by Weiqi Wang
‘The freaking Life magic!’ Halgon complained while helping Soarame out of the vines. ‘They don’t even catch fire! If it hadn’t been for the Lightning spells, we might have been dead by now.’
Although the two were both exhausted, they couldn’t afford to sit down for a proper rest because they had to stay alert. They didn’t even dare to set up a campfire —fire may scare away animals but not magimals — so both were resting in the darkness. The boys certainly understood that, if it hadn’t been for the dragon blood, they wouldn’t have survived both attacks from this ferocious magimal. Therefore, all excessive confidence and contempt were gone now. At the moment, both were summarizing the entire battle in their minds and trying to learn something from it.
‘You can spell piercing wave?’ Halgon asked. ‘That’s a very tricky spell. I wish I could do it.’
‘I can only do it when I’m out of control.’ Soarame had to smile bitterly. ‘I wish I could summon the vines! Is that a spell in Life magic?’
‘It must be. The vines were indeed live plants.’ Halgon nodded.
‘Hmm.’ Soarame nodded as he recalled the illusional battle. ‘What about growing trees then? You know — Chelonad.’
‘He’s definitely the most mysterious one in Libral.’ Hearing this name, Halgon frowned as if he was thinking deeply. ‘Even dad had heard about Chelonad, but he couldn’t get his details.’
‘Your dad heard about him too?’ Soarame was surprised. ‘How did he hear about him if he always hibernates in Magimal Forest?’
‘Well, you aren’t thinking it through, Soar.’ Halgon smiled. ‘Even I’ve been living for 500 years, remember? Now think about my dad — he heard about Chelonad a long time ago, long before I was born.’
‘Holy!’ Soarame’s ears stood up. He couldn’t help imagining all kinds of possibilities behind this — thanks to the broadsword incident, Soarame had got to know that Chelonad was indeed a magimal who had probably been living a lot longer than he thought. And he did say that every time he took a nap it took a year or so…
‘One thing dad was hoping I could do in Libral was to meet Chelonad one day.’ Halgon continued. ‘He said that Chelonad used to be quite famous, but they never met in person.’
‘Famous? Then why is he in Libral now and almost unknown?’ Soarame puzzled.
‘If you still remember, after we survived from MagiMax, he claimed that he couldn’t leave campus.’ Halgon said. ‘There must be a reason for that, just that we don’t know.’
‘Here, check this out.’ Seeing Halgon kept nothing secret from him, Soarame made a decision. He moved closer to Halgon and pointed at his space-ring under the moonlight. ‘You must know this.’
‘Holy shit…’ Halgon pat Soarame’s hands down at once. ‘You must be kidding me! Where did you get that?’
‘From my master.’ Soarame was puzzled to see Halgon’s abrupt reaction. He quickly told Halgon about Scankeen and the ring. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Your master gave you a treasure that a Master would fight for, but didn’t warn you to watch out for a Master’s mind-scan?’ Halgon looked nervous. Seeing the confusion on Soarame’s face, Halgon explained. ‘Long story short, a Master is able to scan his surroundings using his mind power. I don’t know the details, but dad said it felt just like looking around with the naked eye; only the vision extends to a range of miles and everything is crystal clear within the range — even in the night like right now.’
‘So that… if there’s a master performing a mind-scan from miles away, he can see us?’ Soarame suddenly became nervous too. ‘And we can’t see him?’
‘Not only see us, he can hear us too — it’s not just vision, but also sound!’ Halgon took a deep breath and sighed. ‘Luckily, it seems that no one is scanning us.’
Nodding in silence, Soarame was wondering why Scankeen hadn’t mentioned this. Soon he had a suspicion that it was all Ecrif’s decision to let him learn from his mistakes — that was exactly that man’s style!
‘Ahh —’
Just when Soarame was thinking about Ecrif, they heard a distant indistinct screaming. The two were instantly alerted. ‘It’s Sophie!’
