This mission had to be a succesfull one. Kaden knew this. Perhaps to the military, the sabotage of supply lines and command was a high priority, but to Kaden it was Serin.

If nothing else, Serin would die, but to avoid problems once he returned, the rest had to have some success too at the very least. Still, he wasn’t going to commit suicide while at it.

Kaden had never been to Celadon, but he knew of it. It had been the closest city to Dashire and if they needed something they couldn’t make or acquire themselves, they sent some hunters for a trip there. It wasn’t that far away. Still the way there was going back a bit deeper into Sacronan, but not much.

It wasn’t going to be a problem, though. He was the ruler of the forest area. There probably wasn’t even another high beast anywhere near. It had been a pretty good place for the dumb bird. It had chosen a fringe area, yet not too close to the war zone where humans would have cared about it. Now Kaden had its territory. No beast there would bother him and very few humans should be wandering through. Perhaps some people looking for quick money by collecting beast cores. Other than them, no one would notice him.

With so few hindrances along the way, it would only take a bit over a day or perhaps two. Yet, due to the excitement Kaden felt, he did not hold back and moved with much greater speed than he perhaps should have. Someone might have noticed him rushing through at great speed nor did he rest and spent quite a bit of mana to maintain his speed. Despite this there were no problems. It only took a day instead to get relatively close.

Problems would start near Celadon so at that point he started to get careful. There was no telling how much defenses there would be until he could see it. Nor did he know how to accomplish his goals.

“I assume there is no way I can directly deal any significant damage”, Kaden thought to himself. “There will be higher officers. These should be even later stages of Formation stage or possibly even Condensation stage. I have to do this covertly.”

This already gave Kaden some ideas. Good sabotage could be done with bombs, in other words Formations. He was good enough with them that given time, he could arrange something.

“But the main thing is that I find where that Serin is”, Kaden continued thinking. “It was the mayors manor? It should be easy to find.”

Kaden had just stopped outside of an open area. The city would be easier to defend, if anyone, beasts or people, were easy to see. It wasn’t just the city. There were some farms in the surrounding areas.

Celadon wasn’t even nearly as large as, say Corand, but at the time it seemed quite bustling. There was military presence clearly and openly all around it. More than a few supply caravans were moving out.

Kaden figured, if nothing else, he could bomb the caravans on the road, but that would be only minor damage. As for getting in the city, it wasn’t clear how to do it. Celadon’s walls were ordinary size and Kaden expected he could get over them one way or another, but he could easily see guards patrolling on it. He also expected there to be alarm formations around it.

Kaden was well versed in those. He had examined very high quality ones at Corand. Those were difficult to bypass, but it was unlikely that a close to fringe city like Celadon would have formations of that level, even if it was being used by the military. There was also really no way to see into the city itself until he was able to enter. He would have to see the situation and think of a way to move around unseen once there and deal with any alarms or other problems at that time.

There had been no timeframe for this mission, but Kaden assumed he should not tarry with it too long. Otherwise there the damn nobles would likely question his efficiency or something and demand something more, if he actually returned alive rather than not complete the mission due to being dead. Though, they would likely do so anyway somehow so Kaden didn’t care much. His contribution points would suffer slightly, he assumed.

As such Kaden actually spent a day observing the walls and movements of guards and other such things from a distance. There were a few gaps he could exploit, but he could do so only at night. He spent rest of the that day preparing to enter. These included such things as putting together some temporary formations on himself.

Such formations usually don’t last long, but if you carefully maintain them, they should remain for a few hours. Your own personal mana, not being perfect surface and other such things caused this. Some people would draw formation tattoos, but Kaden was not going to do any of such thing yet. He knew his formations were not good enough to be permanent. For any effect he would want.

To pass through any alarms, they should be enough. They merely dispersed whatever mana his body releases and tries to make it similar to what it outside. Unless Celadon had alarms that monitored spatial distruptions or other such matters, Kaden’s formations should be enough. Such high level alarms were exactly the stuff he didn’t believe would be in place.

Eventually sun went down and it got dark. Only lights inside Celadon were visible, but outside it was pitch black. None of this mattered to Kaden as he prepared to enter. He would leap up and silently float down with his movement ability. By using such method, he could adjust his way down in case there were something just beyond the wall where he simply could not land. What if some soldiers were camped there for their night watch duty? Landing in such spot after all preparations and plans would be rather sad.

What Kaden was looking for was when patrol team would move past the area where he was going to go and that there was no one at Formation stage either. Soon such moment came and Kaden immediately darted forward using his movement technique to the best of his ability. Silence and speed!

Just before thet walls, Kaden leaped upwards and that was likely the only sound he made along the way. He only needed a bit of help with his movement technique to push himself over wall. There were some buildings just next to the wall with lights on and Kaden assumed soldiers were staying in them. He floated past the first ones and landed in some alley. From there he silently moved somewhere more out of sight.

Then he waited and watched. He wanted to see, if his entrance had truly been unnoticed. There was no sign of alarm or anyone coming to check anything.

“Good”, Kaden muttered to himself. “It seems I made it.”

