Dragon's Wrath: The Cursed Returnee

Ethan and Ian decided to stop ten kilometers away from the dungeon because the perimeter formed around the dungeon was five kilometers away from them. The place wasn\'t anything like Ethan had seen before. Although he saw hundreds of mages bombarding demons in the past, seeing hundreds of tanks firing at the monsters that were constantly leaving the dungeon looked even more insane.

"It looks like they managed to make the monsters retreat," Ian said while looking around and seeing some signs of a fight around them. "However, the number of monsters isn\'t decreasing."

"I see… tell me exactly what you see around you."

"I can see and sense a lot of remnants of mana attacks in this area," Ian said. "A lot of destruction caused by magic attacks. Craters, burned ground, and some pieces of distorted metal around. Speaking of which, the monsters that are leaving the dungeon are creatures without bodies. What is that called again? Ghost armor? Anyway, those creatures are invisible, but their equipment can be seen, which is a full plate armor and a long sword."

"Ghost Armor, huh… this might be bad."

"How so?" Ethan asked.

"As you can see, they are ghost-type monsters, so they can\'t feel pain, and the only way to kill them is by destroying their visible parts like the armor and sword. So, once that happens, there isn\'t much left to be used. They don\'t leave magic stones behind, either. Against this type of opponent, you spend a lot of resources and time to kill a single, but you can\'t gain anything back to compensate for it."

For Ethan, who, no matter what could gain coins and buy magic items with them, such a monster wasn\'t a problem. However, he could imagine how dreadful things could get for Ghana if the situation wasn\'t solved as fast as possible. For the better or worse, the world depends a lot on resources and technology, and the current Earth is becoming even more proficient at using things like magic stones. So, if a country doesn\'t get its hands on those and spends too many resources on these kinds of monsters… they will stay behind, technologically and militarily speaking since the summoned heroes also have use for the magic stones.

"Apparently, only the military is working at night to keep the monsters at bay," Ian said. "The mercenaries and heroes are resting in some tents spread around the area, and I wonder how they can sleep while things are this noisy."

"Well, even people like us need to sleep, so I would bet that they will resume their actions after sunrise. Unfortunately, I didn\'t find anyone from the area that is related in some way to Emily\'s father. I can try to check with other departments, but I fear that it will take a while. We mostly keep an eye on other worlds, after all."

"Don\'t worry. We will manage to find her," Ethan said. "When that happens, we will contact you back."

"All right, just make sure not to do anything reckless."

After that, the call ended, and Ethan saw Ian smirking. That was annoying, so Ethan fired some Ice Arrows at his feet. He didn\'t aim to cause damage, only to make the idiot stop, so it was fine.

"Trying to look reliable for your big sis?" Ian asked.

"No, I just noticed that I don\'t have to worry too much about this," Ethan said. "If things go south, you will be the one who will suffer more, after all. So, I will be as reckless as I want."

"That seems interesting, so show me what you have in mind," Ian said.

Ethan sighed. For better or, worse, few things could actually surprise and scare Ian. Regardless, following Ethan\'s lead, they headed toward the tents. In the end, they had no real reason to hide if they had come to help. Although they couldn\'t reveal their identities, there are many ways to avoid that kind of thing. First of all, Ethan noticed that some jeeps appeared now and then. Some of them belonged to the military, but some didn\'t. That was a sign that mercenaries were still joining the battle. Ethan wanted to use that in their favor.

As expected, some heavily armed soldiers were guarding the area around the tents. They pointed their weapons at the two suspicious individuals that appeared on foot. However, they relaxed a little when they saw that those two didn\'t have any weapons with them… such a mistake.

"Who are you?" A soldier raised his voice and asked.

"We are mercenaries," Ethan said. "Our boss was called by a friend of hers to help with this situation. However, since we were on vacation, we arrived after her."

"Boss? What is her name?" The soldier asked.

Ethan wasn\'t quite sure if using Emily\'s name would be a good idea. She was smart, so she probably used an alias. Still, Ethan had no idea which name she had chosen. Hopefully, things proceeded the way he wanted. The very moment the guards questioned him and Ian, Ethan used Mana Tracking. He managed to find Emily\'s presence in the tents. She obviously noticed that since she soon appeared alongside a tall, middle-aged man who had light brown hair and green eyes.

"… What are you two doing here?" Emily asked after a long sigh.

"We can\'t leave a friend alone, right Ethan?" Ian asked.

"Two idiots can\'t leave another idiot by herself," Ethan said.

"Don\'t call me an idiot, and just answer my question," Emily said.

"There is no need to feel embarrassed," Ethan said. "I am an idiot by proxy for becoming friends with two idiots. If you can\'t understand that your actions were stupid, then you are worse than an idiot. As for this guy here… Well, you already know that this is probably the head behind all this."

"So what? Did you come here to condemn me?" Emily asked.

"I said that what you did was stupid," Ethan replied. "I didn\'t say that you made a mistake. Anyway, tell them that we are here to help you. It has been a long day, and I am tired."

Emily relaxed a little when she heard that, but then she also felt troubled since she didn\'t expect that she would be find out too soon and Ethan and Ian would be the ones who would come after her. In the end, she also felt a bit embarrassed and happy. Emily never thought too much about it, but she realized at that moment she had made two good friends. They were idiots but birds of a feather…