Titus leaned back in his chair, his arms crossed, and brows furrowed. Across from him sat Elena and Faust who looked at one another nervously.

The old commander cracked his neck and stood up before sighing.

“Alright. You did well Faust. You did the right thing.”

He looked at Elena, mixed feelings in his gaze. Apprehension mixed with doubt.

“But I must add, that we do not have enough reason to trust you. For now, Bronn will accompany you to Rhodusium where you will be able to convince Alexander.”

Elena’s face brightened.

“Oh, I was sent to make Alexander an offer… but it’s a fraud. I will make sure to gain his trust. But after that, I will need to return to the Venerable… working undercover. Otherwise, he would send the others after me immediately…” she shuddered at the thought.

‘If these others… whoever they are, invoke fear in someone as powerful as her, we really shouldn’t mess with that power… yet.’ He clasped his fists tightly and thought of his Mana Core.

‘I will repay my debt to Alexander and protect those I came to love.’ He smiled inwardly.

Titus nodded at her reply.

“Good, Faust, it will be your responsibility to inform Bronn of the pleasure of traveling to Rhoduisum with our little witch here.” He gestured at Elena who sucked in a breath of air.

“I’m no witch!” she exclaimed and crossed her arms.

Titus remembered that the woman before him could easily kill all of them but hadn’t and raised his hands in defense.

“I meant no offense, Elena.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Bronn and Elena left as soon as they had finished their talk with Titus. Leona and the others weren’t even awake.

There was still an hour until breakfast and Faust sat down in his room.

‘Focus Meditation… I will try to feel my Mana Core again.’ He focused on his breathing, yet his mind was drifting. Every time he noticed it, he slowly led his focus back on his breathing. After half an hour his mind had stopped wandering, and his attention was on his breath.

He felt detached from all usual sorrows and worries. It was pleasant to simply sit and breathe. It seemed as if nothing else mattered.

Faust took a deep breath and held it, focusing on his heartbeat to feel his Mana Core again.

His heart started beating slower and harder to the point where each beat sent a ripple through his body. Then he attempted to feel his Mana Core as he had the night before.

He could feel his attention sinking into his own body, just as it was supposed to be, but shortly before he could feel his Mana Core he was overcome by a biting fatigue and headache.

‘Not now!’ he growled and tried to force himself to continue. Yet the pain only increased and his focus waned and the headache got unbearable.

Faust wound himself on the ground holding his head as his eyes squinted together tightly. He heard nothing but deafening ringing.

‘AH FUCK! MAKE IT STOP! NOBODY TOLD ME THIS WOULD HAPPEN!’ he cursed as he felt the worst pain he had ever encountered in his life. It felt like someone tried to smash his head open with a sledgehammer while poking needles into it.

He wound and no sound escaped his lungs as all air was forced out of them. Only after a few minutes did it slowly die down. Faust’s body laid sprawled on the floor and he panted heavily, his entire body coated in sweat.

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He opened his eyes and his head spun. Everything was blurry.

‘I should not have attempted to force things…’ he nearly threw up and focused on his breathing to calm himself. Only after 15 minutes had his vision recovered and the nausea had finally dissipated.

‘Ugh… Note to myself, not overdraw my mental energy…’ he thought and stood up, holding his head.

He still had a splitting headache, but it was bearable.

He changed his clothes and just as he was about to leave he heard a knock.

“Yes?” he said a bit forced and Aquila entered the room.

“Coming to get you for break-“ he stopped abruptly and looked Faust up and down with a snicker.

“Man you look like shit, did you deplete the Inn’s beer barrels?”

Faust groaned in annoyance. Aquila’s loud voice made the headache even worse.

“Fuck off.” He said and followed Aquila, who was visibly amused, to the dining room where he sat down with the others. He kissed Leona briefly and sighed.

“There's much to catch up on.” He looked around.

“But I can’t tell you in here…” he eyed the other guests.

