While packing up their wagon and preparing to reach the city, Asher was surprised to hear a knock on their wagon door. Other than Laura, the young girl Brian had befriended during the first leg of their trip who would occasionally swing by to play, nobody had ever bothered them while they were in their wagon. Curious, Asher opened the door.

  Finding himself face to face with Lily, one of the current members of the royal guard who had been temporarily teaching at the royal guard academy at the time of the demon attack. Blinking at the surprise visit, Asher cleared his throat as the woman walked alongside their wagon, the mogrants yet to stop until they reached their destination.

  “Hello again!” he smiled, determined to keep things cordial despite the fact that she hadn’t seemed to trust him all that much back in Abingdon. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

  “I just received word from Christian, the head of the royal guards,” Lily said, holding up what could only be her personal sending stone. “Looks like you might not have been full of hot air after all. I’ve been instructed to bring the three of you directly to the royal palace myself once we hit the capital.”

  Lily had originally tried to hold Asher at the royal guard academy for questioning, after being kind enough to help heal his severely damaged body, but Asher had tried to explain that they needed to meet with High Prince Donvath and were already on their way to the capital. She hadn’t believed him at first, but seeing as she was planning on returning to the capital herself, she’d ended up hitching a ride in Brant’s caravan right alongside them. Despite that, none of them had seen so much as a hint of the royal guard during the last two days, which was why her sudden appearance was so surprising.

  “I told you I wasn’t lying,” Asher said, rolling his eyes. “So what does that mean, exactly? Do we need to worry about waiting in line with the rest of the caravan to get through the checkpoint before entering the city?”

  “No, we’ll be bypassing it and heading straight for the palace, which is why I wanted to come and give you a heads up,” she explained. “Meet me at the front of the caravan in five minutes.” Having said her part, Lily gave Brian a small smile before turning and leaving them to their last-minute packing.

  “I like her,” Brian decided, picking up his scattered fletching materials and handing them to Asher to store in his Personal Rift. “She’s nice.”

  “She also finished healing Asher after he got himself ripped in half,” Samantha pointed out, wrapping up her crocheting materials. “We can’t exactly fault her for not believing he's on a conversational-basis with the High Prince. She’s not a truthseeker.”

  “And thank God for that,” Asher muttered, feeling like more and more of a personal pack mule as yarn and sticks and tools were handed to him one after another. It was a good thing his Personal Rift had the volume of a small house at this point, or they’d have to start being far more particular about what they stored in it.

  After evolving the skill and getting it up to level 27, the hulkish corpse of the greater demon barely even took up a corner of his entire rift. Asher had big plans for that demon corpse and was more than a little excited to see just how well it would fare being put up on the Grand Auction.

  The only alchemist he’d ever known had been quite excited to get his hands on imp blood. He figured something like the greater demon, which was in pristine condition other than a few stab wounds around the midsection and heart, would be enough to start a civil war among alchemists across the entire kingdom.

  It didn’t take them long to clean out their wagon, and after thanking Fluffles one last time for letting them ride on top of him so frequently, they walked toward the front of the caravan.

  “Well now, I suppose this is the last we’ll see each other for some time,” Brant said, hopping down from his leading mogrant and giving them all a wide smile as he trusted the animal to handle the last few minutes on its own. “I can only hope you enjoyed the trip!”

  “The bandit attack wasn’t exactly the greatest, but we don’t blame you for that,” Samantha said, stepping forward to give the large man a hug. Asher wasn’t sure if it was Secret Seeker kicking in, but he didn’t miss how Brant flinched ever so slightly before opening his own arms and returning the hug with his usual warm expression. Asher had tried to explain to Samantha how, outside of small villages like the one she’d grown up in, most people in this world weren’t comfortable physically touching others unless they were close, but she still forgot from time to time. There were just too many skills that required physical touch to activate, like his own Eternal Mark. And while his skill didn’t inherently do anything bad, that was far from the case for many of them.

  “If we ever need to travel between cities again, we’ll wait for you!” Brian promised, getting a chuckle out of the large man, who leaned forward and ruffled the boy’s hair.

  “No need to bother yourselves on my account, but I certainly appreciate the sentiment! There are countless caravans that enter and leave the capital each day. I wouldn’t dream of forcing folks as kind as you three to wait for mine.”

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Still though, we enjoyed your caravan, and it was nice getting to see you in action,” Asher admitted, thinking back to the bandit attack and how they’d gotten to witness the man leap straight into the throng of enemies. Brant had a rather interesting skill that allowed him to summon twin ethereal trunks like the very mogrants he drove, and the three of them were all but certain the man had a Mogrant element, even if he refused to admit it. “Take care of yourself.”

