“Good day to you, Miss Sage! How’ve you been?”

Fifteen was rather taken aback by the guard’s lively greeting. She passed through this post quite a bit since she often traveled, so it wouldn’t be strange if she had one or two acquaintances among the soldiers stationed here. Except, she never really talked to any of them beyond what was necessary for passing through the gatehouse. Furthermore, though it was insensitive to admit it, they all looked alike – just a bunch of midlander guys in the same armored uniform and face-framing headgear. Even if she did hit it off with one of them she’d struggle to pick them out from a crowd, so she really wasn’t sure how to respond to this sudden burst of familiarity.

Sensing that this was about to turn into another awkward staring contest, Raela decided to step in and save everyone the embarrassment.

“Excuse me, sir, but do you know my Mistress?”

“Hm? Mistress?” the man lowered his gaze to meet the girl’s. “Ah, sorry, I didn’t see you there. You must be the rumored apprentice.”

“Indeed. You may call me Ray.”

‘Raela’ was far from a common name, so that alias was meant to help obfuscate her identity. The hood and new face-mask – handmade by Fifteen – served the same purpose. It was impossible to hide her lineage from the general public forever, but she hoped to delay that at least until she turned sixteen. At that point she’d be legally an adult and her parents’ ability to control her life would diminish greatly. But before any of that, she had to deal with this nosy oaf.

“Nice to meet you, Ray,” he smiled broadly. “I’m Frederick, but my buddies call me Fred.”

“So, Mr. Frederick, kindly answer my question. How do you know the Mistress?”

“I don’t, really. We’ve never spoken before, but I wanted to give her my thanks,” he looked back to Fifteen. “My cousin mentioned in a letter that you helped him out a lot with some trouble at Roderick. Not sure what it was about, but it seems I owe you one for looking after that idiot.”

“… I was just doing my job,” the sorceress said.

“Come, now, don’t be like that. Least I could do is treat you to a stiff–”

“The Mistress,” Raela firmly interrupted, “has work to do, and you are keeping her from it. Kindly stop wasting her time and mine, Mr. Frederick.”

The man was suddenly taken aback by the little girl’s forceful tone. Logically, he should be getting angry at this cheeky brat mouthing off to him like that, but something about the fierce glare in those blue eyes gave him pause. If one was being generous, they could say the young lady’s noble bearing – immature though it was – shone through despite her looking like a little kid in a Sage of the Sands costume. In reality, she just kind of creeped him out.

“R-right. My bad. Go on though,” the guard stepped aside.

“Our thanks. After you, Mistress.”

The sorceress nodded and silently carried on, her steps a bit stiff from the strange encounter. Thankfully, the rest of the formal procedures were completed as efficiently as always. Since Cherrytown was in a frontier region where the wilderness was untamed and full of danger, it was common to ask a few questions of anyone passing through the city gates in either direction. Basic things like names, where they were going, and how long they expected to be gone or staying, all of which was committed to a ledger for reference in case of trouble. Fifteen had already prepared a note with all the necessary details so she was practically waived through. It wasn’t until she took a few steps beyond the gatehouse that she finally relaxed a bit. She glanced down at her apprentice and asked the obvious.

“Where did that come from?”

“Nobles don’t like it when the ‘help’ gets too familiar, so I was taught how to ‘remind them of their place,’ as it were.”

“Seems… excessive.”

There was no denying mages had a higher social standing than commoners since the church put them on pedestals, but they were nowhere near actual nobility.

“It was not,” Raela insisted. “That man had impure motives.”

“Did he?”

“I’m certain of it. You probably think he was just being friendly, but I could tell – he wanted to get intimate with you.”

“You’re imagining things.”

In fact, the thought hadn’t even crossed her mind. Objectively looking at herself, Fifteen was a cripple with an awkward personality and, though she had a decent figure, she showed off none of it since most of her was covered in burn scars. The face especially.

“Please,” Raela rolled her eyes. “You’re a powerful woman, in more ways than one. That alone makes you attractive.”