‘Careful. Don’t forget where we are!’ Halgon led the way while warning Soarame behind him. After the deerhornet battle, they had learnt to be constantly vigilant about hiding Expert magimals. The two proceeded in the forest for a while and the screaming became clearer and clearer, until they finally had clear sight of it —
In a dark clearing not too far ahead, there was a bubble-like shield glowing dimly blue. The blue colour barely lit its surroundings, so that the boys could see two figures inside the bubble and several outside it. But with the partial blockage of the trees, nothing was very clear in the dark. Every few seconds, a figure from outside of the bubble pounced on the bubble but got bounced back, or some spells were cast at it but also got bounced back. At the same time, another round of crying would sound from inside. However, maybe due to the sound insulation of the bubble, the voice was a lot less loud as it ought to be.
‘They are ambushed, and by quite a few.’ Halgon sounded worried. ‘It’s too dark. I can’t tell what those magimals are.’
‘There’s one Fire, one Wind, one Water plus Light, one Earth plus Fire. And that strange-looking one is… an ordinary beast?’ Soarame was counting in a low voice. ‘Oh, that one must be Darkness; because it’s black so that I can’t tell.’
‘Great! I almost forgot how helpful your skills can be!’ Halgon was overjoyed to hear all this. ‘You are right, that one must be Darkness. I think I already know what it is. It’s bad news though — it’s got to be a yakoosha!’
‘Yakoosha?’ Staring at the oddly-curved big wings of the black magimal, Soarame nodded in tension. The yakoosha looked like a person in shape, but had an ugly beast-like face and a pair of bat-like wings on the back. Soarame had heard about this spooky creature; it was known to be insidious and lethal. ‘What about that Water plus Light one — the small white wolf-looking one?’
‘Oh no.’ Halgon sounded worried. ‘Then we have a big problem here — including that yakoosha, at least three of those are Expert level. Especially the small wolf, it’s actually a fox — it’d better not be a beautifox!’
‘A beautifox?’ Soarame quickly searched his memory for this term, and soon got a hit. A beautifox was known to be a gorgeous-looking Expert magimal with a cute fox-like face and beautiful fur. As a Lightness magimal, it was good at mind-attacks — similar to that which Aertiuno had used on Soarame, but supposedly less powerful. But still, having undergone that experience, Soarame fully appreciated the danger of mind-attacks. ‘If it’s really a beautifox, we are in deep trouble. Let’s call for help!’
‘Yes, but we need to make sure we can survive after exposing ourselves — all those magimals run very fast, especially in the forest. Plus, there’s a yakoosha that can fly faster than you.’ Halgon was thinking fast. ‘Even if you can fly away to get help, those two may not be able to hold that long…’
‘Why didn’t they cast some spells into the air? Stoneballs and windblades may be invisible in the dark, but firebolts can definitely attract attentions! Why not do that if their voice was weakened by the bubble…’ Soarame seemed to be choked all of a sudden. ‘Oh god, really? That’s embarrassing…’
‘This dumb girl, she thought an absolute-bubble could keep her safe.’ Halgon said coldly. ‘Now, great — she can’t make her voice heard properly to call for help, and Moelmos can’t even cast firebolts because that will break the bubble from inside.’
‘Let’s place blame later.’ Soarame hurriedly suggested a solution. ‘I’ll fly and yell for help, so that some of them will go after me. You’ll see what to do next, okay?’
‘We don’t have another choice.’ Halgon patted Soarame’s shoulder hard. ‘Careful! The yakoosha can be lethal!’
‘You watch out for the beautifox! The illusion spells are even more lethal!’ Soarame didn’t have time to explain more. He shot up
into the air. ‘HELLLLPPPPPP!!’
‘Hoooeee?!’ The magimals immediately realized the situation, and saw a figure flying fast away from them. After they communicated in some way for just one second, one magimal shot up into the air and chased the flying boy — Halgon was right, it was a yakoosha!
‘Wula!!’ The yakoosha’s weird barking sounded really uncomfortable, especially to Soarame, the prey. If it hadn’t been for the limited time he had, Soarame would really have wanted to fight this enemy instead of fleeing; but right then he had to do the right thing —
‘SOME ONE HELP!!! ON THE HILL!!!’ Soarame yelled at the top of his voice; he even managed to summon some Lightning sparkling to be more visible. However, all those attempts inevitably slowed down his flying speed so, a few seconds later, came the first attack from the yakoosha!
