《The carnomancer》 The departure This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.Meanwhile Adimir''s parents and master were discussing the young boy as he left. "Your son is absurd you know that?" Kurumu told the parents. The formation of a new team Soon enough however the lingering stench of burnt hair and flesh brought him back from the dangerously addicting feeling, as he gagged from the putrid smell. Scrunching up his nose he started walking down the dirt road with renewed vigor. He had been walking for most of the day now and would soon be arriving at the town. Surely enough soon the town gates were looming up on the edges of his sight. In front of it, over two dozen people of varying ethnicities and species could be seen waiting in line to gain access to the town. Looking back towards the gate and the wall attached to it he could tell it was made from solid materials. The gate itself was over 20 feet tall and made entirely of oak wood and had steel rivets holding it together. The wall, on the other hand, was a full 5 feet taller than the gate and was made entirely out of a rough grey cobblestone. On either side of the gate built into the wall were archers¡¯ parapets with several guards with longbows watching the crowd. "Hey kid eyes up here." A gruff voice suddenly sounded out. Startled Adimir looked up to see that while he was busying himself with watching the defenses of the town the line continued to move on without him until it was his turn. The man who called out to him was a red-haired human and a large one at that. He was at least 6''10" tall, and even though his light blue gambeson armor you could tell he had a very muscular frame. His uniform was, for the most part was blue. That included both his gambeson pants and shirt, and he had a pair of leather gloves and a leather helmet. Excitedly he pulled out a slip of paper written by his mom with instructions for where the local adventurers guild was located. He then began to follow the instructions to the letter to where he''d begin his new career as an adventurer. ****** Two hours had already passed, and he still has yet to find the guild. Adimir was now dejectedly sitting on the front steps of what was a probably now-closed shop. It seemed even in an entirely new world he wouldn''t be able to escape his infernal curse of having no sense of direction. In his previous life unless he had someone to help guide him around, he''d always get lost. So understandably he became extremely reliant upon his phone when he lived in Houston. But this wasn''t no city. It was only a town, yet he still got lost despite having written instructions on where to go. Clenching his hands into fists he swore to create a GPS spell to help guide him around, so he doesn''t get lost. A pair of bare scale-covered legs appeared within his vision, and Adimir looked up to see a reptaurian clad in half-plate armor looking down at him. Adimir then began walking between the alleyway between two buildings, and sure enough, when he arrived on the other side there was a street filled with armed people who were coming in and out of the building he was sitting behind not too long ago. And as if to throw salt onto the wound there was even a hanging sign above the doorway with the words ¡°Kentoria adventurers guild¡± written above it. Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.When the wind crashed into him it managed to push him back a full 3 inches before it finally overwhelmed him and knocked him off balance. Seizing this chance Adimir scrambled to get another 15 feet of distance between them before he began to prepare his next spell. By now the orc warrior had gotten readjusted and was charging towards him while yelling out a wordless battle cry. The hellhounds Adimir examined the weapons and couldn''t help but agree. The two blades had numerous chips and cracks running through them and probably wouldn''t last more than a couple of swipes and stabs before being completely useless. Tauna''s mace was most likely in a similar condition, and her shield was destroyed. But that all just attested to how difficult of an opponent the ogre was, and what a miracle it was that they not only survived but slew it. ************************************************************************************************************* A while later after they had exited the adventurer''s guild the trio arrived in the market and were scoping out a weapons shop to buy some new goods at. "Anyone spot anything yet?" Adimir asked while looking around. There were dozens of people in the market area and with them all being 2-3 feet taller than Adimir it could be a bit difficult at times to spot any of the shop''s signs. Thankfully though he wasn''t alone. Upon spotting the two girls with broken and deformed weapons a smile lit up his face. "Hello, dear customers! Welcome to Eldred''s weapon crafts! My name is Eldred, and I''m the owner of this here shop. We buy scrap metal like those broken weapons of yours for cheap, and also sell good quality weapons at fair prices. First-time customers will even get a 15% discount on their first purchases!" The dwarf said pitching in practiced salesman talk. Eldred took a moment to examine it before announcing a price. "I''ll pay you 40 copper coins for the short sword and dagger, and 20 for the mace." He offered. The hellhounds Adimir examined the weapons and couldn''t help but agree. The two blades had numerous chips and cracks running through them and probably wouldn''t last more than a couple of swipes and stabs before being completely useless. Tauna''s mace was most likely in a similar condition, and her shield was destroyed. But that all just attested to how difficult of an opponent the ogre was, and what a miracle it was that they not only survived but slew it. ************************************************************************************************************* A while later after they had exited the adventurer''s guild the trio arrived in the market and were scoping out a weapons shop to buy some new goods at. "Anyone spot anything yet?" Adimir asked while looking around. There were dozens of people in the market area and with them all being 2-3 feet taller than Adimir it could be a bit difficult at times to spot any of the shop''s signs. Thankfully though he wasn''t alone. Upon spotting the two girls with broken and deformed weapons a smile lit up his face. "Hello, dear customers! Welcome to Eldred''s weapon crafts! My name is Eldred, and I''m the owner of this here shop. We buy scrap metal like those broken weapons of yours for cheap, and also sell good quality weapons at fair prices. First-time customers will even get a 15% discount on their first purchases!" The dwarf said pitching in practiced salesman talk. Eldred took a moment to examine it before announcing a price. "I''ll pay you 40 copper coins for the short sword and dagger, and 20 for the mace." He offered. The caravan job The sound of someone banging on his door woke Adimir from his sleep. Groggily he got up from his bed and looked towards the door in mild irritation. Who on Rokna could be knocking out at this hour? "Come on Adimir get up! It''s already the middle of the day!" The familiar voice of a certain annoying girl yelled. Oh. It wasn''t morning he realized. He probably stayed up way too late working on editing the pigeon. "Just wait one moment! I''m getting dressed!" Adimir yelled back. He spared a glance towards the pigeon on the dresser. It hadn''t changed much from outward appearances, but on the inside (which is what truly counts) he''s made drastic changes. Back on earth, there was an immense amount of research being put into synthetic spider silk to use for biology purposes, such as repairing tendons, nerve cells, and replacing one''s own flesh. So Adimir took inspiration from that to redesign the cellular structure of the tendons in the bird''s body into a similar one as spider silk. Seeing as how silk in the first place was made up of generally the same types of amino acids as the collagen in tendons this wasn''t much of a problem. Upgrading the tendons in the bird took a few hours to do, but that was not all he had to do. If you scaled up one thing in the body, you''d naturally have to increase other things to keep a balance in the body to avoid harming it. He then had to spend 10 hours on redesigning the muscle cellular structures of the rest of the body to be able to keep up with the improved tendons. And then to strengthen the bones to keep up with the newer stronger bones he had to resort to luring another pigeon into his grasp and using carnomancy to use its bones to reinforce the bones of the first pigeon. There were two problems that one probably thinks of when it comes to doing this. The first is whether or not carnomancy could actually manipulate bones. But a lesser-known fact is that bones are actually made of calcified cells, and so are made up of protein as well. So, all he needed to do was decalcify it and then mold it around the other pigeon''s bones and calcify it again. Of course, this was a lengthy process and he had to resuscitate the pigeon several times while turning off its sense of pain to prevent the body from making any involuntary movements that could interfere with the process. The next problem is the extra weight of the bones, but with the redesigned muscles and tendons the strength they had was several times greater despite being the same amount, so it wasn''t a problem, and the overall result was the average looking pigeon sleeping on the dresser. It would need some time to recover from the surgery, so he had no choice but to let it rest for a few days at the very least. After finishing getting dressed and putting on his mage cloak Adimir opened the door to his room to find Tauna waiting for him decked out in her full armor. "Finally, you¡¯re out! You look tired did you sleep well?" She asked with concern tinting her voice as she knelt down and placed a hand on his head to take his temperature. Adimir pushed her hand away with a huff. "I didn''t get much sleep last night. Also, why are you taking my temperature? You do that for a cold not lack sleep." He replied "Oh really? Well, you never know you might be sick too! Did you get any nightmares from that fight with the ogre?" Adimir looked at her incredulously from her question. Certainly, such a monster could give a person nightmares, but he wasn''t so weak-willed to lose sleep over a monster. Not over an ogre at the very least. "Nightmares? No way, I''m not a child. Come on let''s go. I''m guessing Mira is waiting for us downstairs." Adimir said before fetching his things, put his pigeon in his bag, and marching down the hallway without waiting for a reply. Tauna shook her head and followed after him. Upon arriving at the ground floor, the tantalizing smell of various roasted meats and stews filled Adimir''s nose. This caused his stomach to release a starved growl. Tauna giggled and patted his head. "Don''t worry, we''ll get some food to feed the beast." She said as she started walking ahead of him to a table a lone figure was sitting at. Following her lead, Adimir went and took a seat at one of the three chairs that were set up there. The figure was, in fact, Mira who flashed him a dazzling smile when she saw him. "Good morning. I hope you don''t mind but we already ordered food. I hope you don''t mind eating beef roast." She said you him. On the center of the table was a large plate with a slab of juicy beef roast placed upon it, with various seasonings sprinkled over the top of it. "I don''t mind at all. Actually, I''m grateful for you already ordering. I haven''t eaten breakfast yet, so I''m famished." Adimir replied while taking a knife and cutting off a slab of meat from the roast and placing it onto a smaller plate that was set in front of him. He cut off a piece of the slab and took a bite as the scrumptious juices of the meat flooded his mouth. "So, what''s our game plan for the day?" He asked looking expectantly at Mira. "Well, I was thinking that we should head on over to the guild and take a look at the quests that are available." Was her reply. "We should definitely consider taking a caravan guarding quest. Today there''s a larger caravan than usual that''ll be heading that''s too much for the typical caravan guards to protect. They''ll definitely be hiring adventurers for decent pay.¡± Tauna said while chewing her food with her mouth open. Adimir scrunched up his face in disgust at her poor table manners and pointed his fork at her. "You shouldn''t talk when your mouth is full." He scolded her. "Sorry sorry. I''ll make sure I do that next time." She replied with a shameless grin. "Tauna''s terrible table manners aside her suggestions, not a bad idea. It would also be a good way to get some more experience with dealing with monsters for you Adimir. But for now, we should wait to see what''s available to make any final decisions on what to do." Mira added on. "Good idea." Adimir replied, as Tauna nodded her agreement. ************************************************************************************************************* Ten or so minutes of eating later the three bid their farewell to Paul before heading over to the adventurer¡¯s guild. They were now reading the quest board for available quests. "We could go on another Goblin subjugation quest?" Adimir suggested. "No way. After that ogre, I don''t want to ever want to take another goblin subjugation quest. Besides it only pays 80 copper coins." Tauna vehemently refused. "Well, there''s still the caravan guarding quest. 1 silver per person for every day the caravan is traveling is a good amount of pay. And the quest says that it¡¯s a journey of five days so that''s five silver each of us. It''s also the quest you suggested we take." Adimir pointed out another quest. "Hmm. 1 silver per person is a bit worrying. It might mean that the caravan is bigger than they''ve been letting on." Mira countered. "Why would that be a bad thing? Safety in numbers, right?" He asked. In his mind, it made sense to travel in larger groups if there were monsters in the world that could randomly attack at any time. "Because once a group of people gets too large monsters will sometimes attack together regardless of species to get a chance at the fresh food that people are to them. It can get especially nasty if it''s for a trip that lasts longer than a day and it becomes a night out like this quest Then you have to worry about all sorts of nocturnal creatures who like to take advantage of the number of people to stir up some chaos. So, there is a point in which there are too many people. It''s even harder on the guards too since they''re in charge of protecting everyone." Mira answered with a scowl on her face. "Well, I wouldn''t mind having a lot of enemies to fight! If we do well, we could get a raise, couldn''t we?" Tauna interjected. Adimir nodded in agreement. "I for once agree with Tauna. We can also use it as a chance to get stronger as well as get our teams name out there." He said confidently. Mira took a moment to weigh the options before relenting. