MHA Fantasy Quest for the SOL

Part 18: The Fishing Village

The plague shook all of them. They had never experienced the destruction of a village because of them before. At first no one said anything, but finally Denki broke the silence. "I... never thought the Dark Lord was really chasing us on purpose... I just... why...? We're just a bunch of nobodies." "Speak for yourself, idiot," Bakugo said. "Well, but why would he care?" Momo said. "I mean, he's never cared about us before." "I could see why he would want to eliminate a Paladin..." Shoto said, thoughtlessly. Momo winced. Deku felt sure it had nothing to do with them. "It's all my fault," he said. "Somehow, every magical creature knows about us, even the evil ones. And they are all after the party. It's because of my quest." "You don't know that for sure," Momo said. "People don't always return from looking for the 8th. When you think about it, this could have happened to anyone who came close to finding him. We would never have heard about it." "I guess..." Deku wasn't convinced.                                                                                                                        "Do you think..." Kyoka spoke. "That makes us responsible for all that. All those people who... and anyone else who might... you know..." "No way, it's not our fault!" Ei said. "It's not like we asked for those monsters to come after us." "Or did we?" Kyoka said dully. "By bringing that map into a village?" "Then, we shouldn't go into any more villages," Shoto said. "It's too risky. We'll keep away from inhabited areas." "I feel so bad..." Mina said. "And it's not even my quest." Ochako sighed, "I feel the same."                                                                                                                              Camie tilted her head.                                                                                                                                                                "You guys are all taking this too far. Sure, we're being targeted, so? Like the Dark Lord is already taking territory away piece by piece? Like he hasn't already killed or enslaved or impoverished thousands of people over the land. Like in all the terrible stuff he's done in the past 20 years alone is somehow him not caring, and now suddenly he does because of 10 misfits with a map? That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard."                                                                                      She crossed her arms.                                                                                                                                                          "You all want to know what to think about what just happened? I'll tell you what to think: Start thinking that the Dark Lord may actually be just a little bit uneasy about us finding the 8th, that he might just be starting to take this quest seriously. That if he's trying this hard to stop us, we must really be onto something that could hurt him. If you all don't get that, you must be pretty dang dumb."                                                                                                                                                                   Now she pointed at them dramatically.                                                                                                                "You should be proud that you've gotten far enough to be considered a threat. All these attacks are just proof of that. If you don't stop talking like you're the one bringing a blight on the land by trying to fix it, that I'm going to knock some sense into y'all myself. Bakugo will help me."               Bakugo nodded.                                                                                                                                               "Furthermore," Camie seemed to be in fine form.                                                                                             "My whole tribe is counting on you. Are you all dreaming? Has it not occurred to you that if you fail, we're next? All of us? Did you forget why you came to begin with? I know I didn't, and personally, all these disasters are just making me even angrier. I can't wait to find that sword and use it to whip the Dark Lord's tail back into the pit he crawled out of. Don't you all start wimping out on me now! I was counting on you!"