Chapter 144: The Attack Squad
The man’s hand began to snake around to the woman’s ass, and the woman slapped it away.
"Behave yourself."
The man smiled mischievously.
"Come on, we haven’t done it in a while."
The woman looked around to make sure no one was looking before she quickly leaned over and kissed the man on the edge of his mouth.
"Come to my tent tonight and we’ll have fun. We’re too exposed right now."
The man released a low chuckle before they both separated when they saw another phantom moving past them. They nodded to their colleague, and the colleague nodded back. They stood in silence for a few seconds before the woman got back to the subject at hand while glancing towards the leader’s tent once more.
"Do you think he found the princess?"
The man shrugged while scratching his chin. Both the man and woman were members of a feline race known as the Fevra that existed more than a hundred-dimensional leaps away from Earth. They had yellow striped skin and tigerlike features that made them look very dangerous.
The man spoke after thinking for a few seconds.
"If he came back without results, then it’ll be his head. Alpha doesn’t take well to failure."
As far as the leader was concerned, it was better if you simply died on a mission than for you to come back without proper results. And if you dared to run away from a mission because you failed, then that would be even worse. The leader’s shadow abilities allowed her not only to travel through the shadows, but she could also use it to find anyone who possessed the same shadow-walking ability. It didn’t matter where you were or where you ran off to, Alpha would find you easily, and she would kill you without fail.
The woman nodded along to the man’s statement as they turned back to watching over the feeding hounds, but it wasn’t long before Alpha’s tent flapped open, and Alpha walked out with a blank look on her face. The lizard-based phantom that had been spying on Jason’s apartment walked out after her and went to join the other phantoms standing at the side. The phantoms that were sitting around the fire all stood to their feet as they turned to regard her, and she glanced over all of them with critical eyes before she pointed to five specific phantoms.
"You five, come."
That was all she said before she turned around and entered back into the tent. The five phantoms followed after her, and they entered the large tent to see Alpha taking a seat behind a round table. The tent was dimly lit with a lantern at the side, and there were maps and bags of coins that they had stolen from their previous missions piled on the opposite side of the tent. Alpha was looking through a map on her table, and the five phantoms all came around and sat on the floor opposite Alpha.
Each of them had a different biological makeup, but they all possessed a significant amount of experience in carrying out stealth missions. From what the lizard-based phantom told Alpha, Earth was a world filled with millions of superhumans, and there were many of them located around the city where the princess was currently hiding. If the phantoms tried to carry out a direct attack to extract the princess, then they would end up alerting the other superhumans to what was going on.
The best course of action was to carry out a stealth mission with three to five of their best members. These members would go in and extract the princess while making sure they were quick enough not to be ambushed by the other superhumans. The lizard-based phantom told Alpha that there were Magical Beasts as well as one other human in the building with the princess, but none of them were above low-level B Rank, so they didn’t have to worry about them putting up a major fight..
The five phantoms in front of Alpha now were between high C Rank to high B Rank, with the strongest one of them being close to breaking into the A Rank. If she sent them to handle things, then she was sure there wouldn’t be any issues!
Alpha looked up from the map that she had been reading and looked over the five assembled phantoms. The map was something the lizard-based phantom created when he was still on Earth, and it was meant to show them the shortest path to take to reach the princess quickly. Alpha turned the map around to let them see it and then she spoke.
"The princess has been found, and her location is two cities down from the closest Dimensional Tear. You five will make your way through the Dimensional Tear here and travel through the shadow across the city to capture her. Take only your essentials with you. Weapons, smoke screens, and daggers. If there are any obstructions, then deal with them according to your discretion. If anyone gets in your way, ensure they cannot run to call for more help. Do you understand?"
The five phantoms nodded, and Alpha thought for a few seconds before she spoke again.
"Yulyv, you’ll lead this mission."
Yulyv was one of the younger phantoms. He had a head of white hair, and his face was completely flat with no nose. His eyes were slanted and sharp, and this gave him a dangerous look that would strike fear into anyone who saw him. Yulyv hailed from a world of desert wanderers who harvested spices and rare metal fragments from the sand and dust around them. He had been on an expedition to deliver a cargo of rare metals when he was attacked and almost killed by an enemy convoy. It was only due to the fact that Alpha and the other phantoms had been tasked with killing the enemy convoy that he managed to live, and after they saved his life, he joined them.
His thin frame and high agility were something he inherited from his people, and it gave him an insane advantage in all stealth situations and allowed him to creep through the most difficult situations without alerting a single soul. Due to his age and the fact that he was only a new member of the phantoms, he had never been given a leadership role before. But Alpha recognized his ability, and since he was growing so quickly, she knew that he could become one of the most useful members of their group, so she decided to use this opportunity to test him.
Yulyv nodded in acceptance of the mission, and Alpha looked to the other four there to see what their reactions would be. Two of them didn’t look like they had any issues following the orders of someone younger than them, but the other two had complicated expressions on their faces. It was obvious that they were not completely in agreement with Alpha’s decision, but they were wise enough not to say anything about it. They simply nodded to Alpha as well, and Alpha turned back to the map and began giving them their instructions.
It was up to Yulyv to decide how he would handle any insubordination from those he was leading, and Alpha would find out whether or not he was worthy of having more leadership roles based on how this one goes.