Rebirth: The Shadow Of Greed

... "If you weren't so zoned out looking at the bread you would have heard it too!"

"Oh, that's great news Odrunn, at least he knows you're safe."

"Yeah... But I still can't go home though. I'll have to stay a little longer. At least until I made a bit of a name for myself."

Z nodded, he didn't particularly feel the need to dig into Odrunn's past and decided it would be best to just let him be.

After packing up the new Artefacts, Soli hurriedly rushed them to move to the next place, these slowpokes took so long at the first location that they ended up being off schedule.

She had wanted to show them a beautiful cafe where they could sit and enjoy some tea or coffee. To Soli, it meant the world to her, but Z and Odrunn were just oblivious to it. Having a seat in the cafe, Soli ordered 3 coffees for them to drink.

The barista took a while to prepare the coffee and finally served it up to them fresh.

"Go ahead, drink it!"

Odrunn sipped the coffee slowly and savoured the taste, it was bitter, yet it carried a kind of nutty sweet after taste. He looked like he was enjoying it very much.

Z, on the other hand, downed the whole cup in one shot. Putting it back down on the table and looking at Soli.

"Did you just down the whole cup just like that? How do you like it? What did u think of the taste?"

"Taste? Doesn't it just taste of coffee?"

Soli face-palmed her face as she shook her head.

"You! I can't believe this."

Odrunn found the whole thing quite comical and started to snicker.

'Boom', someone dashed through the door full speed.

"I need help! Anyone, please! The church past the slums was attacked! There are people hurt and some of the kids are missing!"

The men shouted as he started to beg for help. The onlookers within the cafe started to look down on the ground. They're just civilians after all.

Z stood up and approached the man,

"What happened?"

"Sir, there was a group of men who entered the church, I was there praying, but they came in after I left. They took some kids and destroyed the church. The sister was hurt too. Sir! Please go help them! Otherwise, the sister will die."

Z turned to look at Soli and Odrunn, Soli gave him a firm nod, telling him to go for it.

"Okay, lead the way to the church."

Odrunn, Soli and Z ran full speed behind the man, passing through the slums, Z noted the atmosphere was different, almost tense, but he had one thought in mind, to rush to the church before it was too late. After rushing out of the slums, Z looked straight at the Church that was in his vision. Thick black smoke rose from the building as some kids were found face down outside of the church. Sister Agatha, weak and drained lay down outside with blood trails seeping from her mouth.

"Why are you here? Young sir, just leave us be, the person who did this is really powerful, don't get involved with this."

Z ran up to her quickly as he checked her for any wounds that might have caused any form of complication. Thankfully, there was only one wound on her abdomen, that one wound that caused severe bleeding. Z immediately put some pressure on the wound, holding it in place.

"Shhh, Sister, stop talking and just try your best to keep awake."

Soli stood at the side, raising her commswatch and contacting her father.

"Yes father, outside the slums. Please get as many men as you can to help these people, bring some healers and anyone that can help out. Thank you, father."

Upon hanging up, she rushed over to Z's side, to check out the situation. Z asked her quickly to take over his position and try to freeze the lacerated wound to try to stop Sister Agatha from losing any more blood.

The kids that were outside that were not unconscious started crying.

"Mister Zero... there... there are still 3 children inside the church they are inside the room on the 2nd floor. They were hiding from the baddies. Please save them!"

The boldest kid cried out, as he saw Z as their last hope.

Z turned and shouted out to Odrunn and pointed in the church. The two of them rushed into the burning church and looked around, the furniture had been destroyed, it looked as if a violent fight had happened within the church. Z clenched his fist as he continued to look for survivors.

Upon reaching the second floor, they both heard soft thuds coming from a closed door. A wooden beam had fallen and had prevented the door from opening. Z immediately raised his hand wanting to yank away the beam with his telekinesis, but a huge shadow had already zoomed past him and had grabbed the smouldering beam tightly, yanking it away from the door and tossing it aside.

Odrunn pulled open the door as three kids ran out and hugged him. Odrunn looked at Z and smiled,

"Lucky we made it quickly huh?"

They immediately picked up the kids and dashed out of the building, laying the kids on the ground outside.

"Odrunn, heal your arms first."

Odrunn gave a blank look before looking down at his arms, they were burnt at different places, splinters were stuck on his arms and they looked like they were tattered. He immediately felt the pain on his arms and started to focus on healing them.

"Your adrenaline kicked in, that's why you couldn't feel any pain. Odrunn, you have to think before you do anything. I was around and I could have used my telekinesis to pull the beam aside, you didn't have to sacrifice your body like that."

Odrunn could only look down on the ground dejectedly.