Am I The Villain?

22. They Already Know?!

"So how come you guys don't loot the corpses?" I raised a question after we've killed some dozens more monsters.

"Well, that's because we're already paid in advance. Looting corpse would take too much time." Valens answered with ragged breathing while laying face down on the ground. I'm crouching next to him while preparing healing magic.

We were just ambushed by several Stone Golems. Valens, as usual, got injured while the rest of the party is unscathed. This team mostly fight in pair : Morne with Lillia in the back while Valens go in front with Yuria. Yuria is nimble enough to dodge most attack, but Valens is too slow. You'd think Morne should be at the front tanking all the attack, but surprisingly Morne is mainly a sorcerer, not a warrior. His armor is heavy but he's a wimp.

"Paid in advance by who?" I asked as I cast the healing magic on Valens.

"The Empress, of course. Don't you recognize these emblems?" Yuria chimed in from behind. She is pointing the emblem knitted on her right shoulder. Now that I'm looking at them, all of them has the emblem engraved somewhere on their equipment. Lillia on her left breast, Morne on his kite shield, and Valens on his sword.

"Oh, so you guys aren't normal adventurers? You work for the Empress?" I asked while pulling Valens up.

"Yeah.. We're part of the Empire's Own. It's like the Empress's personal army, although there are less than a hundred of us though." Valens explained to me after he stood upright.

"We're sent by the Empress to monitor Carina until further order." Morne said.

"Can I meet this Empress?" I asked them. I wanted to meet this mythical Empress. Nobody ever said her name, only her title. Could it be that she's one of those immortal ruler I've seen in fantasy stories?

"Probably. We're not planning on going back to the Capital anytime soon, though." Yuria answered my question.

"Well, enough chat. Let's keep going deeper." Valens walked onward while waving his hands toward us, signalling us to get going.

As we walk, Valens told me that their equipment are gifts from the Empress herself. They're quite a big shot in this Empire's Own order apparently. Even though they're always injured after every fight.

A few clicks from us, using the palace view I can see 3 people cornered by a monster. It's not really my problem. I'm just a healer, remember?

"Trouble. People in danger, that way." Lillia suddenly pointed to the direction where I saw the mana are. Hey... she's pretty good.

"Let's go." Valens said with a serious tone as he picked up his pace into a run. The other three are also running following him.

Are we really doing this? 

Haa.. fine~

There, three people cornered into a dead end alleyway by a massive monster. The monster looks like a lizard. It crawls on four elongated limbs that end with sharp claws. Its entire body is covered in dense light blue glass-like scales.

These lizards are pretty tough. They don't have any magic or trump cards, but their physical abilities makes up for it. They can quickly turn their body around in a blink of a second. They fight mainly by swinging their grotesquely long limbs and tail to their victims.

Well, it's not my problem. "Good luck, guys," I waved the four fighters off as I sit on the ledge of the roof above the lizard.

It seems like Lillia and Morne have been preparing their magic on their way here because both of them stayed next to me and pointed their hand and wand at the lizard. From Lillia's wand, a big lightning arc formed and struck the side of the lizard head.