"What?!"She was baffled by his statement for a moment. At that moment, she was the typical example of a person who would ask for the truth with no intention to hear it."Oh my dear Princess, if only you would calm yourself down when a problem arises, like earlier today..."Her face scrunched up immediately after she heard that. Aiden paused for a moment when he saw that expression before clearing his throat and continuing his statement."...like earlier today when I invaded your privacy. I did not mean to do it and I was only here to call you. Dinner was ready and you'd been here since morning"Her expression eased up a tiny bit in that instant while Aiden drew a deep breath. "You could have hurt Mrs. Smith and her daughter. I know I made a mistake, adding it to the list of my punishment is not too hard I presume"She gave a wicked smirk before saying in a low voice, "oh, you are definitely getting punished"Aiden heard this but he wasn't bothered by it. All he did was ask the quest
"So the tunnel led out to a waterfall?" "It did... He did not warn or even catch me when I came sliding up to him" As Aiden listened, he thought the conversation was somewhat hilarious in how bizarre it was. For one, everything sounded like her fault even though she stated categorically that it was his. "Hmm" "..." "So, which of the noble families are you related to?" "The story is not finished, because we are extremely far from home. Do you know the Nation of Sur?" "Sur? In the south?" "That's how far we were carried away from home" "But there are no rivers that stretch that far between the west and the south of the empire" Andrew was a lot more knowledgeable than Aiden expected, and this gave Aiden a bit of tolerance for him. "I'm guessing that's why we have not been found", Diane responded. "Hmm... Well, I am glad that I agreed to let you ride with us. There will be no pesky stops along the way. We'll be in The Great Capital in two days at most, enough time to find your
"Insight?!!""Yes"The surprise he felt was evident on his face. He took another look at both of them and then at Andrew."I thought insights were almost impossible to learn at the apprentice level?", he asked as soon as the guard turned to look at him."That's true young master, however, in noble and royal families, it is not as impossible as one will think", he answered."Sometimes, normal people with a high enough affinity rating don't need to do anything to use insights, it usually comes naturally", the second continued."I was wondering what the affinity rating was used for", Andrew muttered to himself, while his friends spoke into his ears on both sides."They truly must be from a noble family in Sur...If the young master received the same training as they did, I believe you would do better than they doing"One after the other, the two boys tried to cheer him up but they soon stopped speaking after Andrew raised his hand to shut them up.And so, silence ensued, as they waited for
"Crack!!!"One hit was all it took to crush the already weakened and cracked space warp.Cracking the space warp revealed absolutely nothing that was hiding in the warp.The sphere got crushed to reveal the emptiness in the spot where Diane was supposed to be standing in.This made them all pause for a moment as all eyes tried to pick out anything that would indicate a reason as to why nothing was there.Up in the tree, at that exact moment, The Boss and Raven also saw the space.They fell silent for a moment before he burst out laughing... His laughter was more of a gesture than it was an audible thing, however, it said a lot to Raven who was crouched by his side and had looked at him, confused by the sight."Well done, I knew their protector was not ordinary", he muttered to himself."What did he do?", Raven asked."He...? You did see the female figure that was shown in the warp, right?""Well, he could have done that to mislead us into letting a pretty girl go"The Boss glanced at
The next thing anyone heard was something breaking through glass, in this case, however, it was a person who had crashed through the glass.Also, the glass that broke was not glass. It was another space warp that projected a false scene.In addition to this screw-up, the horses tethered to pull the carriage left behind were gone.There were four horses meant to pull the carriage as it was a massive one. It was held back most likely because it was big enough to house thirteen individuals.Unfortunately, all four horses were now gone. The trail of steps showed that they left in the direction of The Great Capital."****"The Boss cussed out loud when he saw this."I thought I had them in a good place but it appears that I have underestimated them greatly"He said this with a bizarre smile on his face. Raven did not say anything this time. Unlike her usual self that could not wait to tear The Boss a new one, she was quiet.Cradled in her arm was her sister, the one Aiden had dropped out o
"I knew it… There must have been something to create an enigma like you"In front of Aiden was a large slab of rock with weird writings and drawings on it. The instant it appeared; all eyes were drawn to it."Hahaha…"The Boss was still cackling loudly to himself when he felt the wind brush past his chest; almost immediately, he felt his legs leave the ground, and then the pain came rolling in…He screamed even before he landed on the ground as the punch drove his teeth into his tongue so hard that he bit off its edges."You wanted a fight, come get it… It’s a wonder what a race humanity can be if a priest is trying to kill an apprentice for refusing his invitation to join a group of misfits"This statement struck a chord in their minds and it caused all ten of them to react at the same time, in the same way.The situation also changed completely when they heard the aged voice that spoke through Aiden's mouth.The Boss wasn't too bothered by those words because the next moment, a flam
"You better pray that they are enough to sacrifice or you're next""…"That statement scared Andrew into silence immediately. His friends also looked over with horrified expressions, keeping their mouths shut as they watched the two guards being dragged off to where The Boss was standing.As soon as they were brought to his side, he went crazy. He placed his hand on the first guard's head and raised his face to the sky.In that position, he burst into flames again. His dimmed fire veins regained their glow, and his arms, and eyes spewed fire the very next moment.The bizarre part of all this was the fact that the guard was used in the same manner that he had been described; a sacrifice.His skin dried up and cracked… Following that, they also shrunk until they were literally hugging his bones. By the end of it, the guard looked like a desiccated human who died the sickliest person in the world. Much to the horror of those watching… It was such a gruesome death that Diane turned away
The Primordial Stele gravitated to both sides for a moment, whipping forward and back, however, it soon came to rest in the middle of the two.Aiden let his senses loose, firing off thoughts to the Stele in a bid to have it return. His thoughts were, if the stele could choose to save his when he did not ask for it, then it should be able to help him with whatever sentience it had when he asked.The tussle soon began to show on both figures. For Aiden, the white armor began to crack at the sections and joints of his outstretched arms, while The Boss' arm began to lose its flames.Aiden put in all his effort and the stele inched forward in his direction. He gathered his strength for a few minutes and pulled again.Again, the stele moved a few inched in his direction… As small as they were, he was making progress.Suddenly, The Boss screamed out loud with more fire veins popping out of his neck. The tug that had begun inching toward Aiden for a moment suddenly came back to life.The Prim