Chapter 299

  The Apprentice’s Reactions

  (Mallory)

  Rotations.

  Everyone was set up for eight-hour rotations. Of the twenty-one groups with soldiers trained by Dr. Spiritlight, seven were to be on shift for specific eight-hour periods. Then added to that, the spirits of the Deolorian empire were also broken up into eight-hour shifts, where they would serve beside the Spiritlight Special Forces. This way the day was covered, everyone had a chance to do their part, while hopefully no one would suffer from burnout.

  Fortunately, Mallory had very capable staff members who took on these tasks themselves, making it so these seemingly trivial details were taken care of before she was even needed.

  “My Queen,” a Deolorian soldier called out with a bow, as Mallory made her way past the group.

  Shiver.

  As he spoke, Mallory felt a tiny thrill of energy course through her from the word.

  Mallory for her part let a faint smile crest her lips as she nodded in acknowledgement.

  That said, the power that was in those words of reverence was not lost on Mallory. In fact, every time a Deolorian soldier spoke to her, she felt that same sensation, albeit in varying degrees.

  The ones that she felt the most from the Deolorian soldiers that had served on the frontlines with her.

  In a way, it felt gratifying. Almost as if they now understood what their king saw in her to begin with. Yet, that only caused doubts to her, as she knew the entire marriage was a sham, despite unlocking all of the secret bonuses and perks.

  In fact, just thinking about the perks made Mallory think about Gwen, and how she looked forward to renewing those same perks tomorrow.

  Though come to think of it, Gwen has been oddly missing of late. Even that heart warming scene where Cass managed to somehow tell the difference between those that were missing and those that were dead.

  At first, the entire process seemed to be great, but there was an odd icy chill in the air. That was how Mallory knew that Cass was telling the truth. The room itself would get noticeably colder with each name noted.

  The only time the odd permafrost effect seemed to stop, or at least slow down were on the names that Cass claimed were alive.

  While there was no reason to believe her, the hope that she was right, was what caused Mallory to press through. For, just as there was no way to prove she was right at first, there was also no evidence to suggest that she was wrong in her assessments either.

  Had it been anyone else, Mallory would have wasted time sending out search parties to verify her claims. But she had proven herself time and time again.

  Thinking back, Mallory remembered the first time they met, when she showed her prowess. One where she showed that one of Mallory’s own accountants was stealing from her ledgers, right on her train. The audacity of what was being claimed by the then elf, was enough to cause her to check personally.

  Now, she had a team that would handle such investigations.

  The team of course was made up of believers. That is, these were people who were at one time saved by Cass, or otherwise helped by Cass throughout. People who had Guild members who were saved from the Blight, a disease once thought incurable, now cured by simply coming and living on Pixie blessed lands.

  Just thinking about that fact, caused her to realize how much this world has effectively been turned upside down in under a year’s time.

  Now there were arrays that gathered seemingly non-existent moisture from the desert atmosphere, and turned it into purifying rain that watered the plants, saturated the lands, and made a literal heaven worth dying for.

  In her past, she had never taken up roots. Never truly called a place her own.

  That was part of the allure of the Midnight Hunters, they were geographic nomads who could go anywhere and set up shop and be immediately in demand.

  Then everything changed with Cass. Suddenly there was a new stretch of land so far out in the middle of the wastelands that no one would dare to lay claim to it, at least not at first.

  This was why Mallory took it personally when the Legrand Empire tried to take it all from her. This wasn’t her land, this was the land that everyone who believed in her and Dr. Spiritlight’s vision had poured their blood, sweat, and tears into.

  Mallory was so lost in her thoughts, while looking for Gwen, that she almost ran into the clear Legrand spy.

  Complete stop.

  At least, that was what her mind processed as she saw the Legrand Healer Mage rags that the mage before her was wearing.

  To make matters worse, she wasn’t even hiding her appearance, nor her contempt. She was just there, long dark hair tied back in a ponytail, as she leaned against the inside brick wall of the out door school training area.

  The reason why this seemed so incongruous was the fact that no one from Legrand was to ever set foot within the school courtyard, lest they draw the wrath of the pixie.

  Seeing her, Mallory instantly began moving forward.

  “Hahaha,” children laughing in unison.

  Then as Mallory got closer she began hearing sounds coming from inside the courtyard. With a few more steps her field of vision shifted, and she could see that Dr. Spiritlight was there in the middle of a crowd of students casting magic in front of a gaggle of children.

  Pausing.

  Mallory found herself pausing in the grand archway, which placed her within a few feet of the wayward mage.

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  “I have to say, she impressive,” the Legrand healer spoke.

  Hearing the comment, Mallory paused as she felt something was off about this. Normally once found, wouldn’t an enemy mage try to run? Particularly from someone wearing the battle gear of elite Midnight Hunter forces?