  “I’ll certainly do what I can, but the world is a dangerous place,” Brant said, his smile faltering ever so slightly. Asher had no doubt he was thinking about the three caravans that had been only a few days behind their own as they’d traveled to Poltar. The greater demon had launched an unexpected attack on them, killing every single person in all three. Asher wanted nothing more than to inform Brant the threat was dealt with, but the last thing he wanted was to make the man grow lax.

  There was no telling if the liches who were after them wouldn’t simply summon a new greater demon to replace the last one.

  At the very least, he didn’t think that was very likely to happen, as word seemed to be making its way around the nine hells that demons who were being summoned to help The Council of Death were somehow being killed permanently, a concept that was nearly impossible for demon-kind to wrap their heads around. Normally, when a demon was killed up on the material realm, they simply reformed back down in the nine hells, good as new and ready for more endless fighting. Yet based on the sheer terror he’d seen in the last few lesser demons who had spotted him, he was pretty confident his Sever the Thread skill was changing the paradigm. Fewer demons would be willing to accept any sort of deal The Council of Death offered when their immortal lives were actually on the line for once.

  “Everyone ready?” Lily asked as they finished up their goodbyes and left Brant to start directing the mogrants into one of the lines. The capital was organized enough that there was a line solely for caravans, which was an excellent idea, as the throng of travelers slowly making their way through the other six openings in the wall was already jam-packed with people trying to get into the capital before nightfall.

  Getting three nods in return, Lily turned and led them over to the line farthest to the right. This one had to be some sort of express lane, as there were barely half a dozen people in it. Apparently, that still wasn’t fast enough for Lily, however, as she simply led them right to the front and flashed a circular badge that looked like a horizon with multiple suns at different positions across the sky.

  “Royal guard, escorting three persons of interest of the High Prince,” she stated confidently, letting the gate guard examine the badge. Asher didn’t miss the curious mutters that erupted out of the adjacent line when she spoke, and he tried to ignore the blatant stares of a few dozen people with nothing better to do as they waited for their own turn to enter the city.

  After trying to keep a low profile for so long, having someone loudly announce in public that the High Prince himself had requested to meet with him, Asher wasn’t a huge fan of how many eyes were now on them.

  “Head on through,” the guard said, nodding politely after he finished examining the offered badge. Asher was surprised at how easy that had been, but based on Identify, these gate guards were no slouches.

  [Guard] - 3/3 elements

  The fact that even some random guard at the city gate had all three of his elements was all the proof he needed that Donvath took his security rather seriously, and Asher tried to ignore how the man’s eyes seemed to bore into his own as he followed Lily through the gate. He still had the tier 2 Hidden Presence skill stuck on his person thanks to his Permanence skill, which meant he should be safe from just about anyone seeing his actual elements or skills.

  Other than those who were already within the Stage of Power or just before it who had bodies and eyes being altered by their very elements, but those were few and far between.

  The capital was large enough and filled with so many people that Asher was a tad concerned about losing Lily in the crowd, but she seemed to have a solution for that ready to go. Shortly after entering the city, she pulled them to the side and took out her badge once more. Letting out a shrill whistle, she tapped the badge twice, before putting it away. She must have noticed their confused looks, because she grunted.

  “The royal guard often has business all over the city, and it is too large and crowded for us to make our way through it on foot with any due haste. This was the solution.”

  Before Asher could ask if a pegasus was going to swing by and pick them up, there was a flash of violet light, and suddenly an elderly man stood before them. Wearing casual, silk clothes that looked almost like pajamas, the old man looked them up and down before spotting Lily and pursing his lips as though he didn’t approve of being summoned in this fashion.

  “Ah, it’s you. Welcome back, and all that. How was your visit to the academy?”

  “Far more eventful than I’d expected it to be,” she said, giving him a professional nod. “Richard, these are a few persons of interest to the High Prince. We need a lift back to the palace.”

  “You want me to warp five people?” Richard asked, looking at her like she’d just asked him to chop off his finger and hand it to her. “What do you think I am, made of tritessence?”

  “Please. I know as well as you do you’ll get a nice bonus for warping so many,” she drawled. “Come on, get to it.”

  “Fine,” he grumbled, motioning for the four of them to step closer. “Come here, everyone, the less I need to stretch out my will, the better.”

  “Asher, are you okay?” Samantha asked, giving him a concerned look even as Brian eagerly walked up to the man, no doubt excited for whatever was about to happen. Asher, on the other hand, was a tad less so.

  From the moment Richard had appeared, Asher had stood frozen, staring at the man in shock. The elderly man held a class he’d only ever encountered once before, and he didn’t exactly have very fond memories of said encounter.

  How could he, seeing as he’d been yanked from his own world and tossed into an invisible cage like a lab rat?

  [Wizard] - 3/3 elements

  did warn Asher something like a hundred and fifty chapters ago that Wizards tended to work in the big city haha. And here's one now!

  Discord