Crane followed Fennec, and Endov followed him. They rushed through the stairs and Fennec kicked open a door and jumped in the room hitting something head-on and trampling it.

Crane followed him right behind and realized that two men were guarding the door on the other side. They hadn’t quite realized what had happened and one of them was down, holding his head.

They wore leather armour and were armed with spears. Fighting them would prove much harder than the quarrel downstairs. So, Crane punched the standing guard in the cheekbone and hoped that the man’s face hurt at least as much as his knuckles did.

Punch the soft spots next time, Crane took a mental note. Faces were too boney. If he kept on doing this, he would break his knuckles in no time.

Still, it was a good thing that he was learning. He had no chance to punch someone in the face back on the island. He could barely get close to Anem during their spars. It was usually Crane who got punched. I wonder if Anem’s knuckles hurt as much as mine do now? Crane wondered.

The guard fell, letting go of his spear just like his friend and holding his face. As he landed butt first to the ground Endov got out of the door and stepped on him, almost tripping over in the process.

They were in a large hall of stone rooms, and other than the surprised guards and a few servants, the place was empty. On the left were stairs that went up to a door that lead to the upper floor with a gate open to outside and on left was a corridor that went deeper into the stone building.

The servant that had just opened the gate and entered the building looked at them with shock and screamed as she bolted outside. Crane and Endov rushed to the stairs, but Fennec grabbed a servant by the collar, an old man. Too old to run away unlike the others.

“Why in Eilar the castle is empty!” He shook the old man and the man dropped the bundle of fresh loaves of bread in his hands. He could only say “Hunt.” Before the guards got up and picked their spears.

Seeing this, Fennec threw the old man towards them and grabbed a loaf of bread as he ran towards the stairs. He took a bite as he followed the other two.

Crane and Endov had stopped, but it was not just because they waited for Fennec’s interrogation to end. Two more guards were standing outside the gate to the yard. Spears at hands, chainmail on the chest and this time, ready for the attack.

They blocked the pass, raising their spears. Crane threw the dagger at one of them, but the dagger was not made for throwing and Crane wasn’t a marksman.

The dagger hit the man in the chest handle first but it had done its job. The guard had covered in fear and lowered his spear. Crane jumped on him with a knee to his chin and toppled the man. He couldn’t enhance his speed and strength but fortunately, he didn’t need to.

The other guy looked at him and swung his spear as he kneed the guard but the spear only grazed his back. Endov had jumped in front of another blow only after a few minutes and saved another life. This time Crane’s. He slapped the guard's face, gripping the head right after the impact and slamming his head to the gate’s wooden frame.

Crane heard a crack as he left for the yard but wasn’t sure whether the crack came from the head or the hardwood.

***

Feeling the sunlight on his skin after a long while, Crane felt a knot up his throat. His eyes teared as he kept running into the yard of the castle, even the evening sun looked too bright.

The lush green ground, an orchard to the left, full of apple trees and training grounds to the right with a few youngsters swinging their swords. Servants of the castle worked, some trimming the grass, some pulling water from the well that was next to the orchard. A woman was yelling at the boys on the tree, asking them to get down as she pulled the bucket up.

There was a small stable next to the training ground but Crane could see no horses. The place looked safe and calm. Something which they had disturbed quite well.

As they entered the yard and kept running on the cobblestone pathway that treads between Crane and the great gate to freedom, the people covered in fear.

The boys jumped off the tree, and the woman rushed to them, dropping her bucket into the well with a splash. The guy who trimmed the grass grabbed his scythe tightly and ran towards the small shack next to the training ground.

These were no warriors, no mages. Crane could feel it. Still, there had to be someone that would try to stop them, if not the commoners then the guards behind.

They had to keep on running.

So run they did. Crane and Endov were slowly falling behind, the latter especially. Fennec however ran like the wind, like he was a gale that swept by the garden. It wasn’t magic, Crane could feel no mana from the young man. His soul was only strong enough to keep his body functioning. No power enough to create mana, no attribute. Just like the servants or the guards. Like commoners as Anem would describe. Crane would call him that too, but he found nothing common about the guy.

“Cath them!” A familiar voice shot behind, still lisp from the loss of two upper incisors. “They are prithoners! Sthop them.” He raised a sword he had picked up on the way and charged after them. The sword looked too big on his hand, and the man was struggling to keep it up.

Some of the bystanders seeing the lisp guy tried to hold them down, but Fennec at first, then Crane and Endov behind ran through them, trampling those they could, dodging whom they couldn’t.

There were at most ten people left in the yard and only a handful of them both understood what the lisping man had told and dared to commit.

