Azura sighed. They had ultimately approached Siara about joining their team, to which she happily agreed. So they submitted their team and were just waiting to see what kind of mission would be assigned to them for tomorrow.

“So Siara, we saw that you use nature magic, but what else can you tell us about your skills!” He was thankful for Roran’s ability to cut through tension and unease like it wasn’t even there.

“Oh well, that is most of my skill set, in order to advance it to the point where I could use it well even when I was in an area bereft of wildlife I had to exclude training much else.” She seemed to sense the pause from them and hurried to add more to her resume. “But, I can do a lot with nature magic. I can make food, I can find water, and I can detect living things.”

That last one was actually pretty useful, not that the other things weren’t, but that left them with two very solid scouts. That was never a bad thing to have. “I see, so in combat you focus on field control, but outside of combat you actually have a lot of support skills.”

She smiled, some of the tension leaving her body. Her nerves weren’t surprising. Everyone on their team had made either solid or spectacular showings in the last trial. Getting on their team would be a major boon for almost anyone. “Yes exactly! I know in terms of combat you guys are already more than set, but I think I can be a useful addition both in and out of combat. Like for example I can keep wildlife away from us when we sleep too, so if you don’t like mosquitoes I’m your gal.”

And Katy was sold. He would hug his father if keeping bugs away wasn’t enough to make Katy fight tooth and nail to get her on the team. As if to confirm his thoughts Katy immediately jumped in. “Cool I think that sells it, welcome to the team.” Siara looked thrilled. He debated saying that really wasn’t a lot to go on, but frankly he wasn’t the biggest fan of pests either, and it’s not like she didn’t have any other good skills.

Surprisingly Lily was the one to be the voice of reason. “As great as keeping bugs away is, I think we need to know a little more before letting her on the team.”

He chuckled, Siara looked even more stressed than earlier, the emotional roller coaster must be getting to her. “To be honest, I think her attitude is good, and that’s honestly the most important thing. She doesn’t have many skills, but she has made it so her one skill does many things which is just as good. I vote yes.”

“I also vote yes. Not going to lie, I was sold at her keeping bugs away.” Katy was quick to agree. Siara was starting to look cautiously hopeful.

“Her magic is really interesting, I vote yes.” Roran chimed in while Cynthia just gave a thumbs up.

“I vote yes too, I think another tracker would be good for places too dense for my clairvoyance to penetrate.” With Luna throwing her hat in the ring it was a done deal, even if Lily disagreed, which he didn’t think she really would.

“I guess it’s not really a huge deal, it’s only for the one trial, and we are strong enough to pass either way, so I guess I vote yes.” Lily didn’t sound thrilled at the idea, he guessed it was because she would have to be careful not to burn of Siara’s spells, or any natural plants she might use.

“I promise I won’t let you guys down! Thank you so much for choosing me!” At least she was quieter than Roran, though not by much. Although to be fair she had been much quieter throughout most of that, so he really hoped the excess energy was just excitement.

***

Azura was spending some time in the library with his copies reading at a leisurely pace. They had agreed on their new member, so he decided to get in the last hour he was allowed in the library today since his copies had been here during the meeting. Afterwards the group would get back together for some team building exercises, and to get a better feel for their new member.

It was kind of odd in a sense. It’s not like the rest of them had known each other for much longer, with Katy and him, and Roran and Cynthia excluded. Yet it still felt like she was a newbie in a team that had known each other for a while. He supposed they bonded quicker because of the shared life or death situations. He had bet his life on saving Luna without even thinking about it, and he knew he would have done it for any of them, which was even stranger to him.

He didn’t mind though, it was a new experience for him. He rather liked having so many people he could depend on. A small part of him was worried though. His father had warned him once, had said that his care for others would get him killed someday, and now after he had almost died for someone he had known less than a month. Maybe his father hadn’t been wrong.

He had thought his father was crazy. After all he had killed… the person who betrayed him. He had cared for that person then, but it hadn’t stopped him from doing what he needed to survive. Although the memories of that awful moment still haunted him. His deepest secret, the only one he had never told anyone. But he had betrayed him, what if he had just been cursed, would Azura have been able to just leave him be.

He didn’t think so. He sighed, it wouldn’t do him any good to think about this. He would just have to make sure none of them got into a situation they couldn’t handle. After all he had never liked all those tales about the hero sacrificing themselves. He was going to be strong enough to protect everyone he cared about, even himself.

