Akari glances over her assembled team, biting her lip with frustration as she considers whether this will be enough. She and Asumi are the first two members for obvious reasons. And while Akari has serious worries about placing Asumi into a combat situation, she doesn't see another option for the moment. The other girl isn't a sentinel. Without an assault state shield, going into combat for the first time is a massive risk.

To mitigate this, Akari took Asumi over to meet with Ratchet. Neither of them was sure if a last resort shield would function for a non-sentinel without any combat experience, but Ratchet suspected that Asumi might gain the same sort of credit buffer sentinels have when first gaining their powers. Either way, the little shield pin clipped to the girl's shirt collar is a weight off of Akari's shoulders. With some luck, they will never have to determine whether or not it will activate.

The other members of the team are a hodgepodge of friends and allies Akari and Serena picked up over the course of their journey. Sadly, none of the heavy hitters like Audrey, Kayne, or the other A Rankers could be extracted from their current assignments without heavy casualties. Although Audrey promised Akari that if her team of weaker sentinels needed to pull out, she would abandon her post anyway to ensure her student's safety. That would result in hundreds, perhaps thousands of civilian and GDF deaths, however.

As such, Akari will just have to deal with what she has. She just wishes that she had the firepower of an A or B Rank sentinel by her side.

Strangely, the leader of Team Firestorm, Troy, was the first to volunteer for the mission. He had just gotten out of the infirmary, and with the rest of his team out on assignment, he was more than willing to help out. He and Serena aren't exactly the best of friends, but he mentioned still owing her an apology.

The next person on the team basically forced his way into the mission. Lucas doesn't have any magic, and after the disaster that was Team Picnic's first incursion, he swore off any further assignments against the Volcora. However, having served as Serena's bodyguard for months now, he just isn't willing to leave her fate up to chance. To be honest, Akari refused him several times at first, but now knowing that someone would literally have to carry Serena through dangerous territory, Lucas was welcomed onto the team to perform the task.

The last member of the team is perhaps the person Akari knows the least about. Hina is a blue sentinel who stands directly next to Lucas and the unconscious Serena and keeps her distance from everyone else. While Akari vaguely remembers seeing her before, she has trouble deciding exactly where. Hina coming to help was some kind of "blue sentinels stick together" type of thing, with Hina coming to ensure Serena's survival. With the number of living blue sentinels continuing to drop precipitously in the last few months, Nightsong called off her previous order and has had all of them stationed at GDF Headquarters to help Calan with medical. The inky-haired girl has mostly been happy to stick with her kind since then. Yet, upon learning about Serena's condition from Calan, she decided to accompany them.

Akari is more than happy to have her along, even if she doesn't know her well. Any blue sentinel is a massive asset to their team, and just knowing that any injuries could be healed away makes everyone feel more confident.

For a moment, Akari simply surveys those standing before her, trying to determine the dynamics of this new impromptu team. Troy stands with a confident air next to Asumi, who currently has golden hair, blazing orange eyes, and tan skin. The young swordsman has been flirting with her relentlessly, and to her surprise, Asumi actually seems interested. Hopefully, that won't cause a problem.

Lucas and Hina are also sticking very close together, the blue sentinel constantly pausing to check Serena's condition and make sure that Felix's time-warping spell is still holding true. Unlike Troy and Asumi, however, all conversation between Lucas and the pale blue sentinel is strictly professional.

Akari sighs, biting her lip. She wishes she could have gotten a green to come as well, but this will have to do. Three sentinels, Asumi, and a single trained soldier. If only Serena held back more of her revival method from Felix, then her life would be considered far more valuable by the GDF as a whole. As it is, with the world falling apart around them, this is all Akari could muster to save the small, magically crippled girl. It will do… it will have to.

If she were willing to wait even one day, she could have assembled a team with far greater power. Nightsong was willing to pull strings to help Serena, but with the GDF and sentinel forces strained to their limits, organizing anything would take time Serena doesn't have. Even just having her own team around her would make her feel far more comfortable going deep into Volcora-controlled territory. However, what if it takes a few days to find the right spot? Or if any number of other things delay them? Ultimately, Akari isn't willing to wait. She'll just have to rely on backup arriving late. If they get an early start now, she's certain that by the time Audrey and her team arrive, they will already know right where to go.

If Akari were Baylee or Audrey, perhaps she might have tried to give some kind of speech or orders to the gathered team. However, she isn't. And when the begged-up transport is ready, she silently climbs on, trusting the others to follow.

The area near where Haruto referenced is heavily wooded, life blooming everywhere around the Shō River and the road that runs up along it. Luckily for the group, their transport is flying high above that road, as the poor maintenance would have made for a bumpy ride. Even so, Akari has to admit that the area is quite beautiful. She just wishes that she could enjoy it.

Akari's stomach feels like it's tied in increasingly tangled knots that only get tighter as time goes on. Knowing that Serena is dying is one thing, but literally seeing her girlfriend lying motionless on one of the transport benches is another. Akari claims the seat right beside Serena and runs her fingers through the other girl's silken hair. It's easy to imagine that her girlfriend is just sleeping, her beautiful features serene in her unconscious state. Yet, the sight of the shimmering blue spell and the black marks rising on her skin paints a different picture, a picture showing Akari's own failure.

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Despite it all, a part of Akari wishes she never took Serena up on her offer to go home with her and escape her nightmare of a life. Despite all of the amazing moments that happened afterward, she can't help but think that Serena would have been better off never knowing her. It was her uncle who tortured and nearly killed her... her uncle who left her a cripple for months. Lately, Serena has been so… broken. The happy little healer girl that Akari knew is lost to the wind, leaving just a hollow echo in her place. And all of it… all of it, is her fault.

