New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

And that was aside from the incident with the Themiscan diplomat's execution.

Things had been going as planned until a group of exfiltrators invaded the palace on the morning of his execution, trying to get him out.

They had teleported almost directly inside the cell block and surprised the few guards around it. The cell was open in a matter of seconds, and they were working on freeing the man.

But before they could finish their job and get out of dodge, a thick blue barrier enveloped the palace, and they couldn't teleport out anymore. The origin of the barrier was still unknown to most, and they assumed it was a palace defence measure.

But Phoenix knew who had put this in place. Only one person in the palace was powerful enough to drop a barrier of this magnitude instantly.

She had tried coming in contact with him, to ask him why and thank him, but Aravelle was nowhere to be found.

In the end, the infiltrators realized they would fail their mission and decided to incinerate themselves, along with the diplomat, with a magic fire that consumed them almost instantly, leaving nothing but ashes behind.

Phoenix had contacted Themiscus, asking for an explanation, but the council swore they were in no way related to the incident. The Head Matriarch even offered to dig into the matter on her end to see if someone had disobeyed her orders.

But Phoenix didn't want this incident to spread out or take up more of their time. She refused the offer, stating that justice had been served, regardless.

Coral had learned that her assailant had been burned alive, and even though it wasn't in a suffering way, she felt a wave of relief wash over her. It was finally over.

She could stop thinking about the what-ifs now that the man was gone.

This had still prompted a wave of improvements to their palace security; Phoenix was highly disappointed that people had just waltzed into their homes as they belonged. Many people were scolded, although none were punished.

The newly formed mage regiment of Stellar Woodlands, or The Magi Mantle, as Commander Dilya Naemenor had named them, did a thorough pass through the entire palace, warding every wall, floor tile, ceiling crevice, potted plant and what not, so that it was impenetrable from outside means.

It took them days, many inspections, and testing runs; Dilya even requested Aberon, who had finally come out of his hidey-hole, to try to teleport in. But they had succeeded.

Aberon even congratulated the young woman, impressed with her astuteness and perseverance. Few mages weren't conceited to the point of trusting their magic immediately.

Most mages who warded their abodes did so and didn't test if the wards worked. They were overly confident in their skills, and it often caused unwanted results or surprise visits.

But even with this, Phoenix had received an unwanted visit the following week from her old 'pal' Blue Peacock, who still moused her way into the palace to question the queen.

Their talk had been short, as Blue was curious if they had caught a glimpse of the infiltrators' clothes. She wanted to conduct her own investigation on the matter.

She had promised Phoenix to make this fast and find the culprit, even though the queen didn't want her to investigate.

"What kind of shadow organization would I run if I let my allies get invaded by another one and did nothing?" she had replied before vanishing.

Just thinking about this made Phoenix's head hurt.

"Trouble just keeps pilling up since he's gone. I thought he was the one attracting them, but I'm starting to wonder. Am I the trouble magnet?" she mumbled as she studied the contract in her hands.

"Gabe," Phoenix called out.

The door to her office opened, and a young human walked in, decked in the Royal Guards' full plate armour.

"Yes, Your Highness?"

Phoenix sighed.

"You can call me Phoenix when you are in my office. Don't stay formal all the time."

"I'm sorry, Queen Phoenix. What can I do for you?"

Phoenix grimaced.

'At least he used my name…'

"I would like you to fetch this person for me. Goes by the name Strix. A male Demonoid. Bring him here, please."

The guard slapped his chest with his fist and bowed.

"I will have the guards fetch him, Queen Phoenix. Is that all?"

Phoenix mentally clicked her tongue, remembering that the young man, along with the other three guards that comprised her security detail around the clock, never left her alone.

It was annoying, but Rodney had insisted strongly .

"No. Just this," she answered, waving him away.

The young man backed out of the room before closing the doors.

She could already hear him barking orders at the other nearby guards, making her chuckle.

Since he had been assigned as security detail, he technically outranked the other Royal Guards, and it caused discontent in some of them. Rodney even had to intervene at some point.

The other guards, with a longer record and more experience, hated getting ordered around by a young upstart. But a quick beating later, and respect was established in the ranks.

Gabe and his teammates were put in their position because they were strong but also highly adaptable. They were some of the few Natives that had spent enough time around the Abnormals to start emulating some of their more eccentric battle tactics.

Although it was dangerous for Natives to fight like the Abnormals since they were not immortal like them, Gabe and his two teammates had found ways to emulate some of these tactics without putting their lives at as much risk.

This always put the other Natives in a weird position, and fighting them was almost always a lost cause. Rodney had picked them specifically for this reason.

*Sigh*

"I wonder how much longer I need to do all this alone. I kind of understand his disdain for it now. It gets boring real fast…" she muttered.

'When are you coming back, Alex?' he wondered, feeling her heart squeeze.