesn’t mean… Well, anyway, then let's go searching for the missing women then.”

Halfway through the road, before reaching the Starlight Forest, Bran stops, and takes a turn to the right, starting going upward “This way.”

“We have to start somewhere anyway.” Tomoe says as she also goes that way while yawning.

“Why here? Shouldn’t we start searching the closest to the forest?” Lacus asks.

“Assuming this is a case of kidnapping, no.” Bran answers.

“The Starlight Forest is really dangerous. Even coming close to it puts anyone at risk. If there is someone doing this, then that person should know this.” Tomoe adds.

“Dangerous? How dangerous? Like the Stardust Forest?” Lacus asks again.

Tomoe thinks about it, but then ends up saying “I’ll show you later on today.”

“I… see, will look forward to it.”

As they continue the search, they find something that its quite out of place: Usually, the city is in a good state, even when there is some destruction there and there, erosion is done by time, to the buildings and the road. They look quite dated. Here though, the three stories box-shaped building has some windows destroyed, the door out of place, and some plant-like material is all over the ground outside. The building lays at the outskirts of the city.

“This…” Tomoe starts talking.

“It looks a lot like it.”

“Well, if the perpetrator has some semblance of intelligence like you guys said, he or she would choose a place far removed to kidnap people and keep them there.”

“Yeah. But something is bothering me.” Tomoe says, as she points towards the ground, then towards the Starlight Forest.

“We are too close to the Forest. Why wouldn’t they know the dangers of it?” Bran asks.

“Maybe they aren’t from here?” Lacus asserts.

Silence. Tomoe looks at Bran, then at Lacus. As she is about to open her mouth, a sound comes from inside the building, in a really low tone “…help…” followed by some sobs.

Crouching slightly, Bran says “Seems like we found our objective.”

Touching Bran’s right arm, Tomoe says “Let me go first.”

Bran nods.

“I’ll cover you.” Lacus says.

“No,” Tomoe rejects “be here with Bran and take care nothing else comes trying to enter.”

Engaging her Aura, she envelops herself with a barrier, really close to the body. Taking steps, Tomoe gets to the door of the building, only to see the room covered in darkness. A faraway sound of rain reaches her ears. As she enters, the light of her Aura shows that the ceiling is gone.

So, there’s no second floor.

Continuing walking, Tomoe moves towards the center of the room. She looks back, only to see Lacus by the door. Looking forward again, she wonders for a moment if she should light up the entire room, but she shoots down the idea since it would require to concentrate her Aura at one single point to illuminate enough the first floor, leaving her vulnerable.

A bit further, the light of the Aura is cast over a body hiding in the shadows. Coming a bit closer, Tomoe encounters a girl, dark-skinned, wavy brown hair, without clothes, trembling. Reaching her hand to hers, Tomoe fully kneels and asks “Are you hurt?”

The girl continues to tremble. She tries to move her mouth, but to no avail, no sound came out of it.

“Do you even remember how you got here?”

“…” The girl’s hand left Tomoe’s, and with her finger, she pointed to her left.

“What? What is it?”

“W…W…”

“Come on, talk to me.”

The girl, taking a deep breath to contain herself, speaks with all of her strength, still resulting in a whisper “Watch… out… up.”

“Up?” as Tomoe heard her, she turned to see upward, to the darkness that surrounds them.

Up?

“Watch out Tomoe!” Lacus yells, still behind her. With a stream of water, Lacus attacks to her right in a fast move.

Tomoe almost loses equilibrium “What are you thinking?!” she yells.

“I’m thinking this!” Lacus yells as he lights up the water with his Aura, casting light on what he just has attacked: A strange figure, kid-like, with abnormal large arms and legs, and a strange small trunk for a body. The water spear got him right on the head, which is also larger than usual.

In a single instant, Tomoe heard wood making cracking noises as if a strong force was just applied against it. Infusing the water she has with her, Tomoe water tames an attack in all directions, as some sort of whip, covering at three heights around her. She gets seven hits, and body parts hitting her Aura barrier in return.

Suddenly, a yellow light fills the room. Turning to see from where it comes, Bran has just entered, forcing his yellow Aura into casting a stronger light. Taking over the shadows, the room lights up, only to reveal a gruesome scenario: Other four girls were there together, at different parts of the floor. Their bodies bruised, in unnatural positions, blood spilled over the floor, all of them naked. The bodies that Lacus and Tomoe got, all had the same commonalities: large arms and legs, small trunks, unnatural large heads, green skin.

“Seems like the mystery of the kidnapping just solved itself.” Bran says.

“How?” Tomoe says, putting her hands to her mouth.

“Don’t Tomoe… Just, let's focus on her.” Lacus says, pointing towards the dark-skinned girl.

Tomoe looks back at her, seeing tears rolling on her face. She is still trembling, but the expression on her face is one of relief. Taking off her cloak, Tomoe covers the girl and lifts her on her arms. With it, the rain starts to go away.

“But… how…” starts saying Tomoe, while she takes glances of the other dead girls and woman present.

“Looking at her…” Lacus says “Bran, aren’t you thinking the same?”

“Gotta be drugs.” Bran replies.

“Drugs?” says Tomoe, raising her eyebrows.

“The effectiveness of the Aura depends on the mind. If they somehow gave drugs to the girls while they were sleeping, Aura will have trouble engaging.”

“How do you know?”

“The girl in your arms. Look.” Bran points at her. Tomoe, seeing her, realizes the issue at hand, seeing the girl barely being able to stand awake “Probably she is a red Aura, the reason the drug is having such a powerful effect on her. If these little bastards gave it to a yellow Aura they would surely have a lot more problem dealing with her.”

“Since we have rescued her, a great relief has invaded her whole body. Now she is almost unable to stay awake. Probably they gave her a smaller dose of the drug, considering how we found her, maybe to use her as a trap a get more… more women.”

“Goblins…” Lacus adds “that is what they are called. Not native to the Aquamarine state. Read about them a couple of times when I was a kid, barely can remember anything else about them though. I do remember that in the book, it was specified that it was a race that the last king of Aeris, Lionheart, cursed at one point in the past, and they have been with this shape since then.”

“Well, that is more than enough for goblins. Let's get the girl out of here back to the city… and tell Daisy about the bodies here. We don’t want Cinders.” As Tomoe ends saying this, a couple of screams can be overheard, coming from in direction of the central plaza of the city. Some sounds of metal clashing, and a couple of more screams, clearly feminine, are clearly heard, and with them, the sound rain came back.

Tomoe embraced the little girl. As the screams teared up her heart, she bit her lower lip. She could feel how that little peace she had the night before was being ripped apart from her.

Almost no time to rest…

Looking at each other, Bran runs out of the building, with Tomoe and Lacus following suit.