Alastor stared at his magical parchment blankly while waiting for a response from Severine. It was a nifty little thing, the magical parchment. It showed him exactly what he wanted to see when he wanted to see it – if he wished to see his points, it would show him his points. If he wanted to see the chaos achievements available for a specific world, it would show him those. It was cool.
Right now, though, he was looking at his points.
Chaos Points:
36
Soul Points:
111
He'd gotten a whole one hundred and ten soul points due to Severine. That was a really good number, especially considering he invested absolutely no effort into killing people. Severine did everything for him.
He shifted his focus to Severine once more. He recognized the spell she'd used – she had once used it in his first run, against an entire army. He was pretty sure it consumed an almost insane amount of mana – it had killed her during his first run. The more area covered, the more mana consumed. With the amount of area she covered right now, could probably not function for a solid hour or two.
Or atleast, not in her peak state. She could probably act as strong as a half step advanced mage right now, even when exhausted. It was extremely weak compared to her usual strength, sure, but it was definitely something. Of course, it’d take her at least a dozen minutes to get adjusted to her new state.
Surely she's brought a teleportation scroll? Unless she's also planning to use the remaining mana she has to teleport? I don’t think Raven can teleport as far as Severine.
Alastor couldn’t help but lick his lower lip as he pondered. But if she teleports us, then we'll have to stop the grind here. She is the key of this grind, after all, and there'd be no point continuing if she's unable to deal with the targets. Or I guess I could kill them. Our next targets are only normal thugs, after all. Even if they can perform magic, it would probably be elementary or intermediate at best – I can deal with them with ease.
"I—I've brought one." Her male disciple interjected, finally breaking Alastor's stream of thoughts. "Should I take it out?"
"Well yeah." Alastor couldn't help but raise his eyebrows. "You do realize reinforcements are probably gonna come in any second now, right?"
Severine's disciple blinked twice, an expression of surprise settling into his face – wait, did he really think reinforcements wouldn’t arrive? – after which he took out the teleportation scroll from within his black robes. He stretched the teleportation scroll out – it was a parchment of pale ivory adorned with intricate sigils and runes written in shimmering, silvery ink – between his trembling hands.
His lips moved soundlessly as he whispered the incantations that would unlock the scroll's bindings. He seemed to be exerting a lot of effort to use a single teleportation scroll.
Just how weak is Severine’s disciple…? Alastor couldn’t help but wonder. Is he just a half step intermediate mage? Or a middle level intermediate stage? There’s no way he’d struggle with even a teleportation scroll otherwise. Severine seriously has disciples in the intermediate stage? She was much more merciful than he expected – most archmages would either expel or kill disciples this weak. Unless they were newly inducted, he guessed – but that didn’t seem to be the case. No teacher would take out new disciples to a massacre, would they? Unless they were a dark mage.
And he was pretty sure Severine wasn’t a dark mage.
Alastor couldn’t help but sigh. Either way, the disciple could take as long as he wanted to. Alastor couldn’t care less. Instead, he focused upon the task he had to do – wipe the mana traces of this place.
“Chaos, wipe Severine’s mana traces. And those that the teleportation scroll leaves, once it activates.”
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Proceed?
“Without a doubt.”
—
A translucent blue circle had begun to build up around them, its shimmering light illuminating their charred surroundings. The energy within the circle built, growing extremely slowly, but steadily.
Only a minute had passed since the disciple had taken out the teleportation scroll. Usually, a minute felt like a trivial amount of time to Raven, but at that moment, it truly felt like an eternity. The seconds dragged on, each one more unbearable than the last as Raven began feeling anxious. It was only her first massacre, after all – it was only natural to feel a bit twitchy.
She was beginning to doubt whether the disciple was even capable of using the teleport scroll. He should have just given it to me. I could’ve done it much easier and quicker. Right when she was genuinely beginning to consider snatching the scroll from the disciple’s hand, the universe gave her a reprieve.
Finally, the blue circle started to flicker. It was a subtle movement at first, but it was enough to make Raven's heart race with excitement. Thank god he’s at least capable of that.
The blue circle continued to flicker, each pulse of energy growing stronger and brighter than the last. Raven could feel the mana coursing through their surroundings – it was nothing compared to Severine’s spell, but it was still noticeable. He seemed to have invested a lot of mana into this, Raven raised her eyebrows. It seems his teleport destination was much farther than she’d expected.
Realization dawned on her. Surely he didn’t put the destination as Vice Head Severine’s chamber? There was nothing fundamentally wrong with doing so, especially since Vice Head Severine did disable the teleportation restrictions to her room secretly for this cleanup, but it was a stupid decision currently. Especially since the Chosen One had explicitly specified that reinforcements were likely coming.
Well, the Chosen One did say he would wipe the mana traces, but did that include that of the teleportation scroll? Thus, if they teleported into the Vice Head's chamber now—
The teleportation kicked in. She closed her eyes tightly as the world dissolved around them into a swirl of colors and sensations, all of them mixed and muted and making her feel nauseous.
And then, it was over. The world snapped back into focus as she opened her eyes – she found herself standing in Vice Head's dismally minimalistic room.
She couldn’t help but let out a sigh; this whole teleportation business never really sat right with her, especially since it was fundamentally playing with the rules established by nature itself. She was an elf in the end, after all, even if only a half-blood one. Using her mana to teleport at least didn't feel that bad, since she had gained mana from nature itself and that did somewhat follow the rules, but scrolls…
They felt foreign. Wrong.
Raven let out a sigh as she slumped into the floor. Even this place, which felt so oppressive to her usually, felt so comforting compared to the dome. She couldn’t help but shiver when she remembered the brutal scene of the elf fighting the beastkin to the death.
The female disciple – who’d not spoken even once till now – finally asked the Chosen One, "Did you erase the mana traces of the teleportation scroll too?" Raven had to admit, she was grateful the female disciple had asked that – it was a question she was dying to know, too.
Before the Chosen One could respond, the Vice Head interjected, her words sharp yet jubilant. "I felt it just as we teleported – all traces of mana disappeared. The Chosen One did exactly what he said he would.”
“I did, yes.” The Chosen One smiled as he removed his mask. “You guys won’t have to worry about being tracked.” He placed a box on the ground – the storage box! Raven couldn’t help but gasp lightly – she’d completely forgotten about it after seeing the Vice Head’s spell. To think the Chosen One remembered to bring it with him while they were teleporting.
He was indeed an amazing person.
The Chosen One gestured at the two slaves – both still in a broken daze, no chains present on them since nothing unalive would teleport unless someone alive and present in the teleportation circle willed for it to – and said, “Please guide them to where the orphans are being kept and get them looked at, if possible. The Head Mage wouldn’t object to that, would he?”
“He wouldn’t.” The Vice Head confirmed.
The Chosen One smiled once more, in a way that made his countenance feel much warmer than usual. “That’s good. Once that’s done, we’ll proceed to killing the normal thugs that rule the slums. Are any of the ones in your list able to use magic, Vice Head?”
“Yes.” The Vice Head confirmed. “However, they are only at intermediate level at best, and I’m confident I can deal with them without breaking a sweat even in my current state.”
“That works, then.” The Chosen One nodded. “Let’s take a break for a few minutes since we’ve teleported into the Institute anyway – I’ll be in my room, so please do contact me once you’re done handing over the people we’ve rescued and are ready, Vice Head.”
He then turned to Raven and asked, “Shall we teleport or walk?”
—