Civilization Chronicles: Rise of the Divine Creator

”Brock Anders! Stand down!” Someone suddenly called out, grabbing everyone’s attention, especially Christina’s as she recognized this young voice.

Being addressed so rudely, Commander Anders’ expression turned even grimmer as he turned and shouted, ”Do not overstep your authority, Captain! Remember, you serve here under my command, not the other way around!”

”Regarding military matters, I have no issue following your orders, Commander Anders, but this is a matter of international diplomacy, so I must insist,” Landon Darr declared as he hopped over from the opposite vessel.

The young prince then immediately turned to the silver-haired girl he had met half-a-month ago and saluted, ”My apologies, Princess Christina, had I known you were present, I would have greeted you sooner and ensured you were shown the appropriate respect.”

Christina’s face remained stoic as she returned the salute, ”There’s no need for that, Your Highness. This is all just a small misunderstanding.”

As the two young royals from opposing kingdoms greeted one another, whispers began spreading amongst the soldiers.

Both sides knew that a royal was among their respective ranks, but they never expected to randomly run into other royals in what was essentially the middle of nowhere.

With the pleasantries out of the way, Prince Landon turned to his commanding officer and announced, ”Princess Christina has been declared her a special state guest by Crown Princess Talia, and has even been granted a Favour Token by her.”

Upon hearing that Christina possessed a Favour Token, which as its name suggested entitled her to one favour within Talia Darr’s ability to grant, Commander Anders reluctantly backed down. He was still bitter about allowing Rockwell Kingdom soldiers to interfere in his work, but he knew better than to publicly oppose the Crown Princess.

That being said, he was still the highest-ranking officer present from either country, so there were certain things he wasn’t willing to let drop.

Shifting his gaze to the cowering little girl, Brock Anders asked bluntly, ”Who is she, then? Don’t tell me she’s also a princess.”

Ignoring the obvious sarcasm in the Martial Initiate’s voice, Christina answered succinctly, ”She’s a survivor from the village. We found her hiding in the nearby forest after the attack.”

Gasps went up from the Darr Kingdom’s side, and Brock, Lani, and Landon all became much more interested in the shivering little girl than they were a moment ago.

A survivor!

That meant this little girl was a witness to what happened, the first one any of them had come across in the past half-year.

Suddenly being to focus of everyone’s attention, Elly shivered even harder.

Noticing this, Captain Lani from the Darr Kingdom’s side tried her best to put on a friendly smile and wave to her, ”It’s alright. Don’t be afraid.”

Predictably, Elly only recoiled further, hiding behind Christina as best she could.

Captain Lani Jess could only smile awkwardly at this.

On the other hand, Commander Anders’ expression remained hard as he declared in an uncompromising tone, ”Since that’s the case, she comes with us.”

Christina’s expression dropped when she heard this and she bluntly refused, ”No. Elly stays with me.”

”She’s a citizen of the Darr Kingdom!” Commander Anders snarled, ”What right does a Rockwell Do... do you have to take her with you?”

Immediately, both Christina and Lana frowned, knowing that while Commander Anders was annoying and aggressive, he had a point.

”Now now, Commander. Let’s not be too hasty,” Lani stepped in at that moment, trying to calm the situation down again, ”Clearly this little girl has become attached to Princess Christina. It would be counterproductive to try to take her with us by force.”

”I agree,” Prince Landon nodded, ”Our two kingdoms are currently cooperating on this matter, so it does not matter who takes custody of this little girl... for now.”

”Of course,” Landon continued, shifting his gaze back to Christina, ”That is only if the information she possesses is shared between both parties.”

Exchanging a glance with Captain Gage, Christina nodded, finding the proposal acceptable, ”Very well.”

”I don’t trust them,” Commander Anders continued to argue, ”How do we know they won’t extract everything she knows and then just lie to us?”

Christina was getting rather fed up with this man and was tempted to pull out Talia’s Favour Token to end this discussion, but she knew that would be extremely wasteful and childish, so she forced herself to compromise, ”If it will alleviate your suspicions, you are more than welcome to accompany us back to Misty City and take part in Elly’s... questioning.”

Elly clearly didn’t like that idea and vigorously shook her head, latching onto Christina as she quietly stuttered, ”D-D-Don’t let them take m-me...”

Something’s wrong, Christina thought to herself, now regretting bringing Elly with her to this hostile environment, but it was too late for second-guessing now. The best thing she could do was to end this back-and-forth as quickly as possible so she could relieve the pressure the scared little girl was feeling.

To that end, Christina proposed, ”If we set sail now, and the wind holds, we can reach Misty City within 3 days. What say you?”

Captain Lani and Prince Landon both nodded, neither of them having any objections to this plan.

Even Commander Anders seemed to be satisfied with this idea, though he still added, ”Fine, but we’ll need to make a stop at Sabre Point along the way so I can send a message back to the army’s headquarters.”

Christina quickly reviewed the map her Master had forced her to memorize and recalled that Sabre Point was a rather large town situated on a deep-water cove a little to the south of their current position.

It was a strategic location due to its topography which allowed multiple large ships to closely approach the Darr Kingdom’s shores.

Over the decades since the last great war, Sabre Point had been fortified into a rather robust stronghold, and had even expanded its naval facilities to include a rather productive shipyard.

Lana was also familiar with Sabre Point, as well as the fact that it was just half-a-day’s journey from where they were. Since it was on the way, she didn’t mind them stopping there for the night and nodded, ”Very well.”

”Hmph,” Commander Anders snorted before turning around and leaping off the deck, back to his ship, rocking the Rockwell Kingdom vessel quite seriously in the process.

Captain Lani, who seemed to be used to apologizing for her gruff commanding officer, bowed her head every so slightly before ordering the rest of the Darr Kingdom forces to withdraw.

As the Darr soldiers were filing back across the gangplank, some of them looking relieved that a fight hadn’t broken out, some of them looking disappointed, Christina turned to her fellow royal and nodded, ”Thank you for your assistance, Your Highness.”

Waving his hand casually, Landon simply stated, ”I did what was in the best interest of both our nations. Nothing more.”

And with that, he too saluted and took his leave.

Watching the retreating back of the enemy nation’s prince, Christina couldn’t help wondering to herself, Does he not like me for some reason? He was much friendlier with Lucas.

Shrugging her shoulders in the next instant, Christina turned her attention to the little girl who was still clinging tightly to her and said in as gentle a voice as possible, ”I’m sorry you had to go through that. Are you alright, Elly?”

However, instead of receiving a proper response, all Christina got from the Elly was her repeating the same line over and over again, ”Don’t let them take me... don’t let them take me... don’t let them take me...”

Now, Christina was really starting to become worried.

This was clearly more than just Elly not wanting to go with the people from the Darr Kingdom, or not wanting to be separated from Christina.

Something more was going on here.

Worried about the little girl, Christina turned to Captain Gage and requested permission to go below, permission she quickly received.

In any case, their patrol mission was now cancelled, so there was no need for Christina to remain on duty.

As a matter of fact, Lana considered taking care of Elly to be their top priority as she was their only clue to identifying who these mysterious attackers were.