***

It was too early to be awake. Lily had definitely gotten used to waking up earlier thanks to her new friends, but this just wasn’t right. Why were they up before the sun again? Azura had said something about making sure they had every choice available for their subjugation mission. Not like it mattered, they were all strong on their own as a team there wasn’t much they couldn’t handle.

Although thinking back she also remembered that he now had a blood oath to a true dragon, so maybe wanting their pick of the missions wasn’t such a bad idea. Even if it meant being up at an ungodly hour. She stumbled around her room struggling to get dressed, in her normal white and violet outfit. It was an interesting piece of clothing. It was like a short dress that flowed like water, but it didn’t behave like normal cloth did.

She had been quite excited when she first found it, but she had long since grown used to its physics ignoring nature. After a few minutes of struggling she managed to get decently ready. She had considered trying to fix the mess her hair was in, but decided that she was too sleep deprived to bother.

She met with the others in front of the amphitheater where missions were going to be handed out. She was pleased to note that almost everyone else looked as awful as she did, and even more pleased at the team solidarity that was glaring at Azura for looking totally fine.

“Don’t get mad at me just because you didn’t take my advice to sleep early.” The glares didn’t even diminish. That bastard made them all get up way too early, and didn’t even have the decency to look tired. “At least I finally know that Roran’s energy is in fact not infinite.” A few unintelligible grumbles were the only response he received. He rolled his eyes and opened the doors into the amphitheater.

They reluctantly followed him, and were even more annoyed when his choice proved to be the correct one. There were two other teams inside already, and they noted that there were at least two more of Azura looking through the various missions. One of the teams was Gareths, and she barely managed to resist starting a fight when the whole clearly better rested team gave them a smug glance.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“Just ignore them, it doesn’t matter. Most of these missions will probably take a few days, so you will all have plenty of time to rest.” Azura bravely allowed their ire to fall back on to him.

Luna was the first to recover from her tired grouchiness, and begin actually helping Azura look through missions instead of just complaining. Katy was next, and then the rest of them began to slowly wake up enough to at least put in a token effort to help.

She herself was mostly just restraining herself from picking a fight with Gareth and his team. She did however note that gaudy staff guy was on his team. She imagined they were trying to get a rise out of her specifically, because she had chosen Azura’s team over his. She was confident she made the right call. Gareth was strong, but he wasn’t a particularly fun person to interact with.

“_ily.. Lily!” She finally snapped back to attention. She hadn’t realized she had completely spaced out. Azura seemed to notice that he actually had her attention now. He rolled his eyes. “I told you to get more sleep” He grumbled for a second. “How does this mission look?” He handed her the sheet of paper he was holding which she currently read through.

“Haden of the city guard offers 500 silver per shadow panther slain. In the grove near Fire Ward city a group of shadow panthers have been attacking patrols and merchant caravans. The city’s normal defenses are busy with another threat and can not handle these beasts at this time. We request a subjugation team to eliminate the threat. Pay will not be dispensed until all the shadow panthers are killed or cleared, however we do not know their exact number so the pay will depend on how many there are. This mission request isn’t time sensitive, but if it can be completed before the next caravan on Friday we will pay an extra 2 gold.”

There was a red stamp over it that simply said rank 3 mission approved.

They were going for the highest of the ranks they were allowed? Well she figured that was fair, their team had plenty of talent. This mission should definitely be doable. So what if it’s hunting shadow panthers. She could handle it. She wasn’t a helpless kid anymore. “Y-yeah, that looks fine.”

Azura gave her a look of concern. Clearly he had seen through her hesitance. “Are you sure? There are plenty of other ones if you don’t like this one.”

She couldn’t run away forever, she didn’t want to do this mission, but it was probably for the best that she did. “Yeah, it’s fine. Sorry I’m just really tired.”

He gazed at her for a while. She could tell he didn’t believe her, but thankfully he decided to let the matter drop anyway. “Alright, then we will accept this one. After that we can nap for 2 hours, and then reconvene in the courtyard for departure.

***

Azura was a little concerned. They had met up in the courtyard as he had asked, and they were now looking for transportation towards Fire Ward. But it was clear that whatever was bothering Lily this morning hadn’t disappeared after she got to sleep a little more. She was being way more quiet than usual, and looked to be in deep contemplation.

“So there’s a small town about 30 miles east of here that has a caravan that goes out to Fire Ward once a week.” Luna suggested.

“But that’s the caravan that the extra pay is attached to. So ideally we would get there before it does.” They could probably make it there in 4-5 days if they just kept a solid pace of their own. They would have to improvise for food and shelter, but he didn’t think that would really be an issue.

