Free Web NovelChapter 173: Level 3 Alert!!
Three days had passed since Raiden had gotten a call from John. He even talked to Isadora about what happened. She only said one thing.
"You are a non-combatant registered Battle Master. It is not required for you to take part. Stay at home obediently."
She immediately cut the call after that and never replied to any of his future messages. Any of the people he knew, he tried to call all of them, but they all appeared to be really busy with something, none of them having time.
After that, the atmosphere in the city grew even heavier as even the citizens realised something was wrong. A city-wide holiday was declared in the meantime.
But he was just a simple farm boy. He couldn’t do anything, so he just stayed at home and trained as hard as possible.
After training, Raiden went back inside the house with a frown still lingering on his face, but the moment he stepped through the doorway, he forcefully suppressed it and replaced it with a calmer expression.
There was no point in letting Sylvia see too much worry on his face right now. If he started panicking, she would start panicking too, and then the whole atmosphere of the house would collapse.
Sylvia, however, was not so easily fooled. She was sitting on the couch with Neva curled on her lap while Woolie stood by the window on his hind legs, trying to peek outside like some sort of woollen guard dog. The moment Raiden entered, her silver eyes landed on him sharply.
"What happened?" she asked directly. "And don’t lie to me again."
Raiden clicked his tongue. "You are really losing your cuteness the bigger you get, you know that, right?"
"That means something happened."
"Nope!!"
"Raiden!!"
Raiden stared at her for a moment before letting out a sigh and sitting down across from her. "There really is some kind of disturbance near the borders. The others are trying to handle it. My friend just called to warn me not to head toward the city borders."
Sylvia’s face changed instantly. "A beast attack??"
"I don’t really know, to be honest," Raiden replied, shrugging his shoulders. "But whatever it is, it has already stirred up the wilds. So from now on, you stay inside the house. No wandering outside. No going near the edge of the farm. Just here and watch TV or something, Understood?"
Sylvia frowned a little. "And what about you?"
"What about me?? Do I look like some kind of hero to you?? I am just a Silver Battle Master, what can I even do?? Stare the enemy to death?? I am also staying right here with you for now."
That much, at least, was true.
For now.
Sylvia looked unconvinced, but before she could continue pressing him, a sudden shrill siren rang out from somewhere far away. It was faint at first, almost drowned out by the wind, but then another joined it. Then another. Soon, a low, trembling chorus of alarms began spreading from the direction of the city.
The room went still. fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓
Raiden slowly turned his head toward the window.
The sirens did not stop.
Instead, they grew louder and more frequent until even Woolie lowered himself from the window, and Neva lifted her small body from Sylvia’s lap, her pink eyes curiously fixed in the same direction.
Sylvia stood up at once with an alarmed expression on her face "Brother!! That’s the city emergency alarm."
Raiden’s expression darkened. He knew what that meant, too. The city did not ring those alarms for normal disturbances, and certainly not one after another like this.
A second later, both their phones buzzed once again.
He snatched it up immediately, only to find a message this time, not a call. It was from the city network that all registered people of the city received.
[Emergency Notice: Level 2 Wild Beast Migration Alert has been issued for Verdant Hollow and all surrounding zones. All civilians are advised to remain indoors. All registered Battle Masters below Silver Tier are forbidden from approaching the northern and eastern boundary zones.]
Raiden stared at the screen, his brows knitting together.
"Level 2?" he muttered.
The alerts in the city were divided into five levels, with Level 1 being the weakest and Level 5 being the highest.
That was already bad enough. But what unsettled him more was the phrasing. Migration alert. Not a beast riot, but migration.
That meant numbers, a hell lot of numbers.
Sylvia stepped closer and tried to peek at the message, but Raiden angled the phone away before she could see too much.
"Brother!! What does it say?!"
"It says just the same things as me. Don’t worry about it." Raiden replied. "Some beasts are moving around in larger groups. The Alliance is just being careful."
Sylvia’s eyes narrowed. "You are doing that thing again."
"What thing?"
"That thing where you smile and lie badly."
Raiden touched his face with a finger and felt a little embarrassed. "No way! I have perfected my art of lying. Nobody could detect it."
"I am not nobody. I am your sister. I have known you for 16 years. I know you inside and out. I even know the colour of your underwear and how many holes it has."
Hearing her argument, Raiden felt speechless. Is that something a sister should even know?
Before he could continue the argument, the earth beneath the house gave a very faint shake.
It was not enough to topple anything, nor was it strong enough to make a normal person panic, but everyone inside the room felt it.
The cups on the table gave a tiny clink.
Sylvia’s voice lowered. "Was that an earthquake?"
"Well," Raiden spoke quietly. "I hope it was."
Outside, the wind was getting louder now. Raiden moved toward the front door and opened it. The moment he stepped out onto the porch, the full weight of the afternoon sky pressed down on him.
The horizon had changed.
A dirty haze had begun to rise in the distance, looking like a mixture of smoke and mist. It sat above the wilderness like a living stain, stretching wider and wider the longer he looked. Every few seconds, he could make out fresh flocks of birds bursting out from beneath it and fleeing in panicked swarms.
He heard the door open behind him and knew without looking that Sylvia had ignored his earlier instructions.
"I told you to stay inside."
"And I told you not to lie to me."
Raiden glanced sideways at her and then gave up on arguing for the moment. Both of them stood side by side on the porch, staring into the distance while Ruby remained beneath the banyan tree, now fully awake and watching in total silence.
Aunt Ruby had been asleep for the past three days, trying to regain her strength, but after she woke up again, it meant something bad was coming.
A minute later, another message arrived. frёewebηovel.cѳm
Raiden’s heart sank the moment he saw the red border around this one.
[Emergency Update: Threat level revised. Level 3 Beast Tide Warning. All outer settlements within 50 kilometres of the eastern and northern city boundaries are instructed to evacuate immediately toward designated inner safe zones. Repeat: this is now a Level 3 Beast Tide Warning.]
Life just got a whole lot worse.
