Even from a distance underground, we could hear the sounds of battle. Our supervisor, a lieutenant, called out and shook us from our stupor.

We braked hard into the station, the terminal already filled with wounded for loading.

“Disembark and move to munitions! They’ll have instructions for you there!”

“Hurry up! We’ve got casualties that need loading!”

Flashes of red and white briefly silhouetted defenders scrambling atop tall stone walls. Explosions rang free from all sides, an occasional Scourge beast being flung high into the sky.

The Blooded Hold was far larger than any base we’d ever been to before. I couldn’t even make out distinct people on the other wall; it was just a mass of colored uniforms launching fireballs and arrows.

I already had my coat on, so I slipped my gloves over my hands after picking up a prepared pack from supply with the others.

Protocol was pretty standard. The warlocks were to go up the walls with ranged knights while the remainder were to meet up in the courtyard to coordinate a counter-assault. As per usual, summoners were left to do whatever.

When we exited the terminal, I was able to pick up several powerful Auras within the base. One of them matched President Carrion, an Authority 11. There were a few Authority 10s below him and many more Authority 9s. As for the Authority 8s and 7s, they were everywhere. There were as many as there were tents in the Hold.

Those at our level still outnumbered the others by far. There were thousands upon thousands of soldiers here. The base itself covered dozens of acres, and it was the main wall in front that held the beasts back.

The terminal was in the middle of the base not far from headquarters. However, the sheer size of the base made the distance rather great.

That’s why several trucks were waiting.

“All those from the Magisterium, board the trucks and we’ll take you to the wall! Hurry up!”

We were waved on, my squad sticking together as we piled into one of the transport trucks.

It wasn’t long before we were dumped out to fight. I went up the wall with Umara, running down its length until we found some room in one of the sections.

We didn’t ask questions. We just set up and fell into the cadence of the commanding officer nearby.

“Fire!”

A hundred mages launched their spells, the darkness flaring with fire, plumes of steam briefly flashing into existence before wind cut them apart, Scourge beasts falling to pieces or vaporizing under the devastating assault. The tide briefly opened, the ground visible for moments between the collapsed bodies of Scourge beasts, before being swallowed up again by another fresh wave of hostiles.

Any warlock at the level to fight here had more than one affinity. There was no earth magic being used since the knights were forming offensive lines to meet the Scourge at their best; any agitation with the ground, while effective at disrupting Scourge lines, would prove equally effective at tripping up the advancing knights.

My gun, for once, barely stuck out with the sheer amount of screaming beasts and fiery explosions. That I was using my suppressed Springfield definitely helped in that regard. The moon was bright enough to see a decent distance by, so I stuck to picking off larger targets, whittling down HVTs while the warlocks cleared out riff-raff with area-of-effect spells.

I tapped into my telepathic connection with Umara for a sudden question.

(Hey, it takes a warlock three advancements to develop a perfect affinity. Can they develop two different affinities back to back? Or do they need to completely advance their affinity before moving on to another?)

(… Give me a moment.)

A gust of wind, uniquely tinted with Umara’s Aura, sliced through a group of advancing beasts.

(… Okay. They can technically take whatever path they want. They can advance their water affinity twice before suddenly switching to fire for a couple of advancements. But no matter what, after an advancement, a decision is made that dictates the purpose of the next level.)

(I see.)

I nodded while firing another shot.

It seemed warlocks didn’t need to focus entirely on one affinity at a time. But then that inspired another question.

(Why is it normal to focus on one at a time?)

(Because then there’s more time for an enlightenment. Not only that, but since the chances of becoming an Authority 12 are so low, if you wait to develop the entire affinity for too long, you may never be able to complete it because the difficulty gets too high. Then you won’t have any good affinities, just a bunch of average ones. It’s no different from setting yourself up for failure on multiple levels.)

(That makes sense.)

If you were like Umara and completed your air affinity early, you would have potentially decades to work on being enlightened. But if you refused to take the last step in favor of developing other affinities, all that time would be wasted. By the time you finally took the last step, the chances of you ever being enlightened in your life would be slim.

It was better to simply develop each affinity one at a time. That way, even if you never made it to Authority 12 and gained all four affinities, you would be a master in the ones you had.

