Weeks passed, and winter began to fade. The days grew longer and the nights warmer, though snow still fell and trees remained bare.

I noticed those changes from a distance as my days became a haze of training and studying, only broken up by moments of respite with Amelia and the others or by unwelcome interruptions.

Twice more nobles approached me about a duel, and twice more, I refused, though out of practical objection rather than a moral or social one. Both had been as strong as Flynn, and neither offered anything worth that risk.

After nearly a month, I had finished the shrinking and compressing refinements to my Traveler's Shield. The next step would involve layering, but I wanted to reach Mist before I committed to a drastic increase in mana demand.

My improved Mana Edge enchantment sat in a notebook, waiting for testing once I had the funds. Casting Force Step grew quicker with each repetition, and my enhancement spell took less focus to maintain, withstanding more physical and mental strain before breaking.

Beyond those, I practiced shrouding my core and drilled various martial forms whenever possible. My mana reserves deepened, largely thanks to another helping of the Aether waters, and I continued honing my control.

Despite my improvements, training only took you so far. And thankfully, Leon had jumped at my suggestion of how best to spend our day off.

--

Fangs closed around my right forearm, pressing against my Traveler's Shield. Ice mana turned the bite frigid and the beast's fur a pale white. It tossed its head to either side, doing its best to tear my limb off at the shoulder but failing to find purchase.

I twisted and pulled, holding my spear with my left hand as I tried to extricate myself from the beast's grip. Its fangs slid across the smooth surface of my armor without snagging, and a part of me marveled at the fruits of consistent, purposeful training. Just a month prior, such a bite would have cracked my defenses.

Then, I was out of its grip. I pivoted away, taking a few steps back into a guard, and examined my latest opponent.

A white wolf stood across from me, radiating with a sensation like a winter's gale. It was an offshoot of a dire wolf, a man-eater who had claimed four lives in three weeks near a town a few miles south of Volaris. The beast was cunning, strong, as large as a man, and had enough magic to challenge any group of hunters.

Or two young mages.

I stepped forward, stabbing out with my spear. Diffuse green mana, my attempt at an unenchanted version of my Mana Edge, covered the bladed tip. Despite that, my strike barely penetrated its dense muscle as the wolf twisted away. It lunged into range, and I fell backward in a retreat.

As the wolf pressed the attack, I shifted my spear to my right hand and gathered mana into my left. The beast managed to latch onto my right forearm again, and the moment I did, I slammed my palm onto its chest and released a point-blank burst of Aether.

The wolf howled and staggered away, one shoulder a ruin of muscle and bone. I returned to my defensive stance, checking my reserves and finding them more than half-full as I braced for another attack.

Thunk

An arrow slammed into the wolf's chest, sinking halfway to the fletching before stopping. A gust of wind accompanied the attack, and I could feel mana burst in every direction on impact. The beast half-turned towards where the strike had come from but stumbled a moment later. It took off, trying to escape back into the sparse undergrowth before losing its footing and falling to the ground.

I straightened, making sure my spell was in place before walking closer. The wolf's chest rose and fell, and one half-lidded eye was fixed on me as I approached. The arrow must have hit something important enough to kill the thing but not enough to kill it fast. Left alone, it would die a slow, painful death.

Growing numb to death was one thing, but I would be damned if I became the sort of person who enjoyed suffering.

I squared my shoulders, drew mana into my spear, set my feet, and stabbed the beast through the heart. It seized up with a yelp, then fell silent as its eye glossed over.

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A minute passed before I heard the crunch of boots on snow. I turned to see Leon approaching, bow in hand. The noble wore a thick cloak of dusk fox fur, a species prized for its innate ability to blend into its surroundings.

Leon shook his head with a frown, "I told you I should've stayed closer. Are you okay? Those fangs didn't get to you, did they?"

I released my magic and held up my arm, "No, my spell held up fine. Nice shot, by the way."

Leon examined me for another second, then grinned and raised the bow, "Simon and his family deserve the credit, not me."

"Shame about the arrows, though," I remarked as I knelt beside the corpse and yanked the arrow from the wolf's side. While the steel tip and hardened wooden shaft could hold and shape wind mana fine, they remained too fragile to survive a direct impact against reinforced flesh and bone.

Leon shrugged, and I stood before continuing, "Also, there is such a thing as too humble. That shot was at least a hundred feet, and the wolf was moving. It could have stood ten feet away, still as a statue, and I would have missed."

"It was eighty feet at most," Leon countered as he walked past me, kneeling beside the wolf's body and pulling out his dagger, "And you distracted it. I had plenty of time to pick my shot."

"No one has ever looked at a target and wished it was moving. Respectfully, take the compliment."

My words felt a little too forceful, but Leon chuckled.

"Fine, fine, if you insist. It was a decent shot. Happy?" Leon shook his head as he started cutting into the wolf, "Is this what you're going to be like as an advisor?"