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. "Alright fine I agree. But if we die don''t blame me for saying I told you so." She sternly said while crossing her arms to add to the effect. "Don''t worry if we all die, we can haunt the ones who killed us as ghosts! Maybe we could even try to possess some actual hellhounds to make our team name the actual truth!" Tauna declared while wrapping her arm around Mira''s shoulder grinning broadly. "It won''t come to that. I''m sure that nothing too extreme will happen." Adimir said unintentionally raising a flag. With their minds made up the hellhounds departed from the adventurer¡¯s guild to the area just outside of the front gate where the caravan was meeting up. Once they arrived Mira went to discuss some of the finer details of the quest with the head of the caravan while the other two walked around to see what this caravan was like. When they were talking about a caravan Adimir had assumed it would be something along the lines of maybe a dozen or two dozen wooden wagons heading out with a couple dozen guards, but what reality provided him with looked more like an army departing for battle. There had to be at least three dozen wagons reinforced with iron plating on the walls and wheels. Then there were easily a couple hundred armed guards loitering around killing time playing cards and eating food. The guards weren''t the only ones who were armed, however. Everywhere he looked even the people who were obviously not guards based on their lack of armor were carrying around swords in sheaths. "This is supposed to be a caravan?" Adimir exclaimed incredulously with his eyes practically bulging out from shock. "Well yeah. The monsters are a very common and dangerous threat. Some groups of monsters can even travel in groups of 30-50. So, when a caravan departs if they don''t have enough guards, they won''t be able to last a day unless they are remarkably strong. And this is a particularly large caravan." Tauna explained to him in a sage-like tone with her hands behind her back trying to appear as wise as possible. "You know for an adult you¡¯re really childish, right? And that''s coming from me when I''m an actual child!" Adimir told her with an amused expression on his face. "What!? Why must you be so cruel to me oh sweet child!" Tauna cried out feigned hurt. He merely shook his head once again in awe at how silly this girl could be. Suddenly though the thought that he didn''t even know his own teammate''s real age occurred to him. "You know now that I think of it I don''t even know your real age. Are you really an adult?" He said looking towards her skeptically. This question seemingly caught her off guard as she dropped her goofy act. "Huh that''s right you don''t know it do you? Well, I''m actually 19. So, I am an adult just so you know." She replied smugly. "Barely," Adimir replied a bit satisfied at the knowledge he was easily 30 years her senior. More if one counted his past life. Tauna ignored his jab at her age and continued talking. "As for Mira, I can''t say. She looks like she''d be in her teens, but then she can be so mature at times, so it makes you think twice about her actual age." Listening to Tauna''s opinion on Mira he couldn''t help but agree. He was mentally over 60 years old, but yet he still acted a bit childish himself with his bantering with Tauna. Mira, on the other hand, maintained a relatively dignified, but friendly persona at all times with the exception of that teasing of Tauna at the inn. Before they continued, however, the very person they were talking about interrupted their conversation. "Alright everyone I talked with the head merchant a bit and we''ll be guarding the middle of the left side of the caravan. The caravan will also be departing soon. At this point, we''re just waiting for a couple more adventurer teams to arrive before we head out." She told them with her signature amiable smile. "Sounds great! Let''s head over there now then. Get to know the people we''ll be working with." Tauna remarked. "That''s exactly what I was thinking." Mira agreed. Before they were able to start heading over to their position they were interrupted once again. "Hey, did I heard you guys are going to be positioned in the middle left side of the caravan?" A masculine voice interjected. Adimir looked over to see that it was of all people the very same orc that he defeated on the day of the combat test to become an iron rank. He was still wearing the same grey gambeson and using the same 4-foot sword, and 4-foot wide shield that he had the last time he saw him. Apparently, he wasn''t the only one who recognized the other as the orc¡¯s eyes widened when he spotted Adimir''s small frame standing next to Tauna. "Hey, it''s you that little elf kid who kicked my ass the other day!" The orc exclaimed. "Are you sure you want to be yelling that when there''s such a large audience?" Adimir questioned him gesturing to the couple dozen guards and merchants whose attention was drawn over to them when the orc yelled. The orcs already green cheeks turned a deeper shade of green which Adimir took as a sign of him blushing out of embarrassment. "Oh yes, your right." The orc mumbled. "Putting aside your outburst why were you asking about where we''re being positioned at?" Mira questioned the orc. After being reminded about why he was talking in the first place he quickly recovered from his state of self-inflicted embarrassment. "Ah yes. I was asking because I''m also stationed there. My name is Bjorn." Bjorn informed them. "Oh really? That''s good to hear! Although I''m a bit disappointed to hear that I missed Adimir beating you up!" Chipped in a grinning Tauna. "Yes, he was a very formidable fighter. I must say it was an honor to fight you Adimir." Bjorn opined. "It was fun fighting you as well." Adimir agreed. "Well since we''re all stationed at the same place shall we head over to where we''re supposed to be at?" Mira chimed in. "Your right um what''s your names?" Bjorn asked her. "My name is Mira. The beastkin is named Tauna." She answered him. "Alright, Mira. Let''s converse while we walk." He suggested. "Well, I for one agree with that idea. So, Bjorn anything you can tell us about yourself?" Adimir asked him. Bjorn got a thoughtful expression on his face as he thought about to say. "Well I''m a steel rank adventurer, and I use a shield and sword as my weapons of choice. I currently work alone." He eventually said. "Ah, a fellow shield user. Shields are indeed one of the best friends an adventurer can have!" Tauna acknowledged. "So, Bjorn how long have you been in the adventuring business?" Adimir asked him. "I''ve been an adventurer for the past year. I already know how long you''ve been an adventurer, but I don''t know how long your companions have been adventurers." He answered. "Mira and I have been adventuring as a duo for around 5 months now. Before that, I was in a group of five adventurers for 8 months. But we eventually disbanded." Tauna answered for herself. "As Tauna said me and her were working together for 5 months. Before me and her teamed up though, I was going from team to team for a year." Mira said. "That means you''re the one with the most experience then! No wonder you''ve been so aptly suited to taking the lead on so many things." Adimir commented. "Oh really? Well, it''s certainly good to hear that there''s someone with more experience than me around. I''m not much of a leader type." Bjorn admitted with a laugh. "If I had to say I think Mira is the best suited to be a leader out of our team anyways. She has an agreeable temperament, the experience, and the composed mind needed for such a job." Adimir added. By now the group had long since arrived at their assigned position and were just lounging around chatting while they waited for the signal to depart. They didn''t need to wait that much longer as one of the caravan guards clad in their signature brown leather armor jogged over to where they were. "Hey, we''re heading out now. Stay on your toes, there have been some reports of unusual monster activity lately." The caravan guard said. By now they had already accepted the quest and couldn''t quit the mission just because of some unusual monster activity. Not without their reputation taking a significant hit. The armed caravan began to depart from the fortress town on their journey. The caravan battle part 1 ************************************************************************************************************* This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon."How many will we be facing?" The gruff voice of the guard captain asked him. Soon an immense wave of green loomed the horizon and poorly made patchwork flags with three claws scribbled on them were raised into the air. The enemy had arrived, and instead of being the mindless monster horde they were hoping for they instead had to face a relatively ordered army. The caravan battle part 2 Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.************************************************************************************************************* ************************************************************************************************************* (Clarattes POV) "Keep it up Claratte! Their charge is faltering!" Adimir yelled out with a grin on his face as he watched the carnage. Adimir didn''t notice the look Claratte gave him as he was too busy admiring how successful his spell was. It wasn''t exactly worthy of being called a spell however as it was quite literally just throwing stones at his enemies. Just at a higher speed than one would expect. He got this idea from two things. The first was the machine gun units that the Nazis used in WW2 to pin down large numbers of enemies with only a couple of people. The other was a random bit of history he remembered about bolas which slung stones with the power of a high caliber revolver. He figured if he could spin ping pong to the 100 miles per hour mark that roman slings could reach then if he launched them en masse at his enemies they''d be turned into mincemeat. The caravan battle part 3 Adimir was sitting in a wagon with the head guard and the head merchant. He was called there to discuss something for reasons he wasn''t told, but he had a hunch that it had to do with the fact that he managed to predict the goblins attack, and stop the direwolf cavalry before anyone realized they were coming with only one other mage. "So, mage. Your name is Adimir correct?" The beastkin guard captain asked. "Yes. That''s my name." Adimir replied wondering why they''d call him here. They hadn''t defeated the goblin hoard yet. So, it couldn''t be to reward him. "Enough stalling Rolaf. Just get to the point." The fat merchant reprimanded the guard captain named Rolaf impatiently. "Of course. Adimir can you explain a bit on how the spell you used to detect the enemies?" Rolaf inquired. "It''s quite simple. I''m able to detect living creatures within 1600 feet. If I want more details, it shortens the range. I won''t go into specifics on how I got it to work, however." Adimir explained to the two. "That''s fine. Can you try and detect the leader of the hobgoblin hoard? Hobgoblins typically follow a powerful warlock when they get around the size we''re facing." Replied the guard captain. Adimir placed his hand on his chin while mulling it over. "I can certainly do that. What''s your plan?" He answered, before asking his own question. "Once we know where the leader is we''re going to form a volunteer squad to go behind enemy lines and kill the leadership of the goblin hoard. If we do this, we''ll be able to cause enough confusion to have the remains of our forces here at the camp to rush in and wipe them out after a bombardment with all the mages and archers we have on hand." Rolaf answered. "I see. Not a bad idea. If I find the leader, I want to go with the squad to kill the leader. They''ll need me anyways to be able to find them in that camp after all." Adimir said. "That''s fine with me. I was planning on asking you to go anyways. You should go get a meal for now. If you can find the hobgoblin lord, we''ll attack under the cover of night." Rolaf acknowledged. Adimir nodded and exited the wagon. He then went over to the center of the camp where several large fires were lit. At these fires, the caravan¡¯s chefs were cooking in large man-sized pots. Before he could go up to get a serving however, he felt someone tap his shoulder. Turning around to see who it was he was delighted to see that it was Tauna and Mira. Tauna offered a wooden bowl with porridge in it. "Here you go. We already got food for all of us and were just waiting for you to arrive. Now you should eat up and recover your energy." Tauna told him with a smile. Adimir thanked her and took the bowl. When they went to sit down and eat, he was peppered with questions right away. "We saw you enter the wagon with the head merchant and the guard captain. So, do you know what''s going to happen?" Mira asked him getting right down to business as usual. "Yeah. I''m going to be using a new detection spell I invented to locate the leader of the hobgoblins. If I find him, they''re going to be forming a small volunteer squad to go and kill the leader during the nighttime. When they head out, I''m going to go with them." Adimir explained to them. Tauna cracked her knuckles. "Well, I suppose we''ll be bashing in some skulls tonight!" She declared with a savage grin. Adimir looked over at her with a confused expression. "You guys don''t need to come with. I''m going alone." He corrected her. Mira put her hands on his shoulders drawing his attention over to her. "Now Adimir what type of teammates would that make us if we just let you go out and risk your life without us? Now we are coming with whether you like it or not. You had our backs when we fought the ogre. Now let us have yours when we face those green bastards." Mira countered. Adimir felt a warm bubbly feeling in his chest and broke into a smile. "When I went to become an adventurer, I never expected I''d find teammates who would risk their life so quickly." He admitted. "Well get used to it kid. We''re going to be stuck together for a long time! And I plan on repaying you for saving our lives with that fancy fire spell on our last mission." Tauna chipped in patting his back. "Who do you think your calling kid? I''m over 30 years older than you." Adimir objected playfully. "You forget the fact that elves your age are still considered children even in the eyes of us shorter-lived species." Mira intervened. "Yeah what she said!" The wolfkin girl agreed. Adimir merely shook his head with an amused smile and busied himself with eating. As soon as he finished, he closed his eyes and sent out a directed mana pulse towards the hobgoblin encampment as he began searching. He didn''t need to search long however as a magic aura matching that of his own former master was found right on the first pulse. He couldn''t stop the frown that was growing on his face. "What''s wrong? Did you not find the leader?" Mira asked assuming the worst. "I found him. It''s just that this guy has easily four to five times the amount of mana I have. Easily enough mana to overwhelm several battle mages. And to make things worse, he is in the center of the goblin hoard. So that''s several hundred hobgoblins and goblins to fight our way through. Then on top of that, he has several mages with him who have twice the amount of mana as me." Adimir replied. Tauna whistled with an amazed look on her face. "Sounds like we have our work cut out for us. I hope the others we''re going with will be strong enough to get through. Us included." Tauna spoke her thoughts out to the rest. "Well, I''m sure we will find a way through them. We have to find a way through them if the caravan is to survive this after all. The archers have already started to run low on ammo, and we have only managed to take out a fraction of the enemy." Mira commented. "It''s an all or nothing gamble. Let''s just hope that we''re lucky." Adimir concurred. ¡°I¡¯m going to go tell him that I''ve found the leader now. See you guys later." Adimir told them before heading back to the wagon he was in earlier. He found that Rolaf was standing outside the wagon waiting for someone. Upon spotting Adimir he beckoned him closer. "Have you found him?" The guard captain couldn''t hide the eagerness inside his voice. "Yes, I did. He''s a powerful one and in the center of the goblin hoard. He won''t be easy to reach but you have my team the hellhounds who are ready to step up to the challenge. There are only three of us but we will fight like there are 30 of us." Adimir answered while standing up a bit straighter when mentioning his team. The news seemed to disturb the ox beastkin quite a bit as his shoulders slouched slightly. When he heard that Adimir and his entire team were still willing to go his spirit visibly recovered a bit. "Good. I''ll go and start gathering volunteers. The plan still remains the same. We attack tonight." Rolaf told him before walking away gesturing for him to follow. Adimir followed along as they climbed up onto a wagon. The guard captain then began to call for people to stop what they were doing and turn their attention to him. "Everyone I have an announcement. This young mage here is named Adimir. And he has managed to locate the leader of the goblin hoard." Rolaf began and gestured to Adimir when he mentioned him. "If we can kill the goblin hoards leader, they''ll become confused and divided, and with how goblins and hobgoblins are they''ll even start to fight each other. When that happens, we can attack with our full force and destroy them when they''re at their weakest. However, there is a catch. The enemy leader is surrounded by their army. No one will blame anyone if they don''t want to go on this suicide mission to kill the leader. But this young mage who is practically a child has already volunteered to go! Not just him but his teammates as well!" Rolaf said to the crowd with his voice growing more fervent as he went on.Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. "They only number three but they still are willing to do more than put their lives on the line but face certain death for the sake of saving this caravan. Now, what does that make us adults if a child and two people have more bravery than the rest of us!? I ask of those who are brave enough to join this mission to cut the head off the snake. If you are one of those brave souls, please step forward now." Rolaf finished his impassioned speech. Adimir watched the crowd for any signs of the crowd being inspired by the speech the guard captain just made, but much to his disappointment all he was met with silence. And anyone he tried to make eye contact would turn away with an embarrassed look on his face. He couldn''t blame them, however. They managed to kill several hundred earlier, but the enemy still had more than double their current forces. However, a single shout disturbed the silence. "We will!" Two familiar girls stepped forward. Tauna and Mira walked out of the crowd with determined looks on their faces. "We already said we wouldn''t let you risk your life without us Adimir, and we meant it!" Mira declared shooting a fierce glare towards the crowd of indecisive people. But that wasn''t the last disturbance as another green-skinned figure stepped forward. "I''ve known you for less than a day, but I would rather die meeting my enemies head-on than cower and wait for them to come and kill me," Bjorn shouted while stepping forward. As if this was the trigger another person a guard stepped forward. "It would be an honor to die alongside brave warriors like you all." The guard affirmed. Soon dozens of guards, adventurers, and even civilians stepped forward. Soon enough over 80 people, a full third of their fighting force was now gathered with resolved faces. Rolaf looked at the volunteers with a hint of pride. "I''m glad you have all decided to join the mission. We will attack the enemy tonight under the cover of night. Once you succeed in killing the hobgoblin leader, I will lead the other 200 guards we have to attack the enemy. Tonight, we will emerge victorious!" Rolaf shouted as the crowd of volunteers shouted their agreements as their fighting spirit soared to new heights. When Adimir was about to get off the caravan wagon he was stopped by Rolaf. He shot him a questioning look before the beastkin shoved three small clear bottles filled with a blue liquid. The third, however, was glowing. "Take this Adimir. These are some mana potions I purchased from one of the merchants. I decided that I''d give you these two mana regeneration potions and this mana fortification potion. The regeneration potions will only recover a small amount of mana and the fortification one will increase your mana capacity by 25%. They are only low grade, but I still hope that they''ll be of some use to you during this battle. "Thank you. We''ll succeed. I swear it." Adimir responded to him as he took the potions with his resolve strengthening further. He went to meet up with his teammates while formulating a plan to increase their chances of victory. Just when he arrived to where his friends were three figures walked over. They were the reptaurian shaman, Claratte, and Bjorn. "What do you guys need?" He asked them politely. "Claratte told us about how you come up with crazy ideas to make the impossible possible. Do you perhaps have any such ideas now?" The reptaurian inquired. Hearing their reason for coming over Adimir was unable to suppress the devilish grin that crept onto his face. ¡°Actually, I have one that''ll make the odds turn to our favor. I just need you and Clarattes to help to make it possible. Here lean in and listen to my idea." Adimir told them as his teammates and the other three leaned in to hear what he had to say. ************************************************************************************************************* It was now night. The 80+ volunteers were assembled at the back of the barricade and were ready to depart. Out of the civilians, six mages specialized in medical treatment and volunteered as combat medics. Adimir gathered those six along with the other two adventurer mages to aid him with his plan. They were all currently marching towards the enemy encampment when he finished telling them the plan. "Will that really be enough to close the disadvantage in numbers?" One of the medic mages asked him with a concerned tone. "Of course, it would. I''ve seen countless battles and with a spell like that even an army made up of plebeians would be a terrifying force to deal with." Interrupted the reptaurian who was now looking at Adimir with a degree of admiration. "What he said. Now you guys make sure you focus on that while shaman guy and Clarette focus on making stones. With this plan, we''ll steamroll the enemy infantry." Adimir told them with a confident smile. They now could clearly see the figures of the hobgoblin army and were only 200 feet away. By now the goblins were beginning to notice them and were gathering together to charge. "NOW!" The furious cry of a child''s voice resounded across the field, and a dull yellow glow began to emanate from the various people from the caravan. The people looked at themselves and each other in mute shock at this sorcery. Soon however the gentle warm feeling began to fill them with bravery and wiped away all the remaining bits of doubt and fear they had. Without their fear holding them back the people raised their weapons up into the air and charged with furious battle cries as they charged the goblins. The goblins, on the other hand, were frozen in confusion and fear at seeing the obviously fewer enemies start glowing and charge at them fearlessly. One of the hobgoblins raised up a pike and issued its own war cry and pointed at the charging humans. However, before it even finished its cry a sharp whistle briefly heard before its head exploded and its body collapsed to the ground. Upon seeing one of their own comrades who died for no explicit reason at all the other hobgoblins began to feel fear creeping into their souls. Soon the whistling sound started to pick up again and dozens of goblins and hobgoblins no matter how strong their armor began to get torn to shreds by a storm of tiny stones. It only lasted less than a minute, but it had already killed dozens of the hobgoblins, and before they even had time to feel relief at the unstoppable rain of death ceasing before the glowing people slammed into them. Adimir watched with what bordered on sadistic glee as the people who were glowing quite literally tore straight through the goblin hoard like a hot butter knife through butter. No matter how hard they fought the volunteer fighters never tired, and any minor injury they sustained didn''t slow them. Whether it was a twisted ankle, a bruise, or a small cut they all began healing rapidly in seconds. Unless it was a severe wound they would just keep on fighting. Because of this Adimir noted the panicking hobgoblins and goblins didn''t have time to formulate a proper counterattack before they managed to penetrate and slaughter their way through over 100 of the enemy. By now the goblins were beginning to order themselves and started to fight back. They easily had two to three goblins per volunteer fighter, but one of those volunteer fighters fought with the might of two to three men. All the while Adimir and the other mages walked in the center of the enraged hoard of people. One of the medic mage''s mouth gaped open as he watched their weaker army hold its own against one many times its size. "Once again you''ve shocked me with another terrifying spell. Who knew that combining a few simple spells into one larger AOE spell would have such a terrifying effect." Claratte complemented Adimir. His grin only grew when he heard her. "Minor injuries can greatly weaken a soldier even if it''s just a sprained arm or just a nasty bruise. But if you had a spell that would automatically heal your allies of minor wounds and stem the blood flow of severe wounds then you have an even more powerful army. Then add the fatigue recovery to keep them from tiring out and the bravery booster and you get a spell that could turn an army of pheasants into a force that could keep up with trained soldiers." He bragged while watching the carnage. "Yes, but the flaw is the mana drain. Even after using up all our potions that we had available to us we can only keep this up for a few minutes at best." The reptaurian stated solemnly. "A few minutes will be all we need to complete our mission. Now let''s push forward. Tauna, Mira watch our backs." Adimir acknowledged before giving orders to his teammates. Taking advantage of the deadlock between the two armies the three mages and two warriors began to force their way through the goblins while the six other mages remained behind to keep up the support spell. "Take this scum! Hahaha! What a power high!" Tauna exclaimed while eagerly seeking out fights whenever a hobgoblin knowingly or not got near them. With a mere swipe of her mace, she was able to quite easily crush bones, and quite often killed her foes in one or two hits because of this. Mira, on the other hand, took advantage of not getting tired to dart around and shred apart hobgoblins with numerous speedy swipes. Because of these two''s efforts, only the shaman was needed to use combat magic to help clear the way. "Tan crafangau!" Following the reptaurians guttural shout, its claws were engulfed in flames and it began to tear apart hobgoblins limb from limb as they progressed. Claratte expression was quite amusing with how it was turning a slight tint of green from the carnage surrounding her. "Not used to the carnage of the battlefield?" He asked her. "No. I told you I''m a researcher first and foremost! The battlefield isn''t where I belong. If I didn''t need the money for this job to fund my next project, I wouldn''t have bothered taking it in the first place." She replied sulkily. "Hm. Well, chin up. We''re nearly there." Adimir replied he wasn¡¯t completely immune to the sight of such bloody carnage, but he has already caused his fair share of carnage and experienced it too, and ws currently in the process of getting used to it. Soon they reached a standstill in front of a dozen hobgoblins who were all over 6-feet tall and in half-plate armor. Tauna, Mira, and the reptaurian all stepped up in front of them to take on the hobgoblins. "Is the leader behind them?" Mira asked him. "Yup. You guys handle the guards. Claratte you support them any way you can. I''m going to go and handle the boss." Adimir said as he took out a glowing blue potion and chugged the entire contents. "You sure you can handle him? You said he has four times your own mana right?" Tauna asked doubtfully. "Don''t worry about it. I''ll be able to find a way to take care of him. You''ll have your hands full facing those guys anyways. So just catch up when you''re done okay?" reassured her. "You heard the young one. ATTACK!" The reptaurian shouted as he charged the hobgoblins with his claws still on fire. Tauna yelled a wordless shout and charged with her shield raised with Mira following behind her. ************************************************************************************************************* (Tauna''s POV) She was worried about Adimir, but she had faith in his strength. For now, though she focused all her unbridled rage upon the hobgoblins ahead of her as she charged shield up. Two of the hobgoblins with their own smaller shields stepped up to stop her, but they made a grave miscalculation in doing so. Tauna''s fighting style focused purely on raw strength, and because of that, she grew into a warrior with great strength even by beastkin standards. Tauna crashed into the two hobgoblins sending them both reeling back onto their backs. Tauna ignored the two fallen hobgoblins as she knew her comrade Mira would take care of them. Only a couple of seconds of her stepping past the hobgoblins she heard the whistle of blades flying and then death gurgles following them. A large smile spread across her face when she heard that. The hobgoblins who had their spears ready to impale her when their comrades stopped her were frozen in shock at her so easily knocking away their two fully armored comrades with such ease. There was a reason she was capable of holding off the ogre even if briefly. She stepped up to the closest hobgoblin and swung her mace down onto its armored shoulder as the iron screeched in protest as it collapsed inwards. Following that, a sickening crunch was heard, and its entire left arm was now unusable. The hobgoblin reeled back shrieked in pain and stumbled back onto its butt. Tauna swiped her shield across its unprotected face shattering its skull while breaking the neck killing it instantly. By now the other hobgoblins had recovered from their shock and were all focused on attacking her. Two of them thrust their spears towards her left flank. She raised up her shield to meet both attacks head-on blocking them both. However, the third hobgoblin seized the chance to attack her from her unprotected side while she was kept busy. The hobgoblin swiped its sword in an arc aiming to claim her neck. But just in the nick of time Mira redirected the blow and slid her dagger into its throat. They didn''t need words to work together after the months they''ve fought together. Tauna pushed back the two hobgoblins while they retreated to keep out of her reach. Meanwhile, Mira was fighting with another armored hobgoblin. There weren''t as many focusing on them as she had expected, and she was beginning to wonder why. Suddenly an armored hobgoblin went sailing over her head and crashed into the one Mira was fighting killing both from the blunt force trauma they received. This unexpected occurrence drew the attention of the two girls and the hobgoblins. "Well damn. I''ve lost all my confidence in my strength." Tauna mumbled. She was, in fact, talking about the reptaurian shaman. He was currently battling the remaining 8 hobgoblins single-handedly with nothing but his bare hands. He had one of the hobgoblins lifted up several feet into the air and threw him down onto the ground killing it and released a feral roar. The hobgoblins were all standing back in fear from the reptaurians immense strength. They had tried numerous times to kill it with their iron weapons, but their weapons weren''t strong enough to deal enough damage to its scales to actually make any life-threatening wounds. Because of this fact, he was one-sidedly slaughtering the group of hobgoblins without even using magic. Tauna looked back to the hobgoblins she was fighting which were distracted with the reptaurian. "RAAAAA!" She yelled furiously and charged the two and started bashing them to unrecognizable piles of iron and flesh. A minute later and the three of them were done fighting, and Claratte healed up the reptaurian. "Alright let''s continue and help out Adimir!" Mira shouted to them and charged towards the tent where Adimir entered. Before she could enter however she along with the rest of them were blown back by a gust of icy wind that decorated the ground with a layer of frost. The caravan battle part 4 (Adimir''s POV) Adimir snuck around the group of armored hobgoblins while they fought his allies. As he entered the tent, he was greeted with an ice shard flying towards his face. He narrowly dodged it as he ducked down, feeling the chill as it brushed against his head before flying past him. Looking back up he saw a 3-foot tall goblin dressed up in a row with a wooden staff pointed at him. "Ignis fulmine!" He shouted blasting the goblin with a bolt of fire before it had a chance to cast another spell. The goblin let out a pained cry as the firebolt slammed into it, burning the fabric of the robe, and scorched its skin. However, the goblin didn''t immediately collapse as its internal mana shielding was enough to resist the attack. It must have been an intermediate mage to have been able to resist it. Cursing Adimir cast a chantless spell to form an 8-inch thick dirt wall in front of him as two other goblin mages cast ice shard spells at him. These shards buried themselves 5 inches into his defense before finally coming to a stop. Adimir heard the goblins shouting furiously as they saw him defend against their attacks. "Crymbl!" He shouted causing his defense to crumble into dozens of small stones. The goblins on the other side of it began to gather up their mana to attack again when they saw the opportunity. However, before they could begin chanting the stones blasted forward shooting dozens of holes and killing all three goblins in one go. "Hmph. In the end, even if you had powerful mana reservoirs you goblins lack the intelligence to make proper use of them." Adimir said while looking for his next opponent. He didn''t have to wait long as a goblin wearing a fancy iron crown decorated with valuable gems stepped forward with a strong aura of killing intent cloaking it. "Triplici ignis fulmine!" He shouted blasting three fire bolts at once at the mage. Unexpectedly the fire bolts dissipated before they even reached the hobgoblin mage as the ambient temperature fell 10 degrees sending goosebumps across his skin. "Ah shit. This is definitely a boss battle." He grumbled while gathering up his mana to prepare for the battle. "Kalunus-lunos insekto. Mamatay." The hobgoblin spoke before sending a blistering wave of cold towards Adimir slamming into him and sending him flying a dozen feet. He landed roughly onto the ground bruising multiple bones in his body forcing a groan from his chilled lungs. "Adimir! Are you alright!?" He heard a panicked voice exclaim. A blurry face drifted into view before gradually clearing up to reveal Mira''s worried face. "I''m alright. Just. Just give me a moment to catch my breath." He wheezed painfully. Sitting up he gazed over with a mix of fear, admiration, and awe at the hobgoblin mage which had a small blizzard raging 15 feet around it in every direction. "Is that some type of spell that it''s using?" Asked Tauna as she walked over. "Worse. That''s only the mana that''s overflowing from his body in the form of the element he''s strongest in." Adimir answered her while struggling onto his feet. Claratte began casting a healing spell on him to heal his injuries. "This hobgoblin mage is strong. He has far more mana than a mage of his mana should have. Young one I do not think we will be leaving here alive. It has been an honor fighting with you." The reptaurian shaman solemnly said. "We won''t be dying today. We''re going to kill this bastard and then get a nice juicy bonus for this job." Adimir replied with a grin as he felt the pain in his body fade away. "Claratte mind giving the melee fighters some support buffs? We''re going to need it for this fight." He asked her. She nodded and went to casting some pain resistance and fatigue recovery spells on them. They had long since gone out of range of the massive AOE support spell, and even if they weren''t the spell had run out a minute or so ago. The only reason that the goblin army didn''t attack them right now was that they were too scared to get close and get killed by their enraged lord. "I will use my pyromancy to distract the enemy with the warriors. I trust you will find a way to defeat the hobgoblin lord young one." The reptaurian told