Contrary to Valar’s expectations, caravan travel was quite boring. Valar had wanted to watch the sights for the first couple hours, but there was simply nothing of interest to look at. At first, looking at the surrounding plains had been a new experience, but as they had entered the forest the sights had changed. Now there were trees. Lots of trees, and it was boring…

  Valar had expected to see beast attacks being rebuffed by the adventurers—maybe even bandits assaulting the caravan—but was left sorely disappointed. At seemingly random times, Arthur or Ciel would break from the formation and come back after a minute or two, reporting to Rodrick. They drove away most beasts and killed the ones that were stupid enough to attack the caravan.

  When Rodrick walked next to his wagon, Valar asked him why they didn’t kill every beast for their mana.

  “Most of the beasts that roam the lands this close to Lyndale are iron rankers like you,” Rodrick explained. “A bronze rank adventurer gains a pittance of energy from an iron rank kill, so we just drive them away instead. Killing them could bring new, more dangerous, beasts to the territory, and dad would yell at me.”

  Rodrick’s explanation reminded Valar of his books. They were both a method to alleviate his boredom and bring more knowledge. Viktor had recommended reading Basics of Magic first, so Valar picked the book up and opened it.

  The book was leather-bound and looked like quite an expensive copy, perhaps rivaling even the original. Valar had been told at the orphanage that they didn’t have books because the copying process was quite expensive, requiring either lots of work or a skilled water mage. A spell to copy a book’s contents had been devised in the Khatesh empire, but it was terrifyingly complex and required a gold rank water mage or multiple skilled silver rankers to cast. Needless to say, books were an uncommon sight at the orphanage…

  The book was a thick one, resting heavily on top of Valar’s thighs. He was definitely not finishing it during the trip. The boy turned to the first page, and started reading.

  Valar had not read a lot of books in his life, so he was a slow reader. The introduction chapter took him almost an hour to read. Some of the text was repeating things that he already knew, but important bits of new knowledge were mixed in, making the effort worthwhile.

  Magic flowed from the soul through a person’s gate. It bled out from every living being, causing ambient mana to permeate the world. Humans and other sapient beings like dwarves, elves or demons of the abyss utilized the magic coming from their gates with runes drawn directly on their skin. Supposedly, casting magic without runes was extremely hard, as the runes were meant to help guide the mana in the right spell form. Simple effects without runes were possible with decades of training, or by just being a beast, however.

  Beasts were quite a bit different than sapient beings in their use of magic. They had magical cores, used to store mana and release magical effects. The author of the book was quite clear with the distinction of magical effects and spells, magical effects being simple and instinctive in nature while spells required conscious thought to work. That being said, spells were much more versatile, as nearly all magical effects could be copied by using the right runes.

  Both beasts and sapient beings were limited by their natural affinity. If a mage wanted to cast a fire spell, they wouldn’t succeed without fire affinity mana. That limitation couldn’t be broken before gold rank, as a partly closed gate could only let through the mana of the original affinity.

  All the earlier ranks—iron, bronze and silver—revolved around opening one’s gate. That required both energy from slain enemies and knowledge of their own magic to succeed. Those ranks increased the available power flow and enabled the user to utilize more complex runes or magical effects. Every one of those earlier ranks also empowered the person’s mind and body to withstand punishment, including the mental load of more complex runes. However, one had to choose what to empower with the mana they gained from their kills. Mages prioritized their mind while physical fighters empowered their bodies. The enhancements gained from ranking up were the same for all, so a silver ranker would always be faster than an iron one, but a bronze ranker focused on speed might have an edge over a silver rank mage focused on their mind. Rank mattered greatly, but it wasn’t the be-all end-all in a real fight.

  Gold rank was the culmination of the work put in through the earlier ranks. When reaching gold rank, a person or beast opened their gate fully. That meant that the gate wasn’t restricting mana flow anymore, giving the person more available power. Apparently, gold rank mages could pull mana of a different affinity out of their gate, although the amount was way less than their original affinity. That meant that a water mage could finally use a simple fireball or a fire mage could cast wind magic to empower his fire, but that fire mage could never manifest the same tornado as a devoted wind mage.

