While journeying, Olivia didn’t come to see Andrew anymore but seems like she didn’t take her threats seriously as food and medicines were still being delivered to him. After three days of travelling, nothing seems to be happening on their journey as it has been going well.

Olivia decided to escort them back to some distance away from the capital if possible which was good news to the girls, while Andrew snorted on getting the message without even feeling a bit of appreciation.

Today, the sun was shining brightly as always in the sky, signalling a perfect beginning for a new day. Since no pit stops have been made on the way, they have been edging closer and closer to the capital. It was on this fateful day when everything seems to be going well that Andrew felt constricted. His heart seems unsettled due to its troubled beating. He is now able to walk albeit with the aid of something to lean on, in the form of clutches.

He calls for the attention of Olivia on this day through the girls, on which she comes later that day. He explains the feeling he has been having that day to her, but she doesn’t take it seriously as there wasn’t something she couldn’t handle presently on this road and it was the relatively safest path they have been taking.

No matter how hard Andrew tries to convince her that they should just rest for today and continue their journey the next day, she pays no heed to him, perhaps it was due to the fact that he had mocked her the moment they met and she was being petty about it or it was due to other reasons.

She even mocks Andrew by saying that he doesn’t have any balls and that maybe he was a scared little child who was trying to be mysterious.

Seeing that his words were falling on deaf ears, Andrew stops trying to persuade her and tries preparing himself to be at his optimum best if the danger comes so that he could have a chance to run away. He after all trusts his instincts since it has saved him countless times.

“Acting all mysterious now, huh?”, were the last words Olivia spoke before leaving him to the girls.

Although Olivia behaved as if she didn’t take Andrew’s words to heart, she still made some preparations and strengthened her formation better in the case that something came up. After all, although Andrew was a newcomer to their crew, he has always kept his calm and avoided chatting or being social with any of her troops and even seemed to hate the idea of talking to her but all of a sudden was asking her to make a pit stop when they were just a little distance away from the capital. That seemed unusual in and of itself, she felt like maybe he had set up something on the other road he had suggested for them to take and that was the reason why he had wanted them to stay behind or take another route or maybe he was saying the truth about his instinctual feeling.

The day passed through uneventfully, and if it was calculated according to the time on earth, it would be five in the evening right now. Olivia was starting to fully suspect the intentions of Andrew at this time since nothing had happened as he has initially claimed to happen.

She starts dragging her horse towards the carriage in which Andrew was situated. Andrew was still meditating in silence, although nothing has happened all through that day, his heart didn’t stop feeling weird. The closer they were inching towards the capital, the stronger he felt about the danger which was coming towards them.

Olivia was just about to reach Andrew to question what he had said earlier on, but that was when her expression flickered and she looks towards the side. On the side, there were three miniature mountains which seem to be like dogs sleeping.

As the troops inched closer, an eye opened on one of the mountains, the eyes made Olivia feel awkward. It seems like one of the eyes opening causes a chain reaction as the other eye opened up, same with the other two mountains which had two eyes opening up on each of them.

“Wow, we got some playthings, Cecil, Crave, Melody”, a voice sounds out from the mountains. The voice caused Olivia to shudder, as, from just the voice alone, she could feel the great power emanating just from the voice alone. She couldn’t help but gulp hard and there was nothing like her usual casual attitude now. She was at the epitome of seriousness. But when she sensed around, all she could sense was the three mountain-like beings and an ordinary human. But it was this ordinary human that she sensed that gave her chills. It has been a long she felt this way, even while outside the kingdom, when she was fighting wars, she hadn’t felt like this. She could feel her hair raising.

Andrew who was in the carriage just smiled awkwardly while thinking, ‘I thought everybody was saying this was the safest route. How come did I manage to meet these terrifying existences on the way to the capital? If am probably able to get through this alive, I would get holed up in the capital for a long while. These are too much for my poor life. Maybe my blood pressure would shoot up because of all these recent happenings and I would die’.

Apart from the man, the aura which erupted from the mountainous beings was as dangerous as what he felt from Lauretta but a bit stronger. It was like having nine Lauretta present. Even that was too much for Andrew to handle when he was at his optimum best, and at this moment, he was still recuperating from his injury.

Lucas’ mouth was as wide as saucers at this moment, staring at these beings, he was at a loss for what to do. If the main commanders of this troop were in this state, then little was to be said about the rest of the troops.

It was at this moment that Olivia screamed out an order, “Retreat”. She regretted not having listened to Andrew and pushed forward with her decisions.

