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As the knights charged toward the bandits in formation, they looked at the disorganized group of rabble scum on horseback approaching them with contempt.

At the last moment before the clash, the lead knight shouted, “Break!”, and the knights flared their auras and raised their spears as they split into 2 columns flanking and funneling the bandits between them.

As the 2 forces passed each other, bandits were skewered like shish kebabs, spears were shattered, and men were thrown off their horses, some of the knights were also unhorsed by lucky strikes, and in 1 case, a bandit jumped from his own horse to tackle a knight, naturally when they got to the ground, the better-trained knights handled themselves a lot better and managed to stay alive.

After the first pass, what was once around 50 bandit riders, were now less than 20, while the knights were all still alive, if not a bit roughed up, and some of those who were unhorsed had broken limbs from bad falls.

Knowing that they would not survive another clash with the knights, the bandit riders scattered into the woods.

After taking a head count and seeing that everyone made it out alive, the lead knight asked, “Did anyone see the bandit leader, Dom?”

This was replied to with a chorus of nos.

This reply sent some of the knights into a panic, “If he was not among those riders, then Dom must have gone directly after the convoy while these riders were a distraction!”

The lead knight nodded and said, “Indeed, we must return with haste. But worry not, the convoy is in good hands, the Royal Invigilator is no pushover.”

With that, those who still had their horses rode hard after the convoy while, those who were unhorsed or had their mount killed, wrangled a ride from the horses of the now-dead bandits who were milling around.

***

It has been a few minutes since I saw the knights ride off with spears in hand and I think we made enough distance from the bandits, so the worst should be behind us.

As I slumped back into my seat, I saw my fellow carriage mates were still huddled on the floor, “Come on guys, the bad guys are gone now, the knights have chased them off.”

Hearing my voice, they asked me in their scared voice, “Really?”, and just as I was about to say “yes”, the voice of one of the coachmen shouted, “Contact right!”

I quickly pulled back the curtain a little to see what they were on about and saw about 15 horsemen merging into the main road from the woods.

When these horsemen, who I now know are the same bandits, came fully out of the cover of the trees, all the coachmen readied their crossbows and took aim.

That was when all the bandit riders coming toward us flared their aura. It may not be a refined aura, but that did not mean they could not deal some serious damage while they had it activated.

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Usually, it would be a stupid idea to ride just next to a carriage while the coachmen were armed with crossbows, but the bandits did not fear being fired at because the projectile barrier was in place, the barrier works both ways, no projectiles in or out.

And from the sound of laughter and taunts the huge rider in the lead was making, I can safely assume this is the so called Dome Dasher Dom that has been blessing us with his monologues before shit went down.

Too bad I am in the 2nd carriage, or else I could have had a front-row seat to the play of generic bandit boss threatening knights.

As the bandits got on the main road, they seemed to ignore the other carriages and headed straight to the front where I was.

As the bandits were about to catch up to my carriage, there was a flash, followed by a sharp cracking sound, and I saw a bandit at the tail end of the rider collapse together with his horse.

Immediately the warnings of “Mage!” were sounded off by the bandits and I saw Dome Dasher Dom pull hard on the reigns of his horse and make his way to the back of the convoy where I presume the lightning came from, “Half of you with me, kill that mage!”.

On Dom’s command, 6 other riders broke off and rode off beyond my sight, all I could hear after that was the sound of spells going off. As for the mage, it could only be Albert the Royal Invigilator that could be slinging spells of this caliber back there, I sure hope he does not get overrun, but I guess that is what Walt is there for, to act as a meatshield.

When I turn my attention back to my side, I noticed shit is going sideways, 5 of the bandits went for the first carriage in front of me while 2 bandits went for my carriage.

These bandits are what I guess would be elites of this bandit gang, because they seem to know how to handle invading projectile barriers without getting killed.

Instead of just pushing through as the other fodder bandits did, these men pushed their weapons through first so they could swat away the crossbow bolts while the rest of their bodies and horses came through.

When the bandits got through the projectile barrier, the first thing they did was throw knives and other projectile weapons at the coachmen and knights, before jumping and latching on to the carriages.

Unfortunately, my carriage did not have any knights and only had the crossbow-wielding coachmen to defend us, which naturally was not ideal.

From my point of view through the small window used to communicate with the coachmen from inside, I saw 1 of the coachmen slump over motionless with a knife embedded in his head while the other seemed to have a knife in his right arm and shoulder.

As the injured coachman raised his crossbow to aim at the bandit that was now above him, the crossbow was kicked out of his hand, and was about to get stabbed by a raised dagger.

In order to save the coachman, I did not bother wasting time casting circle spells, so I pointed at the dagger-wielding bandit and used a wind element Molecular Magic to shoot a compressed air blast.

The air blast ripped a hole through the front-facing window, carrying along with it glass shards and wooden splinters to smash into the bandit.

The force of the blast sent the surprised bandit flying onto the road directly in front of the horses pulling my carriage, where he was trampled and my carriage bounced twice due to the “speedbump” we just ran over.

“TOMMY!!” I hear the other bandit bellow as he takes the other bandit’s place in front of the driver’s seat, “You little bastard! I’m gonna kill you!”.

As the bandit shouted his threat, I noticed he had his mace already cocked back, ready for a swing, and that there was a high concentration of aura contained in the head of that mace.

I quickly ducked down as the bandit swung his mace. After I looked up from the loud crash made by the strike, I noticed the whole driver seat was missing, coachmen and all, it was like a giant took a bit out of the corner of the carriage.

But as impressive as this bandit’s mighty mace strike was, I had no time to appreciate its destructive power. There was a bandit in front of me that meant to do me harm. That means it's GO TIME!

I draw my ceremonial dagger, get into a ready stance, and flair my own aura.