  The author had been a gold ranker himself, so the explanation on ranks ended there. He did say that the last two ranks were no longer about gathering energy from slain enemies and that learning mattered way more, but his knowledge ended there.

  Valar put the book down, wiping nonexistent sweat off his forehead. Reading felt exhausting as he was extremely slow. He needed a break, so he just looked at the sights for a while.

  They had moved to a different part of the forest, the road more narrow than near Lyndale. Beast attacks were becoming more frequent, and Carla had joined Arthur and Ciel in perimeter defence. Rodrick had talked about their team structure on a caravan trip when they walked to the yard, so Valar had some idea of what was happening around himself.

  Arthur and Ciel were the team's most agile fighters, usually working as scouts and perimeter defence. Carla was an ice mage, and her spells were mostly used for crowd control. Ice affinity mages were predictably good at slowing enemy movements, but they did have a secondary purpose. According to Rodrick, Carla was their heavy hitter against dangerous enemies—her slow to cast ice lances being extremely strong for their rank. She was utilized more sparingly for smaller threats, as they wanted her to be rested if a bigger danger appeared.

  Rodrick himself was the last line of defence for the caravan, his bulk making him a bad fit for fast movement. He patrolled the two wagons, axe in hand, and waited for possible threats to appear. He wasn’t needed for most beasts, and only tended to join in when a big pack of enemies appeared. At that point, the team would regroup at the caravan and transition to a defensive formation with Rodrick and Ciel at the frontline while Arthur and Carla focused on long range attacks.

  A team like Cookie Sandwich would also have a healer at hand according to traditional doctrine, but getting one was difficult. Rodrick had complained about the subject loudly.

  “All the healers just want to stay inside the city walls, safe and sound! We need more adventuring healers, but the affinity is rare enough already. Why even adventure when you can become rich by just working at a city infirmary instead?”

  He had admitted that he was oversimplifying the matter, as the guild did have some healers in their ranks. Every team didn’t receive one though, and especially bronze rank teams needed to often work with alchemical potions instead. Healing potions were expensive and inefficient compared to an actual life or light affinity healer, so any team would have liked a healer in their ranks if they could get one.

  “Once you are out of the academy, don’t forget us! Team Cookie Sandwich would be happy to have you!”

  As much as he liked that idea, it was a consideration for the future, not the present. Valar was going to the academy, and he had time to figure out what he wanted to do there. Granted, the iron rank portion of the academy was quite a short time, usually taking 4 months to half a year depending on how fast one learned, so it wasn’t like Valar would sit in class for years to come.

  The royal academy of Rhondell worked quite differently compared to a normal school. While a normal school consisted of consecutive years of study with no real breaks, an academy of magic couldn’t work like that. Instead, the academy was a place to visit at the start of each rank, the length of the visit getting longer when ranking up.

  The royal academy’s job was to teach the students what they could do at their rank, giving them the best runes, combat lessons and other knowledge they needed for their current situation. Sitting in a classroom for years on end became less and less efficient after the student had learned the necessary runes and spells that formed from them, so they were sent to the real world instead—many businesses and the adventurer’s guild letting the students intern at iron rank in order to bolster their ranks.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  Valar would have a few options after the months of study at the academy. The usual option for iron rank healers was to intern at some city’s infirmary, learning about healing in a real world situation. They were given weakened iron rank beasts to kill so that they could rank up in some time. Most likely, the young woman named Angela at the East Lyndale infirmary was doing an internship just like that, although she was probably from a smaller academy in the kingdom. A job like hers sounded boring…

  One of the other options was adventuring. He would intern in a bronze rank adventuring team, working under them until he reached bronze rank. He would earn his pay and gain energy from the beasts that the team killed as long as he participated in the battles. That was a far more interesting, and dangerous, option.