The letter that guy mentioned was no doubt real, but he used it as a pretext to hit on the up-and-coming sorceress. Being recognized as a Master Magus at such a young age was such a big deal that the rumor spread beyond the robed community. Everyone in Cherrytown knew about it at this point, especially since it concerned the enigmatic Sage of the Sands. Previously she was widely known as creepy and bizarre, but now her reputation had evolved to a genius who was often misunderstood because of her taciturn nature. It was closer to the truth than not, from what Raela had seen after studying under her for the past twenty days. While she was glad that the wizard she admired was garnering respect and fame, the girl couldn’t help but feel a bit protective around sleazebags like that… whatever his name was. His motives were obvious from the way he eyed Fifteen up so intently that he completely failed to notice the apprentice right next to her. Raela knew she was short, but she wasn’t invisible.

“You really need to be more self-aware, Mistress.”

The sorceress herself didn’t say anything and just stared off into the distance.

“Hey, are you listening to me?”

“… Sorry, I was just talking with my familiar.”

Raela’s eyes lit up like lanterns, her earlier thoughts instantly discarded and replaced with giddy anticipation.

“The saber-tooth you tamed, right?!”

“Not tamed. Bonded. He is like a brother, not a pet.”

“Yeah, yeah, but where is he?!”

She’d actually been dying to meet the beast for a while now, but he wasn’t fond of the city and this was the first time the two of them had left its walls.

“Turn around.”

“Huh? Waaah!”

Raela couldn’t help but instinctively cling to her mentor’s robes with a yelp when she finally noticed the ferocious mound of muscle and fur that had been right behind her ever since they passed the gatehouse a minute ago. Bahm let out a satisfied snort at that reaction. ‘Introducing’ himself like that was a habit he picked up during the asylum incident. Fifteen didn’t mind it since she saw it as a silly game, though she’d probably feel different if she wasn’t passively aware of the saber-tooth’s presence and therefore immune to his jump-scares. Her apprentice, on the other hand, felt like her heart nearly leaped out of her mouth. She needed a few seconds to snap back to her senses, at which point her earlier excitement overtook any sense of fear or caution.

“My word! He’s even more majestic than I expected! Such a marvelous black coat and dignified bearing! So freaking cool!”

Though her childish side won out in the end, her flowery language accurately described Bahm’s present self. Much like Fifteen, he’d undergone something of a metamorphosis in the two months since Roderick. His once orange fur had fully assumed the coal-like hue of his sworn sibling’s hair, giving it a smooth, shiny, almost luxurious look. The massive claw scars he received from that black dragon were now practically invisible, though they still glowed bright whenever he entered his ‘afterburn’ state. He’d also grown a lot more accustomed to human interaction and no longer gave everyone but Fifteen the cold shoulder. Though he still cut an imposing and powerful figure, the air around him wasn’t as wild as it used to be.

A big part of that change in atmosphere was due to Bahm’s new equipment. The old ragged cloth that used to cover his damaged eye was replaced with a custom-made brass-plated metal mask that enveloped the upper half of his head aside from the ears. He also has some bright yellow bands wrapped around both front ankles instead of another piece of Fifteen’s old ripped-up robe. These accessories were there mainly to help identify the familiar as such, lest travelers or adventurers mistake him for a feral monster. They didn’t need to be fancy, but the saber-tooth himself insisted on the look.

The apex predator always had a strong sense of pride, but then he got all that attention from various scholars and doctors during the month-long quarantine. A prime specimen of a rare species that had an unusually potent bond as a familiar? It was a miracle those eggheads didn’t dissect him on the spot. They still ran a bunch of tests and did plenty of observation all while heaping praise and superlatives upon the saber-tooth. Bahm didn’t know the words, but he understood the intent, and as a result his high self-respect evolved into full-blown vanity. Hence the unnecessarily fancy accessories. Fifteen had some mixed feelings regarding that development – partly because she was the one who paid for those trinkets – but seeing Raela accept him so readily eased some of her worries.

