Hera walked down the street, her hood pulled over face, covering her eyes. Every person she passed she could read them like a book, her vision was not obscured by the fabric. This wasn’t the first time she was coming back here. It was confirmed the closer she had got to the industrial East of the city the more magic that was lingering in the air.

She looked up to the rooftops there she could see the newborn’s magical blood flowing as bright as the moon, They had been keeping pace with her by climbing on the shingles. The combinations of their claws and arms made their movements quite silent despite their size. It seemed whenever Rinae wasn’t around they would follow her and did as she told them. However, the moment that she did appear she might as well have been invisible.

She readjusted the hood and continued through the street. As of late almost everyone who did work in the industrial district went home as fast as they could, the recent mass disappearances of people put people on edge, there had even been rumors of people turning into wolves and eating people only to run out to the forests.

Hera wasn’t just looking for any old person, she was looking for a host, someone with an abundance of magic. In this city that chance of finding a suitable host that could survive the maximum amount of larvae was about one in ten. Luckily tonight she spotted a person, their magical aura was immense. Unlike much of the other humans this one was walking towards her, from what she could see the magic was mostly exiting through the hands and face, she had been wearing a robe, like Hera.

The smell was absolutely delicious. There had been none other humans that were like this. Hera found her prey. She quickened her pace the quicker she would reach the magical anomaly the quicker she might get a taste. Suddenly the target took a right, going down an alley. This action surprised Hera. She quickened her pace to meet her around the corner, she barely got even another glimpse before she turned another corner.

Hera ran forward to the next corner, only to meet a blade being swung closely at around the corner, She brought up her hand to stop the blow. It pierced her armor like it was paper. The dagger was lodged in her hand. The blade protruded six inches out the other side of her palm.

Reactively she hissed at the attacker. This was the second time a weapon was able to do damage to her. She backed up as far as she could and tried to pull the blade out, it was stuck pretty badly, Hera screeched for every inch that came out. Her blue blood illuminated her vision and the dark alley she was in. They managed to dodge out of the way and stepped back. Hera was leaking blue blood at a steady rate. The steel was of much higher quality than what she encountered back in Holden. Even if this was a one time thing the chance of higher qualities of weapons was much higher here.

The robbed person let down their hood revealing a feminine face and black hair. Underneath there were glimpses of shiny steel armor.

She put a “A suspicious person following a girl down a dark alley.” She paused, “An attempt to kidnap her and sell her to-” Her accusational analysis was cut short by Hera. She was most likely trying to arouse a motive out of Hera by saying her observations. Unfortunately Hera was a simple creature her motives were just as.

She sent the dagger flying,The female dodged the attack by a hair. The blade found itself just slightly right of her face, The hilt was in an erect position in between two bricks. She stood stunned for a second. This was the moment her smugness disappeared. The situation of capturing a lowlife bandit organization member had changed to her life being in danger. The blue blood began to drip from the handle onto her shoulder. Staining the robe she wore.

Her face got serious; her training kicked in. She got into combat position; She pulled another dagger placing her free arm over the top the one wielding the blade.

“Assaulting a mage is on grounds for execution.” Her palm lit up with multiple small reddish balls. In Hera’s vision, those balls contained enough magic to be considered substantial.

“Surrender yourself now!” She yelled. She need not any reason for wanting to subdue Hera. Attacking was already enough.

Hera did the exact opposite. She punched the wall to her right, her fist went deep. She pulled out a large piece of the wall and threw it. The mage fired in defence, She fired three shots. The first missed entirely spiraling high into the air, harmlessly exploding like a firework. The other two hit the target. They combusted tearing away parts of the wall and leaving scorch marks.

The prospect of feeling like a melted candle was not in her plans. She turned tail and ran. In retaliation, the female fired off several small powered blasts. They weren't enough to destroy a building but, they were strong enough to remove a limb or two from a human with a direct hit. It made the alley brighter than day and made enough noise to wake a sleeping Elaphan.

