Aren flew higher and higher as he headed south. He did not know why he chose that direction, only that the hum of confusion and anger continued to dance in his head as he tried to make sense of the situation. When had Leilara betrayed him like this? Did she betray him?

  His vision began to darken and his breathing turned shallow. In his mess of emotions, he had forgotten to create the bubble of air around him necessary for high-altitude flight. He tried to calm down and slowly moved his arm, tracing the circles required for the spellwork.

  He took slow, deep breaths as he felt the magic connect to his core. He stopped for a moment and looked around. Vast swaths of desert stretched below, he must have crossed the border some time ago. As his reasoning mind slowly began to function again, he realized he must have been flying at top speed for quite some time, finding his energy reserves were half empty.

  ’ Aren thought. Yet was this his fault alone? She had always spoken about how she would only date someone accomplished and strong. He aspired to be both. He would have nevertheless, but his perfect plan required someone who was his equal to stand by his side. Anyone lesser would only slow him down in his desire to create the perfect future for all.

  Just as he was about to make a decision to return to his academy, he saw something move at the edge of his vision and reflexively created a barrier around himself. A form twice his size slammed into his defense, causing him to tumble through the air.

  An alien creature was watching him. He could easily tell that he was the center of its focus as dozens of eyes looked directly upon him. It maintained its position in the air with multiple malformed, feathery white wings, while its round, bloody, fleshy body covered in eyes was pointed in his direction.

  Aren nearly heaved in disgust as he took in the monster’s appearance, wishing it were some drunken hallucination, though he had cleared alcohol from his system long ago. He wondered if the creature was a migratory species or a mutation. He had never come across any records of a species like this, although monsterology had never been the focus of his studies.

  “So… do we just go our own ways, or will you attack?” Aren said in the direction of the monster. The monster did nothing after the initial impact and just flapped its malformed wings.

  Aren decided to ignore it and started flying in the direction of his kingdom, only for the beast to charge him again. He twisted in the air, barely avoiding the tackle. Instinctively, he summoned sharp blades of wind with his elemental sorcery and launched them at the monster.

  That seemed to trigger something in the malformed creature, and it shone with golden light as the blades dispersed harmlessly against its body. Then the golden light focused into a single point and shot toward the young archmage.

  The blonde man placed his hand over his left side as he felt something warm seep through his shirt. As blood oozed through his palm, a sharp jolt of pain brought him back to reality just in time for another beam of light to shoot in his direction.

  This time, he didn’t take the monster lightly and quickly moved out of the way as he cast vitalic wizardry to stem the bleeding. His adventurer’s instinct kicked in, and he drew his wand as a mantle of darkness emerged from his subspace and enveloped him like armor. It was designed to protect him from all kinds of offensive powers.

  He twisted to avoid another beam, and with a wave of his hand and the full power of his elemental sorcery, he cast his strongest purely offensive magic. Seven circles appeared in front of his wand as electricity sprang to life straight from his sorcery core, surging into his spellwork in tides of energy.

  Another bolt of light was consumed by his mantle as he finished the spell. A column of pure plasma appeared, splitting into thick branches of energy as the air before him burned and screamed. The thunder struck the monster and enveloped it. For a single moment, the creature’s golden defense seemed to hold, but even it could not withstand the fury of a spell capable of shattering a mountainside. The malformed being turned to dust, and the shockwave trailing the thunder scattered it in all directions.

  “I needed to get that out of my system,” Aren sighed as he examined his wound. It seemed that his patchwork spell would do the job, but he would still need to visit the hospital’s night team for proper healing. He felt slightly better after expending tons of mana to fuel the pure destruction, but his reserves were left low. His flight back home would take much longer. He drank a potion to speed up his mana recovery and another to kickstart his body’s healing.

  The air was still crackling with energy as the beam dissipated over the horizon. His spell could probably be seen from below, but he didn’t really care, as he had no plans to stick around. Not that anyone would be able to investigate this high up, at least not anytime soon.

  He began to fly away and traveled for a while before he saw something that sent a cold sweat down his back. A group of creatures like the one before was approaching him at neck-breaking speed. Aren cursed as he prepared for another round of combat, blaming himself for wasting mana before.