“And so fluffy! Ahhh, I can’t get enough of this!”

That said, wasn’t she getting a bit too familiar with someone else’s familiar? Also, fluffy? Last time Fifteen checked, Bahm’s fur was hard and oily, but looking at the glee with which the girl snuggled her face into the saber-tooth’s flank, that clearly wasn’t the case anymore. The sorceress herself wanted to feel it, but the smug look she got from Bahm gave her pause. She had a weird feeling that giving into that impulse would alter the balance of power in their relationship. It would be akin to admitting Bahm had the upper hand, and as her apprentice noticed early on, Acolyte Two-Fifteen hated losing. So, even though she really wanted to test the alleged fluffiness for herself, she regretfully restrained herself for the moment and tried not to let her jealousy show.

“Enough of that. Let’s go.”

She did not succeed.

“What’s the rush?” the girl pouted. “It’s not like we’re actually going anywhere.”

It was a valid point. The three of them needed to make their way over to the Vigil Valley Archive by winter, both for Fifteen’s promised grimoire and to start the girl’s spellcraft training in earnest. However, that was a long and grueling journey that was practically a pilgrimage. It might prove too much for a sheltered teen to handle, both physically and mentally. So, they’d be roughing it in the woods around Cherrytown for a while as a sort of trial run. If Raela proved she could handle the vagrant lifestyle, then there’d be no problem. And if she didn’t… Fifteen would worry about that if and when that happened. For the moment, she just needed an excuse to cease that enviable cuddling.

“We should move before the rain resumes. Come.”

“Yes, Mistress…”

Though mostly a pretext, it was a genuine concern. Even with waterproof coats and boots, traveling during a downpour was a terrible idea for many reasons. It was common sense to keep those feet moving before those loose clouds overhead decided to get together and take a collective dump on everyone’s parade. Fortunately, the skies were keen to cooperate and didn’t let a single drop fall for the rest of the day. As evening rolled around it seemed as though the dry spell would last throughout the night and into the next morning. This was good since Raela needed all the rest she could get. The group had been hiking ever since they left Cherrytown about six hours ago and, as anticipated, the girl wasn’t handling it well. She was so exhausted that when she slipped and fell to her knees she seemed physically incapable of standing up and gasped for air like a beached fish. This sort of thing was exactly why Fifteen had her run so much in the weeks prior, and that surely helped, though the girl clearly had a long way to go. Not only in terms of building up stamina, but also managing it.

“Your luggage is too heavy,” Fifteen firmly said.

“Yeah, well, huff, huff,” Raela panted heavily, “I’ll get used to it.”

“Or you could bring less stuff.”

“Nuh-uh. Huff. If I have to live on those field rations for more than a week, I might just go crazy.”

The sorceress sighed quietly. It would seem the spoiled rich kid couldn’t let go of certain luxuries after all. Indeed, most of the stuff she was carrying was either food, spices, or cooking utensils. Especially the large pan and pot strapped to either side of her backpack. Those were cast iron and no doubt heavy as hell. Though, honestly, whether she adapted to the unnecessary burden or discarded it didn’t matter much to Fifteen, so long as it didn’t slow the group down.

“Eight hours a day. If you can carry those things that long, then you can bring them.”

“I’ll definitely do it! Just watch me!”

Well, it was good she was motivated, but getting all pumped up over little things was also a waste of precious energy.

*Thock*

“Owie!”

Fifteen reprimanded her with a disciplinary bonk on the noggin. It was just a light tap with the tip of a staff – not enough to cause any lasting pain, but plenty to remind her to use that head more.

“I’ll set up the tent. You get the fire going.”

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“… Yes, Mistress.”