Walking was one thing, she could take her time and avoid corners as they did appear slightly in her vision. When she ran, they would look seemingly out of nowhere causing her to hit a wall and redirect.

The balls of condensed heat however did not stop following behind her. Seeing the trajectory of each shot was easily readable in her vision, as it was literally just a giant magic pheromone to her. She tried turning various corners to get the upper hand or at the very least get closer to deliver a strike. That chance never came as she approached the mouth that dumped out to the street.

20 feet from the exit she could see a group of guards enter, they blocked her path with their swords drawn, she was stopped in her tracks as behind her was the mage, She was sweating and nearly out of breath.

“Get on the ground!” She commanded. She was no longer using her magic as a form of attack she fully switched to using the dagger in her left hand.

Hera stood in the center, hood still over her face. She looked up to the rooftops, drops of liquid began to fall. At first, only a few drops of water were tapping at her face and the ground, moments later it turned into a straight downpour. Hera looked back down and saw the woman again. She said one word to her.

“Eat.”

Before the female mage could even react, a singular black creature descended upon the group of knights A few were knocked over others slammed into the walls and died instantly those were the lucky ones. The other knights were ripped to pieces by the creature’s appendages.

The whole chase was leading up to this moment, an ambush. Hera knew of the presence of the knights before they even met. She was a hunter. She saw the situation and planned accordingly, the female mage played right into her trap.

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Another of the black creatures dropped in front of the mage. The creature towered her. She felt the only emotion that she could at the time, fear. Her fight or flight system kicked in. And she chose to fight her flight, as a mage her pride would be sullied if she ran, she had to rescue her comrades. She felt exhausted, out of breath yet, she didn’t reach this far in her life to have it end now. She trained for this kind of battle, at a physical disadvantage, spending way too much energy chasing one suspect. She just had to imagine she was fighting a dragon.

She had never fought a dragon before.

Hera, gripped the hand that was gushing blood. She applied pressure to it. She hissed, the pain of having a hole in her hand was great, greater than the axe that was merely an inch deep. Since the newborns were tied into combat. It didn’t matter if she stayed, she already tired the enemy mage out enough to make her easier. Besides they would have retrieve the bodies for her, but as she worked up quite an appetite she saw some of the knights that would make for a tasty snack. She walked over to them.

Until she heard the pressure around her back rupture, she did a quick 180. The newborn that was fighting the mage was missing most of the body and its appendages. It seems that the mage used magic on it.

“Stop.” She said, huffing every two seconds.

Hera could see that she had less magic left in her system then she did before, she faced her. Hera judged she could withstand a few of her now lower power blasts. She walked towards her.

The mage clenched her teeth even more, fired a series of her last combustions. These balls were much different than the ones fired from before. The first flew high and stayed suspended in the air. The second went high, enough to be above her head. the third hit went to her right, the fourth hit to the left, the fifth was stopped in the middle of her chest. The mage dropped to her knees trying to keep control of the balls. Her physical exhaustion was not helping the mental exhaustion of focusing on five different targets. Hera stood still, the balls made her curious. It looked as though she was being offered food.

That was until they were detonated.

It didn’t take her long to recover, It never took any properly trained mage long, at best it’d be a few minutes to a few hours depending on how much magic was drained. If there was even still even a little and they didn’t deplete their entire reservoir they’d be able to regenerate a small amount to continue combat. However, if they used enough to cause a blackout and they collapsed they’d be out for a few days at the minimum.

She stood up and allowed the dust to clear, from the looks of the background, the other knights defeated the creature. It screeched as one knight drove a sword through its skull. The blue blood gushed out like a watermelon that had been smashed.

In the crater she created was the defeated Hera, her chitin was melted, broken and cracked. Her face was missing the obsidian band that hid her eyes was missing the entire left portion. The eyes, if you can even call them that were fleshy and completely void of any life, they sone a soft mercuric color. Her right hand was missing, yet she still stood. Blue blood was leaking from almost endless amounts of pores. Her hair was singed and shredded.

