Under Her Cursed Scythe

She looked up at Victoria with unflinching eyes and steadily shook her head.

"I knew it." said Victoria and motioned everyone to walk away from Alivia. Then, she stared at her bow and slid her finger across it just like before, after which a flaming arrow appeared on the arrow rest once again. However, instead of aiming towards Alivia's head or her chest, Victoria released the arrow towards the sky without hesitation.

At first, Alivia was curious why Victoria had done that and why all the other cloaked people had hidden themselves and their injured companions behind the trees and bushes. But when she tipped her head upwards, she understood why.

High above the air, the single arrow split into thousands of gleaming arrows and once Victoria's index finger dropped, they descended towards Alivia's direction in high speed like a meteor shower, causing many tiny holes that were still blazing with fire, to appear on the concrete ground and the place was draped in a veil of smoke.

No normal human would have survived under this hail of arrows but Alivia managed to haul herself off the ground with the remaining energy in her and hobble a few steps forward to grab hold of the scythe, before Victoria's command was executed. And when the arrows eventually "rained" on her, she raised her scythe skyward and spun it against them which turned them into gold dust the instant they touched the shiny surface of the blade. However, she noticed that the other cloaked people didn't come out of their hiding places or attacked her after the arrows were destroyed.

The golden particles that splashed over her shoulder began to coalesced with each other and when they were gradually returning to their original forms, Victoria, with her eyes locked onto Alivia, raised her hand and the particles that had already formed into arrows immediately floated from the ground and started to chase after Alivia tightly like seeker arrows.

While she twisted back and forth, blocking the arrows' attacks with her scythe, Alivia's eyes frantically scouted for a spot that could be out of Victoria's sight. That was when she was reminded of the unfinished building in the middle of the construction site.

Without hesitation, Alivia glided towards the entrance of the building and once she had reached a dark corner under the stairs on the ground floor where Victoria could not see from her distance, as expected, the arrows that were pursuing her, stopped, turned around and left her side!

She heard sounds of murmuring and the thug of shoes along the dank path at first. Subsequently, she heard Victoria's voice, "Agent 129, fly up there, to the rooftop. We need to prevent that Witch from escaping from there. Agent 203's injured but her Familiars can accompany you, so take them with you! Agent 507 and 106, you two get into the building and search it. I will be out here, stand guarding, just in case the Witch comes out."

With the instructions spoken out, sounds of the dull thud of footsteps evolved into thumping, splashing, rapid ones.

Alivia stood up at once in hearing of those words, gripped onto her scythe and returned to her fighting posture, knowing that the two cloaked people coming into the building could jumped out at her anytime.

Fortunately, the two figures surprisingly passed by her and went straight up the stairs, unable to acknowledge her presence because her dark coloured outfit had blended into the shadow under the stairs perfectly.

Alivia's shoulder slumped for a second but soon, her guard was up again when a sound of heavy breathing ran into her ears. Someone was nearby!

Stealthily, she looked out of the window on her right hand side. She didn't see which cloaked person was exactly outside the window but she could see shadows on the ground.

From the shadows, she noted that someone had unfolded her cloak, spreading the two sides like a bird spreading its wings as her pace developed into a brisk trot. The shadow of that person got smaller and smaller and the sounds of her trotting were dying away as if her feet had left the ground.

When Alivia looked out of the window on her other side, skyward, she saw two spirit-like beings-a man with a bottom of hairy legs and hoofs of a goat, and a short, squat creature with corals growing out from the sides of its head and skin with the colour of a clear, blue sea-floating in the air and gradually ascending as they paddled, scuttled and "swam" along with the person who was seen clapping her pair of dark blue feathery wings rhythmically towards the dark sky.

'What exactly are they?' Alivia pondered. Her curiosity, though short-lived, was aroused once more.

After making sure there was no one up ahead or behind the wall, she was about to stick her neck out of one of the windows but she immediately sat back down when suddenly…*Schhwaff, schhwaff, schhwaff!

She could hear the sounds of arrows flashing by in high speed The hair on the back of her neck bristled in an instant and cold sweat emerged on her forehead as she quickly slid back down.

'Phew! That's was close!' She thought. In the meantime…

"LOOK BEFORE YOU LEAP! How many times should I tell you that, you moron?" Her mother's voice snaked through her memory.

Then, when the sounds of the arrows died away too. Instead of rashly putting her head out like last time, she gingerly peeked from the window, overlooking as well as scoping her surroundings.

At the edge of her vision, she spotted Victoria's lonely figure that was edging towards her direction and an idea occurred to her.

The arrows will be the only things standing in my way when the effect of their spells wears off. Alivia figured while she locked her eyes tightly on Victoria, observing her behaviours. She requires full attention when she controls those arrows. If I can sneak up on her... A sly smile curled her lips.

After deliberate thought, Alivia stood up again like a tireless warrior and paced towards the closest exit of the building.