Chapter 463

Over the course of three days, the towering trees of the Green Ocean’s northeasternmost reaches thinned, replaced by skeletal birch and cold, gray stone. The air lost the rich scent of loam and grew colder, as winter was always quick to show itself in the north.The dirt roads of the northern grassland, once untamed and wild, were heavily rutted by the passage of supply wagons and armored columns.

Everywhere Nick looked, signs from the long, drawn-out war were visible.

At first, he’d thought they’d find their first targets closer to Floria, perhaps a day or two away, but either Rhea and Gaelen had been more thorough than they’d claimed, or the deserters had learned to avoid House Crowley’s lands.

Either way, that meant their initial stretch of travel had been almost entirely unmolested, with only a few weak monsters daring to attack them, all of which they easily dispatched.

Nick walked at the rear of the trio, allowing his mind to drift from the bleak landscape into the depths of his mana.

He held his right hand out, palm facing the gray sky. A small sphere of orange fire ignited above his skin. In his left hand, he drew ambient moisture from the cold air, condensing it into a floating sphere of water.

Slowly, he brought his hands together.

The elements reacted as nature intended. The heat made the water boil, while the moisture smothered the flame. They fought for supremacy, hissing in a cloud of steam.

Nick pushed harder. Instead of simply mashing them together, he engaged his , layering his will around both spheres.

He was currently attempting to use the intent as a conceptual bridge to force the opposing natures into harmony.

The fire compressed, turning a brilliant, angry white. The water flattened, resisting the thermal shock. For a fraction of a second, the two elements spun around each other, sharing a boundary without destroying one another, yet never quite merging.

Then the construct shuddered. The conflicting concepts of consumption and quenching violently rejected the forced truce, and the structure snapped. The pop of displaced air stung Nick’s hands even through the layer of kinetic mana he’d woven, dissolving both elements into nothing.

, Nick analyzed, shaking his hand out.

It was a fascinating puzzle, one he had no intention of abandoning, but Gaelen’s sudden halt pulled his attention back to the physical world.

He was crouched over a patch of frozen mud near the tree line. Rhea came to a stop beside Nick, her hand resting casually on a bandolier of glass vials.

"What do you see?" Nick asked quietly. As he’d learned in the past few days, was not as omniscient as he would have liked.

He could easily see much farther than anyone else, and once he’d identified a threat, he could study it in depth. But tracking down unknowns, especially people whose passage was too flimsy to leave traces in the ether, was beyond him, so they had to rely on Gaelen’s knowledge of the ranger arts.

“Someone moved here wearing heavy boots," Gaelen reported, tracing the barely visible edge of a footprint with a gloved finger. “This is standard infantry treading. The spacing suggests they were marching in formation, but the tracks are sloppy. They were rushing, but tired, dragging their feet.”

Nick expanded his senses, sweeping the cold forest ahead. "A patrol?”

"No," Gaelen stood, brushing dirt from his knees. "Patrols loop back. These tracks head straight southwest, away from the front. The tread depth is uneven, which means some of them dumped their packs to move faster. We are looking at a company of deserters.”

Nick’s eyes glinted with cold calculation.

Considering the war had lasted six months, the attrition rate was likely high, and with news of the first assault on the dwarven cities spreading south, he had hoped for more, but they’d not had any luck yet.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Until now.

Deserters fleeing the war were exactly what they had been looking for. They were seasoned enough to provide a genuine tactical exercise, yet disconnected from the main armies, making them disposable. More importantly, men running from the front lines possessed the most honest intelligence about the true state of the conflict.

"We should hurry then," Nick decided, unwilling to let the first true prey escape. “If you can lead us to them, we’ll get live targets to test our flow and some fresh information.”

They ghosted into the skeletal woods, leaving the beaten path behind. Gaelen took the lead, following the tracks even when they vanished beneath mud or frost. Nick and Rhea flanked him, eager for some action.

Fortunately, it took less than two hours to find the camp.

The deserters had chosen a rocky ravine to shelter from the wind. There were roughly two dozen men huddled around three small, smokeless fires. They wore the armor of frontline infantry, their tabards stained with mud and dried blood, and looked exhausted, their faces hollow. Their weapons were drawn and resting across their knees, and it was clear they would be ready to defend themselves at the first sign of trouble.

Gaelen signaled from the high ground, fingering a throwing dagger and pointing at the three sentries posted at the lip of the ravine. Rhea unclipped two vials from her belt, nodding toward the center of the camp.

Nick summoned the Shard of Human Ambition, preparing for his role.

Once they were all in position, three dull thuds echoed through the trees. The sentries collapsed, daggers buried in their throats, before they could draw breath to shout.

Down in the ravine, the captain of the deserters—a big bear of a man with a massive broadsword—heard the bodies hit the dirt. He sprang to his feet, barking an order, but it was far too late.