Titus nodded.

“We will once we are on the road again.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Faust’s headache had nearly disappeared after half a day. By now it was well past noon and they were becoming close to the Argorus-Epicrotian border.

Ronan looked around warily. There were reports of mercenary raids on this road which had considerably hurt trade income of the Argorus. They had become rare and never hit groups with guards. Titus ordered Cassius to pose as a guard aswell and mount on a horse. They all armed themselves to the teeth.

Faust had a poleaxe, a mixture of a spear and axe. The others also picked two handed weapons to deter any possible attackers. Leona too was armored under her cloak and had a weapon ready.

Faust rubbed his temples as he rode on his loyal trotter.

‘Travelling on horse with a two handed weapon is a farce… is this really necessary.’ he complained inwardly.

Titus looked back at his companions grimly when he saw a forest coming up on the road. It went straight through. They exchanged nods and gripped their weapons tighter.

They picked up speed and rode through the woods. Everything went well until they reached a curve.

After this curve Titus groaned in annoyance. A tree had fallen over the road.

“Oh come on… now we will have to waste time getting rid of that thing…” he sighed and mounted off, gripping his weapon tightly.

“Everyone, bring your weapons to work on that annoying piece of wood.” His voice seemed off and the words he spoke were extremely unusual for Titus. Everyone was immediately alarmed and warily jumped off their horses, grabbing their weapons tightly.

Faust’s heart beat heavily.

‘This is the perfect way for an ambush… there’s just no other way to Antioch with a horse carriage this big… anyways, we should be able to take on whatever comes out of the woods.

When Titus was about to bring his bardiche down on the tree Faust heard at least a dozen battle shouts from the sides of the road.

“MIRAK DULU!”

“PARAT MINOR!”

“URUK KALAK!”

Deep, roaring curses resounded as a creature jumped out of the forest next to Faust, running at him with lightning speed.

“DWARVES!!!” Titus shouted on top of his lungs and immediately the entire group bustled into action. Titus and Faust to the left flank where the first dwarf appeared and the rest to the right.

The dwarf was about 1.5 meters tall and had dark braided hair and a full beard. Faust gasped when he saw his armor.

‘PLATE ARMOR?!?’ his eyes opened in surprise as he saw the black, beautifully adorned armor the dwarf wore. Yet he had no time to marvel at the beauty of his opponents armor as he recklessly charged forward with his giant axe, aiming to reap Faust’s life.

Faust saw the axe’s descent towards him and with a quick sidestep evaded the axe. The dwarf seemed surprised at how fast Faust had dodged and grunted angrily before shouting ferociously.

‘THE POWER!’ Faust gasped and countered the dwarf’s blow with a slash with his Poleaxe, aimed at the dwarf’s head, the only unarmored part of their bodies.

Titus had once told him, that the proudest of dwarven warriors always charged as the very first and refused to wear a helmet to show their fearlessness in front of death.

‘Stupid.’ Faust thought as his poleaxe slammed down at the dwarf’s neck with incredible speed.

Against all expectations the dwarf managed to deflect it with the heft of his axe. Instead of being struck with fear and attempting to retreat as normal opponents would, he immediately screamed and counterattacked faster than Faust would have expected. While he was able to evade the dwarf’s attack the sheer strength behind the blow scared him.

As the dwarf tried to attack once more with a ferocious grin on his face, about six more dwarves in full armor appeared from the forest.

‘FUCK!’ Faust thought and retreated slightly from the dwarf before him.

Yet before the dwarf could attack him again a bardiche split his head in two.

Titus had arrived by his side.

“Dwarven Veterans.” He said with a grim voice. He gripped his weapon tightly. Blood had splattered onto Faust’s face, painting him. He felt the adrenaline surge in his body like crazy as he grabbed his poleaxe. The ambushers had lost the element of surprise.

Despite losing this advantage the dwarves still outnumbered them two to one.