Illusions

Felix lay on a tree branch and waited for over a minute, but the SI:7 agents did not converge on him as quickly as before. He also knew that his tricks could only buy a little time; by now, the enemy had probably seen through them.

Now, he could only hide here and silently pray for his comrades.

"Lightfinger, Bazil, run! The enemy is coming to arrest us!"

Dudmore sprang up from the ground.

"The enemy? What enemy? The Westbrook Garrison troops haven't withdrawn from the bridge, but-"

"It's SI:7. Damn it, it must have been those adventurers. They reported us to SI:7!" Joseph said through gritted teeth. "Vladimir, you were right. I... I was too soft!"

"Enough. This isn't the time to assign blame," Vladimir said. "Let's pack up our things and retreat east."

"East? But-"

"That's what Felix told us to do too," Joseph added. "He said Shaw didn't bring many men this time, so they can't search that thoroughly. Our only chance of escaping alive is to slip through the gaps in the SI:7 agents' search net in the opposite direction."

-SI:7 was heading west, while the Brotherhood headed east. This would clearly be a "perilous leap."

Everyone immediately began scrambling to pack their things, then prepared to flee east.

Just then, over a hundred soldiers from Westbrook Garrison crossed the Mirror River in force and began searching the eastern bank.

Every soldier held a short torch. The torchlight illuminated their chins, lips, noses, and the bags beneath their eyes from below, while their upper cheeks, the bridges of their noses, and their nostrils remained shrouded in darkness, making them look like demons coming to claim lives.

"Damn it, they've caught up!" someone cried out in alarm.

"Don't panic!" Vladimir gritted his teeth. "If we stay together, they'll spot us easily, and then none of us will escape. Split up and break through. We'll meet in two hours on that little hill ten kilometers east of here. Move quickly. There's no other way."

Everyone scattered like stars across the sky, running east along different routes. Now, they could only silently pray that they would not run straight into an SI:7 agent.

Vladimir ran without stopping, keeping a cautious watch for any movement ahead and around him.

Several times, he heard the rustle of footsteps ahead, frightening him into dropping to the ground and holding his breath, his attention taut, until these agents loyal to the Stormwind Royal Family had walked past him.

He did not know how much time had passed, but he seemed to feel that he was nearly collapsing from exhaustion. Amid this extreme fatigue and weariness, a terrifying hallucination began to take hold of him.

He seemed to see the king driven out and the members of the Stormwind City Council all hanged. There were no more adventurers, no more nobles or lords, while he, Felix, Joseph, and his other brothers rode horses through streets packed with people, surrounded by the laughter of men and women, young and old...

Vladimir shook his head, struggling to drive the hallucination from his mind. Yet after another half hour of trudging onward, another hallucination appeared in his mind.

This time, he seemed to be led to an execution ground alongside Bazil Thredd and the others. The official overseeing the execution loudly announced the Council of Nobles' and the king's decision on their fate, while the Stormwind City soldiers standing nearby drew their swords and approached them. Bazil mustered all his strength to let out one final roar at the soldiers carrying out the execution: "Fools, our cause is just!"...

Vladimir knew this was not real either.

He merely trudged forward automatically on instinct, but those strange thoughts and wild fantasies gnawed at his brain like worms.

He felt as though he were sinking in a desperate struggle, as though he were sinking deeper and deeper into a swamp...

Suddenly, a pair of strong hands pulled him out of all his visions.

Vladimir looked around, his mind finally recovering somewhat. Only then did he notice a dim figure standing beside him.

"Felix, is that you? What's going on? I-"

"Vladimir, come over here. The other brothers are waiting for you. Follow me. We can talk as we walk." Felix pulled Vladimir toward a valley off to the side, where they would be harder to spot.

"You look like you're in bad shape. The other brothers are the same. Good thing it was me here. If it had been those SI:7 agents, you'd definitely have been caught."

A little while later, Vladimir and Felix finally reached the rendezvous point. Dudmore, Lightfinger, Jack, and the others had already been waiting there for some time.

Vladimir studied his brothers closely and found that their complexions looked terrible too. He said, "Friends, I saw a vision. It was as though all our enemies had been defeated, and we-"

Although it was dark, Vladimir still saw the astonishment on Dudmore's and the others' faces, and his words stopped short.

"Don't tell me you also-"

They all nodded. He was not the only one who had seen different visions.

At first, Vladimir had thought he was simply too tired, which was why such unrealistic ideas had entered his mind. But now, it seemed things might not be that simple.

"What's wrong with all of you? What are you doing?" Felix was utterly bewildered. He hated this sort of cryptic behavior more than anything and would much rather everyone speak plainly.

"Felix, all of us saw visions," Vladimir said gravely.

"Some of those visions were wonderful, while others were terrifying," Dudmore added.

"First, I saw us storm into Stormwind City and seize the damned throne. Chairman VanCleef became king, Brother Felix became a grand duke, and we never owed anyone unpaid wages again."

Once Lightfinger finished, Felix could not help correcting this idea, so full of the limitations of a small peasant's outlook: "Lightfinger, the chairman already said he doesn't want to be a king, and I don't want to be a duke either. We want to create a world without nobles-"

Unfortunately, his lengthy speech was interrupted.

"Felix, I saw a vicious witch. She summoned a ferocious tsunami, dozens of meters high, and an overwhelming flood surged toward us. Terrified people fled everywhere, but countless monsters with bones burst out from behind the witch, blotting out the sky..."

Why did this sound more and more outlandish? Why hadn't I seen any of these visions?

Felix pondered for a moment, then reached a preliminary conclusion.