Adimir before rushing towards the hobgoblin mage. "Tan clogyn!" The lizard cried out before his entire body was cloaked in fire and dove towards the hobgoblin mage. The hobgoblin created a large ice wall blocking off the lizard''s way to it and began forming dozens of foot-long ice spikes in the air and bombarded it with them. The shaman cried out in pain as the ice spikes crashed into him partially melting but still causing significant cuts and gouges on its scales. Tauna and Mira quickly joined the fray, but before they could get close the mage blasted dozens of coin-sized ice shards at them halting their charge as they were forced to get behind Tauna''s shield for protection. He was certainly powerful, but Adimir noticed that every time he attacked the hobgoblin held power and size over technique with its magic. Certainly, an outdated way of thinking of stuff as bigger is better. Adimir fired several stones at the hobgoblin from a distance but the wind that was surrounding it blew the stones off course causing them to veer away harmlessly. "Looks like even my stone machine gun will be useless against this guy. Things really aren''t looking up for us." He commented as he racked his brain for ideas to defeat the hobgoblin lord. Out of nowhere, he thought of the banana peel gag where a person would slip on a banana peel. At first, he was about to reject that ridiculous thought, but then he realized he had magic and a creative mind. Why not go out of the box and make a fool of this high and mighty hobgoblin lord when defeating him? As he thought up an idea to make perfect use of the terrain and the enemy''s haughtiness a devilish grin grew on his face. Seeing this Claratte couldn''t help but shiver in fear wondering what crazy thing the child would pull next to win this seemingly unwinnable battle. Adimir began to manipulate the earth under the hobgoblin lord and then as soon as he had a good amount of control over the dirt under the hobgoblin lord, he yanked it. The following events were one that would cause the entire audience to gape in shock. First, the hobgoblin lord despite how powerful it seemed slipped from several inches of dirt underneath him was yanked away. This caused a look of confusion to cloud over its face as it was sent flying for seemingly no reason. Then when it landed its head landed on a baseball-sized stone with a soft thud knocking it out cold.This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. All because the mana that was on the level of a Tier- 1 spell seemed like it didn''t even deserve its attention. For a full minute, everything was silent. Adimir realized that unlike what he had planned instead of just disorientating the hobgoblin mage he managed to knock them out. So Adimir leisurely walked over while spinning a baseball-sized stone in one hand as he drew ever closer to his fallen enemy. Some might say it''s dishonorable to kill an enemy while they slept. Others would say what he had done was a low blow that one shouldn''t do. Adimir says that it''s a free kill. So, with a joyful smile on his face, he sent the stone flying into the unconscious hobgoblins face smashing its skull into a bloody pile of bone and flesh killing them instantly. Then he reached down and took the hobgoblins crown and tucked it away. He looked around at the audience of goblins and hobgoblins who were still standing in a dumbfounded stupor. Their leader a hobgoblin who seemed nigh unbeatable was just killed so easily. As if he was nothing more than a pesky bug to be squashed under others'' feet. "That... That was anticlimactic." Tauna finally said. "Perhaps, but hey it''s their fault for not paying attention to my magic. Even if it was only at Tier- 1 level." Adimir replied with a grin. "Now then let''s continue with the plan. Without their leader, they''ll begin panicking soon, and then our forces will crush them. So, all we have to do now is hold out against countless hobgoblins until reinforcements get here." He told the rest while turning to the goblin army. He then slammed his staff into the ground "Ignis pluvia!" He shouted causing dozens of fireballs to rain down onto the hobgoblins severely injuring many of those within the spells effective range. This woke the hoard from its stupor as they began to split up into their own individual factions as goblins always did without strong leadership. Some decided to attack the enemy that had killed their leader, but between the five of them, the dozens that they had to face were held off. Others, however, began seizing the chance to kill their former allies and pay back any grudges they held. As one would expect of goblins, they were the opposite of unified all because of one child''s actions ************************************************************************************************************* (Rolafs POV) "Sir the goblin hoard is starting to show signs of infighting! I think they succeeded in killing their leader!" A caravan guard reported to him. When he heard this news, he sighed in relief. But then he shook off his current mood and grabbed a double-sided battle-ax. "Well, what are you standing there for!? Let''s go and give those bastards a piece of our mind!" He bellowed. "EVERYONE CHARGE!" He shouted as he ran out of the defensive formation of the wagons alone towards the goblin hoard. Seeing their leader''s willingness to attack the enemy the guards raised up a wordless shout and charged after their leader towards the goblin hoard. All the while the hoard remained oblivious due to their own internal struggles. ************************************************************************************************************* Adimir fired off another batch of firebolts at a couple of hobgoblins that were aiming their bows at them. "Why the hell do so many still have to be focused on us!? Kill each other, not us!" He shouted at the hobgoblins angrily before firing another fire spell. "Well, maybe it''s because somebody didn''t kill the leader in a flashy enough way to make them fear us!" Mira remarked. "Who cares? It was funny, and I get to bash more skulls in. It''s a win-win for me!" Tauna said laughing while she bashed the skull of another goblin in with her mace. "I''ve been meaning to ask this." Adimir paused what he was saying to blast a bolt of lightning at a group of goblins wearing chain mail frying them. "But are you a battle junkie?" He asked her. "Why yes, I am! Thank you for noticing." She replied with a joyful smile. "I''d hate to interrupt your delightful conversation. BUT WE''RE SURROUNDED AND ARE GOING TO BE OVERWHELMED ANY MINUTE!" Claratte interrupted angrily as she healed a cut on Mira''s arm. "Well we don''t exactly have any exit plan, so I sort of figured that we might as well die casually talking. So that way we could be the first if anyone else hasn''t done that yet." Adimir said with a coy smile. "Young one this is no time for jokes. We must figure out a way to survive this ordeal." The shaman chided him. Before Adimir could come up with something witty to say in return they heard a furious shout and the hobgoblins starting to flee from the direction the caravan was from. Soon guard captain Rolaf emerged from the hoard of the goblin hoard wildly swinging a battle-ax sending limbs and heads flying all around him. "I think it¡¯s already being handled!" Adimir exclaimed admiring the carnage that one beastkin made of the hobgoblins he came across. Just behind him the guards and civilians of the caravan were carving their way through the goblin hoard, and soon the remaining 40 of the 80 strong suicide attack force merged with them and continued their rampage across the battlefield. By now the hobgoblins were in full retreat as they ran in terror from the vengeful souls behind them. Stomping any goblin that was unfortunate enough to fall to death. Five minutes of bloody fighting later the hobgoblins had finally managed to run away with only a couple hundred left of them. "WE''VE WON!" Rolaf shouted while lifting up his battle ax into the air with one hand. Adimir grinned as he let himself savor the taste of victory. ************************************************************************************************************* That night all the mages worked together to burn away all the hobgoblin corpses to avoid an undead catastrophe forming here. After that was done instead of continuing, they all celebrated throughout the night. Many lives were lost from this battle, but they still managed to triumph over an enemy many times their number and strength. Adimir and the four others, however, were not involved in that at the moment. Instead, they were all gathered in one of the wagons with Rolaf and the head merchant. "We called you here today to reward you for managing to kill the hobgoblin lord. Had it not been for you Rolaf''s charge would have failed and we''d all be dead right now. Take this as a token of my gratitude. 50 silver coins for each of you for a job well done." The merchant said with a smile. It seemed that when not under the threat that he was a much more amiable person. "Whoop! With this, we can buy more goodies!" Tauna yelled excitedly. "Now go ahead and enjoy the celebration! We''ll be heading out again come daybreak. So, enjoy the night while it lasts and try not to push yourself too hard." The merchant added after watching them excitedly receive the rewards. The five of them thanked the merchant before exiting the wagon. "We did rather well given the circumstances. Although I''m beginning to believe Adimir is bad luck or is cursed by a god." Mira said to the others. Adimir looked over at her with an incredulous look on his face. "Why am I the one who''s bad luck?" Adimir asked with an annoyed look on his face. "Simple. Ever since you''ve joined the team, we''ve been facing abnormal situation after abnormal situation." She answered him. "That is a good point she''s raising, but I''m alright with that. It just means more excitement and bonus rewards!" Tauna added. "Ok ok I guess you raise a point there, but hey we haven''t faced anything insane like a dragon, right? So, I can''t have THAT much bad luck." Adimir acknowledged. "Don''t raise one of those flags you spoke of," Mira warned him. He raised up his hands in mock defeat. "Well, I used up a lot of mana during the battle so I''m going to go rest. You guys party without me." He told them. "You sure? There''ll be a lot of yummy goodies." Tauna asked him. Adimir merely waved it off as he walked away. Seeing this Tauna shrugged and walked away with Mira to enjoy the celebration. After finding a secluded corner behind a wagon farthest away from the celebration Adimir took out his pet project from his bag. He wasn''t here to rest as he had claimed but to make some more changes to the pigeon he had. Unbeknownst to the others in the caravan, he had managed to discreetly dig through the mess he made of the hobgoblin leaders head and dig out a chunk of usable brain mass. He took out said brain chunk now. By using his magic this entire time he''s managed to keep it alive but had to use up all of the mana in his staff to do so. "Time to play Frankenstein!" He whispered under his breath excitedly. By keeping the brain alive he could keep a fair chunk of the mana that the hobgoblin had to use on his pigeon to gradually strengthen it. He wasn''t daring enough to test it on himself as he had no idea about the side effects of what he was about to do, he began by extracting a chunk of the more basic parts of the brain and opening up the skull of the pigeon. Once he connected the two together via a fleshy cord, he moved on to attempting to channel the hobgoblins icy mana throughout the body of the pigeon and mixing it with the plain mana of the avian. To his surprise as the icy mana mixed with the bird''s mana and was gradually overwhelmed and began to change into the same form of mana as it. Like some sort of disease. This brought a smile to his face as he began to think about the possibilities of this phenomenon if it worked as he thought. He then shook himself from his thoughts to focus back on the task on hand. The grand days in which he''d wield tyrannical power was far off into the future after all. Half an hour later and he finally managed to ensure the safe transfer of the mana he disconnected the cord attaching the two''s brains and tossed aside the hobgoblin''s brain. He then closed the pigeon''s skull and took control of it. He decided to test out the pigeon''s affinity for cryomancy magic now that it had the hobgoblins mana flowing through it. He started out with something simple and had it gather its mana into its throat and breath out a stream of frost onto the ground, decorating it with frost crystals. "Success!" He whispered excitedly. With this, he now took his first step to have the magic equivalent of a drone to attack his enemies. He spent a few more hours practicing with his carnomancy before retiring to bed. He had a long journey ahead of him still. Training week part 1 The caravan had arrived at the town they were headed towards. The three hellhounds had already gotten there five silver coins for the job and were saying farewell to their acquaintances. "It was good to see you again Bjorn. Good luck with whatever you are going to do next." Adimir said to the orc while shaking his hand. "It was good to see you Adimir. I must say you are stronger than I had ever imagined. I''m sure you will do fine out there as an adventurer." He replied with a toothy smile before going to say goodbye to his teammates. "If you guys ever want an extra job or something, I know a few researchers I could introduce you to for retrieving stuff. I also might have some future jobs in the near future if my newest project gets me the money I need. You can find me at the university of Rorkstead. I''ll see you guys some other time." Claratte told them before leaving. Adimir made a mental note to talk to the others about going towards Rorkstead sometime for those potential jobs. Adimir turned to look at the 6''9" tall reptaurian shaman. "I never did get your name, did I?" Adimir asked the shaman. "No, you did not. My name is Dant miniog. You are an impressive mage young one. I look forward to seeing what you become as you grow older. May our paths cross again under more pleasant circumstances." Dant miniog said to him. "Thank you Dant miniog. It''s been great working with you." He said before turning to face his comrades who just finished up saying goodbye to Bjorn. "So, Mira. Any idea what we should be doing next?" He asked her. "Good question. We should probably find an inn to stay at then purchase some supplies. We can go check in with the local guild for any good recommendations for places to stay." Mira answered. "We also need to go eat a meal later. One with lots of meat!" Tauna commented. "Sounds like a good idea. So, where''s the guild?" Adimir inquired. Following his question, an oppressive silence suffocated the conversation. "You guys do know where the guild is right...?" He finally asked in a worried voice. "Not exactly. I''ve never been to this town before." Mira said with a crestfallen expression. "Umm, how about we ask the others if they know where it is?" Tauna suggested while turning to call out to their fellow adventurers. But upon turning around they ran into another complication. They all had already left. "Let''s just go ask around. The locals will most likely know where to go." Adimir sighed. After a few minutes of asking around one of the locals pointed them in the right direction. Of course, to prevent getting lost they had Mira lead the way as Adimir had no sense of direction. After arriving at the local guild and getting a recommendation for one of the popular local inns named the Giants den they decided to have Mira go and book a couple rooms for them while Tauna and Adimir stayed behind at the guild to check out what simple quests they had available for them to take and do tomorrow. "There isn''t that much available regarding subjugation quests," Adimir noted. Tauna nodded in agreement as she gazed at the quests. There were only a few goblin subjugations quests, but no other quests for killing monsters. There was however several caravan guarding quests and a couple of quests for fetching ingredients for people. "Nothing but fetch quests or small fry quests. I want a quest where I can kill something!" She whined with a disappointed look on her face. "Maybe we should all get individual quests and use a couple days to train?" Adimir suggested. He could almost see the gears crank in her mind as she mulled over the idea. "Yeah, I like that idea of yours. Let''s suggest it to Mira when she arrives!" Tauna agreed excitedly. As if Tauna''s agreement was a signal Mira entered the guild and started looking for them. Tauna waved over to her and caught her attention. "Hey, Mira! Adimir just had a good idea of all of us taking individual quests and training for a while before meeting up!" She shouted as Mira entered earshot. "Well, I suppose that isn''t a bad idea. How about 1 week from now we meet up at the Giants den?" She replied. "Sounds like a plan to me. Speaking of the inn did you book us some rooms?" Adimir questioned.Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. "Yup. I booked two rooms for three days. You can extend the time later. I''m going to go to the forest later and do some training after this. What plan do you guys have in mind?" Mira answered. "I''m going to do all the goblin killing quests I can. It''ll be good training and I''ll get to kill stuff." Tauna replied happily. "I''ll be doing some training myself at the inn." He said. After saying their farewells, they all left to their destinations. When Adimir arrived at the inn and went into his room he took out his current engineering project. The pigeon. By now some strange changes started to take place in its overall look. Before the hobgoblin mana took over inside of it the bird''s color scheme was the normal mix of blue and drab grey. Now however its grey feathers were starting to become white, and its eyes now had changed colors to an icy blue. "What an interesting change¡­ So, it seems mana has an effect on a creature''s overall design. I''ll need to remember this for my future projects." Adimir mumbled to himself as he began the next round of testing and editing. ************************************************************************************************************* (Time skip!) It''s been four days since Adimir isolated himself inside his room doing experiments on the pigeon. He''d occasionally would stop to eat some provisions he had in his bag, and to lure in rats, mice, and birds that were clueless to the doom that would befall them. By now some shocking changes had taken place. The pigeon no longer resembled a pigeon and was now the size of a chicken and was around the weight of one too. Its wings had also been made larger to accommodate for its increased size. He also used the mana from other animals to provide the mana it needed to stay alive. It now resembled a hawk with its new physiology instead of the pigeon it once was. It was now capable of casting Tier- 2 ice spells. This was massive progress for him in his pet project. With this, he now had his own familiar that he''d use for scouting purposes mainly. This was because despite it being capable of casting Tier- 2 spells as Adimir learned from his short fight with the hobgoblin lord and his mage trio those spells were only suitable for killing small fry. Nowhere near what he''d require if he wanted to become powerful enough to push around things like that hobgoblin lord and ogres like bugs. He''d have continued upgrading his pigeon but on the third day, he ran into a problem. He was no longer able to use small animals to improve the bird''s physical and mana further. The body kept on rejecting any of it no matter how he tried to introduce them into its body. His guess was that it needed mana and flesh from a stronger creature because its body and mana have increased in quality. So he spent the next day improving his carnomancy and has finally reached the point in which he could say that it could provide some support in battle. All he could do was use it to slow down an enemy for a short time or paralyze them for a fraction of a second. But if he learned anything from all his previous battles was that even a second could make all the difference between life and death. Adimir still couldn''t help but fantasize about the day he''d be able to melt people''s flesh off their bones with just a wave of his hand though. One day he swore to himself he''d reach that point. For now, though his project and his own original magic have improved significantly. And with there being three more days left until his team all met back up to continue their adventure, he decided that he should head to the market. Before he left for the market he glanced at the hawk-like bird perched on his bed. "I''ll come up with a name for you later." He said to the bird despite it having no mind of its own. He then left it there to guard his room while he left to the market. Upon his arrival at the market, he skipped right past browsing and searched for a magic shop. He was after a specific type of enchanted item that he''d need if he were to continue his research while on the move. His searching turned up results within a couple of minutes as he located a shop called ¡°The hag¡¯s bag of magic¡±. Upon entering the shop, he found that the one taking care of it was just a bored-looking teenage human boy. Humans really were the most numerous species. No matter where he went the human species seemed to outnumber all others by 10 to 1 at the very least. "This your shop?" Adimir asked the human boy. "Nope. I just work here as a cashier for the owner." The teen said in a bored voice. Seems even in another world some teenagers are bored out of their mind when working as a cashier. Upon hearing this Adimir decided to pay no mind to him and started looking for what he needed. Upon finding it he had to restrain himself from cheering. The item in question was a burlap sack that was large enough to fit a small child with some string attached to serve as a strap that was enchanted with item storage magic. The level of the space magic was very low and only had double the capacity that it originally had. And that alone already made its price skyrocket to 45 silver. He didn''t mind that though as he needed it if he wanted to be able to transport research samples better. He grabbed the bag and paid for it before heading out to buy some more things. When he finished his shopping spree, he had bought the magic bag for 45 silver and a set of 20 sturdy glass jars for 50 bronze. He splurged quite a bit today, but he now had what he needed to properly store away samples for upgrading his bird. If he had this back when he took the chunk of hobgoblin brain during the caravan trip, he could have taken more of it and potentially have upgraded the bird further along than what it currently was at. It was no use crying over spilled milk however and he needed to focus on going out and killing some suitable creatures to use to fuel the growth for his project. With this in mind, Adimir decided he''d just head to the forest to do some hunting. After a 30-minute walk, he finally arrived at the forest and casted his detection spell with a range of 1500 feet. After several mana pulses, he located a suitable mana signature. To the southeast 674 feet, there was a mana signature stronger than the average wildlife. Adimir began to close in on it while deciding what spell would be best to kill the animal with as little damage as possible. He came up with an idea just as he arrived at where the creature was. The creature that he targeted was a lone direwolf. It seemed to be alone as he hadn''t detected any other lifeforms near it that were similar to it. So, if he had to guess it was an exiled wolf. But that didn''t matter to him. He was just here to get a good source of higher quality biomass and mana. It didn''t take long for the direwolf to notice him as it turned towards him and started snarling. "Hmph. Stop that snarling mutt!" Adimir said with contempt coloring his voice as he waved his staff towards it. "Sytris!" He shouted causing the ground below the wolf to begin to liquify and the animal started to sink into it. It started to whimper and struggle as it tried to pull itself free. This only caused it to sink quicker into the mud instead of freeing it as the beast had hoped. Soon enough it was sunk into the mud up to its knees before the ground finally solidified. Adimir looked at the magicrystal on his staff. It had drained ? of its mana to pull the stunt he had just done. But he had expected that. It was good enough considering it bagged him a living direwolf to start taking apart for fresh and undamaged organs. "Lapis artis ligat catenis." Adimir spoke as he walked closer to the wolf. Following his words, two chains made from stone burst from the ground and wrapped themselves around the giant wolf''s snout muzzling it. It whimpered and tried to break free, but its struggle was pointless as it didn''t have enough strength to break free from its restraints. Adimir''s targets were the brain, spinal cord, and heart. Those three had the largest amount of mana congregated within them and would be best for his purposes. So, with that in mind, he summoned up a needle-thin white fire. He then went to work on cutting apart the direwolf while it was alive. Stopping for a moment to stun it with a lightning spell so that it would be unconscious and wouldn''t whimper and howl while he worked. He took out the mighty animal''s heart and placed it inside one of his jars then continued to cut out the spine. Adimir needed to work quickly as the body no longer had the heart pumping blood through it and now bacteria would begin to infest the research samples. Cutting up the spinal cord into chunks and placing them all into their own individual jars. Once that was finished, he took out the brain and divided them into four pieces and placed them into jars. Adimir now was done with the corpse and used his mana to extend the organ''s lifetime a few hours longer. With that done, he set the direwolf''s corpse on fire and placed his jars inside of his new storage sack and went back to the inn to begin another round of testing and was thinking upon what he should make with the extra pieces of the direwolf''s spinal cord. Training week part 2
Adimir was now using the direwolf spinal cords to improve upon his latest pet project. Unlike the bird which he intended to use as an aerial support familiar in future quests, this one was going to serve as a backup source of mana. He had stunned a fox on the way to the inn and was the animal he laid down on the floor at the moment. He had connected three chunks of the spinal cord to the fox and was pumping its mana into the fox while simultaneously increasing the quality of the fox''s body to be able to handle the extra mana. His overall goal with this creation was to test if one could use living beings as a backup source of mana. This was something he needed in the future as a mage''s mana is directly tied to their own strength. Take for instance the hobgoblin lord. Had it not been for his own arrogance he wouldn''t have been able to use such a cheap trick to defeat him and would have died a cold cold death. He was only able to do so much with the mana of an apprentice mage after all, but if this new project of his works he''d be able to start getting to the point of being able to match those with larger mana pools in the near future. After a few hours of work and nearly exhausting his remaining mana, he finally completed the fox. It hadn''t changed much from its original look with its red and white fur and the tip of white on the end of its tail. If one didn''t use a mana detection spell to take a better look at it, they wouldn''t be able to tell that it had four times the normal amount of mana that a fox should have. This amount wasn''t much being only enough to cast a dozen Tier- 2 spells and not even power a fraction of a Tier- 3 spell, but it was a start on his goal. There was only one problem left, however. Transferring mana from its body to his own body. He could use the mental connection to transfer mana, but it would lose a portion of the energy transferred in the process which would be wasteful. If he used that method instead of having enough mana for a dozen spells, he''d only have enough for six. He already ran out of mana and didn''t have any ideas on how to remedy this situation, so he decided he''d move on to testing out his new bird familiar. He decided upon a name shortly after his arrival at the inn, and that name would be blizzard. He thought it would be a fitting name considering its affinity towards ice magic. Thankfully he didn''t need a constant supply of mana to control his puppets, all he needed to do was have a small string of mana connecting the two of them while he controlled it. Taking control of blizzard Adimir laid down on his bed and shifted perspectives from his own body to his familiar''s body. This allowed him to be able to control the bird to a greater degree than just sending orders to it which increased its effectiveness when casting magic. However, this came at the cost of leaving his body vulnerable as he wouldn''t be aware of what was going on around him and would not be able to control his body. Adimir wasn''t worried though. With him being in an inn he shouldn''t be facing any actual danger while doing this. Adimir hopped out of the window of his room and spread the wings of his familiar and flew. With but a few flaps of his wings he was able to ascend with ease above the buildings. Looking down at the crowd below him he couldn''t help but marvel at the liberating freedom he felt from flying. Soon however he was shaken free from the daze he was in as he noticed the connection between his familiar and his main body was weakening. It seemed that it had a distance limitation, and he was now approaching that limit. Adimir decided to turn back and this time pay attention to the distance he traveled while flying to see just how large the range of the connection was. It took him a few minutes, but he discovered that the range wasn''t that bad being around a mile. That was more than enough for blizzard to be used for reconnaissance. Although with his sonar spell that purpose was already filled, it still had potential uses once he strengthened its combat capabilities further. On his way back to his room he spotted Mira walking in the market looking for something. It seemed he wasn''t the only one who had decided to do some shopping during the week they did their own thing. Upon arriving at the inn and perching blizzard on the dresser he switched back to his own body and sat up from the bed. With this, he successfully did his first test drive of the bird and he had to say he was pretty satisfied with it. With his first tests now completed Adimir decided to focus on improving himself. During the time he had flown around in blizzard he made sure he was wearing his mage cloak to regenerate a bit of mana while he was testing it out. Now he had a bit of mana for his next bit of training. Mana meditation. Closing his eyes Adimir focused on his breathing and started meditating. With every breath, he took in he could feel his body absorbing bits of energy and his mana get replenished by just a small amount. By meditating he was able to slightly speed up the rate of his mana regeneration and practice his mana control at the same time. This would help him kill two birds with one stone. It was also the method he had used earlier in his years as a novice mage to train. He spent the next few hours meditating and spreading any mana in his body throughout his body. Soon enough he completely refilled his mana pool and could cast spells again. Deciding that he had enough training Adimir went to the guild to take on a subjugation quest. Thankfully it seemed that there were more quests available this time around as there were a couple dozen monster hunting quests available. One of which was for eliminating a band of hobgoblins that had apparently been stirring up problems with the few travelers who dared to travel in smaller groups. Already there were an estimated 40 or so deaths from this band of hobgoblins.The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. The most interesting thing about this was that it seemed that they are thought to be one of the splinter groups of the goblin horde that he and the other adventurers fractured just a few days ago. This would be the perfect quest to use blizzard in combat. The hobgoblins from the army were all weak enough individually that a Tier- 2 spell was enough to deal with them. After accepting this mission Adimir headed out to the quest location. ************************************************************************************************************* Adimir now was 1600 feet away from the hobgoblin camp which was based inside the forest. He needed to find a way to keep his body safe while he used blizzard to attack the hobgoblins. He decided upon using his magic to open up a 5-foot deep hole in the ground and hooped inside. Once he did that, he covered the top after making several small openings in the top so he could breathe. He made sure to have left his bird up above ground so he could take control of it. He switched his perspective over to his bird and took off into the air. It only took a couple of minutes before he arrived at the camp and took the time to survey the hobgoblins and if he could kill them all with blizzard. They numbered surprisingly few with only ten hobgoblins, which explains why they only dared to attack those who were unlucky enough to not travel with a caravan. The hobgoblins were busy roasting meat over the fire and based on the fact that they were all lugging around swords and spears none of them were capable of using magic or any ranged attacks for that matter. This would be a piece of cake. Adimir wasn''t capable of chanting in the current body but he could still cast spells at a weaker level than he usually cast them at. He led off with a blast of several ice shards towards a group of three hobgoblins who were huddled up near the fire. The ice shards collided with the soft flesh killing one of the hobgoblins with a blow to the neck and severely injuring the other two with limb injuries crippling them. This caused the other hobgoblins to scramble to pull out their weapons and look around for the mage who cast the spell. But they never bothered to look up where the spell had actually come from meaning he still had the element of surprise on his side. He followed up with two ice shard blasts killing another two goblins. By now however they began to notice where the attack was coming from, but those with spears were uselessly trying to lob their spears at blizzard. But it was all for naught as the spears simply weren''t suited for such a task. Something the hobgoblins would have