The Lightning Mage

60 | The Last Battle, Part I

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Lyn was settling the last plate of food on the table when a note appeared in front of her.

"Your team member. Cydney Yen. Hill behind your apartment. Emergency."

That message, however simple, was enough to jolt her into action. After almost flipping over the entire dining table, smashing her door to the ground, and knocking over a few neighbors, she arrived at the scene—only for her mind to be inundated with even more questions.

What the hell happened here? The quiet, well-kept hill located behind where she lived was an utter mess. Trees, shrubs, benches, and flowers were ripped off the ground and splattered everywhere as if a hurricane had ravaged the vicinity. The hurricane also seemed to have deposited the strangest assortment of items too, from torn books and broken swords to fishing nets and giant pillows. What in the hell happened here?

Lyn rushed towards a crowd further up the hill, her eyes darting around. A bright yellow tape barricaded the middle of the wreckage, and on the side, Brendan from the QA was talking to a group of people. She was going to approach the serious man until she spotted Raph inside the barricaded area.

"Yo, Raph!" Lyn spun on her heels and marched into the barricade, ignoring any officers who tried to stop her from entering. "Why are you here? What the fuck happened?"

Raph did not reply. His swollen eyes were glued to the ground, lifeless and unmoving. He had been normal during the team meeting, but somehow, in just a few hours, he seemed to have had his soul drained from him.

"Ma'am," the officer standing next to Raph said, "you're not allowed in here—"

"Of course I'm allowed in here, I was called to this scene," Lyn retorted, before turning back to the hunched healer. "Raph, come on, snap out of this. What happened? Where's Cinna?"

The annoying officer spoke again, "We're not fully sure what happened currently, and we're trying to figure the details out—"

"Did Millie do this?" Lyn frowned as she glanced around. Some of the stuff on the ground looked just like the quest items from Millie's storage unit, but why would she ever do this? And how did she do this? Lyn knew that the conjurer had always been powerful, but the sheer amount of conjured matter seemed absolutely insane—Millie had had to have used up every bit of her energy to achieve this.

"Do you mean Millicent Martinez?" the officer offered. "Yes, she probably did. She's now taken over to the emergency room and in good hands now. She would've died if not for Raph over here." He placed a hand on Raph's shoulder in encouragement, but the dark-skinned man remained motionless.

"E- Emergency room?" The two words stabbed straight into Lyn's chest. She suddenly noticed the blood on the floor—two circles of dark red, obscured by the chaos. Dread filled her body, turning her limbs to jelly. What the hell happened here?

Raph finally moved as he rubbed his dry, puffy eyes. The sound that came out of his trembling lips was weak and hoarse. "I don't know, Leon... I don't know if I did enough... When I arrived, it was already..." He covered his face with his hands. "She called me with the emergency gem and I... I still took so long..."

Before Leon and Raph could go on a round of crying and consoling, Lyn raised her voice. "Okay, so where's Cinna? Millie was sent to the emergency room, but what about Cinna? They went out together, they should be together."

"I don't know..."

"What do you mean you don't know? There's- There's two pools of blood right here! Is one of them from Cinna? Was Cinna also injured? Did you also heal her? Was she also sent to the emergency room?"