  He cast a five-circle barrier over himself and flew away from the monsters. The creatures, refusing to let him go, began to glow as bolts of light shot in his direction.

  This time his shield held up, but he could feel its constant pull on his mana. He couldn’t dodge all of them, as the attacks were fast and the creatures were coordinating, cutting off his escape paths. Aren, realizing he couldn’t last in a war of attrition, quickly waved his wand, and a five-circle spell spawned a torrent of flames that consumed few of the monsters.

  Yet it seemed to do nothing but tickle them, as the golden glow protected them from his magic. Aren grunted as he tried to avoid as many of the bolts striking his shield as possible while casting a six-circle spell, trying a thunderbolt spell as it seemed to work before. A thick beam of plasma headed for one of the monsters, but instead of reaching its intended target, several of them worked together to create a shimmering golden barrier and blocked the spell completely.

  In that moment, Aren knew that with his dwindling reserves, he was outclassed. Not wasting a moment, he pulled out multiple crystals from his subspace and threw them in the direction of the flying beasts. Each took an insignificant bit of mana to activate, and they hovered in circular formation. Each crystal took the shape of a small bird, the little figurines coming to life and charged the monsters. He had created them during his year as a professor aspirant in the Sympathetic Division.

  While his old automated attackers did no real damage, they fulfilled their intended purpose of distracting the monsters. As their attention began to shift away, he darted off in the opposite direction. Summoning his personal set of flying gloves and boots, he surged forward with a sharp burst of speed. He normally didn’t bother using them, but the little energy stored within could be spent in place of his nearly empty reserves.

  With the distance he had gained from his distraction, he was better able to avoid the attacks once the monsters pursued him again. He began drawing another spell in the air. Six circles were filled with formations for vitalic and mnemonic resonances, connected by an emotive and sympathetic element. As he completed the spell, a dark fog trailed behind him. When it touched the monsters, they froze in place, stunned, then turned around in confusion and began attacking each other, even as they shone with golden light.

  It seemed that their defense, whatever it was, could not affect spells delivered through magical dust. Rather than striking the target directly, the spell only activated once its magically resonating particles had entered a body.

  Normally, such spells were forbidden anywhere close to civilization. This high in the air he didn’t need to worry over it. The spell would dissipate long before reaching the ground. He veered past the monster, back in the direction of his home.

  Just when it seemed he might get away, Aren felt something above him. Tilting his head upward, he saw a giant beast, hundreds of meters long. A multitude of irregular, glowing eyes scanned him, and giant malformed wings stretched out at impossible angles as it loomed overhead.

  Aren watched with wide eyes as the creature’s body glowed with golden energy, and a thick bolt of light struck his barrier. Instantly, he felt his mana drop to near nothing. A trail of blood ran from his nose as the shield shattered. As he began falling, his consciousness seemed to detach from his body. With the last bit of energy, he willed a metal box from his subspace to appear and pressed his fingers against it.

  Instantly, a silvery dome surrounded him and solidified. He felt further attacks strike his defense as gravity took hold, and he started falling rapidly. Eventually, the assaults stopped, and he breathed a sigh of relief as he entered a meditative trance to restore both his mind and mana.

  In deep meditation, he did not feel the force of the collision when his sphere struck the sands of the desert below. When he opened his eyes, he grumbled a curse. Only half of his mana capacity had recovered. His injuries and exhaustion significantly limited his recovery rate.

  His dry throat forced him to pull a flask of water and a piece of jerky from his storage. He forced himself to eat a little of the bland food. Thankfully, the beam had not damaged any internal organs, so recuperation was his top priority right now.

  “I wonder how much time has passed,” Aren said to himself.

  Opening his emergency defense sphere, he coughed as the desert air reached his nostrils. He cursed his design as he was forced to crawl through the magically enhanced cushions and dropped onto the sands headfirst. Picking himself up, he dusted sand from his robes and hair and stored the sphere in his subspace. While it was impossible to reuse without access to his lab, it remained valuable.

  Looking around, he found himself on a tall dune overlooking a city of sandstone surrounding a lush oasis illuminated by morning sun. A tall white wall stood before him, thin bands of orange tracing its surface like veins. Four white watchtowers encircled the structure.