It was rather simple logic. The only downside was that you wouldn’t have the spell versatility the other affinities gave you for periods of time.

Even that wasn’t really a negative. The strength a perfected affinity gave you far outstripped the versatility of more. Quality over quantity, as some would say.

I mulled over these thoughts as I chambered another round, a four legged beast crumpling off in the distance. I was perched on a chair, as was Umara. She’d learned her lesson and brought one too so we could preserve our stamina during long battles like this one.

After some time though, I felt something poking at me from beyond the darkness of the battlefield. I dragged my reticle across the back of the horde, but even the moon didn’t provide enough light for me to see that far away. I didn’t feel anything concrete even after reaching out further with my Aura, but I knew for a fact.

There was something, someone, out there.

(We’re being watched.)

(What? By who?)

Umara lifted her head. I could tell that she was concerned about the people around us, thinking that some nobles were trying to cause trouble.

I shook my head.

(Nobody on the wall. Something is out there beyond the battlefield. I can’t see them, but there are definitely a pair of eyes on us.)

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

(That doesn’t sound good. Another scout?)

(It doesn’t feel like one. It’s not hostile, just curious. I don’t know why one would be so close either.)

I brought the scope back up, looking around to see if I could make anything out in the distance.

But it was futile. The feeling was too faint and visibility too low.

However, at some point, the feeling rapidly grew.

No, it was getting closer.

My eyes widened.

……

“We were a half day too early. It seems they made a stop.”

A humanoid spoke from atop a hill, another one already there turning to face it.

The two of them could see the waves of monsters besieging the wall, watching indifferently as the humans fought them off.

The other humanoid waved.

“It doesn’t matter. There’s plenty of fodder left, and they're here now. Who was it that you said to keep an eye on?”

“A few, but two in particular.”

The former approached the latter, a crystal orb filled with mist condensing into two profiles.

One was labeled Ponteck Gulliard, the strongest Elite of the Magisterium. There were some descriptors labeling his outstanding achievements and abilities, as well as his noble title.

But there was another one beside it.

John.

“The son of Gulliard is powerful, but not beyond expectations considering his noble lineage. The great outlier in recent times is this John Cooper. So far, we’ve collected little to no information on him. No noble title, no family, no background. The only achievement he holds is being the Rank 3 Elite, and that wouldn’t be anything of note if not for the fact that he is a Cold Summoner.”

“Hmm…”

The second figure took a look at the information below John’s portrait.

His keen Aura and abnormally powerful weapons were of particular interest, but no additional details could be provided, not even on their functionality.

Nonetheless, he was an outlier, one that it took interest in.

“Where is this John now?”

“He’s on the wall. It seems his summons are ranged weapons. We’re collecting information on him as we speak, but the conclusion right now is that he’s someone to keep an eye on.”

“He’s said to have a keen Aura… We can settle this now. ”

A bow flashed into existence in the figure’s hands, a hefty arrow being nocked as he scanned the walls.

At some point, he recognized an oddity. A man sitting behind the wall, wielding a weapon that occasionally let out explosions. They weren’t of any sort he’d ever seen before. Through the distance and ambient noise, it couldn’t be heard well. But it was noticeable enough.

He smiled.

“Found him.”

He raised the bow, pulling the string back before locking in place, a momentary tableaux of brutal grace.

A slight twitch was all it took to perfect his aim. He watched as John stopped firing, eyes tracking each suspicious movement of his head.

There was a lull in John’s movement. Fingers twitched.

The arrow flew true. His eyes followed.

John’s eyes widened.

“How interesting.”

He smiled.

……

A blur of gunmetal gray flew past my head, a gust of wind brushing past moments later. My eyes followed a second later; fast, but not fast enough.

It had implanted itself solidly in the wall behind me, the arrowhead’s only proof being a cross-shaped hole surrounding a metal shaft. To travel such a distance and still impart enough force to burrow itself into a reinforced wall required an incredibly powerful knight behind it.

Umara also froze, staring at the arrow with cold sweat forming on her forehead.

“T-That’s…”

“...”

This portion of the wall had fallen silent, surrounding soldiers sensing the wisps of leftover Vigor flowing from the point of impact. The commanding officer realized the section had stopped firing and turned to chastise them when he too noticed the rod impaled in the wall.

