Chapter 83

Chapter 83

As the commotion finally died down with all of the infiltrators secured Ajax let one of the other guards take care of the prisoner as he went over to Kate, not only to ascertain that she was ok but also to have her patch up the one cut he did get after the dagger cut through his sword and left a nasty cut on his arm.

“You ok?” he asked her.

“Yeah, she didn’t manage to get through my barrier.” Kate said before quickly getting to work on the bleeding cut.

“Am I captured or dead?” a melodious voice came from behind him. It was different than any other Ajax had heard before and somehow also sounded distinctly inhuman.

“Captured.” the guard responded while securing the restraints.

Ajax was no longer concerned with her arms and feet though. He looked pointedly at the silver hair and the pointed ears he could see now with the hood of the cloak taken down. It was the first time Ajax had ever seen an elf, unlike beastkin and dwarves elves tended to stick to nature as such he saw none in the city.

She had a beautiful naturally symmetrical face with violet eyes. She had also noticed the way Ajax seemed to have turned and started to stare at him so she returned the favor.

“What’s with you? Didn’t expect that a woman could cut you?” she retorted scathingly. Despite the System making gender a much smaller issue when it came to strength compared to Earth, sexism still existed.

“That’s not it.” Kate answered when she saw Ajax not saying anything. “You’re just the first elf he’s ever seen.”

“Yeah, right.” she huffed.

“No, it's true. He was a hunter in a secluded village before all this.” Kate said without any ill will. “They managed to conscript him before he joined the Adventurer’s Guild.”

This was enough for Ajax to break out of his shock and stop staring at her. “Sorry.” he mumbled as he turned away from her face and focused on the ring on her finger he had seen send the lightning bolt.

“The ring on her finger is runed” he pointed out to the guard securing her. Since she was a prisoner it was well within the rules for her to try to escape or use it even once restrained.

“That is runic magic and cannot be seized under the rules of this skirmish.” she quickly spoke when the guard moved to take the ring.

“The other side complained. Apparently he is too strong to be taking part in this skirmish. They even tried to say we cheated by having him take part even with a few restrictions in place.” Tom said. “This is why the meeting took so long.”

“No way they would accept this result.” Kate said confidently. “ They must have asked for more than just his exclusion since he wasn’t meant to be here at all in the first place.”

“They tried.” Tom nodded. “The fact that they brought four cities worth of people instead of the agreed upon three, for reasons we may or may not suspect. “ he gave Ajax a pointed look. “ That and the fact that he is the only person beside the duke’s granddaughter to be part of the people joining one of out three noble forces was enough to limit the fall out.”

With that Tom crashed into his chair in front of the plate that they prepared for him and proceeded to eat. Or more accurately proceed to battle Fluffy for the food on the plate. Fluffy had been left with the commander before the battle so she returned with Tom and was also hungry.

“Any idea what is happening tomorrow?” Ajax asked, already starting to stand and wanting to go to sleep. “Or maybe I should say today, it’s almost morning already?”

“We are all being given the day off. Even the harshest drill sergeant has to know some of us would be able to stand on our feet after being woken up in the middle of the night to go fight a battle.” Tom said around a mouthful of food. “We and the other guard unit are going to be quite a bit busy for the week after that though.”

“Any specific reason as to why?” Kate asked.

“Apparently the future barons were a lot more against the idea of stopping the fort than I thought. They went so far as to block the archduke’s daughter from ordering the guard division to join with her plan, the selfish idiots.” Tom said.

“It took her promising them a whole week off and a gold coin each before they agreed to join her. This means that we and the other guard unit will be having to cover for them during this time so get rested.”

On that note Ajax bid the two goodnight and headed off to bed. He was feeling the exhaustion of the battle but at the same time he finally had the peace and quiet to think back on all the different interesting things he saw today.

The way the archduke's daughter’s bodyguard had been casting spells that seemed to leave some excess mana running that comboed into the next spell. The brief glimpses of runic magic he had gotten, as well as the oddly simple but surprisingly powerful spell the mage used with a single word.

What shocked Ajax the most thinking back on that spell was what he felt. It was as if the spell wasn’t just a simple chant. The whole action of speaking and pointing seemed to be part of launching the spell. What he had learned so far was that gesturing was just useful to help the mind aim the spell correctly by having a constant point of reference regardless of the time and place you cast.

This time however it seemed like the gesture was part of the chant, almost as if the word defined the power and the action the direction of the blast of pure mana. Considering the reactions from the others however it didn’t seem like this would be a topic he would be given answers on if he asked.