The Devil Of Probability-Chapter 60: Resoruceful

The flight was shorter than Simon had anticipated. It took less than an hour for them to reach their first location, Vermont. They planned to search this state, along with four others.

Those four were New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. That was not their destination as of right now, however. Right now, they were in Burlington.

Although the city wasn’t familiar to Simon, this was technically Earth. It wouldn’t take him long before he found his way around these states. The rest of his group was quietly searching for any signs of the Root of Beginnings.

(Roro, do you sense anything over there?)

Roro, who was still inside New York, gave Simon an inconspicuous feeling. Alina had implanted a chip in Roro that allowed him to sense different spiritual energies five times better than Simon could.

This would put his spiritual recognition up with an Integrated Signator. With this, it didn’t take him long to sense Saber. The feeling that Roro transferred to Simon had many notes to it.

There was curiosity, understanding, but most importantly — fear. He could sense how strong she was, and Simon commanded him to avoid the area for now.

However, he did take note of how close the spiritual presence was. The presence wasn’t human, so he immediately concluded:

(This must be the entity from before. The one Leo spotted.)

He told Roro to keep his distance. After all, if the bird was spotted, his cover would be blown from both sides. With this aside, Simon stepped out of the plane, walking with the rest of the group.

"Okay, we need to split up," Evelyn said.

There were fourteen members in total, seven from Simon’s squad and seven from Alina’s squad. Thus, it wasn’t quite hard to figure out how to split among themselves.

Naturally, everyone would go with their healers. This meant Simon would be with Alina, while the others would be stuck with theirs. Simon was not fond of the idea, but he didn’t hate it either.

Maybe he would let her in on a few things, seeing how this would be how they explored for a couple of months. Their first location was an old church.

It was drenched in blood from both the rain and dead Hollow Beasts. Its contents housed many animals, big or small. From elephants to rats, their guts filled the floors, making the seats invisible unless you stood upon them.

Each of their faces was painted in terror — giving the illusion of what they feared when facing Rin Sato. Even with Alina, who was usually stoic, Simon could notice a shiver run down her spine.

"Simon, what are your true intentions with Elliot?"

Simon paused. It wasn’t an unusual question, seeing as they were accomplices, but he was not expecting it to come out this suddenly.

"I have to kill him."

"...Have to? I see."

Whether Simon knew she understood the meaning behind his words or not, they continued to search the place. There wasn’t anything of use; the most they found were unused batteries from kids’ toys.

The two of them left the church and began to walk to their next location. Simon was not paying attention to most of this; he didn’t believe in luck.

There were fifty states and hundreds of countries, leading him to believe it was impossible to find the Root of Beginnings on their first day.

Most of his attention was put into Alina’s words, and Roro, who was currently tracking Saber.

For the most part, Alina stayed quiet, occasionally staring at Simon. It was as if she was trying to pry something out of his mind — if that was possible.

Simon had gotten used to this; he didn’t bother protesting because he would prefer this over being stuck with the rest of the group.

Alina understood his intellect, and when he chose to use it, and when he didn’t. This is why in the Hollow World, he preferred the quiet. It allowed him to focus, to focus on every critical decision and vector at hand.

Right now, that decision-making was getting put to the test. From the connection he had with Roro, he could sense that something was watching the raven.

(That entity... There’s no way it hasn’t detected Roro by now with how strong his presence must be.)

With this thought, he commanded the raven to retreat further. He didn’t want to spook Saber, so he made sure to keep his distance. For now, he told the bird to search for a safe spot for the squad to make a base.

With a nod, Roro complied, and Simon went on his way to South Burlington. Like most of the last city, there was little to be discovered. At most, he would find scraps that Alina could make useful for him.

(At least I can rely on her to be competent.)

As Simon thought this, he picked up a lone wolf. He carried it over to Alina, the body falling with a wet splat.

"Can this be useful to us?"

Alina bent down, inspecting the wolf’s features for a few moments. It had a large crescent moon marking on its head and snow-white fur. She opened the wolf’s mouth, discovering the moonlit fangs.

"Yes. The fangs could be a useful countermeasure against Sun-Based Hollow Beasts."

Simon nodded before pulling out his daggers. He carefully carved the fangs out, making sure he didn’t nip anything important. The veins in them would still need to be connected to get the source of their power.

He stuffed these into his pockets before suddenly pausing. Roro suddenly called out, even though no one else could hear it, Simon could hear his calls.

Simon swiftly moved behind a building, and Alina followed. She seemed confused, but her face showed confidence in his plans.

"What is it?"

"There’s an entity near us."

"Near us? What do you mean?"

"It’s running towards us..."

Simon told Roro to follow, and the bird complied without a second thought. However, what was running towards them wasn’t Saber. The presence was much deadlier, carrying a sense of impending death.

In just a few moments, this new entity had come into Vermont. When Simon got up to see what exactly it was, there was nothing there. He could sense it was in front of him, yet what stood in front of him was air.

(What is this?)