Birth of the Legendary Battle Mage

Chapter 10

Julius went missing after he went to visit the King, and the situation was reported to the public as an act of sacrifice for the Great Kingdom of Esnok. The story that was spread around was that the Great Mage Julius was ambushed by mysterious assassins, protecting the king. He fought till his death and the King was able to return unharmed. Majority of the public believed this story, while a few disagreed, saying that either Julius abandoned the Kingdom, or was eliminated. Everyone in prominent positions knew the truth, but no one dares to say a word against the King.

This news was especially hard for Ashia who was catered for by Julius since childhood like a big brother, even though they weren’t related. The image of Julius had already been painted bad to her by certain people who were planted by the King. Deep down, she felt something was wrong. It was the same for Julius’ group, now they had to disband or dissolve into the other pillars.

“Miss Ashia, please get yourself together, you’ve been crying for hours now. I hear you have a mission briefing today by evening, you should stabilize yourself.” A female soldier said to Ashia as she walked gently towards her friend who stood by the curtain, looking outside. As she moved closer to Ashia, her metal plated amour clinging slightly together, she placed a hand on her friend’s shoulder trying to console her. She knew the pain Ashia was going through since she had experienced something similar with her parents. With a few sniffles, Ashia wiped her face then turned to face her friend, before walking towards her bed.

“Thank you for worrying about me Rina, I’ll be fine.” The girls continued their discussion in the room. Later that day in the evening, almost night, Ashia received a summon from the King. After getting there, she was briefed of her mission directly through the King, surely it had to be an important mission if the King had to give out the briefing himself.

“My Lord, you summoned me.” Ashia said as she took a knee, with her face pointing towards the ground.

“Yes. As you might have figured out, I have an important mission for you.”

“What kind of mission requires the King himself to give the briefing my Lord?” She asked with a hint of worry, all the while remaining respectful.

“Hmm, come with me.” The King instructed as he stood up from his majestic throne. They went to a room where the King completed his briefing as he pointed out certain things on a map that lay on the table positioned at the centre of the room. Her mission was fairly simple, not really worth the urgency it was given. She had to exterminate a group of Master Class mages that were sent by a rival Kingdom, their number was estimated to be about four in total. As a Grandmaster Class mage, it wouldn’t be a walk in the park, but it won’t be too difficult either. She was in the late stage of the Grandmaster Class, her strength was already comparable to that of a mage at the initial stage of the Ascension Class.

As the night dragged on, at about a little before midnight, Ashia set out on her mission towards the north. She would have to intersect the enemy mages before they get too close to any village in the surrounding border. Good news was that they were yet to enter the Kingdom’s territory, so she had a couple of days be they get to the nearest village from the border, and would be about three days from the position they last reported seen. Camping was easy, as she had learned it since her younger days when Julius would take her training in the forests. Sitting there now beside a fire amidst the forest, she couldn’t help but remember her beloved teacher and brother. The pain came back anew, and before long she fell asleep forgetting to put out the fire. She had planned to just have a quick snack before continuing her travel since she hadn’t eaten the whole day but ended up falling asleep. As one would expect, some wild animals were quick to show their interest in the burning wood, but it wasn’t even a challenge as she made quick work of them.

“I was careless. Let’s continue moving again.”

It wasn’t long before Ashia got to a spot where the forest wasn’t dense, this was the predicted route of the mages she had to kill. She hid herself behind the trunk of a tree that was positioned on an elevated ground beside the path that had made by constant passing of people and carts. While the enemy mages were still a good distance away, she cast a kind of smokescreen spell that made it look like this part of the forest was foggy, so that when the enemy would get here, they wouldn’t be suspicious in the sudden change of the surrounding. Not too long after, a caravan rolled by containing five(5) carts, with the one in the middle looking slightly better in quality and design than the other four.

