Before the sun completely rose, the hunters were dismissed to start the plan of taking back the island from the B-type wraiths. The island wasn’t that huge, but the hunters having the disadvantage in numbers against the orcs would take longer to complete their duty. The captains of the five teams agreed to take one area at a time to preserve energy, and manpower, and to avoid as many casualties as possible.

“We’ll start in the east and begin the raid at night. It’s best to subjugate the eastern part since it has the smallest shore. Then we’ll move to the north, west, and south. It’ll take us 4 days at least, depending on the enemy’s numbers. Some monsters will flee for sure, so we are going to set traps on the shores and in the forests. Hunters from the five teams will be sent to patrol the waters around the island and the nearby islands. Now we are good to go. Any questions?” The hunters remained quiet as a sign of agreement. For the first day, they travelled to the southern part of the island under the dwindling sunlight and set up a camp in a cave Calix spotted near the outer part of the forest. Inside, the hunters, mostly heralds, prepared food and some others set traps, such as bear traps and landmines near the shore. All while avoiding the sight of tower guards.

Kino was quiet the whole time, bothered by what had happened that morning. He played with the bracelet on his palm while sitting on a log. His heightened instinct eventually smelled a familiar scent, and strands of flaming red hair lingered at the side of his eyes. “Hey, moon head. The food is ready,” it was that annoying nickname again. Solar sat beside him and offered him a bowl of soup containing sliced hotdogs, beans, and coconut milk. For the whole day, she was busy helping Parker and the other hunters in setting up the tents and traps on the way. At noon, she volunteered to prepare food using combustion energy.

“Thanks.” Kino immediately closed his palm to hide the bracelet and took the small bowl. He was assigned to prepare food, but there were a lot of volunteers already, so he decided to just sit back and sharpen his tactical knife.

Solar sipped on her soup in a loud manner causing him to take notice. “That’s so good!” She exclaimed. “I haven’t had a proper meal since last night!”

After some time, all the hunters gathered at the cave and sat down on logs to share the prepared food. They were careful not to speak in loud volumes but instead shared stories in whispers as they enjoyed their meal. But not everyone can help it, so from time to time, the captains have to remind them to tone it down.

Members of the Parker Team sat around together.

“I’ll be taking over the family restaurant once I finish uni,” Aran mentioned.

“A restaurant? Do you give out hunter's discounts, though?” Calix smirked and raised an eyebrow.

The latter gave him a poker face. “Nope, we do not.”

“C’mon! How about a teammate?”

“For the ninth time, I’ll wrap tape around that mouth of yours if you can’t keep your voice down, Aiken.” Parker threatened from his circle with the other captains, mentioning his subordinate’s last name for the second time that day. Calix “zipped” his lips and sat properly, like a misbehaving student getting lectured by his teacher.

That didn’t stop the guy as he continued talking to Aran in a quieter voice. “We’ll be happy to go there. Is everyone free next week?”

Julius and Ellis nodded their heads.

“I can arrange my schedule. But it’s my sister’s birthday this Saturday. I gotta get her a present first. I’m just waiting for my paycheck.” Julius was playing with a small ball made of energy floating in his palm.

“Well, I miss my dog.” Ellis took out a cigarette and lit it by pointing it at Julius’ energy ball. The man’s sleepy eyes went to Solar. He took out his cigarette pack and offered it to the girl. Solar’s eyes sparkled.

“Thanks.” She lit up the stick by flicking combustion energy in her fingers.

“You smoke?” It was a surprise for Kino.

He remembered a certain female classmate. Why does every girl I know turn out to be a smoker?

“Sometimes. Do you?” Solar offered her cigarette cluelessly.

“T-Thanks, but I don’t.”

“You should try at least once,” Ellis crossed his arms.

“Not interested.”

“Lame. It’s not that bad, you know.” Solar intimidated.

He looked at everyone’s faces. Their eyes are full of expectation. Kino sighed in defeat. He took Solar’s stick and tried to puff, only to end up coughing with a short series of breaths. The group giggled in amusement, avoiding to receive another scold from the captain, who was keenly watching like an eagle from afar.

“How was it? Amazing, right?” Asked the grinning red-haired girl.

“Horrible.”

“I-Is there something wrong?”

An hour before the invasion, Kino took a leak somewhere. When he returned, he noticed Solar having a usual argument with Parker. The blonde captain left after seeing him and returned to the captains’ area under an old mango tree. Solar frustratedly sighed as she took a sip from her tumbler bottle. “It’s nothing.”