"I might not always say respectfully."

Leon snorted before falling silent as he worked on the beast. I watched and did my best to assist as the noble prepared the body for transport. Eventually, I hoped to learn enough to do it without aid, but until then, Leon was faster and cleaner.

Finally, it was time to return to Volaris. The corpse was heavy enough that a several-mile walk would exhaust even an athletic man. Leon had brought horses to ease the trip, though it would still be a decent walk back to the nearby town where we had left them. So, we would need to drag the body out on a sled, which was tiring enough.

I glanced between the sled and Leon, hoping the noble would offer to drag the beast out. Then, I remembered that my enhancement spell bolstered my existing physical abilities.

That, and I was still Leon's servant.

Sweat coated my body by the time we had our mounts and set off for Volaris. I slung my cloak off, soaking in the crisp mid-day air, while Leon whistled. Truthfully, I could not blame him for his good humor.

This was our third hunt together and the most profitable one yet. If we kept this pace, I could repay Julian within a month or two. While I would have preferred faster, it was better than I could have managed without Leon's help.

It was also the perfect opportunity for practical training. I could test my spells in actual combat, and Leon could practice weaving his magic and archery together.

The noble had taken my suggestions to heart, and I could already see his magic moving faster and smoother. Still, there was one idea I had considered weeks earlier. It seemed a poor fit for my magic, but maybe Leon would find it helpful.

"Leon," I said, turning to the noble, "What is your opinion on familiars?"

----

Studying in the Archives had become a pastime I used whenever my body felt worn and my magical training plateaued. It remained open even late into the night, and I took full advantage whenever possible.

I had worked my way backward, piecing together bits of information on every Archmagi in history. While it had begun as an exercise in probing Master Barlow's advice wrong, I had continued for a separate reason entirely.

Each Archmagus had their little tricks, spells, and wisdom. Time had claimed the finer details, but there was enough left to prise out kernels of inspiration. And if I found nothing worth a damn at the end of my efforts, that was a lesson in and of itself.

I had just finished reading a passage on Archmagus Izora, the Heartflame. She was the fire mage who pioneered techniques to control heat directly. In battle, she did as much to her surroundings, and stories claimed steel melted within a dozen paces of her body.

However, even though Izora was a combat mage, she had spent the last decade and a half of her life as a researcher and teacher before dying at only fifty. The Archmagus had, according to my readings, sustained near-fatal wounds in battle two decades before her death.

Sustaining such wounds was uncommon but not particularly eyebrow-raising, even for such a mage. Several Archmagi died in battle across our history. What did catch my attention were the details, or lack thereof.

Any Archmagus that fell in combat had entire chapters dedicated to the event. It was akin to slaying a demigod, and our historians treated it with the appropriate gravitas and fanfare.

Yet, despite Izora nearly dying, there were almost no details. I could find mention of a date and passing references to allies falling in battle, but the foe went unnamed, and the event itself was opaque.

I made a note to dig further into the battle and moved on to the next Archmagus, Umari the Ironwrought, the first forgemaster. He was Izora's senior and the inventor of several techniques used even in the modern era. Unlike Izora, Umari was a researcher and teacher above all else, having spent most of his life refining his knowledge and passing it on to future generations.

Yet, he had died in battle.

Though the event was not impossible, it stood out again for two reasons. First, Umari's cause of death seemed too vague. The passage noted that he fell in a battle on the queen's order but lacked any other details.

Far stranger was the date. Umari had fallen the same day Izora became crippled. If that was a coincidence, then I was secretly heir to one of the Founders.

I sat back in my chair. The Archives were blessedly quiet late at night, giving me ample time to think.

My first assumption was the two Archmagi had dueled one another, though I could not say why. Historians might have omitted some details to preserve their reputations and maintain an illusion of a unified kingdom.

But that made no sense. Umari's biography noted that he had fallen in battle on the queen's order. If she wanted Izora and Umari to fight, why had the former lived for decades after the fact? A strong master could likely kill a maimed Archmagus.

The alternative was worse, though. Someone or something had killed one Archmagus and nearly claimed a second one's life. And I could find no hints as to what might have done it.

Maybe the queen and her advisors worried about the public appearance of telling the truth. Archmagi acted as a bulwark against the wilds and the enemies of Ferris. Announcing that something managed to defeat two effectively could destroy public faith in the country.

Other threats like magical beasts or the Tinkerers would warrant more detail. We had never shied away from blaming our southern neighbors or the monsters that had once ruled the continent, so why become reticent now?

I expanded my search, but after hours of digging, I found only oblique references to the event. There was a mention of a massive fire spreading in the eastern wilds days after the date in question and a public funeral for Umari, who fell "in service to the crown and country," but nothing else.

Finally, I admitted defeat. The mystery that lay here would have to wait for another day. I set it aside, resolving to continue digging in the morning, and returned to my room for a long overdue night's sleep.