‘Sisi…’ A wave of smog spread towards Soarame, with a strong stench. Soarame instantly recognized the spell to be the same as Halgon’s — etching smog. Recalling what had happened to the beetalbull, Soarame found his fine hair standing up all over his body. He insta-cast a strong gale to blow the smog away, but part of it still got on to his body and corroded his clothes and skin. Bearing with the burning pain, Soarame followed up insta-casting a wave of windblades to fight back, only to find that the yakoosha was nowhere to be found anymore.
Shit! It’s too dark! Soarame’s special eyes certainly had their limitation — it was almost impossible to spot Darkness Elements in the dark, therefore the Yakoosha had a huge advantage over Soarame at this moment. Soarame had to keep trying to escape, but the etching smog spread from different angles, one wave after another, so that Soarame had to keep blowing it away — yet still got corroded here and there. Moreover, the yakoosha would emerge for a sneak attack from time to time, so that Soarame was kept busy in a dog-fight and was not able to fly very far. Fortunately, though, thanks to Soarame’s repeated yelling with the help of his sound enhancement spell, the helpers were soon on their way —
In a beam of bright light flashing by, the yakoosha’s body was exposed, with a frightening expression on its ugly hellish face. The next second, a blast of firebolts were cast on to its body, igniting it before it managed to flee.
‘JIAJIAJIA!!!’
With a harsh screeching, the yakoosha was burnt dry in seconds. Meanwhile, Soarame was also panicking about the scarily high temperature of the flame; he hurriedly flew away from it. ‘Effith, Fioca!’
‘Soarame, are you okay?’ The two Expert wizards from Sunrise Alliance flew close, each wearing a flight cloak. ‘You went to the hill after all, huh?’
‘Not only me.’ Soarame didn’t have time to argue about this. ‘Moelmos and Sophie have been ambushed by several Expert magimals, let’s hurry up!’
‘What!’ The two Experts were frightened and sped ahead following Soarame. Just then, a part of the forest was suddenly lit up — it had caught fire for some reason.
‘They must be there!’ Soarame instantly realized that the bubble must have broken, and the battle therefore had started. So Soarame insta-cast the sound enhancement spell once again, and shouted as loudly as he could —
‘HOLD ON, WE ARE COMING!!!’
‘Ahh!!’ A few minutes ago, Moelmos and Sophie had been terrified to see the energy of the absolute bubble being consumed bit by bit due to the magimals’ repeated attacks. What made them desperate was that they realized that they couldn’t move the bubble with them. As a consequence, they were temporarily safe, but at the price cost of being stuck where they were. Moreover, it seemed that they couldn’t make themselves heard clearly to the outside, and they could barely hear the outside either.
‘One, two, three, four, five…’ Moelmos was counting the number of enemies after making sure that the bubble wouldn’t be broken too soon. But as he counted, his face became paler and paler because there seemed to be no way to escape from the gang of Adept magimals led by several Experts. Having received higher education and training from Sunrise Alliance, Moelmos could roughly tell the breeds of the magimals, including the yakoosha and the beautifox; but that just made the boy’s heart sink. Any one of the Expert magimals was worthy of his full power in battle, and he might still lose. With a gang of them, there was simply no chance that he could survive — if it hadn’t been for the scroll, both of them would have died when they had first encountered these magimals. However, it was embarrassing to discover the limitations of the scroll. They didn’t even dare to cast spells from inside the bubble, because that was one of the methods guaranteed to destroy its protection.
As time passed, the two could do nothing other than watch the bubble, until they could see it was about to vanish. Moelmos sighed deeply and got ready to fight to his death. He didn’t want to blame Sophie because, after all, she had kept him alive thus far. He didn’t regret coming here to risk it either — if there’d been no risk, it wouldn’t have been an Expert trial in the first place. Ever since the Starter of History had begun the new era of mankind, countless wizards had died in their Expert trials. Sometimes, even professors died due to a sudden ambush by Expert magimals; or, in rare circumstance, encountering a Baron.
‘Sophie, good luck.’ Moelmos hugged the crying, trembling girl. Sophie tried hard to stop sobbing, but she was astonished to find that it was so much harder than she had imagined.
