Somehow, Violet always managed to get assigned the final watch duty of the night. She had gotten in the habit of practicing the use of Create Food while she was on watch. Rio was always awake when she was on lookout duty and was a far better watch bird than she could be.

The first site wasn’t far from a well-traveled road, so they had made good time and encountered very few magical beasts. The two they had seen were easily scared off and had not attacked them. Violet had only heard about the beasts after they stopped for the night because she had been inside the wagon.

A mountain range to the east of their current location was doing an excellent job of hiding the sun. Usually, they would have already eaten and been on the road by now. They had camped within sight of the barrier last night, and Violet was itching to see what they could find in the ancient ruins.

“Good Morning!” Zane called out with far too much cheer.

Violet responded in kind and then grinned at him when she heard Regina groaning from inside the wagon. Zane had been purposely loud to get the other two members of their party moving. “I was able to perfect my pancake batter this morning, so breakfast is pancakes with blueberries,” Violet said as he sat down at the table. Zane had gotten in the habit of raising a stone table and four stools for them to sit around every time they stopped for the night.

“Marry me!” Zane jokingly replied. The way to his heart was clearly through his stomach.

“You are far too mean to marry. Do you know how many bruises you gave me last night? My healing spells are getting a workout around you.” Violet replied, referring to their daily training sessions.

“Well, if you blocked or dodged better, you wouldn't have those bruises now, would you?”

It didn’t take long after Zane’s wake-up call for the other two members of their party to join them. Waking up to a freshly cooked breakfast was something they looked forward to. “Not that I’m complaining, Vi, but is it wise to drain your mana to make food for us while you are on watch?” Regina said once everyone had finished eating.

“Fruit is fairly cheap for me to conjure, and I only needed to create milk, butter, and eggs for the pancakes. We have flour, sugar, and salt in our food supplies. This meal only cost a little over half of my mana pool to make.”

“You really are a monster. Your Wisdom must be off the charts for your age. Alright, just don't ever drain your mana over two-thirds without letting us know. Practicing magic is important, but we are in hostile territory.” Regina replied.

Violet blushed and looked at her current status. She had used skill points in Mana Manipulation, Mana Regeneration, and Mental Notes to bring them over the skill test barrier. Until she found another skill she needed, she would hold on to her remaining two skill points. The skill barrier made it more difficult for her to quickly gain overall levels. Zane was helping quite a bit with her Swords and Small Blades skills, but more work would be needed to achieve any more levels.

Level

27

Age

16

Experience

(17290/37800)

Health

870/870

Mana

1910/1910

Stat Points

0

Skill Points

2

Strength

50

Constitution

87

Dexterity

50

Intelligence

191

Wisdom

191

[Contracts] [Magic] [Skills] [Storage] [Traits]

“You know it is quite rude to ask someone else what their stats are, your highness,” Violet replied tartly, earning her a hand sign from Regina that was far from ladylike.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“Pfft, I didn't ask. If you start calling me that, I’m going to make up a nickname you won’t like!”

“Ok, enough children. Let’s get moving.” Rick said while walking toward the amberclaws. If he had looked back, he would have seen three shocked faces caused by the number of words he said without being forced.

All banter ceased when they reached the barrier. Rio found a tree outside and refused to follow the party inside. The amberclaws both started to whine, and the humans were all sick to their stomachs. “This barrier is MUCH stronger than the one I grew up in,” Violet said with a grumble.

“The reports we have on this site say that only one room is accessible inside the ruins. We will likely look and then head on to the next site. The amberclaws will start to revolt if we take too long.” Regina said.

“Splitting the party is not a good idea, and leaving them unattended outside the barrier is just begging for them to be stolen,” Zane added.

When the ancient site came into view, Violet was shocked at how small it was. From what she could see, it was smaller than the barracks buildings had been. The building was still pyramid-shaped, with an entrance near the top. When Violet touched the wall on the climb to the top, the building gave off a little bit of heat similar to stone that had been baking in the sun all day. The problem was, it was still reasonably early in the morning, and the building had not had time to gain this much heat from the sun yet.

Once inside the building, their nausea began to increase. Violet went from feeling light seasickness to rough waters, going to hurl at any moment sick. The room that was open to them was thirty-foot by thirty-foot with no visible doors anywhere. An oversized blank slate in the middle of the room drew everyone’s attention.