As per usual, Raela wasn’t quite sure why she was bonked, nor would she be told. Her mentor insisted that the girl should think about her own flaws and figure out a way to fix them by herself. Self-reliance was a vital skill for any adventurer, wizard or otherwise, and this was Fifteen’s method of cultivating it. Or rather, that was the method she came up with on the spot since she really had no idea what she was doing as a teacher and was just using the way she was taught as a reference. With some alterations, of course. There was far less need for survival training since they weren’t in a desert with scorching days and freezing nights, and that was honestly for the best. Even with the rainy season looming overhead, camping out in these sparse woodlands was far less harrowing than in the dune sea.

The tents, for instance. Setting up a temporary shelter was much easier since the soil was firmer than pure sand and there was far less chance of it being blown away. A firepit was similarly simple to make and maintain since firewood was readily available. Granted, all of it was damp, but that was a problem for people without fire magic at their fingertips. In order to ‘get the fire going’ as instructed, Raela had to spend about twenty minutes drying out branches with her conjuration on minimal output. Maintaining an adequate and steady level of heat for that long was a form of training in and of itself, and she got the hang of it quite quickly as per usual.

Once the campfire was pleasantly crackling, the girl finally got around to putting all that luggage to use. Her first attempt at cooking in the wild was fairly basic – some pan-grilled sausages and potatoes with a side of cheese melted onto toasted bread. Far from a five-star meal, but leagues better than the dry and tough field rations. Fifteen still doubted it worth the extra effort, though she had to agree it smelled incredibly appetizing. Something to do with the seasoning, perhaps? Come to think of it, the girl previously mentioned a secret herb blend she learned about from her family’s live-in chef. The sorceress would need to double-check exactly what went into that later since spices were pricey and that cost came out of her pocket.

All of those doubts vanished the instant she was handed a wooden plate of steamy goodness. The food smelled and looked so good that Fifteen instantly decided the extra effort and expense were indeed worth it. She had yet to confirm the taste, but she didn’t need to when she saw the sheer delight with which Raela bit into her improvised cheese-and-sausage sandwich. Watching her made Fifteen’s mouth water so much it was honestly a miracle her drool hadn’t leaked out. And yet despite that positive stimulation, the sorceress hesitated to actually take a bite due to reasons unrelated to the food itself.

“Are you worried about your scars?” Raela caught on. “You already showed them to me, so I don’t know why you’re still hung up about that.”

The sorceress did everything she could to avoid showing her disfigured face to others. Even when she was stuck in a carriage with Tacitus she would only eat when she was certain the witch hunter was asleep or his vision was physically obscured. She kept doing that with Raela as well throughout the apprenticeship, but it would seem the sharp girl noticed the intentional aversion. Not that being called out would stop Fifteen. It was a simple matter to just turn around or maybe take her meal inside the tent and her apprentice would just have to accept that. However, unless something drastic happened the two of them would be in each other’s company for years to come. It was inevitable they’d come face to face, so getting over this hurdle nice and early was probably for the best. Besides, much as the kid said, the cat was already out of the bag.

“… I suppose.”

Raela couldn’t help but hold her breath as the sorceress pulled back her hood and peeled off her mask. The entire left side of the Sage’s face – nose and lips excluded – was covered in dull pink and horribly deformed skin. The feline eye on that side moved in tandem with its twin, but its unfocused and milky white iris made it clear that it no longer functioned. The most gruesome part was the gaping hole in her left cheek. Her teeth and gums were fully exposed from the corner of her mouth to well past her molars, which were clenched rather tightly at the moment. Her drool would have surely oozed through the black face-wrap if not for the layer of gauze and cotton sewn on the inside of it. The moist and fleshy look was far from pleasant, but perhaps the worst part of that gaping wound was the thin strip of muscle that connected her jaws towards the back. It was almost as if that fleshy tether was the only thing keeping her mouth from hanging loosely on one side.

image [https://i.imgur.com/hrKmati.jpeg]

Raela stared at Fifteen. Of course, she did. Though she acted like it was no big deal, she hadn’t gotten a close look at the disturbing injury before she started puking her tiny guts out. It really was a lot worse than she remembered, yet she somehow couldn’t look away. It was a surreal sight, especially when contrasted to the mature beauty of the unblemished half of her face. As for Fifteen, getting stared at so intently made her understandably uncomfortable, and the forest breeze invading her mouth cavity wasn’t exactly helping. For better or worse, this wasn’t the first time the sorceress had experienced this sort of thing, so she handled it relatively well.