“You can’t be suggesting we run all the way there? What if we run into anything worse than the shadow panthers.” He hadn’t really expected Siara to complain about just heading there themselves. After all it would mean more traipsing through the wildlands, which is where she’s at her most valuable.

“If we run into them while far enough from the town we can just run away, and if we’re close enough for it to be an issue we won’t run into anything that strong. So no need to worry!” He knew objectively that Roran was smart, but given how he acted Azura was still surprised whenever he said something to prove it.

“Yeah, besides I don’t think we are going to find reasonable transportation in the timeframe we have. Unless you have a ton of money to throw around anyway.” Katy wasn’t wrong, he didn’t really think they had much choice in the matter.

He thought he could probably build them a transport, but the time it took to make would invalidate its use. “So all in favor of just legging it?”

Everyone gave their affirmative, even Siara, but she was very reluctant about it. “You guys are all crazy. I hope you know that.” He chuckled. He got the feeling Siara was regretting her decision to team up with them.

They did one last minute gear check, to make sure they had everything they needed and then headed out towards the gates.

***

It hadn’t really occurred to Azura why Siara might be so uncomfortable out here without transport. She could detect life within a pretty wide area, even passively. She must feel every beast and monster within a mile of them all the time. He can definitely see that making it a little hard to relax. “You doing ok? I can probably block off your senses for a while if they’re bothering you.”

She shook her head violently. “Thanks, but it’s even worse when it’s quiet like that. I still know they’re there, I just can’t feel them anymore.” He supposed that made sense. Better the devil you know.

“I know we’ve only been running for a few hours, but can I get a break? Endurance has never been my specialty.”

The voice in his head had him glancing at Cynthia, who clearly looked to be struggling to match their pace. He bit the inside of his cheek. They couldn’t really afford to take too many breaks, but they couldn’t let their healer be exhausted either. He made a copy with as little magic as he could. “Carry Cynthia, our healer needs to be in good shape in case we end up in a fight.”

He didn’t turn back to watch his copy following his instructions. “Thanks!” Oww, his head was ringing. She had connected to both him and his copy at the same time, which made some kind of awful feedback loop. His head ached violently even though she had only shared one word. One backwards glance was all it took to confirm Cynthia and his copy were equally affected.

Luckily it wasn’t quite bad enough that he couldn’t keep pace with the others, but the newfound pounding in his head put him in a very bad mood. “Hey, you feeling ok? You suddenly look really pale” Katy seemed to appear out of nowhere, he could normally feel when someone was approaching him, but he guessed the headache was worse than he thought.

“Yeah, I’m fine. We just found out my copies, and Cynthia’s telepathy have an unfortunate resonance. He glanced back to see Roran hanging back with the copy carrying Cynthia who was clutching her head.

Katy winced. “It must be pretty bad, cause you guys look terrible.”

“Wow thanks.” He wasn’t really in the mood to be chatting. He felt a little guilty for hoping she would just let him run in silence for a while so he could properly recover. Luckily she seemed to catch on to his thoughts and just ran alongside him in silence.

“Are you sure we shouldn’t stop? You don’t really look ok” Luna ran up to also tell him he looked like crap. He bit back his temper. They were trying to help, they didn’t deserve him yelling at them. No matter how aggravating they were being.

“I’m not ok. my head feels like crap and I’m a little nauseous, but I’ve certainly moved in worse condition. Just let me have some quiet and I should be fine soon.” He saw Luna and Katy glance at each other. It was clear neither of them were particularly pleased with his answer, but they both fell back a bit to give him some space.

True to his words, he felt his headache slowly receding as they moved. The nausea was almost completely gone after only a few minutes. He glanced back to see if Cynthia and his copy were doing ok. His copies condition seemed to mirror his which made sense, however Cynthia didn’t seem to be recovering. He rolled his eyes, she must have used her magic to explain the situation to Roran, which was a very not good idea. He figured that she had learned that lesson already though, so he didn’t feel the need to lecture her further. At least Roran didn’t look to be making any noise.

“Uhhhhh guys! Something big is coming our way!” Siara shouted, immediately pulling his attention away from Cynthia’s condition.

“How big, and how soon?” He grit his teeth, 2 of their team were definitely not in the optimal condition, and insult to injury he was one of them.

Siara wasted no time responding. “It’s strong, at least tier 5, as for how soon I don’t know for sure. It doesn’t seem to be coming straight for us. It’s more like it happens to be wandering in our direction, but it’s close, I’d be surprised if it doesn’t realize we’re here in the next minute or 2.

“Ok, everyone get ready to run. Copy put down Cynthia, if it comes after us you’re interference.”