Thus, their race towards the gate was a quick one to end. After a short sprint, they met the outer walls. They surrounded the yard and were almost three meters tall with the only opening being the wooden gate.

As they were about to reach the gate, a pair of spears appeared as another set of guards got inside the outer walls. They had to be the last ones on Crane’s path but these were alerted well.

They quickly entered the yard and shut the gate behind, with a giant plank working as a lock that was held up by two wooden hooks attached to each side of the gate’s doors.

Fennec stopped, seeing the gate shut and guards baring their teeth as they snarled like feral dogs. Crane stopped too but not because the path was blocked. Deep inside him, something snapped, a connection that stood there for the longest time, a connection that felt too natural, like part of his soul died.

A coldness descended upon him as he could no longer feel Azavel. The first thing that came to his mind paralyzed his body. He is dead, a thought brushed through his mind as he anxiously turned around, panicking. You let him die.

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The toothless guard reached them shortly and swung his sword in full motion. Crane saw the man but couldn’t react in time as the possibility of losing a brother weighed on him. Endov, thankfully stepped in front of another blow, raising his arms like he was going to block a punch.

The sword grazed the bones of his arms and drew blood as it slashed the dark brown skin like butter. Endov groaned in pain as his blood splashed on the cobblestones in an arc that followed the motion of the swing.

No, he thought as he heard Endov’s pain. That couldn’t have been true. Before losing the connection, Crane felt no, fear no, pain and no harm. If someone had hurt Azavel, he would feel it. Azavel must have hidden somewhere, and my captors must know something.

As soon as Crane realized that he jumped at the guard.

The man’s attack was quite pathetic though he managed to harm Endov. Even a child with a sharp enough sword could kill an unarmed adult. The man was just a little more than that but it was enough.

The guard's arms failed to carry the weight of the sword, making him unable to stop the swing at the right moment. His footing had been sloppy too, almost falling after the wide swing. He almost looked like he was not a guard, but simply a passerby.

If that is the case, why he fights so hard? Crane thought as he jumped at the man with a punch again but this time his fist landed in the guy’s stomach. After the punch, however; Crane didn’t stop. He toppled the man as Endov grabbed the sword.

He gripped the man’s collar taking him a second time but this time, Crane was the one who headbutted him. He buried his forehead right into the guy’s nose, breaking it in the process.

As the guard wept and wetted himself, Crane roared. “Where is the mage! The one hunting the little girl.”

Endov threw the guard’s sword at Fennec who tried to stop the advancing guards so that he could protect himself somewhat. The latter picked the sword but the range difference was still too great and the man could hold them only a few more seconds before a spear stroke dived into his body.

The words of Crane, however, had piqued Endov’s interest for a second but after seeing the blonde man still struggling, he faced one of the spearmen.

“The earth endures!” Endov roared, the attribute of earth flaring within his body as he charged at the spearmen.

Crane felt him and his flaring mana but was too busy to look at the former priest. He wasn’t going to get distracted with this guard this close. Not again.

“I said where he is!”

“I don’th know.” The man wept in response. “They were going tho easth. We heard notthing thince he lefth you and wenth afther the beasth.”

“That’s no beast.” Crane punched the guy in the gut again, making him throw up. He then pushed the guy’s head into his puke. He didn’t like doing it, he felt disgusted but the fear of Azavel getting hurt fueled something deep within him. A rage that overshadowed his morals.

“Was he alone?” Crane continued, blood trickling down from his nose, dripping into the man’s cleaner cheek.

“No, he thook the soldiers here.”

“On horseback?”

“Yesh.”

“Any horses left?”

“Thook them all.”

“And what is his name?”

“I don’th know!” The man screamed, as he wept and Crane let him go.

As he turned back, he saw Endov a head taller and wider than usual, roaring beside the guards he toppled and flexed his muscles under his priest’s robe.

He then slammed his body to the gate head first without a word and broke through it, leaving a hole roughly the size of his colossal body. Crane felt like the man was enhancing himself in more than one aspect. Size grown, strength multiplied and movements fast.

Just one slam into the wooden gate and there was a hole left large enough for Crane and Fennec to go through at the same time side by side.

Crane went out first as Fennec checked the unconscious guards. He looted them, picking whatever he deemed useful and took one of their spears before rushing outside, following Crane.

***

The castle walls had opened to a hillside and a small village that surrounded the hill. Small huts and wooden cabins, goat and cow pens, chimneys smoking with a dark smoke for the nearing night.

They ran outside the town under the suspicious looks of the villagers and a few volleys of arrows and crossbow bolts following them, but the guards didn’t leave the castle and the villagers were too afraid to stop anyone.

