Chapter 80: Tug of War
Though Lisa did know what was actually wrong, she knew that Morden and Darlus absolutely shouldn’t be here. It was just too dangerous at the moment.
If her guess was right, they were talking about the two of them when the flaming lion and the one called Lord Marcus said the two chosen ones.
She wasn’t worried earlier because the two of them weren’t around, but right now they were running straight over.
"Lisa got away from there," Darlus shouted.
The same way she had spotted, they had also seen her standing in the center of a Crossfire. With the pace at which they were moving, the two boys soon managed to arrive at the city gate; right now the only thing blocking their path was the rows of Two-ringed Bearers that didn’t look at all willing to let them through.
"Sorry kids, Lord Marcus’s orders," one of them said to the two boys.
Though Morden had gotten much stronger, he still Knew he was absolutely no match for a Two-ringed, in fact, he even only knew that because he had gotten stronger.
The current scene was the large hoard, the Two-ringed Bearers groups with Lisa in between and then Darlus and Morden on the far back.
Though it wasn’t just Lisa who was in the vicinity of Morden and Darlus; that was the only person they saw.
’What the hell is going on here?’ Morden thought.
Ever since he had left the Old World not too long ago, things had been just confusing for him. He woke up in his spawn room, heard a trumpet, and now they were in a strange impasse.
’Are We just expected to sit here and wait for these guys to just determine our lives?’
The arrival of the two they had been speaking about all along attracted the attention of the two leading figures; they had paused their conversation, and now their eyes were locked on the two.
"Are you really going to hinder us and prevent us from doing our mission?" the flaming lion said with extremely aggressive voice.
It was almost as if having his eyes directly on the price was the final straw needed to break its patience.
"That is not what this is," Marcus said in a calm but tight voice.
"We are trying to protect them, whether they understand that or not."
"Protect us from what?" Morden shouted back, having gotten really impatient.
"You have us completely guarded without our consent."
Nobody answered him right away, and that silence alone told him more than any explanation could have.
The flaming Lion’s golden eyes shifted from Marcus to the two boys standing behind the wall of Bearers, and something about him changed; it was less angry and more calculative.
"Let them decide then," the flaming Lion said suddenly.
"If they are truly the chosen ones, let them choose their own fate instead of hiding behind you like a bunch of Spineless babies."
"That is not how this works, and you know it." Marcus turned sharply toward the Lion, his jaw tightening.
"Then show me how it works," the Lion said, taking one slow step forward, flames curling brighter along its mane.
"Or are you afraid of what they might choose?"
Marcus exhaled through his nose, clearly unhappy, but he didn’t argue further. Instead, he turned to face Morden and Darlus directly with an unreadable expression.
"Fine,"
’This has to be some kind of trick,’ Morden thought, his eyes darting between Marcus and the Lion, trying to find the catch hidden somewhere in all of it.
"Do we actually have a real choice here, or is this just theater?" Darlus leaned in slightly and whispered.
"I don’t know, but I don’t like either option," Morden muttered back.
Morden’s mind raced through everything that had happened since he woke up in the spawn room, the trumpet, the horde, and Lisa standing frozen in the middle of it all. None of it added up to something he could trust, not a single bit.
"No," Morden eventually shouted.
The word came out flat, and for a second nobody seemed to understand what he meant.
"No, to which one," Marcus asked with furrowed brows.
"Both," Morden said, stepping forward until he was standing right at the edge of the Bearer line.
"We’re not going with you, and we’re not going with him either."
The Lion let out a low growl, somewhere between amusement and irritation.
"You would refuse the two of us in the middle of all this."
"I would rather trust myself than either of you," Morden said in a steady voice despite the way his hands had curled into fists at his sides.
"Nobody here has told us anything worth trusting yet."
Darlus glanced at him with a face that showed that he was clearly not expecting that answer, but he didn’t argue against it either. If anything, his shoulders relaxed slightly, like he had been hoping someone would say it first.
"You don’t know what you are saying," Marcus Said
Morden was just about to open his mouth and retort when he was suddenly cut off.
"Morden," a voice shouted.
It was Lisa’s voice, and Morden’s head snapped toward the sound instantly. She had pushed her way through the gap between two of the Bearers, her knives still drawn but her attention completely locked on him and Darlus now.
"Lisa," Darlus breathed out, relief flooding his face for the first time since they’d arrived.
She crossed the distance quickly, positioning herself beside the two of them, and the moment she did, the entire dynamic of the standoff shifted again. Three chosen ones now stood together, facing both the Bearers and the horde beyond them, refusing to be split apart by either side.
"You shouldn’t have come here," Lisa whispered to Morden, though there wasn’t any real anger behind it.
"Neither should you," Morden whispered back.
The Flaming Lion’s patience, whatever thin thread of it had been holding together until now, finally snapped.
"ENOUGH," it roared, the sound tearing through the clearing like thunder, flames erupting higher along its body until the heat alone pushed the nearest Bearers back a step.
The ground beneath its paws scorched black in an instant, and behind it, the horde let out a collective screech that rippled through the treeline like a wave.
"If you will not choose," the flaming Lion snarled, its golden eyes burning brighter than the fire itself.
"Then I will choose for you."