Rhea stepped to the edge and threw her vials.

The glass shattered against the rocky floor of the camp, and a thick gray fog erupted outward, spreading quickly.

Killing them would have been easy with poison, but since they needed to ask questions, this was a rapidly hardening alchemical resin.

The moment the fog touched the soldiers' boots, it solidified into a substance as dense as concrete. Half the company was instantly rooted to the ground, crying out in panic as they hacked at their trapped legs.

Nick flew straight into the center of the chaos.

A spearman lunged at him, thrusting his weapon toward his chest out of sheer instinct, but it was so slow that Nick didn't bother parrying. He stepped inside the guard, weaving a current of air around his staff to accelerate his strike, and drove the blunt end into the man’s ribs. The impact shattered bone, sending the soldier flying backward into the rock wall with a howl of wind.

"Kill the mage!" the captain roared, rallying the unbound men.

Six seasoned infantrymen charged Nick from all sides. They were coordinated, attempting to trap him in a circle of thrusting steel, and from their synergy, it was clear they had gotten to know each other well during the war.

Unfortunately for them, their level was around forty, which was simply not enough.

In fact, to Nick, this was the best-case scenario. He had multiple lab rats, all of whom were disposable, given how many men Rhea’s concoction had trapped.

And he always produced his best work while fighting.

An overwhelming barrage of would have been enough to end the fight painlessly, but he called upon his Fire Affinity, weaving a ring of searing orange flames around himself. At the same time, he drew heavily on his wind magic, summoning a violent, inward-pulling cyclone.

When they were stable, he tried to fuse the two elements, hoping the heat of combat would spark innovation. He used his control to command the air and fire to merge into a single strike, aiming for a blade of superheated wind that both burned and cut.

The magics fought him fiercely. The fire sought to consume the oxygen, while the wind threatened to blow out the flames. Nick pushed hard with his mind, forcing the unstable mixture to hold for just a second longer.

No matter his efforts, though, the fusion failed to stabilize into a new element, and the conflicting matrices collapsed under the pressure.

But the resulting reaction was still devastating when the failed spell detonated. A concussive shockwave of hyper-compressed, superheated air tore through the ravine.

The roar alone deafened the charging soldiers, and the sheer force hit them like a solid wall of iron. The armor of the closest men warped in the sudden flash of heat, and the shockwave hurled all six of them across the camp, slamming them into the dirt, unconscious and badly burned.

Nick lowered his staff, vanishing the lingering heat warming his surroundings with a sigh. It was a failure of synthesis, but at least he’d managed to produce some sort of result. If he worked on it more, he was sure he could stabilize it.

The remaining deserters broke. Seeing half their number wiped out by a single display of magic, the rooted men dropped their weapons and raised their hands in surrender, screaming for quarter.

Gaelen dropped down next to him, twirling two bloodied daggers and looking like he would very much enjoy the chance to use them, while Rhea remained hidden for the moment, with a clear shot on every soldier should they try their luck.

Nick walked slowly toward the captain. The large man had avoided the blast by diving behind a boulder, but he was now stuck behind the stone.

“Come on out," Nick commanded, projecting his high Charisma to make it clear to the man that resistance would be futile.

The captain swallowed hard, dropping his broadsword and raising his hands as he climbed to his feet. He looked at Nick, taking in the pristine clothes and the cold eyes that betrayed no emotion, and came to a quick decision.

"We surrender," the captain rasped, his voice trembling.

"You are wearing the colors of the northern army," Nick noted, stepping closer. “That means you are not mercenaries. For royal infantry, the penalty for deserting the front is the noose. We’d be within our rights to kill you all.”

"The front is a slaughterhouse!" the captain spat, his fear overpowered by sudden, desperate anger. "We didn't sign up to fight the deep dwellers! We were trained to fight men, to break shield walls. Nothing like that works against the dark dwarves. You haven't seen them, mage. Those bastards crawl into your head and make your own brothers turn their swords on you while you sleep!”

Nick listened impassively, though he kept an eye on the sneer of disdain on Gaelen’s face.

In truth, he couldn’t say he didn’t understand the deserter’s logic. He had little trouble protecting his mind, but for a regular soldier, the dark dwarves’ propensity for mind magic would be a nightmare to face, and that wasn’t even to mention the demonic activity reported in the deep tunnels.

“I can tell from your sigils that you come from the northwestern army group, which means you should have been the best-supplied of the lot, aside from the one under the main command. How did it come to this?”

The captain let out a bitter, barking laugh. “Best-supplied? The noble houses of the north abandoned us. When the first attacks scattered our initial forces, they pulled every loyal banner back to Toneburg, stripped the outer fortresses, seized the supply trains, and locked the gates. We’ve been making do, but we could only hold out for so long.”

Nick frowned, exchanging a glance with Gaelen.