  “You don’t know the half of it,” Mallory stated, then moving closer she held out her hand and asked, “and you are?”

  Seeing the hand outstretched, the woman looked first flustered, before shaking herself, stepping away from the wall and properly holding out her own hand to greet Mallory.

  “Sorry Master’s Master, I am Valeria Spray-Healer,” the woman replied while holding out her hand and lowering her head in supplication at the same time.

  Seeing the gesture Mallory began shaking the offered hand, then her mind began to work. As it did, she remembered something.

  “Oh, that’s right, you are the stray Apprentice that Dr. Spiritlight picked up?” Mallory asked, remembering the notes from Jhonny, Penelope, and Redding on this situation.

  “I don’t know if I would call myself a stray, but I guess it does seem to fit,” Dr. Spiritlight’s Apprentice replied.

  Hearing that, there was an awkward pause as the Apprentice seemed entirely too uptight to truly fit in with the eccentric Doctor, but Mallory decided to avoid that situation. She had made it her goal a long time ago to not get in the way of geniuses, so long as they weren’t destroying the world.

  Pausing for a moment, Mallory remembered how that last part about geniuses was thrown in as an homage to old super villains who started their decent into madness with good intentions, at first, but then slowly eroded away due to time and pressure from the outside world. Now though, after seeing Cass in action, she realized that there were apparently easier ways to destroy the world, at least for Cass there seemed to be easier ways to destroy the world.

  At that thought, an involuntary shudder went through her body as her mind recalled the monstrous image of the crazed ethereal being that Cass just casually interacted with, as if it was no big deal. Despite the fact that Mallory was very certain that said creature was inadvertently destroying the world while they watched.

  FWOOSH!

  A spark of magic went off, and a line of visible magic snaked out from one child off into the distance, out and around Mallory, into parts unknown.

  “There you go, follow that path and you will find your parent,” Cass stated, her words echoing through the courtyard.

  Then as if given permission to run, not walk to the nearest exit, the child who still had a line of magic darting off and through the compound, got up and ran out.

  “All right, who’s next?” Cass asked.

  “Oh, me, meee…” dozens of children all clamored at once.

  Seeing them all getting hope from Cass, caused a smile to form on Mallory’s lips. This right here, this was what magic should be. Then pausing for a moment, Mallory realized that these were exactly the moments and reasons why Cass always pushed so hard for magic to be studied, practiced, and then utilized to its fullest.

  “It’s odd,” the Apprentice, Valeria, finally cut in.

  “What is?” Mallory asked.

  “How you always hear and see those stories about a magical loli who is somehow expected to be the best magic wielder in the world. I remember, I always wondered how anyone could believe such a story, yet here she is,” Valeria replied.

  Hearing that analysis, Mallory paused and wanted to refute the claim, as Cass didn’t start off this powerful, she just kind of morphed into the role. Particularly the more she found ways to seemingly shrug off the restraints of magic and then find ways to truly cast and create spells on the fly.

  With that moment of insight, Mallory had her own thought come to light. Or at least blossom further in her mind.

  “My biggest thought was on the tales of the Fairy queens, you know where they are seemingly identical beings who control both the powers of summer and winter,” Mallory began, but then cut herself off as she realized that this might be too personal of a moment to share, especially with someone who isn’t fully vetted.

  Though the fact that Cass chose her, from the apparently hundreds of Legrand soldiers who were patched up and shipped out from the Kujo Caverns is impressive. Implying that the Doctor must have seen something unique in this individual that was not in all of the others.

  “And?” Valeria asked.

  Realizing it might be too much for a first day, Mallory just shook her head. For a moment she wasn’t going to speak her thought, but then finally gave way, as if speaking it out loud might be a way to stop this growing fear within her mind from coming to fruition.

  “And now I can see that with Cass,” Mallory noted.

  Thinking about that, the Apprentice paused for a moment, before speaking.

  “You mean she would be one side, and her Simulacrum would be another?” Valeria asked.

  Hearing that, Mallory thought about it, and realized, while close, this was not what she expected from the constantly outsourcing pixie.

  “No, well sort of,” Mallory began. “Yes, that she could do both, but she would likely have Simulacrums dedicated to the roles take over.”

  Then pausing for a moment, she continued.

  “Knowing her, she would probably give them stupid names too. Something like Summer-Ulacrum, and Winter-Ulacrum,” Mallory finished her thought.

  “Oh those are terrible, there is no way she would…” Valeria began, but was cut off.

  “Really, Spray-Healer? I’m assuming you didn’t get that from an indigenous person?”

  At that Valeria paused for a moment, and then looked utterly defeated, as she crumpled into herself slightly.

  “No, to make matters worse, I would almost renounce the name, if it wasn’t for the fact that the name is darn powerful.”

  “Yeah, tell me about it,” Mallory replied.

  Whoosh.

