Chapter 87 - Pursuit - Part 2

The day was coming to an end but just like Aron had instructed, Claudia had everyone on high alert in case they were caught up to.

It was hard to predict what would happen from this point on, so Aron preferred to be cautious about their movements, this was something Claudia completely agreed with.

"Aron really is incredible; I won't lie, I had my doubts after what he had announced during the party at the manor, but I had nothing to lose so I stayed. I'm thinking I made the right choice,heh." One of the faction members standing on guard expressed his happiness with a grin on his face.

"It's too early to tell, they couldn't stop us either way since we hadn't yet broken the rule. They just wanted to scare us; I don't think it was a major plan to begin with but now we may be facing greater threats. He's not dumb and is strong so I feel a bit more at ease, but I hope we don't make too many enemies, you know?" Another faction member standing close gave his opinion as well while showing a concerned look.

"Pssh, so what? We have Lady Rose with us as well, we may not know what's going on fully, but I have no doubt we'll succeed. Don't be so negative."

The two faction members continued to converse and share their opinions freely but unbeknownst to them, their conversation was being observed by two pairs of eyes within the ship on the higher floor.

"Seems your presence here has made everyone be more at ease," Aron commented as he observed the two with his arms crossed, a little further away from him stood Lady Rose who only glanced at the chatting pair once before turning her attention to the map in her hands.

"They're easily impressed; they clearly lack experience. Lady Belle is a tricky woman that will try to make things very difficult for you, even more so once she learns we're working together," Rose added with no indication of worry in her voice, whether this was out of confidence or not...Aron could not tell.

"You two seem to have a rivalry that goes beyond who gets the seat of Arch-Mage in the future."

"When a woman feels threatened, she'll go to terrifying lengths to resolve the issue. From the time she'd met me, despite myself showing zero interest in petty academy politics, she always sought to destroy me. She's more of a nuisance than a rival. That aside, look here..." Lady Rose ended the small talk and brought her finger to a spot on the map that showed the continent ofDrotzi.

"What am I looking at? It looks like a mountainous region with plenty of flora." Aron's geographical knowledge wasn't lacking so interpreting maps was fairly easy of course.

"It's called the Newman highlands, it's the region in the north with the most mana beast activity. The region has very dense mana and the air itself is hard to breathe, so it makes prolonged expeditions there difficult for most hunters and seekers no matter how experienced."

"Findel acts as a sort of rest area for them being the closest large city to the region so numerous hunters, seekers, explorers, and scholars can be found. This will only increase once news gets out of a possible ruin. Do you know what this means?" Rose turned to Aron and asked with a brow raised.

"We'll have to compete with individuals who are already very familiar with the region?" he asked curiously, but Rose shook her head at his answer.

"Normally, yes, but not everyone there possesses an airship, they are quite costly after all, so most venture via foot into the region. They have no chance competing with us and other nobles who will appear, we'll use this to our advantage and either recruit or buy information before nobles get there, giving us a bigger advantage," Rose began to explain what she was thinking, and Aron more or less understood her train of thought.

"Being a commoner also makes it easier for me to negotiate with them, I doubt they'd be eager to talk with nobles who suppress them. As for recruiting, we're a commoner faction with a powerful airship, so we should be successful in that regard as well," Aron pointed out and Rose nodded as they were now on the same page.

"Exactly, provided, of course, you show you aren't an easy target. Findel is quite the lawless city, you know? Anyway, I best return to my research since I've given you a clearer picture of what to expect, yes?" Rose closed the map and turned to leave, keeping her distance from Aron.

She had this habit of never standing close to anyone be it male or female. Perhaps she preferred having her personal space not invaded? It wasn't something Aron thought he needed to think about it.

After agreeing with her words, he watched her walk away and turned to Evanora who had been in the room the entire time, seated on a chair whilst hugging her legs and staring at Aron.

"Something the matter?" he asked with a brow raised. When it came to Evanora, she was the simplest and the most complicated for Aron to understand.

Her behavior had no distinct patterns and was hard to tell what she was truly thinking. Her room was close to Aron's quarters for obvious reasons. The numerous runes he placed in her room made it so her mana demon caused no issues so far, but she was still a massive unknown.

A mistake could lead to the deaths of many of his crew members, after all. Luckily for him, she stuck to him like a baby chick to its mother and listened to his words without complaint.

"Evanora doesn't understand. She thinks it's too complicated," she expressed lazily as her sleepy eyes gazed at Aron firmly. "It's nothing you should worry about, just remember the rules I told you to follow, okay?" Aron met her gaze and reminded her to which she nodded.

What he could never predict or what can occur in the future,Aron had given her rules she should live by, or he wouldn't keep her around. Her desire to not be abandoned made it easy for her to follow the rules to a T, as if she would die if she did not.

'She's maturing mentally because of the environment and learns new things every day. Will she still be cooperative in the future or...?' Aron looked with narrowed eyes for a moment but she only tilted her head in confusion at the gesture, so he could only sigh and shake his head. Her and Rose were currently the two biggest unknowns on his airship.

"Will Evanora be useful in Findel?" she asked out of the blue which left Aron a bit lost as to what she meant. "What do you mean exactly?" he questioned her, and she hugged her legstighter while rocking back and forth.

"Evanora saw everyone working hard but Evanora has nothing she can do well. Back at the orphanage, kids who didn't work didn't get food and were disliked by the mistress... Evanora doesn't want to be disliked, she wants to be useful." After hearing her explanation, Aron now had a clear picture of what she meant.

Although he still didn't know much of what happened in her past, it had clearly left a psychological scar on her leading her to be the way she was today.

Everything from her messy hair, grunge clothing, depressed sleepy facial expression and need to belong could be related to that.

"You're a fighter, so you don't need to do any regular work. Your main task is to defend the airship to the best of your abilities which is very important."

"Evanora is important?"

"Yes, I'm trusting you with this task."

"Evanora understands, she will do her best." For the first time since meeting her, Aron could see a small, charming smile appear on Evanora's face. It seemed being told she was trusted meant a lot to her.

So long as she was stable, Aron would tell her anything she wanted to hear. He was slowly starting to understand how best to deal with humans.

[A/N: Keep a look out for hints here and there about future developments with certain characters, it's unlikely that I'll do arcs dedicated to side characters, rather, I'm fitting their stories into the main plot without the need for us to stray away from it. This may mean you won't be getting action after action of chapters, but once major action does begin—it flows. You won't see many meaningless fights here like 4-5 chapters dedicated to an Mc fighting random mobs which I always hate to see. Although it may not look like it, the story is progressing very quickly, there's a lot of content I've removed due to it being redundant, otherwise more time may have been spent in the academy, but it would have been boring and unnecessary. So,can you guess what's coming next? Let me know in the comments or join my discord to ask me directly.]