“Eat before it cools.”

“… Yes, Mistress.”

Fifteen put on a casual act she bit into a piece of potato and slowly chewed on her good side. Raela tried to mind her own portion, but couldn’t help herself and glanced up at the disfigured woman every other bite. The girl couldn’t help herself even though she almost lost her appetite when she saw a bit of crumb-filled drool leak through the mangled cheek, prompting Fifteen to wipe it away with a napkin. It wasn’t even shock or disgust that made her act this way, but pure curiosity.

“If you want to ask, then ask.”

Even the socially stunted sorceress figured out why her apprentice couldn’t keep her eyes to herself.

“Does it… hurt?”

“A little, when I chew or speak.”

“Ah. S-sorry about making you talk so much…”

It would appear that, to Acolyte Two-Fifteen, idle chatter was a pain in more ways than one.

“It’s fine. I’m used to it.”

“And, you said a dragon caused this?”

“Mhm.”

“The red one you sculpted before?”

“Mhm.”

“What happened?”

“It attacked my village when I was seven. An acolyte of the Order of Ash repelled it and took me in. Don’t remember much else.”

That was a lie, but the less she thought about the past the more likely it was she’d actually forget it.

“I see. Probably for the best…”

There was another heavy, stare-filled silence, though this time Raela was looking at her mentor with pity more than anything else. That was the number one thing Fifteen didn’t want, and the main reason she kept her facial situation under wraps. An ignorant child’s sympathy left a worse taste in her mouth than the throat full of grit she’d get if she didn’t cover her cheek during a sandstorm. Most adults would’ve gotten the hint and looked away by now, but no matter how mature she acted Raela was still a kid. Perhaps she’d feel more at ease if Fifteen pulled out an old trick from her neophyte days. It worked wonders when her fellow novices wouldn’t stop staring during meal time, back when they were all even younger than the apprentice girl.

Fifteen’s tongue poked out from between her exposed teeth and tasted the air where her cheek would be if she had one, a half-chewed lump of sausage resting on it. As expected, the young lady made a profoundly unladylike grimace that only got worse as the sorceress pulled her tongue back in, but clenched her teeth just enough to scrape off the food so it fell back into her plate with a wet plop.

“That. Was. So nasty!” the girl shuddered.

“Want to see it again?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Then stop staring.”

“Urk… Sorry.”

As expected, making light of her own injury helped clear the air. Fifteen still covered up as soon as she was done eating, but when it was time for breakfast the next day, Raela seemed a lot more relaxed around the gaping face-hole. Incidentally, the meal she prepared was porridge topped off with dried cherries. Neither were new to the sorceress, yet she somehow never thought to combine them like this. No doubt about it, the girl was already a far better cook than Fifteen could ever be, so it was decided to let her handle the party’s food going forward. Once their bellies were full they needed to kill some time before the nocturnal saber-tooth woke up, so the sorceress showed off some of her wilderness survival skills. Nothing too strenuous, just the basics of tracking, trapping, and foraging. If Raela was going to be responsible for their meals, then she needed to know how to procure food in the wild or they’d be back to those field rations she dreaded so much in no time. That alone seemed to motivate her, and she gave the practical lesson her utmost effort despite its nonmagical nature.

Which, in turn, tired her out well before Bahm woke up at around noon, and as a result the group wasn’t able to cover any more distance than the day before. Raela got another bonk, and this time around she finally figured out she needed to pace herself better throughout the day. The following morning she was far more mindful of her actions and in the afternoon actually matched her mentor’s pace instead of buzzing around to poke at whatever random thing caught her curiosity. She was still dead tired by the time they stopped for the day, but at least this time around she lasted the full eight hours without collapsing.