realized if it weren''t for the fact that hobgoblins were shortsighted and weren''t known for their intelligence. During this time Adimir took this time to shoot down three more hobgoblins with a mix of ice shards and spikes. Out of the remaining four hobgoblins were now in full retreat at seeing nearly all of them were killed off by a single bird. He had the bird start gliding after the fleeing hobgoblins and started to pick them off one by one with ice shard spells, and soon enough killed the remaining hobgoblins. The entire attack didn''t even last five minutes. This marked the first success in the combat tests of his pet. The amount of mana he had consumed wasn''t that bad either as he had more than half still available to use. After flying blizzard back to his body and switching back to his own he went back to the inn to get some food and call it a day. ************************************************************************************************************* It was now the day the hellhounds reunite to start taking quests together again. They only were separated for a single week so Adimir couldn''t expect any leaps and bounds in their combat strength. But he still was rather eager to see his friends again after their time of separation. He was currently sitting at a table for three in the adventurer guilds dining area while he waited for the other hellhounds. He had decided to arrive earlier than the others to eat something because he was feeling slightly hungry. "Hey, there short stuff! What''s that fancy bird you got there?" Tauna asked as she took a seat next to him. It seemed she had updated her armor a bit and was now wearing steel gauntlets on her hands and had steel shoulder guards as well. As for the bird, she was referring to Adimir had blizzard perched on the table as he decided it was about time to introduce him to the other since he was just a bit too large to hide anymore. "Must you keep teasing me about my height? As for the bird, his name is blizzard, and you can think of him as my familiar. He''s able to cast ice-based spells, so he''ll be handy to have for future quests." Adimir replied. Tauna seemed to have taken an interest in blizzard as she leaned in to look at it better. "I''ve never seen a breed of its type before. Mind telling me what it is?" She inquired. "That I''ll keep to myself for now." Answered Adimir. He wasn''t sure how the inhabitants of this world would react to magic like his. Had it been in his world it would have likely been outlawed and would only be practiced behind closed doors. In a world as superstitious as this one however one would likely face a much worse fate. "Suit yourself. Have you seen Mira?" She asked redirecting the topic of the conversation. "Not yet. She should be here shortly. It is Mira we''re talking about after all." Adimir said in an unconcerned tone. Right on cue the very person they were speaking of arrived and placed a paper on the table. "Sorry I arrived so late. I went and grabbed a quest I wanted to talk to you guys about." Mira said as she sat down, she only spared a glance of interest towards Adimir''s familiar before moving straight on to business. "No problem Mira! So, what do we get to kill this time? Please don''t say goblins. I killed enough of them to fill up a town!" Tauna replied with a smile on her face at the thought of more killing. At this point, he was unsure if she was actually a battle junkie or just someone who liked to kill stuff in general. He was more leaning towards the latter. "Actually, it''s not exactly a subjugation quest. It¡¯s the location and date for the next rank up test. They''re first setting up the rank up test for iron ranks to rank up to steel. I''m thinking we should use this chance to get Adimir ranked up so that we have a team of steel ranks. It''ll help with our reputation." Mira explained. "I can understand that. So, when and where is it taking place?" Adimir asked her sitting up a bit straighter now that his interest was piqued. "Next week on Throta. It''s in a city a few days away. I''ve already arranged a guard job with a local small caravan that''s heading that way. So tomorrow we can head out to the city. How does that sound?" Mira asked them. "Sounds like a good plan to me. What do you think Adimir?" Tauna commented. "I''d like to go. I have been rather eager to rank up." He answered as he started to get excited at the prospect of being able to get to the next rank soon. "Great let''s meet here tomorrow morning to go then," Mira said with a smile. And with that, the hellhounds have decided the next part of their journey. A taste of power They were all packed up and ready to head out. The hellhound team was now at the meeting location at the east gate where Mira said the caravan would be at. They did indeed find a caravan there, but it was far smaller than the previous one they guarded. This one was only 12 caravans strong and had only around 50 guards armed with round shields and spears. Each caravan had iron plating to protect it as well as the insignia of two spears crossed over a round shield. "What''s the insignia for?" Adimir asked curiously. "That my young friend is the emblem for our company. We''re Tom''s arms dealership and this is one of many weapon caravans. You are the hellhounds I''ve heard so much about are you not?" A cheerful voice answered before Mira could. Looking over to see who had answered his question he found that it was, in fact, a human dressed in blue gambeson armor with grey trimmings as well as a grey robe that was quite obviously made of expensive material. He had graying hair and looked to be in his late thirties. "The one and only. You''ve heard of us?" Adimir said. "Why yes, I have! That''s part of why I accepted Mira''s request to be hired onto the caravan. We typically don''t require an adventurer escort when he have our guards after all, but there have been some rumors amongst the merchants in town that there was an adventurer group named the hellhounds that had a mage capable of using a real detection spell. I would have usually brushed off such rumors as nonsense under normal circumstances, but one of my sources has been able to validate these claims. So, I couldn''t help but get interested in a mage who could cast such magic. So young man would that mage, be you? You seem to be the only mage out of the three of you." The man responded. "Good. We''ll be depending upon your spell for the duration of this trip. That is if the spell is really as great as the rumors make it out to be. You can hop in the 4th caravan. Alert the guards if anything pops up on your spell." The man told them then left abruptly. "Well, that was¡­ delightful?" Tauna said in an unsure tone. "Let''s just go get in the wagon. If we''re not needed for fighting as he says then it''s just easy pay, right?" Mira decided and started walking over to the wagon that the man said to go to. "But I wanted to kill stuff¡­" Tauna grumbled dejectedly following after her. "Didn''t even introduce himself. People these days." Adimir commented as he walked after them. When they hopped in the caravan started moving, and Adimir went to work on casting the detection spell every five minutes. There wasn''t much to speak of during the first couple of hours of travel. Every time he cast a detection spell, he cast didn''t get any alarming feedback. To pass the time the trio decided to chat idly about random topics. "Alright so we''re called the hellhounds, but what if. Hear me out on this. What if we were hellhounds of certain things! Like I''d be the hellhound of battle! And Mira the hellhound of snow or something!" Tauna suggested with an excited grin plastered on her face. "First of all, why am I the hellhound of snow? I''m pretty sure that snow has nothing to do with hellhounds anyways." Mira asked with a confused look. "Because of how your all business about everything! Not an ice queen but definitely enough to at least be a snow queen." The wolfkin girl explained. "While I admit Mira is indeed more straight to the point, she''s not really snow queen material. Much too kind for that. But I do think that your idea is cool. If we were a bunch of ten-year-old¡¯s." Adimir interjected. This caused the two of them to look at them with their eyebrows raised. "You are basically a ten-year-old. You do realize, that right?" Tauna asked him. Adimir had forgotten all about the fact that his body was that of a ten-year-old because he rarely thought of it and tried to keep it out of mind. He pinched the bridge of his nose as he let out a frustrated sigh. "You know what I mean Tauna." He said to her. "Alright. But seriously we should definitely do this for when we become famous platinum ranks!" Tauna continued speaking of her idea.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. "Platinum ranks?" Mira asked doubtfully. "Platinum ranks!" Their tank confirmed. "You know only the most powerful and legendary of adventurers ever reach that point, right? Like only 1 out of 10000 Gold ranks ever reach that point. And we''re not even silver ranks. Heck, I''m still only an iron rank!" Adimir exclaimed. "Well, then all we have to do is get stronger!" She replied insistently. "Ok let''s leave this topic for discussion at least for when we''re a silver rank team. We should discuss something more important than that like team formations we could do." Mira interrupted steering the conversation in a different direction. "Well, I think we already have a basic idea of what formation we''re going to be doing though?" Tauna countered. Suddenly a response from Adimir''s detection spell came back. "I''m afraid we''ll have to leave this discussion for later Mira. I''ve picked up on a group of potential hostiles that''ll arrive in a few minutes." Adimir said suddenly. She nodded in return while Tauna grinned with a spark lighting up in her eyes. Adimir hopped out of the wagon as his teammates followed him. "Hey, guards! We have around 16 life signatures heading towards us from the north. They''ll arrive in a few minutes." He notified the closest guard. The guard nodded in return and went to notify the leader of the caravan. Within the next few minutes, the caravan stopped, and the 50 caravan guards got into five rows of ten facing the north. The man the three-spoke to when they met with the caravan walked over to them. "I hope that your spell works and that it isn''t a fluke young adventurer." He warned him. "It''s not," Adimir replied in a level voice. "Good." was all he said in return. Soon enough they saw a group of 15 orcs and one ogre came into view. "Hmph. Nothing but raider scum and an ogre. Nothing of concern." The man said in a contemptuous tone. Adimir and the other hellhounds tightened their grips on their combat equipment as they got in edge as they were reminded of the fight, they had with the ogre in the goblin nest. "I can provide spell support if you need it." Adimir offered. "Thank you, but we won''t need it for such a small fry." The man rejected. Adimir shook his head slightly wondering how much faith he had in his guards if he had the confidence to call something like an ogre small fry. The ogre in the goblin nest they fought had nothing but a loincloth on and yet it was able to one-sidedly push them back. This one, however, was just as big as the other one with the same startling red skin tone, but it had armor on. It had a leather arm guard for its right arm, gambeson pants, as well as a belt with an iron plate over its stomach protecting one of its largest weak points. In both its hands it held two large brutal looking axes with ax heads as large as a man''s head. The orcs, on the other hand, were wearing a mixture of leather, hide, and fur armor, and wielded axes, spears, and swords. The caravan guards all got into a defensive formation as the first-row locked shields together and the next row locked their shields above them as they formed a shield wall. Through every hole in the wall, there was a spear protruding from it. The entire formation took less than ten seconds for the guards to form showing just how well trained they were. Adimir was shocked at how fluid their formations were when they assembled, and when he glanced over at the surprised looks of his comrades it seemed he wasn''t the only one who was surprised. The ogre, however, wasn''t nearly impressed as its confident stride didn''t falter, and instead started to speed up as it charged the wall of shields as if taking the formation as a challenge. As it rammed shoulder first into the formation instead of the spear poles snapping and the formation collapsing as he expected the spears gouged numerous injuries on the ogre''s thick skin and the ogre slammed into the wall and staggered backward dazed as if he ran into a wall of steel. This led to even more shock on his part as well as the orcs part. The orc raiders hesitated upon seeing the ogre which boasted immense strength and toughness was stopped in its track despite its charge. The ogre, on the other hand, looked back at the shield wall and the spears dripping with blood in confusion. Then its face twisted into one filled with rage and it raised both hands intending to slash the shield wall with its mighty axes. Before it could, however, the guards all withdrew their spears from the shield wall before thrusting them forward and piercing its chest, cutting its legs, and piercing its arms. The ogre roared out in a mixture of rage as it reeled back from the wall in surprise. Before it could recover from its shock however the shield wall disengaged, and four guards surrounded the ogre and started stabbing into its back and legs causing more severe injuries. The ogre attempted to swat them away with its ax blades, but they proved to be difficult to catch as they effortlessly dodged the slashes. One of the guards taking the chance when the ogre was distracted attacking one of his comrades that had stabbed its foot leaped forward and stabbed his spear straight through its upper back going through the ogre''s titanic body and piercing its heart. The ogre looked dumbly at the spear protruding from its chest in confusion before staggering forward and falling face-first without putting up any more of a struggle. While those four were busy with that 10 other guards had long since dispatched the group of orc raiders without suffering a single wound from the orcs despite the number advantage. "Hey, mister just who exactly are these guys?" Adimir asked immediately as soon as he broke from his frozen stupor. The caravan leader grinned proudly as he answered. "Those are specially trained guards. Each and every single one of them is equal to a silver rank adventurer." The man proudly declared. This shocked Adimir further. Five iron ranks were equal to one steel rank. And steel ranks were about as strong as the average soldier in the army. Ten steel ranks were then equal to one silver rank, and 20 silver ranks were equal to one gold rank while 40 gold ranks were equal to one platinum rank. That meant that these 5 guards were equal to 500 soldiers. Adimir glanced back at the guards who were now busy burning the bodies and cleaning their weapons. No wonder he was confident in calling an ogre a small fry with a force equal to a small army. An ogre was equal to 50 steel ranks but when up against the combined strength of so many silver ranks it would be all but helpless. Especially when they used a well-trained formation like the shield wall to gather all their strength together into one unmovable wall. "That''s what I mean by talking about formations. We should also be training our teamwork so that we''d be a stronger team." Mira said taking advantage of the wonderful display of strength to explain to Tauna what she meant. Tauna only dumbly nodded still reeling in shock at what she witnessed. Come on guys. Let''s go back to the wagon. They really don''t need our help." Adimir finally said as the caravan started to move again. The other two agreed and they all went to rest in the wagon. Adimir eternally swore that he''d one day create a group of creatures that could rival these guards in power. If a caravan had the means to train and employ such powerful warriors, then this world certainly would have countless powerful individuals. Training spars The group as of right now were in a wagon discussing their payment with the leader of the caravan. "Thanks to your spell we plowed through everything easier than normal. So, for that, we''ll be paying an extra three silver coins on top of the agreed 15 silver coins." The caravan leader told them. "That sounds like a fair amount for us," Mira replied. Just as they were about to get up and leave, however, the man gestured for them to stay. "Wait I''d like you to have this token. If you show this to any caravan belonging to one of us, you should be able to procure a spot onboard even if you weren''t hired." He said as he handed each of them a coin with the same crossed spears over a shield emblem as the caravan. "Why are you giving this to us though?" Adimir asked with a suspicious. This suspicious look didn''t escape the man''s sight as he laughed. "Simple. Because your detection spell is really convenient and if I can get you guys to travel with some of our caravans, I''m sure my boss will be pleased. Also, you can show that token to any shop belonging to us to get a chance to buy from our private stock of weapons we sell only to VIPs. Don''t misunderstand anything though. Like I said I''m only doing this to build a good relationship with you because of your spell though." The man