Hera would have been correct in her observation on being able to survive individual shots but combined the smaller magical balls yielded a destructive force equal to one of the greater quality. They were seemingly better than the bigger blasts since the explosive pressure were distributed to different areas of her body instead of a single point.

The female mage aimed her arm once more at the injured Hera.

~^~

A day earlier.

The squad of five sat around a campfire. The entire squad had been sharing stories throughout the night. It had been revealed that only two of the chosen mage knights had known of each other, excluding Amalia and her squire. Unfortunately, the entire group had fallen into a fit of silence, those that saw the scene inside the cave were unwilling to talk about the contents, bringing back the memory also brought along the smells and every other sense that accompanied.

However, The silence was broken the moment someone revealed the ale they were packing. The squad slowly began to open up to each other.

“...Then they asked if I was okay.” Elizabeth turned the towards waterskin, taking a drink. “I told them, ‘Yeah, but I doubt he’s feeling too hot!’”

Most of the group started to laugh at her play on words when another mage spoke up. “Tis nothing!”

Elizabeth passed the animal skin over towards the mage known as Augustus, “You got something better?”

He claims he came from across the ocean from another nation, but everyone quickly learned that he was a chronic liar, spinning tales that always ended in him being some great mage that had surpassed even the best holy knights.

“Of course! It happened not too long ago! I’m surprised you haven't heard I was involved. In Cliyca, my unit and I were surrounded by…”

“Oh my god.” The most stockiest and the strongest of the group was Vincent spoke. He pinched his brow and leaned forward. His brown hair fell just slightly in front of his eyes. He was just a foot away from Augustus’ face, He was the one mage who was well acquainted with Augustus. “Tell one more fucking lie and you’ll be the tinder.” Doesn’t mean he was on good terms with him.

He turned his eyes down from Augustus’ eyes. “Drink.”

There was a defiant look for several moments before he raised the drink to his lips. Nothing came to. He overturned the skin, not even a single drip. The entire contents of the insides were frozen solid. He could hear Elizabeth laughing her inebriated laugh.

Once the group caught onto what she had done, they also partook in the entertaining misfortune.

“Having a problem?” She said, still laughing.

“You hussy!” He got up. The ground began to shake slightly, all around her spire raised.

The air around everyone began to feel charged, electrically. That’s when everyone found out they couldn’t move. Amalia had walked to the group, She did not join them in their social gathering, as a person she didn’t see a point in doing so, holy knights typically spent their time raising an apprentice and then working alone.

“Under my command, none of you are allowed to harm each other.” She paused looking at each of the mages. They each had a varying expression under the influence of her magic; some could withstand the pain, others visible twitched from the feeling of their bodies being locked up. “When this mission is finished, then you have my permission to kill each other.”

She released magic she imposed on them. She wasn’t there to be their friends, she only took them because she had to. Each one of them dropped to the ground, Elizabeth was one of the few that couldn’t handle it and passed out.

~^~

“Move.” Lady Amalia tugged on her horse’s reign, keeping the four-legged beast in one spot. She had been talking to the soldier stationed outside the city. The other mages on the other horses were surrounding the area. They had followed the black goops until they reached the city gates where it looked like it disappeared out of nowhere. In front

“My lady, I’m sorry but the city is under internal investigations.” He stopped for a second. “Any mages that approach have to be investigated even a holy knight.”

The soldier was technically correct, the mages she brought were strong enough to decimate an army adding her into the mix, and the decimation turned into annihilation. Even if he wanted to let them through his orders were absolute.

“Make a good reason why I shouldn’t end your life here and move on.” She dismounted from her horse.

The soldier placed a hand on the hilt of his sword and spaced himself slightly. “Because we can’t spare any more men to guards to the gate because of internal investigations.”

The squire dismounted and approached. “Internal investigations?”

“Yes, recently there have been reports of missing peoples.”

The squire turned to Amalia. “Do you think this is related?”

The answer was entirely unnecessary as explosions were heard in the distance. Amalia unsheathed her sword and took off towards the sounds.