William looked at the horse and frowned. Then, he pushed the body off of it and brought it with him toward Daniel. It was remarkably well trained- if the lightning bolt had gone off properly, it might not even have panicked, even though it would have been close. That was hard to accomplish. It just hadn’t expected the way it happened. William arrived in front of Daniel and gestured to the horse. “I’m not sure what we should do with him… but first, introductions would be good. I’m William. That is, Yu Hui’lam, and those two are Dong Xin and Yu Li.” William waved toward the two who were currently off to the side. Yu Li looked somewhat out of breath, but Dong Xin looked as if he could have been always standing there.

Daniel took a moment, staring dumbfounded. Then, he spoke. “Ah, yes. I am Daniel Cyril, and this is my sister Ivy.” He paused for a moment. “Thank you for saving us.”

“Not a problem,” William grinned. “I just happened to be nearby.”

“Forgive my inquiry, but you seem to be more than just a casual passerby. If you don’t mind… how did you do that? Are you a wizard? I don’t recognize those spells...”

“Of course… not.” William was too used to answering that question from his previous life, he almost messed up. “It was simple. I threw a rock, and hit a guy in the throat. Though, for a more specific answer… I’m a martial artist… a warrior.”

“Warriors… can do that?”

William nodded. “Knights could too, with slightly different timing.” William sighed. “It seems that knowledge about martial artists here is still woefully insignificant. I was hoping that would have changed at least a little.”

Daniel look at William, who wore obviously different clothing, and was clearly from Liaoyang. “You’ve been to Ostana before?”

“I’ve… heard things.” William was going to have to be more careful with how he spoke. William looked at Ivy, who seemed to have a twisted ankle. “It doesn’t seem you will be walking far. I um… found a horse.”

Ivy seemed to be about sixteen, and William thought Daniel looked about twenty. She nodded. “Umm… thanks.” She leaned in to whisper to Daniel. William still heard what they were saying, but he pretended not to.

Daniel nodded, then spoke. “My sister has reminded me that we should invite you to visit our manor… though I must say it is not entirely to thank you. We could use an escort. However, if you come with us, you might be further embroiled in the conflict between our families and… them.” He nodded at the bodies.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

William nodded. “I’ll absolutely come with you. However, we should probably do something about that... “

Eventually, they decided to burn the bodies, just to make it less clear what happened. Then, they moved the earth, and buried the remaining bones. The earth was moved back, again with magic, and the ground looked fairly natural. The scorch marks nearby could be slightly covered up by turning bits of dirt as well. It wasn’t a perfect cover up, but it would make any conclusions much harder to come to. The horse might be a problem, but they currently needed it to get Ivy back to the manor. Dong Xin and Yu Li helped with the magical evidence erasure, but Ivy was apparently not a wizard.

As they headed toward the manor, Dong Xin spoke to William in the language of Liaoyang. “Are you sure we should go with them?”

William nodded. “This is the Cyril family. Finding them was actually one of my goals for coming to Ostana. They also have a good chance of supporting the preparations against the Demon King, if anyone is still doing so here in Ostana.”

Dong Xin nodded. “In that case, I agree. It will be good to have a positive relationship with them. However… don’t forget who the current archmage is.”

William nodded. “I won’t.” William paused. “After first hearing who the archmage was, I was hoping that the family had changed, or that he wasn’t like them. I can still hope for the second part.”

William thought about how casually he had killed two people he had just met. It was strange. However, he felt he had gotten better at reading people in his lifetimes, and these two hadn’t even pretended they were actually in the right once he challenged them. More importantly, even if they technically had laws on their side, William would not support killing wizards, even criminal wizards, without a proper and fair trial. Unless it couldn’t be avoided, but it was quite obvious who had the advantage, and one of those under attack wasn’t even a wizard.

There was one additional reason that William had acted the way he did. He could see the family resemblance… in both the Lockridges and the Cyrils. He had to admit this provided major bias, but he had still judged them on their actions. As for the option of not killing them… he hadn’t killed Geoff because he hadn’t seen a good reason, but he felt that was a mistake, and he had good reason this time. Though, he supposed that they might not have died if their spells weren’t powerful enough. He couldn’t say that for sure, though, because he hadn’t been conservative with his applications of ki and force.

When the finally arrived at the manor, William got a better picture of how things were. Instead of a nice house, it was more like a fortress. There were even a few guards on the walls, though not many. Inside, it became a place to live again, but William caught some glimpses of magical wards. He couldn’t be sure what they did without looking more closely, but his first guess was that they would stop the house itself from being damaged if someone were to lob a fireball over the wall. That’s what he would have done, anyway. As they entered the grounds, many people gathered around with worried looks. Servants, a doctor who immediately started tending to Ivy’s ankle, and those William presumed were the Daniel and Ivy’s parents, and the masters of the house. At least, he saw such a resemblance. Though the actual story of what happened wasn’t long, it still took some explaining.