Although the troops were scared, the military discipline which has been drilled into them since their entry made them acknowledge orders and thus, they orderly retreated.

This was no little matter if they were to face it head-on. “I didn’t have to wait long to find some playthings for you all. Today is my lucky day I guess. It would be wrong to allow your playthings to get away, so you can go now”, the playful voice sounds out at this moment. Andrew was screaming in his mind, ‘Lucky day for you my ass. This is nothing but lucky, and how can he even call us playthings? Is this guy insane? In fact, it’s your whole household that is a plaything. Your father behaves like a good dog and lets me ride on him’, he didn’t allow any of his thoughts to escape from his head though as he could be killed at any moment by this guy presently in front of him. He was mad at himself for not having fully recovered to run quickly with Marian.

On hearing the man’s orders, the mountainous beings stood up and starts running in the direction of the troops. On seeing the appearance of the mountains, they couldn’t help gulping more forcefully than before. The mountainous beings looked like dogs, well-trained black-coloured dogs. They seem to have been taken from the forest and trained by a human as they were listening to his orders. Olivia on seeing the dogs in pursuit, was about ready to stall them so that her troops could escape but the man’s voice sounds out once again, “Beautiful lady, would you mind holding up for a while. I would love to have a drink with you”. And finally, a man jumps down from one of the dogs and comes into view of everyone. The man looks exactly like someone born into a very rich family and intends to flaunt his wealth.

His clothes were of high quality with every embroidery well made, a white robe was what he adorned with white pants. He wore gold bracelets, necklaces, and rings and even his shoe had some gold mixed on it. Andrew couldn’t help clicking his tongue on the man’s appearance. Even the dogs had golden neck bracelets and although they have been lying down, they were totally neat.

One thing that stood out would be the man’s appearance and a word that was embroidered on his robe. He had curly hair, a fair face, bright brown eyes, a pointed nose and a fairly long chin. There was a tattoo on his left eye in the shape of a star, and his mouth was smeared with red lipstick.

On his robe, what was embroidered was the name ‘Joker’. This was the most handsome and unique man Andrew has ever met. But not everyone thought so as Olivia who was known as the most stubborn and ruthless general even to herself was gasping for breath.

It doesn’t seem like she even had a chance to even go against this man in front of her. Andrew notices this behaviour of her and his eyes form into slits. This seemingly silk pant seems even more dangerous than Edson.

“Kikikikikikikiki”, the young man starts with a laugh, “Nice to meet you, from your looks I guess you are dumbfounded by my beauty”, after which he holds his head as if wallowing in self-pity and at the same time being proud of his handsomeness.

Although he seems this way, Olivia doesn’t even think about trying to disregard him, as although she has only seen his face on posters, his dressing style gave him off. The man presently before them was the most dangerous in the whole of the kingdom. The man who was said to be half-step into the realm of limitless and could perhaps enter into that realm any day.

The top wanted criminal with the mnemonic of ‘the joker’. He has a crazy personality and he couldn’t be predicted at all. At one time he could be laughing and at the next, he could be angry. He has a huge bounty of five hundred million gold coins, making Edson’s bounty look like child's play. The reason for this bounty was due to the fact that he has personally gone to the palace and insulted the king. After which, he had the king beaten, although there seem to be a power behind the kingdom that was in the realm of the limitless, he didn’t care and was able to escape from the palace all safe and hearty.

Although there were few people who knew of this matter, with most of them already slaughtered by the king himself to prevent it from going out, it was still a boon in the heart of the king. Thus, in his anger, the king placed such a huge bounty on him but that wouldn’t do any good as there is currently no one in the kingdom who can hold a candle to him except if the reserve powers of the kingdom were used.

The second the most wanted criminal had a bounty of not even up to twenty million, hence you could understand the level of craziness this man had. Although he was a ruthless slaughterer, he still did most of his stuff on a whim. And this man has appeared before this troop of soldiers and he has even gotten three pet dogs which were found wanting. He was treating the soldiers as playthings for his pets and planned on them killing the soldiers if they felt like it.

Andrew has to be unlucky to meet two maniacs just on his journey towards the capital. Perhaps he would be killed this time around cause there would be no saviour this time around as none of the generals can even fight the joker to a draw. And they were within the kingdom, not even between the boundary of kingdoms where a good samaritan could perhaps lend them a hand. So their lives were in their own hands right now. Their lives or death depends on the mood of the newcomer.