  At that, Mallory took a half step to the side to avoid yet another running child. During the time of their conversation, three more children had run off, following magical threads to seemingly nowhere. Though only one went out this exit where Mallory and the Apprentice were watching from. The others went out the far exit on the other side, as apparently those were closer to the intended family member.

  Fwoop.

  Nothing happened, after Cass cast the spell.

  At this, the child suddenly looked confused, as this had not happened since Cass started this process.

  “You sure your dad was with you?” Cass asked.

  “Yes,” the little boy replied back.

  “Can you say his name?”

  “Aranthir,” the boy stated.

  Hearing the name Cass let out a sigh of relief, “well you are right, he is not dead. Hmm, let’s try something.”

  With those seemingly innocent words, Mallory looked on in hope. But then felt her pulse quicken as she saw something that caused every survival instinct in her rise to the surface and demand that she pay complete attention.

  Seeing the sudden attention, and complete look of fear and concentration on Mallory’s face, Valeria too became worried.

  “What is it?” Valeria asked.

  “Her tongue, it is out,” Mallory stated, as she watched Cass take on a look of complete concentration.

  “What does it mean?”

  “It means, she is about to create a new magic spell.”

  “Is that a bad thing?”

  “Not all the time,” Mallory confirmed, while Mallory wanted to stop this, her instincts told her to wait, as Cass wouldn’t do anything too dangerous in front of children would she?

  “There we go, let’s try this one,” Cass replied.

  FWOOSH!

  Cass cast a spell, and instantly a new line of energy sparked off from the boy off into the distance.

  “There we go, just follow that line,” Cass stated, a bit awkwardly.

  As she spoke, a text box appeared above her head, letting everyone in attendance know that a first-time feat of magic had been performed.

  Seeing the message, Valeria asked, “what was that?”

  “Oh, that is a sign of a new master class spell being cast for the first time,” Mallory noted.

  “Wait, you mean Dr. Spiritlight, just created a Tier X spell on the fly?” Valeria asked, before continuing, “does magic even go up to Tier X?”

  Mallory almost wanted to point out that she too could cast spells beyond Tier X, but then stopped herself, as she had never learned any spells beyond Tier VII, figuring that those were dangerous enough as is.

  “Yes, and beyond,” Mallory replied, opting to answer the questions in order, rather than note her own mental blocks for why she wasn’t casting similar magics.

  There was a momentary pause, before Mallory could feel a communication linking to her mind.

  “Phew, so glad that worked,” the voice of Cass rang out in her mind.

  Pausing for a second, Mallory was surprised that Cass would talk to her Telepathically, but it seemed she was likely getting bored of helping out the children and needed a slight distraction while casting the same set of spells over and over.

  “What happened?” Mallory found herself asking back mentally.

  “It turns out that the boy’s ‘father’ is actually his uncle. I am so glad I don’t have to be the one to explain that to him,” Cass replied.

  And like that, Mallory couldn’t help but agree, as that would be a terrible conclusion to this otherwise great gesture.

  “Should we tell him?”

  “You can, I’m going to let them live in ignorant bliss,” Cass began, but then added, “unless of course I am asked directly, then I will state the truth. Otherwise, it is just a whole ball of wax that is best left unburnt.”

  While Mallory was going over the idea of why you would burn a ball of wax to begin with, her thoughts were cut off by an apparent interloper into the conversation.

  “You realize, I can hear you as well, right?” Valeria chimed in, her own thoughts coming through the apparent three-way Telepathic communications link.

  “Oh, I know, this is a test, to see how much I can trust you in the future,” Cass responded.

  “A test?”

  “Yes,” was the one-word reply given by Cass.

  Silence.

  Over time, more and more children ran off trying to find their loved ones, when they were down to a handful of apparent strays, Cass finally spoke over the Telepathic link again.

  “So why were you looking for me?”

  At the question, Mallory was over 90% certain that Cass had already read her mind and ascertained the reason for this meeting, but decided to answer anyways.

  “Your presence has been requested to help sort out the Prisoner of War situation,” Mallory stated.

  With that comment, Valeria turned to Mallory, her mouth open in surprise.

  Seeing her look of shock, Mallory suddenly realized why Cass had purposefully included her Apprentice into this three-way communication.

  Well played, was the thought that Mallory mentally gave the pixy, as she too found herself curious about the reactions that Valeria might have when seeing how the Midnight Hunter’s dealt with prisoners of war.

  From the bond alone, it was clear that a wave of fear and sorrow was coming from Valeria, as she apparently knew what happened to Prisoners of War that the Legrand Empire took into custody.

  Then thinking about it one step further, Mallory also realized that most of these children desperately seeking their family members were in fact, previously rescued refugees of the war. Many of whom had their parent’s rescued by Cass as well.

  This would definitely be one interesting test for the young Apprentice, and one that Mallory herself felt she had to see the conclusion of.