Everyone around froze when they saw the stones strike an invisible barrier.
The black-clad man watching from a distance to gather intelligence narrowed his eyes as well.
"What kind of ability is this? Could it be..." As though something had occurred to him, his pupils contracted involuntarily.
Inside the Manor, the children, already startled by the commotion outside, stared timidly toward the entrance.
A wave of uncertainty rose in their hearts.
"Irene, are we going to be driven out?" a girl who had only recently been taken in asked anxiously, hugging her knees.
"No, Aiki and the others will protect us!" Irene stood up and declared firmly.
"That's right! Aiki, Elsa, and the others are all so nice. They'd never abandon us!" A girl in a snow-white princess dress clutched her teddy bear and shouted through her tears, as though doing so could banish the unease in her heart.
"I don't want to leave. I don't want to go back to those dark days hiding in the sewers. Here, we have the tasty food Elsa makes, the playground the Holy Light Clerics built, and the pretty Celestial Pearl Girl." The more she spoke, the harder she cried. She had finally found somewhere to belong, yet now a whole crowd wanted to drive them away. Her two neatly tied black ponytails trembled with her sobs.
Seeing the girl weep, the other children remembered their own past lives and grew sorrowful as well.
Just then, Aiki emerged from deeper inside the villa with the newly arrived Holy Light Cleric Squad.
"Captain Aiki, things don't seem to be going too well here!" a newly arrived Holy Light Cleric said to Aiki, frowning at the crying girls.
Aiki paid no attention to his new companion's words for the moment. He was bewildered. *Elsa went