As the commotion finally died down with all of the infiltrators secured Ajax let one of the other guards take care of the prisoner as he went over to Kate, not only to ascertain that she was ok but also to have her patch up the one cut he did get after the dagger cut through his sword and left a nasty cut on his arm.

“You ok?” he asked her.

“Yeah, she didn’t manage to get through my barrier.” Kate said before quickly getting to work on the bleeding cut.

“Am I captured or dead?” a melodious voice came from behind him. It was different than any other Ajax had heard before and somehow also sounded distinctly inhuman.

“Captured.” the guard responded while securing the restraints.

Ajax was no longer concerned with her arms and feet though. He looked pointedly at the silver hair and the pointed ears he could see now with the hood of the cloak taken down. It was the first time Ajax had ever seen an elf, unlike beastkin and dwarves elves tended to stick to nature as such he saw none in the city.

She had a beautiful naturally symmetrical face with violet eyes. She had also noticed the way Ajax seemed to have turned and started to stare at him so she returned the favor.

“What’s with you? Didn’t expect that a woman could cut you?” she retorted scathingly. Despite the System making gender a much smaller issue when it came to strength compared to Earth, sexism still existed.

“That’s not it.” Kate answered when she saw Ajax not saying anything. “You’re just the first elf he’s ever seen.”

“Yeah, right.” she huffed.

“No, it's true. He was a hunter in a secluded village before all this.” Kate said without any ill will. “They managed to conscript him before he joined the Adventurer’s Guild.”

This was enough for Ajax to break out of his shock and stop staring at her. “Sorry.” he mumbled as he turned away from her face and focused on the ring on her finger he had seen send the lightning bolt.

“The ring on her finger is runed” he pointed out to the guard securing her. Since she was a prisoner it was well within the rules for her to try to escape or use it even once restrained.

“That is runic magic and cannot be seized under the rules of this skirmish.” she quickly spoke when the guard moved to take the ring.

The guard stopped and looked to the older one that had entered the tent in the meantime.”Then in accordance with said rule and the cloak you wear, consider yourself searched and all runic items confiscated.” the older one said while also returning the dagger she had thrown at the end of the battle.

After returning the dagger he turned to the three healers that had been hit either by blade or bolt. He quickly examined the cut and puncture wound before saying. “The three of you are considered dead. Both of the knife wounds were intentionally non-lethal and direct magic hits from runic gear are considered kills as use of lethal runic gear like that is not allowed. Patch yourselves up and then continue treating only other people that have been removed from the skirmish.”

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“Take her to the other prisoners.” he told the guard who had finished securing her arms before he turned back to Ajax. “Good job following after her so quickly, she might have taken another three or four of our healers down otherwise. Consider yourself relieved of duty and get yourself patched up. Nicely done kid.”

Ajax had taken the order to heart and spent the rest of the night getting patched up before getting a serving of rations, he hadn’t even been halfway through his meal when they all started making their way back to the camp.

It was already close to morning when he and Kate crashed in the chairs at the table inside their tent. Both were wiped from a long night but wanted to wait for Tom to also return before going to sleep. Neither had seen him since the start of the battle and they were starting to get worried he might have been captured. They were both also trying their hardest to silence the small pessimistic voice in the back of their head that said he might have been killed.

“You’re both still up?” Tom asked as he walked in almost an hour and a half after them.

They both let out a sigh of relief seeing him with nothing worse than some scratch marks on his armor.

“How bad was it?” Kate asked. She had figured out the reason he was late was most likely the post combat meeting the leaders held after the battle.

“Not that bad actually.” Tom said.”We lost a lot less people in the operation than we expected, not only that but we traded them for quite a few of the guards they had stationed to defend the would be fort. The battle afterwards was pretty even in terms of losses.”

“What about mages?” Kate asked. “I know I treated a few that had some evidently non-lethal wounds.”

“They probably have quite a small mage advantage but it’s not that big. We managed to get a few of theirs that they were using to build the fort in the first place.” Tom shook his head. “The biggest loss has to be the removal of the guard from the archduke’s employ.”

Ajax clearly remembered the man who managed to keep three commanders off the stragglers as they retreated. Not only that but the man had access to mana as well. Considering human nature Ajax was willing to eat his shoes if the man wasn’t above level one hundred.

“Why is that?” Ajax asked.

“The other side complained. Apparently he is too strong to be taking part in this skirmish. They even tried to say we cheated by having him take part even with a few restrictions in place.” Tom said. “This is why the meeting took so long.”

“No way they would accept this result.” Kate said confidently. “ They must have asked for more than just his exclusion since he wasn’t meant to be here at all in the first place.”

“They tried.” Tom nodded. “The fact that they brought four cities worth of people instead of the agreed upon three, for reasons we may or may not suspect. “ he gave Ajax a pointed look. “ That and the fact that he is the only person beside the duke’s granddaughter to be part of the people joining one of out three noble forces was enough to limit the fall out.”

With that Tom crashed into his chair in front of the plate that they prepared for him and proceeded to eat. Or more accurately proceed to battle Fluffy for the food on the plate. Fluffy had been left with the commander before the battle so she returned with Tom and was also hungry.

“Any idea what is happening tomorrow?” Ajax asked, already starting to stand and wanting to go to sleep. “Or maybe I should say today, it’s almost morning already?”

“We are all being given the day off. Even the harshest drill sergeant has to know some of us would be able to stand on our feet after being woken up in the middle of the night to go fight a battle.” Tom said around a mouthful of food. “We and the other guard unit are going to be quite a bit busy for the week after that though.”

“Any specific reason as to why?” Kate asked.

“Apparently the future barons were a lot more against the idea of stopping the fort than I thought. They went so far as to block the archduke’s daughter from ordering the guard division to join with her plan, the selfish idiots.” Tom said.

“It took her promising them a whole week off and a gold coin each before they agreed to join her. This means that we and the other guard unit will be having to cover for them during this time so get rested.”

On that note Ajax bid the two goodnight and headed off to bed. He was feeling the exhaustion of the battle but at the same time he finally had the peace and quiet to think back on all the different interesting things he saw today.

The way the archduke's daughter’s bodyguard had been casting spells that seemed to leave some excess mana running that comboed into the next spell. The brief glimpses of runic magic he had gotten, as well as the oddly simple but surprisingly powerful spell the mage used with a single word.

What shocked Ajax the most thinking back on that spell was what he felt. It was as if the spell wasn’t just a simple chant. The whole action of speaking and pointing seemed to be part of launching the spell. What he had learned so far was that gesturing was just useful to help the mind aim the spell correctly by having a constant point of reference regardless of the time and place you cast.

This time however it seemed like the gesture was part of the chant, almost as if the word defined the power and the action the direction of the blast of pure mana. Considering the reactions from the others however it didn’t seem like this would be a topic he would be given answers on if he asked.