“Good. You’re improving.”

“Th-thank you, Mistress. I’ll get dinner started right away.”

Thankfully, there was no need to set up camp since they never packed up the one they made on that first night and spent the last two days simply walking in circles around it. There was no need to venture far from Cherrytown for a mere trial run, especially since Fifteen was waiting on an important package from home that was slated to arrive in a few more days. It was full of gear and supplies she couldn’t get otherwise – ashplume ignition potions, for example – and she refused to undertake the perilous journey to Vigil Valley without those. Especially since, by the look of things, she’d be bringing her apprentice along after all.

Though it was supposed to be her first time roughing it in the woods, Raela had taken to the wilderness like a fish to water. It was remarkable how at ease she was in the unfamiliar environment. The sun had set and the stars were hidden by thick clouds, making the forest so dark that the world seemed to just disappear into nothingness beyond the light of the roaring campfire. Though the weather had been cooperative until now, the distant sound of thunder made it clear a storm was on the way, and the pair was in for a miserable and turbulent night. Despite all that, Raela wasn’t scared in the slightest and merrily helped herself to a second bowl of steaming soup. Whether it was the outdoors, the culinary arts, or her magic, the girl got the hang of things pretty quickly. Abnormally so, some might say, and Raela herself also realized this. It had actually been on her mind for a while, and this seemed like a good opportunity to bring it up.

“Say, Mistress?”

“Hm?”

“Is it normal for an apprentice to progress so quickly?”

“Mhm.”

“You sure? I asked around the guild and they told me it usually takes years before a wizard learns their first spell, but it hasn’t been a month since we started and you’re already talking about it. Aren’t you rushing things a little too much?”

The Sage of the Sands was never one to take things slow and, by her own admittance, had some reckless tendencies. Raela had become intimately aware of how dangerous magic could be after her more advanced conjuration attempts literally blew up in her face a few times. Thankfully, her mentor always kept a ready supply of Slimotrax-B on hand during their stove sessions. That stuff worked miracles for fresh burns, though it’d be far less effective if the damage had time to settle in. Even that specialized medicine wouldn’t do much if the girl got in over her head and blew her fingers off with a botched spell. Though she was eager to learn, she was wary of biting off more than she could chew.

“It’s fine since you’re a skyblood,” was Fifteen’s response.

“What do you mean by that?”

“You have giants in your ancestry.”

Hard to believe given her tiny frame, but the guild’s blood tests were decisive.

“No, I already know that. I’m asking why that matters.”

“Giants had ancestral memory – knowledge inherited at birth. Vestiges of that trait persist in skybloods. When you pick up a new skill, you’re not exactly learning, but remembering things you didn’t know you knew. Same result, less effort.”

“Wow! So I’m, like, a prodigy?! You know, I always felt like I was special ever since–”

*Thonk*

“Ow!”

Raela was so excited she didn’t notice the spoon headed for her scalp at all, startling her more than usual.

“What was that for?!” she whined.

“Don’t get cocky. The basics come easy, but your gift won’t help you master your magic. The skybloods I was raised with pulled ahead, got complacent, and now they’re all weaker than me. You’re already starting late, so you really can’t afford to fall into the same trap.”

“Yes, Mistress…”

She obviously wasn’t thrilled to have her parade rained on, but she was glad for the direct answer. Since her mentor seemed to be in a talkative mood for once, she figured she might as well make the most of this chance to learn more about the tight-lipped woman.

“So, if being a skyblood lets me learn things faster, does being part elf help you in any way?”

“I’m not sure. We’re supposed to have superior accuracy and control, but that’s hard to measure.”

