Hadrian's heart raced.

Since he'd been close to the city, he'd stopped riding creature Hadrian, spreading his vessels, of which he had five new rodent like creatures, out in his range of control.

The female mage noticed creature Hadrian from that great height, which meant she might be able to sense him too, as they had only been about a hundred metres apart.

Based on her attack, he deduced she was an elemental Mage, and a powerful one, either rank four or five.

He'd not gotten enough time to peer into her essence sea.

So, he stood still suspecting she'd sensed creature Hadrian's movement on the earth, or even a shift in the air.

Movement might not even be necessary for her to notice, but he and Alia had the fog layer wrapping.

For the small burrowing and rodent vessels, they were small and regular enough to be ignored.

Creature Hadrian wasn't so lucky. He looked like a Krita, because he'd been one, and that might have been a good enough reason for the powerful mage to kill him.

The marching sounds had been getting closer, if he stood there, he would be caught either way.

We're human, she might not kill us instantly.

Thinking this, he took a step, choosing to trust his fog layer wrapping to mask his presence.

Nothing happened.

Feeling slight relief, he took another step when suddenly, earth walls rose all around them.

Hadrian's heart tightened then his mind raced as he thought what to do.

Immediately, he swapped his rank two cores into his rodent vessels, remaining with the rank one elemental path core in Alia and the rank one space path core in Hadrian.

With his spatial sense activated, Hadrian sensed as about a dozen people approached the mage formed wall structure.

The earth walls plunged back into the ground and Hadrian found himself surrounded by fourteen individuals.

The whirling sound remained persistent above him, and that way, he could tell the powerful mage was still close.

On the ground, they studied Hadrian and Alia.

With exaggerated frightened looks, his eyes went from face to face, and he saw some familiar ones.

Fiery red hair that matched his short beard, Gurov, and the rest of his small party.

Hadrian and Alia raised their arms in surrender.

"Why are you out here?" One of the mages asked, a tall man with black hair that reached his shoulders.

Hadrian made Alia speak in a shaky voice.

"A failed hunt." She said. "After that, we'd lost our way back."

"You came out here without knowing you're way around?"

"Had someone for that…. " Alia muttered.

"What happened?" Another mage asked.

"Ran into a fiend." Alia said. Seeing Gurov and his party there, Hadrian thought he might use them to confirm his story.

"We're rank one mages and he'd been rank two. We tried but…. " Alia spoke, tumbling over her words, and made a dramatic pause before continuing, "But it was a death path fiend, we didn't know it's abilities. He held it back while we ran."

"You left your comrade behind?"

Alia swallowed before speaking. "He told us to. It was hopeless, said we were out there because of him. Were we supposed to make his sacrifice pointless?"

Her voice was bitter, selling the weight of guilt with every word.

"Stop," Gurov cut in, taking a step forward.

"We ran into that fiend too. If anything was left of their friend, it was probably crushed under that tree."

He turned to Hadrian and Alia frowning.

"You're twins?" He asked.

Hadrian's main body had been Alia's son, naturally, they looked related.

They gave nervous nods in response.

"Parents?"

Hadrian's jaws flexed before speaking.

"Never met our father, and our mother died a few years back."

Gurov nodded apprehensively.

"Recently awakened?"

"Yes."

"Have you sworn the oath?"

Alia and Hadrian shook their heads.

"You wouldn't lie to me?"

"No," Alia said, "We haven't, you can check us."

Gurov gave her a friendly smile.

"I'm afraid we don't have sorcerers for that."

Saying this, he turned to the others and spoke with a full voice.

"Until otherwise, I'll take responsibility over them."

His eyes went up to the trees.

There were grunts and mumbling among the others for a moment.

"They'll fight." One of them said.

"Of course." Gurov said, "They're old enough to."

Hadrian's hands, feeling the situation diffuse, went down.

With only the party of six remaining behind, the rest walked passed him and Alia.

These weren't all the mages he'd heard marching, as he could hear the rest in the distance.

Alia's and Hadrian's eyes were on the ground as the others passed them by.

Looking up when it suddenly got quiet, when even the whirlwind sound was gone, she asked with profound melancholy.

"What happened to the fiend?"

"We killed it." Gurov said. "I'm aware your comrade did most of the work, but i'm afraid the spoils mysteriously disappeared."

"There's no need to lie." Hadrian said, giving what he thought was a natural reaction. "Vouching for us and taking us under your responsibility is good compensation."

Gurov chuckled and shook his head. "No, truly, it did."

His eyes lingered on the beaten up teens in front of him.

"You're willing to fight?" He asked.

Hadrian nodded with a puzzled look.

"Even if you dont know what you're fighting for?"

"As long as it gets us out of here."

Gurov looked forward where the others had headed then back to the supposed twins.

"Looks like you were doing fine in that regard." He gave his short beard a stroke, "But, I've already given my word."

Saying this, he walked forward, the rest of the small party following.

Hadrian glanced at the mage he'd pranked and followed behind them.

No longer acting, his face took on a genuine puzzled look, confused on what was happening.

Walking among them, in the shuffling of their dark green robes and smell of greenery in his nose, he thought deeply.

A memory stood out to him.

When he'd been observing through Baruch's body after the ritual, Haldon had given Baruch the reason their mages robes were identical was so that their "enemies" wouldn't recognise them.

Is this them?

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