said to clear up Adimir''s suspicions. "I see. I won''t be selling the spell to you just so we''re clear. So, if your gunning for that you mind as well get rid of that train of thought right now." Adimir told him. "Fair enough. If our caravan ever has an important shipment to deliver, we''ll be contacting you guys to hire you aboard the crew. Anyway, it was good to meet a team of adventurers like yourself. I haven''t introduced myself yet these past few days but I''m Nick. If you ever need a hand in town just look for our local shop here and ask for me by name and show your token. I''ll be here for the rest of the week." Nick replied his expression briefly showing confusion as he tried to think up what a train was before brushing it off. "Thank you for your kindness, Nick. I believe I speak for the entirety of the hellhound team when I say that we''re thankful for your help." Mira said with her ever present amiable smile. "Think nothing of it. It''s all business after all." Nick said waving off her thanks. With their discussion concluded the three of them exited the wagon. By the time the talk ended, they were now at the city of their destination. Before they left, they had gotten paid so that wasn''t a concern now. "So this is the city where I''ll take my rank up exam? I have to say the defenses are nothing to scoff at." Adimir said with a hint of admiration in his voice. Compared to the defenses of the town he first saw this city had the type of defenses that made it seem like they were preparing to fight titans. The wall was easily 50 feet tall and had a steel gate that had two layers of steel bars to keep out invaders. On either side of the gate was an archer''s parapet with enough room to house 20 or so archers. "Of course, it is. This city''s name is Elvenspire and it has a population of over 800,000 people I''ve heard. They need a good defense to keep a city of this size safe from the number of higher-ranked monsters that would be attracted to such a large population of people." Mira explained to him. Upon hearing the absurdly high population of the city Adimir looked at the defenses again in a new light. "I guess magic must really help with the production of crops," Adimir mumbled thoughtfully. "Come on enough standing around! Let''s go and get a place to bunk at! We still have two days to prepare you for the test Adimir, and I intend to hammer into you the knowledge you''ll need to pass it." Tauna declared interrupting the conversation Adimir and Mira were having. Tauna''s gung-ho attitude about the rank up test proved to be infectious as even Mira had a small smile on her face. "Alright alright let''s go." Adimir relented with an amused smile. After getting through gate security the hellhound team managed to get a couple rooms at a local inn called the hound''s lodge. Right now, however the group was inside the girl''s room discussing the Rank up exam. "So, what should I expect from the rank up exam?" Adimir inquired. "First of all, it''s not going to be easy. They usually do it differently each year, so our knowledge won''t be enough to get you through the exam. For instance, for me, we were all abruptly dropped into the middle of a forest filled with monsters the guild captured and released in it." Mira told him. "Seriously!? But what if a person dies?" He asked with a shocked expression on his face. "They usually have silver rank advisors on hand to save a person if it looks like they''re about to die. And if that happens, they are automatically failed. But even with that, there are still many deaths during the exam." Mira answered him. "For me, I had to fight against a steel rank and at least manage to hit them five times before they hit me five times. It was a pretty tough fight." Tauna added on. "What we can help you with though is practice. From now on we should do daily spars to get you used to fighting against humanoid opponents like with the hobgoblins. Just a bit more cunning. You''re a mage so I''m not entirely sure what type of test they''ll have for you since mages take a different test, but the spars should be enough to serve as training." Mira decided. "Got it. So, who will I be facing first?" He asked the two girls. This question caused a dark grin to spread across her face. She then cracked her knuckles and then her neck. "Me." She answered gleefuly. Mira then patted Adimir''s shoulder. "Good luck." She said with a solemn expression on her face. "Hey hey! Don''t say that like I''m about to die!" Adimir cried out his face morphing into one consumed by panic. ********************************************************************************************************** Adimir and the other two went over to a nearby clearing just outside of town for their spar. Both Adimir and Tauna had their full combat gear on. The two had a distance of 20 feet between them and Mira was in the center 20 feet to the side so she wouldn''t get caught up in the fight. He couldn''t help but think that with Tauna''s towering height from his perspective paired up with her gambeson armor, steel gauntlets and shoulder guards and the tower shield she had made for an intimidating sight. Tauna got into her fighting stance with her shield raised up in front of her. "When I say fight the spar will begin. The first one to get three consecutive hits wins. Are you both ready?" Mira asked the two of them. Both Adimir and Tauna nodded wordlessly. "FIGHT!" Mira declared while backing up a couple more feet. Right away Adimir began his assault on Tauna. She was the type of fighter who excelled in both defense and offense and was very difficult to counter, but with her heightened senses as a beastkin, he knew that he''d have plenty of ways to turn this fight to his favor. "Caeca mico!" He shouted while pointing the tip of his staff at Tauna while turning to look away. As soon as he finished the magic chant for the spell a blinding light erupted from his staff and Tauna who was looking directly at the staff to dodge whatever it attacked with cried out in surprise as she was blinded by the bright light. Even Mira who was examining the fight carefully was blinded by the light. Only Adimir who looked away was unaffected and he seized the chance he created to push his advantage further. "Exagitant venti!" Adimir yelled causing a powerful wind to manifest itself in front of Adimir and crash into Tauna who was still disoriented sending her onto her butt. The wind served as enough for Tauna to get her head back on as she stumbled back up to her feet and rushed him intending to close the gap before he could cast any more spells. However, he had already predicted this and used the same strategy that he used during his combat exam to become an iron rank. "Luto artis murum!" Adimir murmured under his breath causing a 6-foot-tall and 10-foot wide dirt wall to appear in front of him. He then began to back up preparing to cast another spell. However out of his expectations instead of going around the dirt wall like Adimir thought Tauna would she instead rammed straight into it. The first charge alone nearly caused it to collapse as cracks appeared in the dirt wall. While it was only made of dirt it was still sturdy enough to block off most humanoids, but Tauna nearly breaking through it in one charge served as a testament to her ridiculous level of strength. Then the next instant the dirt wall collapsed as Tauna leaped forward with a battle crazed look in her eyes. Adimir still was in shock about her breaking through his wall with such ease that by the time he recovered, she was already in front of him and placing a well-aimed kick on his chest. With that one blow, Adimir was sent flying 5 feet and had the air knocked out of him. Coughing and hacking he raised his hand as he tried to cast a spell only for a boot to step onto his arm preventing him from raising it. Then another one kicked away his mage book out of his reach and a mace was leveled towards his forehead. "This round goes to Tauna!" Mira yelled declaring the winner. Adimir looked up at Tauna''s smirking face and sighed. "Hehe. It looks like your magic wasn''t enough to beat me. But I have to say I like the light show you did earlier." She commended him. "Yeah, thanks, I guess. Next time I''ll make sure to beat you though." Adimir replied as he reached up his hand towards Tauna. Tauna grabbed his hand and pulled him onto his feet. "We''ll see about that." She said with a coy smile. Mira handed Adimir his mage book to him and patted his shoulder. "Don''t beat yourself up over this loss. Tauna is pretty much a steel rank mages worst nightmare. She''s very good at countering attack spells and can use brute strength to get past most defensive spells that apprentice mages have at their disposal." She disclosed to him. "Huh. So, a bad matchup? Guess I''ll have to put extra effort into beating you next round." Adimir decided. "Well, you already got farther than any other mage has with that light trick. Can''t say I''ve ever seen a mage use a spell like that before." Tauna clarified. "Ah, the blinding flash spell. I made that one. I figured the next time we faced an ogre or something we could use that to turn the tables." Adimir told the two. "That would explain it. So ready for round two?" Tauna asked him. "Hell yeah!" Adimir replied in an upbeat manner. (A few minutes later) Adimir and Tauna just finished another spar. This time around she was prepared for the blinding flash spell, so he used some water magic to make a mud spot for her to slip in. Unfortunately, she recovered quicker from that than he had expected and sent him flying with a one-handed throw. After a short rest, Tauna switched out with Mira for a sparring match. "Same rules?" Adimir asked Mira. "Same rules." She confirmed while drawing her short sword and dagger. Mira was wearing full gambeson armor with a steel shoulder guard for her right arm. He knew from experience that she used agility and skill when fighting, unlike Tauna who fought more like an actual monster with her brute strength. Because of this when it came down to it Mira was much faster than Tauna which would make her more difficult to hit with any slower attack spells. With this in mind, Adimir was going to have to think up a strategy to actually be able to land at least one hit to daze her before bombarding her with more spells. Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. He was after all desperate to at least win one match after being beaten two times in a row by a certain brutish girl. "Ready? Set! Fight!" Tauna yelled starting the match. Instead of doing a verbal casting for his spell Adimir went with a mental cast to sacrifice power for speed. Right away a couple dozen five-inch long spikes jutted out of the ground in front of Mira to hamper her progress forward. But once again it seemed that things weren''t going his way as Mira ran through the spiked area easily avoiding the spikes with cat-like agility. "Shit!" Adimir exclaimed as he fired off a barrage of stones from the ground below him at her. And yet she surprised him yet again as she did a front flip sailing directly over the stones, he shot at her and started running in a zigzag the moment her feet touched the ground. By now Adimir was firing off balls of clay at her trying with all his magical might to hit her even once before she got close to him, but by the time he fired off his third barrage of clay balls she already had her dagger at his neck. Adimir''s lower jaw dropped open as she was just a moment ago a good five feet away from him and now was already in front of him. "Why the heck are you guys so monstrously strong!?" Adimir exclaimed. Mira moved her dagger away from Adimir''s throat with the faint outline of a smile on her lips. "That''s because unlike mages who use their mana to use spells our mana is constantly strengthening our body 24/7. So, something like a backflip and other feats of similar levels of strength are easy enough for steel ranks to do." Mira answered him. Adimir thought back to the fact that a steel rank is equal to the average soldier and couldn''t help but shiver in fear. Wouldn''t that mean the average soldier is basically a spartan in this world? Truly a terrifying world this place is. He definitely did not want to know what the spartan equivalent of this world was if that was the case. "Again! This time for sure I''ll land a hit on you!" Adimir insisted. "Ok. Just don''t get ahead of yourself. This is only training after all." Mira replied before she walked back to her original position. Adimir realized that this time around he''d need to do something to hamper her senses if he wanted to stand a chance at defeating Mira, but in a way that would still allow him to target her with his range spells. That was his only chance at defeating a fighter like Mira. With this in mind, Adimir attempted his first mixed element spell. By massing the water molecules in the air and heating them up into steam he blanketed the small area that they were fighting with a layer of obscuring steam. He could already tell it was changing the battlefield to his advantage as he was only able to see five feet ahead of him before the steam became too thick for him to see farther. Adimir activated his mage eyes and began to silently creep to the left. Inside the mist, he could see Mira slowly walking forward with her head darting around trying to catch a glimpse of him or one of his attack spells. Unfortunately for her, he was still a good 20 feet away from her. Resisting the urge to giggle Adimir set about in one of his specialties. Altering the battlefield. Using the last bit of mana inside of his magicrystal staff he began to make the topmost layers looser to increase the tripping hazard. It seemed; however, this action didn''t go unnoticed by Mira as she slowed her pace and started to pay more attention to the ground below her. Tch. How perceptive of her, but it was already far too late for her by now. With this Adimir''s trap was set and now he''d be able to make her dance to his own tune. He then used his own mana to gather up five clumps of loosely packed dirt and began to float them five feet away from him to his left. Doing this took a degree of concentration and he was forced to stay still and allow Mira to approach him slowly but surely, but he was able to look past that to win. Just as Mira was eight feet away from him the dirt clumps, he floated away from him were sent flying towards Mira. The first three were slashed apart by Mira''s sword and dagger before she dodged the last two with that absurd agility of hers. But he accomplished his goal as she turned her attention towards where the attack had come from and darted forward while brandishing her blades. All like he had hoped. Adimir''s lips curved into a sly smile as he gathered up the mana he had into his hands and began blasting bolt after bolt of lightning just in front of Mira. The lightning bolts crashed into her causing her body to convulse as she crashed into the ground. They weren''t anywhere near strong enough to actually harm a person, but they had enough of a punch to stun someone like a taser would. Not taking any chances Adimir slammed his staff into the ground and shouted. "Ligat lapis!" And with those two words, four stone restraints emerged from the ground and pinned down Mira by her ankles and wrists. Then with another spell, Adimir pushed away from the steam that had been blanketing the area till then. Walking over with a smug expression on his face Adimir looked down at Mira. "Looks like I''ve managed to pull a win this time." He said with a pleased tone. Mira shot him a glare before shooting daggers at the stone that was restraining her limbs. She opened her mouth to say something, but before she could say anything a loud outburst of laughter emerged to their left. When they looked forward, they saw Tauna holding her stomach as she laughed. "You got taken out so easily! I told you that strength was important! I''d be able to tear those stone restraints right out of the ground and keep fighting!" She claimed with a cocky grin on her face. Mira rolled her eyes and ignored her opting to look back to Adimir. "Ah yes I''ll free you now," Adimir said before the stone restraints crumbled away allowing her to get back up. She rubbed her wrists before standing up and patting Adimir''s head. "Good job. Can''t say I expected that. You certainly are well suited to using traps to deal with your enemies." She complimented him and offering a supportive smile. She then turned to Tauna. "Your still too much of a brute in my opinion. Your strength wasn''t of much use when facing something stronger than you like that ogre now was it?" She reprimanded Tauna who on the other hand became flustered and seem to have struggled with coming up for something to say back before her shoulders sagged as she relented. "Well, I think that was enough training for now. Let''s go get something to eat. Replenish our energy a bit." Mira suggested. "Sounds like you finally had a great idea!" Tauna agreed as she bounced back from her sullen mood at the mention of food. "I am rather hungry. So, I''m game if your buying. You did lose the last spar after all." Adimir replied with a coy grin. "Ooh, he''s right about that one. So, Mira you buying?" Tauna asked eagerly hopping aboard at the prospect of a free meal. "Fine, I''ll buy. But nothing too expensive." Mira relented to the their pestering. ************************************************************************************************************* Mira sighed regretfully as