Claire watched as Ethan tensed up and jumped out of the carriage to face the monster that had appeared in their path, immediately yelling to attract its attention. As her shoulders sagged, she felt shame that she could not help in any way, being left to the role of a damsel in distress. The only consolation was that, at least, she did not suggest Ethan go out to try to save them in the first place.

Claire turned to look at Alice and saw that she was watching how Ethan fared. Claire also turned to look at the fight, but after a glance, she could barely call it that. Instead, it looked like a small ant was trying to attract the attention of a large boot, occasionally stumbling around awkwardly.

Claire recognized that what Ethan had said during their short talk was true. He did stick out like a sore thumb and did not resemble the locals in any way. And she would surely know as she grew up in these parts. Nor could it be that he somehow wandered to the north from the Plains or the Wide Sea, where the descendants of the giants chose to reside.

Ethan was from another world, a plane-walker who could cross dimensional barriers willingly or by chance. And as such, he was surely out of his element; that much was evident as Claire observed his awkward fight. The man clearly was new to fighting using aspect powers and was not used to teleporting in short ranges as he stumbled around.

However, she had this nagging feeling that something was wrong with his explanation of his origins. It was as if what he had described, using so few words as he did, was not enough to convince her that he had not made all the little bits and pieces up.

First, the Castle of Gloom was lost, long forgotten in history, and known only by a few. Claire knew this as she was interested in the past of the place where she resided; besides the other topics, her mother pushed her to educate about getting ready to sell her off in marriage to some noble from the capital.

The Castle had been lost for many years, thought to be buried or destroyed, and no one knew where it was. A few records from the people who survived a calamity a few hundred years ago remained. And even those were too fragmented for the historians to construct a cohesive understanding.

It was believed that the castle once housed the eldest grandmaster rank aspect user the Kingdom of Morwhea had. He led the era of magical discovery with his order in the Castle of Gloom. However, his findings were lost after some calamity came upon the place and buried it. Only a few eyewitness accounts remained written down for historians to find. It made no sense to Claire that Ethan had found such a place when countless others could not.

Then came the news that he survived so deep in the northern forest and managed to find two quite rare aspect seeds. Claire had long kept her sights on acquiring a seed for herself to break free from the fate her mother had devised for her; however, she could not muster the funds.

Even the common rarity seeds were something out of her reach. Could her family buy it for her? Sure. But why would they? Her mother did not want her to go and join the Guilders and work an honorable profession, protecting the weak and eradicating the plague that the monsters were. No, she would instead choose Claire as a bargaining chip to get herself out of the region and into the good graces of wealthy and powerful nobles from the capital.

Claire and her family called themselves ‘nobles,’ which they certainly were for the region, but the truth was that they were simply too poor in the grand scheme of things. A noble from the capital could easily afford to buy common rarity seeds in the hundreds, even up to rare rarity ones. However, Claire’s family? It would cost half their fortunes to secure a simple common seed. That is how big of a gap there was between her family and those who resided in the capital.

Therefore, the fact that Ethan had acquired two certainly rare seeds and somehow managed to absorb them, surviving the process, baffled her. It was simply something that did not happen to people every day or even at all. However, maybe this man was just that lucky, Claire considered as she saw Ethan avoid another of the deer’s charges.

The fact that the man, despite being apprentice rank, did not die instantly to an adept rank beast was remarkable enough and mainly why she and Alice were so fixated on the fight.

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Claire turned to look at her childhood friend again and saw Alice’s eyes glisten with curiosity and something else. The desire to possess, maybe? Claire could not discern the thoughts on her friend’s face, but she recognized that look she had. A look that Claire knew meant trouble for those it was fixated at.

Claire turned back to the fight and saw that Ethan was not only surviving anymore but slowly and surely getting the upper hand in his battle. His improvement speed seemed unnatural to her, as many who acquired aspect abilities trained years to go between the ranks by challenging themselves constantly against stronger foes before any real progress was made.

And by the looks of it, Ethan was already slowly understanding how to use his teleportation ability better. However, Claire had to recognize that she felt envy when he mentioned that he had found the two seeds and gained such coveted skills. Pure mana manipulation was rare and considered the highest form of magic one could perform. After all, manipulating the pure energy around them was the highest of the honors, according to the Arcane order.

She did not think much of such statements from an organization that focused on research and making new trinkets for people who could afford them. However, her talk with Ethan opened her eyes to see that she was a little, if not more, biased toward them.

Either way, the minutes ticked on as he fought the creature, evading its attacks, occasionally trying to injure it, making Claire marvel at the man's endurance. She knew that one in apprentice rank could not outlast an adept rank beast, given how the stamina and mana pools compared between these ranks.

Was it somehow connected to the ‘windows’ Ethan mentioned and tried to show them? She did not know but believed it was all somehow linked. There simply was no other explanation for how the man could have survived so far in the north up to this point and last as long as he did fighting the monster. His abilities should have eaten through his mana pool already.

If the man was indeed a plane walker and was not associated with the sect of the Serpent, then she could not allow him to get arrested by the guard for whatever reason they deemed necessary and interrogate him. He would quickly end up as a research subject for the order. Nor could she allow Alice to drag him into the schemes she was weaving in her head at this very moment.

Claire knew from the rumors circulating between nobles that the North was weak. While the monster hordes were manageable for many years, something changed since the sect of the Serpent appeared. The guilders now were having a tough time beating the monsters back. And it was getting worse.

Many wondered why the guild leader had disappeared from the public eye, but Claire had pieced it together from Lady Latimer's few hints. The grandmaster leader had gone hunting alone, leaving the guild in relative disarray.

Only a few of Veer’s residents knew what had transpired. A paragon rank beast was slowly but surely approaching Veer. And if it were allowed to reach the city, then the city would be wiped out either due to the fighting or simply because the beast would eradicate it.

The majority thought that the eccentric grandmaster had gone into seclusion, no doubt to play around with the herbs he loved smoking so much, but Claire knew better. She and a few others knew that the higher-ranked monster appearances were worsening. In her opinion, the city’s days were counted until it got so bad that the guilders and their local leader could not hold them back anymore. What would happen when that day came? She did not know.

That was why seeing Ethan jump into the dangers simply at Alice’s request brought back a long-lost feeling in Claire. It had been years since the first Aspect Tournament in Veer when she felt she should be making a difference. It had been so long, and all the while, she had been trying to suppress the feeling of being trapped without a say in her fate.

Now, after all those years, Ethan and his disregard for rank, the rarity of aspect seeds, or even the fact that he was not from this world brought everything crashing back down on her. She had more than book smarts to offer the world, and she knew it. She just needed to seize the chance.

The monster cried out loudly, its cry shaking the trees around it and equally shaking the carriage’s sides, making Claire and Alice shut their ears with their hands. Claire’s eyes widened as she observed Ethan stand before the monster, unflinching, resolute. He glanced toward their carriage and Claire, gripping his sword tighter.

Claire met his gaze even if he could not see her directly, and she clenched her fist in turn. If he can break the chains of fate, either by sheer luck or determination - so can I. I will not be a pawn in someone else’s games, she thought, feeling that the fight was about to reach its climax.