Zane was the first person to set off the domino effect. When he began to throw up, the smell caused everyone else to empty their bellies’ contents. After rinsing their mouths with water, they continued their trek to the only fixture in the room. Even the walls were left bare.

Violet was the first to arrive at the slate. She immediately started examining the decorative scrollwork around the edges of the slate for the power switch. When she located the hidden text, the slate came to life with a menu written in Runic. Usually, menus were written in English for Violet, so this was new.

“What does it say?” Regina prompted after Violet stared at the slate for a little too long.

“Oh, sorry, it is the most flowery wording I have ever read in Runic before. To sum it up, it says ‘Fire Magic-Users Only.’”

“Why are there so many symbols for four words?” Zane asked.

“It is a whole bunch of random symbols. I think you need a cipher to read it. It would not surprise me if the ciphers were only given to people who belonged here. The only phrase that makes sense to me on this board is the Fire only phrase.” Violet said.

“We’ll have to come back when you gain access to Fire magic. For now, let us leave before we lose any more of our stomach contents.” Regina said.

The quartet left the building and the barrier much faster than they had entered it. Rick had to slow the amberclaws down on multiple occasions while leaving. Upon exiting the border, they were greeted by Rio screeching, “INTRUDERS INTRUDERS.”

An arrow flew towards where Rio was flying, but he dodged it. He then flew a distance away and settled on a branch to watch. The bird had given them quite a few intruder warnings over their travel, but this was the first time their pursuers were so visible.

A large man holding a crossbow began to speak. “Howdy, folks! I reckon you are quite sick about now. Going in them there ruins is right stupid. Waste not want not. Step away from the wagon, and we will allow you to live.”

Zane whispered under his breath to Rick, “Bandits, wonderful. How many do you count?”

“Five on the road, two more in the trees,” Rick replied.

“Me too. Girls, can you take care of the crossbowman in the trees, please? Rick and I will handle these.”

Violet exited the wagon and walked left while Regina took a right. As soon as Zane gave the word, they all jumped into action. The guy Violet was sent to take care of was holding a crossbow and was relatively high up in a tree. Rather than do anything flashy, she used Telekinesis to steal the crossbow from him and then slowly walked toward the tree the bandit was in.

Before she had gotten a chance to get near him, he jumped from the tree and landed awkwardly on his back. She rolled her eyes and kept her distance from the man. He may not have a crossbow anymore, but he could still have throwing knives and other weapons. Her job was to disable the attacker, and he was not going anywhere anytime soon.

Looking back at the road, the bandits were all either disarmed, heavily injured, or dead. On the other side, Regina’s target had not survived. Regina needed to be more aggressive because she didn't have a way of effectively removing the weapon.

“Go help Zane. I’ll watch this one,” Rick said.

When she reached Zane, she was shocked to see he was bleeding from a cut on one of his arms. “How on Zogara did a bandit manage to hit the mighty Zane?” Violet said as she came up and cast analyze and then heal on him. She made a point of always analyzing a patient before healing to make sure she was not missing a more significant problem that healing would not fix. If someone were sliced with a poisoned knife, she would need to remove the poison before healing them.

Zane pointed to one of the bandits and said, “That one is a mage. He managed to slice me with some kind of wind spell.”

As Violet was working on healing the bandits that Zane had placed handcuffs on, Regina said. “Including the one Violet had incapacitated, only four of the seven bandits survived the fight. It looks like we’ll need to make a detour south to drop these gentlemen off before we continue our journey.”

It was fascinating to watch Zane work with Earth magic. After retrieving a bar of iron from their wagon, he manipulated it into four sets of handcuffs. The only way to remove the handcuffs was by sawing them off or having another Earth manipulator take them off. Sawing them off was not recommended as it often left the person bleeding. Each peacekeeper or guard post was required to have at least one modern mage with the ability to manipulate stone and metal.

It was a crowded ride down to the closest town. Thankfully, they were able to make it to the small town a little after the sunset. They decided to push the amberclaws to make the journey in one day so they would not need to guard or feed prisoners for any longer than necessary.

When they reached the town, the guard captain was happy to see them. “We’ve been chasing this group for a while now. They usually attack unarmed carriages or peasants.”

“They thought barrier sickness would be enough to slow us down, apparently. Their loss.” Zane said.

The innkeeper offered them rooms free of charge that night as a reward for bringing in the brigands. While they were all happy to have a real bed to sleep on, they were sad they didn't have any results to show on their quest yet. Tomorrow they would be on the road again, heading to the second site.