she looked at the three platters of roasted chicken and the two plates of gecko steak that were set on the table. She then forked over 3 silver to the waitress who had a beaming smile upon her face. "You know when I said not too expensive, I meant something that didn''t cost me three whole silver coins to buy," Mira said with a scowl on her face. Both Adimir could only offer her a sheepish smile. Tauna, however, didn''t even do that much as she tore off a leg from the roasted chicken and started gorging herself completely disregarding manners. Both Adimir and Mira this time scowled at her. Noticing this, she stopped eating for a moment and swallowed what she had in her mouth. "What? Ladies gotta eat right?" She said before continuing to feast to her heart''s content. Adimir cut a slice of the gecko steak and took a bite. Surprisingly the meat tasted similar to the steak back on earth. It was only a tad bit chewier, but it was practically bursting with scrumptious juices. "This stuff tastes surprisingly good. Is this really gecko meat?" He asked. Mira looked up from her own serving of gecko meat and nodded. "Yup. A lot of the beast type monsters are used as a source of food for restaurants. Gecko meat is pretty common, but we bought some of the better quality so it''s a bit pricier than usual. Of course, buying so much doesn''t help with the price." Mira answered before shooting another glare at Tauna who ordered most of the food that was on the table. Tauna merely shrugged off the glare as she finished eating another chicken leg. Wait for another chicken leg? Glancing at the three plates that had the chicken on them he discovered that half of one of the chickens was already eaten. Adimir gaped at the amount of food Tauna ate. He only took a few bites of his steak while she was already done eating half of an entire chicken. Mira noticed what he was looking at and tapped his shoulder. "She''s a ravenous eater. Probably because she needs a lot of nutrients to fuel the growth of her strength. She actually still is growing despite her age. Surprising I know. I''m not sure how she managed it, but she did." Mira explained to him. After wondering where all that meat went to once she ate it, he brushed it off and focused on eating his food. When the three finished up their meal they decided to go rest at their rooms for the rest of the day. This gave Adimir an opportunity to begin experimenting with magic once again. However, instead of carnomancy, he decided he''d try inventing new magic to help him combat warrior types. Namely a flashbang spell. That way he could deafen, blind, and disorientate his enemies. But for this, he''d also need to invent a personal protection spell to prevent himself from being affected by his flashbang spell since he didn''t have any or know of any specialized gear to defend against this type of spell. So, he set to figuring out his new spells. For the flashbang spell itself, the blinding light part was simple enough as he already had the blinding flash spell to draw from. There was still the part about figuring out how to make a bang loud enough to deafen people though. He knew that sound waves were created by vibrating the molecules in the air so all he''d really needed to do was make those vibrate fast enough to make a loud noise. But as the saying goes, easier said than done. As for the sound dampening to protect himself an air gap would be the most effective method. Since sound waves used air as the transfer method then if one had a gap between the air, you''d be able to deafen noises. This was one of the things soundproofing technology did. Put barriers between the noise and the ear to soundproof. As for protecting against the blinding flash part of his spell he should probably just close his eyes and use mage eyes instead of his normal eyesight. And so, with an overall idea of what he should be doing Adimir went to work on creating a new spell for the spars he''d be doing tomorrow. ********************************************************************************************************** Meanwhile in a backwater tavern filled with shady people two men were huddled in a table in the corner of the establishment speaking in hushed voices. "So, did you get the package?" One of the two men asked the other. "Yes, I have the package. It''s waiting in the drop site. Is the pay in the agreed-upon drop site?" "It is. It''s a pleasure doing business with you as always." "The pleasures all mine." The second man responded before abruptly leaving. Soon after another man this one easily 7 feet tall sat where the second man was sitting. "We got it?" He asked. "We''ve got it." The first man answered in a hushed voice. "Good. Then chaos shall ensue very soon. The plan must succeed." The giant of a man said. "Indeed." The first man agreed. The two then left the bar separately with the second leaving five minutes after the first. PSA No unfortunately this is not a new chapter for you guys to read. Sorry for that. But it is about something that will have a massive impact on this series of mine. If you don''t know yet I am writing another story called I was reincarnated as a monster flower. As for why I''m bringing it up its because of its writing style. This one is written in what I believe if memory serves is called third person point of view. The other one (Which has had far more success in a single day than this one in a month) is written in a first person point of view. What I want to know is if you would rather me continue this series in the writing style I''m currently doing it in or rewrite everything in the other writing style. Before you make a decision however I IMPLORE you to read the other one to get a general idea of what you can expect from a first person point of view storytelling of the carnomancer. If you complied with my requests and vote and comment your opinion then I thank you. Really thank you. I mean it. So I''ll wait a couple days after this post for people to get their opinion in if they chose to contribute. The invasion part 2 "Hey, you kid. Are you the one that used the spell that killed most of the shades?" A brusque feminine voice asked Adimir. When he turned around, he was surprised to see it was that terrifying gold rank fire mage. They had long since entered the guild by now doing who knows what and Adimir was occasionally helping out with the defense using his stone machine gun spell. "Yeah, that''s me. Why do you ask?" Adimir answered putting up his best innocent child act. He had a bad feeling about this person coming to ask about him specifically, so he wanted to get answers about why. And what''s more effective on people than a small adorable child? Other than puppies and kittens that is. "The guild master needs you. Follow me." She told him without batting an eye at his acting skills. It seems she''s more resistant than he thought to cute things. How frustrating. Watching the back of the gold ranker as she walked towards the guild without looking back to see if he was following, he couldn''t help but sigh. It seems that when one is a gold ranker, they''re most likely used to getting their way. Not that he''d have the guts to go against one of them when they''re a small army compressed into one person. Adimir started rushing after her as fast as his small legs could carry him. When they went into the guild, they climbed a set of stairs all the way to the third floor. He hasn''t been anywhere past the first floor in any guild he''s been in much less all the way to the third floor so Adimir was a bit curious as to what the third floor would have. When they made it to the third floor the fire mage brought him to a room in the back and opened it. Inside the other people that he saw walking with her when they made their way back into the guild earlier. The white-haired man that Adimir''s instincts didn''t like looked up to see who entered and called out. "Did you bring him, Cass?" He asked the fire mage. "Yup. This kid is the one that Yohan told us about." Cass answered as she closed the door behind Adimir. The room was spacious easily being 20 by 20 feet large and had a round table in the center with a map of what looked like the town placed on it. The other people were all looking at the map and some figurines that were on it. Adimir didn''t pay much attention to it however as the man in leather armor set his eyes on him causing all the muscles in his body to seize up in fear as his fight or flight instinct began to take over. "My name is Rick. I''m the guild master of this branch. What''s your name?" He asked him with a reassuring smile on his face as if he realized that Adimir was panicking and was doing what he could to calm him. "My name is Adimir. It''s an honor to meet you guild master, but why exactly did you want me of all people?" Adimir replied. "Well you see Adimir the guards, the church, and the guild are going to be cooperating to attack the source of this shade invasion and we need mages who can take out a large number of shades in one attack if we are to get close enough to the source to stop this. I''d have Cass do it or one of my assistants do it, but we''ll be needing heavy hitters like them for the source. But I''ve heard about how easily you managed to push back the shades single handily. So, I want you to be one of the main forces to push back the shades. What do you say?" Adimir took a moment to weigh the odds in his mind. He could accept and face a swarm of killer ghosts with the help of three different powerful forces in the city, and possibly get a big reward and get his teams name out there. Or he could refuse and lose out on all the good things of accepting. Not a difficult choice he had to admit. "I''ll accept on one condition," Adimir announced his eyes glittering mischievously. "What is it?" The guild master asked him. "I want my team the hellhounds to be allowed to take part in the attack on the source if we manage to clear out the shades and set up a formation that allows the rest of the adventurers to be able to handle them with relative ease," Adimir answered. The fire mage known as Cass scoffed and slammed a closed fist onto the round table.Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. "Do you really think you can manage to pull that off and still keep up with us? You''re still an iron rank. Know your place." She objected with a snarl. However, before she could continue the guild master glared and she stopped talking. Albeit reluctantly based on the bitter look on her face. Rick then looked at Adimir with an amused look on his face. "The only reason I want gold rankers on this mission is because we don''t know how strong the enemy will be." Rick sternly said to the gold-ranked mage. "If you could manage to pull off a stunt like that, I''d treat you to a meal and allow you and your team to come along with us if you think you can handle it," Rick said. "We can handle it," Adimir said quickly with a look of determination evident on his face. Rick nodded satisfied with his answer. "Alright, we''ll be meeting up at the town hall with the other two groups. Once all the forces have arrived there, we''ll need you to cooperate with the other forces mages to hold back the shade from getting into town hall by any means necessary." He declared to the others in the room. "Now let''s head out and begin coordinating the adventurers," Rick added before walking away to carry out his plan. As the group of formidable fighters and mages left one of the adventurers in full plate steel armor with a dragon insignia on the chest plate stopped and looked down at Adimir. He then patted his shoulder. "You''ve got guts kid I''ll give you that much. Good luck." He said before following the others. Only when the others leave the room did Adimir release the grin he was suppressing. He''s managed to secure his team a spot on the forces to end this entire disaster which would undoubtedly raise his team''s fame significantly if they managed to stop the shade invasion. The only problem was that he needed to figure out a way to not only kill as many of the shades as quickly as possible, but a way to keep on pushing them back without him being present to take them out. A simple machine gun spell would not be enough to do the trick. He''d need more information on these shades before starting to formulate any concrete plans. And who better to ask than the knowledgeable Mira when it comes to something as important as this? She''s proven reliable thus far when it comes to worldly knowledge like this. Not to mention she already knew about them to the extent she''d be confused about why they''d attack during the daytime in the first place. He then rushed down the stairs of the guild and out of it to search for Mira. And after a bit of searching, he managed to locate her and Tauna taking a break and eating some sandwiches while taking a break. Seeing him rush over slightly panting from the mini marathon he just ran Tauna raised an eyebrow while taking a bite of her sandwich. Mira, on the other hand, took a more direct approach. "Hey, Adimir. What''s the rush?" She asked him tilting her head slightly. Taking a moment to compose himself he asked her his question. "Mira tell me what do you know about these shade things? Anything you know is fine. No matter how small it is." This made her look at him oddly before she nodded. "Alright. I don''t know much, but the shades typically attack during the night since that''s when they''re hardest to spot when they actually try and use the stealth, they''re so famous for. They also usually show up when large amounts of people die in battle or in other agonizing ways. Shades are also classified as undead and are ghosts comprised entirely of mana. Why do you ask?" She informed him. "Simple. If I can come up with a way to hold back the shades effectively our team can go with the gold rankers to stop the source of this threat! Imagine how well known our team could become if we succeed!" Adimir exclaimed grinning. "Woah, Woah, Woah. Hold it. Going on a mission that takes gold rankers is near impossible for us! Mira and I are only steel ranks for crying out loud!" Tauna exclaimed with an incredulous look on her face. "Well, the guild master said that they didn''t know how strong the enemy is so there''s a chance we''re capable of handling it. Besides who said we have to solve the problem. We could just help with dealing with the enemies that pop up along the way and that would be enough." Adimir shot back. "That''s pretty shameless of you to suggest." Mira pointed out. "Sometimes a bit of shamelessness can help out a person''s career." He replied with a sly smile. "Well, I suppose your right. Not every battle can be won fairly. As you''ve shown us in the past." Mira admitted with an identical sly smile. Meanwhile, Tauna was looking back and forth between the two with an appalled expression. "You have got to be kidding me. Am I the sensible one for once? That is not natural." Tauna wondered aloud. Mira ignored her and leaned forward with a fire in her eyes. "So, do you have a plan for taking out the shades?" She asked. This question turned Adimir''s sly smile into a full-blown downright devilish grin. "I think I might just have one. I''ll let you know later what it is." He answered her. Mira nodded. "Everyone gather around! We will be marching out towards the town hall! I want all our damage soaking adventurers on the outside holding back the shades! Mages will be the center while everyone else is in between the damage tanks and the mages." The guild master shouted out orders as he walked towards the front line. "That''s our cue to start heading out," Adimir said with a smirk before heading towards the center of the circle formation that was being formed by the adventurers. Because they didn''t have any formal training in these formations it took a good five minutes for everyone to get together. But when did they through the mages casting various spells to clear out the shades in their direct path and the warriors forcing back the shades from every other direction they made for a fearsome foe. It sort of reminded Adimir of tanks with how the shades relentless assaults couldn''t even slow down their march. Now all Adimir needed was to finish up planning his counterattack against the shades to wipe them out to a sufficient degree. Things were already crazy in this town, and if everything went according to his plan they''d only get crazier. PSA No unfortunately this is not a new chapter for you guys to read. Sorry for that. But it is about something that will have a massive impact on this series of mine. If you don''t know yet I am writing another story called I was reincarnated as a monster flower. As for why I''m bringing it up its because of its writing style. This one is written in what I believe if memory serves is called third person point of view. The other one (Which has had far more success in a single day than this one in a month) is written in a first person point of view. What I want to know is if you would rather me continue this series in the writing style I''m currently doing it in or rewrite everything in the other writing style. Before you make a decision however I IMPLORE you to read the other one to get a general idea of what you can expect from a first person point of view storytelling of the carnomancer. If you complied with my requests and vote and comment your opinion then I thank you. Really thank you. I mean it. So I''ll wait a couple days after this post for people to get their opinion in if they chose to contribute.