Luckily he was still wearing the civilian clothes. They had got somewhat damaged during the fight with the Sandstorm Hawk, but he had been able to mend them to not be immediately noticeable.

“I better look for some hiding place where I can prepare things”, Kaden thought as he walked along back alleys.

Considering Kaden’s external appearance, he would have hard time being unnoticed, if he didn’t wear a long cloak. Still, he thought he would have to act mostly during night time. This was fine.

Kaden quietly wandered around looking for potential places to stay at. While he did find some acceptable places, none of them were perfect. He decided he would pick one of them only if he didn’t find any better.

He spent hours looking until he noticed sun was starting to come up again. Kaden picked one of the places he had found. It was in the poorer section of the city. Kaden assumed it had probably been used as a storage room for some merchant at some point, but the storefront was dilapidated and clearly been closed for quite some time. Guess the poor people didn’t have much money?

Still, there were signs that people occassinally came there. It was a risky place, but it was good enough for Kaden to hide for the moment.

Kaden needed to confirm the security level in the city somehow. Once sun was finally up, Kaden put on his large cloak and discreetly moved through the backalleys to a good spot to observe.

Military presence was obvious, but was not too big of a problem except at the places where they moved supplies and the command headquarters.

From what Kaden could see, there was near constant stream of supplies coming into the city and then soon after moved out. Condition of the materials was checked, where to send what and such things needed to be done. Everything was stored until that was done. That was a good place to sabotage.

The command HQ was much more difficult. It was Celadon’s city hall that was being used by the military. Kaden had no idea how to get in or whether he should even try to.

There was something that immediately caught Kaden’s notice, though. Not far from the city hall, there was a large manor with its own wall. It looked almost completely abandoned with grass growing freely on its yard, fallen leaves that no one had swept away. Road inside had trash on it.

Kaden could from a distance read the sign next to the main entrance that it was the mayors manor.

“Thats where Serin stays?” Kaden thought. “Does he even live there? It looks to be completely abandoned.”

This was bad! Kaden mainly wanted to kill Serin, but what if he wasn’t even there? What a waste!

Even so, he would carefully look through the manor and see, if he could find where Serin went. Perhaps he could manage some excuse to go look for him. Then again, once he sabotaged Sacronan’s military, he would need to quickly escape.

“Damn it!” Kaden cursed as he took steps back into the alleys.

Then Kaden happened to pass by an area near Celadon’s temple where all the altars to gods were. He had already noticed the place earlier and thought he should arrange some bombs for it too. If he could arrange it, he would get to spit at the gods faces. Maybe he would even get some bonus for it when he returned to Saint Empire?

As he was imagining the temple on fire, he happened to see someone he knew at the stairs leading to the temple. The man was a priest, but had an unkempt beard and his clothes were not in very good condition. His head was down and he was just staring at his feet. This was what Kaden noticed first. Some kind of washed up priest? Then he realized he knew the face behind the beard when he got a better look.

Peil.

The priest who had lived in Dashire! He was still alive? Could it be that some of the villagers had survived with him all the way to Celadon?

Kaden had to speak to him. He had no idea how Peil would react to him, but he still had to speak to him! What if he alerted everyone to his presence? It was dangerous, but he wanted to try.

There was very few soldiers near the temple. Only those that went in to pray to gods or were simply passing by. It seemed like most people felt the temple was holy and one should not cause problems around it.

This was good thing to Kaden. Fewer people to avoid and those who would be there, were likely concentrating on bowing, kneeling and praying in front of altars.

Kaden waited for a good moment and made sure his cloak was well placed. Then he took steps out in the open. Slowly at casual pace that would not attract anyone’s attention, Kaden walked towards Peil.

Peil did not even seem to notice anyone approaching him.

“Peil”, Kaden said.

At this moment Peil shuddered and turned to look at Kaden. He clearly did not recognize Kaden. Yet, he did not say anything and expected Kaden to say what he wanted.

“I would speak with you about Dashire”, Kaden continued.

At that moment Peil’s eyes opened. They were kind of round and he had a haunting face.

“Who… who are you?” Peil asked quietly.

“This is not a good place”, Kaden replied. “Do you have a private place we could speak at.”

“Why would you bring that place up!” Peil said with his voice going up slightly. “All dead… all dead. Why must you torment me!”

Kaden frowned as he noticed Peil getting riled up. He did not want to draw attention. Still, he already had answer to one of his questions. Any survivors? None, it seemed.

“No”, Kaden told him and leaned closer. “There is one survivor. Me. I repeat. A private place?”

Peil shuddered again and looked at Kaden, now having calmed down a bit.

“I don’t know you”, Peil said. “You look strange.”

“Things happened”, Kaden continued and then decided to offer something that would prove his words. “I am Kaden. No one would know that name except those who lived in Dashire. So a private place now?”

Peil was shaking a bit, but then calmed down. “I… I have a small room they gave me at back of the temple.”

Kaden looked at the temple a bit. Last time he had been into a temple to a god was likely Stefinos’s temple, if the altar to God of Lies didn’t count. He felt the temples were disgusting.

“Fine, take me there”, Kaden replied despite his aversion.