“You fought with Sir Parker again?”

She almost spat her drink, then harshly wiped her lips with the back of her hand and looked at Kino bewilderingly. “‘Sir Parker?’”

Kino shrugged his shoulders. “He saved my life once so I call him with honorifics.”

Solar nodded with pouting lips, not in the mood to argue anymore. “Okay! Understandable.”

“Did something happen?”

Solar closed her bottle and returned it inside her black duffle bag. “Just the usual argument. He saw me passing you a smoke. Do you have asthma? Why didn’t you tell us?”

“I-I had a record but not anymore! Don’t worry!”

Solar chuckled. “Yeah, that’s why he got mad. He can’t afford to lose another hunter over petty things. I’m sorry about that, moonhead!” She hit him by the shoulders. It was hard and painful.

Does she really have to hit me that hard?

Everyone knew the deaths of hunters weren't a joke, making the association desperate to recruit as many people as possible. He wasn’t allowed to die over a ridiculous thing like asthma. It made him wonder how many hunters Parker Team had lost in raids over the years.

“That stupid Parker had asthma too, yet he smokes like a chimney. So why is he freaking out like that? That annoying four-eyed dictator.” Solar continued grumbling.

“Have you known each other for a long time?”

“You didn’t know yet, huh?” She smirked. “You wouldn’t believe it but our families are great friends. We are a clan of ergo-heralds and his family are dealers, we were also seen as… close friends in their eyes.” She cringed at the last word.

Kino awkwardly laughed. “Do you consider him a ‘close friend,’ though?”

The girl’s face crumbled. “No.” She answered straight up. “Even when we were younger, he was never nice to me. The only people who treated me well were his parents and big brother, and that’s probably because he’s adopted.” She joked.

Kino was about to ask more when Calix interrupted to tell them about an upcoming word from Maxi and another captain named Norman. After the final briefing, a total of fifty wraith hunters finally began their real objective on the island.

As soon as each of the teams formed five large folds, they seized a 9-meter area (295 ft.) of the eastern portion of the island. The hunters began the ambush against the orcs. The plan caught the wraiths unaware. The hunters successfully swept off the part of the village that was turned into their nest. It was all chaos. The smell of blood and gunpowder lingered in the air. Fortunately, most blood didn’t come from the hunters, thanks to their planned attack.

“We found humans!” A hunter from Leon Team exclaimed from one of the village houses. Plenty of civilians were rescued. All were women and children.

“They must be serving an H-type boss, having kept humans like this. Investigate the whole area for anyone suspicious.” Parker commands.

The hunters freed the tied civilians while a portion of them volunteered to bring the rescued to the island’s port to meet the rescue team. Parker Team and Maxi Team teamed up to investigate the destroyed village houses in hopes of tracking an H-type wraith that could be the boss behind everything.

“This is hard. We all know H-type wraiths look identical to humans, right? With today’s technology, there should be a way to know when someone is a wraith or isn’t in an instant.” Julius says. Kino’s heart thumped out of nervousness.

The sun was already rising. Solar snapped her fingers to turn off the flame in her hands. The hunters went inside a huge 2-story building that had all the familiar attributes of a school. Everything from the outside to the inside was destroyed by the ambush.

“Well, the door in the headquarters can detect wraiths. Right, Kino?” Kino jumped in surprise when Calix mentioned his name and hurriedly nodded his head.

“Y-Yeah. That door was very effective. I-I hope we can have some sort of a wraith gun detector or something…”

“Speaking of. Miss Maxi is part of the Wraith Innovators Team. She mentioned they’re already working on a similar thing that detects a person’s DNA and cores and automatically kills them too.” An enforcer from the Maxi Team joined the conversation.

“W-What if the gun makes an error?” Calix widened his eyes.

“That’s why they’re taking so long to manufacture the damn thing. It should be a hundred percent perfect to not accidentally kill someone. There’s no taking that back.”

Once that gun gets invented and distributed, I’ll be dead… and everyone else. Kino’s eyes flew to his bracelet.

“That would be a huge advantage for humans. We can’t make every person we meet wash their hair and pop their eyeballs,” Solar rolled her eyes. “Hold on, I hear someone coming.” She raised her pointer finger. The enforcers pointed their guns as they heard footsteps from upstairs.

It’s just Captain Parker.

The said captain stepped down the wooden stairs with his head bowing down, his height not enough from the collapsed ceiling.

“All clear. No signs of anyone. Everyone move out and start setting a camp in the woods.”