Silently, Akari lowers her head, clasping it in her hands. "Some guardian I was… I let her down. I… I don't know if I can fix this."

Liora gently nudges her nose into Akari's side, offering her quiet support.

"I'm not a healer…" Akari continues, letting her thoughts flow to her familiar. "If Serena were healthy, she'd know what to do. Stars, she literally brought me back from the dead. All I know how to do is hurt things… I can't…"

Ever since she saw Serena in this state, Akari has been holding in a dam of emotions. She's cried, yes, but she needed to keep moving. There has always been more to do, people to organize, favors to call in, and tasks to complete. Now… now all she can do is wait. Nothing left to do… no distractions remaining. So, with the loud rumbling of the transport engine as her backdrop, Akari begins to weep.

Even without the noise of the transport, none of the others would have been able to hear Akari cry. With her upbringing, she has long since mastered the art of suffering silently. With her head lowered and her hands covering her face, no one notices the thick tears dripping down to wet Serena's soft hair. The dam holding back Akari's emotions breaks, and she lets all of it out.

Again, Liora presses herself into Akari's side. [We can do this,] she says, sending absolute confidence to her sentinel. [We killed a Mind Flayer, came back from the dead, killed hundreds of Volcora, and helped destroy the Reavers. We can do this, Akari. We'll save her, and then we'll help both Serena and Celeste get better. You're right, neither of them is stable right now. But once we save her, Serena can go right back to healing people. We protect her from the fighting, and… she'll get better. I know it.]

Swallowing roughly, Akari forces herself to nod, to agree. Yes… Serena just needs time. Time to heal others, heal herself, and probably a lot of therapy. Who knew how much of the difference in Serena's mental state before and after Akari's death was caused by her torture? People don't just recover from that without serious help.

However, all of it starts with finding that point of power. And Akari will find it. She doesn't care what rules she breaks or who she has to kill. Although this time, she's going to make sure that she doesn't die herself either. Stars, if she died and Serena survived, this whole thing would just start all over again.

Slowly, Akari begins to catch her breath and steady her heart once more. She returns to stroking Serena's hair and watching out the windows for the abnormally tall trees Haruto mentioned. Into the roar of the engine and the air rushing outside the transport's cabin, Akari whispers her promise.

"I will fix this, Serena… I will help you. I swear it."

"Well, it certainly looks abnormally tall to me," Troy says, standing at the base of a tree so large that all of them together couldn't touch hands if they reached around its trunk.

"Yes," Asumi says, leaning in to get a closer look at one of the strange golden flowers growing in a ring around the tree. The flowers glow with enough light that, even given the late hour, there's easily enough light to see by under the forest canopy.

"Because that's the strange part," Asumi murmurs, smiling serenely as she takes a big sniff of the wonderful floral scent drifting through the air.

Even the sentinels, used to incursion zones and strange phenomena, are awed at the sight of this golden forest. Haruto mentioned that the trees here would be abnormally tall, and so the group spent the majority of their transport ride with their eyes peeled for anything that could be considered as such — even stopping to check out a few false positives. However, when they saw the actual forest, it was as obvious as the dawn.

Glowing golden flowers ground in clusters around trees with bark the color of a sunrise and leaves like delicate fragments of daylight. It isn't that Haruto was wrong about the size of the trees, as they stretch up to heights that would make a redwood blush. Yet, that's somehow the least impressive part of them. This entire place just feels… magical.

If it wasn't for the veritable line of Volcora corpses lying just outside the forest, Akari might have decided that this would be an easy collection mission. Yet, there are C and B rank Volcora lying dead just away from the tree line. Despite having now approached the trees themselves, Akari still can't make out whatever threat killed them. Maybe it has to do with what Haruto told her, about the point of power looking for someone to bond with? Hard to say for sure.

"Stay sharp," Akari snaps at her gawking team members. This place is dangerous, and we have no idea how dangerous."

Asumi straightens at her admonishment, tucking her hands behind her back with a sheepish expression. However, Troy beside her keeps up his cocksure attitude.

Standing with Lucas — who cradles Serena's still form to his chest — Hina nods sharply. "There are many possible futures where we all die in this forest."

This revelation makes Akari swallow nervously, casting a glance toward the stoic Hina. Her powers are among the least understood by the GDF, primarily supporting her team by guiding them away from threats, rather than by directly fighting. From what Akari understands, Serena at her best would have been more than a match for Hina. However, the other girl's dominion art relating to seeing alternate futures makes her almost impossible to kill — likely why Nightsong had even entertained sending a precious blue sentinel on the mission.

"You can lead us around the dangers?" Akari asks, hoping that the living threat detector could live up to her reputation.

Hina frowns a moment, stepping forward deeper into the tree line and picking up a stick colored in streaks of red and gold. Then, casually, she pokes a seemingly random point on the ground. Golden magic immediately surges around the stick like a cloud of shimmering light. Hina lets go of it as it's crushed and flung out of the forest in a rain of sawdust and colorful twigs.

With that, Hina nods to herself and turns back to the group, who are all watching her with a mixture of awe and horror. "Step where I step," she says simply before heading deeper into the tangle.

For a moment, Akari and the others just watch her go before scrambling to move after her and match her steps exactly.

As Akari moves, she is reminded of the first rule of magic. Everything comes with a price, and apparently, this point of power will be no exception. However, that price is something that she can understand. Whether this point of power requires her to pay a cost like Stygian Mana or earn it like Tributary Mana, this is a game Akari has played before. She glances at Lucas, moving in the center of their single-file line and carrying his precious cargo. Yes, this is certainly a game Akari has played before. And she intends to win.

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