No two mages were alike. Even if they had the same ancestry, element, and environment, they could still turn out completely different as wizards. There was a famous story of a pair of identical twins, both rockblood geomancers, yet one’s talents lay in terraforming while the other was far better at making golems. Even a seemingly one-note element like fire could be specialized into explosions, beams, or persistent conflagrations. It was hard to get reliable statistics on such a diverse group’s abilities, but it was generally believed that feybloods had precision, wyrmbloods excelled in power, and rockbloods boasted the greatest capacity. Skybloods were the only ones whose inherent traits were easily observed while the rest were unconfirmed theories based on records surrounding the War of the Ancients. A lot of experiments on human mages were done in those days, most of them inhumane and forcibly performed by the other races. It was tainted data that modern scholars were hesitant to rely upon.

Raela had no knowledge of any of that, but she would not deny what was in front of her own eyes.

“From what I’ve seen I’d say accuracy is definitely one of your strong points, Mistress. Even I can tell nobody can make straight lines or perfect circles like you can.”

“I haven’t noticed.”

“That’s because you don’t pay attention to your colleagues. You know Mr. Fletcher and Ms. Reed from the guild?”

“You mean Firebeard and Controlled Chaos?”

They were both Named Mages like her, with similarly flamboyant titles. The Ordo Mystica loved to sensationalize their veteran members like that. They had yet to give Fifteen a second title to go along with her recent promotion, though it was sure to be something pointlessly theatrical.

“Yes, them. I happened to bump into them in the stove and asked them to show me a thing or two, and their spells were nowhere near as cleannNNNGH!”

Raela abruptly groaned in pain while clutching both cheeks. The sudden toothache in her molars was so sharp that it made her drop her wooden bowl into the campfire, nearly putting it out with the spilled soup. Though this was the apprentice’s first time experiencing something like this, she instinctively knew what it meant – a drastic spike in ambient magical energy. The pain dulled somewhat in a few moments, but persisted, and as she opened her reflexively clenched eyes she found Fifteen already standing on her feet. She had one hand around a staff and the other on her neck. There was little urgency in her motions and she didn’t even cover her head or face. It seemed as though this situation was nothing out of the ordinary for her.

In truth, the sorceress was just as confused as her apprentice. She’d never experienced loose magic this potent, not even while fighting the dwarf. Standing right on top of a place of power would, at most, make her neck itch as if a mosquito had bitten it. Though she silently endured it, that allergic reaction was now so intense it was as if a hundred fire ants were tap-dancing on her skin. Fifteen had no idea what this could mean, but her gut told her it wasn’t something she could handle on her own. It was therefore quite fortunate that she wasn’t alone.

“Raela.”

“Y-yes?”

“Flare.”

“Right!”

It was worth incorporating emergency drills into the girl’s conjuration training, as her body knew exactly what to do with just that word. She clapped her hands together in front of her chest, and as her palms parted a bright flame stretched out between them as if it were fresh dough. Raela brought her hands closer and under the malleable conflagration, balling it up just before she hurled it upwards with an exaggerated motion. The wild magic left a bright orange streak as it rapidly ascended to a height just above the surrounding treetops and started to fizzle out.

“Ignum perpeta expulso trionis.”

Fifteen added her own spell to it, drastically expanding the floating projectile while also extending its lifespan. The flare now shone with a light so bright that it made everything within fifty meters turn from night to day for the next five to ten minutes. Now that she had more than a fading campfire to work with, Raela could make out some dark, inhuman figures shifting in the treeline at the edges of the clearing. The girl would have surely succumbed to panic at that sight if not for the reassuringly calm presence of her mentor or the powerful familiar who stood at her side. As usual, she had no idea where Bahm had appeared from, but being sandwiched between him and Fifteen made Raela feel incredibly safe.

“Mistress, what’s going on?”

The Sage might have been clueless before, but having caught a glimpse of the creatures lurking in the trees, she was able to make one of her educated guesses.

“Demons.”

The apprentice was far too green and uneducated to grasp the full gravity of what her mentor just said, but she was nevertheless certain it was not a good thing. And yet…

“Why are you smiling, Mistress?”