Seeing a man over two meters running outside of the castle, alongside two other armed men probably had something to do with it.

They kept on running down the hill as far as they could. After ten or so minutes, they entered a forest on the hillside and then, Endov collapsed head first, having depleted his mana. His size returned to normal.

The form that he took was a lot stronger than Crane could do with his enhancements but the toll seemed to be too great.

Fennec and Crane grabbed Endov on each side and put his arms over their shoulders, walking him like they were a pair of crutches. The sliced arms of Endov bled over their backs for a while but the wounds stopped bleeding before they went far enough to feel safe and tend the wounds.

A couple of hours had passed since the breakout from the castle and the group hid in the depths of the forest after the sunset.

After resting for a while, Fennec pulled out the bread he stole from the castle’s baker and split it into three, giving each man a piece.

They all munched on their slices as Crane tried to light a fire. His mana reserves started to get filled enough for spells, but Fennec stopped him.

“You want to go back so soon? The goons at the castle were complete shitheads but someone probably looking for us, let’s not make it easier for them to find us.”

He was right. Crane was doing the same mistake that he was angry at Azavel for. The little spirits fond of burning stuff had given Anem their location on the sparring they had on the last peaceful day of the island.

“Well,” Endov smiled. “You did fine but I would say I did the most saving, brother.”

“Pfft…” Fennec laughed. “You did the most bone-breaking. What do they teach you at the temple? How to slam through doors and mutilate people?”

“You are surprisingly correct.” Endov started to laugh. “The path of the lord is a harsh one. Sometimes coercion is advised by the Vaelin.”

“Vaelin?” Crane asked, finishing his bread. “Is that who taught you that growth spurt?”

“A Vaelin. Think of them as high-ranking clerics.”

Crane had felt the magic transforming Endov’s body. His bones cracked and healed at the same time; growing in size as he healed the space the cracks left, increasing their size and toughness. It had to hurt like hell. Crane felt like he was going to die with only a broken arm. Endov’s every bone shattered like glass both the moment he grew in size and shrunk to his normal size. The severity of the pain Crane couldn’t estimate.

“I see.” Crane nodded, he was not going to ask for any more details, there were not going to be any happy tales to tell about how he got that magic. Attributes appeared mostly regarding a person’s lifestyle.

If he could heal bones at that pace, that meant his body got broken and healed over and over again ever since his birth. Just like how Anem made Crane manifest the fire attribute.

“What the hell that place was anyways.” He changed the topic.

“The castle of the lord I mentioned? Duh!”

“I wonder if the lord is the mage I fought.” Crane continued. “He was on horseback accompanied by three knights clad in armour made of that black steel and a couple of hounds. Looked like someone important.”

“No. I doubt that coward Ada can approach a horse, let alone ride one. He could be the court magician but I doubt that scrawny guy leaves his room.”

“What magic he used?” Endov asked this time.

“I suppose if the friend we had left in the cell could breathe, the air leaving his lungs could describe the winds the mage sent flying at me.”

“Hmm…” Endov continued. “It could be the Illgale. I heard that he’s around doing something shady with the Lord.”

“Who is he?” Crane asked but the answer came from Fennec.

“A freelancer mage willing to do whoever pays the right price?”

“Sounds like the man I met.” Crane sighed. “He was hunting a little girl. I tried to step in and got caught and sent to that shit hole.”

“What a shame.” Fennec pulled out a dagger to pick his teeth. Seeing Crane’s reaction, he continued. “What? I got it from the last guards. Want one too?” He pulled another dagger which was tucked inside his pants.

Crane took the blade after hesitating for a brief while.

“Good thing you are done with the mage.” Fennec continued, Endov still silent. “You were lucky, he rarely leaves any witness behind.”

“I am not done.” Crane stabbed the dirt with the dagger after inspecting it for a while. It was a short crude weapon but still could cut an unaware throat.

“The girl is with some friends of mine. Probably still running to the east. I have to help them.” He omitted the part where he had to find Levise or the world would cease to exist. He didn’t want to scare them off or sound too dramatic. “You care to help?”

“I was planning on going east. I could come with you for a while.” Endov finally broke his silence after scratching his chin in thought.

“Great! What about you?” Crane turned at Fennec who tried to avoid eye contact.

“I think I might be left off better. Especially away from this place and Illgale.”

“Fennec?” Crane smiled. “The lord is probably still after you right?” He conjured a ball of magefire. “I guess you would be quite safe with me, wouldn’t you? I fought him with a broken arm and almost won. Think of what I could do now.”

“Fine!” Fennec groaned. “But turn that thing off before anyone sees us.