  Then he noticed a group of soldiers not far from him. His emergency fall must have been noticed, but it seemed they hadn’t dared to approach his sphere before. Now that they saw him, a group of people led by a woman dressed in light armor approached on brightly colored lizards the size of horses.

  The skalith used by the people of Ayru were tall, two-legged beings covered in scales. Their long necks stretched upwards, and their thin legs ended in claws that could tear a man apart. They were difficult to tame, as wild ones would not respect anything smaller than themselves.

  A woman wearing a long embroidered green cape over her shoulders approached him. Her dark skin reflected the early morning sun. Aren knew that the cape was a symbol of some station, but he had never studied Ayru culture, and his adventures had only taken him to the outskirts of the land of sands.

  She looked him over, and noticing his robes, scoffed and asked, “A mage?”

  Aren nodded. He knew enough not to expect a warm welcome here. “Indeed.”

  “That silver ball was yours?” she asked curtly.

  “Yes, it was… an experiment that went awry,” Aren decided to keep the details to himself. He didn’t want to explain about the unknown monsters nearly invulnerable to magic.

  “Hmm.” She looked him over again, but since his robes were still covered in inky black cloth mantle-armor, there was no way to identify him by what lay underneath. “Fine, I shall take you to the gates. They will ascertain your identity while your punishment is decided.”

  “...Punishment?” Aren asked, slightly surprised. He looked around. He hadn’t destroyed anything and was well outside their cities, where he knew use of magic was forbidden.

  “Your fall happened during the Silent Night, mage,” she stated, and noticing his confusion, she caressed the shaved left side of her head and sighed as her braided hair fell over her forehead. “Don’t worry too much. You will be fined. As long as you are able to pay, you won’t be indentured.”

  The woman didn’t wait for his response and rode away at a fast walking pace. He had to do his best to keep up, as neither his boots nor his wound made it easy. Each step caused him a small amount of sharp pain, but he gritted through it. He probably could have used magic to travel, but he doubted it would turn out well. They might attack him if they proved zealous, and that would only escalate the issue.

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

  They traveled in silence, which left him with time to do the thing he wanted to do least. He thought about everything that had brought him to this point and felt a hollow anger rise in his chest. In the end, he had no one to blame but himself. He should have acted sooner, he should have paid more attention, and he shouldn’t be affected by this to such a degree.

  He forced himself to think of this as just a setback. Maybe in a way, it was even a good thing. Leilara would remain his close friend, he could find a different ideal partner for his life plan, and this thought taught him a valuable lesson. He has been rushing too much to achieve his plan, but it was a marathon, not a sprint. Still, he didn’t know how long it would take to find someone he trusted as much as his childhood friend.

  He sighed and couldn’t help but feel terrible. No matter what he thought, it still felt too raw. He noticed that the walls of the city were getting closer and could see a line of people standing in front of a gate.

  The woman leading him ignored the crowd and guided him through the archway, the guards saluting her as she passed. She stopped and waved to one of the guards, the only one wearing a blue cloth over his shoulder. “Captain, take this mage and check his identity. He violated the Silent Night.”

  The captain looked in his direction and saluted the woman. “Of course, Exemplar. It shall be done.”

  Aren looked over the woman again. As far as he knew, the exemplars were warriors, judges, and executioners who traveled the sands with the authority of the prophet-king. They were both law enforcers and religious figures, representing their way of life. Since civilization in the sands was scattered around water sources, having agents travel as representatives of authority was their way of keeping the government connected.

  She looked in his direction and said, “Behave. I don’t want to have to hunt you down. You’re too pretty for a rope.”

  Aren nodded tiredly, and she rode away as the captain led him inside. He was taken to a room with two chairs, left there, and told to wait.

  Sitting down, he checked his wound and found that it wasn’t too bad. It hadn’t opened, wasn’t bleeding, and wasn’t releasing pus yet, but he would need to find a healer.

  He also hid his ring in his subspace, controlling the mana emission of the act and neutralizing it. The technique was used to avoid triggering any magical detection wards but could only be applied to small actions.

  He sat down as comfortably as he could and closed his eyes. He meditated again, trying to recover mana. It still didn’t feel efficient, but mana here was thicker. It was a well-documented trend that life tended to gather in places of higher mana density.