‘It must be a merchant travelling.’ Ashia thought to herself as she remained hidden. About 2 hours passed by and still no sign of the enemy. It worried her, ‘what if the enemy mages detected me and took a different route? I should patrol the vicinity a little.’ As she moved around cautiously, looking and staying aware of her surrounding, she felt a sudden spike in magical energy in a specific direction, towards the direction where the caravan that just passed would be at the time. The mana didn’t come from a human, it seemed like the caravan had been attacked by a mana beast, and a strong one at that. For a slit second there she thought to herself if she should go help those poor merchants who would be totally helpless before a mana beast of that caliber, or should she ignore it and keep searching for the enemy mages.

Ashia choose the first option without even contemplating too much, “accelerate!” she called out as she cast a spell. Before long, she was jumping through the branches of the forest trees at high speeds. As she closed in on the spot where the caravan stopped, she could see a two and a halve metre tall beast with a body resembling a giant Anteater, wielding long sharp claws that could leave a body on the pages of pamphlets in seconds, this was an Earth class beast. Under normal circumstances, an Earth class beast would be easy to kill by someone in a higher class. The only thing is this one’s claws. ‘Let me just use a long ranged attack.’ Before Ashia could finish her thoughts, she saw something that threw her off. Now she had just gotten to the scene but was still hiding well within the tree leaves, three of the guards in-charge of protecting the caravan, were fighting the beast, while the last one who also seemed to be the oldest sat on his horse picking his nose unbothered, as if the fight in front of him was not even happening.

“Come on now you three have had enough fun now, kill that thing fast. We don’t have all day!” the one sitting on the horse shouted out to the others just when Ashia was about to make her move. Within a second, one of the guards fighting leaped backwards about seven metres, raising his palms forward and then turning them to face the sky as he raised them above his head. A big spike grew from the ground and pierced the beast’s chest. This happened in less than three seconds, with the beast left struggling with the large spike in its chest, a second spike sprouted from the ground into its neck before it finally gave up its struggle.

‘Who are these people? I can’t help but think that they are the mages I’m supposed to eliminate. With magic like that, they have to be. But why would people who are coming to fight be riding carriages and moving in a caravan? Not to mention the fact that they are guards. Wait, are they sneaking in through this caravan? It doesn’t matter. I’ll monitor them for a while longer before deciding.’ The whole time she stayed with the caravan that had stopped to take a break, she noticed nothing unusual. The sun was soon setting, and it looked like the caravan had decided to camp there. It got dark quicker than she expected, and before the night grew any deeper, she received her answer. Two of the guards who seemed to always be on each other’s neck started a petty fight over which alcohol was best, eventually releasing their magic pressure after the good job they did concealing it. From their magic pressure, it was clear these two were Master class mages.

‘What’s going on here? I thought these people were coming to the Kingdom as enemies that posed a threat. Why are they moving in a caravan? I wonder who’s in that special carriage. It doesn’t matter. I will finish my mission.’

As at the moment, her spell that caused the fog was still in effect and with it she could even control the intensity of it. She seemed to have cast another spell as black wave-like smoke that mixed with the fog flowed from her body to her sides. She vanished. Appearing behind one of the four guards who had left the others to take a leak, and with a soft touch at the back of his head, he fell flat on the ground, Ashia catching the body before it hit the ground. Within an hour she was through with killing the three that fought against the beast from earlier. Now it was remaining the last and oldest of them there. It shocked her as she heard a voice speak say something, purposefully directed towards herself.

“I see you have handled my brothers well, not bad.” The last guard who was still sitting on the ground said a in an audible voice. “Why don’t you come out? Don’t worry, it’ll be worth your time.” A strong magic pressure covered the whole place, which almost felt intimidating to Ashia for a second. ‘This, this man...’ She stepped out from the fog into the small clearing, the magic immediately dispersed. There was no need to hide in the shadows anymore.

“So you are also an Ascension class, just like me? I thought you’ll be the same with the other two.”