  Valar didn’t need to know his answer yet, as he would have plenty of time at the academy. He would learn his runes and spells, making up his mind after learning more about the possible options. First however, was learning the basics.

  Valar was broken out of his thoughts as Rodrick shouted in warning.

  “A pack of beasts is coming this way! Everyone outside, take cover! The enemy is a pack of bronze rank infernal lycans!”

  Valar followed the instructions, laying on his stomach on the wagon roof. He was aiming to make himself as small of a target as he could while still retaining the ability to see what happened around the caravan.

  Arthur had already returned to Rodrick’s side due to him being the one who notified the big man of the coming attack. Carla was running back too, emerging from the forest at a fast clip. She took position some distance behind the warrior, and ice blue runes started slowly appearing on her skin.

  Ciel arrived last, practically materializing from thin air with dark purple runes covering all of her available skin. She chatted quickly with Rodrick, taking a position on the other side of the caravan—the rogue’s job to slay any flanking lycans.

  A calm fell over the caravan as they waited for the pack to appear from the forest. It was only broken by Arthur’s happy hoots, the young man obviously happy to fight something bigger than a wandering iron rank beast. Everyone else just waited, the caravan drawn to a standstill to better protect the perimeter. Viktor was still on top of the first wagon, just looking into the distance with a neutral expression on his face. He didn’t seem worried, so Valar didn’t worry either.

  The silence was broken as a pack of rust-coloured four legged creatures emerged from the forest, barks and rushing steps filling the forest road. Valar had to admit, the lycans looked intimidating. They reminded him of big dogs, but they were much slimmer. Every muscle was easily seen, and they had no fur to cover their thick skin.

  The lycans would have been scary if they were just that, but they weren’t, were they? The beasts were infernal in nature, clearly showcased by the burning saliva dripping down from their mouths. Their eyes were a bright orange, staring at the caravan in hunger. As if that wasn’t enough, fire seemed to flow through their veins, making the lycans glow a bright orange similar to their eyes.

  The violence started quickly, Arthur’s bow letting out a twang as the lead lycan received an arrow between its eyes. The other beasts ran over its dying body without even glancing at their dying leader. Carla’s prepared spell followed, small shards of ice raining down upon the pack. They were hurt and slowed, but no dog died from the spell.

  The rain of ice allowed Arthur to shoot a few more arrows, two more lycans falling down in quick succession. The loss of three lycans didn’t worry the pack though, as it consisted of more than twenty-five dogs.

  As the lycans neared the caravan, Rodrick found his moment to strike. He rushed in, swinging his axe in a mighty swing. The pack tried to dodge the man’s strike, but his reach was massive. Rodrick’s first cleave hit two dogs, going through the first one completely and stopping at the second lycan’s ribcage.

  Valar didn’t know where to look. Rodrick fought ferociously, cleaving, punching and even kicking some lycans as Carla and Arthur shot spells and arrows at some of the beasts. The lycans clawed back ferociously, heedless of their mounting wounds. The beasts fell quickly, but nearly every one of them managed to land a strike, be it a claw, bite or ball of flaming liquid spit from their mouths. Rodrick’s wounds mounted, but he did not seem to care.

  Valar didn’t notice some of the pack slinking off for a flanking strike, until he heard the sounds of dying lycans at his back.

  He gazed upon the massacre, a grinning woman covered in shadows brutalizing five lycans with her daggers. He thought he heard laughter, but he couldn’t be sure as the dogs barks and yips were too loud. Looking at the scene felt almost wrong, the beasts obviously not standing a chance against the dark haired woman. Ciel is much scarier than the others… She’s handling the wolves totally alone. Wasn’t she supposed to be more of a rogue type, or did I just assume so?

  As Ciel took hold of the last dog's head and decapitated it with her dagger, Valar turned his head back to the main fight. I think I’ll be sick…

  The main fight was still total chaos, about half of the attacking lycans already dead. Valar gasped as one of the infernal dogs almost reached Rodrick’s back, but one of Arthur’s arrows appreared out of nowhere, piercing its eye. Arthur was on the other side of the big man, right?