  After some time, when the sun was reaching its zenith, two figures entered his room. He recognized the captain who had led him here, and realized the other was a sunseer. While he was no expert on the Ayru religion of the One Sun, he had studied their shared history of wars with Vo’Teol. That was the name given to priests who had offered parts of their bodies to their worship and had been changed irreversibly.

  “So you are the mage that fell in the silver sphere,” the priest said, looking him over, his eyes shining like two small suns.

  Aren didn’t know what to say or how to greet a priest of the sun, so he simply nodded.

  “At least you seem well behaved for what you are,” the priest continued. Despite the insulting nature of the words, they seemed to hold no malice.

  Aren looked at the bald man’s honey-colored face and said, “Can we move to the questioning, please? I’m injured, so I would like to get this over with.”

  The shine in the man’s eyes brightened. “Show me,” he ordered.

  Aren shrugged and moved his robes aside, revealing a clotted wound and reddened skin. There were still burn marks around the wound from the beam that had struck him.

  “Did someone stab you with a hot rod?” the priest asked, his palm glowing with bright light.

  “Close enou… ARGH!” Aren screamed in pain as the man laid his hand over his wound. He felt a searing heat deep in his stomach and instinctively reached for his magic. He was ready to defend himself, but just as his spell nearly came into existence to separate the man’s head from his body, the pain stopped.

  He looked himself over, and the wound was gone, leaving only a red mark, as if he had gotten lightly sunburned. He released the magic he had gathered and said, “Thank you… but a little warning would have been welcome.”

  The sunseer didn’t look a little apologetic and smiled as he sat down opposite of him. “Now we have all the time you may need. Now tell me who you are?”

  “I’m Aren. I’m an adventurer,” Aren said simply.

  “Truth, but you are trying to hide shadows in the sun,” the priest stated to which the captain took a step forward.

  “Don’t omit anything,” the officer said.

  Aren took a second then added, “I’m Aren Maloryn. I work at the Vo’Teol’s Academy of Magic. I’m a professor there and am a respected researcher. At least respected by those who don’t discredit me simply because of my young age.”

  “Truth.”

  Aren nearly breathed a sigh of relief when the priest spoke. He hoped he wouldn’t need to reveal that he was an archmage. Not only would that make the whole matter political, but it could also affect his reputation. Thankfully whatever holy powers were at work suffered the same limitations as divination magic. The change was too new for his mind to fully identify with the title and accept its authority as his. He had not yet accomplished anything as an archmage, so this was not surprising.

  The questioning continued, “What were you doing last night?”

  He decided that he should be honest. “Something happened that upset me in my private life. I suppose in my anger I decided to test how far I could fly at my top speed and ended up in your skies. Then a monster I didn’t recognize attacked me and caused the wound you saw. I managed to kill one, but more appeared, along with what I assume was their alpha or matriarch, since it was larger than the rest. They forced me to use my defensive shell, which you saw fall. After that, I meditated to recover, and then your exemplar found me.”

  “Truth. It seems you had quite a tribulation,” the sunseer said, turning to the captain. “Do you have any questions, or can I return to the temple?”

  The officer stepped to the desk and said, “Just a few basic ones. Do you have any ill intentions toward Sands of Ayru?”

  “No,” Aren answered truthfully.

  “Are you planning to cause more problems for our city?”

  “No.”

  “Do you know of any plots against our nation?”

  Aren denied it again. Such questions continued for a while, trying different angles of approach to see if he knew anything. Fortunately for him, he never bothered with politics and always tuned out such talks unless they concerned him. He knew that his kingdom viewed the land of sands mostly neutrally since their prince’s marriage nearly a decade ago.

  Finally, the last question was asked. “What are you planning now?”

  “Find a place to sleep and recover, eat something, and then leave tomorrow for my home. Do you have any recommendations on where I can stay?” Aren asked hopefully.

  “Truth. There is an inn in the travelers quarters called the Evening Sun. They don’t overcharge mages too much,” the priest said with a hint of mirth.

  The captain scoffed. “If you want to stay within the city, you will need to wear this bracelet.” He pulled out a black band of metal designed to lock around a person’s wrist and opened with a key. “It will detect any use of unauthorized magic.”

  “Will you remove it when I leave?” Aren asked promptly.

  “Yes,” the officer answered.

  “Can I still use my storage artifact with it?”

  “No,” the captain said simply.