“What is that? An arrow?”

“Something out there fired it…”

I mumbled in response as he walked over and yanked it out, a shower of debris accompanying it.

Umara spat out her words.

“That’s a Royal… Why the fuck did a Royal try to kill you?”

(I don’t think he was trying to kill me.)

I responded to her telepathically.

(There was no hostility. Merely observation, until I sensed the arrow. It feels more like a test than an assassination attempt.)

(That’s even worse… Let’s get off the wall.)

She stood and stowed her items, grabbing my hand and leading me down the wall.

(We need to find the Puppet Master and tell him about this.)

(Does this mean something?)

(You do know what Royals are, right?)

Umara asked as we searched around, causing me to nod.

(Yes. They’re intelligent humanoids unlike the rest of the Scourge.)

(Then it should be obvious that catching the interest of a Royal is really bad news. I don’t think you know this part, but the intelligent part of the Scourge doesn’t just sit back and throw fodder at us all the time. They use the Scouts to collect information, then take out targets with potential. There’s been many reports of student deaths from Royals.)

(So they want to kill me before I can get stronger.)

(Well, they certainly know about your strength now. It’s safe to say that everything you do beyond the walls of this base from now on is going to be extremely dangerous. A strong Scout is the least of our worries.)

I could feel Umara’s solemnity through our connection.

It seemed that the Scourge had its own special task force in charge of espionage and sabotage. This was a side of them that the public didn’t know about or conveniently chose to ignore.

If I was now on a list, I had to be extra careful. If they really wanted to kill me, then there wasn’t much I could do to protect myself.

After a bit more thought, I stopped Umara from walking before taking out my Aerial, dialing the Puppet Master.

“Yes, John?”

“I have some bad news.”

I told him about what happened, causing him to go silent for a moment.

“...I swear, you can’t go a day without pissing someone off.”

“I didn’t realize I needed to tiptoe around the Scourge’s feelings.”

“I’m talking about me! Here I am trying to keep you alive while you continue to attract the worst possible enemies to have! Now I need to second guess every little mission I send you on lest everyone gets killed just because you were with them! You know, I’m starting to think I should just kick you off the Elites so that you don’t get put on every damn hit list known to mankind!”

My face went blank as the Puppet Master ranted through the Aerial, as if it were my fault.

Well, I couldn’t completely blame him. I let him get everything off his chest, a process that took a whopping 15 minutes.

He was usually succinct, but apparently today he decided to take exception to my plights and talk my ear off. It was quite impressive, really.

Once he was finally done, he took a few deep breaths before giving me some clear instructions.

“Just sit your ass down on the sidelines while I figure this out. And don’t go blabbing about this either if you want to keep your life.”

“Yes sir, Puppet Master, sir.”

“Don’t patronize me.”

He grumbled and hung up, causing me to chuckle.

“So?”

Umara asked, earning a shrug.

“The Puppet Master just rewarded us with unpaid vacation. We get to do whatever the hell we want until he finds a suitable mission for us. Which may take a while.”

“So he’s keeping you away from danger. Good.”

“How strong are the Royals anyway?”

I hadn’t a clue how strong they were besides judging bounties and looking at information available on the Black Spider Repository. Anything on there would be worth killing, and thus higher Authority, but I didn’t have exact numbers; bounties were so high on Royals both because of the lack of information about them and their high kill counts.

What I did know was that they were humanoid Scourge entities with intelligence on par with humans. That made them especially dangerous, because they could plan ahead just as well as humans could and, more importantly, control the masses of beasts below them.

There weren’t as many of them as there were humans, so humanity still stayed ahead. But on the battlefield, numbers meant less, so their lethality was amplified.

Even more worrying was their odd powers: while some were generally in line with the three Magi classification, others diverged and were more like Scourge beasts. I wouldn’t know what to expect when facing one until they attacked.

Umara shrugged.

“They still go by the same Authority system as us. They can be of any level, but, chances are, the one that tried to shoot you wasn’t absurdly high level since you’re not dead. Still, they’re not things you want to mess with.”

“I get that. Let’s just relax. Lord knows when we’re going back out. I’d prefer to train until then.”

I grabbed Umara’s hand and walked off. The battle was still ongoing but we had done enough; some relaxation and food would be just rewards.