  Valar gazed at the roof of the first wagon. Viktor was still sitting squarely on the first caravan’s roof, but his right hand was covered by an intricate tapestry of white runes. He was looking at the collapsing wolf that almost reached Rodrick, a blade of wind aimed at its form. Valar saw the man mutter to himself, mouthing a clear “What the fuck?”. The wind mage shook his head and shrugged, placing his attention back on the melee below.

  The fight was falling back under the team’s control. Rodrick was hacking and slashing at the remaining dogs, able to do more since he wasn’t being overwhelmed by sheer numbers. One of the lycans tried to spit fire onto his chest, but the man dodged surprisingly gracefully for his size. That lycan received a small lance of ice though its body, collapsing to the ground from the wound.

  The encounter reached its end as Ciel joined the massacre, her daggers and Carla’s lances killing the rest of the lycans. Team Cookie Sandwich stood in the field of slaughter they had formed, every single one of the members unharmed from the attack, apart from numerous scratches on Rodrick’s armor and a few claw marks on his thigh. Again, he did not seem to care.

  The team members threw high fives—Carla having to jump to reach Rodrick’s hand—and laughed among themselves. Even if they had only known each other for some weeks, they seemed close, especially after a fight. I… I want to be part of something like that. I want to feel the same joy as they feel right now. I think there’s no question on where I’m interning after that…

  Viktor jumped down from his wagon and went to congratulate the adventurers, the runes on his arm dismissed after the fight ended. He also beckoned Valar over—the boy jumping from his wagon and jogging to the field of death.

  “You’re my student—or at least a sponsored prospect—so I want to do some teaching. I assume you know that beasts have cores?”

  “Yeah, I just read about it in the book you gave me, although I didn’t get far.”

  “That’s good. I’ll show you how to extract a beast core and what one looks like. Keep in mind that these cores are weaker as they are from pack beasts. For example, the umbral terror you slew would have had a much bigger core because it reached its power as a solitary hunter.”

  Viktor grabbed a knife from his robe’s pocket and started carving into one of the lycans. He targeted just under the beast’s heart and lungs, eventually sticking his hand in the cavity. The bloodied hand emerged from the beast’s carcass, a pearl the size of a large berry pinched between two fingers. It was the beast’s core, glowing with a color that shifted between orange and red, the mix of two colors moving across its surface in a cyclical motion.

  “This is a beast core. As you can probably guess from context, this core is one with a fire affinity. Any questions coming up right now?”

  “If the beast’s energy is absorbed by its killer, how is there a beast core at all? Wouldn’t they be drained of energy?” Valar asked.

  Viktor smiled, clearly happy that Valar was asking questions as he was teaching.

  “That’s a common misconception, and many ask the same question the first time they see one of these. In reality, the beast’s killer drains only the free flowing energy coursing through the beast at that time. Draining a beast’s energy for your advancement means that you use it to empower yourself instead of the beast, and the core’s energy is the wrong kind of mana. If you tried to empower your body with that, I imagine you would burn to death.”

  Valar shivered, managing to nod as he returned to his memories. No more burning please…

  Viktor noticed Valar’s rising distress, and quickly switched the topic to distract him.

  “I would value each one of these cores at about 35 copper each. They’re certainly not expensive, but blacksmiths and other people who want fire affinity mana to power their enchantments need them every once in a while.”

  “That means that this pack is worth more than half an average person’s monthly salary though?”

  “Adventuring is a lucrative yet dangerous business. Do remember that this team has four members though. They aren’t all getting half a person’s monthly salary with these attacks, but they do live comfortable lives when they are not on missions. That is at the cost of risking their lives like this. Don’t forget that, ever.”

  A good lesson to keep in mind, that’s for sure. Now, however, is time for some more reading!

  Valar returned to his spot on the second wagon. He picked the book up from his side, and started to read.