“I thought you would have known…” Risa said, her voice no higher than a whisper. “The Academy… The Royal Defence Corps leadership… they know, so why don’t you?” “I don’t know Risa, but I’m beginning to think that not everything may be as it seems with the RDC and the Academy,” Alexei said between deep breaths. He was trying to keep calm, both for the sake of Neave and Risa and for his own mental state. It wouldn’t be right away, but eventually he was going to have to go back to the Academy, and when he did he was going to confront the Administrar. There were too many coincidences starting to build up. Lies that had been told, events that had happened. The Assassins of Delsi had appeared so quickly after he had been kicked out of the Academy that it was slowly starting to dawn on Alexei that there had only ever really been one option for who could have set them after him… and the answer was the Academy itself. He clenched a fist and clamped his teeth together painfully hard. It
After getting washed up, Alexei and Neave both spent the afternoon reading by the fireplace. The room that they had been given had access to many things, including a summoning stand that allowed them free reign over the library of the Mage Temple. He’d learnt his lesson about testing anything with magic after the whole sandwich exploding incident, but that didn’t mean that Alexei didn’t want to know a bit more about what he was getting himself into. So, when choosing his book, he’d decided to go with something related to his problem. A bestiary, noting down different creatures and monsters across the ages. The one he had, in particular, was about creatures that were most active before the last major war between nations and he had the yellowed pages turned to that of the Nilbog. Unfortunately, the Nilbog pages didn’t really tell him much more than he already knew. Well, other than the secret to defeating the beast, that was.It was a Goblin class creature that was first born of t
Alexei woke with a start. The smell of rust and smoke assaulted his senses, dragging him out of his slumber and back into reality. His eyes opened with a snap, what he saw was exactly what he had expected. It was exactly what he had seen the last time this had happened. The walls were painted red with blood, and once again at the foot of his bead was the dripping red decapitated head of Neave. The body parts were littered around the room as well, just like the first time, scattered like the forgotten toys of a child. The prickle on the back of his neck flared up as the Nilbog made its presence known. “Doing the same trick twice,” Alexei said offhandedly as he pulled himself out of his bed, “I have to say, not very impressive.” “The initiate knows!” The Nilbog’s voice echoed, just as high-pitched and nasally as it had been before, but this time Alexei was sure he could detect just the smallest bit of fear in the creature’s voice. “Indeed! The initiate knows, as does his mage fr
Alexei woke with a start, and for a moment he was ready to lash out at anything that got close, thinking he was still locked in deadly combat with the Nilbog. But as his senses returned to him, he realised that wasn’t the case at all. There was no smell of rust and smoke. No blood coating the walls of the room. No decapitated head of Neave. In fact, Neave was sitting right next to him, his clammy hand wrapped in her tiny comparatively cool ones. “Ah, you’re awake at last,” Risa said from a chair on the other side of his bed. “What…” Alexei tried to talk, but the raspy croaks that came from his throat made it impossible for him to get more than a word out. “Neave, remember what we talked about? Give him water, but only a little bit at a time so it doesn’t overwhelm his throat,” Risa said to Neave. The small foxgirl nodded with a smile and poured Alexei a small glass of water from a jug that sat on a table next to the head of his bed. She brought the liquid up to his
The Alexei that went into the shower and the Alexei that came out of the shower again felt like two completely different people. The water had washed away all of the grime and it felt as if he were completely rejuvenated. Now that he was out, and he felt well rested and well cleaned, it was time to experiment. “Those clothes at the foot of my bed,” Alexei asked, noting the package that had been placed there for the first time, “Is this the outfit that I asked Christopher to make for me?” “Yup, he brought them by shortly after you were knocked out,” Risa replied, “He said to give you his best and that you should come around for a drink sometime now that you’re Nilbog free.” Alexei nodded, picked up the parchment parcel, and retreated to the bathroom once more. He’d almost forgotten that he’d asked the old lion beastkin to update his look before all the nastiness with the Nilbog got started, and now the clothes were ready. The only instruction that Alexei had given Christopher wa
The training rooms of the Mage Temple were, as Alexei was beginning to believe was the case with all rooms, extended to contain more space than their exterior dimensions might suggest. The effect in this space was in fact similar to the effect that he had seen in the Black Market’s fighting ring. An array of tiered seating wrapped around a divot in the ground. As the depth of that divot increased the walls seemed to split outward, allowing more and more space to be taken up by the actual battle space on the floor below. There were two platforms, one on either side of the space, that jutted out from the rest of the upper level that were clearly designed to lower two fighters down to the fighting space. “Take a seat, Neave and I will head down and spar so you can see what she’s already capable of,” Risa said. “Spar? Are you sure?” Alexei said as worry laced his tone. In his mind Neave was still just a young girl, the idea of her fighting against an adult was a worry to him, even i
With a quick wave of her hand, Neave dismissed the thick blade that she had summoned into being in a shower of light motes. Alexei was on the edge of his seat, eager to see what kind of magery his ward would rely on next. He had thought that the sword would have been her strongest form of attack, considering her boosted speed and strength, but it seemed as if the girl had something else up her sleeve. A runic circle blossomed into life on the ground below her feet as Neave weaved an intricate series of hand gestures. The ground began to quake and rumble, and for a moment, Alexei believed that this girl definitely could have destroyed a private garden if she so wished. Seemingly out of nowhere a massive green vine sprung from the ground and leapt toward Risa. The thing was about as wide as Neave was tall, and moved at least twice as fast as she had. Risa’s eyes widened in shock, she had clearly been expecting something like this, but obviously, the sheer size, power and speed of
Since Risa was already buffed up from her fight with Neave the first step Alexei took was to cast his own speed and agility enchantments. He also expected the woman opposite him to engage him in the exact same way that she had engaged Neave, with a volley of magery missiles from afar. He wasn’t disappointed by his assumptions. Risa launched a volley of magery missiles at him that numbered twice as many as she had sent at Neave, and were moving at least twice as fast. Alexei couldn’t help the cocky smirk that came over his face as he gripped his staff in both his hands and burst into movement. He was faster than Neave was, but surprisingly not by much. Her beastkin heritage had helped her a lot in that department. Either way, he was fast enough. As the magery missiles came in he batted each one away with a flick of his staff. Unlike Neave’s wild sword swings, each parry he made with the ends of his foci were precise and thought out. He made short jabs, one side after the other,