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[b][u]Abatheo:
En route to the Guild:[/u][/b]

The day had been long, and the trek back to Abatheo from Thaum more exhausting then any of the Pride had expected. Despite their entire adventure within Thaum, from the minute they had received the mission to hunt for and exterminate a mysterious monster known as the Dream Eater involved them being asleep, none felt rested and energetic. All in fact felt more lethargic then before, and disturbed by the ominous news left behind them in their waking. 

The video they had seen of Dr. Dream, hovering around their sleeping bodies, promising to meet them all again in the future, with a new and improved, much more powerful Dream Eater… Estelle didn’t know how to respond to that. Her thoughts flitted back to the rest of the adventures she had had with her friends since meeting them back at Tabul, and the enemies they had all encountered… and the ones whom got away. The two neko thieves from Fenaru, Java and Lyja. Members of the Hawthorne Family they had fought within Vandrell who had all vanished when Tiberius and his men had arrived and searched the manor, finding no one bar Lucifer and Oren’s deceased body behind. And the events in Paraisos… the man whom tried to kidnap her and sell her and Josette into slavery, as well as try and kidnap Selan… Estelle had learnt his name was Neil Hunter. He too was still out there, walking free. As was the band of mercenaries working for the noble, Dumont, who called themselves the Suits.

Too many loose ends… the Pride had managed to stop them all, but those battles were far from over yet. And Dr. Dream and the Dream Eater… they were still out. Still out there to plague the dreams of the innocent, to steal their hope and happiness and grow more frighteningly powerful from it. The cases of people suffering from apathy… the Pride might have halted and slowed them down, for a spell. But it wasn’t truly over.

“It’ll be alright, Estelle,” Marcus said, putting his hand on his partner’s shoulder. “We’ll place a report of everything that’s happened in with the Guild, and they’ll forward it on to the Artar Empire’s authorities as well. Dr. Dream will be a hunted man, and he’ll be found and stopped sooner or later, I’m sure.”

It didn’t entirely ease her, however. The nightmares she and her friends had suffered… what the Dream Eater had done to them, she didn’t think those nightmares would ever go away, at least not for a long, long time. And they would keep coming back, until [i]she[/i] was sure Dr. Dream was no longer a menace. It frustrated her. She wanted to chase him, to hunt him down and put a stop to him, no matter where he might hide. But there were no clues to go on, at least none that they could find within his lab. Any information or data that might have been gleamed had been sabotaged. There was nothing left. 

And even then, she and her friends had an important mission of their own to carry out. To deliver the sealed letter Largo had entrusted to her in the last moments before his death to Clockwork Town’s two missing Guild Leaders; Rize and Kara. On and on they would go, following the trail they had left behind using whatever information they could from the Guilds they passed, and the secretaries that worked there. But she couldn’t be sure if they were ever getting any closer, if even going in the right way. Rize and Kara had been missing for nearly a year now… would their search ever end?

“MAN THIS WALK IS TIRING!” Don moaned loudly, as his feet trailed one step at a time up the hill towards the Guild. They had missed the last tram. “I can’t wait to get to the Guild and get some food… ugh… but that was some mission, huh?” Don suddenly perked up, throwing his body onto Atlas and Lute, pulling them in close. “You bros were pretty awesome! Sorry for the, er… suspicion earlier,” Don looked to Atlas, and then turning to Lute- “And, er… sorry for smacking you with that blobfish a hundred times.”

A smile formed on Estelle’s lips. Despite the uneasy worry that mission had caused… with friends like these it would be easier to ignore and forget what had happened. 

And she couldn’t wait to have a shower and some dinner, either.