I don’t wanna die! Not in this god-damn hellhole! Sophie was crying like crazy inside. As tough a girl as she was, even a qualified wizard, she could barely keep from crying those words out loud. But that seemed to be the best she could manage — the overwhelming fear was still springing up in her young heart.
Plonk! All of a sudden, a big rock was thrown at the beautifox, making it hurry up for a dodge. Due to the tears in her eyes and the bubble’s sound insulation, Sophie couldn’t really tell what had happened. She could barely see the magimals, which were suddenly in disorder, yelping and roaring all around. The girl was too nervous to react at a normal speed; she didn’t move until Moelmos shook her —
‘Halgon is coming to help us!’
‘What?’ After a brief moment Sophie’s eyes lit up with hope. ‘For real?’
‘Look for yourself!’ Moelmos pointed to somewhere in the woods, where Halgon had disappeared, having shot a wave of stoneballs at the magimals, hindering their pursuit of him. At the same time, the two heard a loud yelp-for-help somewhere up in the air. Although the bubble was still insulating the sound, it could be heard clearly.
‘It’s Soarame!’ Sophie jumped up all of a sudden, totally awake now. ‘YES! What shall we do now?’
‘Get ready to break out!’ Moelmos pondered for a bit and made up his decision. ‘They are only Adepts, but they are risking their lives for us! We can’t let them die; I’d die first!’
‘Okay!’ Sophie was trying her best to toughen up again. Thanks to her previous hard training, the girl managed to stop shaking. ‘On your command!’
‘NOW!’ Moelmos shoot a wave of firebolts into the sky, breaking the bubble. He was madly anxious because he could see the yakoosha chasing Soarame and the beautifox chasing Halgon. At that moment, only a few magimals were staying around for Sophie and himself, and Moelmos believed that there were no more than two Experts among them. Setting the surrounding trees on fire, Moelmos could see that one Expert magimal was a bufflox, a guaranteed Expert; another one was a snake of some kind, guaranteed poisonous — but Moelmos wasn’t certainly if it was an Expert or not because he couldn’t tell its breed. So Moelmos decided to charge at the bufflox and leave the snake to Sophie. ‘Lightning counters most poisonous magimals! Do your best!’
‘YAAAA!!!!’ Sophie spared no effort on her best Lightning shot, while Moelmos was already fighting the bufflox. The magimals launched their attacks at the same time, so a ferocious battle started right away!
THE BADGE
‘Go to hell!’ As time passed bit by bit, the battle was still going. Moelmos and Sophie were exhausted sooner than they thought they would be. After all, they were fi
ghting against so many more, so the situation was becoming worse and worse. Thank god, Moelmos could spell shadowcape and escape from the bufflox and its magimal followers from time to time — then he would sneak over to Sophie and help her out before it was too late — then he had to engage in another round with the bufflox. On the other hand, Sophie was holding a stoneshield and spelling deadly Lightning spells. In that way, they barely managed to survive as long as they did — wearing scary wounds that were gashed down to the bones.
That said, the battle was still too difficult for the two of them alone. Moelmos had realized that, if he went to help Halgon, he would have to give up on Sophie first, and then probably be seized himself soon after. Fortunately, he had not heard any cries from Halgon, although he did hear fighting noises coming from somewhere close to where he last seen him. This comforted Moelmos but at the same time confused him; he had no idea how an Adept boy could hold out this long, especially from a beautifox.
‘AHHH!’
Sophie’s pained cry frightened Moelmos; he instantly hid himself in shadow again and leapt towards the girl. Setting a dhole-like magimal on fire, Moelmos showed up beside a bleeding Sophie to realize that her blood on the shoulder looked abnormal — under the orange light from the flames around them. ‘The snake bit you?!’
‘Yes…’ Sophie’s voice was trembling badly. She was obviously affected by the poison. Moelmos hurriedly spelled a double firering around to buy them a few seconds, and tried to suck out the poisoned blood. However, this didn’t seem to work very well, and Moelmos remembered that there had been other students poisoned to the point of coma earlier in the day — probably due to similar snakes.
‘I’m sorry…’ Sophie couldn’t hold it anymore; she finally started crying out loud. ‘I shouldn’t have followed you here… you could have escaped without me…’