  Aren frowned. “Can I use it one final time, then?”

  “That’s fine, but I will watch you,” the officer stated, not worried at all about his privacy.

  “I will take my leave then,” the sunseer said, standing up. “Young man, if you ever wish to abandon the heretical path you walk, I would welcome you at my temple.”

  “I doubt I will, but I’ll remember that there are good people in your order who don’t want to burn me at the stake,” Aren said.

  “They’d leave you out in the sun to dry and let the scavengers feast on your remains,” the priest chuckled, nodding to him in farewell as he left the room.

  The officer glared at him, prompting him to hurry up. He decided to change into his adventurer apparel. He wore it whenever he left the academy for his expeditions nowadays. He stored his destroyed robes in his subspace and placed his mantle on the table as he changed under the watchful gaze of the captain.

  From his storage, he removed a pair of dark brown pants and a white shirt that reflected the light. Made from steel-cotton, the cloth alone was durable enough to prevent mundane blades from cutting him.

  On top of that, he pulled out a bright, pearly scale armor made from an earth basilisk. Its natural properties were enough to deflect the attacks of an experienced warrior, and passively enchanted, it would give even masters of life enforcement a moment of pause.

  Finally, he swapped his dress shoes for ones more suited to traveling across rough terrain.

  He decided not to take out any of his magical artifacts. Instead, he pulled out a simple-looking bracelet that he usually carried more as a curiosity than as a defensive measure. It was made of three copper-colored bands interwoven together, forming a vine-like structure. The material was an alloy of copper and another metal he had failed to identify. Each band had symbols engraved on it that, as far as Aren could tell, were no longer in use.

  The ancient artifact was a holy tool that, unusually for its kind, responded to anyone who wielded it, providing a protective barrier over the user’s body in exchange for any kind of energy. From his testing, it was more effective than any four-circle wizardry he could produce. However, since he could cast most five-circle spells almost instantly nowadays, it was not particularly useful to him under normal circumstances.

  Pulling his black mantle over his shoulders, he looked at the officers expectantly. “So… I heard there would be a fine.” He retrieved a pouch from his storage to show he was willing to pay.

  “Rare for an offender to offer a reminder themselves. Not that it’s needed,” the captain said. “Normally, I would add lashes on top of that, but I will heed the exemplar’s words. It will be two white gold.”

  Aren’s mouth dropped. “That’s… that’s ridiculous!” It was enough money to feed a large village for two winters.

  “If you can’t pay, we can always find work in the mines for you,” the captain said with a shrug.

  Aren sputtered. “Do you really expect anyone to pay such a fine!?”

  “Not anyone, but a foreign mage who is clearly well off.” Now there was a smile on the captain’s face. “We can always make it a diplomatic issue, but this is the amount agreed upon in the Fifth Prasqan Treaty. Every Teolian mage found in violation of our laws shall pay a hundred times the standard fine.”

  Aren shuddered as he pulled a small box from his storage. It was keyed to his mana signature, and when it prompted him for the correct combination for the section where he kept his gold, it spat out two crystal-white coins bearing the emblem of his kingdom.

  “So you can pay. Good. Put the band on first. We will head to the governor’s accountant, and you will hand the money to them,” the captain said, placing the black band on the table. For a moment, Aren felt a flicker of respect for the man. There wasn’t even an ounce of greed in his eyes.

  After storing his box and tying his pouch to the inside of his mantle, Aren took the item and examined it. There were no runes or adornments, and even when he focused his senses on it, he felt nothing. Not wanting to waste any more time under the captain’s gaze, he slipped it onto his left wrist, where it locked itself. There was no other sign that it was active.

  The captain prompted him to walk. They only needed to leave the room and head upstairs toward a reception area. There, a chubby man, flanked by four guards in embroidered pink mantles, waited for him. The man, who Aren guessed was the accountant, wore an embroidered golden robe with turquoise cloth draped over his shoulders.

  “This is the mage. He can pay his fine,” the captain informed.

  The accountant smiled at that. “Good. It would be a pain to have to trade him back to his kingdom or find a way for him to pay it back.”

  One of the four guards walked over to Aren and outstretched his hand. A sharp pang twisted deep in his soul as Aren placed the two coins in the guard’s palm. There was nothing he could do, and a hollow emptiness spread through him as over half of his wealth dropped into a box the accountant produced from his robes, making his stomach turn.

  After that, he was quickly kicked out of the guard station and left alone on the reddish sandstone streets. He saw more scaly skalith pulling carts and people dressed in lightweight, loose clothes of various colors. With the sun high in the sky, the air felt searing to his unaccustomed skin. Thankfully his mantle produced a slight cooling effect due to the material it was made from, making it bearable.

  For now, he decided to walk wearily with the crowd toward the city center. He hadn’t slept in over a day, and though he was used to long days from his adventuring past, everything that had happened, along with his low mana, made him feel more exhausted and hollow than ever.

  The buildings seemed to be made with a variety of sandstone, focusing on red and orange, with occasional white ones. Most of the buildings were decorated with colorful images of animals, plants, and religious sun symbols, adding vibrancy to what would otherwise be quite boring streets.

  Occasionally, he saw people with colored capes draped over their shoulders, and when that happened, the crowd parted to let them through. By this point, he realized that the colors of the capes dictated their position, but he didn’t have the energy to worry about the details. He noticed that people wearing white capes were still respected, but less so than others.

  Finding the travelers’ quarters was not difficult, as he found it simply by following the flow toward the center of the city, the oasis. The body of water was crystal clear and treated with the utmost respect by the people. There was not a single piece of trash in it, and it seemed to be actively cared for by people on boats.

  The travelers’ quarters sat on the edge of the oasis, closest to the west wall of the city. After asking a few merchants for directions and ending up buying some strange green fruit with spikes that tasted sour, he found the Evening Sun Inn. It was a simple building made of white sandstone, adorned with images of birds flying toward a sun sinking below the horizon.

  Entering the inn, he found himself in a vast dining hall, with colorful cushions lining the floor around stone tables. Walking on a soft yellow-and-green carpet toward a wooden bar along the opposite wall, he was greeted by a smiling young woman. She wore a blue-and-green sleeveless dress, and her thick braided hair was adorned with feathers of every color. Her blue eyes regarded him with curiosity.

  “Welcome to the Evening Sun Inn. Are you here to eat or to stay?” she asked cheerfully, but he could see her glancing at the black band on his wrist before seemingly dismissing it.

  Aren nodded and tried to return the smile, but it felt strained on his face. “Hopefully I can eat something light and then sleep until the next day. It has been a long day for me. I heard from a sunseer that you don’t gauge people like me.”

  “Ah, so you are the one who disturbed the Silent Night,” she stated. Noticing his eyes widen in surprise, she explained, “There is no other way for you to speak with a sunseer, since they would not normally leave their temples in the Sun District today, and they do not allow foreign travelers there.”

  “Ah, I guess I gave myself away. For my defense, me falling from the sky was a long string of coincidences and misfortunes,” he explained.

  “Unlucky of you to do so when the Honored Exemplar declared the Silent Night, then,” she commented. “It was quite a disturbance when the watch raised the alarm as we waited for the Revered Sun to rise.”

  “Yeah… well, I paid for it.” Aren sighed, then commented on the sound of kitchen work from the room behind the woman. “Any chance I could get something from there along with a bed?”

  “Ah, yes! Sorry, I get chatty. The room for a night will be one small silver, food included,” she said. “We have a mutton stew today! Although it will be ready in the evening, right now I can get you soup and bread.”

  “That will be wonderful.” While one small silver wasn’t cheap, it didn’t feel like he was being gauged. He had heard that everything in the sands was more expensive. He took one coin from his pouch and placed it on the wooden counter.

  “Welcome to the Evening Sun Inn! My name is Mag,” she said cheerfully, taking the coin and heading toward the kitchen.

  He sat on one of the cushions in the empty hall. The lack of guests wasn’t strange, considering it was early noon. Soon he was given a fragrant bowl of soup that tasted of delicate meat and spicy root spices. He ate it with the bread, enjoying the meal. After thanking Mag for the food, he was given a key and directed to his room via the stairs leading upstairs.

  Without ceremony, he collapsed onto a low wooden stand draped with a soft woven mat, letting the chaos of the day settle behind him. Rejection, sudden assaults, and absurd fines blurred together, dissolving into the restless void of sleep.